What I Did on My Summer Vacation (Part 5 in a Series of 5)

This is the last vacation one, I promise. Only contemporary adventures from here on out. Don't get too jealous!

Originally emailed June 23 and June 30. Enhanced August 6.

Alright. I've been in Iran long enough to make some summary judgments. First of all, they are very interested in keeping up appearances. they are all poor, but they all act like they're not, even though everyone knows everyone else has to be poor since there are no jobs here. Thousands of educated, competent engineers, and taxi driver is the most secure job they can get. Mack's uncle Ali has been working for the last four months and has not been paid, and if he complains about not being paid, he gets told to quit if he doesn't like it. If you have a job you can borrow money, if you don't, you can't. So he keeps working for free. It's sad to see how hard he works and know that he gets nothing for it. his is the same story as a lot of people, I gather. Also, in their attempt to keep up appearances, they leave the plastic on things... from car seats to cell phone screens (BRETT!) to computer chairs at every internet cafe we've been to. Like the plastic makes it look so new they haven't even had time to open it. Mack and I call this type of behavior "boughaz," named in honor of the ghetto ferry we took to morocco last year that left four hours later than it was supposed to and seemed like it hadn't had a heyday in 30 years.

Iran Air, the main airline here, has great commuter flights (they give you an Iranian Creme Saver before take off... they love sweets here!), but its international ones are boughaz. Our plane hade a board room in the front of it, complete with board table and spiral staircase to an upstairs lounge (at least I'm imagining it's a lounge since i didn't get to go up there and it makes it more exotic if it was in fact a lounge), but it also hadn't been updated since the 70s and people SMOKED in the back of the plane NEAR THE OXYGEN TANKS and babies stood in the aisle when WE WERE LANDING! That is boughaz. I felt like i was on one of those indiana jones planes where there are caged chickens around you and feathers are flying all over the place. Mack was convinced the emergency door we sat next to had an air leak so we had to sleep in shifts, which was a silly propostion in the first place. sleeping would have been a dream come true considering all the people leaving Western civilization and heading back to Persian had to get one last actual toilet use in before landing. 400 people must have gone in and out of that bathroom. They also like silk flowers and plastic fruits here, which is totally boughaz, but then they have these incerdible gardens with real roses and palm trees and grass that they spend the entire day watering... not boughaz. We've decided, after our wedding party last night, that Iran is suffering from an identity crisis unseen anywhere else on the planet. When we were in Chefchaouen last summer, the Muslim townspeople didn't drink beer or carouse with women because it was forbidden by their religion, but they didn't make it illegal for people who visit their town. Part of its attraction and the reason I would visit there over and over again was the acceptance of other ways of life and how peacefully and wonderfully (as in full of wonder for other lifestyles) they integrated. Not the case here. In Shahin Shar, which is a pretty small, very conservative town where we've spent most of our days, the identity crisis is really felt. Here we are in this place where women must cloak themselves from head to toe, but then the preferred type of dance for both men and women has you moving like a stripper, with shoulder shaking, and hence boob shaking, a must. It's like extreme no sexy to extreme sexy, and how people can coexist in both spheres and keep all the right times and right places straight in their heads has proved too hard for me. I get looked at everywhere I go because I am white looking, regardless of whether I'm walking with my head down or slow motion running because I am playing with Laila (turns out any display of fun is frowned upon when in public, but as soon as you step behind a 10-foot brick wall into your own yard, you should be having the time of your life). They love their families deeply and spend all their time with each other, but they don't have the emotional intensity that i'm used to in my family and which i credit for the deep love i have for them. Cousins often marry here, which makes Kentucky and iran a little similar, because the families know each other and can stay close. It's different, and some of it's weird and some of it's beautiful, but the overall feeling I am taking from small town Iran is one of sympathy. It's boiling with potential that is stifled because of its religious government, where forbidden is illegal and where people are scared to be human.

Off to Amsterdam...

