L.A. trip was no Disneyland

If one subscribes to the philosophy that the best kind of vacation is one that makes you glad to be home again, my trip to Los Angeles was a smashing success. Boy was I glad to be home.

Those of you who read my column two weeks ago, “California Dreamin’,” will remember I had high hopes and big plans for this trip: visiting famous graves, shopping on Rodeo Drive, soaking up much needed sun to store for the Northwest winter.

Alas, I failed to remember the first rule of traveling with my young adult daughter. Said companion doesn’t like to get up before noon. Leaving the hotel at the crack of 1 p.m. doesn’t leave a whole lot of room to pack very many activities in one day.

Still, day one we gamely headed out in the rental car, destination Beverly Center, a supermall for designer clothes in West Hollywood. Translation: Not a chance of finding any clothing that would fit my budget or my body. My daughter however knew just what she wanted — designer jeans with a pricetag that was equal to several days pay.

She found the perfect pair of jeans and I had fun watching the ultra-thin, uber-beautiful people. There was even a designer pet store with adorable and pricey puppies begging to be carted home in Louis Vuitton carriers.

Each subsequent day seemed to involve more driving than doing, more looking than lounging. My overall and overwhelming impression was that L.A. was hot, dirty and crowded. Reminded me a lot of a certain third world country in which I once lived, especially when we visited the so-called fashion district.

The guidebook promised great bargains on designer clothes, but what we found were endless blocks of vendors selling cheaply made clothes in day-glo colors.

Grabbing a quick bite from a streetside food vendor was out the question for my vegetarian companion. Street food consisted mainly of plump foot-long hotdogs wrapped in bacon and fried on aluminum cookie sheets over propane campstoves.

We were amused to see that the mannequins seemed to have been modeled more after J-Lo than Twiggy. Those babies had plenty of “back.”

Wherever we went it was impossible to escape the reality that in Los Angeles there is a vast and unbreachable chasm between the haves and the have nots. The caste system is alive and well and living in Southern California, in Beverly Hills mansions and cardboard shacks under the freeways.

On one block of Melrose Boulevard is the fortress-like walls of Paramount Studios. On the next, boarded up storefronts covered in graffiti. Traversing any of the miles-long east-west boulevards takes you from ethnic enclaves teeming with life and smogged with bus diesel fumes to sleek storefronts and limousines with darkly tinted windows. You can buy a 1992 Ford Taurus for $650 at one end, a vintage Jaguar XKE for $65,000 at the other.

Even in death, said to be “the great equalizer,” some are more equal than others. We did manage to fit in visits to the cemeteries Hollywood Forever and Westwood Memorial Park.

Hollywood Forever is located literally on the back lot of Paramount Studios. I wondered if actors on the living side of the high wall separating the two ever ponder their mortality as they await their next scene. The cemetery is the final resting place for many stars of the early 20th century, including Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Rudolph Valentino and Jayne Mansfield, but we were there to visit the monuments of two more recent additions, Johnny and Dee Dee Ramone. Johnny, born John Cummings, was cremated and his ashes scattered at an undisclosed location, so the monument doesn’t mark his actual burial place, but it’s an impressive tribute to the seminal punk rocker.

Dee Dee, born Douglas Colvin, is buried not far away in a simple grave with a black granite marker. His epitaph is the classic Ramones line, “OK…gotta go now.”

The pilgrimage to Westwood was solely to visit its most famous resident, Marilyn Monroe. Her ashes are interred in a simple niche marked only with her basic information, but there was a fresh bouquet of red roses in the brass vase attached to the plaque, and several fans of the fanatic variety milled around.

A man with a thick European accent (maybe German?) asked if we had heard about the “hair dye scam,” apparently involving a Monroe relic, and was appalled when we confessed ignorance. “It was international news,” he sniffed.

Another Westwood regular was happy to help us locate other famous people, such as Truman Capote and Frank Zappa (whose grave is an unmarked patch of grass).

“I’m here all the time,” he said. “I know where everyone is.”

It’s good to be home.