friday distraction

sadly, these are almost all true...

You Know You're From Southern California when:

You drive next to a Rolls Royce and don't notice.

You don't know anyone's phone number unless you check your cell phone.

Getting anywhere from point A to point B, no matter the distance, takes about "20 minutes".

You eat a different ethnic food for every meal.

If your destination is more than 5 minutes away on foot, you are definitely driving.

Calling your neighbors requires knowing their area code.

You really can never be too rich or too thin or too tan.

You think that Venice is a beach.

You know that if you drive two miles in any direction you will find a McDonald's, Subway, and Starbucks.

The gym is packed at 3pm on a workday.

You think you are better than the people who live "over the hill". It doesn't matter which side of the hill you live, you are just better than them, for whatever reason.

You know what "sigalert", "the PCH", and "the Five" mean.

an L.A. first for me

last night i was at my favorite frozen yogurt place getting yogurt. no, this isn't a first for me. i was waiting in line when i noticed the woman in front of me. i only noticed her because she was wearing a tank top and her shoulder bones were bursting through her skin. also, not a first for me. i examined her more closely and saw that her forearms and wrists where the smallest grossest things i had ever seen. and her hands were really aged. clearly i was looking at an anorexic woman. again, not a first for me in L.A. but as my eyes made their way down to her ankles, i noticed a peculiar thing. she had weights velcroed around her ankles. seriously. and they were huge! and it's not like she had come jogging in because she was wearing flip flops and real clothes. no, i really think she just wears ankle weights all the time. it looked absolutely ridiculous and, paired with her stick-like frame, it was actually quite sad. she did order a large yogurt rather than a medium so maybe the extra 20 calories will help. maybe not.

production office fun

if anyone has ever doubted how awesome it is to work on a major motion picture, these photos should squash all of those doubts.

here's a beach ball that got stuck in the rafters after a long night at the office.


after a fire sale on stuffed animals that our AD's son grew out of, rocky raccoon ended up lurking on top of our bookcase.


apparently we always lack energy because we got hooked up with a red bull fridge (that is always LIT UP like a grocery store display!) and all of the red bull we can drink. i think that's healthy.


no part of the day takes longer or causes more headaches than lunch. try picking a restaurant that 50 people agree on. no one can. so we had to resort to the Wheel...Of...Lunch!!!! exciting stuff.

really?

okay, i can't handle it any more. an employee here at work has started going to the gym every morning. no, that's not what i can't handle. but she works out and, for some reason, doesn't get ready at the gym but comes to the office and whips this out. she then proceeds to tweeze her eyebrows and apply her makeup. with the huge lighted mirror. on her desk! for real! i just see this as absolutely ridiculous. maybe it's the bulkiness of the plastic mirror or the fact it's plugged in and beaming flourescent light. but it's just weird. no one wants to see you tweeze your eyebrows.

this same girl takes out a brush and brushes her hair 20 strokes three times a day. seriously. SERIOUSLY. it reminds me of a 1950s schoolgirl or something and it is bugging me today!

it's getting hot in here, so take off all your clothes

i thought i'd borrow the lyrics of one of the classic songs of our generation to share with you a story of heat and sweat. it's not pretty. sure, every place in the country is hot right now. and sure, maybe even it's more humid where you are. but here's the thing...LA is not prepared for this type of weather. no one i know has air conditioning in their house. no one. so that means that during the day you're sweating just sitting on your couch and at night there are no amount of fans that can cool you down. oh, and guess what? LA is never this hot so most of the restaurants are not air-conditioned. they have a ton of outdoor patio seating though. i guess we could just walk around a mall...oh wait, we don't have indoor malls. dammit!

the past two mornings i've taken two showers. the first one i wash my hair. then i get out and blow dry my hair. then, after that, because i am overheating and dripping with sweat, i throw on a shower cap and take a cold shower. good times. the good news is that i'm the cleanest i've ever been.





p.s. happy getting old day fatso. we love you.

why i'm paid the big bucks

“Lisa, it’s Brett on line 1 for you.”

“Shit. Brett, the director Brett?”

“Yeah.”

“This can't be good...... Hello?”

“Lisa, what the fuck are you doing to me?”

“I don’t know Brett, what am I doing to you?”

“I don’t have a window seat. I’ve told you before that I have to have a fucking window seat. Don’t waste my time Lisa. Now I’m not getting on the plane.”

“Brett, I had you in a window seat on your flight yesterday but when you changed at the last minute, you took the last seat on this flight today. They couldn’t assign the seat until check-in.”

“But don’t waste my fucking time. If I had known that I didn’t have a window seat I wouldn’t have come all the way to the airport to NOT get on a plane. It’s a total waste of my time. In the future, just tell me I don’t have a window seat and I can stay home.”

