Barfor and Frangelico: A Chronology of Miracles

Barfor shouldn't bequeath it. He frumpled right down on the ledge and sconed. "Boughwood pay and this patten?" But he could gormulate no dancer. He slept for Frangelico. He slept gormley for Frangelico.

TO BE CONTINUED

Barfor and Frangelico: A Prehistory of Events

Barfor squeamed. He was trundled, to be sure. Flecked betwine the crook and the callet, our young bletch slopped the gush from his tips and baited for the call to poot. He could not be taut with an Elian at his wide. But were there crunching Welsh? The snot made him vervous. He perched from high to high, but not too sidely. Their fission were tooth in portent. Fun waltz hooves, and it were clover, ponth or no.

Frangelico was in double and Barfor could gormley notch. As Frangelico rowly dredged into the roarmy ree, his packador snarled and snacked, woely snushing from its tips in the wake of a primitine beast. Frangelico was effably munxed. He was a blight to be!

Keeping Frangelico in double, our young bletch rose. The Gornstable was in vain. Suddenly a pot sang out.

“Too bad,” huxed the Gornstable wainly. “I never vie on the Ponth of Olender.”

TO BE CONTINUED

HD Diva D.

I got an Xbox 360 a little while ago. Anybody who knows me knows that this is heresy, as I’ve been a Nintendo loyalist ever since the Super Nintendo vs. Sega Fagasis (okay) console war of 1991. When my friend’s mom referred to video game systems collectively as “Segas,” it made me sick. I mean come on, lady. They’re “Nintendos.” Get some effing perspective.

And then there was this Playstation thing. Did you know that Nintendo originally commissioned Sony to design a console that would play all Super Nintendo games as well as newer, CD-based titles? Well, they fuckin’ did. Then it turned out that Sony had hoodwinked Nintendo into handing all game rights on the SNES-CD format over to Sony. Well, I’d collapse all negotiations too. Good on you, Nintendo! We had 32 MORE bits to suck on!

So anyway, Microsoft comes along and says they’re gonna make a console too. By this time ol’ Segs is getting a little long in the tooth, and their Gaycast is dead. They’re making games for other consoles. Fine. But now Microsoft has a console in the pipes? Don’t they make computers or soe’en? Nevermind that the name they’ve chosen is pure gorgeous simplicity. Xbox. Sexbox. Or that at this point Nintendo was going to call their latest system the “Star Cube.” Whatever, I like it. It’s positive. The point is, videogame systems are meant to be called “Nintendos” by moms and that’s fuckin that.

Well, the next console war rolls around and here’s Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, at it again. The rollout is a little more staggered than before because Sony and Microsoft want to drop their systems as soon as they can get away with it. And they do. But here’s something curious - for an update to a system that made such a splash the first time around, the Xbox 360 makes hardly a ripple. And saddled under the weight of its internal Blu-Ray drive, the PlayStation 3 costs about as much as the Queen’s diamond dingleberries and is about as tough to procure.

Moms, and everyone else, found the Wii to be their solution. Just as Nintendo had (n)intended, their motion-based controller appealed to absolutely everybody, and soon all of us were swinging a golf club in our living rooms because, holy shit, it made us go "wii"! Nintendo had introduced an entirely new demographic to video gaming – the casual homebody. Plus, the name sounds like another name for “dick.” Now THAT’S sexy.

So here I am with an Xbox 360. What happened? Well, I just REALLY needed to play some videogames. And with my Wii back in Redmond, I wasn’t about to go for another one. I still think the Blu-Ray drive is a joke, and had foolishly assumed that the Xbox 360 might have entered the market with some sort of competitive alternative (i.e. – the HD DVD drive). Well, it doesn’t. I mean, wow. But I do get to play Halo 3 all I want, and for an extra $179 I was able to purchase the bare-bones HD DVD add-on that plugs into your 360 via a USB plug. It’s actually a wonderful little device. And it comes with King Kong! Anybody who knows me knows that I've wanted to make out with Peter Jackson since the age of ten, so this was like bundled porno. I also found a Best Buy gift card for $200 that expired yesterday, so I got Hot Fuzz, Eyes Wide Shut, Transformers, and the Ulitmate Matrix Collection for naught but the tread on my shoes.

Yes, I’m a thirteen-year-old boy. But I know back in Redmond that my mom will always call my game systems “David’s Nintendo,” and I love her. And that, I'm sure, means the war was won.

Cybernetic Organasm

You know when your coughs taste like the monkey bars you “accidentally” tasted in grade school because you were a filthy child? You know… like blood? I remember years later in health class when I found out that blood actually has a significant number of metal ions in it and finally making the connection. It was a moment of clarity I’ll never forget due to my mild embarrassment over sucking on a monkey bar.

