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Job. [10 Nov 2006|06:25pm] [ mood | morose ] In order to protect the innocent, I have changed the names of all the co-workers I mention in this blog. And, just to make sure I don't accidentally give them the name of another co-worker, I have given them very unusual names. MONDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2006 I was on the phone with my friend Ben making plans for something when I started getting a beep from a number I didn't know. I decided to answer it, and it was some guy who'd received my resume from when I applied to be a Movie Screening Recruiter. Movie Screening Recruiters are the people who stand in different spots around LA distributing passes for advance screenings of unreleased films for the purposes of market research. We arranged for me to come in and interview the next day at 9:30am. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2006 I came in and was asked a lot of rhetorical questions such as, "What do you think this job entails?" and "Why do you want to work here?" I answered them anyway and was informed that this job would pay roughly $75 to $100-something per day. I was then told to come back two days later to sign some things. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2006 Don't remember this entire day. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2006 Me and some other guys were sat down at a table to fill out a bunch of forms, including something really bizarre and confusing called tax forms. I think I filled out a W9, and then some other thing. I didn't really know what I was doing, so I just put numbers in the blank spaces, mostly zeros. Just to play it safe. Then I was told to come back the next day for training. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2006 Me and some other guys showed up for a meeting where a woman who worked there went over all the rules and practices of Nielsen Entertainment. This one guy kept interrupting her to ask questions she was about to answer. None of us liked that guy! He would also ask her about different sales scenarios, like what if he sets up a stand somewhere or an email/phone-based system of distributing his passes. In addition, he had trouble accepting the fact that we're not supposed to give them to tourists. He would raise the possibility that in this town, you never know who might be a tourist and who might not be. JUST GIVE IT TO THE TOURISTS TOO THEN. WHAT DO YOU WANT. We were also informed that the one thing they did not want us to do when advertising these tickets was to use the word "free." I guess because it makes the whole thing sound like a cheap giveaway or something. This was kind of a blow, because up until then, I was planning on using that as my main selling point. "Would you like tickets to a FREE screening?" If I couldn't just come out and say these things were free, what the hell was going to make people want to come to these movies? This was going to be tougher than I thought. The woman talking to us asked for half of us to come out and do our first on-site training that night, and for the other half to do it the next day. I volunteered to go that night and get it out of the way, so I could have my whole Saturday free. The way it goes is, on the days you work, you come in and you get something called a pack. A pack consists of 50 passes to a movie test screening. You are expected to go stand somewhere for 6 hours, distribute all 50 passes in the pack, and for every person who shows up to the screening carrying one of your passes, you get 8 bucks. Each pass is good for one person and one guest. And the guests are included in the whole 8-bucks-a-head thing. So, hypothetically, if you were to distribute all 50 passes, and every one of those people shows up and brings a guest, you stand to make 800 dollars. The first pack I was assigned was for a movie called LUCKY YOU. It was about a professional poker player who befriends a lounge singer and goes up against other players in high-stakes poker. It starred Eric Bana, Drew Barrymore, Robert Duvall, and also contained Robert Downey Jr as well as "Poker Legend" Doyle Brunson. Uh, and Debra Messing. The training lady told us to meet her at a movie theater in Woodland Hills. This was not the movie theater at which the movie would be playing, and to date, I still don't know why she picked this theater. Although I think I have an idea. Anyway, I went to this theater, which was in a mall food court, and stood there holding my flier advertising this movie, asking people if they wanted to go see it next Wednesday. In the same vicinity, there was training lady and half the guys from the group. I thought it was kinda detrimental to have to work alongside other movie recruiters, but it was just a training scenario, and I would probably get my upcoming locations all to myself. Little did I know there is actually no such thing as going to a theater and being the only recruiter there. My pitch to try to get people's attention ranged from the formal, "Would you like passes to a sneak preview on Wednesday?" to the flippant, "You ladies like Eric Bana?" It turned out that nearly every moviegoer is familiar with the idea of recruiters, and most of them aren't interested. Some of them will stop and consider what the movie is. And a few are instantly excited by the prospect of free advance screenings. Before I had this job, I fell into that last group. Sure, these movies may only be working cuts, sometimes even scored to sloppy temp music, but they are free, and not one frame of them has been spoiled for me by trailers and commercials. However, as an employee of Nielsen Entertainment, I was no longer allowed to attend free advance screenings. I was also not allowed to distribute the tickets to people in the film industry or even students whose major is film-related. So that's pretty much all my friends within city limits. Unless they lie on the form! Wink. At one point in the evening, there was a man interested in going, but I had to turn him away because he was an actor. He reinforced that he wanted to see it, and I told him I wanted to see it too. Then he realized he was in the movie, and he started telling me about Robert Duvall. This was all well and good, but I still wasn't giving him a fucking ticket. There was lots of kids out too. One little elementary-aged girl flirtatiously approached me, said hi, and asked if I would buy tickets for her and her friends. Probably she wanted to see SAW III. I was floored by her suggestive boldness. Later, another group of elementary kids surrounded me and started ridiculing my Superman shirt. They claimed that Superman was gay, and that Batman looked better in tights. I informed them that Superman was most definitely not gay, and I didn't defend how good he looked in tights, because that would have made the argument gay, but I did say that I liked Batman too. Eventually they accused me of being boring and wandered off. It made me wish that I was back in school again so I could humiliate strangers in a carefree environment. Maybe someday. By the end of the night, I had distributed 13 passes. I was a little disappointed, but I considered it a good start. I would later learn that most of the recruiters at this company do at least one pack every time they go out. Some of them do multiple packs at a time. But I attributed my slow start to the fact that I had to take names. See, when you first start out, they give you a sheet that you have to fill out. Every time you give someone a pass, you have to get them to tell you their name, occupation, phone number, and age. You also have to guess their race and gender, and fill that out too. And you have to do this for your first 8 packs. Most people don't consider standing around dictating personal info to be a fun thing. I rank it somewhere between getting my gums jabbed with pointy things at the dentist and driving my car into other cars. See, I hate being approached on the street and asked to do things. Whenever I walk through the mall and one of those demonstration cart people asks me a question, I simply stare at them and keep walking. But here I was, approaching strangers to try to convince them to do something, and then demanding personal information from them before I even let them do it. This was quite possibly the most hypocritical job I could have ever taken. But for now, I needed some kind of income. So I took my 13 names and went home. Then I think I ordered a pizza, which was awesome! SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2006 On this day, I hiked up a mountain. Has nothing to do with my job. I went with my friends to a mountain and we like, hiked on it. Was really out of breath. SUNDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2006 I showed up at the office and reported my 13 names. I figured I would just go back out and finish the pack, but one of the recruiters who was hanging around there recommended that I check out a second pack, just in case I finished my first pack and still had time left over. I figured it couldn't hurt, so I told the boss guy that I would finish my first pack and also check out a second pack of LUCKY YOU. He let me take it and sent me on my way. Now, the most logical place to distribute these movie passes is in front of the theater where the movie will be playing. Anyone walking by there is bound to live nearby and would probably be able to attend on the night of the screening. But on Friday, I had gone to that other theater. So today, I decided to simply go to the actual place. It was in the valley, in the shitty outdoor area of a mall in Northridge. This was an abysmal, depressing location, but hey, I didn't have to live there. I just had to hand out movie passes and go home. Although its overall shittiness did clue me in as to why I hadn't been sent there on Friday. There was another recruiter there when I arrived. He chatted me up for a bit before I got to work. I noticed that most of the recruiters are friendly, personable guys. I suppose you have to be to do this job. I do not always enjoy talking to people I don't know. It can be fun when performing for entertainment, but not in real life. Why would I want to talk to a person? Whatever. This guy was nice though. So I stood out in the hot sun walking around with my little flier asking people if they wanted to come see this movie. Then I started to really see the problem with one of the aspects of this job -- demographic quotas. See, for every movie, there are different recruitment requirements put upon us. We are only allowed to recruit people within a certain age group, and they are only looking for certain races. Usually, they want at least 80% Caucasians. And standing at this crappy mall in the valley, I realized something. There are about as many Caucasians in California as there are in Florida. And that is none. After about three hours, I only had one name. It had been this black guy who had approached me and started asking me all kinds of questions about my job. "So what do you do? And how do you get paid? So if I brought a bunch of people here to get passes from you and they all went to the movie, you would get a nice little chunk of change, right?" I think he was trying to work out some kind of business venture between the two of us. Earlier, when I'd asked him what his occupation was, he had thought about it and replied, "Entrepreneur." But I don't think I saw him again after that. So after those three hours, I started to get restless. I was uncomfortable standing around for hours at a time (when I worked Halloween Horror Nights, we were only out for 45-minute shifts), I was kinda hungry, and this location was dry in both weather and profitability. So I drove around looking for an area that might be more populated. I had seen a park on my way in, but it turned out this park was a college or something, and I don't think recruiters are allowed on college campuses. Then I grabbed a bite and reluctantly returned to the location. The two other recruiters that had been there were gone by then, so I went to where they had been standing and walked around. Then Felonius shows up. Felonius is one of the veteran movie recruiters, and one of the top movers in the whole company. This guy moves packs the way other people move passes. The rate at which I was recruiting people was unfathomable to him, so he started talking to me, giving me tips and showing me how he does it. Basically he gets right in people's faces, puts the flier right in front of them, and sells the movie like it's the best movie that is ever going to come out for the rest of mankind's time on the planet. "Sir, can I give you the biggest movie coming out, look at all these names." "Ladies, can I give you free tickets to the new Drew Barrymore movie?" This approach requires a lot of fast talking and comfort around strangers. I attempted it, and it got me a few more names, but I just wasn't comfortable using this slick approach. I am naturally polite and distanced when approaching strangers, and to presume to casually tell a stranger what's good for them is simply against my nature. By the end of this day, I had 5 names. Pretty sucky. But while I was there, these two old guys were circling the mall in a giant half-truck/half-tank military vehicle with giant turrets on the back. THAT was awesome! MONDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2006 On this day, I had a ticket to a special screening of Spider-Man 2 at Grauman's, which was immediately followed by a Q&A with Stan Lee, to be moderated by Kevin Smith. So fuck my job, I took this day off. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2006 I love Halloween, but this one really sucked ass. I went to the office and the guy there told me to finish my first pack. He also had me return the untouched second pack I had checked out (which I was glad to do). So I drove back out to the same shitty location from Sunday to try to finish this first pack. It was starting to dawn on me that I was never going to finish having to take down people's information before I could give them their passes. Here I was on my third outing, and I was still not even halfway done with my first pack. I still had 7 more to go before I could stop taking names. I was really looking forward to being able to just hand these out without having to write shit. Then I'd really roll in the dough. I would move these things like hotcakes. Like fucking free hotcakes, that I don't have to take anything down in order to get rid of. But for now, I was still standing there holding my god damn pen, waiting to ask strangers to please give me their phone numbers. I don't know if it was because it was Halloween, or a Tuesday, or an unpleasant location, but this place was abandoned. The few people I did see were not even Caucasian. I spoke to my brother on the phone about how I wished I hadn't been so stupid about Halloween Horror Nights. See, I've worked Halloween Horror Nights in Orlando part-time for the past two years. But for some reason, when I moved out to LA, it never occurred to me to apply to do the Halloween Horror Nights here. I could have done it full-time. And now, when I need the money the most, the possibility of working there completely escapes my consciousness until after it's too late to audition. I'm like a really really big idiot. Also my ankle hurt because I had twisted it the night before. So after standing around for a while, I went home with 0 names. This marked the second Halloween I didn't wear a costume. Last Halloween, I was all set to go as Dr. Gregory House, but the guy throwing the party cancelled it the day of, so I wound up seeing SAW II in the theater twice in a row (which was actually really awesome). But this year, all I did was hang around a shitty mall in the valley trying to do a job I couldn't do. I was wearing a Charlie Brown shirt at the time. So maybe one could argue that my costume was Adult Charlie Brown. I think the adult Charlie Brown would have a terrible job, too, so I really had the whole package going. Anyway, this was the day I decided I would eventually quit this job. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2006 On this day, Stan Lee was doing the ribbon-cutting at the new location of Golden Apple Comics, my favorite local comic book shop. So double-fuck my job, I took this day off too. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2006 On this, my fourth day of work, I would have still been working on my first pack, had the screening not been on the night before. So finally, I got to move on to my second pack. This time, I was to distribute passes to a movie called PENELOPE. It was some fairy tale chick flick starring Reese Witherspoon and Christina Ricci. I figured there was no chance in hell anyone would want to see this movie, but the two big stars in it gave me a selling point, so I didn't feel too hopeless about it. This one was screening at a theater in Culver City, but the guy who gave me the pack said the theater would be deserted today, so I should go to the college next to it and hand out passes there. No problem. I went home and googled around until I found a college 3 minutes away from this theater. The West Los Angeles Community College. I went to their website, which prominently advertised, "FREE PARKING." All right! So then I drove there. When I finally got to this college, I drove around and around the campus. There were tons of near-empty parking lots, but they all said "permit required." Some were for students, some were for staff. One was for staff and preferred students. There was maybe 23 cars total and 500,000 parking spaces. But not one for me. At one point, I even had to cut through a mud road and I splashed some mud on my freaking car. Anyway, this college was completely deserted. So even if I had found a parking space, I wouldn't have been able to do my job here. Also, I remembered being told that I wasn't allowed on school campuses. So like. What the fuck. I drove back the way I came, hoping to find a shopping area or something. Before I got too far, I saw a library. Hot dog! Maybe I could distribute movie passes to the massive crowds that were sure to show up at this library later in the day. When looking for a parking spot, I pulled into an adjacent suburban area, and I spied some people in a tiny little park pushing their kids on swings and shit. They were all Caucasian, so I briefly considered giving them passes, but they couldn't bring little kids to this movie, so it would have been pointless. Plus, I'm sure they don't want some strange guy with a beard and sunglasses walking around their kids' fucking swing set trying to hand out free movie passes and get their phone numbers. While on my way to the library, I walked on a small bridge over a reservoir (like the one from the chase scene in T2). And looking down at the reservoir, I saw a long line of children walking alongside it, like ants. These kids probably just got out of school! Out of nostalgia from when I used to walk places when I was in elementary school, as well as the possibility that there would be lots of Caucasian parents picking up their kids, I decided to walk down this reservoir and find this elementary school. I happened to be wearing a shirt that was a parody of the SURVIVOR logo, but it said that I was a survivor of the school bus. So I was fucking perfectly dressed to go traipsing around an elementary school. Holding my colorful movie passes, I almost looked like I belonged there. But when I finally came up on it, there was no way to go around it, because the whole block was fenced off. If I wanted to get to the front of the school, I would have to go into the campus through the rear and walk through to the front entrance. Now, I know I'm not a dangerous guy. There is no person you can trust more to walk through an elementary school they have no business in than me. I don't even make eye contact with passersby. But out of my immense respect for these teachers and parents, and my own fear that someone might see me and wonder who the hell I was, I opted not to cut through the elementary school. Which is probably for the best, because, knowing me, I would've gotten lost inside the school and caught by an adult before I could even find the front entrance. So I kept walking the direction I was going, saw it led nowhere, turned around, and walked back toward the library. There was really nobody in this area. This had been a terrible idea from the get-go. Frustrated and angry, I took my 50 passes and went home. As I was unlocking my car door back in the nice suburban area, a Caucasian couple walked by me, pushing a stroller. I blurted out something like, "Would you guys like to go to a free movie screening?" Whenever I get caught off guard and only have seconds to do my pitch, I always screw up and say the word "free." The guy casually informed me that they were not the least bit interested, and the woman was more apologetic and implied that they couldn't, because of the baby. Which is pretty much what I'd figured hours ago. So I went home for the second time in a row, with 0 names. But PENELOPE had been a special high rate for recruiters. So rather than my usual $8.00 times zero, this time I was making $14.50 times zero. I was moving up in the world. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2006 On this day, I found out that out of the 18 passes I distributed for LUCKY YOU, 9 people showed up. At 8 bucks a head, this meant I had made 72 dollars in 2 days of work (or 4 days of work, however you look at it). I was then asked to choose my third pack. The guy assigning packs recommended I take some horror movie with Jet Li, plus some other movie I didn't recognize. I politely asked if I could do the new Vince Vaughn movie, and he said okay. So for my third pack, I got to do VINCE VAUGHN'S WILD WEST COMEDY SHOW: 30 DAYS AND 30 NIGHTS - HOLLYWOOD TO THE HEARTLAND. This was a documentary about Vince Vaughn on the road with four up-and-coming comedians. Kind of like a Tourgasm thing, I guess. So, remembering my previous experience with weekdays, I decided to sacrifice my desire to not work nights and show up at this place at 6pm. When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised with the shopping plaza. It was full of cool and familiar stores, such as Barnes & Noble and Chik-Fil-A (the first I'd seen in California). The area and the theater itself looked really nice. Plus, it was a Regal-affiliated theater, which meant my Regal Crown Club card need not necessarily go to waste while I lived on the West Coast. So I took a moment to check out the bookstore, and then I made my way to the front of the theater. I saw one other screening recruiter there, so I approached him to say hello and make pleasantries (now out of habit). The guy was surprisingly standoffish. I said something like, "So you got tickets for this thing too," and he curtly dismissed me with a, "There's like 10 of us here." Oh, okay, guy. I only see you, but whatever, you must be good at counting if this is your job. As I had done whenever I'd previously encountered other recruiters on a job site, I gave this guy some space and stood at the other end of the theaterfront area. I then went into my usual smiley respectful "Would you like passes for a sneak preview Wednesday night?" routine. As the night went on, I noticed some other recruiters, and they were all crowding together with the guy who was there when I showed up. I briefly wondered why they weren't spreading out like I was, but assumed they knew what they were doing. After all, I was the new guy. ABSOLUTE WORST THING ABOUT DOING THIS JOB: When you see someone coming out of the theater and you recognize them from when they first got here and bought their ticket. It's the same feeling I got in film school when I would go into the editing bay during the day, then I'd go out into the hallway for something and see that it was night outside. Or, worse, when I would go in at night and later discover it was day. I remember one time I went to the Arclight cinema and a woman gave me a pass for an advance screening, then I went inside and saw THE PRESTIGE with my friends, and when we came out, I observed that the woman was still standing outside handing out passes. I remember pointing her out to my friends and being so happy that I was me, and not her. But that's just another thing that adds to the hypocrisy of me having this job. The walking traffic was really good at this location. The BORAT crowds were in full swing and I had free passes to an R-rated comedy, so I was starting to do okay. Eventually, I passed 13 names, and I realized that once I passed 18, I would have distributed more passes in one night than I had distributed in a total of 4 days. What a sucker I was to attempt this job anywhere but here, and anytime but now. Felonius would periodically walk over (Felonius was there) to check on me and encourage me to start moving these things faster. I'm always too shy to express to Felonius exactly how uncomfortable I am doing this any other way but modestly and politely. I understand that I am not going to make as much money doing it my way, but this is the way I work. At one point, Felonius said that the recruiters are only supposed to be in one spot (the spot where they were all crowding around) and that the other guys were only letting me stand off to the side because I was new, and that I should be cleaning up over here by myself. By 8:30, Felonius let me know that everyone else had finished all their packs and gone home, and he expressed amazement that I had been there since 6pm and I was only up to 16 names. Up until then, I was feeling really good about my progress, because it was a personal record for me, but then I lost all my confidence when Felonius implied exactly how shittily I was doing compared to everyone else. Of course, Felonius was trying to help me. He was finished, and he offered to stay behind and help me get all my passes out, but I awkwardly refused his help. I am a big stickler for the rules, and the money I would make with Felonius's help was not as important to me as the sense of accomplishment I would earn by doing this by myself at my own snail's pace. Felonius was seemingly born to do this. He was moving multiple packs by his second day on the job. And he wants me to do as well as him. I think it would probably have disappointed him to learn how I planed to quit the fuck out of this job. Not because it isn't a noble profession, but because it is simply not for me. Plus, it's fucking stupid. I continued walking around for a while after all the other recruiters were long gone. By the time I went home, I'd distributed 35 passes. I was sore and tired, and I felt nothing but despair about my current station in life. But at one point, these guys had a big lightsaber fight in the middle of the shopping plaza, which was awesome! SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2006 This probably would have been a very profitable day to distribute passes, but triple-fuck this job, I took the day off. SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2006 I was dreading going back out to do this, even though the location was pleasant and I only had 15 passes left from my pack to distribute. Shouldn't take too long... right? I got there at like 4:30pm. There was one guy there, this time a friendly guy. I said hi and made a point to ask him if he would mind if I just kinda stood wherever. He said that was cool, so I went back to my usual spot and started doing my thing. I began moving them at a fairly decent pace, not unlike Friday night. I attribute this moderate success to the primo location. After a while had passed, I noticed a female recruiter walking toward me. Our conversation went something like this: HER: "Hi." ME: "Hi." Already I could sense a little attitude. Just from that hi. She said hi, but her subtext read, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" HER: "I'm Apunda." ME: "I'm Diego." HER: "(accusing) Typically when you arrive at a new location, you say hello to the other recruiters." This might be the fastest I've ever hated someone. ME: "When I got here, I only saw the one guy. I said hello to him." HER: "(bullshit bullshit bullshit)" ME: "(polite smiling and nodding)" HER: "(reference to having been here all day)" ME: "(further smiling, visions of fiery demons)" Our wonderful conversation was sadly cut short by a wave of people exiting the theater. It seems that the fire alarm had been tripped in the building, and everyone had to leave their movie, snacks in hand, and evacuate out into the courtyard where I was working. This made it a little harder for me to spot people and be seen. At one point, a couple I had seen earlier (who had already received tickets to the Vince Vaughn movie from another recruiter) approached me and asked me to describe the Vince Vaughn movie. I went into my description as they continued eating their popcorn. It was immediately evident that because these people were no longer watching their movie inside, they were now using me as entertainment. So I kept my description brief, in hopes of moving on to more promising clientele. Before I moved on, the woman remarked that the fire alarm was at least a good thing for me, because it would help me with my job. Yeah, lady. Nothing like a courtyard full of pissed off people cradling overpriced concessions to help me with my job. I found a new spot and stood there holding up my flier, asking people if they wanted passes for a sneak preview. Sometimes, I didn't say anything; I just held up the flier to gauge how interested they were. A lot of people would be engaged in conversation, but would lock eye contact with my flier and study it as they walked by. So, at least I know that if I ever needed to take a job as a sign post, I would be fucking the shit at it. It didn't dawn on me until I had 4 passes left that I was on the threshold of finishing my first entire pack. By the time I got down to 2, I was so restless to get the fuck out of there that I considered throwing the passes away and lying about it on this blog. I wondered if a potential 32 dollars was worth however long it would take me to finish. But I couldn't muster the stones to do it. Eventually, I finally handed out my last one. It was a great feeling. Of course, the woman who took my last pass wanted a second one. Where the fuck was she a half hour ago? I had to direct her to one of the other recruiters for her second pass. By then, it was around 6:30pm. 15 passes in 2 hours. Not too shabby. Of course, Felonius would think that's bush league, but whatever, fuck this job. I finished not a moment too soon, as I was being driven crazy by the smell of popcorn coming from the theater and the Wetzel's Pretzels sign in front of me. What I found interesting about the popcorn smell was that it was distinctly like the Regal theaters back home. They must have a very specific type of popcorn. It made me homesick. And while I'm on it, I wonder how many career paths Wetzel embarked on before submitting to his destiny of opening a pretzel-related chain. Maybe he was always passionate about something, but everyone kept telling him he would fail, and he should just give up and open the pretzel place already. I think this stream of thoughts is what prompted me to give the name Wetzel to a mattress salesman in a short story I wrote once. I wanted to see Wetzel do other things. Unfortunately, he was a really shitty mattress salesman. As I was getting ready to get in my car and go home, I realized that this would probably be my last time on the job. There was no way I could do this again. I really hated this job now. The question was, when exactly would I quit, and how? I thought about this as I drove home. I also wondered how pissed Apunda would be when she realized I left without saying goodbye. A half hour into the drive, I realized I was going the wrong way, turned around a couple times, and finally got back in the right direction. I lost a whole hour but I got home all right. I'd say that drive was fairly symbolic of my last couple weeks. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2006 On this day, I called in and told them I finished the pack. The guy asked me if I was going to work today or tomorrow, and I said I wasn't sure; probably not. I don't know why I was prolonging my resignation at this point, because I was already sure I would never in my life hand out another free screening pass. Later that day, I was tagging along with my friend Justin while he ran an errand, and a recruiter for Jimmy Kimmel Live got me to come to that night's taping. I got no joy from knowing that my attendance contributed to his commission, which only proved to me how done with this job I really was. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2006 - THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2006 These days are just kind of a blur to me. Although I can tell you that on Thursday, I finally washed the mud off my car from the WLAC campus one week earlier. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2006 Today I went into my office to do three things: hand in some papers, see how many people I brought to the Vince Vaughn screening, and quit. I almost didn't make it before they closed, because the night before, everyone had parked their cars really far apart on one side of the street, and the other side gets street-cleaned Friday mornings between 8 and 11am, and if your car is there on those times, you get a $45 ticket. So because of my inconsiderate neighbors, I had to park on the street cleaning side, get up early, and spend 20 minutes looking for a spot on the side of the street that wasn't being street-cleaned, which I finally found about two blocks away. Then I went back to sleep because I'd been up late the night before, and I almost couldn't get up and get to the office before they closed at noon. But I just made it at 11:50-something and turned in the papers. I immediately checked out the book that annotates how many people everyone brought in to the screenings. Now, remember that for LUCKY YOU, I only distributed 18 of my 50 passes, and 9 of those people showed (that's 50%!). So naturally, because I distributed all 50 passes for VINCE VAUGHN'S WILD WEST COMEDY SHOW: 30 DAYS AND 30 NIGHTS - HOLLYWOOD TO THE HEARTLAND, my only goal was to go out on a number that was at least higher than 9. I looked in the book and saw my number. It was 8. 8 people. Which is actually one less than 9 (and only 16%). So. I would like to know. WHY ALL YOU ASSHOLES IN LONG BEACH. STOOD THERE AND SMILED IN MY FACE. AND TOLD ME THAT YOU WOULD BE AVAILABLE. AND INTERESTED IN GOING. TO VINCE VAUGHN'S WILD WEST COMEDY SHOW: 30 DAYS AND 30 NIGHTS - HOLLYWOOD TO THE HEARTLAND. YOU MINDLESS DEGENERATES. THERE IS A SPECIAL PLACE IN HELL. RESERVED JUST FOR YOU. WHERE I WILL BE WAITING. WITH A CHAINSAW. AND A BARREL OF ACID. AND A DVD OF THIS MOVIE. Then I went to the guy and he started telling me the movies I could choose to distribute for the day, and I had to interrupt him and tell him that, in actuality, I was interested in ceasing my employment. He said that was cool, and asked for my official reason (for form-filling-out purposes). Now, I had put some thought into this. As early as Sunday night, when I was getting into my car after my last night of work, I had decided that it would personally amuse me very much if the reason I cited for quitting was that I was very passionate about advance movie screenings, and I wanted to quit so that I would be allowed to attend them. But I later conceded that this might probably offend them, because it sounds like kind of a smartass reason. So I decided to phrase it the way my friend Justin had suggested some days earlier. "I'm unhappy," I told him. He was very confused, which forced me to elaborate and ruin the poignancy of this simple statement. I had to meet him halfway, at the corner of "It's too difficult," and "It's not for me." But he was very nice about it and directed me to my paycheck from LUCKY YOU and PENELOPE. The paycheck listed my $72 for LUCKY YOU, my $0 for PENELOPE, as well as gas money for both things. However, it failed to reflect my gas money from the second and third times I went out for LUCKY YOU. As of this writing, I have yet to point this out to them. But I have two whole weeks before my next paycheck. WHERE I GET MY BIG VINCE VAUGHN BUCKS. LONG BEACH DICKS. So maybe I'll say something before then. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Paychecks that don't seem like enough. 2. Paid parking. 3. When there's a movie that is clearly not your type of movie, but so many people recommend it that you go see it, and it SUCKS. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. A movie you really want to see that isn't spoiled by a trailer (in theory). 2. Free parking. 3. Presents. Cheers, Diego post comment

