On Pretending To Be Tourists To Photograph Tourists

Sometimes I have what I guess are unusual ideas. Nicci was telling me a few days ago that when she's not working, she gets bored. In trying to be a good partner, I quickly rattled off a list of things one could do that would instantly cure their boredom. I told her she could choose a random friend and follow them around for a day (you know, like spying?) to see what they're up to. I told her to think of a place she wanted to go (like a bookstore or a music store) and then use the Internet to find one she hadn't been to that's at least twenty miles away from the closest location. I told her she should dress up like a tourist and go to Hollywood and Highland, but instead of doing touristy things she should just snap photographs of the real tourists. Then I thought -- what a minute, that's a fucking incredible idea -- I want to be a part of it. Yesterday we both had the day off from work, so we decided to go through with the plan.

The preparation was simple. I put on a pair of ten-year-old Abercrombie & Fitch khaki shorts (which were originally packed with my belongings in an attempt to appease my mother, who said I couldn't move to L.A. without a pair of shorts), a collared t-shirt, and sandals. I removed my glasses, as they are a pure "L.A.-er" giveaway. I tried to style my hair, but there isn't really much I can do with it. Nicci wore her own pair of touristy shorts, a plain green t-shirt, and styled her hair into some sort of hairspray-enriched "Midwestern sorority girl" coif. We created names and backgrounds for ourselves. She was "Kourtney" and I was "Christopher", and we were from Evansville, Indiana. We met at at fraternity/sorority function at Indiana University. I beat her sometimes. The hardest part was trying to perfect our dialect. I wanted to speak like a sixty-five-year-old dock worker from Chicago, which she said was "too much". Try as I might, I sounded like a fucking retard, saying things like "yous", and using D's instead of T's in words like "this" and "that". I tried to tone it down, but she thought I still sounded like a jackass. Having taken classes in speech and accents and dialects before, Kourtney had the Midwest dialect down (bland, soft vowels), but I think she was still afraid to use it.

Our first stop was Pink's Hot Dog Stand (La Brea & Melrose), because that's where all the tourists go for lunch. Unfortunately for us, I hadn't been there before, so I was a bit too excited about the hot dog to worry about photographing our compatriots in line. Although, I think I learned a lot from the married couple standing next to us, as the husband (who was wearing the best "tourist" pants ever) and wife spent the entire time bickering. I tried to use it for my character, but instead I just wound up saying things to Kourtney like, "I swear to God, I'm going to punch you in the face." Then she'd smile and say, "Oh, Christ-a-pher" and kiss me. Being a douchebag frat boy is awesome.

It took almost an hour to weave our way through the line, but the horrible family in front of us and the two East Coast muscle-head assholes behind us provided enough giggles as we whispered to one another in character. Finally we reached the end of the line, and placed our orders. Honestly, I can't remember if Kourtney ordered in character or not, but I forgot. She ate a Lord Of The "Rings" hot dog (onion rings and barbecue sauce), and I had a Nacho Cheese Chili Dog with bacon. Sweet, sweet bacon. After spending an hour in line, we ate our hot dogs and were back on the road in less than ten minutes.

The next stop was Hollywood/Highland. The epicenter of the tourist universe. The Chinese Theater is there. The Walk Of Fame runs through it. The Kodak Theater. People trying to make a buck dressed as famous celebrities, movie characters, and completely useless, unidentifiable dolts. The tourists arrived in great numbers. There were Asians everywhere, as well as contemplative Red State-ers, and skanky bitches who wanted to pretend they were L.A. natives. Our techniques for obtaining quality photographs varied. Sometimes I would say, "Get a picture of me here!" while standing in front of a particularly awesome-looking tourist. Then Kourtney would shoot over my shoulder. Other times, we pretended to look at already-taken pictures, while actually framing and shooting new pictures. Sometimes, we boldly just aimed the camera and fired away at people without care. And yes, we snapped photographs of people snapping photographs, just to be meta. We had to take fifty or more photographs, but here are some of the best:

You can always spot a tourist by their camera, which has an obnoxiously-long lens (or by their backpacks). You can spot a young Jewish girl because she's trying to look like Natalie Portman in Garden State. Also, tourists always try and see if their hands are bigger than their favorite celebrities.

Children are an easy way to target tourists. They run like the wind, and always come with a set of parents (unless one died prematurely or cheated on the other). Tourist children dress in an understated, "please don't abduct me" fashion.

He's trying to fit in by wearing a USC baseball cap, but look closely and you'll see that this gentleman is stepping off a StarLine "tour the homes of the stars" bus. Total giveaway that he's a tourist.

You can always tell a tourist by the way they try to look like they've lived in Los Angeles their entire lives, or by the luggage they are dragging behind them.

Although he might look like the contestant from next season's "American Idol" who is too old to be competing, but eventually turns into a fan favorite, this guy is actually just another tourist coming out of the Virgin Megastore. What's in his man purse, you ask? Why, it's the new Dave Cook CD!

Speaking of the Virgin Megastore, we stopped in for a few minutes so that I could pose with a copy of "The Hipster Handbook" (turns out I'm not a hipster -- phew!), and model off the new Paris Hilton clothing line.

Plain and simple: black people love Elmo, fat Latino children love McFlurry.

This series is called "The Fight". It captures a boyfriend and a girlfriend trying to solve a problem (it's probably sexual -- I think I heard her say something about dating a white penis is supposed to feel better than dating an Asian). To best capture these three photographs, we utilized the "Aye, Kourtney, take a picture of me standing here" routine. You can see perfectly over my shoulder as the struggling tourist couple solves their problem (I think I heard her say something about his agreeing to penis-elongation surgery).

This douchebag has the complete package. He's got the collared shirt, the greasy hair, the khaki shorts, and he's texting somebody on his phone. The giveaway that he's a tourist? It's either the clean white shoes, or the fact that he's positioned himself right next to a parking cone that is almost as tall as he is. A Los Angeles native would ever diminish their stature like that, because we all know the basics of art direction and production design.

