Dexter – Page 2 – IAMNOTASTALKER

March 16, 2010June 16, 2011

Marix Tex Mex Cafe – Jennifer Aniston’s Favorite Restaurant

Two weeks ago, while out doing some Oscar Weekend stalking, I dragged my fiancé to Marix Tex Mex Cafe in West Hollywood, a restaurant which has long been one of my girl Jen Aniston’s favorite places to dine. And while Jen has always been pretty vocal about her love of Mexican food and margaritas, I had never actually heard of the eatery until last year when a woman in one of my acting classes mentioned that she had spotted the actress there on numerous occasions. Well, let me tell you, I just about died upon hearing that! For whatever reason, though, I had yet to stalk the restaurant. So, when I realized that my fiancé and I were in the West Hollywood vicinity this past Oscar Weekend, I begged him to make a little lunchtime pit stop at the Tex Mex hot spot. It should come as no surprise that the Grim Cheaper was not AT ALL keen on the idea of grabbing a bite to eat at a place frequented by a famous actress, as he thought the prices would be outrageously expensive. I am happy to report, though, that Marix was EXTREMELY reasonable and that even the Grim Cheaper enjoyed himself while there! 🙂

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Marix is an absolutely ADORABLE little restaurant tucked away off of Santa Monica Boulevard on a tree-lined side street in uber-hip West Hollywood. The eatery is small, casual, and intimate and it’s not at all hard to see why Jen frequents the place. Not to mention the fact that it serves up some fabulous food! Like FABULOUS! The chicken fajitas were A-MA-ZING, as were the tortilla chips and fresh salsa. I literally gorged myself while there. The Marix staff also could NOT have been more friendly and I am happy to report that the place lacks any of the pretentiousness that is usually prevalent in L.A. area restaurants. I literally cannot say enough good things about the place and wish I lived closer so that I could frequent it more often.

Marix Tex Mex Cafe has actually been a long time favorite of Jen’s and was even mentioned way back in December of 2001 in this People Magazine article about the star. According to my friend from acting class, Jen can usually be spotted on the restaurant’s SUPER CUTE front patio which is pictured above. I hear Jen doesn’t frequent the place as much as she used to, though, thanks to the paparazzi who discovered the celebrity hot spot a few years ago and have been a constant presence ever since. Other stars who have dined at the eatery include Jessica Simpson and her BFF/hair stylist Ken Paves, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, and their daughter Coco, Kate Hudson, Oliver Hudson, Ian Ziering, Brad Pitt, Angie Everhart, Dexter’s Michael C. Hall and Jennifer Carpenter, Ron Livingston, Gwen Stefani, Gavin Rossdale, Pamela Anderson, Michelle Rodriguez, Wanda Sykes, The Biggest Loser’s Bob Harper, and Wilson Cruz of My So-Called Life fame.

And while we didn’t run into Jen while dining there, we did spot former Bachelorette contestant Jerry Ferris at the table directly in front of us. I noticed Jerry pretty much immediately upon sitting down, but, while I knew he was famous, neither my fiancé nor I could place who he was. I asked our waitress if she recognized him and she in turn asked the other servers on duty, but no one seemed to have any idea whether or not he was even famous. Am I the only person who watched Season Three of The Bachelorette???? LOL Anyway, by that time I was going absolutely crazy because I KNEW I recognized Jerry, but could not for the life of me figure out from where. Then all of a sudden it hit me like a ton of bricks – sitting in front of me was the man who had stolen America’s heart (or at least mine) on Jen Schefft’s season of The Bachelorette. I had absolutely LOVED Jerry on the series and was actually lucky enough to have met him shortly after his reality TV stint ended just about five years ago. Well, as soon as I figured out it was him, I told my fiancé I wanted to ask for a photograph, but that I felt bad since he was eating at the time, to which the Grim Cheaper said, “You ALREADY have a photograph with the guy (pictured above) – please do NOT bother him again.” LOL Sadly, I listened to the GC and did not go up to Jerry (HMPH!), but I really regret doing so as he had been a TOTAL sweetheart to me when I met him back in 2005. Ah well! Maybe I’ll run into Jerry during my next Marix stalk. 😉

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Marix Tex Mex Cafe is located at 1108 North Flores Street in West Hollywood. They also have a second location which can be found at 118 Entrada Drive in Santa Monica. You can visit the Marix website here.

January 12, 2010January 11, 2010

Dexter and Rita’s House from “Dexter”

This past weekend, I dragged my fiancé out to Long Beach – or as Snoop Dogg calls it “The LBC” – to do some stalking. My original plan was to book a room at the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort and Spa – the spot currently standing in for the Beverly Hills Beach Club on 90210 – and spend the whole weekend down in the South Bay, but being that I could not find a room for under $270, the Grim Cheaper was having none of that. 🙁 So, I had to settle for spending only a single day in Long Beach, which actually worked out just fine as I managed to cram quite a bit of stalking into that 12 hour period. 🙂 And the first location I stalked? Dexter and Rita Morgan’s new home from the fourth season of fave television series, Dexter.

