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I COULD feel my body softening with each wave of my masseuse’s hand.

She scrubbed in circular motions, massaging the salt into my skin until it sparkled like the sea just beyond the spa door.

Salt, it turns out, is so much more than just a seasoning to sprinkle on your food — especially here on this picturesque stretch of Majorca’s southern coast.

I was staying at recently-opened five-star hotel Iberostar Selection Es Trenc, in the town of Colonia de Sant Jordi, half an hour’s drive from Palma airport.

It oozes relaxation, with its seafront location, ocean-coloured decor and knock-out spa treatments.

The hotel is also big on using local produce — including the nearby salt flats’ Flor de Sal.

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This is used in massages and scrubs, as well as food served at the hotel and even cocktails.

Keep your eyes peeled for the picante salt, used to rim some of the hotel’s signature cocktails like mezcalitas and spicy margaritas.

Should you wish, you can visit the salt flats — a 20-minute cab ride from the hotel and home to fabulous wildlife.

You can even try harvesting some salt — it’s harder than it looks, but you’ll leave with your own jar of the flakes.

If that’s not enough physical exertion, the Iberostar Selection Es Trenc also offers rental bikes.

I weaved my way along the sun-drenched local roads for a gentle ten minutes toward the Far de la Colonia de Sant Jordi lighthouse.

The views from here are breathtaking and great for photos.

Those who prefer a more intense workout can pick from kickboxing, TRX gym work and Zumba classes.

I opted instead for a dip in the pool on the hotel’s rooftop terrace, also used for sunrise yoga classes.

I’m sadly not a very nimble yogi, but did join a session and felt serenely relaxed.

Not that I needed to unwind any more — the hotel is designed so every room has a sea view, and I opened my curtains each morning to soothing views of the waves.

Another treat is the hotel’s a la carte restaurant, Salvient, which has a homely feel.

It takes its name from the Spanish word for salt — sal — and you will not struggle to guess why.

If you’ve developed a taste for Es Trenc’s “white gold”, as the locals call it, make sure to order the dentex — a sea bream-style fish cooked whole and served on a huge bed of salt.

The large fish can be shared with family or friends, but was so light and flaky I reckon I could have eaten the entire thing by myself.

Or the hotel has a buffet-style restaurant — and there’s plenty of restaurants in town, too.

5Illes restaurant, by the town beach and about a 15-minute walk from the Iberostar, is well worth a visit.

It specialises in rice dishes and my paella was one of the best I’ve ever tasted, served sizzling in a large pan and stacked with seafood.

Tummy well and truly satisfied, I ended my Majorca getaway with a private boat trip around the island to soak up my final sunset.

I’m not sure what was better — the view from the Iberostar rooftop or this one from the sea.

As long as I have a salt-rimmed cocktail in hand, who cares?

Brace yourself, Coronado. The hospitality maven who brought San Diego its most over-the-top maximalist hotel — the Lafayette in North Park — is back with another glitzy project, this time in the wealthy island city known for its traditional bent.

Opening Thursday, Baby Grand includes a 35-foot faux rock wall, a 20-foot waterfall, a Mediterranean restaurant that feels like a Greek ruin being consumed by a jungle and a hidden oyster bar full of crystal and mirrors. All of this, including the Spanish statuary, Moroccan fixtures and Murano glass, is squeezed onto an Orange Avenue lot that once held a 1950s motel. If Liberace had run away with an art historian, they might have landed here.

The idea was “to create this little mirage within the mirage that is Coronado,” said Arsalun Tafazoli, founder of CH Projects, the group behind a multitude of design-intensive establishments across San Diego including the speakeasy Raised by Wolves, the hi-fi listening bar Part Time Lover and the Middle Eastern restaurant Leila.

The Baby Grand hotel and its restaurant Night Hawk stands along Orange Avenue about a block from the Hotel del Coronado.

The patio dining area of Coronado’s new Night Hawk includes seating for about 150.

Baby Grand’s high-density, high-gloss environment, which cost about $17 million and took about five years to complete, will come as no surprise to those who have followed Tafazoli’s earlier ventures.

Asked about the design philosophy behind the 2023 renovation of the Lafayette — the company’s first hotel — Tafazoli had a simple answer: “More is more.”