When a tourist sees that there is a television program filming live, they are always quick to document their experience "on set". Ooh, look at me, I'm talking like a real TV industry insider! (Note: Nicci and I were asked to be a part of the program "10 Years Younger", but while she wanted to, I declined the offer. Do I regret not agreeing to be on television while dressed like an asshole, and speaking with a horrible accent? No.

Look! She's just like us! Even Marilyn Monroe takes the bus back to Reseda after a hard day's work.

Holy shit are lesbian tourists an easy one to spot.

Hmm...tourist, or Angelino? It's hard to tell. His sunglass-wearing, open-shirt "just don't give a fuck" attitude says Angelino, but if you look very closely, you'll see that his leathery-faced wife is holding a shopping bag alongside her purse. No Los Angeles native would ever be caught dead shopping at Hollywood/Highland, so this couple are definitely TOURISTS.

These gays came to Los Angeles expecting round-the-clock parties, great E, and maybe a sexy closet-case white boy to add to their Latin sandwich. Unfortunately, all they found was a case of the sleepies! Look at that gay. He's all tuckered out.

Flower Travellin' Band - Unaware
Cactus - Parchman Family
Pere Ubu - Beach Boys
Montana Hornet - Organ

"Oxbow is a long-lived Avant-Garde band out of San Francisco, California notable for a unique sound. Oxbow plays a blend of Noise Rock, Experimental Jazz, Musique Concrete (AMG), and Blues, creating soundscapes caustic, or plangent, with overtones of paranoia, revulsion, exaltation." - Wikipedia

"What came out of Eugene's body the night we played with Oxbow in France was definitely not crap! I believe it is called jiz." - Matt Kadane

I don't know the first thing about Let Me Be A Woman, other than I found it for $5 at Amoeba last month. Apparently it is a long out-of-print CD that was recorded by Steve Albini in 1995, and released on Brinkman Records. The insert includes lyrics and musical notation. I always knew Eugene Robinson was a wordsmith, but I don't think I'd ever read his lyrics until I found this CD. Beautiful stuff. The music is standard Oxbow fare, mixing the above-mentioned genres into a sound entirely their own. It's a gas, man.

Oxbow
Let Me Be A Woman
MediaFire Download Link

Tracklist:
01. Sunday
02. Gal
03. The Virgin Bride
04. 1000
05. Me And The Moon
06. The Stabbing Hand

Tags: Hollywood, Highland, tourists, photography, Virgin Megastore, TLC, 10 Years Younger, Pink's, Hot Dog, stand, Los Angeles, Walk Of Fame, Kodak Theater, Oxbow, Let Me Be A Woman, mp3, blog, download, rare, out-of-print

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 10

Today is my last day in New Jersey, again. Who knows how long it will be before I return. It took almost exactly one year -- from April 27th, 2007 to April 30th, 2008 -- to warrant a first visit. Supposedly (if you believe what I've promised my parents and friends) it will not take another year for me to find my way home. We'll just have to wait and see.

I'm taking today "off" in order to relax and prepare myself for the return voyage. I awoke early this morning and drove to Denville to pick up a new pair of back-up glasses (for those days when I accidentally leave the house without them), and watched last night's episode of LOST. Holy fucking shit, was it good. Does anyone else maybe think that Jacob is Locke? Is that just the craziest fucking thing you've ever heard? I don't know, let me know what you think.

I've actually accumulated enough airline miles to fly first class from Newark to Los Angeles, so it should be an easy, comfortable flight. I might shirk my blogging duties tomorrow depending on what time the plane lands and how tired I am, but at the very least I'll try to put together a brief entry with some music downloads tomorrow before I head to the airport.

Tonight we're having a feast at my mother's place. Fittingly, she has chosen to make her famous chicken parm to mark the occasion. It's only three o'clock, but familiar scents are filling the air. The scents, surprisingly, are completely unrelated to my not having showered in over twenty-four hours.

It's been an interesting ten days. I got to see a great number of my friends, and spend enough time with my family to not feel like I came home and dedicated all my time to non-family-related affairs. My biggest fear upon returning home was that I wouldn't dedicate an equal amount of time to my friends, my mother and my father (especially considering I haven't seen him in a year), but I think I handled it well. Of course, there were some road-bumps along the way. Several times I was reminded why exactly I chose to move across the country. Idiosyncrasies I used to find cloying or irksome are still capable of enraging me. In the end, I guess, nothing really changes. The characters that lived and breathed and flourished here for twenty-four years are still here. I guess that's why they call it "home".

The Top Ten Best (And Worst) Things About Coming Home

10. Good - Record Collection - I've started a nice little West Coast collection for myself, but nothing beats walking into my old bedroom and smiling at the site of that large IKEA shelving unit with all the records I bought since I started collecting in the summer of 2002. The first thing I did upon arriving at my father's house (after we had a great dinner at a local steakhouse, but more on that later) was to walk upstairs and drop the needle on Simply Saucer's Cyborgs Revisited. It finally felt like I was home. Then, of course, I walked downstairs and chatted with my father for a while, and then invited my friends over. The record collection, it appears (sadly), came first.

09. Bad - Weather - Temperatures in Los Angeles before I left reached the high-80s and low-90s. On Friday of last week, at Yankee Stadium, the temperature felt as if it had dropped well into the 40s. I was not prepared for such severe coldness. For the most part, it was warm here this week. It's been consistently in the 70s, but the cold(er) nights are tough. It's been raining all day today, and it drizzled yesterday as well as one day last week. I don't remember the last time it rained three times in one week in LA. The weather out there, to put it bluntly, is perfect.