The Megan Mullally Show and Jimmy Kimmel Live. [10 Nov 2006|03:08pm] [ mood | contemplative ] There's two things I want to say, both related to talk shows. THING #1: Sometime last week, I had the TV on and The Megan Mullally Show started. Usually, my response for this is to turn the TV off, but I saw that Clay Aiken was going to perform, so I set it to record (I find that Clay Aiken can really perform the shit out of a song when he puts his mind to it). Some days later, I put it on and skipped to the Clay Aiken performance. I must've been distracted by something, because I let the episode keep playing till the end, past the Aiken performance and interview. And as it turns out, Megan Mullally had given one of the audience members a notepad and made her take notes on the entire episode, and if she passed a verbal quiz at the end, everyone in the audience would get a prize. So she brought the girl up and asked her some questions, and the girl didn't get them all right, but Megan Mullally gave everyone a prize anyway. So what the fuck was the point of making this poor girl take notes through your entire shitty show like she's in goddamn school? News flash, Megan Mullally: people take vacations and come to your inane wasteland to have a good time; not to do meaningless chores. I discussed a similar phenomenon in one of my first ever entries, regarding The Tony Danza Show and Tony Danza's practice of giving out prizes even when people got their trivia questions wrong, but even Tony Danza didn't force someone to take notes while he lobbed annoying chit-chat at one of the supporting idiots from Grey's Anatomy. Someone cancel Megan Mullally already, so that they can give the time slot to someone slightly more suited to interview people on daytime TV. Like, say, a monkey in a diaper that can hold a microphone. THING #2: Last Monday, I was accompanying my friend Justin on an errand and we happened to be across the street from the El Capitan Theatre, where they tape Jimmy Kimmel Live, so this guy comes up to us and asks if we want to come to that night's show. I wasn't sure if I wanted to go, so I took the ticket and decided I would base my decision on who the guests were. I went home and looked them up. First guest was Lauren Graham. I would say I have a slight thing for her. Not enough to seek out interviews with her or religiously follow her TV show, but certainly enough to get a thrill out of being in the same room as her and breathing perhaps the same air. It would all hinge on the second guest, who turned out to be Ricardo Chavira, who is better known as Carlos Solis on Desperate Housewives, one of my very favorite shows, so that sealed the deal. Also, the recruiter had said something about Saturday Night Live, but I hadn't made out exactly what. Turns out, when I got there, that before they shot that night's episode, Jimmy Kimmel would be pre-recording an entire interview with SNL alumnus Tracy Morgan, to be aired the following week or so. Jimmy told us that whatever audience showed up next week hoping to see Tracy Morgan would be "shit out of luck." So looks like I came on a good day. At the beginning of the interview, they discussed Tracy Morgan's "upcoming" November 10th birthday, which I mentally noted would have already passed by the time this aired. Luckily, one of the producers also noticed this, so after they finished the interview, they did about a 10-second pick-up where Jimmy said Tracy's birthday was "last week" and Tracy agreed. Live my ass. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. When you're in the left lane of a two-lane road and all you want to do is go straight, but the guy in the very front stops to make a left-hand turn (yielding for traffic), and the right lane is too busy for you to squeeze out, so you and 20 other cars just sit there until the guy turns, one second before the light turns red. 2. When you're in the right lane of a two-lane road and all you want to do is go straight, but the guy in the very front stops to make a right-hand turn (yielding for pedestrians), and the left lane is too busy for you to squeeze out, so you and 20 other cars just sit there until the guy turns, one second before the light turns red. 3. When everyone on the street parks like an ass, forcing you to have to park somewhere else, even though you could easily fit like two more cars on the curb if everyone made the effort to scoot up to the car in front of them. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Old commercials. 2. Holiday decorations. 3. Driving. Cheers, Diego post comment