The Baby Grand project, put together in collaboration with design studio Post Company, is cut from the same cloth, describing itself as a “polychromatic pastiche” on its website. The goal, Tafazoli said, is to enrich Coronado’s culture and give people a respite in an anxiety-ridden time. But “it is different,” he said. “I don’t know if it is going to be embraced.”

Getting the necessary city permissions “was definitely a struggle,” Tafazoli said. “Had I known how difficult this was going to be, I don’t know …”

In the days before the hotel’s opening, Tafazoli, 44, led a tour of the site. The entrepreneur, whose heritage is Persian, wore his hair in braids and a button-down Supreme shirt featuring Barack Obama.

The Baby Grand hotel’s guest rooms feature separate tub and shower.

“I have a very one-dimensional existence. I’m single. I have no kids. This is what I do,” said Tafazoli, who grew up in San Diego and studied at UC San Diego. He lives now in downtown San Diego’s East Village, where his company is based and where his first CH venture, Neighborhood, opened in 2007.

Though his company started with eating and drinking establishments, Tafazoli said, his goals were always to create and run hotels, “the pinnacle of hospitality.” As a child of divorce, he said, he may have a heightened awareness of when the energy feels right in a room and when it doesn’t. Creating social environments, he said, gives him some control over that. Moreover, he added later, “beauty is important to me, because it conveys care.”

To make the most of Baby Grand’s compact location (2/3 of an acre), the CH team has exported parking. Instead of leaving their cars on site, guests will hand keys to valets who will deposit vehicles in a Bank of America parking structure a block away. That move freed up space for not only palm trees, torches, tables, booths and 21 pieces of statuary from Spain, but also a little faux beach with a 4-foot-deep wading pool that can hold a handful of people.

“I can’t tell you how many iterations of sand were brought in and taken out,” Tafazoli said. “Sand is its own universe. You want local sand. But local sand was not conducive to that feeling.” So the sand is from Turkey.

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1. Guest shower in an en suite bathroom. 2. Hotel design touches include guest bathroom door handles. 3. Fiberglass clamshells serve as headboard in guest rooms.

The property’s main restaurant, Night Hawk, is Mediterranean, with cooking by open fire, a Greek ruins vibe and seating for about 150. The second restaurant lurks behind the lobby — a hidden oyster-and-Champagne bar that holds about 35 people, reservation only. The space, called Fallen Empire, features red mohair booths, built-in Champagne buckets, mirrored walls and chandeliers, sconces and lamps from the Italian glass-blowing island of Murano. The floor is a custom mosaic of sea creatures.

There are 31 guest rooms, beginning at $350 per night. Each is dominated by a custom-made clamshell headboard (fiberglass). Beds are surrounded by animal-print seating, parquet oak flooring, marble tables, mirrored cabinets and custom wallpaper. The rooms measure roughly 300 square feet each, nearly half of that space taken up by their elaborate bathrooms, each with separate tub and shower, sinks from Morocco.

Now picture all of that placed in the heart of Coronado (population 20,192), which sits next to Naval Air Station North Island and is known for attracting well-heeled retirees. The median home value is $2.5 million.

Up the block from the Baby Grand is the grand dame of San Diego County tourism, the Hotel del Coronado, which went up in 1888, completed a $550-million renovation last year and starts its rates north of $600. Another option is the Bower Coronado, also a dramatically upgraded motel that reopened in 2025 with prices similar to Baby Grand’s but a much more buttoned-down style.

This view from above at the Night Hawk restaurant space shows a stone booth, elaborately patterned cushion and table top.

All of those properties stand close to Coronado’s wide, sandy beaches — which means they all face challenges as waters are often fouled by the northward flow of untreated sewage from greater Tijuana. The longstanding problem has worsened in recent years, and Coronado’s Central Beach was closed to bathers on 129 days in 2025 because of unsafe bacteria levels. The U.S. and Mexican government say they have sewage-treatment projects in progress, with improvements expected by the end of 2027.

“We are, unfortunately, not marine scientists just a group of deeply overcaffeinated hoteliers with strong opinions about lighting, linen textures, and good design. So please check local water conditions before swimming,” Tafazoli wrote in a statement.

