The Commercial Break

Whilst I have gained patience and become more tolerent of many of the foibles of my newly adopted homeland, I do still have a few major bugbears.  The commercial break is definitely one of them.  One year on, I still find these continuous interruptions drive me to distraction. As far as I am concerned the commercial break is one big turn-off.  In fact, there has been many a time when towards the end of a film or TV show, as the time between the breaks decreases from 7 to a mere 3 minutes,  I have reached the end of my tether. Forget the flipping ending…I can’t be bothered, and I give up and switch off.  It’s that bad.

And, for those uninitiated in the delights of American life, the commercial break will burst onto your TV screen without warning, at least 50 decibels louder than whatever you happen to be watching.  The subject and content of these commercials may well surprise you.  Well it surprised me and I thought I was an open minded worldly wise individual. The amount of advertising for medical and pharmaceutical products here is phenomenal and these Americans are not backwards about coming forwards, you will be spared no details. Do I want to watch advertisements for products that will “enhance” my love life at 2.00 pm in the afternoon?  Not really.  Do I want to hear about regular and irregular bowel movements whilst I eat my supper?  No. In the same vein, do I want to watch lengthy commercials for prescription only drugs that go on forever listing every possible contra-indication and side effect including imminent heart seizure, kidney failure, and very occasionally death: I’m not a medical practitioner.  Sell the drugs to the professionals, not me.  After all what has a doctor spent ten years in medical school training for, isn’t he/she the one who’s qualified to tell me what I need to make me better or shall I just do a bit of self-diagnosis following a five minute TV ad or a three page spread in a magazine?  

And it’s not just TV advertising that drives me nuts. Buy a glossy mag out here and you play a guessing game of spot the genuine features and articles.  You can pay $5 just to read page after page of adverts.  The newspapers are the same.  The LA Times on a Sunday is so heavy it takes two of you to carry it back from the supermarket; but the whole bundle is double the size it needs to be because of the adverts and promotional inserts. Oh and the coupons of course.  Americans just love their coupons.  Every time I go the supermarket I’m asked if I’ve got my coupons.  Americans like to think they are getting a good deal, well I know a good deal when I see one and it doesn’t involve spending Sunday afternoon cutting up bits of newspaper then wasting fuel by driving all over town clutching my coupons just to  save a couple of bucks in seven different stores…

And talking of food…....I’m sure the food production companies are in cahoots with the pharmaceutical industry ( in fact having studied a vast amount of food labels and seen some of the ingredients I'm actually convinced they are one and the same thing).  For the first 40 years of your life they entice you buy all this rubbish to eat, then for the last 40 years of your life they sell you all the remedies to counteract the effects! Brilliant idea!  

My least favourite ad on TV at the moment has to be the Jack in the Box fast food guy smugly telling weary mom  unpacking grocery bags that rather than spending $200 on the weekly shop, she should have just gone to Jack in the Box and spent $3.99 on his double burger, fries and soda meal. Hold on if she’s got a family of four and they all go to Jack in the Box, then that’s $16; but that’s only one meal a day, so if you times the $16 by three then times it by seven for the whole week, I actually think Mom’s weekly grocery shop was quite a good deal.  Of course the advertising guys behind Jack in the Box aren’t expecting their audience to think like that.  In fact, no TV production team over here ever expects their audience to think.

Take the car adverts.  Super car whizzing round the hairpin bends on snowy mountainside.  Little caption comes on screen. Professional driver. Closed circuit. Do not Attempt.  Funny that - I wasn't going to.  I knew it was an advert.  I’m not that stupid….

How – and why - on earth does your average, intelligent American put up with being patronised like this? Come on guys,  enough is enough. I’m going to start a campaign to get rid of  crass adverts, I just need to publicise my cause and get noticed by a wider audience....how can I do that? I could always make a commercial I suppose…. 

Acclimatization (with a zee....)

The most awful thought occurred to me the other day as I drove to school…I’m becoming acclimitised.  My bubble is starting to burst.

How did I come to this conclusion? My driving is deteriorating. I jumped two sets of lights in quick succession. Why? Because if you don’t go through amber lights at certain junctions it’ll be ten minutes before the light goes green again. Some of these road junctions are just too big and convoluted for words, but in my defence, I didn’t go through on red, and a lot of people do.  I’ve seen more crashes in 12 months of driving out here than in over 20 years in the UK.  Pop in a few roundabouts and a lot of the problems would go away overnight.

