*Official Thread* - One Stop Shopping - Quick Questions, Quick Answers

Nobody was checking because Gen Con did a horrible job of running the con, not to mention they had bigger issues (store, lines) to worry about. Hopefully everyone will do it right this time but also do it at a reasonable pace so people can get in the door when the place opens instead of an hour an a half after it opens.

Anyways, my question concerns prices and cost of things in general in LA. How much is:

a gallon of gas?

a big mac meal at mcdonalds?

a new release music cd at a record shop?

a loaf of bread?

a bottle of beer?

 

Now for a quick question from me
Where in LA do the best burgers?? Is it the burger bar across the road from the chinese theatre??

One thing I have learned from cost of things in america and california for me is its just so cheap I had to rub my eyes to see if I was seeing things when at mcdonalds seeing the prices for the meals.

 

Hamburger Hamlet is the restaurant you're thinking of. I'm sure the hamburgers there are OK, I just haven't had one.

Southern Californians would probably say In-n-Out make the best hamburgers of the chains. Of course, you'll get the argument from the Tommy's Hamburgers fans that they're the best, but I don't like chili on my hamburgers. So there LOL.

The best hamburger, through, is the one made at my local mom and pop stand, Chris's. They are the BEST.

 

Since everyone here was so helpful with my last question I thought I'd post another one:
I looked up the convention center on mapquest and seems to be close to USC. Now as far back as I can remember, I've always heard that USC is in a terrible part of LA i.e. you step off campus and you're going to get shot. So what is this part of LA like? Is it pretty bad or are the stories I've heard about it just hyperbole?

 

Mostly hyperbole; the area is slowly but surely becoming a safer place to be. No, you don't get killed stepping out of your door. If you want crime stats I can supply 'em. .

BTW, the convention center is not considered to be in that part of town. It is several miles away.

 

Well I cannot imagine you stepping out in the street and getting shot at without a reason cause then there would not be anyone left.
I know someone that went to LA hired out a rental car and ended up driving towards the compton south central area and got pulled over by the police and told to turn around, but I suppose the issue is being dealt with as we speak to make these such areas a better place to live and visit.

 

I have to register for an account with Gen-Con and the tickets for C4 will be sold by Gen-Con, not by the Official Star Wars site. Correct? What's the link to Gen-Con? Thanks in advance.

 

Well firstly if you attended C3 you should have a account with gencon anyway but heres the link that takes you directly to the registration page
http://registration.gencon.com/socal/register.cgi
you will be however be able to do this when the C4 site gets up and running but if you odviously do it now you only need to login.

 

Thank you, skywalker.

 

My question that I have is I made a reservation at the holiday inn last night can they by rights if gencon decide they want more rooms cancel my reservation??
If they did surely they have to offer me priority or another way to look at it they cannot say turn around to people not attending the convention and say they are taking their room from them cause afterall it is a business district.

 

The hotel can pretty much do whatever it wants with your room; that's kinda what overbooking is all about LOL. However, the likelihood of that happening is slim. The hotel is very small, there's no reason why they haven't done the math and offered every room possible to GenCon. In my experience with hotel booking there'd be no reason to add your one room to the mix.

 

just out of curiousity, Skywalker...who did you make the reservation through? Was it an online reservation or did you call the hotel directly? I have called a few times and they have told me that they werent taking reservations at this time due to the Housing Block for the convention. If you did speak to the hotel directly, please let me know who you spoke with so that I can use a little Jedi Mind Trick on them (along with a piece of my mind). Thanks

 

Your answer is that ever since C4 was mentioned I have been going onto the LA convention centre website then from one of the links into nearest hotels which of course is the holiday inn and it directed me to this link;
http://www.ichotelsgroup.com/h/d/hi/925/en/home
I have been trying all the while and its come up no room available it wasnt till last night that I tried it that the rooms became available.

 

Just to bump this up when I rang up the holiday inn in LA the reservation department were shocked and could not believe I made a reservation she said I was lucky.
Like to point out she mentioned reservations cannot be made for the star wars convention for another
14 days so we may have a website on the 23/10/06.

 

I like my date better beause of the symbolism , but OK, I'll take notification this coming week and then the res desk opens up on the 23rd. Makes sense.

 

thanks for the heads up....do you remember what your room rate was? I have been trying there too, and would prefer to stay as close as possible.

 

Dont hold me against that date though

My room rate for the holiday inn was $189 including tax on it makes the holiday inn around $210 which for the downtown area in LA it basically works out about the same as what you would pay in london.
I am not really all that fussed paying that anyway per night cause I did promise myself after C3 that C4 if there was one I wanted the best hotel on offer and within a short walk cause I missed out on alot of things with my hotel being so far away.

 

My wife mentioned something about the "toy district", could you give me a little more info on it, I'm a huge toy collector, I probably have 95% of all the kenner/Hasbro figures and vehicles from 95 and on so I'm kina curious about this..
Thanks in advance!!!

-Joe

 

http://www.centralcityeast.org/toys/index.html
I found this link in regards to the toy district

I cannot remember the name and even where I looked but I saw a mentioning of a series of market stalls somewhere in LA which is just like the ebay of the real world I dont think it was on all the while though.

 

a gallon of gas?

Where I buy gas it's currently $2.39 a gallon, which is pretty low. Right now the average is about $2.63 a gallon.

a big mac meal at mcdonalds?

Big Mac Combos are something like $5.50 out here. They do have their $1.00 menu. You can also buy Arch Cards in $5, $10, $25 and $50 denominations. Not a bad way to go.

a new release music cd at a record shop?

$13.99 is usually the listed price, but if it's a new release, a store like Best Buy will sell it to you for $11.99.

a loaf of bread?

Store brands can be as low as $1.50. "Premium" brands can run you between $2.50 - $4.50 a loaf.

a bottle of beer?

It's easier to quote this if you do it by six pack, which is how grocery stores sell beer to you. At Ralph's, a citywide chain in Los Angeles, a six pack of Guinness Draft or Stella Artois will cost you $7.99. Sam Adams, a good American beer - $6.99.

 

Joe, you can't buy Hasbro figures (or any name brands) in the toy district in downtown L.A. It is mostly generic "stuff" you see, nothing from any of the major manufacturers. It's the kind of toys you would have seen in dime stores if we still had those kind of places .

 

You might be thinking of Frank & Son. It's a pretty incredible "one stop shopping" kind of place for toys, action figures, Hot Wheels, etcetera, all under one big warehouse roof. It's open on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Prices tend to be a tad high, I understand (it is near where I live so I go there to buy my SW comics, and don't pay attention to much else). But if you want a toy, chances are that one of the vendors at Frank & Son will have it.

It's about 25 miles from downtown Los Angeles, so it's only accessible by car. Here is the link: Frank & Son.

 

I would like to ask considering I am across the road if there is any basketball games on at the staples during the time of C4 or will the nba season be over?? Or even a dodgers game considering its not that far away
I could have gone and watched a game whilst at C3 as people were offering me tickets for $200 which if you got and watch a football game here in the uk is what you would pay the touts for big games.

 

NBA season will be over... Dodger schedule hasn't been finalized yet, I'm waiting for that to happen, will post as soon as I find anything out.

 

Thanks Valeda....I keep hearing how much higher the cost of living is in LA as opposed to the rest of the country but it looks like prices on basic items like food and merchandise is about the same (a little higher) as it is here in Southwest VA. Not so in London where everything costs an arm and a leg.