About two minutes off the train at Central Station in my Amberdam and I was once again ready to move here. Coming from a place so conservative and where I was so watched and so guarded made it even sweeter... although I just looked over at Mack's computer and he's looking at gayromeo.com followed by gaydar.nl and I'm wondering if freedom really is so great for our relationship. Hee hee. We've been here about four days, and I've been spending roughly 10 hours out of my hotel room and 14 hours in it. Retoxing is what we're calling it. Trash tv (and by trash I'm not talking about the porn that comes on but episodes of Real World and Larry King Live), french fries with mayonnaise (don't knock it till you try it), short-sleeved t-shirts and beer. The first day we were here we dropped our luggage off at our hotel and went to have a Guiness at the Irish pub around the corner. Mack brought out his magic tricks and won over a couple of British mates named James and Ryan who then amused us until 2 p.m. (we started drinking at 9 a.m.) when we went to check in all the way at our hotel.


Well, we apparently asked them to move our reservation up a day later than we expected so when we checked in they only had one room left and it was roughly the size of my bathroom. Oh, it had a bed, tv, shower, toilet and sink in it, but it was still the size of my bathroom. Mack let me have the bed while he laid on the floor, and when we started to wake up at around 11 p.m. from our naps, our hangovers put us right back to bed. The room was stiflingly hot, so we had to sleep with our door open, which was fine for us but which probably puzzled all the people stepping off the elevator and looking in at our pathetic selves. So the next day...

We've been pretty low key since then. I've been trying to stay out late enough to see the nakeds in the red light district just because they're an interesting breed to observe, but it doesn't get dark here until no kidding 11:30 p.m. so by then I'm absorbed in some really great episode of the Wayan Brothers show that I've never watched before and don't feel like going out. Mack's ventured out a couple times and brought back reports of people with darker skin whispering "cocaine" as he walks by. I have yet to verify this account, but I tend to walk around in a self-amusing daze and don't really notice stuff directed toward me if I'm not interested in it. (update: The red light distict is, it turns out, one of the most beautiful parts of Amsterdam at night. The women are sort of sectioned off by race -- Asians, then blacks, then whites, and cover lots of blocks -- and there is one stretch that has red lit windows on the left and the back of a church on the right, and the sex being sold makes that passageway so beautifully lit. And there's also the added bonus of "good" versus "evil" laid out in front of you. Evil is more interesting, in my opinion. There are also a ton of boats in the canals of the district at night. It's like floating bachelor pads and the boys just cruise through the canals drinking beer and looking at all the women in the windows. Some of the little passages are only one person wide with two lanes of sideways traffic going through them. You can taste the animal hunger in the air, but luckily these are men and not animals, so most have some self control or friends to control them. Plus, if they want to satisfy themselves, they have hundreds of girls ready and willing. They have all kinds of girls there... fat, thin, every race on earth, big boobs, no boobs, long hair, short hair, old, young, majorly stripperesque and girl next doorish. And the coolest thing, the canals aren't gated off, so if you step too far back to gawk you get a punishing plunge to deal with. That, and there were no cops pushing you with billy clubs or accusing you of being guilty for satisfying your curiosity.)

We've seen a lot of awesome things this time around... went to the Van Gogh Museum, and the Riljksmuseum (it has rembrandt paintings), which were incredible;

I loved this downspout!

Went to Madame Tousseau's Wax Museum where I joked with Gandhi and the buddhist guy I can't remember what we call him,,, Dalai Lama,,, had dinner with George Clooney, compared prisms with Isaac Newton and, alas, discovered that Mack is the vitruvian man, much to my dismay and to his inflated ego;





Went to the Amsterdam Zoo yesterday, which was really beautiful and had lots of animals that, believe it or not, didn't look depressed to be at the zoo. They use a lot of water barricades around their exhibits so it's like you're right up on the animals. The grounds were really pretty and we stumbled across a bonus aquarium which was really cool;


Went to the Heinken experience for 10 Euro, which basically paid for the three beers we got along the tour. It was pretty cool, and it was the best Heineken I've ever tasted in my life.