So yes, I’m starting to drive like an American.  My neat, tidy, economical little Ford Focus has gone back to the car showroom in exchange for a convertible.  Not for me, you understand, but for the man having a midlife crisis.  I’m now stuck with a Honda Accord, which although not big by American standards, is really twice the size of what I actually need for the few miles I do each day.


I’ve got fed up of having to repeat myself six times when I politely ask for a glass of water (with a T) so I find myself asking for waugher  when I want a drink. I realize our daughter starts school every Monday  speaking the Queen’s English after a weekend at home with mum and dad, but by Friday, we have this little American kid in the house, who, like me, has gotten so fed up of having to repeat everything at school she just slips into this lazy Californian drawl….

The packet mix cookies she bakes for school functions no longer seem so unbearably sweet, in fact they are so nice I’ve just had two…

I’m suddenly concerned about the welfare of the KTLA 5 morning weather man.  I miss him - he’s been off screen for ages and they say he has pneumonia but I’m starting to suspect something far more sinister.  And what about poor Ginger Chan, the girl who does the traffic news – she’s had the longest pregnancy on record; is she ever going to give birth?  Suddenly I care about these people whose lightweight news programme I used to so despise…..

And then last week we had a cold snap.  It got down to below 65 degrees during the day.  Brrr...I had to put a pair of socks on! That’s how soft I’ve become.

I pass houses on my morning walk dressed from top to toe in Christmas decorations - I no longer think how OTT; instead it inspires me to go home and create a winter wonderland on my balcony.

And even the grocery shopping doesn’t seem such a chore anymore. - even when disaster happens like it did last week at Fresh & Easy.  I'd just self-checked out a large weekly shop when the computerized till broke down at the payment stage.  At Fresh & Easy it’s all self-check out and you have to pack your shopping yourself which I’m sure is why no-one else ever shops there.  It's always empty. Anyway, an assistant came over; had a look then called the supervisor who spent about ten minutes trying to sort the computer out.  They both offered profound apologies but the outcome was that my shopping would have to be unpacked and rung up all over again on a different till. Can you imagine the furor this would have caused back home? Fresh & Easy is  part of Tesco and if this had happened at my local Tesco on a Thursday morning back in the UK there would have been a riot! The queue behind me would have been huge and I’d have wanted the ground to swallow me up but here there wasn’t another frustrated customer in sight.  And that’s when I knew I really had become acclimitised. I merely shrugged and said:  “Don’t worry, you go ahead, not a problem, take your time….” 

What’s happened to me? Soon I’ll have nothing left to blog about…no gripes or moans.  Next I’ll be telling you we've become so integrated into American culture we had full Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings.  Well we did actually, my sister was over and we had a very pleasant family meal.  It was just like Christmas but without all the stress of having to get presents for everyone.  Our turkey was delicious but pumpkin pie is definitely something you have to be spoon fed since birth to appreciate.....

But don't worry - my bubble hasn’t completely evaporated; I still don't find Two and a Half Men  funny. But I did spot a Chihuahua in a Santa outfit and found myself thinking, gee that looks kinda cute…….

The Health Kick

Now here’s a contentious issue. I know it's just because I've always lived in a country that has a government run national health service  but I really don’t understand this huge problem  the vast majority of Americans seem to have with the prospect of President Obama's health care reforms.  The bottom line seems to be Americans don’t want affordable health care for all – they certainly don’t want tax increases to pay for it and they definitely don’t like the thought of money they’ve earned being used to support anyone else.  And what would Ty Pennington and the producers of TV's Extreme Home Makeover do if they couldn’t go around helping those poor unfortunate families whose houses are literally falling down around them because they have bankrupted themselves spending their very last penny on medical bills for their sick children……

Health insurance over here isn't cheap and it certainly isn't a bottomless pit - all schemes have their limits.  So,  if you have to pay your own medical bills doesn’t  that mean you start looking after yourself a bit better? Well in California the answer is a resounding yes – and it’s very easy to get yourself on a health kick out here. 

I remember those mornings back in the UK, waking up in the dark when it's grey, wet and windy outside, all you want to do is pull the duvet back up over your head.  What is there to get up for? I’ll have another cup of tea and chocolate digestive please….

