You can never find one when you want one

My garden, while only about a mile from where I used to live, is currently 8 miles away.

Interestingly, it takes the exact same amount of time to drive as it does to bike, and since the bike doesn’t burn $4 a gallon gas I usually prefer to ride than drive.

But lately I’ve had this shoulder issue, and it seems to cycle (no pun intended) between ‘getting better’ and  ‘won’t this thing ever stop fucking hurting’.

Today’s physical therapy appointment wasn’t until noon, and since I’ve been in a ‘getting better’ phase, I decided to bike instead of drive. Hey, I’m unemployed and gas is expensive (for the US).

So I hopped on the bike and headed out. I swear I behaved – I didn’t lean on the handlebars and I stayed off of the drops. I got to the garden fine – no pain and I felt really good. I dumped my veggie scraps into my compost bin, watered the seedlings (leeks, rutabegas, parsnips, beets and celery that looks like it’s not going to come up), admired the out-of-control fava beans (looks like I’m in for another 50 lb harvest from my tiny plot), and weeded for a few minutes.

I then headed out as I needed to be at the PT place.

About a mile into the return trip, I started hurting. Bad.

I then, for the first time in my life, decided to do the sensible thing and catch a bus back home.

I found a bus stop and sat. And sat, and sat and sat.

With the clock ticking (can’t be late, don’t want to anger tiny Asian woman who is torturing me), I decided that I couldn’t wait any longer and started riding, figuring eventually a bus would catch up to me and then I could give my poor shoulder some rest.

Except no bus came. I kept looking over my shoulder, hoping I’d see something – anything. Any bus would do.

Nope. Nothing.

Normally, when I’m biking, I have to avoid being flattened by a bus approximately every five minutes, so the complete lack of buses just when I really needed one was maddening.

Every time I looked back and didn’t see a bus, I’d let loose with a torrent of language that would likely shock a sailor. At one traffic light, a police car pulled up beside me, and the nice officer asked me what the problem was.

“I’m hurting and need to catch a bus, but now I can’t find one.”

“So.. they’re just like cops, then?”

Yes, indeed. Just like cops. Only not on a frantic manhunt which involves several innocent drivers getting shot up.

I finally saw a bus two block from my apartment.

Bastards.

Filed under: cranky, humor, life in LA, Los Angeles, mishaps, Non-Work, bike, buses, cars, compost bin, crime, gardening, Los Angeles, manhunt, police, transit, transportation

It’s the 6th day that gets you

The problem with six day weeks isn’t days one through five. Those days are fine. Long and filled with silliness, but fine.

Nope it’s the 6th day. That’s the shitty day. The day when one hurts as soon as me gets out of bed. The day when one can’t seem to focus or remember much for longer than a few minutes.

Sunday, I got up, shuffled to the kitchen and stared into the fridge for about a minute before I realized that everything inside had gone bad and would need to be thrown out.

I then did laundry, shuffled around aimlessly and then went back to bed.

I’ve started out our last week tired and unable to think – and  this week will most likely be 14 hours every day with 10 hour turnaround every night.

So I come home and make some incoherent notes and then go to bed.

The posts are there, I just haven’t gotten to them yet – When I can, I’ll go back and actually post them. I know it’s ‘blog cheating’, but it’ll still be entertaining, I promise.

I’m off to work after the Monday 10 hour turnaround for the Tuesday 14 hour  day.

Filed under: cranky, locations, movies, up all night, Work

The beginning of the end, maybe?

This past weekend was a real eye-opener for me. I knew the industry was slow here in Los Angeles, but when I sat in a continuing education classroom at Contract Services with a bunch of guys who are usually always busy (and I mean always), all anyone could talk about was  how thin work has gotten around here.

Yikes. If the heavy hitters aren’t making ends meet, what hope do the rest of us have? I’m currently getting enough work to keep the wolves at bay, but that, of course, can change at any time.

For those of you not familiar, over the past few years several other states (and countries) have been handing producers suitcases full of cash in order to lure film production away from California. I think the technical term is incentives, but really it’s a bribe.

And it’s worked very successfully.  There is currently almost no production in California, but Louisiana and Georgia (the newcomer to the world of corporate kickbacks) are hopping.

I love my job and I’d like to keep doing it, but I’d rather drink poison than move to Georgia or Louisiana (nothing personal, you understand), so the question is how long I can hang on. An added complication is my being  well past the age of being able to snag a rich husband.

Note to parents of girls: Look at my life. This is what happens when you teach your daughters self-reliance. They end up alone, without  Botox, veneers, or overpriced sports cars and worrying about how to pay the bills.