We've been walking everywhere and have pretty much covered every square inch of the city's center by foot twice. I told Mack this morning that vacation has been long enough, we either need to move here or go home and move to LA. His response was, it's better that vacation was too long than too short, which is true so I shut up after that. I think we're going to try to go to a jazz club tonight or tomorrow so Mack can get his music fix, but it remains to be seen if I stay awake that long. (update: I did stay awake that long, and it ended up being an awesome night. First we went to a sports bar to watch the Brazil v. Someone World Cup game and there were these awesome (and hot) Brazilian drummers making a sound so dynamic everyone was bobbing their heads in the air.

Football has a ton of followers there. People lined up outside the patio where we sat and watched from the streets.

After the game we walked down to the jazz club and were the first ones there. It started to fill up quickly though, so we ended up with the best seats in the house. We got to meet the leader guy, a sax player named Akos Laki, and his apprentice, a guy named Rex from New Orleans. It was cool to see a New Orleanian performing in Amsterdam, but also kind of sad to see just how displaced New Orleans' musicians had become from Katrina, etc. I generally don't like jazz, except for like Louis Armstrong and Etta James kind, but I had a really good time watching them play. I'm sure the few beers I'd had added to my fascination, but whatever.

It was a great night, until we had to ride our bikes home and I completely had no idea where things were in the dark. I could remember if it was daylight, but night in Amsterdam looks completely different.


I guess since ít's the weekend I'll live it up and retox some more. I'm just so glad I don't have to do anything all I want to do is nothing. Vacation.
Hope everyone is doing well and not cooking in the hot pre-July weather. Love and hugs!

In the words of Vincent Vega, the guy who saved John Travolta from being a has-been: "It's the little differences. I mean they got the same shit over there that they got here, but it's just - it's just there it's a little different."

Examples?
The bikes made to carry an entire family and their groceries.
The conversation hearts brought to your table after dinner with Dutch on them.
The light poles in Shahin Shar that are made to look like illuminated trees.
The headscarves that mannequins and drawings of women wear in Iran at bathrooms, prayer rooms and other women-only entrances.
The toilets that are different every place you go.

Eight Down, One More To Go!!

Leiah is officially in her 8th month of baby making, and I think it's safe to say that bun in the oven has turned into a full loaf! You think she can't physically get any bigger or else the baby's limbs are going to start popping out of her skin, and then --poof!-- the bottom of her belly fills up. I can't imagine how she'll look at 9 months. Are people really made to do this? Ben's supposed to get here on Sept. 5, so only one month to the day until I get to be Auntie Am!

What I Did on My Summer Vacation (Part 4 in a Series of I Don't Know How Many Yet)

The big day has arrived. The day that I will share our wedding woes and enlighten you with that experience. Best wishes.

Originally emailed June 23, Seriously Enhanced August 3

Our wedding yesterday was pretty strange. Shahin and I went to get our hair done by the beautician, who got her post because she bought a compact of 50 colors of eyeshadow and thus was the most qualified. She colored my eyebrows red and used theatrical makeup to make me white (i thought i already was but apparently you're supposed to be porcelain white, who knew) and started to put a ponytail on the top of my head when I finally had to intervene. Instead of doing what I asked, she tried to sell me on what she wanted to do, which was something out of Boughaz Weekly. I ended up with a lopsided french twist and some brown-red makeup on top of my porcelain skin, which still looked pretty bad but was 1000 times better than what she first did. And i got my eyebrows shaped by a professional, so they look a little better. Oh, and I got a good shave. Yes, she shaved my face with a straight razor sized for women. She got peach fuzz from my cheeks and held it up for me to look at with a look on her face like "oh, see all this nasty hair coming off your face." that's when I decided my degree of maintenance was just right, and that i would from here on out forgive myself for having hair on my face. As long as it doesn't grow in thicker and coarser than before.