Anyway, I just coughed and it tasted like that. Not like blood, but like metal. I think I’m getting sick. Or maybe I’m becoming a Terminator, which would be even more upsetting. It could be some computer virus. Let's review the symptoms: every time I blink my eyes, one pixel is removed from the clothing of a thickly muscled lumberjack until he is fully naked before me and pouring out two sloppy shots of bourbon. He tells me that the woods are unkind and then we knock those suckers back and kiss each other like our lives depended on it. Happens every time. The only bug I cannot catch is love. Our relations must remain purely erotic and devoid of emotional fire. A Terminator, unfortunately, can’t have it all.

Where was I? Oh yeah, I think I’m getting sick.

Pooptown - Poopulation: 1

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything. I’d like to blame it on an excess of good times, but the fact is I could have been writing for months and I haven’t been. It would be like saying I’ve been "practicing" abstinence. Somewhere I crossed a line where the strength it took to climb back on the horse was more than the horse could travel, but if I’d stayed on, I could snap the reins and write anything whenever I wanted. Now I’m stuck in the mud. Nobody hasn’t been there, I think.

But I have always been more comfortable with my drawings than with my writing. And having read over everything related to my current project over the last few days, I’ve come to several crushing realizations about it:

1) it sucks
2) it’s hacky
3) it’s unoriginal
4) it’s pointless
5) it’s timid
6) it doesn’t resonate
7) it all reflects me

No matter how good I felt about my progress, something about it always felt wrong. I didn't say anything because I didn’t know what I was doing. I don't think I've been writing.

Yes, I have been arranging words into sentences and paragraphs on the page. But I’m still in barren country because I haven’t started walking yet. I’m still too afraid and too self-absorbed to write something that could connect with anybody else. Like my writing, I feel like a sideshow. It makes me scared to see myself differently.

I’ve been afraid to travel where other people have gone because I might do it the same as them. Instead I try to sell my little spot to you because I need to believe it’s better than yours. The alternative terrifies me because it suggests that I’ve been doing things wrong for my entire life.

There’s still a part of me believes I am special because I’m David and I’m a writer. There are worlds in my head that I can’t stop from being there, even while the rest of me worries that I'll never be able to tell you about them. Maybe they’re just too personal to be shared as they are. The truer I stayed to them and to myself, the more sickeningly arbitrary it all felt. I guess if you try to bring a really deep well to the surface, it turns into a really big puddle.

For better or for worse, anybody who takes their work seriously measures their own worth against the strength of their art, because they see themselves in it. It’s pretty easy to feel worthless if you think your work sucks. How not to? But the part of me that still feels special wants to believe that the things in my head are worth sharing. Maybe not as they are, because to see these things naked diminishes them. But I’m just fine to see that world peek its little limbs out of the shadows. It doesn’t need me shrink-wrapping the woods before I realize what I’ve done. I’d rather believe this world can grow forever, maybe in the dust and corners of whole other stories, than prove that it can’t. That mystery is too precious. I would be wrong to trap it in amber.

Blogsnot

I've been terrible about keeping up my blog. I promise to update constantly and be terrible at it.

Los Blancos

Some ladies were taking tea in a garden across the street. Here is an exchange I had with those two ladies.

Lady 1: There's a nice-looking man.

(I smile as I walk past.)

Lady 1: Dark.

Like... okay. Which LA does she live in? The one with all the white people in it? How strange it would be, living in LA, to be surprised and delighted fully half the time somebody strolls past your garden? It would be like Christmas morning all the time! And remember how I said I'm not good at dealing with people liking the way I look? Well, I totally grimaced in this woman's face before I realized what I was doing. THEN I smiled.

So maybe "dark" is actually better than "rude." Or maybe she was talking about my manners. Either way, she's a racist. She should consider moving to LA to be where all the white dudes at. Or maybe I should just be flattered that she called me a "nice-looking man."

I mean, it sure is a relief after being a called a "nice-looking woman" all those years!

Hancock the Walk

Will Smith has a movie coming out next Summer. It's called "Hancock," and it stars the incomparable Mr. Smith alongside superstars Charlize Theron and Jason Bateman in a plot that IMDB outlines like so. So, what I imagine is something like, Will Smith stages a bunch of close shaves with disaster in plain view of the public, ending up in a love triangle with the guy who's doing him a favor. A real supervillain shows up amidst the controlled chaos that Smith and Bateman have orchestrated, and Smith is suddenly in way over his head. He will come to learn that being a real hero means saving people who need saving, not just your reputation. He will defeat the villain and Charlize will remove her top and do the can-can in front of an enormous American flag while the credits roll.

