Sweet sunset.
The following was a little diary I wrote whilst I was waiting in Los Angeles for Matt Barr and his wife to arrive, so we could hang out. I was waiting for awhile, but it was mostly my own fault. In order to miss rush hour traffic, I decided to come early. Oh well, live and learn. The following is unedited, as I typed it up by myself. You can probably sense my descent into boredom and madness. Anyway, without further ado, here is:
Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary.
3:10. Arrive at Sunset. The drive up from SD wasn’t particularly bad, but I had to kill my manual transmission trying to get up La Ciegna blvd (or however the hell you spell it) to turn right onto Sunset. It took a whole lot of tr-eye-in’ just to get up THAT hill - I’m not particularly good at working hills under pressure. It seems as though parking is going to be very difficult to find. Ideally, I’d like to find a coffee shop someplace to sit and wait for MB. But the Starbuck’s has a parking lot good for only a half-hour.
3:25. Pita Pizzaz. I found a parking spot that I absolutely had to take because I really had to, ahem, use the facilities. I bought a lemonade at some pita place, but the parking here says 15 minutes. Ugh. Time to take off again.
3:50. Xanadu. I found (incredibly luckily) a parking spot at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf coffee shop that doesn’t seem to have any sort of a time limit (no jinxes). I’m just going to pull in here and wait for MB to show; his hotel is like two blocks away.
4:25. CB&TL. I’m trying to do a little writing, but I’m finding it very difficult what with all the sunset strip related distractions. Women keep walking in here in incredibly high heels, obviously stretched faces. Really ugly. There was this one woman who had a son about 15 or so, and she looked like a botched Joan Rivers job. I feel bad for that kid.
4:47. Two girls just sat down next to me and are eyeing my table jealously. Mine’s in the shade. Their table’s in the sun. Too bad for them.
5:02. Got up to go to the bathroom, returned to find the two girls sitting at my table. Sumbitch!
5:04. Two girls get up and leave. HAHA! The table is mine once again.
5:30. Just talked to MB. He says they’re roughly 200 miles away. I’m not quite sure what the time looks like on that one with LA traffic coming from the North, but it can’t be super-good. Looks like I’m going to be working here for a long while longer. No worries. More diary!
5:32. There appears to be a couple of incredibly, you know, uptight business type jerks at the table next to me working the cell phones. They’re seem to be trying to salvage some kind of “deal” that’s likely to fail. I keep hearing the one (fat) guy saying over the phone: “I just want to make sure they’re not trying to fuck us.” News flash, pal. They’re trying to fuck you.
6. Apparently these guys are actually in the movie business, because some big shot showed up and started talking to them about “stars” and “international distribution” and “genres” and “series” and “seasons”. Huh. There’s a movie deal going down right next to my chair.
6:05. There’s a set of Target billboards across the street that I’m finding very distracting. One features a guy dressed all in white with 3D glasses on, sitting in a white theatre, eating white popcorn out of a white tub with little red Target logos on it. The other one features a girl, dressed all in red with 3D glasses on, sitting in a red theatre, eating red popcorn out of a red tub with little white Target logos all over it. It’s bugging me, however, that both of their 3D glasses are white. Seems to me that they should switch it up, make the dude’s glasses red. That would make it more symmetrical.
6:23. The guys sitting next to me keep calling the movie they’re trying to sell: “the property”. That strikes me as weird. It’s not property, it’s a freakin’ movie. Corporate buzzwords. Ugh.
6:24. Some guy in a yellow jeep and a really loud engine just pulled up and sprayed exhaust into my face. Screw him.
6:26. The bigshot just asked the other guys who they would cast as the lead, the other guy said “someone in the mold of Jessica Biel”. I’m not quite sure what I think of that. I’ve been able to gather, however, that it’s definitely some kind of super-hero movie.
6:40. The movie deal has just concluded. No big handshakes. This was probably just, as they say, a “pitch”. I say “as they say” because I have no fucking clue what a pitch is, and am pulling that term completely out of my ass.
7:03. The guy with the yellow jeep, who also turns out to be a generally annoying person in his own right, has apparently camped out with a bunch of his Baltimore buddies, each of whom is equally annoying if not more so. They’re all smoking these incredibly disgusting cigarettes. In addition, I don’t think a single one of them has purchased anything yet from the coffee shop. You know, not that I’m a big fan of huge corporations or anything, but that strikes me as a little childish. One of them keeps talking about his upcoming trip to Morocco in an extremely loud, grating voice and (possibly fake) French accent.