Dream Analysis. [13 Sep 2006|07:38pm] [ mood | thoughtful ] THE DREAM: Last night I dreamed that I spontaneously decided to get a haircut from a very affable woman. She was impressed with my authoritative tone, and charmed by my decidedly odd request to keep most of the side of my head at a 1. This was a very fulfilling part of the dream for me, because I've been drifting from barber to barber ever since my regular woman moved to a different city without saying goodbye back in high school or something. Anyway, at some point during the dream, the woman turned into a weird man (who I think was played by this eccentric Texas guy I cut out of my Capstone film last year) who was inexplicably using my beard trimmer (without attachments) to shave my head hair. I thought this was dumb, because that meant the trimmer was at a 0, not a 1. Then my friend Drew shows up. I should mention that earlier in the dream, before the whole hair-cutting thing, I was at a Wendy's drive-thru with Drew and he was making this big order because he also wanted this prize box they were offering. But then I was suddenly at a hair salon and Drew was getting me Wendy's over the phone, and I was supposed to pay him back, but because I had so authoritatively demanded a haircut in order to prove to this barber woman that I was authoritative, I had to pass off a phone call from Drew to my brother, and I guess my Wendy's eventually went cold, because I never saw it. Anyway, Drew shows up. I'm not seeing the Wendy's because I'm still getting my haircut. Then, the lights start to go down around us. Turns out this hair salon is not really a hair salon, but a movie theater, and Ocean's Thirteen starts playing. Then why are there mirrors all on the wall? So the guy quietly finishes cutting my hair, and I REALLY suspect that he's just pretending to be done because he doesn't want to make noise during the movie, which bugs me. Ironically, it also bugs me that Drew is trying to talk to the barber from across three rows because he wants his hair cut too. He's ruining the movie for everyone at this point, and I can't get him to shut up. I start to get the feeling that he's jealous of the haircut I got while he was getting me this Wendy's that seems to have gone missing. I never ask about the Wendy's because I feel bad that I got my hair cut while trying to coordinate a Wendy's pickup (in retrospect, it doesn't really sound like such a big fucking deal). Eventually I exit the theater to go pay the guy. For some reason, we end up in his hotel room and he sprawls in bed with the intent of taking a nap as soon as I leave (it's also broad daylight). I ask him for my trimmer back, and he says he left it by the door inside the theater. For some reason, I don't buy it. Then I notice my haircut is really stupid-looking, and most of my hair has been dyed silver white. He says this will make it so that my hair is better and less gray once it grows back out, which I inexplicably believe, while at the same time noting that every god damn word he tells me sounds like he's making it up on the spot. I ask him how much the haircut was, and he flippantly remarks that it was 15 bucks, which is already slightly more than I usually pay. Because of the specific bills I have, I only tip him one dollar. He doesn't seem to mind, but I figure I should tip him one more dollar at least, so I ask to make change with this bizarre colorful 10 dollar bill I have left. Then, I think he gives me a coupon book, and the three or four coupons inside are drawn by Alan Moore, who is not a comic book artist, but a comic book writer, and the drawings don't even look the way they might if he had drawn them anyway. They are also of trademarked characters like Garfield and the Wuzzles. So I'm trying to find the shittiest-looking one to give to him, so I can keep the good ones for me and my brother, and he keeps saying "Give me some Alan Moore art," referring to the coupons. Eventually I find an all-black one with Einstein's face on it, and I think, that one's pretty shitty. Then the coupons keep changing into door hangers and novelty mugs, and of course it all makes sense because it's a dream. And I'm wondering why the fuck I'm bothering with this bullshit for so long, considering the haircut sucks shit and the woman I was trying to impress in the first place is gone because she metamorphosized into this fucking guy. At this point, I've already decided in my head that I'm going to catch a later showing of Ocean's Thirteen, so I don't have to miss the beginning, and I will text my brother to tell him I'm at a later show. I think I also owed Drew for my original ticket to Ocean's Thirteen, which is ridiculous, because my dad was there the whole time when I was in the theater, and my dad always buys the ticket. I guess I was just confused. FACTORS AT PLAY IN MY SUBCONSCIOUS: - The stress of owing people money. - The stress of trying to get a decent haircut. - The stress of tipping people an amount that will not be offensive to them. - The stress of impressing females. - Actors I still need to send DVDs to. - Fear of losing possessions. - Fear of missing movies. - Fear of getting old. - The fact that, at the time of this dream, I was planning to have Brian K. Vaughan (comic book writer) autograph a sketch drawn by Pia Guerra (comic book artist). Which I subsequently did, by the way. - The Wuzzles? 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. When radio stations play a really long, uninterrupted stream of three-second clips of the songs they like to play. 2. Unmarked streets. 3. DVR recording "errors." 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Comic book signings. 2. Getting hired for a job (in theory). 3. When the DVR actually fucking works. Cheers, Diego post comment

My Review of the Mexican Place I Ate Dinner at Tonight. [02 Sep 2006|02:11am] [ mood | contemplative ] Earlier tonight, I dined at a Mexican restaurant in Los Feliz. I decided to write a review of it, which could help me get a job as a restaurant critic here in LA. I'm unemployed. The restaurant is very nice looking from the outside. A very swanky exterior with a cool sunken interior, so that diners are never eye level with pedestrians outside, eliminating the possibility of awkward eye contact. The door, however, is inconspicuously slapped on a diagonal wall, and it doesn't match the metallic signs or see-through windows. It is an ugly orange door that you can't see through, so that people going through the door are in danger of getting hit by someone coming out. If they can even find it in the first place. I walked halfway around the restaurant looking for this door, and then my dining partner had to point it out to me. Not a good start for this place. We were told our wait would be 30-45 minutes. Not good. My dining partner and I walked to an ATM, and when we got back 20 minutes later, our name had already been called. Definitely not good. It's like this place couldn't make up its mind about how it wanted to inconvenience us. The tables were all too close together and the prices were outrageous. But that's not really a Mexican restaurant thing; it's an LA thing, so I have to live with it. Usually, a major factor when I form an opinion of a new restaurant is whether or not I am provided with free bread or something before my food comes. This place gave us free tortilla chips, with two (!) free dipping salsas. A spicy brown salsa and a spicy green salsa. So this is great if you like chips, but also stupid if you don't like spicy salsas. I myself don't like spicy salsas, but kept dipping the chips in them out of blind appreciation for free eats. I then ordered something called a "tostada," which was a plate with a mountain of Mexican shit on top of some crispy tostada things. I didn't manage to actually eat my way to the crispy tostada things in that one sitting, but legend told that they were there under the big mountain of shit. While we were there, Josh Schwartz, the creator of TV's The OC sat right next to us, and at one point my foot touched his foot. Also, when we were walking back from the ATM earlier, my friend claimed that we walked right by Amy Adams, although I never actually caught a glimpse of her face. This is just the kind of glamour you have to get used to living out here in LA. In all, this was a moderately average dining experience. On a restaurant critic scale of one to five, I give the Mexican place I ate dinner at tonight a qualified two stars, with room for improvement. I won't be going back anytime soon, but it was better than Del Taco, the shittiest Mexico-related eatery on the planet. I am currently available for freelance gigs at local newspapers, so any newspaper editors reading this, make sure I get your info before I sign any kind of long-term deal with another publication. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The possibility of a star dying close enough to Earth that it would cause a world-ending catastrophe. 2. Most types of bubble gum. 3. Unstable connections. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Freedom. 2. The sponge that comes with the George Foreman Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine that is the perfect shape for cleaning the ridged surface. 3. Packages. Cheers, Diego post comment

Six Flags Magic Mountain. [23 Aug 2006|08:12pm] [ mood | cheerful ] The other day, I went with some friends to Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, California. As we walked toward the gate from the parking lot, we observed the brilliant majesty of the wooden Colussus. Not only is it the tallest wooden coaster in the west, it is also ingrained in popular culture. Many of us remember the Griswolds' legendary trek to Walley World, culminating in their armed hijacking of the Screaming Mimi in NATIONAL LAMPOON'S VACATION. The rest of us certainly remember the Lamberts and the Fosters plunging into the roller coaster of their new lives together, metaphorically and literally, aside the amateurishly superimposed ocean in the theme song to STEP BY STEP. All of these magical moments from our past took place at the Colossus here at Six Flags Magic Mountain. There was also some talk amongst us that it might have been the roller coaster from BEVERLY HILLS COP III, which would certainly explain the posted signs prohibiting firearms in the park, but further probing reveals that it was shot in Paramount's Great America in Santa Clara, California. Paramount produced and distributed BEVERLY HILLS COP III, so we were idiots not to have realized this sooner. Anyway, my biggest disappointment came quickly, as the ride known simply as X was closed. About half a decade ago, I watched a special on Travel or Discovery or one of those channels on the world's top ten roller coasters. Somewhere on that list, possibly even topping it, was X, the world's first 4th dimensional roller coaster, where riders could fly, flip, spin, and rotate 360 degrees forward, backward, upside-down, and head-first, even during straight 90-degree drops. Of course, at the time, I lived in Florida, and X was in Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, California. But I made it a personal goal to one day ride this thing. However, my discontent was immediately neutralized, because as soon as we entered the park, I spotted Bugs Bunny and Marvin the Martian playing with some kids in the distance, so I knew we were in for a magical time. There were signs everywhere featuring various cartoon characters with the text, "CELEBRATING 45 YEARS!" For our Mexican friends, half the signs said, "CELEBRANDO 45 AÑOS," which, as I pointed out to my friends, hilariously translates into "CELEBRATING 45 ANUSES" if you simply remove the tilde from the N. Right around this point, we all realized this would be a fun time. The first thing we rode was the prominently advertised new ride, TATSU -- FLY AT THE SPEED OF FEAR. The line for this ride was incredibly long. There was actually a line alongside the ride that was a line to get into the line for the ride. As we waited, we were each handed a special piece of paper with a number on it, ensuring that no one would steal a spot in the line. Later on, a man would collect this numbered ticket without so much as looking at it or us. Once inside the official line, we slowly passed through sections that doused the guests in a thick mist of what I will heretoforth call "park water." As long as you didn't swallow, you were fine, and also wet, making this a refreshing and bewildering addition to the park. The ride itself was well worth it, and a smart way to start the day. Once we were strapped in, the seats were pulled up horizontally, making us face the ground during the slow ascension to the crest of the first drop, so that we died a thousand deaths before the coaster even got going. We were then treated to a wild array of loops, twists, and crazy somersaults. In all, a magnificent and thrilling addition to the wealth of attractions at Six Flags. After this ride, we decided to get some food, because it was just about lunch time. Due to poor map reading skills, we hiked up a long, circular, uphill walkway (they don't call it Six Flags Magic Mountain because it's not built on top of actual mountains) when we could have simply cut through an easy shortcut ten minutes earlier. We stopped to eat at a place called Laughing Dragon Pizza Co. This place had some trouble deciding what it wanted to be. The music was 1920's Chaplin-esque piano ditties, while the art was an eclectic series of famous human paintings, but with dragons as the subjects, in various styles. The only consistent theme here was fun. This was a fucking fun pizzeria, and there was no way they were going to let you forget that. One confusing thing about the pizza itself was that this place was advertised as being owned by Papa Johns, but the pizza looked and tasted like it was made by animatronic dragon characters. Not the best, but I think we all understand that there is a social contract one enters into when buying food at a theme park. We don't expect the best rides of our lives at a restaurant, so we shouldn't expect the best pizza of our lives at a park. That's why Six Flags has shitty pizza and amazing roller coasters, whereas Pizza Hut has delicious pizza and a pinball machine. One of the friends in our party happened to bring a big coupon book with them, which resulted in most of us acquiring a shiny red souvenir sports bottle, refillable anywhere in the park for cheap. I was one of the lucky few, and boy, it made my day. It came with a handy belt clip so you didn't have to carry it all the time, and there was also a coupon for Blockbuster Video taped to the side, so I gladly excused the fact that it made every beverage taste like fresh plastic. One problem is that this thing held a lot of soda, which meant that I consumed more orange soda in one sitting than any human being should. It changed my molecular structure and certainly influenced the level of enjoyment I experienced in the next few rides to come. Additionally, I would go on to fill it with an endless symphony of cool drinks, from soft frozen lemonade to Sprite with ice that seemed to actually be cubed "park water." Next on the list was Superman The Escape. The production design of the queue to this ride was great. We walked into a structure that was made to replicate Superman's Fortress of Solitude, as seen in SUPERMAN: THE MOTION PICTURE. The welcomed circulation of air conditioning convinced every last one of us that we had really somehow just walked into the Arctic. We passed some interesting structures, such as a robotic Superman suit which I hypothesized to be either the Eradicator (as seen in the Death of Superman saga) or possibly one of the special suits Superman wears to handle kryptonite or breathe comfortably in space. Also present was the classic structure of Jor-El and Lara-El (Superman's parents) holding up the planet Krypton (as seen in the comics). As they loaded us into the coaster car, we experienced some difficulty due to a large man's restraints not being able to fully interlock. We switched rows with his party (the front rows I guess have more room) and the employees frantically pushed down on the bars to try to get the green light blinking on the main console. At one point, the green light came on, and the employees decided to launch the car quickly, before the green light stopped. This filled the ride with a palpable air of uncertainty and fright, for it is not only advertised as the tallest, fastest thrill ride on the planet, we were now riding it with the definite possibility of passenger death. Luckily, we all made it through fine, and we even met Superman at the top. We continued on our way to the next big coaster (I never joined in the decision-making process; I was just glad to ride on anything) when one of my friends noticed a small old-fashioned coaster off to the side called Gold Rusher. There was something understated and charming about this thing, and we all knew we had to ride it. It turned out to be great fun, in an odd way, especially during parts where barriers and tree branches came dangerously close to chopping off extended limbs. Little did we know that this was the park's first roller coaster ever. Later on, we made our way to The Riddler's Revenge, the world's tallest and fastest stand-up roller coaster. The queue was housed in a crazy neon warehouse that was clearly influenced by BATMAN FOREVER. But perhaps "stand-up coaster" is misleading. What actually happens is that, in addition to shoulder harnesses, you straddle something like a bicycle seat, while standing, and the seat then locks into position right before the ride begins. I unfortunately was not able to achieve a seat position that was harmonious with the arrangement of my genitals, so the ride, to me, was more like The Riddler's Revenge on my Balls. At one point, half of us got separated from the group, and, while the other half rode some spinning ride, we stopped by a petting zoo. It mainly had goats and sheep wandering around on sand. There was a big black pig on the other side of a fence, and a disgusting enclosurement where turtles crawled around in filth. This petting zoo was depressing, and there didn't seem to be any nearby place to wash your hands. I personally hadn't touched the goats, but my friends did, and even though this was a really good theme park, its attention to maintenance of goat-related attractions left a great deal to be desired. We managed to reconvene at a very impressive gigantic cartoon tree that served as the entrance to the Looney Tunes-themed children's area known as Bugs Bunny World. Our next stop was a water ride called Log Jammer. I had previously promised myself that I wouldn't be participating in any water rides, because I had chosen to wear jeans, socks, and sneakers on this day, but for some reason, I went on Log Jammer anyway. Big mistake. The ride itself was lots of fun, and adequately wild, but the chafing afterwards was even wilder. Half of us decided to leave early while the other half stayed behind to ride some of the other major attractions, such as the Goliath, or the Déjà Vu (I'm guessing). But before we left, we embarked on the legendary Colossus. I've always enjoyed wooden roller coasters, and the historical significance of Colossus certainly made the ride worth it, but I got a bad headache from this fucking thing. During the g-forces that accompanied the drops, it felt like my skull was being jackhammered down into my spine. But maybe this physical response just meant that it was time to go. I've never been much for overly extended stays at theme parks. Overall, this was one of my favorite theme park visits of all time. And regular readers of this blog know that I have no qualms about painting events in my life as miserable or as mundane as they really happened to be. I don't believe in puffing things up just to make them sound better. This really was a fun-filled trip to a magic mountain. But I will never understand why they felt the need to tell us that this was their 45th Anniversary. What the fuck is significant about 45 years? Now you're just looking for things to celebrate. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Animals in poorly-maintained captivity. 2. Excrement, just, on the floor. 3. Chafing. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Claire Danes. 2. Souvenir sports bottles. 3. You know those, like, giant Toblerones? Cheers, Diego post comment