08. Good - Comfortable Bed - The bed in my apartment is a fucking twin. It doesn't even really fit one person comfortably. I rarely sleep well in such a small bed. At home, not even the fact that my bedroom has been converted into an office can take away from my excitement about sleeping in that big, comfortable queen-sized bed. I get to lose myself in the sheets and bundle up with all the fancy blankets (as opposed to the cheap shit I have in LA). Even if I'm not getting a full night's sleep (as evident from just about every entry I've posted this week) I sleep soundlessly in the big bed. I even dream.

07. Good - New York City - Though I didn't have a car all week, the great thing about living so close to the city is that it is always accessible. Last night we got home from the Hoboken PATH in less than 25 minutes. Sometimes it takes me that long just to drive from my apartment to Soy Cafe, and that shit's less than five miles away. Being so close to the greatest city in the world is a huge benefit to being at home. It offers a kind of escape that perhaps nothing else in the world can equal. Of course, if you're going to do anything other than just walk around all day you'll need a pocket full of cash, and that's something I rarely have.

06. Good - Friends - I grew up in New Jersey. I made all my friends here. I spent twenty-three years cultivating relationships and building strong bonds with people. Many of my old friends have moved out-of-state, and I've lost touch with many, many more than that. The few that remain here in the New York / New Jersey area are awesome in every way imaginable. I've got Ian to geek out about music and baseball with, Jack and Ken to get drunk with, Sam and Lindsey offer a touch of sobriety and normalcy, and everyone else who came out last night (Z, Nat, Mike, Bret, Anthony, Zoya) to...uh...also get drunk with. Getting to see two of my oldest friends this week (Matt and Evan) was a complete surprise, and really elevated the amount of fun I had wile home.

05. Bad - Abnormal Psych - As I stated before, part of visiting home is dealing with all the frustrations that inevitably lead to my leaving New Jersey for California in the first place. Rather than insult everyone by writing exactly what I hate about them, I'll just say that it's still as annoying as ever having to deal with bad attitudes and irritating behavior. Thanks for bringing me down all week, assholes.

04. Good - Free Meals - This would be higher on the list if I had a more refined palate. Instead, it just ranks as the second highest "good" part about being home. I ate really, really well this week. The scale in the bathroom does not lie. On my first night home, I had a wonderful steak dinner at a local restaurant. Every morning I awoke to yummy breakfast foods, I was treated to lunches (oh, the number of eggs I ate this week!), and great dinners. I had fucking Wegmans the other day. There were fresh bagels available all week. The good kind, too. Not a fucking Trader Joe's or Thomas' bagel. I had Calabria's buffalo chicken wing pizza, and Arturo's coal oven pizza. My mother prepared two incredible meals. It was a non-stop feast, and I will be very, very sad when I return to LA and fall back into my routine of eating shitty gourmet pizza (or Pizza Hut), terrible bagels, and otherwise ho-hum food. Ugh, and all the fucking vegan options in Echo Park. Gross.

03. Bad - Appointments - The worst part about being home might be that your schedule is never really your own. Before I'd even landed in New Jersey, half of my days were booked solid with things to do. I guess that's the sign of a person whose company is much sought after, but these ten days have also been a vacation, and I can't even count the number of times I commented to myself just how little this has felt like a vacation. Doctors, relatives, family friends and even a former employer or two, it can be a struggle to assert oneself and decide that you are going to take a day to do entirely what you want to do. Luckily the length of my stay enabled me to spread out the appointments over the course of ten days, leaving me plenty of time to see everyone I wanted to see and still have one day or two to sit around doing absolutely nothing. And that day is today!

02. Bad - Guilt - Ah, those inevitable questions about life choices one must face whenever we return home after a long, long time away. It's always about how you don't call enough, or you don't make enough money, or you haven't done one million different things you should have done by now. Questions mount about how long you think you want to live where you're living, or work where you're working, or do whatever it is you're doing when you're not working to barely cover your rent. Then there's the guilt about leaving home and never visiting, or moving three-thousand miles away. To placate or not to placate? That is the question.

01. Good - Free Money - With the exception of buying records and the occasional meal or two, I haven't had to spend any money all week. My father pays for whatever meals I eat with him, my mother (and in one instance my old boss) is the same. Home-cooked meals are always free. Ian paid for dinner last night. Drinks were free. Jack and Ken constantly provided beer and wine. I came home with $3 in my pocket, and somehow I have $70 now without even making a trip to the bank. Yeah, I guess hanging around at home can actually be pretty sweet. At least momentarily, the free money that comes with staying under the same roof as your parent(s) provides you with a break from worrying about how the fuck you're going to afford to not ever have to move back in with your parent(s).


The Clash - Clampdown - (buy this album)
Cursillistas - St. Leonard
Stereolab - Tempter - (buy this album)
Tengir-Too - Belek (Gift) - (buy this album)
Dillard Chandler - Cold Rain And Snow - (buy this album)

Tags: travels, New Jersey, California, LOST, Newark, Los Angeles, first class, top ten, list, home, record collection, weather, comfortable bed, New York City, friends, abnormal psych, free meals, appointments, guilt, money, The Clash, Cursillistas, Stereolab, Tengir-Too, Dillard Chandler, mp3, blog, download

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 9

Thank you, Mike.

Thank you for working on Wall Street, and for having a corporate AMEX card.

Thank you for being a bored husband with a wife waiting at home while you're out on the town.

Thank you for being susceptible to the charm of young women.

And most of all, thank you for footing the $1,000+ bar tab we ran up this evening.

Yes, you read that correctly. We somehow managed to run up a tab that totalled over one thousand dollars, in the span of maybe two hours. How did it happen? You're going to have to wait to find out.

