All’s Quiet On the Western Front

It’s that time of year again – work’s slow (I’m getting just enough work to fuck up my unemployment – I don’t mind. I love work), and I’m playing catch up with that stuff that gets shoved to the back burner when I’m busy.

I’m hanging paintings (some of them), reinforcing my shitty IKEA furniture (I love L-brackets, yes I do), going to the gym, catching up on blogs and email, riding the bike and taking advantage of a nearby beach.

I hadn’t realized though, just how much of my time the crazy in the old neighborhood occupied. I kind of don’t know what to do for free entertainment now.

No weirdos screaming outside my window at 3 am, no police chases, no Saturday night hipster-fests at the nearby cemetery, no random gunfire, no roaming packs of dogs, and the craziest neighbor I have is the very nice lady a few doors down whose entire English vocabulary consists of “good morning”.

Even the people who go through the trash for recyclables are nice.

I suppose I’ll get used to it eventually, but right now it’s making me nuts.

Filed under: Los Angeles, Non-Work

Sometimes it’s good to be a blogger

For some unknown reason, I managed to score an invite to the opening party/press clusterfuck of The Market at Santa Monica Place. I can’t find a decent link for it, but it’s a combination of very upscale food court and foodie destination for ‘artisan local products’.

All I know is there was tons of really, really good food being passed around (including fresh burrata from the salumeria) and lots of wine.

I’ve been trying to eat healthier lately, but I’m only human.

Fresh chocolate chip cookie? Yes, please.

Salted caramel ice cream? Pass it over.

Overly garnished fried thing on a plate? I don’t know what it is but, what the hell. You only live once.

Why yes, nice person at Rockenwagner bakery, I would like a goody bag to take home (breakfast this morning: pretzel rolls).

After going batty trying to take a good picture of Jonathan Gold (local food critic, bad posture), I gave up and just ate the good food, talked to the nice people and drank wine. Lots and lots of wine.

Surprisingly, I feel okay this morning, except for the cheese tummy, which will hopefully resolve itself before I have to go to work tonight.

Should you be in Los Angeles, I’d recommend Nice Cream (salted caramel ice cream. It’s like crack), Norcino Salumeria (the best mortadella I’ve had in a long, long time, and they made fresh burrata, so I love them forever),  and, well, just about every place in there.

I’m going to go try to bike off the cheese before work.

Filed under: Los Angeles, Non-Work, Off-Topic, Photos

Entrenched

A war has broken out at my gym.

Until recently, the gym played nice, soothing classical music in the ladies’ locker room (I have no idea what they play in the men’s locker room), which was nice.

For some reason, about a month ago they switched to jazz. Not the boring cardboard elevator stuff, but sax heavy jazzy jazz, which is also nice.

Who doesn’t like jazz, right?

Apparently, about half of the ladies at the gym. They hate the jazz with such a burning passion that they’ve gone on a rampage and are now attempting to have the saxophone de-certified as a legitimate musical instrument.

Now, battle lines are being drawn in the locker room.

An acquaintance was complaining about the jazz to me and I responded with “It’s not so bad – it’s Coltrane. It’s not like they’re playing gangster rap, right?”

The next time I saw her, I said hello, and she refused to speak to me. She then whispered to a friend of hers that I was one of ‘the jazz people’ and they both glared at me and stomped off.

A lady at the locker next to me leaned over and whispered “just ignore them. Those old Beethoven bags are all the same”.

Wow.

According to the nice folks at the front desk, the complaints on both sides are running high, and love/hate is right about 50 percent. I suspect the staff are enjoying this, as it’s a nice break from the normal complaints about the pool being too cold/too hot, the towels being too scratchy and there being nothing good on TV.

Filed under: life in LA, Non-Work

Friday Photo

Prop trees are usually just a trunk and the lower few branches, as generally on stage sets, one isn’t looking up at the ceiling.

How much of the tree one sees depends on the set – hence the palm tree with receptacles for additional fronds. Since this particular palm tree is located outside a set window,  we only see the bottom few fronds, so why bother to rent more? No one will ever see them.

Except the crew, of course, and we don’t count.

Filed under: Photos, studio lots, Work

Last day

We’ve now had our not so official last day of production – the main unit finished a week ago, but because they’re all on another show/ vacation/ really drunk right now we got one last day.
Although we all wanted it to go long to make some money, we got out in 10 hours, and then had margaritas (virgin of course. We’d never drink at work) on the stage and chatted for a bit before we went home.

It was nice to have one last day with a great crew before break.

Of course, the town’s totally dead right now, so I guess i need to get started on hanging pictures and (finally) unpacking the last of the boxes.

Filed under: Uncategorized

It’s hot, but at least I’m inside

So much for my theory that living near the beach would somehow prevent me from sweltering once the weather started to get warm.

It’s been unseasonably warm for May (or maybe just regular warm for May and I’m not used to it), and although I was always under the impression that it was cool at the beach, right now it’s not.

I suppose it’s cool compared to other areas of the city that are in valleys, though.

On the bright side, it’s so warm that it’s faster for me to dry clothes on the line outside than in the dryer.

Lucky for me the heat wave held off until I stopped working.

So today, it’s close to 90 degrees and I’m cowering inside my apartment, when I should be outside doing something fabulous, or at least interesting.

Maybe tomorrow.

Filed under: Non-Work