Asked his target market for the new hotel, Tafazoli said he was looking close to home.

“I see this as a staycation for locals” from San Diego County, Tafazoli said. “The big risk is that we don’t get locals and it doesn’t resonate with tourists who like the status quo.”

That said, Baby Grand and Coronado might be a better match than some imagine. Christine Stokes, executive director of the Coronado Historical Assn. and Museum, sees at least a few parallels to Baby Grand in local history, beginning with the historical association’s own building. From the 1950s into the 1990s, Stokes noted in an email, Marco’s Restaurant operated in the space, with a “Roman Room” bar — “a dark and immersive hidden gem where bartenders performed sleight-of-hand magic tricks.”

Guest rooms, including No. 103, are labeled with inscribed brass clamshells.

Then there was the Hotel del Coronado’s Circus Room restaurant, open from the 1930s into the 1960s. That was “an immersive environment, using specialized murals and striped tents on the walls,” Stokes wrote. It’s also where, in 1950, the manager of an L.A. TV station spotted a promising young piano player and decided to give him a chance on screen. The pianist’s name was Liberace.

However people respond to the particulars of the new hotel, Tafazoli said, he knows that the larger setting of Coronado is a special place.

From his office in San Diego’s East Village, “it’s a six-minute drive,” he said. “I come off that bridge, and I feel like I’m in a different place.” It’s amazing, he said, “to be so close and feel so far away.”

The Dodgers added a bounce-back candidate to their organization’s outfield depth, trading for Diamondbacks center fielder Alek Thomas on Tuesday.

In exchange, the Dodgers sent 18-year-old outfielder Jose Requena to the Diamondbacks. They also designated outfielder Michael Siani for assignment to clear a spot on the 40-man roster.

Thomas, in his fifth major-league season, had a slow start to the year after establishing himself as a standout for Team Mexico in the World Baseball Classic.

“He’s an absolute stud,” Team Mexico manager Benji Gil told reporters after Thomas went three-for-three with a home run against Team Brazil. “He’s about to have a breakout year. I think he’s going to become a perennial All-Star, a Gold Glove candidate every single year.”

Thomas’ offensive production, however, didn’t continue into the regular season. He was hitting .181 with a .563 OPS when the Diamondbacks designated him for assignment last week.

The Dodgers signed Requena out of Caracas, Venezuela in January, and he has yet to appear in a professional game.

Siani, who the Dodgers twice claimed off waivers this offseason, had a .659 OPS in Triple-A Oklahoma City.

WASHINGTON — An attack on the White House correspondents’ dinner by a gunman who came within feet of the ballroom where President Trump sat raised immediate questions about the night’s security protocol — and the future of large, high-profile events in a country with easy access to firearms and increasingly high political tensions.

The man breached metal detectors in front of the Washington Hilton ballroom and sprinted dozens of feet ahead before exchanging fire with federal agents. Shots were fired in an anteroom that had not an hour before seen thousands of guests, including senior government officials, streaming through.

A manifesto allegedly written by the suspect described his targets as members of the Trump administration, ranking from the highest to the lowest — but said he was willing to “go through” any guest standing in his way in order to kill the president’s aides.

The attempted attack on a room full of dignitaries underscored domestic unrest in Trump’s second term and deepened questions about how to effectively create security in a modern era of lone actors, online radicalization and mass shootings. It was the third known time an attempted assassin has come close to Trump since his 2024 presidential campaign began.

Acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche on Sunday called the U.S. Secret Service response a “massive security success story.” But within hours of the incident, bipartisan leaders of the House Oversight Committee demanded a hearing on the agency’s security plans for the dinner.

In the manifesto sent to his family, the alleged gunman, Cole Tomas Allen, of Torrance, marveled at a lack of security.

“No damn security. Not in transport. Not in the hotel. Not in the event,” he wrote. “I walk in with multiple weapons and not a single person there considers the possibility that I could be a threat.”

The Hilton, in a ritzy Washington neighborhood, has long hosted the White House correspondents’ dinner. It is the same hotel where President Reagan and three others were shot in 1981.