LA Trip II. [20 Jul 2006|06:30am] [ mood | quixotic ] It only makes sense to schedule a plane ride early in the morning. Get it out of the way and have the whole day ahead of you. Too bad I am the kind of person who stays up all night watching VH1's World Series of Pop Culture and the movie French Kiss, so that I only sleep two hours before I have to wake up and get on a flight. DAY 1. JULY 13, 2006. So I woke up at 6 and my dad drove me to the airport so I could get on a plane and find an apartment in LA with my friend Justin. One thing I noted is that they made me scan my shoes at the X-ray machine. This is kind of weird, but I rather enjoy taking off my shoes. When I got on the plane, the lady two rows ahead of me was asked if she could move back one seat so that the girl next to her could sit next to her friend. She instantly started passive-agressively bitching about how she can't ever get on a plane without being asked to move. The girl said she didn't have to, but the woman did it anyway. She just wanted to bitch. So she moved back to the seat in front of me and stuffed her blanket underneath her own seat, instead of under the seat in front of her, like she's supposed to. Maybe before bitching about airplane inconveniences, she should learn how to follow the fucking rules herself. During the 5-hour flight, they showed two movies. The first was called TAKE THE LEAD. I was too tired to see it (and even if I wasn't, I wouldn't have paid for headphones anyway), but from what I saw, it appeared to be about a teacher who inspires troubled inner city kids with ballroom dancing. I HAVE TO RENT THIS FUCKING MOVIE. The second was called LAST HOLIDAY. It appeared to be a zany comedy with Queen Latifah about a dying woman who blows all her cash on a fun holiday vacation. I was trying to sleep, but looking up occasionally I noticed a lot of scenes of her relaxing in a huge bed, as well as an extended sequence where she accidentally snowboards down a mountain. I'll only see this movie if it happens to be starting on one of the movie channels at my dad's house and nothing else is on and I have nothing to read and it's too early to go to sleep and I have no video games I'd rather be playing. And it's raining. For the entire 5 hours, I was extremely uncomfortable, mainly because of my feet. Never mind the fact that the seats in a plane are half as big as they should be, and you can't even lean in any direction because you'll either invade the space of the person next to you or your face will collide with a beverage cart. I wear very large size 13 sneakers, and my giant laptop case was sticking out from under the seat in front of me, which was compounded by the blanket that had been stuffed there by the stupid woman in front of me. It wasn't until 45 minutes before landing that I realized I could simply take my feet out of my shoes and put them up on top of the soft blanket-covered laptop case. And it wasn't until the writing of that sentence that I realized I could have just stowed my laptop in one of the overhead bins and probably no one would have noticed that I was stowing both my carry-ons. Anyway, that 45 minutes was the best part of the flight, and possibly of my entire life. While taxiing to a gate, people kept getting up and going through the overhead compartments even though the seatbelt light was still on. The flight attendants kept having to come over the intercom and tell people to sit the fuck down. What exactly is wrong with these people that they can't follow simple rules? If I was a flight attendant, I would have encouraged the captain to purposely jostle the plane so that everyone would fall down. "We should have waited for the little light to turn off," they would say. I'd be a hero. As this was happening, this woman in the window seat across from me was talking loudly on her cell phone about how incredibly annoying it was to have shared this flight with screaming children. She complained in particular about the child sitting behind her, who supposedly would not stop "bashing" her seat. She then submitted to her call recipient that what they need to do is just make adult-only flights. No one in the general area bothered to inform this woman that the logistics of an idea like that would drive the ticket price up so much that the kind of person who would normally be sitting in the 35th row of a shitbox sardine can with wings probably wouldn't be able to afford it anyway. After she got off the phone, the kid sitting behind her started playing with a musical stuffed bear that played "Rock-A-Bye Baby." She turned around and started begging the kid to turn it off. There was, in fact, no way to turn the song off once it had been activated, so the kid just kinda tried to smother the bear, then realized it was no use. We got our rental car (a stylish Dodge Caliber), looked at a shitty place, looked at a cool place, then the next morning signed the lease for the cool place. This left us with plenty of time to spare in our apartment hunt. During this trip, we stayed in the new apartment of my friend Jordyn, who at one point attempted to bake oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that she subsequently insisted came out terrible. I kept telling her I liked them, but she refused to believe me. Just accept the fact that I liked the cookies! God dammit! DAY 2. JULY 14, 2006. We woke up fucking early and signed the lease for our new place. Remember? Actually, before signing the lease, we looked at a third place that was really beautiful and amazing, but it wouldn't have worked out, because the room I was going to take was a tiny office with a fireplace. There was barely any room in it, my closet was in the living room, my bathroom was by the front door, and all the showers were upstairs. But the upstairs bedrooms were fantastic, and as a 2-bedroom apartment, this was a phenomenal find. Too bad we needed a 3-bedroom place, not a 2-bedroom and 1-office thing that you just call a 3-bedroom place. People are maniacs. For lunch, we decided to go to the legendary Schwab's restaurant, where we famously had our first-ever LA dinner (documented in the Week 1 entry of my original LA Trip blog). When we got to Schwab's, the windows were all papered up and a sign on the door said they had closed in January 2006. After wondering how we would be able to go on with our lives, we walked to a Baja Fresh and ate like kings. Then, at Amoeba Music, I found a cheap DVD of an old Chuck Norris movie called THE HITMAN. The cover was Chuck Norris holding a sawed-off shotgun like a badass. I couldn't in good conscience not buy this. Later, my friend Justin went to Rodeo Drive to show his movie to his old internship boss while I walked around aimlessly with Jordyn and her boyfriend Regev. Justin had earlier suggested I ask the Musem of Television and Radio if I could work there, so I went to check it out. I walked in through the rear entrance where they seemed to have their official corporate area with lots of desks and papers and shit. I asked the lady up front if they were taking applications and she gave me a pamphlet with a website and stuff. After walking out, I realized she thought I meant a membership application. No, lady. I want to work here. So I went in through the regular front entrance and asked this other girl if they were taking JOB applications, this time making sure to deeply emphasize the word "JOB." She said they were, but there were no openings to work there currently. Great. Who the fuck runs this place? A Jamba Juice drink made me feel better, and later at the supermarket I was able to get a beverage called CACTUS COOLER, which is an orange-pineapple soda. Man. Don't ever kid yourselves that we're not living in the future. Jordyn and Regev had just recently acquired HBO on Demand, so we got to watch a lot of episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm while we ate homemade tacos for dinner. Then we went to the Arclight and saw A SCANNER DARKLY in the dome. We had never seen anything in the dome, and we had heard that the dome was the shit. Here's the problem with this place: The Arclight lets you pick in which section of the theater you want to sit when you're buying your ticket. So because everyone picks the center, if there is a small crowd, everyone is all bunched together with no natural buffer zone like idiots while the other 95% of the theater remains empty. Plus it was pretty hot, and my drink was too small, and I was kinda tired, so I did not enjoy or understand the movie. I would call it A SCANNER BORINGLY. DAY 3. JULY 15, 2006. On this day, we went to a barbecue at the lovely home of some guy who was the friend of a friend or something. As we ate, nobody was bold enough to grab the last piece of chicken. And, surprisingly, no one addressed the issue of who was going to take the last piece either. The host just asked if anyone was still hungry, then probably saved the chicken for leftovers. Or threw it in the trash and laughed at how rich he was. Then, we drove to the beach and leaned against the side of the pier, watching the surfers trying to catch waves. Before we left, we assigned them all nicknames. They were, in no particular order: Ninja, Kip, Rainbow, Iceman, Longshanks, Buttcrack, and Girl. Girl later became Nips, and then later that night, Tits. Kip would grab almost every wave no matter how short, and he could do a mean jump. But I think we were most attached to Ninja, the underdog who never gave up. Buttcrack and Tits were showboating assholes. We hate them. Then, we went to Westwood, our old neighborhood from when we stayed at UCLA last summer. We went to some of our old favorite places (such as Jerry's Famous Deli), I got the new ESCAPISTS comic book by Brian K. Vaughan that I'd been looking for at Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash, and I finally bought a tin of brownies from Diddy Riese to take back with me (my unpublished blog of Weeks 2-6 of my original LA trip would have revealed that I wanted to bring back some Diddy Riese brownies for my dad and my bro, but didn't have enough room in my luggage, or enough money, or probably actually both at the same time). That night we saw PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST at the Regent. Sitting behind us was a girl who had a laugh that was 100,000 times louder and more high-pitched than that of a normal human being. When she wasn't laughing, she was coughing. It was like that scene in CAPE FEAR, except instead of Robert De Niro, we were watching the movie with the kraken herself. We all forgot to look at her before she left, so her physical makeup remains a mystery. It's at least a good thing this was actually my second time seeing this movie. Some people don't mind that kinda thing, but if this had been my maiden viewing of this movie, I probably would have killed this loud bitch, then myself. DAY 4. JULY 16, 2006. Woke up at 10-something (nice) and had brunch with Barry Sandler, one of the coolest teachers we had at UCF. He likes to summer in LA, and who can blame him? Florida is a disgusting swamp. After that, we stopped at this museum that we'd kept seeing for the past few days (that my friends kept saying we should stop and look at). It was called PSYCHIATRY: AN INDUSTRY OF DEATH. This museum was slapped together by the Church of Scientology and is entirely devoted to brainwashing everyone into thinking that psychiatry is the cause of everything bad that has ever happened ever. It had sensational documentaries, interactive displays, and an incredible production value. Did you know that everything bad in medicine, law, religion, and education is because of psychiatry? And that it is also responsible for every war ever started, as well as the very concept of racism? Remember Columbine and 9/11? Guess what caused them. That's right. Psychiatry. This museum informed us about psychiatrists' master plot to infiltrate every facet of society on a global scale. And now that we know the facts, finally, Scientology can come to the rescue. Phew. We went back to the apartment and watched some Seinfelds on DVD. Then we decided to go to Shakey's for an early dinner. But Justin claimed that it was too late, because he wanted to return the rental car to the dealership and get to the plane, and he didn't know how long that would take (we had about 4 hours at this point). We went back and forth about this for about a half hour, then decided to go to Shakey's. Shakey's turned out to be pretty terrible, so we realized then that we should have listened to Justin and not eaten there. But if we had, we would have continued thinking that Shakey's was awesome, which it isn't. So believe it or not, we did the right thing. After returning the car and finding our gate, we had over an hour to kill. I read a magazine the whole time, but at the last minute before boarding, I decided I wanted an orange soda. So I started walking down to the terminal restaurants and shops, all the way to where we went through the X-rays. No orange soda anywhere. The best I could do was a lukewarm Sprite. THAT COST THREE DOLLARS. That is 15 cents an ounce. No American should have to pay more than 5 cents for an ounce of Sprite. One of the main functions of this blog is to point out some of the major problems that exist in our so-called "wonderful society." Speaking of which, they had me take off my shoes again for the X-rays this time, so I guess that's a normal thing now. And also speaking of which, I immediately removed my shoes when I got on the plane this time, so my ride back was much more comfortable than the ride over. By the way, here's an idea. Instead of loading the first class passengers first so that all the poor people have someone rich to make eye contact with when they get on the plane, why not load the people in the back of the plane first and continue loading by descending row number? See, because the plane loads from the front, so this way, you won't have massive rows of people carrying heavy luggage waiting around for one jackass to load his carry-on in the overhead and sit down so the line can keep moving. I know if I was rich and got a first class ticket somewhere, I wouldn't mind waiting to be loaded onto the plane. What the hell do I care when I sit on a plane? The gate lounge is more spacious than anything. And I get to be fashionably late. And poor people don't look at me. I think we got a win-win idea here. Right about now, you're probably thinking that I have no celebrity sightings to report after 4 whole days in LA, but you'd be wrong. Sitting on the other side of the aisle from me on this plane back was Edward Barbanell, one of the retarded guys from THE RINGER. This was especially remarkable because he had been in one of the episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm that we'd watched not two days earlier. I didn't say anything to him, but I'm pretty sure it was him, because he kept talking about THE RINGER, and he had a shirt on that said THE RINGER in giant letters. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Forms and paperwork. 2. Airline seats. 3. People who complain about everything. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Several episodes of a good TV show. 2. Personal transportation. 3. New socks. Cheers, Diego post comment

