I just finished watching the saddest episode of Buffy and I
cried my fool eyes out. If you’ve seen it, don’t give a spoiler
because I’m trying to get my sister to watch Buffy and I don’t want
it to get ruined. But check out my Charlie Brown squiggly lip!
I’m working on the next roadtrip posts so they’ll be up soon!
I know it sounds crazy but I hate LA’s weather. I guess you can take the girl out of the unpredictable weather but you can’t take the unpredictable weather out of the girl. Whenever I see snow or coldness on TV I get really jealous!
And you know what else I miss? Old things. Everything in LA is basically brand new. Even the older buildings are not as old as they are in the Northeast. I miss being close to DC and Massachusetts and Pennsylvania and New York. I feel like holidays are cozier there.
My cousin Jennifer, Aunt Rosemary’s granddaughter, gave me this picture to post. Aunt Rosemary was a sweet, funny little lady who went through hell this year with cancer. She is my Nana’s sister. She’d been feisty and full of energy for her entire life apart from these past two years. This past year though the cancer would knock her out for a few months and then she’d come back to herself and then it would knock her out again. Anyway, she’s no longer suffering. She had a long happy life (89!) and a sweet, peaceful death which is all anyone can ask for in this life.
Obviously I can’t go to her wake or her funeral (being that I’m 3,000 miles away and dirt poor) so this is my tribute to her. We’ll miss you Aunt Rosemary! :*)
Today:
1) The alarm didn’t go off but I woke up at 7:00 am on the dot anyway.
2) I made it on time for an 8:30 appointment. A passive-aggressive time was had by all.
3) I got something done that I thought would take a lot longer.
4) I bought cat food which was good because Kristyn said the cats were pulling tiny switchblades on her. Can’t have that.
5) I applied to a few jobs.
6) Allergies sucked.
7) I decided to sit on my bed all day.
8) I started crocheting a blanket, more on that later. (Christine I’m going to make yours but I’ve been wanting to start this one forever. This was my “good times” reward.)
9) I watched a lot of “Sons of Anarchy” and “The Office”.
10) My Mom told me that my Aunt Rosemary passed. She was very sick so it wasn’t sudden but still sad. She passed at home in her sleep surrounded by her children and grandkids. She had a good life and a peaceful death. She will be missed.
The cats are all sitting around me and behaving for once. Either its because I’m sick and can’t move around much or they’re cutting me some slack. Thanks guys.
I wanted to post a picture of Aunt Rosemary but my Flickr Pro account expired so I can’t access all of my pictures. Unfortunately all the pictures she’s in, I can’t access. :/
So I guess that’s it for today. It’s 11:58 afterall. I’m just waiting for Kristyn to come home so we can go to sleep. Tomorrow I have to get up early and go to the DMV.
I’m actually going to start with the Bad Things because it’s nicer to leave things on a good note, no?
A few weeks ago, we had some drama because our car got towed. We had racked up a lot of parking tickets that we couldn’t pay. It’s not that we were trying to be negligent, it’s just that:
A) Parking tickets are EXPENSIVE here.
B) LA is SERIOUS about making money off of parking tickets. If you are one fraction of a second over a meter or a no parking zone, there is someone THERE writing you a ticket.
C) We DO come from another state in the USA where parking tickets ARE issued but not like this. In Kearny, it’s definitely a lot more relaxed than it is here and there are definitely a lot more places to park the car without fear of getting a ticket. In LA, one block will ticket you, the next won’t. We live nearly on the corner and we got one of the tickets for parking near the corner. It’s “residential parking”. We’re residents. We don’t apply. *sigh* So what I’m saying is that there is a learning curve to this that we are only just getting the hang of.
D) We are worried about feeding ourselves, getting back and forth to work and interviews and keeping the lights on. Yes the car is a priority so we WERE making payments but it just wasn’t enough for them.
SO, one day I was walking Kristyn to the car so I could get something out of it before she left for work. Nowhere to be found. We checked all the usual spots, gone. Well she had to stay home from work so we could find out where in tarnation the car had gone. A zillion phone calls later we found out that it had, indeed, been towed and that we had some traveling to do to get it back.