So that's what I think of "Hancock." I'd known that something huge was coming to the HoBo (as I've just renamed Hollywood Boulevard), but had assumed that it was road work or a large premiere or some other ho-hum celebrity nonsunse I've totally grown accustomed to. I couldn't have imagined that it was in some way all of those things, and I certainly couldn't have imagined that I'd somehow become involved in it without even trying.

On Monday morning, when I arrived at that section of the HoBo, something was most definitely up, and it wasn't the sky, but rather something large blotting out most of it. An enormous diffusion sheet was hanging from a giant boom attached to a small tank assuming its position in the middle of the street, and I don't know if you were there when the towers fell or your 7/11 became a Kwik-E-Mart, but there must have been the sense that this thing, this certain place that has been a certain way for as long as it's been part of your world, is suddenly another thing entirely, and it gives you chills to see. People, there shouldn't be people and camera equipment chilling out in the middle of the road, nor should the road be ripped up like somebody stopped a bus with his body and dug hisself three feet into the cement. Yet here was all of that, and there were huge rotating light-source panels twirling ominously on either side of the street, as slick-looking dudes and dudettes in sunglasses chirped into walkie-talkies to the rent-a-cops who rudely ushered pedestrians along the sidewalk and prevented rubberneckers from rubbing their necks while staring on in curiosity.

Looking back, I really must have become quite the jaded little something, because on my way home I'd forgotten there was a set there in the first place. Oh, “Hancock”? I passed on that script back when it was called "the first act of 'Spider-Man 3.'” And just when I was high-fiving myself for possessing the wit you can't buy on trees or something, that's when I saw Charlize Theron and Will Smith strolling in front of the Virgin Megastore, saw them with my very own eyes.



Now, it's difficult to relay the experience of a celebrity sighting as tippity-top as this, because the feeling rests on your actually seeing the person in three dimensions when until now they've existed only in two. But God help me, was I ever a lookie-loo, flipping out my cell phone and snapping away like a Harajuku girl on Western shores. Our girl Charlize and my boy Will were just strolling down the set and saying "hi" to fans on the other side of the street (of course), but an entire filmmaking apparatus cranked and whirred about these two tiny, tiny people that both highlighted the absurdity of movie stardom and underscored its supreme power. Here was a man and a woman (and probably Jason Bateman, somewhere), and here was also this entire operation so incredibly out of proportion to them, doing its multi-million dollar job to ensure that this acre of movieland was maintained for yet another blockbuster season. It was the strangest thing, and I wanted to be caught up in it at the same time I wanted to see the strangeness for what it was. I'd say I succeeded in doing both.

Cut to Wednesday, when I was very much over this whole industry and wanted filming to end so that I'd be accountable for less information when the time came to write this up. Girlfriend got herself a blended mocha for being so fly, then set out down the HoBo for Will's last chance to land some of this straight-up ghetto booty.

Since the sidewalks have always been open to pedestrians during filming (as indeed the signage assured us), I didn't think much of breezing past their flimsy barrier, and got about as far as the Disney Soda Shoppe before realizing that something was up, and it wasn't just the diffusion sheet. A real-live Panavision camera was set up against the wall, and operated on by a real-live person. Everyone here was wearing a badge. People with megaphones were telling other people to put their badges away. I heard snippets of conversation flit by, hurried mentions of "this is gonna be huge," and "put your camera away," and "if there was ever a time you didn't want to be caught on the sidewalk taking pictures because you might die, this is it." I put mine away so I wouldn't have to do the other thing.

In fact, I did try to leave. I got about twenty feet from the El Captian before my natural instincts to make myself as small and unobtrusive as possible kicked in. Basically, if I kept walking away, I'd stick out more than if I just ran back to the El Capitan and illegally showed up in a Will Smith movie. So that's exactly what I did.

And that's when a car exploded. And then another car exploded, and then several more cars flipped over when they were yanked backwards on steel cables, and smoke machines started pouring out smoke, and my last suspicions that anybody on the sidewalk was an actual pedestrian were dashed when they all started running and screaming from something I COULDN'T SEE. I looked on in fear from underneath the marquee at the El Capitan, and if ever in my life I experienced waves of chills from things in this world being not the way they should be, this was it. And if my shot ends up in the movie, and you see a clueless wiener in a blue checkered button-up looking like he has no idea why he’s in a Will Smith movie, well – that’s your friend, who finally made it onto the Walk of Fame. If only just on top of it.