New York Trip. [04 Jun 2006|03:35am] [ mood | calm ] DAY 1. MAY 12, 2006. My dad, my brother, and I woke up very early so that we could leave at 5am in order to make our flight to New York. I'm more of a nocturnal person, so this gave me about an hour of sleep total, which was maybe not the best way to arrive in the city that never sleeps. Some people get nervous during flights, especially anything around big cities like NY or LA. The last movie I saw before this trip was UNITED 93. On the way to the airport, my brother and I asked my dad what our flight number was. He said 518. I naturally responded, "WHAT?!" See, everyone knows that the number of the flight that crashed horribly in the first episode of LOST is Oceanic Flight 815, and 518 is 815 backwards. So I made sure to note to my brother as we were waiting to be boarded that he should get comfortable with the people sitting around us, because we may be sharing an island with them for a while. It didn't help that one of my fellow passangers was in a wheelchair, or that I was currently reading the book BAD TWIN, written by Gary Troup, who died on Flight 815. Also, our hotel would end up being on 42nd street, LOST fans. While we were waiting in the airport waiting area... I don't know, what is it, a lounge? While we were waiting, there was a couple seated across from us. The wife went over to the newsstand and bought a couple magazines, then brought them back and put them in the seat next to her on top of her bag. Moments later, a strange woman one seat over asked the wife if she could look at her PEOPLE magazine. She said yes, and the strange woman started to read it. And I don't mean she just perused it. She read the whole fucking thing cover to cover. To me, it seemed like a very awkward situation. This poor schmuck of a wife was just sitting there, reading her other magazine, wondering when she would get her PEOPLE back. And the newsstand where she bought it was only like 50 feet away. The strange woman could have stood at the newsstand and read it there. But she chose to read this poor lady's own personal copy, and the lady had no choice but to sit there and take it. What was she supposed to do? Say no, you can't read my magazine, go read one of the unpurchased copies over there? Inexplicably, this would have violated a social code of common courtesy. But there's just something very disturbing about a stranger reading your own personal copy of anything, even though this person could have read it five minutes before you bought it and it would have been hunky dory. On the flight, there was a very sassy steward who was going around offering snack boxes and headphones by waving them around in the air. When I politely declined my free beverage, he snapped, "Thank you for saving us money, sir." What are you, angry? Are you making a joke? What the fuck is-- WHY ARE YOU BEING SASSY? We arrived at JFK, the same airport where an immigrant named Viktor Navorski once lived for several months. We took a cab to the Grand Hyatt, a very nice hotel right next to Grand Central Station and the Chrystler Building, both of which I believe were destroyed by asteroids in July of 1998. But they looked fantastic, like brand new. They didn't have a room for us, so we checked our bags and decided to get something to eat. We were starving, but rather than get something close, we opted to take the subway to Katz's Deli, where these two people named Harry and Sally once ate and she faked an orgasm. We took the subway to the correct street, then spent like two hours walking back and forth trying to figure out which way to go. At one point, we went into a store that had all kinds of vintage toys and games (old crap becomes vintage if you put it behind glass). Finally, we found the deli and went inside. It was very crowded, and very much like a cafeteria. You're supposed to go to one of like three counters and order food, then bring it back to a table on trays. But we found an area that had servers, so we sat there. The walls were covered with pictures of some guy standing next to different celebrities. Most were unlabeled, but some (of public officials) were. Incredibly, they felt the need to label Liev Schreiber's picture with his name and a few of the movies he's been in. Relax, I know who the fuck Liev Schreiber is. Nearby, there was a table with a big sign over it saying, "This is the table where Harry met Sally. Maybe you'll have what she had!" Meaning an orgasm. Our waitress was an old woman who was extremely rude and impatient. And the customers in the table next to us were no better. They introduced themselves to the waitress by informing her that they were in a bit of a hurry. Later, one of them demanded to know where his iced tea was. "It's back on my tray; relax!" "All right!" the man screamed back. I ordered a Philly Cheese Steak that the menu purported to be better than the ones Rocky has in Philadelphia. I've had the ones in Philadelphia. Wrong. Then we walked around for a while looking for different landmarks my dad had mapped out. At one point, we saw a bridge and attempted to determine what bridge it was. First we decided it was the Brooklyn Bridge. But then, when we were walking under it, we arrived at the third and final hypothesis that it was possibly the Williamsburg Bridge. Which means that I'd been singing the TAXI theme for nothing. Whatever. Who gives a fuck what bridge it was. While looking for the Five Points from GANGS OF NEW YORK, we stopped at an intersection and realized we were standing in it. It was different than one might expect. For one thing, it's overrun with people of the Asian persuasion, because it is right where Chinatown is. But according to GANGS, the Points don't belong to these immigrants. They belong to real Americans: The Irish. Or the Italians. I don't know, one of those. Before we came to New York, I read that the temperature there was in the 50's, but it was hot as hell, so we then went into a little cafe to get a cool drink. It was called the Hip Cup Hut, or some other monosyllabic thing like that. We then walked down to Ground Zero (formerly the World Trade Center). At the moment, it looks like a big empty lot with the beginnings of construction inside it. But there is no structure to speak of yet. Soon it will house something called the Freedom Tower, which will serve as a gigantic middle finger to terrorists. At least according to the brochure. I was pretty exhausted by then. Luckily, the area right underneath Ground Zero led us to a subway, which we took back to the hotel and finally got to see our room. We got to relax a bit before our 8pm show of the Broadway musical DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS. We left the hotel early though and walked to a beautiful area called Times Square, where Spider-Man once bravely fought the Green Goblin during a Macy Gray performance. We went into a Toys R Us that was there, and I was blown away. This was the most incredible Toys R Us I'd ever been in. It was three stories high. It had a comprehensive array of all the name brand toys. It had a functioning ferris wheel that spanned all three stories. It had a mechanical Tyrannosaurus Rex that roared at me. See, every Toys R Us I've ever been to has been a miserable warehouse; not a magical wonderland. So this was really cool. Geoffrey the Giraffe was even there! I couldn't take any pictures of these things, because my digital camera was malfunctioning, so we decided we would come back later on in the trip, when I would hopefully have a disposable camera with me. We then had a quick slice of pizza at Sbarro. Two stories. Everything in New York seems to be built vertically. So then we went to see the musical adaptation of DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS, starring Jonathan Pryce and Norbert Leo Butz. I heard Pryce's role was previously played by John Lithgow, which made me kick myself because I LOVE Lithgow, but Pryce was great nevertheless. For those interested, it was a pretty good adaptation. The scenery was constantly being changed by actors, machinery, and the spinning stage. The performances were excellent, which made up for the somewhat unmemorable songs. It started out great. Toward the middle, they started to take a lot of liberties with the script, discarding the subtle nuance of the original (starring the brilliant pairing of Michael Caine and Steve Martin) in favor of over-the-top pandering punchlines. But then toward the end it got really good again. Overall, a highly entertaining show that I would recommend to everyone in the world. When we exited the theater, there was a huge commotion going on in the theater right across the street. There were some limousines and a massive crowd gathered around a couple people I couldn't see. The theater in question was housing a play starring Julia Roberts, Paul Rudd, and the asshole guy from Wedding Crashers, so I suppose it could have been any combination of those three people standing around signing autographs or something. But we didn't stick around to find out. We went to a very tall hotel called the Marriott Marquis, the top of which supposedly held a revolving restaurant that looked out over the city. Naturally, we wanted to eat there. So we went inside and tried to figure out which of the elevators within this large circular structure of a series of elevators would take us to the top. After getting into lots of different elevators and going up and down and getting nowhere for like 20 minutes, we decided to leave. Also, someone told us we would need reservations for that restaurant anyway, so we decided to try again some other time. Now, ever since I found out about this New York trip, the one thing I knew I would do was attempt to get a standby ticket to see the following evening's SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE show, with host Julia Louis-Dreyfus and musical guest Paul Simon. So we went over to 30 Rock to inquire about how early I should show up to get a standby ticket the following morning (which was going to be a pain considering I'd had like an hour of sleep for the past two days), and when we got there, there was already a line of people sitting on the sidewalk with pillows and sleeping bags. And this was for a line that would get them STANDBY tickets, which doesn't even guarantee entry. So that is when I realized that I would not be seeing Saturday Night Live on this trip. We then walked around the Rockefeller Center ice skating rink where this kid named Kevin McCallister once reunited with his mom after being lost in New York for a while. Except I guess skating wasn't in season, because it wasn't an ice skating rink now; it was an empty lot full of folding chairs. Which made no difference to me, because I don't ice skate, so if anyone ever shows me an ice skating rink, I always think to myself, "This might as well be an empty lot full of folding chairs, that's how uninterested I am in this ice skating rink." We were then walking around looking for a place to eat. We considered eating at the Carnegie Deli, which we coincidentally ran into, so we ate there. The waiter there was very nice and polite, which helped me realize that the rude waitress from earlier that day was not a typical impatient person from up north; she was just an asshole. I also realized that New York delis assume that if you order one sandwich, you are feeding five people and a horse, because that is how much meat they give you. New York deli sandwiches are just massive piles of meat with bread. Don't order a sandwich by yourself if you go to New York. Share with friends. Of course, the menu does have a $3.00 sharing fee. Why a $3.00 sharing fee? $3.00 for an extra plate and a few slices of bread? We don't really need that to share. Have you ever been caught sharing without notifying them in advance? What's the policy here? "Hey, you're sharing. I caught you. Three dollars." But then you can argue that you were just giving the other person a taste. Giving other people a taste is okay. But where do they draw the line? What if your friend wants a big taste? Or wants several tastes? Fine, here's your $3.00, you miserable SHITSACKS. While walking home, we came across a huge three or four-story music store. It was amazing. They had every damn CD ever made. The TVs were playing A NIGHT AT THE ROXBURY on a loop. There was a book store within the music store. And they sold lots of shirts and memorabilia. There was a sign advertising a special sale of certain CDs for $8.00. The sign told people to relax, because they knew this sale would drive people insane with excitement. And here's an observation that doesn't really fit anywhere else, but applies to the whole trip: One thing we saw a lot when walking through subways was urban youths performing break dancing moves to Michael Jackson's BEAT IT on their boombox. That seems to be the official song for what they do. We also saw lots of horses at night. For horse-drawn carriage rides, that is. The horses don't just come out at night by themselves. You're thinking of vampires. We were able to relax some more when we got back to the hotel. We found the movie JURASSIC PARK on one of the TV channels and finally got to sleep at around 3am. This is where I would make up my sleep for the past two days. At 5am, the fire alarm came on and a loud voice urged us to evacuate the building. As we were walking out the door, the voice told us we didn't have to evacuate after all. The alarm continued until 6:30, but I believe we fell asleep before it stopped. DAY 2. MAY 13, 2006. We woke up at like 11-something, and found that the movie FAR & AWAY was on TV. What is this, awesome TV week? We had no shows to attend on this day, so we figured we'd spend the whole time going to places and looking at things. We then went downstairs and started walking. We stopped at a little cafe nearby called Pret a Manger. Stuff in New York is sometimes very weird and fancy. This place had boxed sandwiches with very bizarre ingredient combos. There was one, for example, that was tuna salad, but with a bunch of crazy crap in it. I stood in line and asked the person if I had to buy the tuna salad sandwich in the box as it was, or could I have them make me one that didn't contain onions? They said I had to take it as it was in the box, so I didn't have tuna salad. I instead had a sandwich that was bree, tomato, and basil. Fuckin' New York. For our first major stop of the day, we went to the Museum of Television & Radio. This was first because we knew they closed at 6pm. Now, because I never posted Weeks 2-6 of my LA Journal, you guys don't know this, but I had an extended love affair with the Museum of TV & Radio in LA. This is a museum where you can go into a room and watch any TV show ever made. Well, not any TV show, but they have a very impressive library of selections. You could watch Andy Kaufman on Letterman, or even the first broadcast hour of MTV. But hey, more about LA when I actually finish writing Weeks 2-6. The NY Museum of TV & Radio is not free entry (like the LA one), but it does feature an even bigger selection of shows than the LA one, so it balances out. I immediately called up some episodes of THE DANA CARVEY SHOW (which LA did not have) and I also got a recording of a seminar done specifically by the museum where they talked to four SNL writers (Rob Schneider, Ian Maxtone-Graham, David Mandel, and Steve Koren) about the process of writing for SNL. I watched the SNL thing first, which was awesome, but also ate up 90 minutes of my viewing time. So that only left me with enough time to watch two of the three episodes of Dana Carvey. In the end, the trip was worth it. This was some kickass TV. Weirdly enough, though, there was a trailer for EXECUTIVE DECISION in one of the commercial breaks for THE DANA CARVEY SHOW, and I saw on a shot of the plane that the airline in that movie was called Oceanic. This is the name of the airline on LOST. But surely that didn't mean that I was going to die on the plane ride back! The whole museum thing took about two to three hours. When we left the museum, we decided to check out NBC and see if we could do one of those NBC Studio Tours. I figured it might be cool, because maybe they would show us something related to SNL, which was undoubtedly still setting up at the time. But when we got there, the last tour had already left, so we just looked at the NBC Experience store and left. Also, I had a street pretzel and a Sprite before we got to NBC. Just for you detail sluts. What's next, obviously, but Trump Tower. As avid followers of THE APPRENTICE, we always knew we were going to visit Trump Tower. So we were walking down 5th Avenue, and I was lagging behind my brother and my dad, when I noticed this woman walk by me who looked very familiar. She looked exactly like the first person who was voted off SURVIVOR: EXILE ISLAND. So I stopped and stared at her as she walked away and noticed she was wearing a shirt that said LUMBERJILL, which confirmed that it was her! The woman I was thinking of was Tina, the female lumberjack! I didn't say anything to her, but this was a very thrilling sighting for me. If there's one reality show I love more than THE APPRENTICE, it's SURVIVOR. I called my friend Justin, who pointed out that the season finale of SURVIVOR: EXILE ISLAND was being taped the next day in NY. So that explained it. This finale would prove a challenge for me. Because I wouldn't be able to watch the live finale the next day, I had to wait until Wednesday to get the tape of it from Justin. Anyway, enough celebrity indulgement. It was time for Trump Tower. We walked in through the 5th Avenue entrance, through the very door where all the fired contestants exit the building at the end of each episode. And hey, Trump really knows how to party. He had a three story-high waterfall running down the wall, a Trump bar, a Trump grille, a Trump Starbucks, and lots of Trump merchandise. I was disappointed to find that the place selling bottles of Trump Ice water had closed already, but my brother was able to get a thing of chocolate Trump ice cream, so it wasn't a total loss. After that, we walked across the street to F.A.O. Schwartz, where child-in-man's-body Josh Baskin once played "Heart and Soul" with his boss on a giant piano, but it was also closed. City that never sleeps my ass. Luckily, on the other side of Trump Tower was a three-story Disney Store that was still open. And man, all these places I used to visit in my childhood at the Aventura Mall in North Miami Beach were nothing compared to their NY counterparts. This place was like an enchanted forest, complete with lifesize statues of beloved childhood characters. After running around this place like an idiot, I and my dad and bro made our way to another NY landmark you might have heard of. The Empire State Building. As we were walking up to the Empire State Building, we spotted a comic book store right across the street from it. It was called Jim Hanley's Universe. Fearing it would be closed by the time we exited the Empire State Building, we went to Jim Hanley's first. And MY GOD! This was the most extensively comprehensive comic book store I have ever visited in my entire life. It made me want to move to the Empire State Building. I could have spent hours there, but eventually we had to go so we could look at the stupid Empire State Whatever. So I left Jim Hanley's Universe, leaving my heart behind me. We then entered the famous Empire State Building, where the great ape King Kong was shot and killed after climbing to the very top in 1933. And let me just say to those of you who hold a romantic ideal of this building from movies like SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE, where little Noah just gets in the elevator and breezes up to the top to meet his new mother-- it don't work that way. Rather, you get into an interminable line and they herd you, like cattle, around different rooms that look like the DMV. Then they stick you in automatic elevators that take you in groups to the 80th floor, where they herd you through more lines and force you to take a picture in front of a drawing of the Empire State Building (later, you are given the option of purchasing a gift pack of this picture in forms such as key chain, magnet, and ordinary portrait, for $73,000). Then, when you're in line for the next elevator, a loud man tries to sell you an audio tape of narration by an animated cab driver who tells you what is on top of the building, because there is no other tour information available at this building. Finally, though, you get to the top, which is a big gift shop. If you work your way through the gift shop though, you can go outside and see the wonderful view of New York. It was very very windy and cold on top, much like when I visited the Eiffel Tower (there was no livejournal for that; I was in high school). But I was fine, just as when I did the Eiffel. It takes a lot more than a little breeze to get the best of me, New York. Bitch. I walked around the top and looked at all four views of the city. It was very nice looking. I didn't try taking any pictures though, because my new disposable camera didn't have a method of turning off the flash, and you can't take pictures of a night cityscape with flash. This is a discovery I made at the expense of an entire roll of film on top of the Eiffel Tower in 2001. Anyway, while I was walking around the top, I heard some little kid telling his girlfriend about how all the windows of this building had shattered from the cold in THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW. I was like, what a dumbass. That movie sucked. We then took a taxi cab to Little Italy, where we dined at a restaurant called Angelo of Mulberry Street. This was a very nice restaurant. It was also expensive as shit. Probably they import all the raviolis from the goddamn Italian Alps. After that, we took the subway back to the hotel. By then, the SNL I missed was almost over, so I didn't bother to watch the ending. What I did do was take a shower. Because, see, there is a phenomenon that occurs when you walk around on a hot day wearing boxer briefs. My friend in high school used to call it "fat man's rash." I've never heard a technical name for this condition, but let's just say the shower helped. Then I decided I wanted to use the internet. In order to get a good wireless connection on one's laptop, you had to sign into a page that automatically loaded when you tried to use the internet, and create a 24-hour account for $10. So I turned on my laptop and tried to get the page to load so I could use the internet. It kept not loading. After trying to get it to work for two hours, I went to sleep. DAY 3. MAY 14, 2006. The next day I woke up at 10-something. My brother got the internet working on his computer in like five minutes. We went down to the lobby, and my dad forgot something, so he went back upstairs. While we waited, we looked in some of the lobby gift shops. I found an Entertainment Weekly that had the LOST characters on the cover. Surely this would be an excellent read! When asked if I wanted a bag for the magazine, I said no. Either that, or I was not offered a bag. Whichever actually happened, I'm an idiot, because I had to carry that fucking magazine around in my hand for the rest of the day. First, we walked to that Marriott with the intent of having lunch at that big rotating restaurant, but when we got there, they told us that it was like $80 per person, so we got the fuck out of there. Maybe it's because it was Mother's Day, or maybe it's because people in New York have no sense of what food is actually worth, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that price was unreasonable. We were hungry, not retarded. So we walked to Times Square and ate at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. that overlooks Times Square. Now, Bubba Gump is an expensive place to begin with, but to look at the prices in this place, you'd think the restaurant overlooked heaven. The only reason I put up with it is because I could pretend for one meal that I lived in Forrest Gump universe. After that, we went to 30 Rock to take the god damn NBC tour we couldn't take before. We all lined up and were greeted by our two guides. A spiky-haired guy named Mike and a pretty thing named Courtney. They gave us guest badges and took us upstairs to a screening room, where we watched a video on the history of television and the National Broadcasting Company. This Mike guy I guess was the joker of the two guides, and Courtney looked like she was hung over or sick or something. Then we went to yet another floor to look at our first television studio. I should mention that whenever we took the elevators, half of us would go with Mike and half of us would go with Courtney. By the second or third time, it became apparent that certain people were reluctant to get on Mike's elevator if his opened first, because they wanted to ride with Courtney. Now, there was a nine-person party within our seventeen-person group, and I'm sure they just didn't want to split up for a ten-second elevator ride, or maybe everyone was just sexually attracted to Courtney. But we heard a lot of, "Come on guys, we're all going to the same place." I will say that the elevator riding experiences were slightly different, depending on whose elevator you got into. On the second ride, Courtney asked everyone where they were from. Once we determined that the eight people in our elevator were collectively from three different states, there was nothing left to discuss. I wondered if Courtney always asks people where they're from, or if she got out of bed today and decided she was going to be more talkative in the elevators. I hope it's not the latter, because her elevator conversation needs some serious work. She should come up with little jokes or stories after she asks everyone where they're from. It doesn't even have to relate to their answers. "Where you from?" "Stamford, Connecticut." "Conan O'Brien knows the names of all 23 makeup people." Just give us something, Courtney. The first set we visited was for some news show. They gave us a lot of interesting* facts about the different parts of the set, then we went to the next set. This was for another news show, and they told us things about this one, like how the video of technicians behind the anchor is a loop, and you can see the same guy walking in and out of the shot every minute. * - not interesting. Next, we went to Studio 8H. As everyone should know, this is where they shoot Saturday Night Live. The whole studio was cluttered with the sets from the previous night's show. People asked questions and Courtney told us some cool facts. For example, the seats for the audience were donated by George Steinbrenner from Yankee Stadium, who said NBC could use them until SNL was over. 30 years later, they're still using them. And it was awesome to see the geography of the studio, especially after having watched that thing with the SNL writers at the Museum of TV & Radio, because I could see firsthand what they were talking about in a couple of their 8H-related anecdotes. At one point, Courtney said SNL tickets are the most difficult tickets to get in all of show business. Next, we saw the set of another news show. To make it interactive, they took two volunteers and had one read the news and the other do the weather, which was about as interesting to watch as a real anchorman and weatherperson on TV. They also took everyone's picture at the news desk for possible purchase at the end of the tour. Then, they took us to an HDTV theater inside a giant ball in the NBC store, where we watched a video montage of NBC shows. Overall, the best part of the tour was getting to see the legendary Studio 8H. Even the hallway that led to 8H was better than the actual sets for those news shows. In the 8th floor hallway, they had two big cast pictures. The first SNL cast next to the current cast. Then, the entire hallway was lined with pictures of memorable SNL moments. Sometimes at night, under the covers, I wonder if I'll ever see Mike and Courtney again. And if Courtney is always so drag-ass, or if she just happened to feel like shit that day. After that, we took a taxi to the Museum of Natural History. There was a giant statue of Theodore Roosevelt riding a horse in front of the building, for those of you reading this just for the statue sightings. When we went inside, we walked into a giant hall that dealt with ancient Asian Peoples. As we walked around, I really wanted to get the fuck out of there. Not that I have anything against Asians, or Peoples, mind you. It's just that I was here for one reason and one reason only. I wanted to see the fucking dinosaurs. So after walking around the ancient halls of Asian Peoples for 65 million years, I found the exit and discovered that the dinosaurs were four floors up. So I led the way up the stairs and found the dinosaurs. We walked through all the dinosaur sections, and then through a "dino-store." At this point, I'd like to remind the reader that I'm still carrying a magazine in one hand everywhere we go. So my enjoyment comes at a very steep price. We then took the subway toward 5th Avenue so that we could see F.A.O. Schwartz and go to Trump Tower again. We had to walk for a couple blocks once we got there, and on the way, I passed a woman on the sidewalk who looked like former Marquesas and All-Stars Survivor Kathy Vavrick O'Brien. It could have been just some woman though, so I CANNOT count it in my official list of Survivor sightings, which so far only includes Tina the lumberjack and that asshole Johnny Fairplay, whom I saw in LA (sorry, Weeks 2-6). I also once met the brother of the first guy voted off SURVIVOR: AMAZON, which is about as worthless as meeting the first guy voted off SURVIVOR: AMAZON. We then got to F.A.O. Schwartz and looked around. I was not THAT impressed by this place, because I had already been to that magical Toys R Us in Times Square. And this place mostly had generic things, as opposed to the brand name shit at Toys R Us. Perhaps F.A.O. Schwartz is somehow affiliated with the goddamn elves in the North Pole. Also, I don't know if this contributed to my low opinion of this toy store, but when I was watching the very effeminate performers doing the song on the big piano, a guy told me to move because I was too close to the escalator. Then when I went outside to wait for my dad and brother, some guy told me I couldn't sit on the ledge I was sitting on. I think if I ever had to tell someone not to sit or stand somewhere, I would feel like a complete shitheel. Fuck those guys. Then we went to Trump Tower, and I was finally able to have a taste of Trump's bottled water, Trump Ice. It wasn't orgasmic, but it was pretty good. Certainly tasted better than the standard spring water in NY. Or maybe it only felt like that because I was drinking this out of a container that had Donald Trump's face on it. After that, we went back to the hotel and I was able to put the Entertainment Weekly down. This magazine probably saw more interesting things on Mother's Day 2006 than anyone reading this. And I'm not saying that to brag. I don't give a shit about a magazine. Then we relaxed for a bit and got changed to go see CHICAGO on Broadway. I suggested we take a taxi, but we walked, and we almost didn't make it. We had to really haul ass, and we got there just in time. As we were rushing through Times Square, my brother guaranteed we would be in our seats by 6:57. The show started at 7pm. We didn't get to our seats till 6:59 though, so I didn't even want to think about how embarrassed he was by that development. The show was really good. It provided a lot less backstory than the movie. Pretty much it was just musical numbers. My favorite number was definitely the ventriloquist's dummy press junket. It seemed to be the most challenging to pull off live. But hey, you're not reading this blog to hear about lavish musicals, and what my favorite numbers were in them. After CHICAGO, we were looking around for a place to eat, and we came across an interesting souvenir store, so we went inside and looked at all the crap it had. This is around the time I realized that every souvenir store in NY was full of crap. This one had SUPERMAN RETURNS lunchboxes though. Then, we ate at a place called The Majestic Deli, and as we ate, we looked at a building across the street that was half-covered in a series of digital screens that was playing visually innovative video advertisements of itself. To be honest, I don't really like delis. DAY 4. MAY 15, 2006. Woke up elevenish. Packed, checked our bags, checked out of the hotel. This was our last day, so we had to make the most of it. It would then naturally benefit us if we could eat fast, and I personally decided that we had been spending way too much on food, so I insisted we eat at McDonald's, which turned out to be three stories tall. At this point, I was still very amused by the vertical nature of places in NY. We ended up eating our food in the third story, which I think is the highest altitude at which I've ever eaten McDonald's food-- while still in the restaurant. And you know what, this place was cheap, but still slightly more expensive than a regular McDonald's. Fuck, man! Then, when asked what we wanted to do, I demanded to go back to that Toys R Us, which we had yet to do since we left it on Friday (with the intention of returning when our cameras were working). When we got there, I started snapping pictures of this thing and that. However, when I went to take a picture of Geoffrey the Giraffe, I saw that they had a setup where people paid to take pictures of themselves with Geoffrey. And I'm not trying to take away business from Geoffrey, so I didn't take a picture of him. Then we took a subway to another part of town to visit the American Museum of the Moving Image. When we got off the subway, we were walking and I saw something that completely mindfucked me. An Eckerd. An Eckerd! I was under the impression that every Eckerd in the world had been replaced by a CVS. This means either that they are merely endangered instead of extinct, or that I found a part of the universe that time forgot. A... lost world. The American Museum of the Moving Image was closed, so we walked back to the subway, stopping at a little store first that had some of the more decent NY crap. I got a Sprite and only paid like a dollar, which is unbelievably cheap compared to everything else we bought in NY (read: it was reasonably priced). This further solidified my lost world theory. So we rode the subway back and decided to look for a bookstore we had passed at an earlier date. While walking around the city looking for this bookstore, we were passing a hotel and I came across a very interesting object. Sitting on some side steps of this hotel was a sandbag with the SURVIVOR logo on it. This was very thrilling for me, because it was the exact spot where I'd spotted the person who I thought might have been Kathy Vavrick O'Brien the day before. It was also more frustrating, because it still didn't prove shit. If anyone knows Kathy Vavrick O'Brien, please ask her if she was in NY on the day of the filming of the SURVIVOR: EXILE ISLAND live finale. Then we went to that bookstore, where nothing of significance happened. I think my brother bought hot honey-roasted nuts from a vendor on the street. Insert testicle joke. I like to entertain as well as inform with these blogs. We then returned to the hotel, picked up our bags, and were cajoled by a doorman to take a luxury car back to JFK. We made it just in time to get on the plane without waiting. After boarding, I considered the fact that we might miss 24 that night, but there was nothing we could do about it. During the flight, I finished reading BAD TWIN by Gary Troup. I also bought one of those snack boxes that had so intrigued me on the flight over. It contained dried fruit, crackers, cheese spread, cookies, a cured meat snack, and nuts. I'm sure my brother loved that! Insert reprise of testicle joke. And I did not refuse my free beverage this time. We got home way after 24 was over. We ended up downloading it legally* at a later date. Then, we had dinner at Chili's, and enjoyed our first semi-reasonably priced meal in some time. * - illegally. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Having nothing to do. 2. Having a lot of shit to do. 3. People who hang out in stairwells and when you stop in front of them, just stare at you before doing you the enormous favor of moving their fat asses. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Having nothing to do (one of life's mysteries). 2. Calendars of things you enjoy looking at. 3. Movies that looked like shit in the trailer, but when you paid to see them anyway because you're a moron, they actually turned out to be good. Cheers, Diego post comment