 

Here you wake up, jump out of bed with a spring in your step, have a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice, grab a granola bar and get out there and feel that sun on your skin  (not for too long though otherwise you’ll end up like a wizened up old prune.)  The weather out here is an instant pickup. And yes people really do all they can to keep themselves fit and active and away from the doctor’s surgery and the $20 they have to fork out just for the appointment….

For a start Americans carry on working as long as they possibly can – people don’t want to retire here  and it’s not because they love their jobs, it’s because they don’t want to lose their company’s medical insurance.  And when they do retire and have to go onto Medicare, then they do all they can to keep fit and healthy - so they “volunteer”. Very admirable – you certainly don’t want things seizing up through lack of mental or physical activity.  Of course this is all well and good until you realize that lots of American public institutions rely on these elderly retired volunteers to perform what really ought to be paid jobs –  are your hospital notes truly safe in the hands of a couple of 90 year old filing clerks who really should be sat at home playing dominoes…

Anyway, back to this continuous strive to stay healthy.  Americans can appear just a little obsessed with their health - there is definitely an air of neurosis out here which must stem from this fear of visiting the doctor - well not actually visiting the doctor but the bill that will come afterwards.  I'd say self diagnosis is widespread and there are all kinds of aids available for the prevention of all things nasty and infectious.  Sales of antiseptic wipes and disinfecting handwash must be huge, and as for the market for vitamin and mineral supplements....well that's a winner!

I thought we could do with some multi-vitamins to keep us going this winter.  Our daughter had been a bit under weather and with the colder temperatures looming I thought we should be doing a bit more to boost our immunity so I set off to the pharmacy hoping to spot a recognisable general  multivitamin suitable for the whole family.  Could I find one? No this is America.  I was totally overwhelmed by  shelf after shelf of vitamins, minerals and supplements for absolutely every condition you’ve ever heard of and plenty that you haven’t heard of as well, and whilst I could find vitamins disguised as gummy bears and chewy sweets for the very young, and vitamins designed specifically for teenage boys, and others specifically for teenage girls, and  a variety of supplements for pre-menopausal women, post-menopausal women and men having a mid life crisis, could I find one designed for all of us? Of course not!! Why make do with one vitamin and when you can create a sales pitch for thirty three?!

What a great country! I’d give up now Mr Obama – it’s a lost cause.

Viva Las Vegas

Well we just had to go didn't we?  It's only a four hour drive away and only two roads - the 210 freeway and the 15. To be honest Las Vegas was never going to make it to my "must see" list alongside the Taj Mahal, Machu Picchu and Ayres Rock, but as we are so close....well it would be stupid to give it a miss, wouldn't it?

Las Vegas rises out of the desert like an oasis of neon.  There really is nothing else to see along the journey - just a couple of small towns which appear to have been built purely to service the roadside break.  As soon as you reach the Nevada border you spot your first casino, and a power station.  California likes to import its fuel from its neighbours rather than produce its own - that way it call call itself green and clean - who are they kidding?  It's 100 yards over the border.....

So you leave the freeway and join traffic deadlock trying to get onto the Las Vegas strip.  This is when you realise that cruising up and down the strip to take in the sights is probably not such a good idea.  Fine, just get to the hotel, park the car, unpack the suitcase and go for a walk.

And here at last is an American town that has been designed for pedestrians.  Yes of course there are roads and crosswalks and lots of them, but the hotel planners have at least realised that their clients do want to be able to get from one casino to another without dicing with death and negotiating the traffic.  They have constructed bridges and, even better, built elevators and escalators to help you reach the bridges, and moving carpets to transport you from the bridge to the hotel.  Some of the hotels have even clubbed together and built trams to ease your journey, so yes, you can see the strip without using your car, and yet you still don't have to use your legs either - that's so innovative and amazing....

Well everything about Las Vegas is amazing - jaw dropping opulence and awfulness side by side as each new hotel tries to do out do the other. 

We found the infinity shopping mall - it just goes on forever, never reaching an end......

