I am moving to LA

I don't know if anyone is actually reading this blog anymore, but the page count keeps going up... So, who am I to judge. What they say about frequent updates must be a scam. Anyways. New is, I am moving to LA in september. Go me!

/end news

If you live in LA og knows someone who lives there you should share them with me. Sharing is good, and I am really nice.

I am alive

See you in Norway on friday :)

Back to School

I have hit Washington DC, and have spent my three days here doing something that will make my professors back in school very happy (Jan Erik, nå skal du nok bli glad!) The picture below is taken from the roof of the Newseum in DC. I visited it the last time I was here (10 years ago), and I remember having so much fun that I really wanted to go back. Turns out the NEWSeum has been closed for years and opened again the day before I arrived. Talk about timing! Six flors of heaven for a news junkie like myself.

While being here I have stayed with my friend Lauren which I went to Camp Rising Sun with in 1998 and stayed with in New York the summer of 2000. Now she´s a hot shot Pro Bono worker in DC.

 

Monday night Lauren took me to The Kalb Report at the National Press Club here in DC. 

"The Kalb Report In Search of Truth: A Conversation on Investigative Reporting with Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalists: Dana Priest from The Washington Post and Seymour Hersh from The New Yorker." (Pictures to the right.)

Not unlike Norwegian print journalists they think the internet suck, and that everything should be done old school. Besides that it was very interesting. To listen to the way these people work and what they have accomplished was very inspiring. 

Tomorrow I am off to New York City... on a Greyhound bus.

Southern LOL

When I arrived in North Carolina on Tuesday, I was all by myself. Hotwire had placed me in a very nice hotel in the middle of nowhere. After sleeping the day away I decided walking down the road and See what was out there. I was hoping to find a gun crazy republican that wanted to go out and shoot democrats in the name of Jesus Christ, but I would not be that lucky...

The good thing about America is that it is just like the movies. After a short while I found a bar along the way. An old man with a grey beard was sitting by the bar smoking cigarettes. He had a baseball cap and  flannel shirt on. I spent the whole night there talking to him. He was a republican, but he didn´t have a gun and he was hardly religious. OH well... one out of three isn´t that bad.

After my night in the outskirts of Charlotte I hooked up with my friends. The result can be seen here:

Something old, something new and a little magic

I left the sweet city of Chicago on tuesday, but I got to meet a lot of great people before I left.

Something new: 

I met Cary, better known as Honeybear and Honeypie on MySpace. She is as sweet as you get the impression of and she is a wicked makeup artist. She pampered me and gave me a full makeover. This is not the last time I go out for cocktails with this one...

Something old:

It has been ten years since 14 year old Inga went to Camp Rising Sun in upstate New York. There has also been ten years since I saw my fellow campers Gaby and Tanya. They both live in Chcicago, and they haven´t changed at all. I hope it will not be ten year until I see them again.

Gaby, Tanya and Inga.

Magic Trick:

Thanks Robert!

And of course I had to make a video (after the Portland success) from Chicago as well. It´s long, but I promise... the end is fantastic!

The windy city

Is not as windy as you  might think...

So far, Chicago has been great. I am staying with Vincent and Jennifer. Here is him looking up her skirt. That is just the way they say hello in Chicago.

They have three cats. This is my favorite one, because it is the first one who trusted me. Which means that if he was a child he would be the one who trusted the old man with the candy... Not that the cat IS a child and I am not an old man. I do not have any candy either.  But you never know.

So far I have:

- Eaten mexican food and had Margaritas

- Seen downtown Chicago

- Been on the subway and bus

- Eaten a Chicago deep dish pizza (they say it is better than in New York)

- Been to Vincent´s play reading, and loved it!

- Sung live band karaoke (Come on Eilieen)

- Met Myspace-people

Kelly, Robert, Vincent and Jen.

Inga, Todd, Kelly, Robert and Vincent.

Last, but not least. Vincent and I made a videoblog based on the many videoblogs of me and Kristin. Enjoy!

Ringht now there is a cat on my foot...

I <3 Portland

Life is sweet

This is my view right now....

And I am actually at the third floor in a huge hotel in the middle of down town LA. Hotwire turned out loving me, and got me a room at this sweet hotel for practically nothing. I have spent the last few days working on a story. Therefor there have not been a lot free time to blog and such.

Now I will enjoy my last working day in LA and I´m looking forward to meet the gang in Portland. 