“Okay, but – “

“You know I fucking am afraid to fly and I HAVE to have a window seat so I can see where I’m going.”

“Let me call the travel agent and see what I can do.”

“Forget it. The rep here is working on it.”

“I’m sure the rep will be able to get you a window seat. That’s why we hire and pay a special representative to check you in. I’m sure you’ll be able to fly.”

“I’m not so sure. We’ll see.”

Click.

Only in LA...

...does the local mall have a four-piece orchestra performing in the outdoor food court on the weekends.

...am I unemployed one hour and have an insane 15-hour a day job the next hour.

...does the neighborhood Vons grocery store have a pianist near the produce section.

...does it take 30 minutes to drive 3 miles.

...is there constant traffic between 6:30 a.m. and 9:30 p.m.

...is the airport PACKED at midnight.

...do I have to hear Ryan Seacrest on the radio AS WELL AS on the television.

...do you forget that people under the age of 16 and over the age of 55 exist.

...do you get charged $10 for a sandwich, burrito, or hamburger.

...do you get to watch a fountain dance to Donna Summer’s “Last Dance” and love it.

...do you eat breakfast next to Luke Perry, Dominic Monaghan (hobbit), and Katherine Heigl (Grey’s Anatomy...why don’t you watch it!?)

lord of the rings

amusing bumper sticker seen today in hollywood:

frodo failed.
bush has the ring.

you're really racist, ya know. no, seriously, you are. and you are and you are and you are...

so, here's the thing about "crash". sure, my hatred of the movie has developed and grown as the year has gone on because it has been receiving so much attention and so many awards. when i first walked out of the theater i just thought it wasn't that good. john's immediate hatred has been well documented but i just thought it was extremely over-rated. my main problem with it was the lack of subtlety. i've never seen a more ridiculously obvious movie that was trying so so hard to be controversial.

"In L.A., nobody touches you. We're always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something."

see, it's a metaphor. MET-A-PHOR. because there is a literal car crash in the movie (several in fact, why stop at one?) but it's also indicative of different races and cultures crashing into each other. get it?

i absolutely died laughing during 'crash's' best song number because the production was just as heavy handed as the film itself.

complete with a burning car and representations of all of the characters on stage, it was extremely moving. moving, that is, if you are an old white man with a lot of guilt. i suppose anyway. the real gem, and i'm sorry i couldn't find a picture of this, is when the guy dressed as a cop got behind a woman in a dress and reached through her legs and up her skirt, simulating a scene in the movie. just precious.

all that being said, i don't think 'crash' won best picture because the academy wasn't ready to give it to a gay movie. i just don't buy into that. in my tiny experience, i think that there is far more opportunity for homosexuals than minorities in this town. i've worked with many gay men and women but i unfortunately have to say that i've worked with very few black, asian, or latino men and women. basically none of the movies were stellar this year so it opened the door to a mediocre movie to come in and win. 'crash' won because the producers and lion's gate studio staged a HUGE marketing campaign in which they sent out more DVD screeners than any other film in history. it's an ensemble movie so when a large portion of the voters are actors, they love to vote for 'actor-y' films. besides, you know ludacris has a huge academy posse voting for him. and let's not underestimate the power of oprah who was hawking this movie for months.

to sum up my 'crash' lessons... thandie newton weighs 80 lbs and cannot act, in 2005 matt dillon was better in 'herbie: fully loaded', brendan fraser will forever be encino man, latino men with tattoos have cute kids, tony danza is totally underrated, and i better be more careful when i make racial slurs in public now.

only in LA

recently overheard...

"call in and caller #10 will receive a free surgical procedure at the beverly hills plastic surgery center!"
- d.j. on star 98.7

"this is fucking unbelievable. my trailer should be the closest to set. today i had to walk another 20 yards."
- director yelling at a p.a. on set and yes, someone did get fired for this.

"you can take my car, but don't touch my food. you can take my tv, but don't touch my food. you can take my man, but DON'T TOUCH MY FOOD."
- awesome big black woman laughing with her friends at roscoe's chicken and waffles. when it comes to roscoe's, i may agree with her.

"this underwear is cutting into my vagina and ass."
- female comedianne who believes jesus may love magic as she lifted up her skirt and showed the whole crew.