7:09. The traffic on Sunset Boulevard seems to be backing up in an eastward direction. That strikes me as strange. I thought West Hollywood was supposed to be the hip, where you wanna be area of Hollywood. Maybe I’m west of West Hollywood. Maybe I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.
7:19. I think I disagree with Huey Lewis. He says, if you recall from “The Heart of Rock ‘n’ Roll”, that the Sunset Strip is something everyone should see. I’m not sure I’m seeing anything that is particularly worth seeing. There are some girls dressed scantily, but their status as “pretty pretty” has somehow eluded me. Just seems to be just another LA street with some restaurants and hotels on it. And by that, I mean, a shithole.
8:23. Just spent about fifteen minutes playing that music quiz game on the iPod. I find that it’s difficult to accurately select the song you want in a timely manner with the clickwheel. I only legitimately missed three out of seventy-four, but it told me I really missed six. I’m startin’ to lose it. I need to use the facilities again, and I think the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf people are starting to look at me funny. Am I being paranoid? You betcher ass.
8:26. The sun has set over Sunset Boulevard, and it’s starting to get a little chilly. I should have brought a jacket or something. You would have thought that the sheer number of cars traveling my direction would have kept me warm by the incandescent glow of their headlights but hey, sometimes the world’s counterintuitive. I’m thinking of making the move to that Starbucks that only has half-an-hour parking. But it’s risky. There were only a few spots when I went there earlier today, and there’s no guarantee they’re going to be there again. I’ve also come up with a plan for the bathroom. I’m going to wait until someone ELSE goes in with the key, and then intercept them before they go back inside, avoiding the CB&TL staff altogether. It can’t fail! I’m also running out of battery power on my laptop. Only 17% left. According to my computer that’s 39 minutes, but that estimate is highly suspect. Sweet. Here comes someone with the key.
8:39. That plan worked like a charm. And, whilst I was in the bathroom, MB called me! WOOHOOO! I’m leavin’ here in a paltry fifteen minutes. It’s time to close up Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary. It’s been a lot of fun. A lot of laughs. A few tears. A lot of annoying LA residents. So, as I bid you goodbye:
DALE SINGING:
I’ll bee seeeeeeeeing you,
in alll the ooooooold familiar plaaces....
8:45. As I’m reading over Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary, about to close up the ol’ laptop, some woman exits the coffee shop, tosses a half-full cup of coffee into the trash bin in a way that causes a decent amount to splash all over me. Fuckin’ a. Piss on you, Sunset Strip. Piss on you.
Following that, I had a very enjoyable time with Matt and Sarah. But LA, you suck.
Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary.
3:10. Arrive at Sunset. The drive up from SD wasn’t particularly bad, but I had to kill my manual transmission trying to get up La Ciegna blvd (or however the hell you spell it) to turn right onto Sunset. It took a whole lot of tr-eye-in’ just to get up THAT hill - I’m not particularly good at working hills under pressure. It seems as though parking is going to be very difficult to find. Ideally, I’d like to find a coffee shop someplace to sit and wait for MB. But the Starbuck’s has a parking lot good for only a half-hour.
3:25. Pita Pizzaz. I found a parking spot that I absolutely had to take because I really had to, ahem, use the facilities. I bought a lemonade at some pita place, but the parking here says 15 minutes. Ugh. Time to take off again.
3:50. Xanadu. I found (incredibly luckily) a parking spot at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf coffee shop that doesn’t seem to have any sort of a time limit (no jinxes). I’m just going to pull in here and wait for MB to show; his hotel is like two blocks away.
4:25. CB&TL. I’m trying to do a little writing, but I’m finding it very difficult what with all the sunset strip related distractions. Women keep walking in here in incredibly high heels, obviously stretched faces. Really ugly. There was this one woman who had a son about 15 or so, and she looked like a botched Joan Rivers job. I feel bad for that kid.
4:47. Two girls just sat down next to me and are eyeing my table jealously. Mine’s in the shade. Their table’s in the sun. Too bad for them.
5:02. Got up to go to the bathroom, returned to find the two girls sitting at my table. Sumbitch!
5:04. Two girls get up and leave. HAHA! The table is mine once again.
5:30. Just talked to MB. He says they’re roughly 200 miles away. I’m not quite sure what the time looks like on that one with LA traffic coming from the North, but it can’t be super-good. Looks like I’m going to be working here for a long while longer. No worries. More diary!
5:32. There appears to be a couple of incredibly, you know, uptight business type jerks at the table next to me working the cell phones. They’re seem to be trying to salvage some kind of “deal” that’s likely to fail. I keep hearing the one (fat) guy saying over the phone: “I just want to make sure they’re not trying to fuck us.” News flash, pal. They’re trying to fuck you.
