University of California Los Angeles

We flew in late last night and crashed at an airport hotel, got a good night's sleep and made our way to Brentwood, just west of L.A., where we're staying the next seven nights at "Hotel Angeleno" (4 stars + free WiFi + free "wine hour" + free shuttle within a 3-mile radius = pretty awesome).

The hotel's a 5-minute drive to Westwood where UCLA is headquartered. The campus is this massive sprawl of lush green lawns & ancient trees, stoned terraces & beautiful red brick buildings, all happily drenched in sunshine 300 days a year. There was something so very American about the campus and though I didn't quite know what it is, I liked it.

As we walked around the campus we finally began to realize: this is where we're going to live for the next couple of years -- in Cali-freaking-fornia. Pretty cool, huh? :)