In the premiere episode of Season 4, which was entitled “Living The Dream”, Dexter (aka Michael C. Hall) and Rita (aka Julie Benz) move into a new home together after tying the knot in the previous season’s finale. Ironically enough, though, until making screen captures for this post earlier today, I had never actually seen their new house onscreen. Because my fiancé and I only just recently became Dexter fans, we have yet to see any of the series’ fourth season episodes. In fact, we are just now beginning to dive into Season 3. But even though we have yet to see the episodes in which the new home appears, I was still absolutely dying to stalk the place as I have a (very) small personal connection to it. As it turns out, some good friends of mine who live in the Long Beach area happen to know the people who live directly across the street from the new Morgan residence, in the home pictured above which was actually featured very briefly in Dexter’s Season 4 opener. So cool!!! Because my friends know my penchant for filming locations, as soon as they learned this information they passed it on to me, but sadly this was long after the filming of Season 4 had already wrapped. I so wish I had found out about this location earlier in the year, as I would have LOVED to have stalked the place and seen Michael C. Hall in person. I do love me some MCH! 🙂 Anyway, since we were in the area on Saturday, I just had to drag my fiancé out to stalk the home.

And I am very happy to report that the Dexter house looks EXACTLY the same in person as it did onscreen in Season 4. Even the address plaque and the mailbox are the same! In fact, the only difference I noticed, besides the fact that the house appears a bit more pinkish onscreen, is the front gate. On Dexter, the house’s front gate is made of polished wood, while in real life it is constructed of wrought iron. The Dexter house is extremely cute in person and it’s not very hard to see why producers chose it to stand in for the Miami area residence of the series’ main star – the place definitely gives off a Florida vibe.

I did notice something quite interesting while stalking the place, though. At first glance it would appear that Dexter’s home is a typical single-family residence, but while there I noticed that the curb out front had two address numbers – 3319 and 3321 – painted on it, as you can see in the above photograph.

So, when I got home I did some cyber-stalking and, thanks to Zillow, discovered that the property is actually a multi-family dwelling with one house located in the front and a second house situated out back. You can see both houses in the above aerial images. The front house, which is the one shown on Dexter, was built in 1922 and is a 3 bedroom, 1 bath dwelling measuring 2,219 square feet.

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Let’s all keep our fingers crossed that this same house is used on Dexter next season, as well, and that I’ll be able to make it out there to watch the show being taped live!!! How incredibly cool would that be? 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Dexter and Rita’s new house from Season 4 of Dexter is located at 3319 East 1st Street in the Bluff Park neighborhood of Long Beach.

September 30, 2009September 27, 2009

Lila’s Apartment Building on Dexter

A few months ago, my fiancé and I started watching the Showtime television series Dexter and I have to say that it didn’t take very long for the two of us to become completely and totally obsessed with it. So, as I’m sure you can probably imagine, I’ve also become pretty obsessed lately with the Seeing Stars website page that catalogs the many filming locations featured on the show. In fact, I can’t even watch an episode of Dexter now without having my laptop next to me and open to the site! LOL Anyway, after my fiancé and I had finished watching the series’ second season, I was absolutely dying to stalk the apartment building belonging to Dexter’s psychopathic girlfriend Lila Tournay on the show. And, while I actually could NOT stand the character of Lila, I absolutely loved her loft-style apartment, which is one of the main reasons I wanted to stalk it. But that’s not actually the whole story. The biggest reason that I wanted to stalk it is that it was actually thanks to Lila’s building that fellow stalker Chas was able to locate the Girls Just Want to Have Fun apartment for me. Apparently, Gary from Seeing Stars was having a hard time tracking down Lila’s building, so he enlisted the help of master stalker Chas in his hunt. And while Lila’s building and the GJWTHF building don’t look all that much alike, they do both have central courtyards and are both made out of brick. So, during his search for Gary, Chas came across the GJWTHF apartment and took a close look at it. And, while he quickly realized that it wasn’t the Dexter building, he remembered it later when I mentioned my GJWTHF quest. And the rest, as they say, is history! If it hadn’t been for Dexter, it’s quite possible Chas never would have found the GJWTHF apartment, and because of that, Lila’s building will always hold a VERY special place in my heart. 🙂

The exterior of Lila’s apartment building was shown repeatedly throughout Dexter’s second season, beginning with the episode entitled “Dex, Lies, and Videotape”, and I am very happy to report that it looks exactly the same in person as it did on the show. Well, sort of!

As it turns out, the view of the building shown on Dexter is not actually the view of the building that is visible from the street. The view featured on the show is actually the building’s side entrance, which can only be reached via a gated parking lot located just East of the complex. You can compare the view shown on Dexter to the street view of the building in the screen capture and photograph pictured above. As you can see, they look nothing alike.

But if you go around to the East side of the building, you’ll see the entrance that was shown on Dexter, looking much the same as it did in the series. 🙂

Sadly, though, that entrance is located behind a locked gate and is not accessible to the public. But as it turns out, when Chas stalked the building back in February of this year, the stalking gods were smiling down on him because he was actually invited onto the property! 🙂 As fate would have it, when Chas first showed up to stalk Lila’s place, a gentleman happened to be outside painting the gate and when he noticed Chas snapping photographs, he, of course, asked why. When Chas explained that the building was featured on Dexter, a show which the painter had never heard of LOL, he opened the gate and allowed Chas to step inside to get some better photographs. YAY! You can see Chas’ pictures here.

And while the interior of Lila’s apartment was actually filmed on a soundstage at Sunset Gower Studios and not at this location, as you can see in the sign pictured above, the building is actually made up of loft-style apartments just like Lila’s. 🙂

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Big THANK YOU to Chas for finding this location! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Lila’s apartment building from the television series Dexter is located at 6201 Yucca Street in Hollywood.