We found Venice; the Rialto Bridge and the Grand Canal.  Yes we did the gondola ride - and why not?!! Yes it was very tacky and our teenager cringed with embarrassment as we were serenaded by the gondolier.  We floated past the resplendent white and gold wedding gondola, and were informed that 27 marriages were being performed that day - nothing like making your wedding day unique and special here then!  Of course every hotel has its own wedding chapel; these poor brides must arrive reeking of beer and tobacco as they stroll through the gaming rooms to reach the altar.   Las Vegas was the first place we've come across in America where you can smoke indoors and boy do they take advantage of it! And drinking in the streets - this is America's Ibiza - college kids suddenly reach the age of 21, everything's legal, and here they come....

Oh and don't think Vegas, casino, glamour!! This isn't Monte Carlo here you know - don't bother de-mothballing the tuxedo and unwrapping that little black dress - jeans and shorts, sneakers and a baseball cap will do you just fine.

Yet despite the masses on the street at midnight clutching their beer cans and swigging margaritas, you wake up the next morning and the place is spotlessly clean.  It's like Disneyland - there must be a whole team working behind the scenes to keep the place looking immaculate. 

This really is sanitised America.  And not just America - here they have sanitised the whole world - the Grand Canal smelt of chlorine and you can climb the half sized Eiffel Tower outside the Paris Las Vegas Hotel and instead of a great view of the Champs Elysee, you look across the road and you're in New York, there's the statue of Liberty and the Empire State; to the left you've made it to Egypt because there's the Sphinx and a pyramid, to the right is Treasure Island and it's pirate ship, and there's the erupting volcano outside the Mirage....you could be anywhere in the world.  But you're not - you're in America and you know it can only happen in America when you walk through a casino on a Sunday morning and there's a religious service taking place in one of the bars. I really didn't get that - nor did I get what that wholesome couple Donny and Marie Osmond were doing performing in a place like Vegas every night.  Making lots of money obviously but doesn't Vegas represent all those vices Mormons abhor - drink; tobacco; gambling.....although actually the town of Las Vegas was originally settled by Mormons - or so I learned from our rather thin guidebook....

And talking of gambling - yes, fortunately we came back with the bank balance still intact.  One very brief flutter on a slot machine and we were in credit so we quit.  We spent our meager winnings on a bottle of wine in a restaurant overlooking St Marks Square.  A squeaky clean St Marks Square under a sky blue ceiling painted with puffy white clouds...I love that place!

Then it was time to drive back across the desert and home.  Suddenly LA doesn't seem such a bad place after all.

Culture Vulture

Any one who knows me well will know that I’m a bit of a culture vulture.  I do like my old stuff.  I’m not saying I’m addicted to Time Team or the Antiques Roadshow, cos I’m not, but I do like a bit of art, a bit of history and an authentic old building or two.   I’m one of those people who will always read the guide book; I like to discover a bit of the heritage and history of wherever I happen to be – despite those exasperated sighs from the rest of the family whenever we’ve been on holiday somewhere – yes you really do have a give up half a day on the beach to go and walk around some old ruins….

So, to be honest, I didn't think LA was going to be the ideal place for me to be.  But on the contrary, I’ve been amazed by the amount of culture I’ve found out here.

There’s "new" money in California and lots of it.  What do those 20^th  century American entrepreneurs and industrialists like to do? They collect stuff.  They spend their cash sending their minions around  the world buying up everyone else's antiquities, Old Masters and National Treasures.   There’s stacks of it out here.

We’ve visited the two Getty museums – the Getty Centre and the Getty Villa.  Mr Getty acquired so much art he had two museums specially commissioned to display it all in.  At the modern high tech Getty Centre in LA you can view the Rembrandts and the Van Goghs; at his pseudo Italian villa in Malibu you can see statues from Pompeii and ancient Greece.  Zillions of dollars worth of it. And how did Mr Getty make his money?  Oil.  His formula for success? Rise Early; Work Hard; Strike Oil.  Well my husband has been rising early and working hard for an oil company for the last 20 years.  How come he hasn’t bought me a statue of Aphrodite yet? 

Then, here in Pasadena, there’s Henry Huntington.  He made his fortune out of the railroad and this man collected anything and everything.  He started with books – hundreds of them –  then moved onto art, furniture, ceramics, silverware, plants.  He's got Wedgewood; Constables, Gainsboroughs; he has medieval manuscripts, a  Gutenburg bible, and a collection of light bulbs.  Yes light bulbs. Why? Presumably just because he could.