In order to get the car out of the pokey, we had to bring the registration to an office. The registration was in the damn car. We had to take the bus to go to a weird area of LA (maybe Chinatown or beyond?) to get the registration out of the car that night. When we looked at the registration, we realized that it had literally JUST expired. SO you can’t get bust your car out of the joint without a valid registration. SO we had to take the bus to the DMV in West Hollywood. Then we had to take the registration to the parking office in Downtown. Then we had to take another bus to the car bighouse and spring her out with the help of Kristyn’s parents (thank you so much we will pay you back if it kills us or even just me!).
Anyway, when we were in Chinatown, weird-LA, we saw this be-yewt of a VW Beetle. Because the weather’s so nice there are a lot of old cars on the road. Key words: No weather = No rust.
Perhaps the saddest part of this story (as if it could get any sadder) is that the office where you PAY to get the car out of hock is pretty far from the place where she actually IS. The week this happened was hot as BLAZES, like 90’s weather. So we had to literally “hotfoot” it over to the holding cell a bunch of times. (It’s an aggravating walk but way too close to bus it to.)
BUT the bright spot was that we found one of the canals that is kind of like the one where they drag race in “Grease”. I could almost see Cha cha dropping her scarf.
My mind’s eye:
As if things couldn’t get bad enough, I had a terrifying experience with a spider and a web. I had done some laundry and put it outside to dry. It was dark and I wanted to bring the clothes inside. I went to open the door and found a showstopper of a web. I mean this web had to have been like two and a half feet high and hanging from the roof DIRECTLY in front of the door. It only took the spider like two hours to do, tops because it wasn’t there when I had gone out to check on the clothes earlier. I was scared but sad to knock it down. I felt like as if I pulling apart this spider’s Granny Square blanket. And I’d be PISSED if someone pulled apart my Granny Square blanket. BUT it had to be done. No I don’t pay the bills around here but I would if I could which is more than I can say for that lout spider squattin on our roof. Get a job!
And here comes the “good”. There is much good here in LA but sadly I only have two meager offerings for you for the “good section”.
One is that I decided to paint my toenails weird the other day. I haven’t done this dual-color nailpolish thing since I was twelve but I’ve seen it on a couple of blogs and missed doing it. I’m going through a Teal thing and I’m ALWAYS going through a purple thing so here you have it (booyah):
The other thing is that “The Wiz” came on BET and confused/delighted me. As you know, I’ve been yammering on about Michael Jackson’s corpse for a while so it was loverly to see it animated and in a scarecrow suit made of trash bags. Coincidentally, my MJ corpse (of MJ’s funeral fame) is ALSO wrapped in plastic garbage bags in my closet. Small world!
I’m hungry now so I got to go. Please send my love to your parents.
As you guys may already know, me and Kristyn took MJ’s death strangely last year as evidenced here, and here, and here, and here.
We even had a full-on funeral for him. My favorite joke of the night was, “But when is this party gonna start to get weird?” Here are some pics:
Anyway, when MJ died last year, I was at work at my old job. Me and some co-workers were talking about the reports that he’d had a heart attack. We were discussing how weird it would be if he died. Then someone came and told us he’d died. No matter if you’re a fan or not (I am) or if you think he’s a pedophile or not (I sort of do), MJ’s death was kind of a big deal (you don’t say).
It’s weird for me to think of that day because I think I had JUST given my notice to leave that job. I had JUST made the final decision to move here. I hadn’t told any of my co-workers yet (I don’t think), that’s how fresh it was. Between that exact day and today SO MUCH has happened. So for me, MJ’s death is kind of a perfect marker between that life and this one and to actually BE HERE one year later was surreal to say the least.
What was even weirder was that I coincidentally had a big job interview and a ticket to see the Jimmy Kimmel Show on the one year anniversary of MJ’s death. I didn’t get the job but I DID get to see Tom Cruise.