The Biggest Wang

One of the things that’s nice about getting wasted at a dive bar (and there are many), is that there’s no such thing as pretense. After a certain number of drinks in a place like that, no one’s even heard of being “cool,” which is nice, because I haven’t heard of it when I’m sober. What is “cool,” anyway? Is it something you don’t want to put your tongue on? Gosh, how lame! Dive bars, on the other hand, are loud, messy, crowded, wonderful places where you can shout happy things to your friends. When you take a dive, you’re there to unwind and get hammered off beer and shitty drinks, and that’s just a grand little atmosphere. And it's all just a touch more grand at a little dive called Big Wangs.

Big Wangs is my local(ish) big-time sports bar, and while I’m the kind of sports fan that wonders why they’ve gotta toss a ball around for so long (and can’t you just read the scores in the morning?), something about Big Wangs oozes that turbo-chummy vibe that totally wins me over. Because yo, so you're wearing a beef-stained sweatshirt and ripped jeans with the ass torn out, but at least you don't look half as crappy as that stuffed marlin nailed to the wall. Big Wangs is underlit, the cushions are uneven, the waitresses are sexy and overworked, it takes up an entire leg of a strip mall, and it couldn’t even be more awesome.

When Jessica invited us there for the first time, I couldn’t believe this place had the balls (ha!) to carry a full menu - it gets so crowded in there, some folks have to deal with standing room only. Yet somehow, they pull it together. There’s this incredible thing they make called the “heart-a-tot,” which is such an amazing concept that it bears some loving description: it’s a basket of deep fried tater-tots, tossed in with fried bacon, all swimming in alfredo sauce, and topped with a tiny sprig of parsley, for greens. It’s also a play on the term “heart attack,” which is a term that everyone would feel more comfortable going to see if only there were a play on it, and it’s also the name of another dish they prepare, which cleverly replaces the tater tots with French fries, again called the “Heart Attack.” If you can possibly remain cool during a culinary experience like that, then more power to the establishment. I couldn’t do it. I wept heavy cream.

So last night, Jessica took several of us out again for another crazy night at Big Wangs. It was a big game night, though I’m not sure which, though if I had to guess, I’d say it looked like there was some ultimate fighting going on. And maybe some of that team golf on a dance floor with the big orange ball and the sneakers? I don't know. But boy, was there ever the hell out of some football happening on most of those screens. I’m usually a big fan of casual din, but tonight, yo this noize could make a girl anxious. Hold up, with the roaring!

It was interesting, though, to see an entire room packed so full of people reacting to something I couldn’t possibly relate to less. I settled in on watching them watch the TV, which is pretty disturbing when you think of the TV as an evangelist, which I usually do. (I didn’t grow up with TV.) I thought it might be nice, when the crowd roared up in manly approval, to snap a picture and capture a real moment when something collective and human was happening. I meant to do this only once, but every time they cheered, they got just a little more crazy – more intense, more aggressive, more emphatic, more more. So, every time they roared and pumped their fists in unison, my camera shot up and a silent flash appeared to remind them they were all being watched. I guess that’s not something you can easily hide without covering it, and I think it was yanking them out of their ecstasy, because at one point they cut themselves off from getting too happy without my even taking a picture. That’s some kind of power. It was probably a lot like someone poking you in the ribs when you’re stretching - eventually you learn not to stretch and deal with being all crampy. And yeah, I maybe went on a little bit longer than I probably should have, but these pictures were totally worth my kneecaps. I'll never walk again!

Oh yeah, and a group of thirtysomethings was unwinding at the table just beside us and looking maybe a little older than they probably were, and I couldn’t tell if they were reacting with the rest of the crowd or laughing at the flash photography, but the next time there was a wave of cheers, I turned and snapped their picture. These people suddenly laughed like crazy, and I didn’t even think it was that funny, until I started laughing at their laughter, and you know how this story goes, because suddenly our table and this table of strangers were all laughing at this one thing for no reason other than that we were all totally wasted, and while I’m terrified of meeting strangers in public and pray for nothing other than for conversations with them to end immediately, this is the kind of quintessential bar experience I’ve always hoped to have, because humans are social creatures that crave joy, and we treasure it where we can find it.

Also, one dude in a bowling shirt became our best friend for five minutes when he came over and started doing these unbelievable pointing poses. When we tried to get his e-mail address to send him the photos, he spelled out “Togg_Spears” and not one @-symbol more. He took Jessica’s hand and looked like he was about to crumple it in his, then announced, “WE SHALL ALWAYS HAVE TONIGHT.” It was wild. Then he gave us the Nixon peace-hands and they all left. The end!

I'm all grown up now

Yo, today I watched a pigeon WEDGE ITSELF in between metal and brick on the outside of my office building. It came in all "weeeooo!" for a landing and died instead. The lower half of its body stuck out like in a cartoon.

that is all

O.P.C.