And then, just last week, we discovered the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena.  Mr Simon was another 20^th century industrialist who made a whole lot of money and spent it on collectables.  He has paintings by Picasso; Raphael, a garden full of sculptures by Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore (haven't we all?), and the largest collection of Indian statues outside of India. Why?   How much “stuff” does one person need?

Couldn’t these people think of anything more worthwhile to spend their money on?

I’ve never seen so much culture in all my life.  In fact, I’ve seen too much.  Must be time to visit Hollywood Boulevard again to buy up a bit of old tourist tat.

Dining Out

We all know America loves to eat - so are all those preconceptions about super size portions and round the clock junk food justified? Well sadly....

Out in the suburbs our dining out opportunities were severely limited.  Within a ten minute walk of the house we could have dined at McDonalds, KFC and Pizza Hut; across the road was a Subway, a Chinese takeaway and a Taco Bell.  The culinary delights of American fast food were literally on our doorstep, great for teenagers but what if you want  a proper meal? Unfortunately the local restaurants left a lot to be desired, a five minute drive away was the main drag of downtown suburbia - a row of eateries that would have you in and out within an hour.  You soon realise that the American eating experience on offer here isn't quite that laid back, share a bottle of wine, enjoy good food, soak up the atmosphere, and make the evening last experience you have back home.  Americans simply go out to "eat" - not so much of a social occasion as a necessity - they want their food quick and without any fuss, they want to watch at least one TV but preferably four whilst they wait, and they want to be back home as soon as possible - and definitely before 9.00 pm. Seriously we've been in restaurants where they have been locking the door behind us...

But now we are in town we are spoilt for choice - Pasadena has a wide variety of restaurants serving international cuisine.  And it really is available 24 hours a day, not just from the burger bars and drive thru's - there are takeaways for everything and everything is available to take away.  Every restaurant in town has a home delivery service.

This really is a society obsessed with food, and there's no getting away from it. Food outlets are everywhere and every occasion presents an eating opportunity.  You think the national games of baseball and American football have those frequent time outs for treating injuries and team changes?  Think again, it's actually an opportunity for the crowd to top up their tray of cheesey nachos or buy another hot dog without having to miss any of the game.  On a trip to Los Angeles zoo - highly not recommended - it was more of a question of count the fast food outlets rather than spot the animals. Junk food plays a huge part of the American dream - it's convenient, affordable and readily available.

Restaurant portions do tend to be on the generous side but on the other hand its perfectly acceptable to split and share.  You can take leftovers home with you and I literally mean leftovers - it doesn't matter how little you have left on your plate, waiting staff will always offer to box it up so you can take it home - your bin or mine?  Sometimes there are occasions when you are in a hurry and you are happy to have the bill thrust under your nose the minute you've ordered dessert; on the other hand there are times when despite the "there's no rush, when you're ready" that always accompanies the bill, you can't help but wish you'd been left alone to linger a little longer.

Menus can be vast - think 24 page novelette - and baffling.  We have been  surprised by the combinations on offer, sweet and savoury are frequently put together, sometimes in a pleasant way, sometimes in a  slightly peculiar way.  No I really don't want a blueberry muffin before my salad, with my salad, or even after my salad....but if you have to give it to me, box it up and I'll take it home.  Something that starts out sounding perfectly decent can  quickly turn into a "did I really order that?" and it is very easy to picture Masterchefs John Torode and Greg Wallace shaking their heads in dismay at the "too many flavours, too much going on" combinations.

Fortunately, Californians being on a bit of a health kick, vegetarians are well catered for with plenty of fish and a variety of salads.  Vegans would find it hard, most food is liberally sprinkled with cheese, whether you ask for it or not.  But that's another thing we've learned, don't be shy about asking for exactly what you want or don't want when ordering - always ask for the  dressing to be on  the side otherwise the salad will be swimming off the plate, and its perfectly acceptable to request variations and deviations from the menu. Waiting staff are extremely willing and courteous, after all they have to make a living on the gratuities and Americans are notoriously fussy and demanding eaters.  Carrot soup without the carrot Ma'am? Not a problem...

So dining out is definitely a case of not bad, just different.  It's not uncommon to have your main course brought to your table whilst you are still eating your appetiser, and of course we Europeans are considered incredibly ill mannered for using both our knife and fork - but then again I think it the height of rudeness to have my plate cleared away whilst the rest of my table are still eating.....here it's just good service! Better leave an extra large tip for that....