6. Apparently these guys are actually in the movie business, because some big shot showed up and started talking to them about “stars” and “international distribution” and “genres” and “series” and “seasons”. Huh. There’s a movie deal going down right next to my chair.
6:05. There’s a set of Target billboards across the street that I’m finding very distracting. One features a guy dressed all in white with 3D glasses on, sitting in a white theatre, eating white popcorn out of a white tub with little red Target logos on it. The other one features a girl, dressed all in red with 3D glasses on, sitting in a red theatre, eating red popcorn out of a red tub with little white Target logos all over it. It’s bugging me, however, that both of their 3D glasses are white. Seems to me that they should switch it up, make the dude’s glasses red. That would make it more symmetrical.
6:23. The guys sitting next to me keep calling the movie they’re trying to sell: “the property”. That strikes me as weird. It’s not property, it’s a freakin’ movie. Corporate buzzwords. Ugh.
6:24. Some guy in a yellow jeep and a really loud engine just pulled up and sprayed exhaust into my face. Screw him.
6:26. The bigshot just asked the other guys who they would cast as the lead, the other guy said “someone in the mold of Jessica Biel”. I’m not quite sure what I think of that. I’ve been able to gather, however, that it’s definitely some kind of super-hero movie.
6:40. The movie deal has just concluded. No big handshakes. This was probably just, as they say, a “pitch”. I say “as they say” because I have no fucking clue what a pitch is, and am pulling that term completely out of my ass.
7:03. The guy with the yellow jeep, who also turns out to be a generally annoying person in his own right, has apparently camped out with a bunch of his Baltimore buddies, each of whom is equally annoying if not more so. They’re all smoking these incredibly disgusting cigarettes. In addition, I don’t think a single one of them has purchased anything yet from the coffee shop. You know, not that I’m a big fan of huge corporations or anything, but that strikes me as a little childish. One of them keeps talking about his upcoming trip to Morocco in an extremely loud, grating voice and (possibly fake) French accent.
7:09. The traffic on Sunset Boulevard seems to be backing up in an eastward direction. That strikes me as strange. I thought West Hollywood was supposed to be the hip, where you wanna be area of Hollywood. Maybe I’m west of West Hollywood. Maybe I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.
7:19. I think I disagree with Huey Lewis. He says, if you recall from “The Heart of Rock ‘n’ Roll”, that the Sunset Strip is something everyone should see. I’m not sure I’m seeing anything that is particularly worth seeing. There are some girls dressed scantily, but their status as “pretty pretty” has somehow eluded me. Just seems to be just another LA street with some restaurants and hotels on it. And by that, I mean, a shithole.
8:23. Just spent about fifteen minutes playing that music quiz game on the iPod. I find that it’s difficult to accurately select the song you want in a timely manner with the clickwheel. I only legitimately missed three out of seventy-four, but it told me I really missed six. I’m startin’ to lose it. I need to use the facilities again, and I think the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf people are starting to look at me funny. Am I being paranoid? You betcher ass.
8:26. The sun has set over Sunset Boulevard, and it’s starting to get a little chilly. I should have brought a jacket or something. You would have thought that the sheer number of cars traveling my direction would have kept me warm by the incandescent glow of their headlights but hey, sometimes the world’s counterintuitive. I’m thinking of making the move to that Starbucks that only has half-an-hour parking. But it’s risky. There were only a few spots when I went there earlier today, and there’s no guarantee they’re going to be there again. I’ve also come up with a plan for the bathroom. I’m going to wait until someone ELSE goes in with the key, and then intercept them before they go back inside, avoiding the CB&TL staff altogether. It can’t fail! I’m also running out of battery power on my laptop. Only 17% left. According to my computer that’s 39 minutes, but that estimate is highly suspect. Sweet. Here comes someone with the key.
8:39. That plan worked like a charm. And, whilst I was in the bathroom, MB called me! WOOHOOO! I’m leavin’ here in a paltry fifteen minutes. It’s time to close up Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary. It’s been a lot of fun. A lot of laughs. A few tears. A lot of annoying LA residents. So, as I bid you goodbye:
DALE SINGING:
I’ll bee seeeeeeeeing you,
in alll the ooooooold familiar plaaces....
8:45. As I’m reading over Dale’s Sunset Strip Diary, about to close up the ol’ laptop, some woman exits the coffee shop, tosses a half-full cup of coffee into the trash bin in a way that causes a decent amount to splash all over me. Fuckin’ a. Piss on you, Sunset Strip. Piss on you.
Following that, I had a very enjoyable time with Matt and Sarah. But LA, you suck.
posted by dd0031 at 3:39 AM
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