I was ready to get the hell out of there as soon as Shahin got her makeup done, so I suggested we just get dressed at home. We called Ali to have him come get us only to learn that he was on his way with Mack and the photographer. We put on our dresses in about two seconds flat, got all of our crap together, and as I started to put my headscarf on and walk out the door, Shahin said to leave it off. I opened the door to a handsome but annoyed Mack, heard the words ACTION, and received a bouquet of red and white roses. Apparently we didn't do this impromptu exchange very well because we had to redo it a couple of times. I walked to the car, the first time I'd been outside without a headscarf in more than a week, and climbed in... with Shahin, Laila, Mack, Ali, and the photographer all in a compact car in formal wear. Let the sweating begin!
I was positively glowing!

We walked into the courtyard and Mack's aunts immediately started singing something. Because I'd been conditioned over the last 10 days I started clapping to the beat of their song... not recommended. I think the bride is just supposed to be still and smile and dance when the people want her to. So I stopped clapping as they brought out some burning sage and waved it over our heads. We took our seats on the marble deck-turned-stage and watched our DJ and singer set up their enormous speakers. It was going to be entirely too loud up where we were so we relocated our chairs to the courtyard amidst the other chairs. Cherries and bananas and peaches were out on all the tables, and as soon as the DJ started up, the dancing ensued.

It started inside, where I was told to sit so my makeup wouldn't melt, but when I couldn't stand it anymore and went outside, the dancing followed. I asked Mack's dad, Tom, if I could have a cigarette... not because I wanted the nicotine but because I wanted the habit that doubles as an excuse to get away for a minute. He laughed, whether it was at my desperation or my dramatic eyeliner, I have no idea. My legitimate smile was morphing into the God-I-Love-Jesus-So-Much-I-Could-Explode one that I see on preacher shows... a little coma stained with numbing mind control. I hope I looked delightful, but I doubt I was fooling anyone. Mack was trying to pull off the same look that I was, and I could see how badly he was executing it, so I can only assume I was just as transparent. Luckily, it got dark pretty quickly and lots of people started showing up.

I got a bouquet of flowers from one of Shahin's relatives and a ring from another. People just kept coming and coming, all of them shaking my hand and saying things I completely didn't understand. I just said, "Salaam" and "Merci" whenever it felt right. Some of the women were really beautiful with hair that went past their butts when they took off their scarves, and the men were all over the place. Young, old, ancient, babies.

Everyone danced. And danced. And made us dance. And we are not dancers. I wish I could upload video because there are some dance moves on there from Jaffar that are youtube worthy. They also do this fantastic shoulder shake thing that basically vibrates their shoulders without moving their chests. I tried it and my boobs were flopping like a stripper on The Sopranos, so I decided just to stick with the wavy arm move. And to try to dance as little as possible. At one point, we had a belly dancer girl who was about 14 with quite a tank butt but a good dancer perform for all of us. She was wearing a white mini skirt, a shirt that accentuated her pointy bra boobs and some white thigh highs that peeped out from under her skirt on certain movements. I was proud of her outfit, but after a few dances she was asked to put on some pants. That kind of made me mad, but she didn't seem to bothered by it. An Iranian tradition is for the groom's family to give money to all the people dancing, so when Shahin walked out with a wad of tomen, people got out of their seats and started shaking even more. I'd earned enough gold this trip, so I didn't dance for dollars.

At one point we had to do our first dance together as a couple. We took dance lessons at one point a few years ago and learned the waltz and the box step and the swing and the foxtrot. The music came on, Mack started doing a box step that was robotic even by my standards, and our attempts to loosen up and have a good time failed. I kept telling Shahin if she could get us a few beers we'd dance our heads off, but alas. While we were sharing this forcibly intimate, awkward moment, Mack mentioned that the song sounded really familiar. It did. I got visions of shootouts in a restaurant setting. Where had we heard this? Then he said, "It's the song from the Godfather!" How appropriate.

