When I walked into the building last week, one of the security officers said to me, “I can’t believe how good your boys are doing!” I didn’t know what he was talking about at first, and then realized he meant UCLA men’s basketball. “I know!” I said happily. And then watched my first UCLA game last nite. *sheepish*

Diana and Jimmy both came down to LA independently and we all met up, with 9 other people, in Marina Del Ray for dinner last nite. Dinner for 11 was difficult at the small, non-reservation-taking restaurant Killer Shrimp. But first, 6 of us met up at a bar 5 blocks away from the restaurant and watched #2 ranked UCLA’s very tight game at #10 Alabama. I can’t believe it was such a close game, there was no consistent lead, and in the last 5-6 minutes or so, we never led by more then 3-4 points. The bar was alive with UCLA fans’ adrenaline. (By the way, the people we were meeting up with were old UCLA friends, too.) We barely won, which is scary considering the ranking difference. But it was an exciting game. “Now we can relax and eat in peace,” Diana said as we left the bar to begin our trek toward the restaurant. (I emphasize the distance because there was some debate about whether it was 2-3 blocks away from the restaurant or, like I said, more like 5-6 blocks away.)

Killer Shrimp wasn’t able to accomodate a large party like ours until their 2 linkable tables left, and altho I’d given them a heads up that 11 would be coming at 7p, they couldn’t get those tables cleared until almost 9p. Diana popped in and out and gave us updates. “They’re just waiting for these 4 women to leave, and they already paid and everything, but they’ve just been sitting in there FOREVER!” After standing outside in the cold for that long already, I offered to kick these lolly-gagging women’s asses on their way out. Jimmy pointed out that this is where Mr. W’s gun, had he brought it, would’ve come in handy to add some pressure. Mr. W forbade me to take advice from Jimmy in the future. The dinner turned out to be worth the wait. Killer Shrimp is about a dozen large shrimp served in a spicy Louisiana-style broth in a large bowl, and they give you a generous refillable basket of French bread to dip into the broth and to dig the shrimp out to peel-and-eat. You can also get rice in the broth or angel hair pasta in the broth for $2 more ($16.95 or something like that) in addition to the bread basket. Their pecan sweet potato pie was AMAZING, too. And that is the entire menu. It was a lot of fun and I HIGHLY recommend it. The sauce was rich with butter, chili, garlic, basil, rosemary, parsley, and oregano. Large chunks of these herbs. *drool*

Oh. Jimmy took some pictures, so there may be something to post up later.