"he won't get into the car unless it's a black suburban with sirius satellite radio, a personal dvd and cd player, and stocked with fiji water, chewing gum, breath mints, a new york times, an l.a. times, a variety, and a hollywood reporter. and tell the driver not to talk to him."
- assistant to horrible untalented actor.

that's all for now but also a very happy birthday to leigh!

hollywood wonders

i've lived in LA for almost five years now. yikes. that's a while and i've formed a love-hate relationship with this city. we all know the bad things about it so i won't go into that. but there are some great places and things to do here that i would really miss if i moved. for five years i've been wanting to go to the hollywood bowl. but it never worked out. weekdays were hard because of work and the few summer weekends we had available just didn't seem to work out. but FINALLY we went to the hollywood bowl last night for a night with john williams and the LA philharmonic. and let me say that it is amazing. i wish i had brought my camera to take a picture of the venue becuase it's amazing. from the street you would never guess that this amazingly huge amphitheater is hiding among the trees. i really can't believe that this place continues to thrive because of two things. one, the seats are still only $14. (granted, the cheap seats but their still awesome). and two, you are allowed to bring in whatever food and drink you want. that's right, you heard me. tons of food, beer bottles, bottles of wine, etc. how does this work? yet it did. there were no drunk fights, no bottles thrown, etc. amazing. next time i'm bringing some serious alcohol.

BUT the best part of the night was a certain aspect of the crowd. john williams really is an amazing composer and all night we're listening to some of my favorite movie themes. at intermission i happen to glance behind me and i see these two people with these long white staffs or something. i whisper to john 'holy shit, i think those are lightsabers.' awesome. so then the concert continues and this song comes on that john and i don't recognize immediately. and that's because it's from the "new" star wars. something from episode one i think. but i KNEW it was star wars because suddenly these bright lights come on behind us. yup, the light sabers. the most professional intense light sabers i had ever seen. i look down into the rest of the darkened crowd and suddenly a few light sabers begin to pop up in the dark crowd of 18,000. just these little lights sticking out. john and i thought it was the funniest thing ever. boy, were hadn't even gotten started though. williams finished the episode one song and went on to indy and e.t. then for the finale, the orchestra goes right into it...the star wars theme. the real one. the rad one. (i'll admit it). but suddenly hundreds of light sabers are on!! way more than i had thought. and these nerds are getting up and running through the aisles with their light sabers a-blazing. it might have been one of the funniest things i've ever seen. damn i wish i had brought my camera. it was so amusing to me. i'm sure i didn't tell the story very well, but damn it was good.

if anyone here wants to go to the bowl one more time before the summer ends, lemme know.

l.a. by day

i'm unemployed. and my lack of blogging is deplorable. i'd apologize but i'm not sure anyone is still reading this crap so there's no one to apologize to. but i can't believe how hard it is to blog when you're not actually sitting at work in front of a computer all day and supposed to be doing other things. it's just hard to get motivated to sit down in this horrible broken "desk" chair in our 2nd bedroom/"office"/music room/crap room. doesn't exactly inspire.

day 10 of unemployment brings new awareness though. i've learned that pretty much all of l.a. must be unemployed because there's still traffic during the day, restaurants are still crowded, and shops are still bustling. i guess the out of work actors, writers, musicians, and producers have a lot of free time like me. i've also learned that pigeons are the anti-christ. maybe not all of them but the three that like to perch in the eaves of our front patio and shit all over the nice slate-tiled ground. i HATE them. i shoo them away and they come back one minute later. last week i resorted to extreme measures. i made the trek to the store and bought an owl. yes, an owl. a blowup plastic owl. and hung it on the patio. it looks so trashy and awful but it's keeping away the birds. and their shit. so i will keep the owl up. with great pains to my aesthetic side. oh well.

what else? had an awesome awesome bridal shower courtesy of ten percent, my sister, and my friend katie. opened more real wrapped presents than i had since i was fourteen and drank the most champagne ever. subsequently experienced the worst headache ever. i went to see a taping of 'american idol' (don't be jealous), and have been going on hikes and chilling in starbucks. then there was that day i read a book in barnes and noble. i felt like i was stealing but no one bothered me.

that's basically it. unemployment is no big party every day. i keep having to stop myself from spending money i don't have. up next? more wedding stuff in san diego. pray that i survive all of this time with my family.

l.a. livin'

there are definitely good and bad things about living in l.a. i won't bore you with the bad things because you already know them. but the good things are often forgotten. especially the main great plus about this town...the reason i choose to live here...my love of movies and television. this weekend the gods of hollywood rewarded me with two tickets to an event that the Museum of Television and Radio puts on. They feature a different television show throughout the series and generally the cast and creator/writer/producer shows up to do a panel and answer some questions from the audience. saturday i went to the LOST event and it was awesome.