I awoke at 6:00am this morning to the sound of dripping rain smacking against a loose piece of siding outside my bedroom window. I don't remember exactly what I was dreaming (though it was probably something extremely depressing, like one of my recurring dreams where everybody I love turns their backs on me and I die), but at some point a character in my dream began hammering a nail into a very large piece of wood that was shaped like my head, and before I knew it I was awake and listening to the rain pelting against that fucking piece of aluminum siding. God, what a fucking annoying sound. I rolled out of bed, slid over to the window, opened it, and kicked the screen three stories down to the ground below. Then I stuck my head outside and started banging on the window's aluminum frame until the hammering sound subsided. Then I closed the window, grabbed two tissues to jam into my ear holes, and crawled back into bed. I slept soundlessly for another three hours before I officially woke up.

I actually showered today. It had been a few days since I remembered showering, and with friends expecting to hang out and interact with me all day, I figured I would reward them by not smelling like a dirty, homeless piece of shit. I ate a mini bagel and downed a diet soda before my sister drove me to the PATH station.

I spent my entire day buying CDs and LPs to resell on the Internet. If my calculations are correct, the $100 I spent today should net me roughly five-times that amount once everything is sold. Of course, there's no guarantee that will ever happen, because I don't really think anybody buys music anymore. Oh well, maybe somebody will prove me wrong.

Since I spent all day on my phone typing UPC codes and ISBN numbers into Amazon's website, my phone battery was down to one blinking bar at 4pm, so I decided to call it quits and turn my phone off for a while. Before that happened, I talked to Z and told him to meet me and hang out for a while until Ian got off work. Z and I met at Kim's and walked to Chipotle where we shared an order of chips and two sodas. He seemed in good spirits, and we discussed work and our social lives. He asked if I wanted to go to K-Mart to help him buy a fan and a bath towel(?), and once that was done he headed back to his Brooklyn apartment to shower and change out of his work clothes. I headed over to Other Music and then walked to Ian's apartment in SoHo. I stood around waiting for him for twenty minutes. It smelled like rat poison and garbage.

We ate dinner at Arturo's (coal oven pizza, oh my God was it heavenly), and then met up with Jon before hopping on the subway and going to the Ginger Man. The first person I saw was Anthony (of Hype Machine fame), sitting outside talking on his Blackberry. We greeted each other and walked into the obscenely crowded bar. My sister and her friend were already inside, seated at the bar with a crowd of older men in suits surrounding them, clamoring for their attention. I asked what the fuck was going on, and she said something about how they were buying drinks. Did I want a shot of Patron? I said sure, and the next thing I knew I was holding four shots in my hand. Apparently the suits were paying for it. I asked for a beer (Rogue Shakespeare Stout on tap!) and got that too without paying. I took two shots and gave away the other two. Z showed up, Nat showed up, Zoya showed up, Mike (not pictured: me, drinking a shot from Mike's crotch) and his girlfriend showed up, and Bret (pictured here with Ian, who seems to be having a great time) showed up. The next time I saw Elissa, there were a dozen shots sitting in front of her on the bar. I grabbed two, then two more, then two more and returned to the table where my friends were seated. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the free tequila. The next time I went up to the bar, there was one guy standing next to my sister and her friend, and another dozen shots sitting in front of them. Maybe it was the same dozen...who knows. The two girls introduced me to their Asian banker friend, and all I could think to say to him upon hearing his name (Tony) was, "Do you have an iPhone?" The two girls yelled at me and told me to go sit down, but I made them give me two more shots and another beer (Captain Lawrence Brown). That's when I realized the girls had taken the AMEX card of one of the bankers and pocketed it. One of the banker guys caught on and took the card away from them, but when they asked him for another round of shots he put the card down on the bar and reopened the tab. Before leaving, I had another two shots and an Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence courtesy of a guy who introduced himself as Mike. Mike offered to take my sister and her friend to a hotel room for the night, which is when they decided we needed to leave as soon as possible. Once he offered to shift our tab over to his, we realized we were free to leave. According to my sister's friend, his bill was $742 and change, and our bill was between $150 and $200. Mike took care of both, and supposedly left a generous tip. He then posed for a picture and we darted off into the night.

It took forever for the PATH train to arrive. It was quite sobering to wait around for it. The drive home was quick, because the girls wanted to hit another bar on the way back to Livingston.

What a night.

Swervedriver - A Change Is Gonna Come - (buy this album)
Teenage Filmstars - Soulful
Pere Ubu - Humor Me - (buy this album)
Leadbelly - Good Morning Blues - (buy this album)
The Books - Bonanza - (buy this album)

Tags: Wall Street, AMEX, cheating husband, bar tab, rain, PATH, Pavonia/Newport, Academy CDs, Academy LPs, Kim's Underground, Other Music, Chipotle, Amazon, Arturo's, coal oven pizza, Ginger Man, Rogue Shakespeare Stout, Captain Lawrence Brown, Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence, Patron, tequila, iPhone, Livingston, Swervedriver, Pere Ubu, Leadbelly, The Books, mp3, blog, download, travels, photography

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 8

And on the eighth day, I rested.

I've been back East for seven days, and until today my schedule was packed tighter than an Asian's pussy with appointments, people to see, and things to do. Today was the first chance I had to just relax and take it easy. The only problem was, I thought I was going to need my father's car to get around town today, so I had him wake me up early so that I could drive him to work and take the car. I soon realized that my mother was not working today, so I could have slept in and used her car. Once again, I wasted an opportunity to get a full night of sleep.

I had a bagel for breakfast. Fuck, these local bagels are so much better than anything I've consumed in the last year. I want to freeze them all and bring them back with me so I have something delicious (and free) to eat for the next few weeks when I return to Los Angeles. I'm not kidding, LA Jews have no idea how to craft a tasty bagel. After my bagel I drove my sister to the mall so she could make some makeup appointment and shop around for a bathing suit. I think there was another purpose for our mall visit, but I cannot remember what it was right now. I'm tired.