The shooting caused terror among guests, some of whom noted they had expected more security to enter the event and Trump was whisked offstage within the first minute of shots being fired. While the event has traditionally hosted sitting presidents in the past, Trump’s decision this year to appear for the first time since taking office made the event particularly high profile.

His presence, alongside Vice President JD Vance and much of the Cabinet and line of succession, brought with it added security protocols and personnel — raising questions over whether the storied dinner and its guests of congressional members, diplomats and mid-level officials would have been even more susceptible to attack without Trump in attendance.

Trump on Sunday said it is “tough” to secure a hotel in the middle of a city with “buildings all around and hotel rooms on top,” but praised the Secret Service and law enforcement officers. One officer was shot, not fatally.

Talking to reporters after the incident Saturday night, Trump swiftly likened it to the attempt on his life by a gunman in Butler, Pa., during the 2024 presidential campaign, and suggested that it justified his controversial plans to construct a fortified ballroom on the White House grounds. He called the hotel “not a particularly secure building,” though he later said the room was “very, very secure.”

Plans to reschedule the dinner are under review. White House Correspondents’ Assn. President Wiejia Jiang of CBS News said the organization’s board would meet to assess what had happened.

Blanche said Sunday an investigation into what had happened was ongoing. He had attended a reception before the dinner on the first floor of the hotel hosted by CBS News, one of many that did not require any security check by law enforcement authorities.

“The first takeaway, or the takeaway that should be obvious, is that the system worked. And that we stopped the suspect, and we stopped him as soon as he tried to do what he was trying to do,” Blanche said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

But the attack raises a question about whether presidential security protocols are effective for modern tactics, or whether the country is “in a new domain” in which those procedures no longer meet the nature of the possible threats, said Neil Shortland, director of the Center for Terrorism and Security Studies at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.

Federal investigators should examine what the security policies were, what type of attacks they were designed to prevent, and whether that protocol was out of date, Shortland said.

“Did you follow the policy is a great question,” he said. “Was the policy correct in this modern day and for this modern situation is a separate question.”

The country is facing “the most complex threat environment in our nation’s history,” particularly from lone actors who are often radicalized online, Sam Vinograd, a former official at the Department of Homeland Security, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“It can be true that law enforcement and intelligence professionals prepared exhaustively for last night,” she said Sunday. “But it can also be true that in this moment, in this security environment, the paradigms of the past may not be sufficient to meet the moment.”

That raises the “need to rethink what it is going to take to actually secure these mass gatherings,” she said.

Trump appeared to voice the same idea Saturday evening, telling reporters, “Today, we need levels of security that probably nobody’s ever seen before.” He went on to say that “this is why we have to have” the East Wing ballroom, which he described as drone-proof and having bulletproof glass.

Kris Brown, president of the gun control organization Brady — which is named after Reagan’s press secretary, James Brady, who was shot in the 1981 attack — said lawmakers should instead consider passing legislation to help prevent gun violence.

“Not every public event can take place in the ballroom, in that kind of protection — nor can we afford to live in a society where our solution to gun violence is to barricade our public officials, our children, away in fortresses,” Brown said.

About 2,000 journalists, dignitaries and other guests attended the event, rushing through rain to enter using multiple hotel entrances. They were asked to show their tickets as they walked past security guards, but there was no check-in procedure or ID check. A Times reporter was waved toward the entrance without showing a ticket as she tried to get it out of her purse.

Inside, guests milled about on multiple levels where pre-dinner receptions were occurring. Hotel guests mingled with the crowd, granted full access to the hotel’s amenities, including its boutiques and restaurants.

Two protesters briefly took over a small red carpet where guests were lined up to take professional photos; Times reporters saw a third woman dressed in a formal gown and shouting protest slogans being escorted out by security guards after apparently having entered the event.

Guests were required to flash their tickets to go down an escalator to the ballroom level, then present the ticket before walking through metal detectors and having bags searched ahead of the ballroom entrance.

Allen, who had reserved a room as a hotel guest, said in his manifesto obtained by the New York Post that security was far less stringent than he had expected. Two U.S. officials told The Times that the contents of the manifesto are authentic.