I just have myself and the cat, so as long as I can get enough hours to keep my health insurance, I’ll tighten my belt and soldier on.

But what about the people with families?

One state ends their sop and another starts up. Since most of these subsidies actually cost the states money (currently for every dollar of film revenue that Louisiana brings in, it spends $7.30*), it’s baffling that they keep doing it, but I’m certainly not one to underestimate the capability of humans to not in any way, shape or form learn from our mistakes.

Most of us who have spent our entire working lives in the film industry have skills that don’t easily translate to the real world, and even if we do decide to branch out, we have resumes that are confusing and frightening to anyone not familiar with the transient nature of film production (“No, it’s the same job, for the same people.. just with a different name on the letter head”).

So Wednesday, I have a career counseling appointment at The Actors’ Fund to see if I have any chance of any sort of work at all once production in California dries up for good.

Or, even better,  if I can manage to start some sort of business that legally appropriates taxpayer money just like the studios are doing.

I suspect not, but we’ll see.

*http://www.labudget.org/lbp/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/LBP-Report.Louisiana-Film-Tax-Credits.pdf

Filed under: cranky, life in LA, rants, California, film, FilmWorks LA, movie, Runaway Production

Friday Photo

Earlier this week, I worked 40 hours in three days, with a five hour turnaround (one show to another, so there’s no minimum) between day two and day three.

Although I knew it was going to hurt, I wasn’t prepared to still be exhausted two days later.  Guess I’m getting old.

So, since I still can’t think and am planning on doing a lot of napping today, here’s a photo:

From a reality show about cooking (hence the restaurant setting). Careful what you say!

Filed under: camera, cranky, Photos, up all night, Work, photo, reality show

Some weeks are better than others

This week started out so well. Work’s picking up, the weather’s been gorgeous, etc…

Until Tuesday, when I decided to go to the grocery store, and because I needed some bulky stuff, I took the car.

Midway through my backing out of my parking space in the six-space carport, the neighbor’s little rat-dog ran across the alley and under my wheels, and in an attempt not to flatten said rat-dog, I swerved and hit the support post instead.

Which would have been fine, except my current car is apparently made of vacu-formed tinfoil as the low-speed oopsie resulted in the following:

One torn off driver’s side mirror

One severely dented front driver’s side door.

One fucked up front quarter panel.

One fucked up front bumper.

One $500 deductible.

One rat-dog owner refusing to admit that she’s at fault.

Awesome. So now, I’m on the hook for five Benjamins and my car has to go to the body shop for an undisclosed amount of time.

Also, I’ve spent eons on the phone with said insurance company and will now get a point on my license and jacked-up rates for the foreseeable future.

Lucky for me my insurance covers a portion of the rental car – not all of it, of course, but some of it.

Gods bless America.

So for the next week or so, I’ll be driving a Prius, which is what the rental car company gave me. Side of smug is on the house.

And five days of work turned into three.

How was your week?

Filed under: cranky, life in LA, mishaps, Non-Work, Off-Topic, overspending, California, car, dog owner, Los Angeles, money, oopsie, quarter panel, rental car company, side mirror

Why I lie.

Sometimes, when someone asks me what I do for a living, I make something up. Usually, it’s something boring, like data entry, telephone customer service, or prostitution.
I can usually get a feel for when I need to lie – but today while I was at  the gym I missed it, probably due to fatigue after having worked out.
I’ve seen the lady many times before, both in the locker room and on the gym floor, and she’s always seemed nice enough. Today, she waited until I was naked, then asked me what I did for a living, and due to oxygen deprivation after a swim I told her I worked set lighting.
She paused,  then asked me if there were any way I could get a script to Past Her Prime Starlet.
I tried to explain to her that PHPS would likely not even speak to us dirty toolbelt people, and probably wouldn’t even hit her brakes if she saw one of us in a crosswalk, so my attempting to get a script to her was futile at best and a fast track to the ‘don’t call her to work any more’ category at worst.
She just kept telling me I should help her out, and I kept trying to explain to her that she was, as they say, barking up the wrong tree.
Remind me next time someone asks to tell them I pull cans out of the garbage for a living.

Filed under: cranky, Non-Work

Gaaah!

All this internet synchronicity stuff is supposed to make everyone’s lives easier.  Applications talk to each other, share bookmarks, recipes, plans for world domination, etc..

Everything’s automatic, so humanity can waste away our lives playing video games. Or something.

Until it stops working.

Now, all of a sudden, Twitter and Facebook aren’t speaking to one another and despite my telling them to work it out and get over it, there’s still an internet stony silence.