After a few hours of relaxation, I got a call from Ken asking if I was ready to drive him, Alex and Adam to the airport. I picked him up from his house (he even remembered to give me the special packaging we ordered for the Obscure References CD-r's, the doll!), threw his suitcase in the trunk, and headed for Alex's house to meet him and Adam. The three of them were being flown to Amsterdam to perform with a Jewish-themed band at some sort of children's festival. The main personality in the band was that MILF I mentioned the other night, whose CD is pictured several entries below this one (the bagel CD/jewel insert design). We sat and chatted for a few minutes, and then drove to the airport. Ken slipped me $20, which I thought about taking to the liquor store, but decided to stick in my pocket for safe keeping. I returned home and picked up my sister and father, and the three of us had dinner at a diner in the town where my father works. It was good.

More relaxation after dinner, as Ken was gone and Jack was busy with one of his wink-wink meetings. He swung by to pick me up at 10:30 and we drove to Borders to look at some books, but I refused to purchase anything. He bought a book on becoming a movie producer. He then dropped me off at home, and I watched "Top Chef", like a total fucking loser.

I would not say that today was boring, but it certainly was not my least busy day yet. At the same time, it was the most vacation-like day I've had yet, because it was completely unstructured. I think I'm better off not scheduling my life, because even if I plan something cool and exciting for myself I always dread going through with it as the event approaches. I'm not sure what that says about me other than I'm probably really lazy...but it's certainly a weird trait I have. Nevertheless, I'm quite excited about tomorrow night's planned drinking excursion in the city. I've spoken to ten or fifteen friends who have sworn they would stop by to pay their respects to me on my last real night on the town before my flight. I'm sure there will be lots of pictures to share then. Speaking of which, Lindsey and Sam sent me a few pictures from the other day, so if you've noticed some links to pictures of me in this paragraph, those are what you're seeing.

Stereolab - Harmonium - (buy this album)
St. Louis Jimmy Oden - Going Down Slow - (buy this album)
Derek Lamb - The Money Rolls In - (buy this album)
Spider - Midnight On The Nile - (buy this album)
Jerusalem & The Starbaskets - Fields and Strings

Tags: appointments, relaxation, tired, bagel, Los Angeles, Jews, Newark Airport, Amsterdam, MILF, liquor, Top Chef, Borders, boredom, life, lazy, flight, pictures, Stereolab, St. Louis Jimmy Oden, Derek Lamb, Spider, Jerusalem & The Starbaskets, mp3, blog, download, photography, travels

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Days 6 & 7

Apologies for not writing a second entry last night, but I got kind of drunk and was too tired to type. Ken and Jack procured a bottle of vodka and two six packs of beer, which the three of us worked our way through while watching the Mets lose to the Dodgers (ugh). We were joined by Matt, and the four of us decided to shoot some pool with the remainder of our evening. By the time we were kicked out by an angry old man guard, we were in varying stages of intoxication. Someone (Jack?) thought we should watch Planet Earth, so I tried to get the program to display on the HDTV, but for some reason it wasn't broadcasting in high definition. I think we missed the entire program due to my constant attempts to fix the television. I even went on the computer and tried to download a manual for both the TV set and the remote control, but nothing worked. This morning I found out I downloaded the french version of the manual. Whoops, I guess I was pretty drunk after all.

I awoke relatively early (again!? AGAIN!?) this morning to shower and dress for a day-trip to Allentown, Pennsylvania. The goal was to visit some old friends from college, explore the campus, and -- most importantly -- eat at Wegmans. I also decided to stop in at Double Decker to see if their ridiculously good vinyl selection was as great as I remember it being.

The drive from Livingston to Allentown was nothing new. I've made the trek several dozen (if not a hundred) times before, so I was pretty much in cruise control the entire time. I don't have the names of all 50+ Interstate exits and all the overpass street names memorized anymore, but I still remember some of them. The bunny bridges in Summit looked more overgrown than ever. Route 78 was lush and green, but certain stretches of land actually looked more like they would in Autumn than Spring. Nevertheless, it's always nicer to drive surrounded by electric green trees and bushes than it is barren skeletons of trees.

Before hitting Wegmans I drove through the park, made several stops at my old college campus to see various former dormitories and apartments, the house on Gordon Street where I once lived (which has since become a frat house, ugh), pretty architectural achievements, the new class buildings they've constructed, and even the dorm where I lost my virginity...when I wasn't even officially enrolled in the school! Don't ask me how that happened. Bad memories.

I actually improvised an original song as I pulled into the Wegmans parking lot. I was that excited about having lunch here. Screw the friends and catching up and trying to relive old times, I was only interested in two things: eating a buffalo-style chicken finger sub, and finding out what the current price is of burgandy truffles. The sandwich was orgasmic. They've definitely switched the spicy buffalo sauce that they dip the chicken strips in, and it tasted as good if not better than I remembered. As I ate, I kind of zoned out and watched people shopping below. I don't remember hearing a single topic of conversation. I guess I'm kind of a dick, but whatever, it's fucking WEGMANS.

By the way, the truffles are up to $999/lb..

After a few heartfelt goodbyes, I drove downtown (lock your doors!) and over the bridge to reach Double Decker. I spent far too long in the store, studying every imaginable section. I managed to keep my bill under $100, but not by much. I had a brief chat with the owner of the store about how great his selection was, and he actually recognized the name of my store and mentioned that he's purchased items from us before. Small world!

The drive home was with without incident. Again, I was on auto-pilot as I raced through a tiny sliver of Pennsylvania and a chunk of New Jersey. I arrived home in time to watch the Yankees lose, the Mets lose (ugh!) and drink more vodka with Jack and Ken. Are you seeing a routine develop here?