“I expected security cameras at every bend, bugged hotel rooms, armed agents every 10 feet, metal detectors out the wazoo. What I got (who knows, maybe they’re pranking me!) is nothing,” he wrote.

He noted that security guards appeared to be focused on protesters and arrivals outside, writing, “apparently no one thought about what happens if someone checks in the day before.”

It is possible that steps to further restrict access to the ballroom level, keep guests away from the event location and check attendees’ identities outside could have provided additional security, said Erin Kearns, director of law enforcement partnerships at the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology and Education Center.

“The lesson that can be taken away is just thinking about how to harden and strengthen security at future events when you have so many high-profile people,” she said.

The hotel was a “soft target” with a makeshift perimeter, and there were “almost zero intervention points” where the shooter could have been apprehended before arriving, Shortland said. That was partly because he traveled by train, which does not have security screenings.

Authorities should also examine whether Allen was known to authorities and, if so, whether intelligence operatives could have pieced together his train travel and arrival in the president’s orbit, Shortland said.

The attempted shooting added to a growing list of instances of political violence in the United States. Last year, one Minnesota state legislator and her spouse were killed by a gunman while another lawmaker and his wife survived; the conservative activist Charlie Kirk — whose wife, Erika, was in attendance Saturday — was shot and killed at a speaking event; an arsonist attacked the residence of Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro.

Some of that violence has been directed toward Trump, something he frequently talks about. He was injured in the Butler incident, but has used his survival to argue that God saved him so he could become president. Two months later, a Secret Service agent shot at a gunman pointing a rifle on Trump’s golf course as the president golfed.

On Feb. 22, an armed man was shot and killed after entering the secure perimeter around Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, when the president was in Washington.

“It’s always shocking when something like this happens. It’s happened to me a little bit,” Trump said Saturday.

Luxury hotel designer Tatiana Sheveleva, who has worked with brands such as The Ritz-Carlton and St. Regis, has been involved in some remarkable projects and knows a thing or two about hospitality

A luxury hotel designer has revealed the key feature in every room that guests might miss, but it can make a huge difference.

Tatiana Sheveleva, originally from Kazakhstan but living in Toronto, Canada, has been a luxury hospitality designer, including for hotels, resorts and yachts, for 15 years and runs her company, Chapi Design. During her creative career, she’s worked on incredible projects with major brands, including St. Regis Hotels, The Ritz-Carlton, and The Luxury Collection.

These projects have taken Tatiana all over the world, designing interiors for hotels and resorts in Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Peru, Antigua, Orlando, Nashville, and Toronto. She’s even designed a luxury yacht for the Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection, Luminara, which boasts 226 suites with private terraces, five restaurants, seven bars, and a wine vault.

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One of Tatiana’s most recent projects was for St. Regis in Cap Cana, Dominican Republic, which was completed last year. “I like to do big properties, and everything we design [at Chapi Design] is custom-made,” Tatiana told the Mirror, “I have been very fortunate to work on different properties around the world.

“But it’s still so surreal for me that I’m working on the most amazing properties in the world, even though I have been doing this for 15 years.”

With a wealth of expertise on luxury interior designs, Tatiana revealed that there’s one key element in every hotel room that guests regularly miss.

The designer said: “The most money is spent on the headboard. Typically, it’s the most expensive piece as it’s often a feature. How you design the headboard depends on the bed’s location, and it can be a strong element of the project’s narrative.”

Tatiana revealed another important feature of any hotel room. “I would say the bathroom, believe it or not. It always gives the guests a good impression, and it’s the first place they go when they check into the room.

“The bathroom area is important. If you design a very unique layout for the washroom, people will start to talk about it. In the washroom, you can create something very sculptural and unique.

“If you are successful enough to create this interesting washroom, first of all, people will be spending more time there, they will have a bath and feel more relaxed. And actually, we spend a lot of our time in there.”

She added: “The light in the bathroom should be accommodating for different scenarios, bright enough to put on make-up but cosy and romantic at the same time. For me, every single washroom I design is very unique.”

Another feature of a hotel room that Tatania argues warrants attention is the bed.

“The mattress has to be comfortable, and the bedding. Also, there might be special glasses by the bedside table; it’s these details,” she said.

The designer likes to add a special feature inside the closet, such as interesting wallpaper, a splash of color, or a pretty stone.