After upgrading my cell plan,  I now have a smart phone (which is turning out not to be all that smart). I’m told that I can do all sorts of things with it, except when it posts something to a blog (this one or the couch blog), Twitter, Facebook and the RSS reader don’t see it.  Also the formatting’s seriously fucked up.

Which sucks, because one of the reasons I got the smart phone was to make updating the blog easier. And to play time-wasting games.

Of course, there’s no way on any of the mobile apps to change this sort of setting, and no matter how hard I press the buttons on the ‘real’ computer, nothing changes.

The ‘smart’ phone also has a battery life of approximately 15 seconds, so instead of uploading clever shit to the internet, I now spend most of my day frantically searching for someplace – anyplace – to charge the damn phone before it dies and I can’t call ’911′ when some axe murderer appears out of nowhere and attempts to say hello.

Stupid phone. Stupid internet. Stupid technology.

I’d also like to take this time to mention that any ads you see on the blog are placed there by WordPress. I have nothing to do with them, I get nothing from them and I can’t turn them off no matter how hard I try.

Filed under: cranky, Non-Work, Off-Topic, rants

Corporate vandalism in a broke city

DISCLAIMER: I did a long-ish bike ride in the heat today and am tired and cranky. Lector Caveo.

As you may or may not know, the city of Los Angeles is broke. Even more broke than the proverbial joke. They’re cutting back on services to the needy, laying off police,  firefighters and teachers in an attempt to make ends meet.

One of the financial responsibilities of the city is graffiti removal. On vertical surfaces, this involves juvenile delinquents (the ones who got caught) slapping a coat of paint that doesn’t quite match the building over the graffiti, and it’s done.

But stuff that’s been sprayed on sidewalks requires a skilled crew to come out with a sandblaster, at what I can’t imagine is a small expense.

Did I mention the city’s broke? Yes, yes I did.  So you can imagine how upset I was when I saw this:

Yup. That’s a misguided attempt at ‘viral marketing’ spray painted on a city sidewalk.

It’s going to have to be sandblasted off, costing the city money that it doesn’t have.  

Of course, the city won’t go after these idiots for the removal costs, but they should.  Also of course, someone’s being robbed right now and there’s no police around because they’ve had their hours cut.

Assholes. Straining a broke city’s resources because some ad agency asshat wanted to try out that newfangled stuff that the kids like.


So fuck you, overpriced flip-flops and the worthless shit-stain of an agency you rode in on.


If I find the person who cooked up this ‘idea’, I’m going to beat them to death with their own copy of Adweek. Or an overpriced flip-flop. Whichever’s closer.

Filed under: cranky, life in LA, Los Angeles, Non-Work, Off-Topic, Photos, rants

Long nights make short tempers

The problem with afternoon calls is that everyone starts the day in ‘death march’ mode – we know it’s going to be long night and since most of us weren’t able to sleep all day for various reasons we’re not starting out the day particularly fresh.

For me, the worst time of night is right around 3 am. I haven’t gotten that pre-dawn second wind yet, the coffee’s stopped working and all I really want to do is jump in my car, yell “see ya, suckers” and go home. Of course, that would result in my no longer getting work calls, so I just have to stick around and suffer. You’d think it would make me feel better that everyone else is just as tired and miserable, but no.

Production delays are worse when one is tired, the crafty’s worse when one is tired, the fact that the caterer put fucking capers in the goddamn chicken again is worse when one is tired and there’s no end in sight.

So all of us started out Friday in vile moods, and when everyone on the crew’s cranky it just creates this endless loop of sour grapes from which there is no exit.

This was made worse by our boss deciding to get pissed off about the crappy equipment we have in our lighting package.

Boss: “What the fuck is wrong with this stuff? Why can’t we get equipment that’s in proper working order?”

Me: “Because when we loaded in the lamp dock were out of all the good stuff and they won’t let us sub-rent* anything, so we’re stuck with this crap.”

Boss: “Unacceptable. Do something about it.”

Me: (pause)”Okay.”

Boss: “And stop fucking blinking so much”

It just went downhill from there. It’s worth noting that our boss is normally a really nice guy, but late call + slow director = cranky. The fact that they kept adding and dropping a move to another stage didn’t help the general mood (“Wait.. are we moving still?” “Last I heard, but let’s ask again in 5 minutes and see if the answer’s changed”)

By the time the impossible happened and we actually did have an 8 hour day it was too late. The cranky had taken hold of everyone. I went home, had a couple of martinis, decided to skip that night’s installment of the battle of the claws (Me: “Just let me trim those” Cat: “NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!”) and start fresh the next morning.