Closing Time. [08 May 2006|02:20am] [ mood | melancholy ] So tonight I went out to eat with my dad and my brother. We first went to a Hispanic-owned seafood place whose name escapes me. We got there at 9:55 and they told my dad they were closed. The sign out front says they close at 10. I was reading a book and having a conversation with my brother at the time, or I might have suggested to the restaurant person that they simply change the sign out front to 9:55 or 9:43 or whatever the fuck they want their official closing time to be, as long as it is consistent with their practice. This experience reminded me of Easter Sunday from like five or six years ago. My dad and brother and I had gone to the drive-thru of Miami Subs Bar & Grill (which closes at 11pm), and they explained that they couldn't serve us because the register was already closed, despite it being only 10:55. I ended up boycotting that restaurant for the rest of my life (except for a handful of times that I felt like going there, usually because my friends with cars called the shots about where I ate). Anyway, that Easter Sunday night so long ago turned out okay because we discovered that the Pines Ale House was not only open until 1AM, they were showing movies on their TVs such as Friday and The Matrix. What a cool place! Unfortunately, we weren't in Pines tonight, so we didn't so much have that option. I then recalled that the TGI Friday's in Orlando is open till 2AM every night, so we tried the TGI Friday's here. We got there at 11:20 and saw that they wouldn't close until midnight. So my brother and I went in while my dad went to park, and the lady told us that they had just administered something called "last call" and that we could sit at the bar, but they were no longer serving food. I discussed this with her in an effort to understand what was happening here. They don't close until midnight, but they stop serving food at 11:20PM? It seems to me a restaurant should not stop serving food until the doors are locked. However, the conversation did not come to this, as a waitress ran out and proclaimed that they could take one more table. So we sat and ordered, and they did get our orders slightly wrong. I said nothing, because I was sure I was eating chef spit anyway at this point. What is wrong with this fucking country? It's bad enough that in the year 2006, establishments still even have closing times. This is the nation that never sleeps. Now we have to worry about finicky serving staffs? The closing time on the sign out front is not a suggestion. It's policy. I would also point out to my local Subway and Wendy's that leaving the OPEN sign on while you are closed should be a federal crime. The next time something like this happens to me, you're going to hear about me on the fucking news. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The seat all the way on the end of the front row in the pit at the movie theater. Does anyone actually sit here and enjoy the movie? 2. Book stores where tables and book carts block the actual shelves and surly employees ask customers to move out of the way so they can shelve magazines (this is another thing from tonight that was extremely relevant to the point of the entry, but didn't really fit into the whole restaurant motif). 3. The point in the middle of a spoken paragraph when you realize the other person isn't paying attention, and the subsequent thought process wherein you must decide whether or not to finish talking and consider what sarcastic quip you should make. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The unforeseen release of a book you're interested in reading. 2. Seeing a trailer to a movie you had no prior knowledge of (a movie you're interested in seeing). 3. Orangeade. Cheers, Diego post comment

Kool-Aid Jammers. [09 Apr 2006|03:08am] [ mood | nostalgic ] So when I was a kid, Capri Sun was the only thing that came in those silver juice pouches for lunchtime. But now Hi-C's doing it, and so is Kool-Aid. Normally, I wouldn't give a shit about all this, but hear me out. My brother recently bought a box of the Kool-Aid ones, known as Kool-Aid Jammers. It's a blue Tropical Punch artificially flavored juice drink. What's interesting about it is that the back of the pouch is see-through. So I can look at the blue liquid inside and see it as I'm drinking it. Let that sink in. I can look at the blue liquid as I'm drinking it out of the pouch. THIS PRODUCT IS FUCKING INCREDIBLE! I suck the whole thing down while looking down to see how much blue is left. For my last one, I did it standing in front of a mirror so I could look straight ahead instead of down, and it was the tits. Now THIS is what America is all about. Now all they gotta do is bring back that Pop Secret multicolored popcorn and we'll be in business. This is the childhood of my future offspring we're talking about here. I understand that all TV is shit now, but that's okay; I can buy my kids the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on DVD. But if I want my kids to have the same great weirdo foods, it's up to you guys at the food companies. Keep making shit with imagination. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Puppy mills. 2. Haunted paintings. 3. Unrequited love. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. When you empty the spam folder in Gmail, and it says, "Hooray, no spam here!" 2. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. 3. Oh, just the 80's in general. Cheers, Diego post comment

Two Block-Related Mos Def Movies. [06 Mar 2006|04:03am] [ mood | sleepy ] And now, for my movie review of the two movies I saw this weekend. These two movies are very interesting because they both feature rapper/actor Mos Def and are both somehow related to blocks. The first was called 16 BLOCKS. Was this movie good? Well, Mos Def was really good in how he crafted his character, and Bruce Willis was also good, which is really no surprise. Another thing that comes as no surprise is that Bruce Willis is in a stupid movie again. This movie had a mildly interesting premise that was beaten to death by every cliche ever. You know how sometimes in a movie, the director uses tricky editing to make you think that something is happening or will happen, but then something else happens? Imagine that with Bruce Willis and Mos Def. There, you just saw 16 BLOCKS. Now for my review of the other movie I saw, DAVE CHAPPELLE'S BLOCK PARTY. This is a documentary by Michel Gondry that shows Dave Chappelle inviting people to a block party in Brooklyn, preparing for the block party, and then having the block party. It is very well made and very interesting. The only way you won't like this film is if you don't like rap music, because there's a lot of rap music in it. I forgot to mention that David Morse was also good in 16 BLOCKS. He's a good actor. You see him in a lot of things. So there's my movie reviews. I hope this was useful to everyone. If it was, I'll post a lot more movie reviews. If not, I'll think of something else to post maybe. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Food poisoning. 2. Dead batteries. 3. Drug dealers. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Warm sunlight. 2. Cool cars. 3. Robin Williams. Cheers, Diego post comment

The Top Ten Worst Movies of 2005 That I Saw. [15 Jan 2006|04:49am] [ mood | calm ] And now I will say it again. This is not a list of the ten worst movies of 2005. I actually happened to avoid a lot of movies this year that looked like shit. So for all I know, the absolute worst movie this year was MISS CONGENIALITY 2: ARMED AND FABULOUS. As promising as Sandra Bullock's career once looked. Ah, who am I kidding, I'm pretty sure the last few entries on this list really are the worst movies of the year. It was a really weird year. THE TOP TEN WORST MOVIES OF 2005 THAT I SAW 12. WAITING... I sort of enjoyed this movie, but looking back on it, if I had the opportunity to erase it from existence, I probably would. Not because of the wonderful cast (Ryan Reynolds? Good! Luis Guzman? Good! Dane Cook? Finally!), but because of the fact that it's such a nothing ripoff of better movies (CLERKS) and even worse movies (EMPIRE RECORDS). Seeing it did not improve my life in any way. My time could have been equally spent sitting in a chair playing with a bit of string. 11. BE COOL I can't yawn hard enough at this movie. The only thing worse than a subpar sequel is one that comes out ten years after the original. What the hell happened all of a sudden that made them want to rush out and make this? Did a trickster god appear to an MGM exec and challenge him to complete the sequel before the tenth year, or fire would rain down from the heavens? Cuz if so, this man is a hero. And it would certainly explain THE SANTA CLAUSE 2. 10. THE LONGEST YARD I think we're all losing our patience with these fucking Adam Sandler movies. Just a little bit. Where's that Billy Madison magic, fuckface? 9. DEUCE BIGALOW: EUROPEAN GIGOLO I'm not even going to pretend that not having seen this one excuses it from this list. I'm a huge believer in not judging something without having even seen it, but give me a fucking break. 8. FUN WITH DICK AND JANE STOP WASTING JIM CARREY. 7. FLIGHTPLAN This gets points for containing Jodie Foster. But it loses points for having a plot so asinine that it didn't even matter that the trailer gave the whole thing away. With every plodding, drunken plot twist, I found myself wishing more and more that I was watching AIR FORCE ONE instead. I went right out and bought the DVD. 6. FANTASTIC FOUR For something based on "the world's greatest comic magazine," this movie sure was a piece of shit. 5. KICKING & SCREAMING I looked it up, and this is definitively the worst usage of Will Ferrell that has ever occurred, ever. Let that sink in. Remember Will Ferrell was in a movie adaptation of the most irritating SNL skit character Molly Shannon ever created. 4. HOSTAGE The trailer made this movie look really cool. But then the 8-year-old kid became a supergenius, the psycho villain became invincible, and Bruce Willis was powerless to stop them. This was just a honey of a train wreck. 3. A SOUND OF THUNDER When I first heard about this movie, I was psyched. I knew the awesome premise of the short story this is based on, and I'm not too crazy about Edward Burns, but I love Ben Kingsley. Then, one day I realized it was coming out, and there had been no advertising. Really? I better go see this thing and find out why. And find out why I did. Not too long after it started, in fact. It came to me, as I sat there with my jaw hanging open. There was no effects budget. The direct-to-video prequel CASPER: A SPIRITED BEGINNING starring Steve Guttenberg and Lori Loughlin had better special effects. Whenever Edward Burns and hot female scientist walked through the streets of future Chicago, it was painfully evident that they were fake-walking in front of a green screen. Yes, like a sketch on Conan O'Brien. And that would have been the worst of it if this movie didn't rely on dinosaurs and mutant monsters that should have looked real but instead looked like the animators went to render them on the computers at the DMV. AND THEN. PUTTING THAT ASIDE. THE SCRIPT WAS TERRIBLE. EDWARD BURNS IS UNABLE TO KILL AN UNDERWATER DRAGON WITH A GUN, SO WHILE HE IS IN THE DRAGON'S MOUTH, HE DEFEATS HIM WITH A HUNTING KNIFE. EVERYONE RENT THIS MOVIE. 2. NOVEMBER This movie actually made no sense. Courteney Cox's husband dies, a bunch of weird shit happens, then the movie starts over, and everything happens again, but a little different. Then, I think it happens again, more weird shit happens, and then the movie ends. I think what happened was, the guy who made this movie once attended a class about making movies. And the teacher had a big lesson plan about movies that are very abstract, and then they turn out to have an underlying message about something. But the day that the teacher went over how the movie should have some kind of meaningful thread tying it together, this guy was HOME SICK WITH SYPHILIS. 1. GUS VAN SANT'S LAST DAYS Gus Van Sant likes to make these really weird experimental movies every now and then, where we spend entire minutes following a character as he walks through a field or a hallway, and then we see the same event from multiple perspectives, but the event is not something interesting; it is two people crossing paths in the same room. Sometimes, the character will pass a bush and Gus Van Sant will stay on the bush for a spell before moving on. And it's a good thing he does. Did everyone get a good look at the bush? No? Let's look at it for a little bit more, and then we'll go back to following behind the guy on the dirt road. We have a lot of dirt road to cover, and then we're going to go in the big house and walk through all the hallways. There was one part of this movie where the main character, who is supposed to be an homage to Kurt Cobain, sits in a room acting braindead while the entire music video for Boyz II Men's "On Bended Knee" plays on the television. This is the best part of the movie. SPECIAL FOREIGN MOVIE BONUS 13. ONE MISSED CALL - I would be remiss if I didn't mention this piece of shit. Just like OLDBOY (my special foreign movie bonus entry for my best of 2005 list), this came out in 2003, but we didn't get it in the U.S. until 2005. And, just like OLDBOY, it seems to be getting remade for American audiences. This was Japanese horror at its best. See, Japan has figured out that the scariest thing that can happen is evil magic, and when this evil magic is combined with technology, it is unstoppable. So that's the worst movies of 2005 that I saw. DON'T SEE ANY OF THEM. UNLESS YOU'RE STUPID. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Bad movies. 2. Bad TV shows. 3. Bad popcorn. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Good movies. 2. Good TV shows. 3. Naked celebrities. Cheers, Diego post comment

