Eclipse Premiere, Pictureka, and Mel's Diner

July 7, 2010

At the end of June we took a long-awaited trip down south to visit Lisa and the girls. Our visit was packed and the time just flew by. We got there late on the evening of the 30th, just in time to get in line for the midnight premiere of Eclipse. Some of Lisa's neighbors were already at the theater, saving places in line for us. It was like one big block party. Even Nicholas, who hadn't seen the first two movies, was a good sport about seeing a movie geared primarily at the female half of the species. He wasn't that into the whole Edward/Bella up-close-and-personal-shots, and certainly the Jacob-with-his-shirt-off scenes didn't do much for him (he was a little non-plussed by the cheers of twelve year old girls in the audience), but the idea of the vampire-werewolf showdown was definitely appealing to him. The girls, naturally, had a great time as well.
The next day, although we were all pretty tired, we headed down to Hollywood to watch the taping of a new kids' game show called Pictureka. It hasn't even premiered yet, but we were there for the last two episodes of the season. According to the warm-up guy Jake, our episodes are set to air a year from November. Talk about delayed gratification! It was a long day, but it was a lot of fun to get to see all the different segments being filmed. Devin, Danielle, and Bailey were small enough to be seated in the front row, so every time they panned the audience they got an up close view of the girls cheering and clapping. They'll probably get lots of screen time when we finally get to see the show over a year from now. Can you set a DVR recording that far in advance?

The kids, singing along to Journey in the car on the way to the taping. I love that our kids can totally rock out to 80s songs!
After the taping, we were all starving. Laura, who had joined us for the game show, suggested Mel's Diner right near the studio. It's a 50's style burger and shakes sort of a joint, with enormous and tasty onion rings. We ate, chatted, laughed, and took lots of pictures (of course!). It was the perfect end to our day.