But I’m going too fast. I took this picture after dropping Kristyn off at work. My brother Charles watched the Toy Story movies like mothercrunkin WHOA as a kid and this gigantic billboard made me think of him:
And you can’t take pictures during the show so the only picture that I have is that one above that I snatched off the internets. HOWEVER, they DID have an outdoor concert that they didn’t seem to care too much if you took pictures so I did. This is a picture of Sublime by the by. They were pretty good.
Here is a giant pillar outside. I guess this is just for lighting?
And here is Mr. Kimmel himself:
I took this picture for my sister Christine because she LERVES her some Three’s Company. This is on the side of Hollywood High School:
Jimmy Kimmel Live happens to be across the street from Graumann’s Chinese Theater (where the handprints are) and the Kodak Theater (where the Oscars are held usually). Michael Jackson’s Star on the Walk of Fame happens to be in front of Graumann’s Chinese Theater. I figured I’d waddle over to get a picture. There were quite a number of lookyloos there as well as some people dancing to Billie Jean.
A few days after the anniversary of MJ’s passing, we decided to go visit his grave. We hadn’t done it for the entire time we’d been in LA. We really weren’t sure where it was. As it turns out, we’ve passed it a bajillion and nine times. It’s about ten minutes from the house door to door, if even that. When you enter the gates of Forest Lawn Cemetary, the road actually takes you straight to the mausoleum he is in. You can’t go inside but you can pull over and take as many pictures as your rubbernecking heart desires. Here’s what we found:
There were flowers, handmade goods and art sent from all over the world. You can’t really tell in the pictures but there are gifts sent from Japan, Norway, the UK, Africa, Montana, everywhere. This picture below doesn’t really do it justice how much stuff there was. There was a LOT. But anyway, that’s his mausoleum. It’s a large building with lots of other people in it. It’s closed to the public because he is in there. You can only gain access if you are related to someone buried within (to my knowledge).
BUT if you turn around, THIS is MJ’s eternal view. This picture doesn’t even show you how gorgeous the view actually is. This entire cemetary is breath-takingly beautiful, honestly.
So we spent probably a half hour there poking around and then left to play soccer at a nearby field. The World Cup was underway and we were feeling sprightly.
The other day I had to go to Glendale to buy some more yarn for a Granny Square blanket I’m working on and decided to stop back in to see what was left of the paraphernalia. Here it is. This platform is also pictured above but crammed with things. I assume the rest of the stuff was tossed.
And for a comparison, here is the front of the mausoleum as it looks now:
It was all roped off before but now you can go up the stairs and right up to the door. Here is the statue in the front:
And in case you were wondering, here is the contents of the garbage in front of the door to MJ’s mausoleum. Someone felt like they needed a Modelo Especial at MJ’s grave. Why not?
Gary Coleman, Kristyn, Moi
In honor of Gary Coleman’s death, here is a picture of me and Kristyn with him in 2007. Don’t mind our hairs, we were trying some things out. Gary Coleman was really, really nice. This was at the NYC Comic Con. We paid to take this picture, although I can’t remember how much. Still, sometimes when you meet these people, they’re perfunctory or kind of quick to take the picture and get you out of there. Gary Coleman insisted we at least take two so that we can get a good shot. We didn’t, but the thought was nice. He shook our hands too and I remember thinking how dry his hands were.
Anyway, I’m currently watching the Golden Girls in honor of Rue McClanahan and that somehow reminded me of this picture of Gary Coleman. I’m really sad for that guy because it doesn’t seem like anyone really cared for him. Reports keep coming out that his parents and his wife (all of whom bilked him for all he was worth) are fighting over his remains. His funeral has been cancelled and there’s nothing left of his estate to pay for it. Even in death, this guy can’t catch a break. Rest in peace, Gary Coleman. Poor guy.
This could have been me.