The Top Ten Best Movies of 2005 That I Saw. [14 Jan 2006|07:31pm] [ mood | pensive ] I will open this list with the same disclaimer I always give: I did not see every movie in 2005. For all I know, Paul Reiser's THE THING ABOUT MY FOLKS was the best movie of 2005. Something tells me it wasn't. The point is, this list is not the best movies of 2005. This is the top ten best movies of 2005 that I saw. And I rate them not only by how good they were, but also by how much I enjoyed them. This allows seemingly unseeming movies the chance for greatness. Just read the list. THE TOP TEN BEST MOVIES OF 2005 THAT I SAW 15. WEDDING CRASHERS This was the first of 2005's two major exceptions to the piece of shit idiot comedy genre. Movies of this genre usually contain Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, Luke Wilson, Vince Vaughn, or Will Ferrell. Or sometimes combinations. This one, however, was really funny without having to be stupid. I was thoroughly impressed. Although I will say that none of the credit goes to Owen Wilson. Owen Wilson is something like a book jacket. You put it on the book, and it looks real nice, but if you take it off, the book still says the title on it, and the inside is still the exact god damn same. 14. SAW II I'm not a fan of extreme horror movies. What I like about the SAW series is the story. I really like what they did with the Jigsaw character in this one, and the way they gave us a totally new premise and then tied it all back to the first one. And also when that guy-- you know what, I had a cool comment here, but it's a spoiler, so if you want to know what parts I liked, send me an email or something and I'll tell you. 13. RED EYE I love Wes Craven from the SCREAM movies (you know, SCREAM, SCREAM 2, and then that was it), and this was a rare opportunity for him to employ his talents to a non-horror thriller. We are also treated to a killer cast, among which Survivor: Outback's Colby Donaldson will be spotted by eagle eyes and REAL Survivor fans. 12. THE 40-YEAR-OLD VIRGIN This was the second exception to that piece of shit idiot comedy thing I was talking about earlier. No one would have been surprised if this had been a brainless joke fest like Adam McKay's ANCHORMAN: THE LEGEND OF RON BURGUNDY. And it fully could've been. The title alone already guarantees $20 million on the first weekend. And don't get me wrong. I like ANCHORMAN. But thank god this was not like ANCHORMAN. This was a real true-to-life story about a virgin who is 40 years old. And it was very funny. There's not much more you can ask from a movie. Except for maybe a bear fight. But hey, not every movie can be THE EDGE. I have to keep reminding myself of that. 11. STAR WARS: EPISODE III - REVENGE OF THE SITH I guess this was the best of all the Star Wars prequels. It had a lot of really kickass action scenes and an interesting story about a stupid douchebag who killed everyone because he was an idiot. 10. MATCH POINT Woody Allen's best product in a long time. Taking into account that Woody Allen's worst is better than most people's best, that makes this one of the best movies ever made by a human, mathematically speaking. A study would have to be conducted to really validate this hypothesis. I sure enjoyed it though. 9. FRANK MILLER'S SIN CITY Frank Miller is a lunatic. I'm probably putting this on the list more because it's so uniquely and amazingly put together by Robert Rodriguez. 8. THE WEATHER MAN There were times during this when I suspected that the movie was simply trying to duplicate greatness rather than create it. But there were several moments of inspired brilliance, with a cast that featured Nicolas Cage AND Michael Caine. I also award it a slight handicap, considering the trailer ruined almost the entire movie. I bet if I watched this again today, I would enjoy it a lot more. In the long run, trailers have brought me nothing but pain. 7. MR. & MRS. SMITH One of the best mixes of action and comedy since James Cameron's TRUE LIES. 6. THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY This was not one of the most cinematically noteworthy or especially unique movies this year, but it gets significant praise from me for raising important questions about life and the universe, and answering them in a very hapless and inept way. 5. HUSTLE & FLOW A terribly inspiring story that speaks to dreamers of all creeds, races, genders, and social standing, about a pimp who wants to be a rapper. 4. KING KONG I think Peter Jackson was the perfect man to adapt this, and I could not envision a more definitive version ever being made, not even in the distant future. But then, I'm sure the same was said of the 1978 version, which, to me, plays like claymation shit. And I say that not in reference to the effects, but the script and direction mostly. THEN the effects. 3. WAR OF THE WORLDS Rather a mind-blowing event. By the year, I grow more and more accustomed to Spielberg's unwavering mastery of cinema. For that reason, I have only included one Spielberg movie in this list. You MUNICH nuts will just have to go visit another site. 2. KISS KISS, BANG BANG Quite possibly the best-written movie of the year. Shane Black once again plays the action genre like a fucking Stradivarius. 1. BATMAN BEGINS I've been going on throughout this list about how all these movies were blessed with perfect casts or directors. Well, for the primary holy shit shining fucking example, look no further. When I heard that Christopher Nolan was directing this movie, I thought I was dreaming. When I heard that Christian Bale was going to play Batman, I thought I had died while dreaming and been sent to heaven. And when I heard the rest of the cast, I thought I was dreaming because I had fallen asleep while in heaven and angels were playing with my balls. Even after that, this movie surpassed all my expectations. So when you hear some comic book nerd tell you that this movie is a fanboy's wet dream, do not take those words lightly. SPECIAL FOREIGN MOVIE BONUS 16. OLDBOY Yes, that was fifteen movies in my top ten list, and here's number sixteen, fuckers. I'm listing this movie here because it came out in 2003, but we didn't get it in the U.S. until 2005. It was so good that a lot of people are wondering why it is even being remade for American audiences (to be released either in 2006 or 2007, I think). Anyway, everyone in the world should at least see this version. And that's my list. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, which was really not that enjoyable for me. I'd say I experienced moderate joy. Why did you read this anyway? Don't you have any video games? Stay tuned for my next list, which will be called THE TOP TEN WORST MOVIES OF 2005 THAT I SAW. I think we both know that one will be a lot more fun to read. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The CAST AWAY trailer. 2. The SPIDER-MAN 2 trailer. 3. Every DVD menu in the world. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY teaser. 2. The SUPERMAN RETURNS teaser. 3. THE. SUPERMAN. RETURNS. TEASER. Cheers, Diego post comment

Black Cherry Vanilla Coke. [06 Jan 2006|04:30pm] [ mood | relieved ] You may recall in November when I made a post chastising the Coca-Cola Co. for discontinuing Vanilla Coke in the face of their January 2006 release of Black Cherry Vanilla Coke. They also discontinued Diet Vanilla Coke, although I don't really care about that, because I think diet cola is the dumbest thing anyone can drink. If you're on a diet, drink something good. Like water. Water has an underrated taste. And it's extremely beneficial to your health. Water is the best thing anyone can drink. Cola is liquid shit, but at least it tastes good. Diet cola is just like cola, except it tastes terrible. It contains artificial sweetener that is meant to act as a sugar substitute. NutraSweet is as much a substitute for sugar as a hole in a fence is a substitute for a lover. I have now tasted Black Cherry Vanilla Coke. It is one of the best-tasting cola flavors ever. At first, it was too much for me. I couldn't figure out which part of the flavor to enjoy first. It's cherry AND vanilla! It TASTES the way a sunset LOOKS. In the past months, I have found Coke with Lime to be my favorite of all the Cokes, but with the advent of Black Cherry Vanilla Coke, I now have a second flavor to which I must devote my time and pursuit. For it was so good, it eliminated the need for an already-existing Coke flavor. People tasted it and said, "My God! Let's discontinue Vanilla Coke!" And once you taste it, you will understand why. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Unexpected loss. 2. The relentless pace of time. 3. Piece of shit products. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Rainbows. 2. Windy days. 3. Discovery. Cheers, Diego 1 comment|post comment

The Top Ten Worst Movies of 2004 That I Saw. [24 Dec 2005|05:00am] [ mood | relaxed ] Let me make this clear, for anyone who still hasn't read my previous list (one entry below). I don't know what the worst movies of 2004 were. For all I know, the list rightfully includes the likes of AGENT CODY BANKS 2: DESTINATION LONDON and THE PRINCESS DIARIES 2: ROYAL ENGAGEMENT. But I tend to avoid what I anticipate will be bad movies, so this list is only going to detail the worst movies of 2004 that I saw. And it is in order, from least worst to absolute worst worst. So here it is: THE TOP TEN WORST MOVIES OF 2004 THAT I SAW 10. THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW This might be on the list not because of how bad it was, but because of how disappointing it was. Whatever hopeful scope of humanity Roland Emmerich was able to capture in INDEPENDENCE DAY is utterly lost here. The entire planet is completely screwy, and we only see it through the eyes of two or three people [who matter to the story]. The challenges come in the form of ridiculous situations, such as crazed wolves escaped from a zoo, a magical wall of subzero temperature that is super fast and super cold, yet slower than Dennis Quaid on foot in the snow, and not cold enough to put out a Wendy's oven. The United States government is headed by Snidely Whiplash and Dick Cheney. And a guy dies because he falls into a mall. 9. THE CLEARING This movie strung me along for 95 minutes with an interesting character study nestled in a kidnapping story told slightly out of sequence. The entire movie begs the question of the outcome, and when it finally arrives, you want to stab everyone in the theater. I could pull a better ending out of my fucking ass. 8. JERSEY GIRL I'm not sure why this is on here. Firstly, I didn't see it in 2004; I rented it in the summer of 2005, and it really wasn't that bad. There are actually some funny bits. Oh wait, now I remember. It is pretty bad. Kevin Smith thinks that if he abandons his "View Askewniverse" characters and stuffs the story full of sentimental shit, then he's making a real movie. This was unrealistic, full of sap and cliches. It really felt like he was just mimicking other movies in an attempt to get serious with his career. But DOGMA remains his high point. CLERKS 2: THE PASSION OF THE CLERKS sounds far more promising than this colossal misstep. 7. NATIONAL TREASURE I was looking forward to this one. A very interesting premise with one of the best actor/action heroes of our time and even a really cool poster. But it felt like a shallow imitation of all the other modern action adventures it was trying to be, complete with hot model scientist lady, young sidekick comic relief boy, and Sean Bean villain guy. I will cite a scene that has been cited before in discussions of this movie (this is merely an approximation; it's been a while since I've seen it): Nicolas Cage and hot woman scientist are at Cage's father's house, hiding as fugitives with the stolen Declaration of Independence. Cage requests lemon juice in order to decode a message written on the Declaration in invisible ink. His father produces a large bowl of lemons from the kitchen, saying, "This is all I have," without the slightest hint of irony or self-awareness. This is the best part of the movie. 6. EUROTRIP This was a brainless farce in the spirit of shit like ROAD TRIP (which was itself an imitation of better movies, making this a clone of a clone, which we know from MULTIPLICITY, will come out retarded), except less funny and with less star power. It was full of pointless, offensive jokes that were injected unnaturally into the story for cheap laughs (a German kid dressed as a Nazi goose-stepping around for no reason). Although I think there were breasts at some point, which saved this from being knocked up a spot. And an inexplicably hilarious cameo from a surprisingly major name star. 5. AFTER THE SUNSET This falls into the NATIONAL TREASURE genre of modern-imitation-action-adventure. But it's somehow worse because it seems to be much more full of itself with much less to show for it. Shame on you, Brett Ratner. Didn't you once direct RED DRAGON? What the hell is this movie supposed to be? Just something you slapped together while on vacation? It is a hollow chocolate Easter Bunny attempting to pass itself off as the real thing. 4. THE PUNISHER As I sat in the theater watching this movie, I was marvelling at how a movie this pisspoor could ever actually get made in the present day. I would completely believe it if someone told me that every producer attached to this had skipped every screening of every cut. It is preposterous, and at times, not even funny in its absurd lack of common sense or credibility. The Punisher doesn't really kill anyone until the movie is 95% over. But he does use a fake fire hydrant to turn the villain against his helper man. I wept openly during this movie. 3. CHRISTMAS WITH THE KRANKS I didn't see this movie. I saw the trailer. That was enough for me to name it the 3rd worst movie of 2004. Imagine if I had actually watched it. 2. CATWOMAN The fact that this is even implicitly associated with Batman makes me want to erase celluloid from existence. Thankfully, the bat is never mentioned in this ludicrous adaptation of the DC comics character. Halle Berry revokes her Oscar by unbelievably leaping through one asinine scene after another as a woman who acts like a bitch for no reason in a city full of morons. I think what they did is, they took the Catwoman transformation scene from BATMAN RETURNS, then concocted a think tank of 12-year-old girls to come up with new ideas for what Catwoman should do, then inseminated it with a mindless feminist agenda that pits the immature, thuggish Berry against an evil cosmetics tycoon played by [none other than] Sharon Stone, then handed it over to not-at-all-pretentiously-named Pitof, who is more concerned with generating interesting-looking CGI transitions than he is with not insulting the intelligence of every living being with eyes and a brain. She does wear a stupid little leather number though, so there is that. 1. WELCOME TO MOOSEPORT I had no doubt about making this movie number one. There are many kinds of ways that a movie can become a failure, but perhaps there is nothing as bad as an unsuccessful comedy. There is nothing funny in this movie. The character arcs are more transparent than invisible shit. Ray Romano's girlfriend is frustrated with him because he won't propose marriage to her. I'm sure this won't come up later in the movie, say, somewhere toward the end. It's just really bad and simpleminded. Ray Romano's grating voice can't save it, nor can the usually-limitless humor and talent of Gene Hackman. What I find remarkable is that this was written by Tom Schulman, the same man who wrote DEAD POETS SOCIETY, HONEY, I SHRUNK THE KIDS, and WHAT ABOUT BOB? How can a man lose it so devastatingly? Well, I guess it's not like he didn't try to warn us by writing HOLY MAN and 8 HEADS IN A DUFFEL BAG. And that's the ten worst movies of 2004. This was way more fun to write than the best movies list. The likely reason being the possibility that I may be helping someone out of a doomed rental decision. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. A pile of shit, just, somewhere where people are walking. 2. Someone's gum stuck under a type of surface. 3. A ball of hair, surreptitiously placed in someone's food. You'll notice right about here that I cover purely hypothetical situations as well as realistic ones. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Top ten lists. 2. An unspoken connection between two human beings. 3. Aaron Neville. Cheers, Diego post comment

The Top Ten Best Movies of 2004 That I Saw. [23 Dec 2005|01:55am] [ mood | mellow ] I wanted to go ahead and write down a list of my Top Ten Favorite Movies of 2005. I made a list last year (for fun; no one really saw it), so I wanted to do it again for this year. But the Academy Awards website still has not posted their definitive list of every movie that came out in 2005. So while I waited, I figured I would re-compose my Top Ten list for 2004, then revisit the original one I composed a year ago, and discuss the differences. One disclaimer: I did not see every movie that came out in 2004. There are some that I suspect had a shot of making my list, such as THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU, which I still have not seen. So this is a list of the top ten best movies of 2004 that I saw. Also, it's in no particular order, other than alphabetical. My 2005 list will be in proper countdown format. So here it is: THE TOP TEN BEST MOVIES OF 2004 THAT I SAW 1. THE AVIATOR I only saw this the one time in the theater, but I remember it being excellent. There was lots of debate over whether the Academy should've recognized Martin Scorsese (or this movie) instead of Clint Eastwood (and MILLION DOLLAR BABY). I don't have a problem with Scorsese's loss, nor THE AVIATOR's loss (as I didn't the year before with GANGS OF NEW YORK) because I also liked both MILLION DOLLAR BABY and CHICAGO. However, this was a phenomenal portrait of Howard Hughes, and touched upon several of the worthy themes Scorsese tends to explore, such as isolation. And the crash sequence was the balls. 2. COLLATERAL Shot on HD in a cool handheld style, the cinematography is practically a character itself. And the script and characters are pretty awesome too. 3. ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND I also only saw this the one time in the theater (and then again a couple days ago). I didn't immediately buy it on DVD, because I was waiting for a good deal. Which I was glad I did once the special edition came out. I still don't have it. Part of the reason I'm glad I avoided it is because of the film school hype surrounding it after it came out. A lot of people wished they had made it and started ripping it off in their own work. But I do hope to own it in the future, because it is brilliant, accessible, and life-affirming, like everything Charlie Kaufman writes. The direction is exquisite as well. And Jim Carrey is my favorite actor. 4. HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN This one was not on my second iteration of the list. Again, I only saw it the one time in the theater, so it's not very fresh in my mind. But, having seen HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE, I can confirm that this is the best Harry Potter movie to date. So maybe it does deserve to be on the list. 5. I HEART HUCKABEES I instantly loved this movie. Really quirky, but appropriately so, as it is meant to be an "existentialist comedy." 6. I, ROBOT This one was also not on my second iteration of the list. And in retrospect, I would take it off. It is a movie filled with great action, but by no means a great movie. It is in fact fairly brainless. But cool and worth a viewing. 7. THE INCREDIBLES If you had told me two years ago that FINDING NEMO could be topped, I would have said you were crazy, but this is quite possibly Pixar's best work to date. The title sums up the movie quite nicely. 8. KILL BILL, VOL. 2 Also not on the second iteration of my list. Like HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN, it's probably because I haven't seen it for so long. I suppose this should be on the list as well. I would say that volume 1 was better, but that's really unfair. This movie was made and should be released as one movie. Quentin Tarantino promised a huge special edition that would include both volumes. Sadly, it takes him forever to do anything. But I suppose that's the price of genius. Genius and lazy. 9. NAPOLEON DYNAMITE I saw this before the galactic hype. In fact, I remember seeing the trailer online and being immediately hooked. This is just brilliant comedy, and I feel nothing but pity for those who didn't catch it before the expectation-aggrandizing word of mouth. 10. SIDEWAYS On my fourth viewing of Napoleon Dynamite, I saw the poster for this in the theater. I didn't know a thing about it, but I knew I definitely wanted to see it, being a huge Alexander Payne fan. And surely, it turned out to be a wonderful, beautiful film. Unfortunately, I caught it after the hype, so it took longer for me to be able to fully appreciate it. I might even purchase it one day. 11. TEAM AMERICA: WORLD POLICE Hilarious! To be fair, I think I only included this in my second iteration because I remembered that it was in the first. But then, I also only saw it the one time. Either way, it was something of a groundbreaking parody with plenty to say about the state of movies and the world. It definitely belongs on the list. 12. THE VILLAGE I was spoiled about the ending of THE SIXTH SENSE and was then unable to enjoy it, and UNBREAKABLE was fine, but M. Night Shyamalan became a favorite filmmaker of mine the second I saw SIGNS, which I felt was unbelievably good (and probably his best to date). I shared a similar love for THE VILLAGE, which I consider to be severely underrated. Maybe it was poor marketing. Maybe it was the fact that people were already looking for the patented "Shyamalan twist" and were therefore underwhelmed by the ending of THE VILLAGE. If it had been Shyamalan's first movie, who knows how differently it would have been received? But man, the score, the pace, the performances. The story itself is elevated by how Shyamalan presents it. I maintain that it is some of the most original and wonderful work in recent days. That's right, my original TOP TEN BEST MOVIES OF 2004 THAT I SAW list contained 12 titles. It's my list. Weee! MOVIES THAT WERE NOT IN THE FIRST ITERATION, BUT WERE IN THE SECOND: 1. MILLION DOLLAR BABY I don't know why I didn't include this movie in my original list. I'm fairly certain I had seen it at the time. Maybe I found it too depressing? Truth is, when I saw it, I was expecting something the nature of which I will not describe, thanks to the loose lips of a professor who had already seen it (I didn't know what it was, but I knew the nature of it), hence, the impact of the thing in this movie was greatly undermined. But, like SIDEWAYS, in retrospect, I grew to appreciate it for the kickass film it truly is. I'm a big fan of both Clint Eastwood and Hilary Swank. And Morgan Freeman? Nothin' wrong with that! 2. THE TERMINAL At the time, I considered this to be a very well-made feel-good comedy, mistaking its lightheartedness for unremarkability. Truth is, no one could ever have made this film as well as Spielberg and his cast and crew. It is magnificent and worthy of utmost recognition (a certain point of its ending notwithstanding). Coming up next... THE TOP TEN WORST MOVIES OF 2004 THAT I SAW. In proper countdown format! 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Toilets that are too low-flo. 2. Toilets that are too low to the ground. 3. Intolerance. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Books. 2. Magazines. 3. When someone breaks out into song. Cheers, Diego post comment