After today's little "whoops!" at the record store, I came home and decided to put a few personal items (not like underwear "personal," but items that held significant meaning to me at one point in my life "personal") up for auction on eBay. As always, if the winning bidder for any of the items turns out to be a Swan Fungus reader, I'll include a free blog-related surprise with whatever item you win. You can view my current auctions here. If you're feeling generous and want to donate some money to my website without the hassle of bidding on an auction, keep in mind that every penny of your donation goes towards my getting drunk and blogging about how good the beers I drank were. Where else on the Internet can you happily give money to somebody you don't know and really know that your cash is going to a specific cause? Nowhere, that's where. VIEW AND BID ON MY AUCTIONS!

Until tomorrow...

Harvey Milk - The Boy With Bosoms - (buy this album)
Godz - Alone In Regret - (buy this album)
Leannan Sith - Turn On The Moon
Rolf Harris - Sun Arise - (buy this album)
Miles Davis - Vote For Miles - (buy this album)
Les Rallizes Denudes - Enter The Mirror

Tags: vodka, Mets, Dodgers, HDTV, billards, pool, Planet Earth, user's manual, Allentown, Pennsylvania, Muhlenberg College, Wegmans, Double Decker, Route 78, Interstate, sandwich, burgandy truffles, vinyl, mp3, blog, download, Harvey Milk, Godz, Leannan Sith, Rolf Harris, Miles Davis, Les Rallizes Denudes

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 5

I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock as it struck 9:00am. Last night was another night of deep, dreamless sleep, only without the benefit of awakening refreshed and ready to greet the day. Although I longed to roll over and return to wherever the fuck my consciousness escapes to when I sleep, my desire to keep all the plans I've made this week got the best of me, and I instead rolled out of bed and threw on some clothes. My mother yelled to me from downstairs to declare she had made breakfast for me, and asked if I wanted a glass of orange juice to go with the french toast she prepared. I quickly consumed one and one half pieces of the battered and fried bread, then grabbed my camera and ran to the car. I actually left at the exact time I was hoping to leave (10:00am). That almost never happens...because I'm always too early for everything.

Getting to the Parkway and driving south to Route-1 was just as I remembered it. Several landmarks pointed the way further south, and many new landmarks were identified. I gleefully recognized the adult bookstore, the AIM uniforms store (what is that place, where you buy outfits to sit in front of your computer and talk to friends online?), the huge bowling alley, the Skylark diner and more. Several new shopping centers have sprung up on both the north and south sides of the highway. One of them contains a Chipotle, but more on that later...

I got to Sam and Lindsey's new home in exactly one hour. Their directions were precise. I was greeted first by the two dogs, Brutus and Scooby, then Sam (who gave me a scintillating man hug), then Lindsey (who gave me a run-of-the-mill girly hug). We stood around their living room for a few minutes chatting, then they gave me a tour of the house. It's much nicer than their old apartment, and they've done a great job decorating and filling the rooms with various oddities. While Lindsey drove to Starbucks, I sat down with Sam in one of the house's two studies to work on an audio/writing project he's been working on for some time. He asked to record my voice reading the parts of two characters in two different stories, so we breezed through a short recording session before Lindsey returned. I think I did alright. I warned him right before I started my first piece of dialogue that I was a little bit dyslexic, but he didn't seem to mind. He also didn't mind when I had to repeat lines due to my missing words, jumbling the order of words, or losing control of my voice (it might have cracked once or twice). When the project is done, I'm sure I'll be writing more about the labor of his love.

Starbucks coffees were consumed, and then we left for Princeton. We were out of the store in about an hour, which is probably a record for my shortest visit there. Still, I found some interesting records (Laibach, Foetus) and some CDs I can resell at a modest profit. We decided that we'd go to eat at Burrito Royale, since Sam and Lindsey had never been. As we drove north on Route-1, their excitement was palpable. I listened to their stories about how every time they drive passed the location, the restaurant is closed. I tried to feed their giddiness with statements about the awesomeness of their burritos. Of course, as we approached, we realized that it was closed -- again. Those poor kids, I really hope they try again one day this week during regular dining hours. Burrito Royale is pure gold. Pure edible gold.

So, we headed for Chipotle. It was yummy, as you might expect. Seeing as we were traveling further north on the highway, we decided that instead of returning to their house, we'd just drop by Vintage Vinyl. I found a few more CDs to sell there, and a Burzum LP to help round out my otherwise black-metal-less record collection. As we got back in the car, our conversation somehow shifted to Nintendo, and I discovered that not only did Sam and Lindsey move into a new home, they furnished it with a Nintendo Wii. Having never seen one before, I decided that I'd stay longer and play some of the games I keep hearing about from everyone who cherishes the Wii. First, we stopped at Wawa for some snacks. I couldn't get the hang of the baseball game, but eventually beat Lindsey in a close 1-0 game. Then she kicked my ass at bowling, and then I beat her at tennis. See mom...all those thousands and thousands of dollars you spent on clinics, private lessons, personal trainers, coaches and summer programs didn't go to waste!

It was starting to darken outside, and my phone was dead, so I decided to high-tail it back to my current former address (yes, I just used the expression "high-tail it"). I almost fell asleep behind the wheel while on the Parkway. That could have sucked. I arrived in one piece, and quickly called my old friends Matt and Evan to stop by my house. Apparently they were getting pretty drunk at the local TGI Fridays. I don't think the three of us had been in the same room together for almost five years. Still, it was as if we'd never moved across the country, moved back, gotten jobs (well, Evan has a job...), or anything that could possibly make once strong bonds between friends feel awkward. "It was just like old times, we were dressed like new times," to quote my old Livejournal. Upon cracking open beers, we decided that tonight would be the night we finally figured out how to get rich together. The three of us spent the next several hours taping our conversation so we wouldn't forget all our amazing ideas. Jack, Ken and Katie showed up at some point, and a short while later I noticed we'd started listening to Razorblade Suitcase and playing Nintendo. Yup, it was beginning to look and feel like "1996 Night" in my old, childhood bedroom. Everyone looked and sounded jovial. Even me (I'd make an "out of the closet" comment here, but, well...you know).