I had applied for and interviewed at Blockbuster. This was one of my “over-qualified” positions. The store is right around the corner. I can moonwalk there if I wanted to. It would have been a perfect way to score some duckets either as my main job (for now) or my side piece once I got a real job. Well, guys, get ready to spit tears out of your eye holes because it’s looking like being awesome has struck again. I was supposed to hear the gossamer phrase, “You’re hired bitch” today and that didn’t happen. The phone has turned against me and refuses to ring.
It’s tough being this excellent guys, but someone has GOT to do it.
(But seriously, if I was too talented to come inside, couldn’t they have just sent me the money as a cash prize for excellence? Americans.)
P.S. In case you have no sense of humor, I am making FUN of my current position by accepting my own awesomeness. Settle down. See the above photoshop job I did if you need further proof of my incredible mind.
This is just a sprinkler and some flowers. Reminded me of summer so I liked it.
This morning I was having extremely vivid dreams. I wish I had committed to remembering them. The only part that I distinctly remember was hanging out with the recently deceased Gary Coleman and his nutjob wife. We were climbing a hill and over the side of the hill was a bunch of reporters. They weren’t here to talk to Gary, they were here to report about a Mets game or something. There happened to be a pool of water (not a real pool, just a pool of water) that we decided to swim in. We were having a really good time in that water. The cameras turned to us and honestly I’ve never seen Gary Coleman so happy. Then the alarm went off. I’m here to say that wherever Gary Coleman is, he is having a great time. No need to worry.
Rest in Peace Rue, You will be sorely missed.
In more important tragic celebrity death news, my girl Rue McClanahan has also flown off to heaven. There are just no words to express my grief over this shit. Yes we all knew that this was something on the horizon but who can ever REALLY prepare for the loss of a Golden Girl? Tonight I am going to go home and watch some episodes on DVD. That is right, I’m proud to say that we own every season of GG and even season one of Maude. (Goddamn it release season two already!) Kristyn told me that Rue’s death inspired a feeling of creativity in her today. I said, “Why? To make Rue McClanahan art?” And she said, “No, to work on a TV show like the Golden Girls.” And I agreed but then I was inspired to make Rue McClanahan art. You guys might not know this but me and Kristyn actually have already made GG-inspired art that is languishing at home. I’ll show ya later.
Purple Tree down the block from my job.
What else, what else? I took a walkaroo at lunch and feverishly took some pictures of California’s purple tree populace. It’s a mark of how little I get out lately that I only noticed the purple trees when we drove down to Long Beach to do the Flash Mob considering that now I see them all over LA. Eyes wide shut bitches.
Trailer Park in Santa Monica with two purple trees.
I also had a white flesh nectarine today. It wasn’t even ripe but it as delicious. If you like really sweet fruit, trust me, you will like white flesh nectarines. They’re a little bit more expensive than your standard nectarine but the expenditure is worth it. What a delicious fruit.
Some pretty flowers that I just liked the color of.
So you know, I have one and a half hours of work left today and I have nothing to do. I’m extremely a little bored. I’m reading a new blog (for me, not for them) called The Windshield Diaries. I like it because the couple lives in Upstate New York. I have been CRAVING Upstate New York for weeks. I’d do a surprising amount of debauched things in order to be up there for one day and one night at this moment. Kristyn had to cut me off from waxing poetic about it the other day. Yes, friends and family, I miss you. But right now, you are being usurped by the Catskills.
I MUST OWN THIS.
I think that’s really all I have to say for right now. Natch, I could go on but I talked myself into reading the Windshield Diaries again. See ya.
RUN DON'T WALK!!!
Hey guys! My friend Aleix is the bomb and he’s co-hosting a benefit for Doctors without Borders to raise money to aid the people of Haiti. (That link is in case you are emerging from the soundproof room with no access to the outside world that you have been living in for the past two weeks. Hey it happens.) He was able to get some amazing people to appear and I’m so mad that I can’t go (bc I’m a dummy who moved to LA). It’ll be a fun night for a great cause so if you’re in the NYC area: GO!!!
If that’s not reason enough to get you to go, how about this adorable picture of Mr. Aleix himself and the late Michael Jackson:
How can you refuse these faces?
Buberella 
