City of Culver City

I've been in Los Angeles since Saturday.  (I flew on September 11th.)  I'm staying at the Culver Hotel.  My room is right next the H of the HOTEL sign in the photo.  The hotel is historic, built in 1924.  The exterior and the lobby are very nice.  The rooms and upper hallways not so nice.  I do love the view from my room though.  I'm right on the end of the building so I have those two windows facing west as well as two facing south and one to the north.  Nearly panoramic.  I like seeing the lights and sky to the west at night as Washington and Culver Boulevards intersect.  John Wayne owned this joint long ago.  One if its other claims to fame is that the actors playing the Munchkins stayed here while the Wizard of Oz was being filmed.
Many of my friends have asked why I'm staying in Culver City.   No particular reason.  Last time I was here, I stayed in Santa Monica.  I like being near the beach, but everything else is too much of a shlep when you're out there.  One can experience the openness of this area on foot.  You have to get in your car to go anywhere at many hotels in LA.  Except for downtown, but I didn't feel like staying downtown this trip.  The purpose of which is mainly restorative and to see some people.  I like the simplicity of being around here.  Some of the architecture is nice.  And the hills to the south feel like some sort of uninhabited border, the other side of which could be a vast western desert instead of Inglewood and LAX.  The streets are very clean without it seeming posh or exclusive.  There are some good restaurants just across the street such as Ford's Filling Station and The M Cafe.  There's a movie theater to the right of the plaza in the photo.  I saw The American there the other night.
The scale of Culver City feels very comfortable.  I first drove through here late one night many years ago before it was revitalized.  Then a couple of years ago my friend had the privilege of opening a new play by David Mamet at the Kirk Douglas theater.

I was staying with him, so the night I went to see the play we went over to Culver City and had dinner at Ford's before he went to work.  I roamed around by myself until curtain.  It was a typically beautiful Los Angeles  evening.  Everything had a nice feel to it.  I've stayed all over the place down here.  I don't know that I would make Culver City my forever go-to spot in LA, but it's got its advantages.