“That’s a unique element you don’t notice right away, but you notice it after,” she added.

For Tatiana, the joy of the job comes from travelling and working with different people. She said: “The whole process is quite fun, and during this process, you get to meet a lot of interesting people who are passionate about projects. I also like to investigate new locations and new countries, because when I was in Kazakhstan, I didn’t really travel much. So, my first project for St. Regis was in Mexico, and it was my dream to go there.

“Mexico has a very unique culture, it’s very colourful, there’s amazing food, and they use alot of bright colours – there’s a lot of celebrations. It was very different, and I was very excited about that. The Dominican Republic is the same. It’s very comfortable, the people and land, it’s very nice.”

And her travels aren’t stopping anytime soon. Tatiana is currently working on mega interior design projects for St. Regis in Costa Rica, The Luxury Collection Hotel in Mexico, and Luxury Hotels in Peru and Antigua, and some projects can take as long as six years to complete.

You can read more about Tatiana’s projects on the Chapi Design website. You can also follow their Instagram page.

Do you have a travel story to share? Email webtravel@reachplc.com

I have a “big” birthday coming up. It’s the big 70 (gulp!). I’d like to throw myself a party, but one that might seem more fit for a 7-year-old than a 70-year-old (except when it comes to the food). I would like for there to be activities or games such as scavenger hunts, escape rooms, billiards, pinball, karaoke, pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey — you name it. But my friends and I also appreciate gourmet-quality food like the stuff that’s served at Providence, Crustacean and Mélisse. Is there any way to combine all of that into a party for 20-30 people? — Marla Levine

Looking for things to do in L.A.? Ask us your questions and our expert guides will share highly specific recommendations.

Here’s what we suggest:

Marla, I love that you want to celebrate your milestone birthday in a playful way that sparks your inner child. Who says you can’t run around and play games with your friends just because you’re a “grown-up”?

Similar to you, I prefer fun activities over stuffy, formal parties. I’ve celebrated my birthday at a go-kart racing track and a bowling alley. One year, I hosted an adult field day at the park with sack races, water balloons and snow cones, so I have some fun ideas for you. While many of these spots don’t offer gourmet-level cuisine — unless you consider chicken tenders and fries fancy — I’ve paired them with nearby restaurants that you can walk to. Depending on your vibe, you can do the activity first then walk to dinner, or vice versa.

One of my favorite adult-only barcades in Los Angeles is EightyTwo in the Arts District. Not only is it nestled between an array of bars, shops and restaurants, it is home to more than 50 vintage pinball and arcade machines. They have all of the classics like “Donkey Kong,” “Galaga,” “Mario Bros.,” “Ms. Pac-Man” and “Mortal Kombat.” On certain nights, you can catch live DJ sets as well. For a meal, consider the Michelin-recommended restaurant Manuela, which received a stamp of approval from the late Times restaurant critic Jonathan Gold. Tucked inside of the Hauser & Wirth complex, Manuela is a farm-to-table establishment with a variety of modern American bites to choose from. Whatever you do, be sure to order cream biscuits for the table.

An activity that instantly makes me feel like a kid again is singing — OK, more like belting — my favorite song into a microphone while surrounded by loved ones. One of the coolest karaoke spots in L.A. is Break Room 86, a nostalgic speakeasy hidden inside Koreatown’s Line hotel, which has private karaoke rooms, live DJs (and sometimes dancers, including a Michael Jackson impersonator) and an ice cream truck that serves boozy ice cream and Jell-O shots. Times senior food editor Danielle Dorsey says, “Entering the bar feels like you’ve stepped through an ’80s time machine with vintage arcade games, stacks of box TVs with static-fuzzy screens and tape cassettes decorating the walls.” Break Room 86 doesn’t open until 9 p.m., so check out Openaire for a sunset dinner. Led by Michelin-starred chef Josiah Citrin (the same guy behind one of your favorites, Mélisse), the rooftop restaurant offers elevated American fare such as a brick-pressed jidori chicken and grilled branzino — and it’s inside a glorious light-filled greenhouse.