As the clock struck midnight, people began to sober up or grow tired, and they all left. As we all hugged goodbye, more plans were made to continue our work on making millions of dollars. I don't know if I'd call them "plans," per se, because all we really decided was that since Matt and I are Jewish it was time to claim our birthrights and become mega-rich movie producers. After all, isn't it the God damned right of every fucking Jew on Earth to break into the industry?

Tomorrow is another busy fucking day. I'm really beginning to take exception to my inability to schedule some time to just fucking relax on the couch and watch TV. I feel like I'm constantly on the move, which seems impossible without my own car, but somehow I've been up early every morning and keeping busy to varying degrees (from very busy to super busy) until the wee hours of the morning. In an e-mail statement made earlier this evening, I wrote that I somehow managed to get better, longer nights of sleep when I'm in LA than I am on this vacation.

Blues Magoos - (We Ain't Got) Nothin' Yet - (buy this album)
Blues Magoos - She's Coming Home - (buy this album)
Grails - Clean Living - (buy this album)
The United States Of America - Cloud Song - (buy this album)
The United States Of America - Hard Coming Love - (buy this album)

Tags: vacation, travels, photography, french toast, orange juice, New Jersey Parkway, Route-1, New Brunswick, Starbucks, Princeton Record Exchange, Princeton, Laibach, Foetus, Burrito Royale, Chipotle, burrito, Vintage Vinyl, Nintendo Wii, baseball, bowling, tennis, Wawa, TGI Fridays, get rich quick, Nintendo, NES, Razorblade Suitcase, Blues Magoos, Grails, The United States Of America, mp3, blog, download

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 4

Ah, Saturday. Wait -- today's Saturday, right? I am sitting at the computer hutch in my mother's house with what began as a quart of Dogfish Head's malt liquor. Spiritualized's newest LP Songs In A&E is mesmerising me. Look for a full-length review upon my return to Los Angeles. The desktop image on this monitor is a photograph that was taken in Griffith Park by my sister. It is a weird dichotomy between my early life and modern times. When these last four-fingers worth of booze has been consumed, I'll move onto a pint and a half of Fat Tire. That should be enough to help me sleep through the night. By the way, I haven't mentioned this yet, but my sleep patterns have been entirely fucked up since traveling home. I am up until 4 or 5am each night partying with friends and then returning home to blog about the previous day's events. The fact that I always seem to have plans early the next morning (and by always I mean the only three mornings since I flew back East) just isn't a compelling enough reason to go to sleep at a reasonable hour.

Fuck. A shrill voice yells for me to awaken. I only had one drink last night, and the drive home from Manhattan was without traffic, but somehow I managed not to crawl into bed until well after 4am. It's 9am, and I have to be in a chair at the dentist's office in less than an hour. What sucks is, my car is (obviously) still in Los Angeles, so I have to rely on my family to cart me around to various appointments and meals. It's like being sixteen years old again. It can be a fascinating experience if you're -- totally random example -- being ignored by the other person in the car, but more on that later. All I really wanted from this morning was to make sure I survived the appointment without hearing any bad news, and arrive home in time to watch the Mets game.

My dentist is a fag. That is to say, he is the most self-conscious, obsessive-compulsive professional I have ever interacted with. One time I called an employee of his a sadist and he actually hand-wrote me a personalized letter of apology and swore that all of my future visits would be quality controlled and overseen by him directly. It was the kind of move you'd expect from a guy who probably spent a number of nights standing on a ledge as a student. Today I told him doctor's visits are, for me, like chess matches. No matter what I do to try and better my life, doctors always unsheathe some flashy new invention that can examine my body even more closely, and they always find something wrong with me. This is the reason for my fear of people who practice medicine. Lo-and-behold, my most recent chess moves (daily flossing, one soda per day) were squashed by some new computerized contraption that might have found a "problem." So much for my first goal of the day.

Breakfast was consumed at Livingston Bagel, that bastion of young MILFs, their annoying, crying children, and old folks who really have no use wandering through the world outside their assisted living houses. It took over twenty minutes to place an order for a simple wheat bagel with one egg and cheese. An old woman drove her walker into my shoulder and I thought I heard a pop. Dumbfuck parents couldn't shut up their children. It was just like every other meal I've ever eaten at Livingston Bagel. If they didn't make such delicious bagels I'd never eat there. Well, that and the nostalgia elicited by eating at a place owned by the father of a cute blonde girl I asked to blow me in high school. I guess there are two reason for going there.

I was dropped off at home to watch the baseball game. The Mets fucking sucked. So much for my second goal of the day. Before they even finished losing (it took over three hours -- I wanted to shoot myself in the face just for enduring it) it was time to head over to Calabria for pizza with Elissa, her friend Liz, and Ian. Of course, I yelled at Elissa for being lazy and wanting to watch the end of a TV show rather than being on-time to meet our friends, and she called me an asshole and refused to speak to me until our main courses arrived at the table. Calabria, much like Livingston Bagel, is used filled with dumbshit parents, retarded fucking kids, and people from high school you hoped to never see again. Tonight was no exception, as the entire back room was packed with families yelling at one another and a few recognizable faces from my high school days. What these people are still doing living here is beyond me.

I left with Ian and we drove to Bottle King for some booze. We picked up his dog and brought it over to my mom's to run around while we, along with Ken, Katie and Jack, drank and watched American Movie and Coven. Things were going well until I spilled the 40oz. bottle trying to hand it to Jack, and then I sat around angrily waiting for my clothes and hair to dry. Just when I was starting to feel dry, the phone rang. I lifted the receiver to my ear and it was covered in malt liquor. I looked down at the cradle, and it was filled to the brim with alcohol. Again I became temporarily enraged. The movie was just as enjoyable the second time around. Coven contained some beautiful shots, but was also quite worse than I remembered it being.