Dear Eric,

Here's the thing. Elaine left us a little gift in the freezer the day she left. You never knew, but she had gotten us something she knew we both would enjoy, and she even left a little note, folded in half and taped to the top, thanking us both for a wild ride on the Slow Roll and a journey through "Hollyweird." It was a gesture as well as a gift. You take one look at it, and you know girl had herself a great time.

Well, you know how I get. Did you know that I left my wallet at Dan's, and left my phone in Jessica's car when we picked up my wallet? Uh, because I didn't. The point is, I forget things. And now, I'm writing to apologize for forgetting some very important thing, and I don't think you could ever forgive me.

You see, Elaine left us this present in the freezer and I never remembered to see what it was. And it's unforgivable because it was a chocolate fucking cake addressed to both of us and I'm eating it right now.

I'm sorry that the whipped mousse is like sliding down David Beckham's snowy ass in a toboggan, except twice as divine. I'm sorry that when the chocolate icing melts so delicately in my mouth, the newborn child next door mewls and kicks and doesn't know why. I'm sorry that the flavor is as rich as Uncle Scrooge's money pool, and that the cake is as hearty as a lumberjack's har-dee-har. I'm sorry that I started in five minutes before it was completely thawed. I'm sorry that this means the chilly center is pleasantly offset by the warmth of the room.

I'm sorry because me and a chocolate cake are in a room together that you aren't in. I'm sorry that there's gonna be plenty left over, because there just won't be by the time you get back. I'm sorry because it was in the freezer for one whole week when we were both home. I'm sorry because I never remembered to check. I'm sorry that there's so much cake, that I really can eat it, and have it, too. I'm sorry that it is sooo good.

I'm sorry that I have to be sorry. It's so delicious. I hope you can forgive me.

Love,
David

Credits.

For those of you who missed the big to-do last night, I was on TV! Like, actual cable! You see, I'm a logger for a respectable Oxygen Network celebreality program that airs on Tuesday nights, and that means I summarize and transcribe all the raw footage that comes in from the field. This all deserves some repping. It's a pretty lowly position, or is at least seen that way in The Biz, and sometimes it doesn't even get credited on television even though we comb through every inch of this footage and are the first to put actions into words, okay, and we decide what is important enough for the editors to see, people I am just saying.

I sort of hopped on board late into production and missed out on a whole month's worth of footage and three weeks of episodes. But I'm a real logger now, and time from some time ago has finally caught up with a certain more nowfangled time, and so, ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you my very first television credit, underlined with my stinky pinky for your viewing convenience!


Isn't that crazy? Dan must have read my blog from Toronto and seen that I couldn't watch the episode on TV, because today I received a small parcel at my desk all clandestine-like with said episode on DVD. Props, Dan. Props till you drop. Props with a cherry on top. Mm, sundae. So, I guess this screen is really just from a DVD and not an actual broadcast, BUT STILL. CHECK THAT OUT! IT'S REAL!

Weirdly enough, it doesn't even feel that weird to me. Although, it is. It's weird to imagine that there is a household out there in some state where they export so many bread baskets watching this show and seeing my name flash by in half a second, because I mean, what if this family took a family photo and right then my name flashed by on their TV? That would mean that a photo existed of my name and some people I'll never, ever meet! What an odd snapshot! Why would this family care about a celebreality program so much? Don't they know it's on again at 10:30? God, relax! I'll be around! Call me if you need anything!

I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's real crazy to have a real-live telvision credit, but I've also seen how much work goes into making just one of these episodes happen, and it's A LOT more than I do. We tend to dismiss this programming as slick trash that appears fully-formed on douchey channels we would rather not watch, but people, it doesn't appear fully-formed. An entire building of professionals are in there doing their best with the material they've been given to turn out 23 minutes of airable television and maintain the illusion that it's all effortless. Nothing ensures that it isn't crude homemade garbage. It takes a lot to put together something you can happily forget. Let me tell you: that deserves some credits.

Mario Bother

These are some new pajama pants that I bought for $9.99 from my local Mom and Pop's canteen, Target. They're comfortable and loose, and appropriate for all bedtimes. And wouldn't you know it, here's an article I found in Variety that describes what happened after I bought them:

"Wow, check out these hammer slacks! They've received full marks from the nation's top critics. They've appeared on over 100 top ten lists. Reviewers have piped, 'Boy, does that crotch ever ride appropriately low! There's a ripping yarn if I ever saw one.' Others have trilled, 'Hats off to an exceptional set of trousers! They really hit this one out of Pinna Park!' With the popularity of these pants leaping to the top of the girders, analysts suspect it's only a matter of time before they get the girl. Metaphorically, of course! Certain critics were not so barreled over, however, as one bashed the portly plumber's trademark duds: 'Overall, I'd say that the pants left me feeling kind of blue. And dare I say, high-waisted.' He even went on to knock the whole cask, deeming it 'so numbingly repetitive, I wished there was a POW button!'