Another spot that would make for an enjoyable birthday celebration is Highland Park Bowl, the oldest functioning bowling alley in L.A. Built in 1927 during the Prohibition era, the venue still has that vintage aesthetic with old pinsetters that serve as chandeliers, a revamped mural from the 1930s and eight refurbished bowling lanes. There’s also a billiards room and a full bar (with a tasty cocktail menu that rotates twice a year). When you get hungry, take a quick walk to Checker Hall, a neighborhood bar and restaurant that serves California-Mediterranean food such as skewers, turkish chicken and chicken schnitzel. Actor-comedian Hannah Pilkes told The Times it’s her “favorite bar in all of L.A.” How she described it: “It has the best cocktails and it almost feels like you’re in New Orleans when you step inside. It has a beautiful patio overlooking Highland Park. The decor is funky and kitschy yet classy; it’s magical.” Afterward, you can take another short walk to Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams for a sweet treat (if you don’t have a cake).

My colleague Todd Martens, who writes about theme parks and immersive experiences, says it’s difficult to find escape rooms that can accommodate 20 to 30 people, but if you don’t mind splitting up and staggering your start times, check out Hatch Escapes near Koreatown. The venue can accommodate about 10 people at a time. Martens wrote about their room called “the Ladder,” which he describes as a “90-minute interactive movie with puzzles, taking guests through five decades, beginning in the 1950s, in which they will play an exaggerated game of corporate life.” The room “incorporates a wide variety of games, puzzles, as well as film and animation,” he adds. If this theme doesn’t spark your interest, there are three other options, including “Lab Rat,” which can accommodate 12 people.

You sound like a fun person, so I have a feeling that anything you do will be a good time. I hope that these suggestions are helpful in planning your special day. If you end up visiting any of these spots, please send us a photo. We’d love to see it. Happy birthday!

Back when late-night TV sets were still the primary route for a comedian to reach a mainstream audience, Ari Shaffir found a different way to make his mark. It started with creating a show where comics could tell completely uncensored, unhinged real-life stories. What started as a live show grew into “This Is Not Happening” on Comedy Central, and later, into “Ari Shaffir’s Renamed Storytelling Show,” building a loyal fan base along the way, with clips still making the rounds 15 years later.

Supporting shows leads to new opportunities, and while Shaffir’s latest chapter may close the book on his storytelling run, his final offering is certainly a strong one. Aptly titled “The End,” and taped live at the Box NYC, this seven-part series will be released and available for purchase through YMH Studios on Thursday , and it’s jam-packed with comedians that quite literally might kill you. Especially one.

The lineup is too stacked to leave anyone out, so buckle up for wild, unforgettable stories from Shaffir, Tom Segura, Ali Siddiq, Nate Bargatze, Tony Hinchcliffe, Ms. Pat, Shane Gillis, Sam Tallent, Steph Tolev, Jim Breuer, Robert Kelly, Chris Distefano, Big Jay Oakerson, Jordan Jensen, Joe List, Steve Simeone, Mark Normand, Duncan Trussell, Roy Wood Jr., Jessa Reed, Sarah Tollemache, Dan Soder and Colum Tyrrell.

Dan Soder, left, and Shane Gillis appear in Chapter 6.

(Troy Conrad)

Everyone’s stories are so next–level, and I almost choke-laughed and died during Ms. Pat’s. It also looks incredible, tell me everything about the room.

Ari Shaffir: The room is called the Box, and it’s this burlesque place. Or maybe you call it modern burlesque because it’s not just those feathers. I really don’t know, but I feel like burlesque has evolved and that’s what this place is. It’s kinda crazy, and it’s definitely a night out. Dave Chappelle used to have these “comedian balls,” which were so cool because he would just invite comics. Like, all of the comics. He’d invite everyone out and pretty much without saying it was like, talk to each other and trade ideas about the industry. It was just so cool in there, and we scouted a bunch of places, but the look of this place, it was just right.

It makes so much sense that the room is called the Box now, visually.

What you saw wasn’t even color-corrected, so I appreciate it. I went to test the sound because we put the stage in a different place. It moves around and we just thought it looked better with all the red, but I wanted to hear what the sound was like when they were not on the stage too. They were like, oh the emcee will have a cordless as they move around, and I watched it, and it was great. But man, I was so f— up on molly that I was grinding my teeth so hard that I cracked a molar, so yeah, that place rules!