We knew dinner was on the itinerary, but we'd already been fed fruit and cookies and ice cream, so we were thinking maybe the itinerary had changed. Not quite. We were herded into the neighbors' courtyard where tables had been set up with soda and lamb kababs and rice and salad, and we all stood around the tables and pigged out. It was pretty good food, but it was quite a challenge to shovel rice into my mouth from 2 feet away. I filled up pretty quickly, snuck back over to our courtyard, and snuck into the bathroom to pee one last time while no one was around.

The music, which rubbed my tolerance for techno completely raw, resumed, and I danced one final time for the remaining guests. It was so funny. I can't dance the way they do, so when I stood up, I just did my typical arms-in-the-air, I-can't-care-what-you-think-this-is-how-my-body-moves dance. Then everyone else started trying to do my dance. They all tried to imitate my move and I thought, "Dear God, don't let them think I'm a dancer to be copied."

About 11:30, that would be four and a half hours after our nuptial soiree began, we snuck into our bedroom and hid behind the door so no one would see us. I practiced the shoulder shake, realized it would just be one more dance move I'll never absorb, laid down on the floor behind the door, and fell asleep. About 30 minutes later, Shahin woke me up, told me to wash my face, which was one of the most painful things I've done, and the day came to an end.

It wasn't at all the wedding I would have made for myself, but it was really wonderful to be able to get Mack's entire family together and to celebrate our relationship with them.
Shahin, Me, Bobba Bezorg (Shahin's dad)
Me and Momma Bezorg (Shahin's mom and the hardest working woman I've ever met in my life)

What I Did on My Summer Vacation (Part 3 in a Series of I Don't Know How Many Yet)

Alas, our trip Persepolis and Shiraz, which was my favorite experience in Iran. Up next, the wedding. I promise.

Originally written June 23, embellished August 1

We went to Shiraz and Persepolis a couple of days ago. Shiraz is where the wine was born, from a special grape variety that grew there (Bobba Basorg has a grape vine in his backyard that has delicious grapes too, as an aside) and made wine so wonderful it inspired poets Sa'di and Hafez to become poets. They don't make wine anymore, but the town does have tombs and gardens set up for each of these men for visitors to read their words and celebrate their lives. We visited them and one had the coolest underground river going through the middle of a tea room. It was something to be in a town where the poets are that reverred and honored instead of the politicians.


Shiraz is where Shiraz University is, so we think that is why it's more progressive. Our first night we went out for dinner in search of an authentic Persian restaurant that Mack's dad recommended. On the way, as we were walking through town, we came upon this huge castle that took up an entire city block. It was surreal. All these modern day people playing soccer and laying around next to this enormous ancient building with 30 foot walls. (Turns out, this is the Arg-e Karim Khani, duh. It was used as a prison in Pahlavi times.) Only in Iran.

We made it to the restaurant, which was an old bath house that had been converted into a restaurant. We sat at the tables, but there were carpets laid out on raised floors for people to have that just-like-home experience if they wanted it. After enjoying our wooden chicken (don't ask, I still don't know, but it was good and served with potato sticks), we ordered a hookah.



It was delicious but a lot stronger than what we're used to here, and only two puffs into it my head started to get buzzed. We left and wandered back to our hotel and on the way, Mack stepped of the curb onto what I assumed was a sloping road but which turned out to be a 2-foot deep drainage ditch (they have those here on the side of every road without any barriers to them for some reason). He fell into the road and took a while to get up. I was worried he'd broken his leg or something, but it turns out he just sliced the top of his toe halfway off somehow. (No, Jennifer and Shannon, I did not push him!) We asked for the first aid kit at the hotel and got a bottle of ethyl alcohol. I suggested he drink half of it before we pour any on, and then he decided he'd just walk with it in the air and it would be fine until his mom, the nurse, could take a look at it. Good thing, because I almost puked and then cried for being such a wuss when I looked at it. And when I consulted the Iran travel book we brought to see what to do if you need a hospital, it said most things like stiches and general procedures were done at home. Not at my home.