More beers in my stomach sloshing around now. "The Waves Crash In" drawing to a close. It is 2am. I have to be awake in seven hours so I can drive to meet Sam and Lindsey at their house early enough to get to Wegmans at a reasonable hour for lunch. For the third day in a row, I left the camera where I was not. All you're really missing is: A picture of the two places I ate, and a picture of me screaming at everyone to help me clean the beer out of the carpet. I promise some great shots tomorrow detailing whatever hijinks ensue when I am in the company of Sam and Lindsey.

Charlie Parker - All The Things You Are - (buy this album)
Charlie Parker - Blue 'N' Boogie - (buy this album)
Neil Young - Harvest - (buy this album)
Neil Young - Are You Ready For The Country - (buy this album)
Edgard Varese - Ionization - (buy this album)
Edgard Varese - Poeme Electronique - (buy this album)

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 3

It began innocently enough. I awoke to find Annie Hall on my television, and the sounds of rushing cars on Walnut Street filtering through my bedroom windows. It was 11:00am exactly. I slowly composed myself and decided that I would spend the day at my mother's house (100 yards down the street). My sister was sleeping in my father's room across the hall, with our dog curled up next to her. I asked if she wanted to lend me her car for a few hours, or should just walk to the other house. She said she would drive me, because there was something she needed to do there, too. As it turned out, what she needed to do was sit on her ass and watch TV all day, but that's besides the point.

There was a bowl of fresh chili waiting for me in the fridge, so I ate half of it with a plain bagel for breakfast. Oh man, you wouldn't believe how delicious the bagel was. I've missed the New York / New Jersey bagel like you wouldn't believe, and now I am convinced that I will be returning to LA with at least a dozen of them, to be frozen and enjoyed over the course of the next month or so. The chili was also good, but that will be devoured long before my week here draws to a close.

I showered, as I am wont to do, and dressed myself in my Friday best: jeans, a long-sleeved t-shirt, a hoodie, and the exterior of my old winter jacket. I figured that would be enough to keep me warm on a 50-degree evening. At 4:30 I began my voyage to meet Ian in the city so we could attend tonight's Yankees/Mariners game. The original plan was for me to drive to Jersey City, park and take the PATH into Manhattan, walk to his apartment, and then travel via 4-Train to the Bronx. This didn't even remotely come close to happening, because there was no parking in Jersey City, and the public lot that used to serve as a back-up to street parking has apparently been closed or re-appropriated for residential use only. Instead, I had to drive directly to Ian's apartment.

Having not driven in New York in over a year, I was a bit nervous about not being able to find my way, but it was actually quite easy to locate and navigate my way to where he lives. I found an incredible parking spot, and sat in my car waiting for 6:00pm to roll around so I could leave the car without any fear of being ticketed. Ian called five minutes in front of six to ask where I was. When I told him, he said he was walking towards his apartment and would be happening upon my car momentarily. I looked out the window into my side mirror and there he was.

He looked good. Not in a gay way, of course, but in the way that a man will sometimes compliment his male friend who has been living healthy and trying to better himself through diet and exercise. You know what I mean. We walked fifty paces or so to his apartment, and he showed me exactly what four-times my monthly salary affords you as far as real estate in SoHo is concerned. We took his dog for a short walk, took a shot of $150 bourbon (that's not a typo), and walked to the train station.

It took far too fucking long to reach Yankee Stadium. Ian figured that Justin was going to get angry and enter the stadium without us, and once a voice announced that there was train traffic holding up our trek to the stadium, he started to really worry Justin would grow tired of waiting for us. Exiting the train onto the platform afforded me my first glimpse of the new Yankee Stadium, which is being built across the street from the old one. I don't watch a lot of Yankees games -- because I hate them -- but I hadn't seen any photos of the stadium prior to my seeing it for the first time today. This is entirely different from the Mets situation, where Citi Field is being bit almost right on top of Shea Stadium. We met Justin right outside our gate, and entered together during the top of the first inning.

The game was alright. It was fucking FREEZING in the upper deck where we were seated. No amount of cover could protect me from the elements. My West Coast life has absolutely spoiled me in that anything below maybe sixty degrees is uncomfortable and irksome. From about the fourth inning on I was constantly watching the clock to try to calculate when the game would be over. I tried to grin and bear it, but by the 9th inning when the Yankees tacked on two insurance runs, I was ready to get the fuck out of the Bronx and start drinking somewhere warm.

We wound up back at Ian's after the game, sharing a bottle of Dogfish Head Black & Blue (which tastes heavenly, by the way -- it is a must if you like Dogfish Head beers, a golden Belgian-style ale made with over 300 pounds of fresh blueberries and blackberries) and listening to records while watching the conclusion of the Mets game on TV. There was talk of plans for tomorrow as well as later in the week, so this will certainly not be the last you hear of my exploits involving Ian. Speaking of which, has anyone else noticed that all three nights home have included drinking in varying degrees? I wonder what that says...

Until tomorrow, when I'll once again try really hard not to forget the stupid fucking camera again!

Tags: Annie Hall, New Jersey, chili, bagel, Los Angeles, PATH, SoHo, Manhattan, drive, Holland Tunnel, 4-Train, Bronx, Yankee Stadium, bourbon, baseball, Yankees, Mariners, Citi Field, freezing cold, West Coast, uncomfortable, wind, drinking, Dogfish head, Black & Blue, Mets, television, beer, mp3, blog, download, travels, photography

Boy Blunder Brought Back: Day 2

Hello readers, Evan here. My first full day back in suburban New Jersey was an eventful one. Of course, I didn't actually lay my head down to sleep until well after 4:00am East Coast time, and I was awoken by a phone call at 9:45am, so I've been (understandably) tired almost all day. Things started out normal enough. My mother picked me up and drove me to the Department of Motor Vehicles so that I could renew my driver's license (though I am a California