Ali Siddiq appears in Chapter 7.

(Troy Conrad)

Well, the room took my breath away, kinda like the lord took your solid tooth away. It’ll make sense to fans of your podcast You Be Trippin’ that ‘The End’ is produced by YMH Studios, but how did this series even end up happening?

Tom [Segura] and I have a relationship, we were openers for Rogan together, and we were kinda broke together, so we just talk about things. He’s so funny and prolific and I like talking things out with him. I talked to him about doing my special “Jew” too, but they were busy with the show, and you know back then, people weren’t jumping on getting into YouTube specials. So I had a chance to think about doing this show over the pandemic and finally was like, alright, let’s start working on this, and they said, “Come talk to us about it because we can help you now.” They have a great infrastructure there, and a streaming service too, so it’s like they already have everything built in, and Tom was like, “Dude, this show meant a lot to me, and we should make it again.” It’s not going to be a huge moneymaker for Tom, you know, it’s like pro bono work for lawyers, so it’s really cool of them. Another cool thing about this is the way the staff kicked in too. They’re all super talented, and kind of wasting their time on podcasts because they’re more talented than that, but it’s cool to work with a family and I liked the way they really took ownership of the work they did.

They’re a well-oiled machine of fun over there! With so many wild stories in the mix, is there anyone you are especially excited for people to see?

I’m excited to show some people new people. Even with the live shows, it’s always like, let me show you two headliners you know, a mid-level guy you’ll know and let me show you two people that you just don’t know. That’s what stand-up is in New York, L.A. and even Austin. There are some killers no one has ever heard of, and they’re destroyers. So I’m excited to show people Colum Tyrrell because he rules, he’s so funny, and his story is great. Tony Hinchcliffe’s story was really good, he’s just a monster storyteller in every sense of the word now. I just rewatched all of these a few times in a row for sound, and Roy Wood Jr. is so smooth it makes me feel like I’m needy and insecure on the stage. He’s just so calm and so good you’re like, “Damn, I’ve never been this smooth.” Sam Tallent is going to be one people talk about, Jim Breuer is so great, Steph Tolev crushed it with something fun and interesting and wow, this is really tough. Every time I’m doing a promo for this show it’s like, but what about this person, and this one?

It was also nice to see past killers on, definitely love to see the classics doing something new.

Yeah, having Big Jay [Oakerson] back was a key because he’s on the Mount Rushmore of this show, and we have three of those on “The End.” Jay, Ms. Pat and Ali Siddiq. We couldn’t get Sean Patton out because he was shooting something, and Bert [Kreischer] had a movie or something with his daughter moving or maybe it was a graduation…

Ms. Pat, from left, Ari Shaffir, Dan Soder, Duncan Trussell, Shane Gillis and Colum Tyrrell.

(Troy Conrad)

What a funny world, though, if Bert Kreischer paid to have a graduation moved so he could do your show.

Yes! Just pay the school to move the graduation for a week! Don’t you make like $50 million a year? It’s so funny how it used to be crazy to think of someone making $100 million and now there are like 10 comics who make at least half of that. And without doing press! It is really cool, though, I haven’t paid for lunch in so long. And Ali Siddiq has become so huge, he’s like the success story of this storytelling show in its entirety. Everyone got helped a little bit, but Ali kind of broke off of these stories and to see him so successful and still so smooth, it’s really cool. You can’t be “niche” doing arenas, and there’s this independent boom that’s not going to wait for anybody. So it’s another big win for us, it’s our turn in the whole story of this.

So then is this really “The End” or could it be a new start?

There is a very, very small percentage of a chance that it comes back. The plan is that this is it, and that’s why we called it that. I’m just glad you liked the show. I’m glad you liked the look and the intimacy, and that you picked up on all of that. It feels so long ago that you forget, but that’s so awesome to hear because it was a lot of fun. I think comedy fans that knew about the show before will want to see more of it because it’s just this funny televised storytelling, and they missed it. And everything turns over every five years anyway, so new people can now be like, actual stories being told like this in front of an audience? What is this cool new thing?