We also went to Bagh-e Eram (a botanical garden that is incredibly beautiful) and realized that is where the students go to hold hands and be young and hang out. They had rock gardens and paths and the most incredible irrigation system with the freshest cold flowing water I've ever felt.


We also went to Bazar-e Vakil to look around and got hassled by a guide. This was the worst one yet, because he was less obvious. What they do is ask if they can talk to you for a minute and you assume it's because you speak English and they want to practice. Then they want to show you a 400-year-old theology school and you assume that's because the people here are just so fantastically hospitable. Then when you finally get tired of following the guy but you're up on the roof and he leads you down a dark staircase that you didn't go up while telling you that the school now serves a lot of Afghanis and you know that there are al qaida recruiting places in the middle east and you're imagination starts spiraling into darkness as fast as the staircase and suddenly daylight brings you out of your nightmare where Bin Laden was videotaping your decapitation and showing it on CBS and you get back into the street and then the guy asks for money. That's when you shrug and say, you tricked me and he tries harder and you say i'm sorry no and walk back to the good time you were having before.

The bazaars here have some of the most stunning stuff I've ever seen. They have these incredible carpets that look like paintings and the booths showcasing spices and herbs are so unexpectedly colorful.


Outside of the bazaar we went into a mosque (Regent's Mosque) that boasted a staircase made from a single slab of marble that was brought to Iran from Azerbaijan, a neighboring country. You had to wear a full chador to get inside, but luckily they had some you could borrow so we could go in and look. I must say, I make an adorable, sloppy Muslim.


Persepolis is just outside of Shiraz, so we took a taxi out there early in the moring and that was something to behold. The walk up to it was a wide gravel road, boughaz as expected and hotter than hell, but once we got there the whole trip was worthwhile.


The ruins, which date back to before 500 BC, are massive and back up to a mountain which now holds the sarcophagus of Arteserxes I think. It's unique because the city was built on a foundation of rocks that are easily four stories tall. Like, they stacked up all these rocks and the shaped them and then built their city on top. Some of the rocks were taller than us!

There is carved script that is in three languages throughout the city, so it's kind of like a Rosetta Stone. The museum has deciphered the writing and it's basically a message from the king talking about how he is fair and awards men good fortune based on their character rather than their lineage and how he was a good horseman and swordsman and athlete. People have also left more recent marks on the place by carving their names and the dates they were there. It was neat to see the names and where people hailed from and when. Carvings from 1500s, 1800s, you name it.

The structures themselves are enormous. All that's left of most of the walls is a mound of dirt along the edges, so you really have to use your imagination... if you can wrap your mind around it all. There was at one time a treasury that held all of his gold and silver, a harem that held all of his flesh and bone and a few other rooms that held all of his guests that came to call.


One of the walls is decorated with carvings of what each country in the Persian empire brought to the king (my history here sucks because it was too hot to read all the info, but I do know that like 4 kings lived there, so I'm using king to cover all of them, okay!), and they're all a little different. Like the Afghanis brought a camel and pottery and goats, so there'd be a guide holding an afghani looking guy's hand and three or four other afghanis who had all the presents they were bringing for their king in their hands. There are drawings of all the countries in the empire and their gifts. What was so awesome is that every drawing couldn't have been done by the same sculptor, but everywhere in the city where it was repeated it was identical, like they had a mold or something to carve the stone.


The gates were enormous and it's easy to imagine how imposing this place must have been at its pinnacle. The White House looks like a broom closet compared to Persepolis. I used to think we've come a long way with our civilization, but seeing what they were doing more than 2000 years ago and acknowledging that we could never accomplish something of that magnitude now out of sheer will and determination without any of our technology crutches makes me wonder if we've really come that far.

(a stone well in the side of the mountain... the water was so far down!)