"Nevertheless, this little grey barrel's on fire. The consensus among our nation's trouser enthusiasts is, 'these britches have it all buttoned down!' Wa-hoo, Mario! Yah, wa-hoo!"



This is really not a respectable update. I'm just distracting myself from the sad fact that I can't watch my own name go by on television for the first time because none of the televisions in this apartment are hooked up to cable. Boo hoo. And maybe that'd be easy to fix, but you see I'm quite busy hammering out terrible puns to describe my new pajamas. Oh well. C'est la me. Ho, ho.

Less than meets the eye

You guys, Los Angeles is getting so hot, transformers are exploding all over the place and causing rolling blackouts to sweep across the city. Eric and I have just abandoned the dread ovens of the House of Rogge to scarf pizza around Dan's air-conditioner, and this stuff has gotten me munching over several important issues:

1) The Los Angeles region is actually uninhabitable

2) I regularly walk through heat that causes reliable machinery to explode

3) This happens annually, when it should never happen at all

4) Our society is one blackout, four horsemen, and seven days from total anarchy

5) I feel cheated when blackouts happen during the day

I mean, this is actually terrifying. It's so hot here, it limits where the human body is allowed to be. You just can't have rolling blackouts here. As Eric pointed out, this is why old people die in their homes.

On another note, I feel like we too often use the word "transformer" to describe the device on telephone poles that converts raw electrical power into a high-voltage, low-current form for use in our homes. This is ignorant. I want to take that word back. I want to make it OUR word. It becomes so tedious when I'm telling all my friends, "hey, check out my car. Nay, check out my robot. Nay, check out my car," all the while not moving my eyes. I am a lazy bastard and wish we could all respect that my eyes are precious jewels. As it stands, it's more accurate to call Dan's cats "transformers," as they convert feline saliva into a high-voltage, high-current dander that powers my sneezes. Interestingly, they have not yet exploded in the heat.

YOU, SIR, TRANSFORM ME INTO PUFFY DESPAIR

Also, here's a youtube clip that shows exactly what happens to a transformer when everything goes wrong with it. Be sure to read the video's description for an odd sort of thrill.

All Swork and so gay

It's always super weird when I get hit on in public, because I can count the number of times it's happened on four fingers, even though that would be pretty arbitrary since it's only happened three times. I'm not one used to being treated like a young, hot, sexy thing with a young, hot, sexy wiener. So it kinda freaks me out when I'm getting some mad work done at a coffee shop and suddenly I'm on a big loud game show where the prize is having sex with a man. Maybe my work leaves me easily overwhelmed, but that's some pretty high stakes right there.

Of interest: Swork, a comfortably douchey cafe in Eagle Rock, remains the exclusive carriers of "Sworkuccinos."

Bitter and employed

It might seem like my life has reached the point where I get all worked up over people inside a computer for nine hours a day, but that is in fact completely correct.

Something is happening. It's so hot at 8:00 in the morning, and I walk to work inside a constantly exploding nuclear fireball while nursing an inexplicable anger toward things like pedestrians sharing my sidewalk. I get to the office and know that whatever my mood is then, it's only gonna get worse over the next nine hours. I wade home through a sea of crackheads and tourists while the sun burns in my eyes and the first little tugs of sleep sneak up through my legs. The sun melts my eyeballs, and before I get home, I hope it's not as hot inside as it is out there, because homegirl just needs a minute to think. Then I always find out it's hotter.

I'm all tired and jittery at night when I'm supposed to relax and don't know what to do with myself. Something is happening, people, and I think it's that this city is making me angry. What am I supposed to do with that? It makes me so tired to be angry. I have stuff to do! FUCK YOU, BEING TIRED! *zzzzzzz*

Luckily, Elaine came to visit and we had ourselves a crazy ol' time. Those four days had nothing to do with angry. Experience:


Keepin' it metal on Manhattan Beach


Giving the sky a brisk slap for being so pretty


Daring you to tell us gettin wasted at three pm AIN'T some kinda neat


The trick is to take out a quarter of the vodka, then fill the rest up with Skittles, then make a face as awesome as this one when you drink it.


HARK, A LAD


The totally rad floor decal at my office


And lo, there issued a *FAP* heard 'round the world


R2D2 - HIMSELF
C-3PO - ANTHONY DANIELS
DARTH VADER - HIMSELF


Elaine and Eric went to Runyan Canyon while I boiled in anger soup at work. There's no way to make that sound not bitter I guess. Except, they had an awesome time! Hooray!