i am a huge fan of the show so that was helpful. and i am in love with a few of the male cast members so that was helpful as well. but i'd forgotten what it's like to really be an EXTREME fan living and working outside of hollywood. sure, i once slept on the streets of downtown and stayed awake for 72 hours just to be in the Oscars bleacher seats. but ahh, how hollywood has jaded me. but this sold-out event was crawling with uber-fans. some had flown in from the east coast. some had been in line for good seats since 6am. some had pages and pages of photos and memorabilia. some (many) had started fan websites. some had cool nicknames for the cast and knew details of their schedule and behind the scenes info. but there i was, almost the last in line i had sauntered in after grabbing a latte. it was daunting. sure, call them 'nerds' or whatever (and we did - more my fiance than me of course), but they had a certain charm about them. i loved when one woman stood up with the mic and told daniel dae-kim (who i learned that internet fans call DDK) that his "web mistress" says hello. rad. and after the session was over, i loved to see the fans rush the stage to meet their idols. that must be cool to get so excited about a television show or actor. sure, it's sort of bullshit, but i miss that.

flowing through the streets

i was walking the other day... had to park and walk to a store. sadly though, the store and parking lot were not right next door to each other so i had to walk through some hollywood streets. now, it's not the best neighborhood, but it's definitely not dangerous. i did feel slightly out of place as i heard my work high heels clicking on the sidewalk. but i just pulled my wool pea coat more tightly around me and tried to walk faster. passed the first homeless person who politely asked me if i could spare some change on the way back to my car. 'that was nice' i thought and decided to give him something on the way back.

after my brief shopping trip i started back towards my car. suddenly i was startled when i noticed a man/woman squatting behind a parked car. my first thought was 'hmm...man or woman?'. my second thought was, 'why is he/she squatting?' and my third thought was 'oh no! really?'. yes, really. i could hear the reason that the man/woman was squatting start to hit the concrete and trickle down the block so i started booking it back. even though those damn high heels were killing my feet. when i got to the nice homeless dude i promptly gave him a $5 bill and thought 'it's for not pissing on me.'

though people probably pay a lot more than that to have people piss on them.

my summer with manny perry

or why i love zach braff.

to me, this is hysterical. maybe you have to live in LA to get it, but damn, i love it. check out zach's liner notes for his garden state soundtrack:

Special Thanks from Zach: I'd like to thank Bonnie, Jake, Josh, Cary, Chad, Myron, Rachel, Amanda Demme, Buck Damon and all the artists that very generously agreed to cut the fees for their music so we could afford to put them in Garden State. I'd also like to thank "Manny" the stunt guy in the anti-piracy announcements that play before every movie I see. We didn't have any stunts in the movie, but if we did, I would have said "Hey, let's get Manny, not just because he needs the dough, but because he knows lots of stunt guy jargon and that would be funny to hear him say words like "ram."

for more manny perry fun, visit this site.

i kid you not

included in the notes from a producer after the director's cut screening...
note #35, part j:

When Jeff approaches Samantha's legs hanging down from air pocket use the shot of the bathing suit pulled tight against her crotch.

lord have mercy.

reason to laugh this morning as i drove into work at 8:15am

a license plate frame that said:

I'd rather be at a Clay Aiken concert

classic.

i love l.a.

my current favorite sign in LA is on Olympic Blvd. which, if you don't know, is a major thoroughfare in los angeles that just happens to have half of its lanes blocked off right now.

"Construction on Olympic through October 2005. Use alternate route."

October 2005. you heard me right. wow. that's reassuring. so i just have to put up with this increased traffic and construction noise for the next YEAR AND A HALF. by that time i'll be married, taryn will be married, we'll have honeymooned, i'll be living with john, and i'll be in a different job. jesus christ.

someone up there hates me

really hates me. and i'm not specifically saying it's God, but it may be. if it is him, he's got a sick sense of humor.

my 2nd assistant left and for a week now i've been doing both jobs. and it's not wondeful and i have to get here way early, but it's okay. my boss has been urging me to get a temp to help but i've always said that they're more trouble than they're worth. and i don't want them fucking my shit up. but finally yesterday i gave in and called a temp in for today. now, i don't get to pick the person. but i was praying he or she wasn't lame because i have to sit next to them all day.

so in walks this blonde. cute, perky. but i didn't judge her. i was nice and tried to make conversation. and in this conversation, she says, "yeah, i'm really an actress but pilot season is over so there's no work. so i thought i'd just temp." yeah, an actress. kill me now. but i'm still willing to give her a chance. i mean, how can you really screw up photocopying? right? WRONG. i seriously can't believe it. i give her one thing to do, i even write down instructions, and she seriously fucks it up. i mean, something a 5 year old could do. it was putting papers in mailboxes that we're clearly labeled with people's names. and she put them in the wrong mailboxes. i am so pissed off. and if you know me, you know i despise stupid people. (and that, yes, i'm a bitch.)

and the winner of best bumper sticker of all time is....

"I LOVE BOOBIES!!"

a bumper sticker handmade (from stick-on letters) seen on the 5 freeway on the way down to san diego. the offender? a dorky looking white kid who couldn't have been more than 17. the looks that the kid was getting as cars passed him was worth the gas money i spent on driving down.