Of course, my next door neighbors chose Saturday to have a garage sale. Right outside my window. They’ve recently acquired a smallish yappy-type dog which, also of course, decided to start yapping right about 8 am.

Eventually, I decided to leave rather than give into the temptation to kick the dog and the neighbors into next week, only to find my driveway blocked by a nice lady who refused to move her car as she was busy perusing the selection of heavily used muffin tins.

When I finally did get to leave, I went to the gym and swam for almost two hours, which improved my mood greatly. After a decent night’s sleep, I feel almost human today.

*sub-rent: when a rental house doesn’t have a particular bit of equipment, they’ll rent it from another company and add it to the package. For obvious reasons, rental houses don’t like to do this.

Filed under: cranky, up all night, Work

Stop me before I kill again.

Although I really wanted to grab the camera, hop in the car and go somewhere scenic and cooler than LA (like up to the redwoods), since unnecessary driving is no longer on the agenda around here I decided to use my holiday weekend to catch up on some of the around-the-house type stuff I’ve been putting off.

My project this weekend was installing some shelving in what I generously refer to as the ‘office’. Really, it’s what is called in Los Angeles apartment nomenclature as a “junior bedroom”, which really means a large closet used to justify a ’2 bedroom’ rating and thus more rent. Of course, I don’t use it as an office so much as a repository for the flotsam that doesn’t have anywhere else to go – most of which is books, so shelves would give the appearance that I’m organized. Or at least that I care.

So, I drove up into the valley, fought the crowds at the local Swedish furniture warehouse, bought some of the unfinished wood shelving, wrestled it into the truck and somehow got it home.

I decided against trying to finish the shelves – the humidity is still at tropical levels around here, so I’m guessing it would take the varnish about 30 years to dry completely, and it’s still way too hot to even think about sanding anything.

If you’ve never purchased furniture from said Swedish furniture warehouse, it’s all flat-packed and has to be assembled with some of the most fucked-up instructions I’ve ever seen. In an attempt to only print one set of instructions for the entire world, they’ve decided that hieroglyphs are the best choice of instruction for assemble-at-home furniture. There are little line drawings of bits of what I can only assume are the shelves being attached to each other with a hexagonal bolts (wrench not included, of course. Thankfully I happen to have a socket set and a power drill).

The main problem is that the recommended method of assembly and installation is simply not physically possible.

I don’t mean ‘difficult for one person’ or ‘impossible after a few drinks’. I mean it’s not physically possible to put the fucking shelves together the way the stick figures are doing it in the little paper.

Although the idea that the furniture should be assembled while flat on the floor and then ‘Iwo Jima-ed‘ into place looks great on paper, I knew from the get-go that it wasn’t going to go well as I purchased a configuration that has corner pieces, since I needed shelving on perpendicular walls.

If the hieroglyphs were to be believed,  the shelving units also had to be connected to one another for structural integrity which made my original plan of just building them individually and bolting them to the wall unworkable.

I decide to try the recommended method of building them flat on the floor first, and it went well until I got to the corner piece, where it became completely impossible to build as the floor was no longer supporting anything, and to lift and a corner shelving unit with one half-assembled end sticking straight up into the air is surprisingly heavy and unbelievably awkward. Several attempts to lift the thing resulted in a nasty bump on the head, a cut on the shin and several deep gouges in the wood floor.

I then threatened to kill the person who had drawn the instructions.

Next, I tried to just assemble the back side, lift that into place and then bolt the front uprights onto the units while they were, well, upright. That failed as well and resulted in my threatening to find and kill whoever designed the damn things in the first place.

By this time the cat and my neighbor had both wisely hidden (guess the screamed obscenities rattled them. The neighbor, at least. I would imagine the cat’s used to them by now) somewhere while I had a temper tantrum, threw some things, threatened to kill a few more Swedes just for practice and then decided that if I’ve ever really, truly needed a drink, that was the time – medication be damned.

After I’d calmed down, I made the trek back up to the store, bought extra uprights and made each section a stand alone bookcase, lined them up and bolted everything to the wall, despite the warnings from the store’s personnel that this would create a dark, unstable-shelving magic which would lead to a politician selecting a completely unqualified redneck as a running mate in the presidential race…

Whoops.

Sorry about that. But I did get the shelves in and they’re loaded up with books (and camera gear, and painting stuff) and they’re still holding.

So far, I’ve only got one day of work this week, but it’s a short week so I didn’t have my hopes up to begin with.

How was your weekend?

Filed under: cranky, humor, mishaps, Non-Work, Off-Topic, rants, do it yourself, furniture, garbage, hillbilly, holiday, home, house, IKEA, Sarah Palin, shelves, travel, vacation