Ciao

I did get some sleep in Seattle

I have moved on from sunny Los Angeles and I am now in Seattle, which is almost as cold as it was in Norway when I left. There is a lot about this town that reminds me about Norway actually. The people look real here, and everyone is wearing Converse shoes. At least everyone worth mentioning. 

The main reason I came here was to meet my friend Aaron. I have known him for over two years, but never met him. That sounded geeky. Oh well... it really did not feel like meeting someone for the first time.

I also got to meet his wonderful girlfriend, Pei.

Aaron left for Texas today to go to a meeting... so yesterday he and Pei tried to find him something to wear. They were so adorable, see for yourself:

Today I have spent most of the time walking around time. I can really tell that I have spent mot of the last week on my butt in various cars, driving up and down the Californian highways. I think this was good for me. I haven´t talked to anyone, as people seem to be more introvert than in LA. That´s not the only thing that is strange about this place. Because even though California got the palms, Seattle has a weirder relationship with trees... seriously. They are everywhere. You can be in the middle of a huge tarmac-parking but there will still be a tree sticking up of the ground. 

I am not complaining. It´s really pretty.

BUT! I´m going back to LA tomorrow for a couple of days, before I hit Portland on friday.

 

Jakten på Britney

This is my first video blog, so it´s kind of bad and in Norwegian. With practice I will get better.

So, let´s talk about the war?

Before I get to the whole war theme, let me just show you a picture of some random hot guy from a weird bar on Sunset. Here you go:

Jeremy has taken me to tons of places in town, but he has avoided Hollywood. He knew he had to take me out there at some point, so yesterday we went there with Brian and Sarah.

I didn´t get a chance to stand in line for the Viper room or the Sky bar. We went straight for the Saddle bar that is located on Sunset Boulevard.  It has a cowboy-saloon type of team, and it has a mechanical bull in the middle of the room. That´s not the best part though. People actually talk to each other. 

A drunk guy that was celebrating his 27th birthday gave me a lei. A blonde girl named Kelly that was hardly wearing clothes was very upset because someone had asked if she was a working girl... And then some random guy from the army started talking to me about the army and his country and how he is willing to die for his men. I didn´t say much, I just listened and got him to tell his story.  Since I was there with the veteran Jeremy he was really interested... More in Jeremy than me actually. By the time I left him I was pretty drunk so all I managed to say was "I hope you don´t die".

The Los Angeles skyline

Is it not weird how you travel around the world and end up meeting Norwgians everywhere? It is not that I mind, Norwegians are awesome, but you just feel like the earth is getting smaller and smaller. Over here I am nothing special. I am just a girl with a cute accent. And it is tons of us. We could start a club.

I still love LA. I would not mind living here for some months with my feet buried in the sand, writing random articles about the american life style. That is what Richard is doing... except he takes the pictures. 

... I do envy him a little bit. Last night Jeremy and I met up with him at a party on a roof in down town LA, where you had view over the Los Angeles "skyline". Nice.  I could gladly have that experience again. The bottom picture is also from this roof party. The guy on the left is an Norwegian actor (They are everywhere, both the actors and the Norwegians.)

Earlier friday night ( I am going backwards, I know). We met up with Myspace-personality "The Happy Commutor" or Trista. She is a talker, and here friend Mai is even more of a talker and a sharer. So I was entertained for a couple of hours. They were just great. For some reason I did not manage to take a photo of them, but there is a link to Trista´s blog on the right had navigation bar.

I would write more, but I´m off to the beach. Enjoy snowy Norway. I did finally buy a videocamera (at the papparazzi store) so there will be video blogs in the not to distant future.

Bing Crosby had small feet

I have been in LA for two days and have realized that my life will not be complete until I get a car. This city is not really a city, it is just an area where they have randomly put down houses, shops and other necessities far away from each other. 

There is other stuff I have found out these last two days:

The Olsen-twins had to share a star at the walk of fame.

Not all people you meet on the internet will cut you into pieces and put you in their closet. At least Jeremy has not done it yet.

VG has one new reader. Jennifer liked the pictures even though she only understood one word: London.

Though palms are of no use, they are pretty to look at. 

Bing Crosby had small feet.

The water is warm in march.

I am not the only Norwegian in LA. Richard and I used to work at the same paper back home. Now he is living the sunny life in LA.

 

Waiting for something good

This is the blog where you can read about my adventures in the USA from 19th of March to 21st of April. I will post pictures, videos and of course tell you about all the fabulous people I hook up with on the way.

Bookmark, and come back later.

Inga