Just down the road from Persepolis are four tombs of other kings, called Naqsh-e Rostam, and another tomb called Naqsh-e Rajab (named after a man who once had a teahouse there). The stone carvings at Rajab depict much beefier types than the one in Persepolis. At Naqsh-e Rostam, you can wander forever looking at the carvings of jousting matches and war scenes. This is the only place I saw any depiction of a woman, and I wouldn't have known it was a woman unless the little info slab told me so.

(she's the queen on the right)
We also so a zorastrian temple there, which I think was built so the kings could get into whatever was there eternity. I wonder if Islam incorporates any zoratrian traditions.


That trip to Shiraz and Persepolis was a great trip, sealed by four kisses by the taxi driver who took us to the airport and tried to park and walk us in. I would absolutely love to visit Shiraz again someday. The Hotel Eram was great and the staff was really friendly (yes, that is a plug if you ever make it to Iran). (We didn't have to be temporarily married to stay in the same room together because we have American passports, and they're cool with Americans living in sin.)

Heaven's to Betsy

My darling baby sister just left today after having a two-week Hollywood experience that kept me laughing in whispers. Just to recap, and to show her the evidence, here is a dose of her hilarity.

The first or second night we watched Hedwig and the Angry Inch, an endearing musical about a botched sex change operation. I love it. In it, a black man named Luther seduces Hansel (who later becomes Hedwig) and takes him from East Germany on the condition that he become a she so they can get married. Hansel agrees, while he's not singing in the oven. Here is Luther (also known as Maurice Dean Wint):

So the next night, we rent Requiem for a Dream, a troubling honest look at the rise and fall of heroin addicts with the mom from the Exorcist making an award-worthy appearance as a speed addict mother. Betsy, with all the passion of a know-it-all 18-year-old who prides herself of remembering faces boldly proclaims, "That's the guy from Hedwig!" about the pimpish guy who hosts sex parties for girls who need drugs but can't find them anywhere. "That's not him," I calmly countered. We bet $20 on it. This is that guy (also known as Keith David):

A few days later we headed to Melrose to do some shopping and stopped in to Johnny Rocket's to satisfy the hamburger cravings I've been having since being around Betsy. She is a feind for hamburgers to the same degree Seth is a Philly Cheesesteak junkie. While we ate, Wayne Brady, of Whose Line Is It Anyway? fame (and also of that hilarious skit on the Dave Chappelle show), sat at the next table, and Betsy got a few glimpses of her first real life celebrity. This is Wayne Brady:

So the next day, after spending a few hours watching the waves crash and reading about Fergie and what men want from sex in the latest issue of Cosmo, we headed to the bus stop to go home when Seth succumbed to his Cheesesteak addiction and we landed in a restaurant. On the way out, Betsy spotted an autographed photo and said, "Oh, look, it's him... that guy we saw yesterday." This is who the photograph pictured:

That's right. Cuba Gooding Jr. Who, it turns out, looks nothing like Wayne Brady.

Finally, during our last supper together at an Italian eatery, Betsy saw a celebrity she actually, truly, correctly recognized. Don Cheadle, who played the adorable cowboy radio salesman/porn star in Boogie Nights and Paul Russessabagina in Hotel Rwanda, sat back to back with Betsy.

He, his wife, and his two adorable daughters paid no attention to our stifled admiration, and Betsy and Seth posed casually for a photo with Don Cheadle's back in the background. We were so cool you'd never know we were getting a photo of him (even if it was just his back). I'm not sure if Betsy would have known who he really was if I hadn't told her, but I'll give her the benefit of the doubt... mostly in appreciation for the laugh I got when she saw the Tupac impersonator in Holly wood and practically exploded and said, "Why is Tupac standing right there? Why is Tupac standing right there?" I still don't know if she knows he's dead, but I'm going to assume she does. I couldn't take it if she thought that guy was the real Tupac. Then she'd be so cute I'd have to eat her.