Eric captures some hot beaches


what is a ghost's favorite ride


Atop the 'wheel


Elaine was later found on the ocean floor wearing a pair of cement boots

So that's that. Oh hey, I've got three weeks of unemployment coming up, and I'm looking forward to those three weeks like a whore waits for sunrise! There is going to be so much tourism going on. Did you know I never did any of that here? Elaine and Eric saw more of L.A. in two days than I have in a month! That's cray-zay. Plus, there's so much reading, personal projects, sleeping 'till noon, and not being angry to be doing so hard.

FUCK, I'M SO EXCIT-- *zzzzzz*

Camp Boring

I'm writing this from work because I nearly went insane yesterday whilst in this very chair.

Nudists. You all want to see one, right? Or many of them? Together, being naked? Something about the idea of them being available for the looking at seems pretty exciting (not the least because I am a pervert)? I mean, they're naked, and we wonder how people look naked. Even nuns wonder that, about God. It's like an exclamation point to the great big question mark, right in your asterisk if you're lucky and easy. So, spending several days looking at naked people on a computer maybe doesn't seem like such a bad thing, does it? Not at all. It's like checkin' up on some porn for a bit of cash and blowing it on chicken nuggets at dinnertime. Porn and nuggets, yo. What a life.

Well let me tell you about this buncha nudists. These people are BORING. And not just boring, but deathly humorless about everything, ESPECIALLY about being nudists. And if there's one thing the human body is, right behind sexy as all hell, it's fun-nay. It's a funny thing, how it's kinda flabby and misproportioned and has a great wad of flappy taboo junk right in the middle, or maybe some non-flappy inverted junk if you're a lady. I mean, I think says a lot if you can't laugh about what you are, and even more if you really, really can't stop talking about it. Like, we get it. You're free. And I mean all of that, unless you were at Dachau.

Basically, these are some sour nudists. They look sour, talk sour, and are sour. They spend all day roaming the grounds and sucking at being good. The grass turns brown under their feet and the trees above nod off and forget to be alive. These guys just can't stop justifying themelves to each other. It's one of those things where I don't get it, but then I do get it, and then suddenly I REALLY SUPER don't get it. People, nothing could be less interesting than this guy's tree-sized dong to me right now. This is bad, bad news.

It's like that person who tells the same bad joke over and over again in a group. At first you laugh 'cause it's a bad joke, then you laugh 'cause it's a meta-joke, and then suddenly you don't wanna laugh anymore because it's no joke at all. For a moment, this person is so desperate to be funny, they go right around the spinner to "ugly." It's the Chris Farley effect - like, he's so scary and shrill, it's like being in the room with a killer elephant on dope, who hates being an elephant. I'm not laughing, I'm running for my life! It's self-destructive and mean! He makes me scared! The worst part is, this elephant doesn't like it when anyone else tells jokes. This elephant hates it when you're funny.

And I mean, DON'T TELL JOKES. These nudists can be naked and out of shape, fine, they're people, but the minute YOU start talking about it, you're dead meat. You're just not allowed to. And don't even think about cracking a joke about Ron Jeremy unless you have three days to listen to the nudist manifesto on body acceptance. These chumps actually think they're being persecuted.

Y'all, I have nothing against nudists. I am a nudist. Actually, I wear clothes like a human being. But seriously, I think nudists are fine. Because really, put one of these bozos in clothes for a minute. Don't they still suck? They don't have to suck. You can totally have funny, dynamic nudists to camp with, or go on a rafting trip with, or even drink around the fire and shoot the breeze with. This seems fun and illuminating. Or, you can have boring, defensive nudists that don't seem to enjoy being nudists at all. Why do that? I don't get it. They're closer to nature, aren't they? So when did nature become so dull?

I gotta say, to top it all off, their biggest crime is that they make the show boring. That's all.

(Yo, I mean any show. I'm not even saying they're gonna be on the show in five weeks.)

Stinkberry

Oh hey, there's also this stupid frozen yogurt craze called "Pinkberry" that's kind of a lot of bullshit. What's more, I kind of love it.

You remember Krispy Kreme? How douchebags from miles around descended upon Issaquah at two in the morning so they could wrap their dumb asses around a glazed donut at four in the morning? How nobody really knew why, except that it was called "Krispy Kreme" and recalled a hip shred of bygone history that no one remembers correctly? Transplant that to frozen yogurt, without even the fake history, and it's called Pinkberry. It's got fruit topping on it, but it's still JUST frozen yogurt. And yet somehow, somewhy, this chain went MEGATON. Somebody bought a frozen novelty phenomenon (froveltomenon) and deployed it upon a city.