Celebrity Spotting

This has been a source of  major disappointment.  After a whole year of living in LA we haven't seen a single celebrity.  To be fair locationally we are at a disadvantage, Pasadena is on the opposite side of LA to Hollywood and Beverly Hills, but it's a pretty cosmopolitan place and every Saturday night you can walk down the main street and see Ferrari's and Porches valet parked outside the swankiest restaurants. These must surely belong to some celebrity or another, but who? Of course the other great disadvantage is that I don't watch enough films, sport or TV, or read enough gossip magazines, to actually recognise a celebrity if one was standing right in front of me.  Every time we go to Santa Monica I see beautiful people jogging along the beach with designer baby in designer pushchair, designer Chihuahua riding shotgun on designer bicycle - surely these people must be the "rich and famous"? But again, who exactly?

When we first arrived in California we took the customary "Homes of the Stars" tour of Beverly Hills.  Sure I've seen the seven foot high fence Orlando Bloom has just erected around his property, I've seen the sturdy locked gates at the beginning of Jack Nicholson's very long drive, I've seen the house where Sharon and Ozzy used to live and the mansion Richard Gere owns but hasn't lived in for the past 3 years. I've also seen the house Tom Cruise once shared with Nicole Kidman, and tucked away in the distance behind that we could just spot the Beckham's chimneys....but well I would have liked to have seen at least one  well known personality out on their drive washing their car! But there again, if I was a celebrity, would I choose to live somewhere a bus load of tourists pulled up outside every 20 minutes or so? No way!

As we drove along Sunset Strip our guide pointed our the cafes and restaurants supposedly frequented by the beautiful people, but we were "just a little too late" for breakfast, and "just a little too early" for lunch, so of course we saw no-one.

You can, however, regularly see film crews and production teams hard at work around the city.  The Arboretum where I do my voluntary gardening is frequently used for location shots.  The parking lot overflows with large heavyweight production trucks; you can watch hoards of technical guys off loading lots of complicated equipment and other media paraphernalia; miles of cabling, huge lighting structures and lots of scaffolding.  The mobile catering team is always hand to feed the masses; setting up large BBQ's, occasionally you can catch sight of the wardrobe mistress wheeling out costume rails, and there are always lots of beefy looking security men milling around with headsets and walkie talkies.  But I've never actually seen any filming - that's just a very minor part of a very longwinded procedure - it really is a case of lights, camera and very little action!  And you can get very excited thinking you're going to catch Johnny Depp stepping out of the portaloo, but actually, at the end of the day it's more likely to be a Hollywood wannabe making a TV commercial.

So what other opportunities are there for star spotting? What about the Oscars and all those charitable functions and film premieres that bring Tinseltown out in force? Unfortunately the surrounding roads are almost always blocked off.  Those people you see standing along the edge of the red carpet are specially invited guests.  There's no hope for us mere mortals to catch a glimpse of anyone famous through the entourage of TV crews and security guards.

Perhaps I will just have to work harder at this star spotting lark.  There are websites which will tell you where to hang out if you really want to make an effort to see celebrities - personally I think this might just be a clever marketing ploy.  Apparently a lot of celebs do their grocery shopping at Bristol Farms - very upmarket food stores.  There's actually one near us in South Pasadena - a reliable source tells me they spotted Liz Taylor there 20 years ago.  I don't think I'll bother changing my grocery habits just for that.

So whilst Los Angeles still holds onto its reputation of being the entertainment capital of the world,  the days are long gone when entire movies were filmed here. The writing team, editing team, production team, might well still be based in Hollywood, but the actors and actresses certainly don't need to be.  These days the only stars you will see in Hollywood are the ones embedded in the paving slabs along the "walk of fame".  And whilst a walk down Hollywood Boulevard is a must from a touristy point of view, it does have a tacky, past-its-best sort of feel which is actually rather sad.   Now Beverly Hills, that really is plush, and Rodeo Drive is positively deluxe, and yes you do have to be mega rich to shop there - but should that  alone automatically entitle you to celebrity status? There are plenty of so called modern media "celebrities" I've no desire to meet whatsoever.

You wanna see real stars? Wait until its dark and look up at the night sky - there's hundreds of them twinkling away up there. I think for now that will just have to do for me!