Eric and I were so ready to blow the whistle on Operation Bullshit that we never counted on it being any good. To our surprise, it was amaaazing. I loved how it tasted. I loved its subtle icy grit and light citrus tang. I loved how awesome it made me feel to walk around with it next to people without it. I loved how good it tasted in my mouth. It's actually pretty stupid how good it was. This fad is great. I kind of want some Pinkberry right now. Mmm... Pinkberry. Pink. Berry. Iced yogurt. With fruit. Fresh fruit. Pinkberry.

mouth

Oh hayl, they also sell Pinkberry merchandise which seriously must be an awful joke, because a plastic anime saltshaker that was JUST PLASTIC, and like | | <--- THIS BIG, was selling for $24.99. THINK ABOUT THAT FOR A SECOND. !!!!!!! That's a nice steak in some places. Or a new release on DVD. Or, like, some crank maybe, but holy shit! A saltshaker?! It doesn't even have salt in it! You have to buy that separately! That's called being a chromosome dumping ground! they also sell plastic dog bowls for $70 omg

Mo' Angeles

Life these days has been a balancing act between my inside and my outside, between my feelings and my chores, where some feelings keep me motivated to do my chores, and most chores keep me from feeling too many feelings. It's all about work, rent, spending habits, groceries, furniture and the apartment. I need to keep my eye on the smaller picture because my brain can't handle anything else. One day it'll all fit into the bigger picture and lay the groundwork for the biggest picture: my motion picture. Ghehe. Poop.

Feelings are weird. There's the need to constantly clarify the situation while it's been changing, but the danger that too much clarity will be overwhelming. There's the need to be overwhelmed because it's the only time I'll ever feel like this, in this place, in this way. There's the worry that it's only been two weeks and I'm already feeling my life congeal into into a routine that works perfectly fine. There's the absolute freedom of living in a city where my dreams live and not a soul knows me but my brother. And this is such. a. big. city.

It's so crazy and so big that I haven't even accepted that it's home yet. How could I? I haven't felt like I had a room that was a part of a "home" since I lived in Redmond. For years it's been a fact that my living situations were temporary and by chance, linked to college life, a life that was always supposed to be over. College is the final guarantee that something will be different someday; afterward, your life can stay exactly the same if you want it to.

So as this life stops feeling like vay-cay, there's a feeling setting in that my home is actually going to be My Home. It's like touring an empty set the night before they start filming. You turn over the props in your hand with a kind of heartsick clarity before all the next day's bustle makes you forget you have anything but a job to do. Before I realize it, this room is going to be where the next few years have happened; one day, I'll think of this room when I miss home. However long I stay here, there's never going to be an artificial countdown. It's been a long time since I was promised that kind of peace.

I'm in the middle in a lot of different areas in my life, and I feel like this is as good a thing for my friends to know as *actual* things that happen to me. Things haven't been just home and work - I've seen the sights, seen Eric on the weekends, met his friends, heard endless bloodcurdling screams in Old Filipino Town, gotten in touch with a smokin' hot babe whose number I was somehow given at the bank, and watched Baby Geniuses 2 while fucking high. Things are good, but so, so weird. And since these feelings in this place will never happen in this way ever again, it might be interesting for you to hear my non-thoughts before they're all sexed up for the biopic.

ANYWAY. thanks for all of YOUR updates, people. They mean SO MUCH to me even when you think they're boring. :'D

L.A. Tori

Hey baubles,

IT'S DAVID. Just wanted to let you know how things are going. It's still kind of at that stage where huge life changes feel pretty mundane. The newness of my surroundings is so complete, and the change so sudden, that nothing feels very strange, and there's no reference point for "normal" against which it can all feel totally fucked up. I wake up on my floor because I don't have a bed, I wear shoes to the bathroom because of the stinky kitty butt sand in the hallway, and I go home on foot because I need to map out the alien geography of the planet I live on now. But none of it feels that strange. It's all kind of coming at me, and either it's too big a shock to deal with it, or it's not a shock at all and I should be proud, or that's what she said. LAFFOL. Hmm. I guess since all of this feels peculiarly normal and mostly i just wanted to check in before heading out for TACO TUESDAY (YESSSSSS), I will now share with you a story about cleaning my new room, which was ass nasty when I showed up.

Yesterday I ran a bunch of errands and then vaccuumed up a whole motherfucking cat in my new room. Dirt devils are pretty wild by the way, since you can kinda see a tornado of filth swirling away in the clear uptake cylinder, and within the first five square feet of vaccuuming the entire thing was opaque. This was after the first night, which I'd spent on a mattress, so I guess I spent 10 hours floating in cat hair, which is pretty awesome.

Oh yeah, and I start work tomorrow, instead of Monday! I AM OFFICIALLY A GROWNUP!

CONGRATULATE ME

missin ewes,
David