Humbug 2. [07 Dec 2005|08:52pm] [ mood | crushed ] Since my last post, I've confirmed that the radio station I used to listen to every night has changed to a complete Christmas format. The entire radio station. So I don't listen to it anymore. I listen to mp3s of the songs that station used to play. Because they played the same shit every night anyway. I notice I got a reply to my November 27th post on November 29th. I, however, did not receive an email notification of this until today, December 7th. And it was in my Junk Mail folder. So great job, Livejournal. I have not slept in my bed for the past two months. I had it out in the hallway, leaning sideways against the wall, thinking that I was going to clean my room first, then bring my bed back in. But because I became very busy writing and directing and producing my very long Capstone Directing short, my room only got messier, as did the rest of this apartment. Occasionally, I will walk past the metal bed frame and hurt myself on it in some way, such as a toe stub or flesh slice. In the coming week, I will have the time to clean my room in preparation for the coming year. I might throw the bed away and buy a tent and a small cot, and pretend like my room is a forest. I don't know if there is a policy regarding this at my housing development. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Overpriced items. 2. Teachers who know things, but don't know how to teach. 3. Unnecessary rudeness. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The newspaper column where people sarcastically bitch about strangers who did something they found inconsiderate. 2. The SUPERMAN RETURNS teaser. 3. Video games. Cheers, Diego post comment

Humbug. [27 Nov 2005|12:05am] [ mood | discontent ] I love the latter part of year. The weather is nicer (in Florida, at least) and there's a lot of superfluous commerce going on (presents). But there's one thing about it that I hate. Christmas music. I've been listening to the radio every night for a while, and ever since Thanksgiving, my station has played nothing but old Christmas songs. And every store I go to provides a steady sountrack of the same fucking Christmas classics they always play for the seasonally regulated frantic herds of rampaging consumers. So any decent song that ever existed but sadly does not contain any reference or inference to or about Christmas is unceremoniously removed from the airwaves in favor of a much smaller arsenal of tunes that, quite frankly, aren't that good, but share the fortune of mentioning something that, be it implicitly or explicitly, involves Christmas. And see, I listen to music because it's good. "Jingle Bell Rock," I'm sure, at some point in time, was an amusing song to listen to for about three days. You know when it came out? 1957. 1957. NINETEEN FIFTY-FUCKING-SEVEN YOU FUCKING MONSTERS. THAT IS TWO YEARS SHY OF HALF A GODDAMN CENTURY. THE SONG IS NOT THAT GOOD. Christmas songs no longer even have the effect of putting me in a cozy Christmasy mood. They put me in an irritated, homicidal mood. Play something else, you stupid fucking idiot radio and store assholes. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Large groups of people buying things in excess. 2. Germs. 3. Circuit City. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Getting presents you like. 2. Cold, wintery days. 3. Target. Cheers, Diego 1 comment|post comment

Vanilla Coke. [04 Nov 2005|11:31pm] [ mood | restless ] I just heard that the Coca Cola Co. is phasing out Vanilla Coke and Diet Vanilla Coke. What are they, crazy? They're also phasing out Diet Coke with Lemon, but who gives a shit about that? I'm not an avid cola drinker. I in fact stopped drinking cola for about nine months, which sadly overlapped with the long-awaited release of Coke with Lime. That's a funny name, by the way. Typically, Cokes have the flavor name preceding the word Coke. Cherry Coke. Vanilla Coke. Caffeine-free Diet Coke. But Coke with Lime? That's the name of what should be Lime Coke? Whatever. Pepsi kinda has the flavor after the word Pepsi thing going. Pepsi Vanilla. Pepsi Twist. Pepsi Lime. Wild Cherry Pepsi is the exception. Partly because it was established before they got the idea to stand out by putting the flavor after the brand name, and they're afraid of changing it because then people won't recognize it anymore. And partly because it's so wild. Then there are some varieties that are named after numbers. Coca-Cola C2 has half the sugar, carbs, and calories (the Pepsi equivalent of this is Pepsi Edge-- so cool!). Then there's Pepsi One, which has one calorie. And Coca-Cola Zero has nothing. But zero, that's more of an integer, isn't it? Where the hell was I going with this? The phasing out of Vanilla Coke (and Diet Vanilla Coke) does not come without compensation. In January 2006, Coca-Cola is going to introduce a new flavor. Black Cherry Vanilla Coke (and Diet Black Cherry Vanilla Coke). Now what exactly is the fucking point of this? You can get Cherry Coke and Black Cherry Vanilla Coke, but not Vanilla Coke? Now people who want vanilla are accomodated, but if they don't feel like cherry, they're shit out of luck? What is the problem with introducing Black Cherry Vanilla Coke and keeping Vanilla Coke? There's really not enough room for this flavor? What is the logic behind offering a combination of two Coke flavors, as well as one of the flavors, but not the other? Fuck! And bring back Crystal Pepsi, you fucking idiots! 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Product discontinuation. 2. Talentless people attempting to entertain everyone else. 3. Evil kings. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. The sun. 2. John Tesh. 3. Magical wizards. Cheers, Diego post comment

New Keyboard. [25 Oct 2005|12:25pm] [ mood | crazy ] I was just thinking about how I never posted Weeks 2-6 of my LA summer adventure. The reason for this is that the five-week period was taking a very long time to anotate. And I now have other writing responsibilities. Namely, my Directing Capstone and my Feature Writing Capstone. I did write a significant portion of the Weeks 2-6 entry, but am not nearly close to finishing. But I promise I will eventually post it, sometime far in the future when nobody even cares anymore. I think that will be a good time for it. The reason I am addressing this is because I thought of something that would make an interesting livejournal entry, and realized I had stopped making livejournal entries because I felt there should be no entries until my Weeks 2-6 entry was finished. And that's retarded. So here is my interesting entry. I have a great new laptop from Dell and the J key had always been a little loose. One day, I pried it from the board to see if I could fix it, and it came apart into four separate pieces. So I called Dell and they sent me a new keyboard, which I just attached now, and it is awesome. It has a different "click feel" from my old keyboard. I think it's way better. Plus, I can use this J now. JJJJJJJJJJ, oooooohhh, I love to type JJJJJJJJJJJJ. Well, I guess that wasn't so interesting after all. But you can all go fuck yourselves for all I care. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. People who sing along with the radio. 2. People who sing along with the radio incorrectly (out of synch, wrong lyrics). 3. Just people in general. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Bionic implants. 2. Space exploration. 3. New keyboard. Cheers, Diego 2 comments|post comment

LA: Week 1 [03 Jul 2005|09:05pm] [ mood | cold ] So here I am in LA for my 6-week internship. We flew out on Sunday June 26th on a 5-hour flight that reverse-spanned three time zones, so that we traveled backwards through time and arrived in a mere two hours. That was easy. We then got a nice red Contour from a car rental shack named "Rent-A-Wreck." Since there was four of us, the rental guy called a cab place because we couldn't fit all our luggage in the Contour. This took an hour because the cab place didn't really send anyone, so the guy called another cab place and it was there in five minutes. So this was our first official waste of time in LA. When we arrived at UCLA, we discovered that my friend and I were not sharing a bathroom with my two other friends, as had been promised to me several weeks ago. This is because the man organizing this whole thing is not a man, but a child who promises things and is, incidentally, often accidentally demeaning. So we switched with some other guys so that we could have our fucking shared bathroom. We then went out and explored some things. We heard word that there was a small premiere for an independent movie nearby, and that Lisa Kudrow might possibly be in attendance. So we hauled ass to the theater, but the movie had already started. So this marked our first time standing outside a theater that Lisa Kudrow was possibly inside of. For dinner that night, we went to a place called "Schwab's," which the menu informed us was a very historical trendy hangout of big-time Hollywood guys. For example, one tidbit also in the menu detailed how Jack Nicholson got his role in Chinatown because he sat next to the writer at the lunch counter there. So this was a pretty big deal. I ordered a simple cheeseburger, which was great, but I paid a fortune because my idiot friend kept ordering glasses of wine and drove up the tip percentage in the non-separate check. But I was instantly cheered up when the waiter informed us that just the night before, Alanis had eaten like, two tables from where we were sitting. Boy, was I starstruck. Alanis recently commemorated the 10th anniversary of the brilliant "Jagged Little Pill" by releasing an entirely acoustical version of that album. But it was released exclusively in Starbucks, and everyplace else has to wait till like July. According to my one friend, this enraged some record companies or something. Evidently, entire companies are mad at her. I personally don't give a shit. I just bought it, and I'm probably going to listen to it, like in my room or something. We also went to a really nice Borders. It was huge; the shelves went really high. I got a graphic novel and my friend got a copy of the Fight Club novel, autographed by Chuck Palahniuk. Later on, I remember thinking that that would've made an excellent gift for another friend of mine who really loves Fight Club. But that person already owns it, probably. Plus, I didn't even get it for this person. It was just a thought. And in the end, isn't that what really counts? Nope. Then came Monday, June 27th. At this point, we are all supposed to be working at our internships, but none of us had anything set up for Monday, so we figured fuck it, let's look around at shit. We all had one internship secured somewhere, and plans to interview with Maverick for our second. Maverick is Madonna's production company. Later on in the week, we will come to realize that Maverick promised us all interviews, but then hired this other guy from our school and realized they didn't need anyone else, thereby fucking us each in the ass. This is probably okay with me in the long run, because I hate Madonna, and Swept Away sucked shit. Maverick didn't make Swept Away, but they did make the Agent Cody Banks movies and a bunch of other shit no one's ever heard of. So fuck them to hell. We meandered our way to the famous Grauman's Chinese Theater and discovered that they were setting up for the WAR OF THE WORLDS premiere. We hurried into a line that went around the entire block and barely got into the red carpet area, so we could hound our favorite movie stars for pictures and autographs. We were also given WAR OF THE WORLDS T-shirts, so that we could show how huge fans we were. Here is a list of all the celebrities I saw: 1. Brooke Anderson -- The adorable correspondent for CNN, looking very bored and very cute in a long golden skirt thing. 2. Giuliana DePandi -- The correspondent for E! News Live. I got a picture with her after the event. 3. Mary Hart -- The correspondent for ET. Not much here. 4. Tom Cruise -- He drove right onto the red carpet on a motorcycle and circled the crowd before spending an hour signing autographs and taking pictures. My friend got a picture with him, taken with extra zoom by Cruise's apparently retarded sister. 5. Katie Holmes -- Arrived with Cruise on his motorcycle and followed him around as he signed autographs and took pictures. 6. Ann Robinson -- From the original WAR OF THE WORLDS, she has a cameo in the new one. 7. Gene Barry -- Same as above, except he instead of she. 8. Anthony Hopkins -- Remarkably, my friends all yelled "Hannibal" as I yelled "Zorro." 9. Virginia Madsen -- Remarkably, my friends all referenced "Sideways" as I referenced the few episodes where she played Cassandra on "Frasier." 10. Jonathan Lipnicki -- Nobody seemed to recognize this formerly cute kid from Jerry Maguire, or would have, except just a few days prior I had caught a show on VH1 about former child stars, and this bastard was on it. That plus the fact that he was being interviewed confirmed all. 11. Leah Remini -- Stacey Carosi from Saved By The Bell, she's also on The King of Queens. Not the most major of celebrities there, but my friend and I screamed at her until she waved at us. The footage of her interview also got us some substantial screen time in the background of E! News Live. 12. Ice Cube -- A rapper/actor who once rapped about a momma bouncing her tits and shaking her cheeks, while proclaiming that he had dick for days and she had ass for weeks. He was also in Barbershop and Anaconda. 13. Jason Lee -- Skateboarder-turned-actor. He got pretty close when signing autographs. 14. Emile Hirsch -- The dude from Girl Next Door and Imaginary Heroes. He zipped by pretty fast, so he was like an imaginary actor. 15. Adrien Brody -- We got to shout "Hey, Brody!" like in his world-famous diet cola commercial. He also won the Academy Award for Best Actor, but he's mainly known for the diet cola thing. 16. Michael Clarke Duncan -- His presence was not nearly as cool as the fact that he arrived with or at the same time as David Hasselhoff. 17. David Hasselhoff -- Pretty much the definition of cool. He delayed the production of the Knight Rider movie for two years because the producers wanted to not have the car talk. God bless this man. 18. Will Smith -- The batteries in my camera died when this guy was right in front of me. As a result, I forgot to ask him about the Willennium. 19. Erika Christensen -- Almost went by unrecognized, because she'd dyed her hair red or something. But we did get to yell "Swimfan" at her. 20. Efren Ramirez -- Pedro from Napoleon Dynamite. He threw a "Vote for Summer" button into the crowd and waved at me when I screamed at him. 21. Matthew Perry -- He arrived somewhere in the middle of the event, but it's hard to remember when, because he avoided the red carpet altogether, so I only saw him for three seconds. But it was a three seconds I will never forget. Did I mention I saw Will Smith? After the movie started, we sneaked onto the red carpet and snapped some pictures of ourselves like we were Tom Cruise or some shit. Then we got tickets for the Wednesday night opening night screening at that theater. We immediately considered visiting a wax museum for like $13 each, but we eventually realized that we weren't total idiots. Then came Tuesday, June 28th. I went to my first day of work at my new internship, where I learned how to shelve scripts and make copies. They asked me to photocopy a 400-page book about the Trail of Tears. But I had to do it a certain way so that none of the pages were crooked, and low enough so that the binding wouldn't cut off any of the words. Evidently, I did an excellent job, because people were complimenting me on it all day. At one point, the receptionist introduced me to someone who worked there, and she said, "Diego? Oh, you photocopied the Trail of Tears!" She went on to rave about how their book photocopies usually suck ass, but mine was magnificent. I'm sure it was a joy to read. So that was a good first impression. When I got out of work, I learned that my friends, after dropping me off, saw Mike White walking his dog. Mike White wrote Orange County and School of Rock. Now, if you were to ask me, which would I rather do-- intern at a "vibrantly hip" production office and make good impressions, or see Mike White and his dog very briefly at a coffee shop-- I don't know, let me think. It was around this day that we started to feel the heat of our meal plan situation. We get free breakfast and dinner, but because we're not official UCLA students, we are assigned to one specific dining hall. As of this date, we had no idea where this phantom hall was, so we made it a habit to argue with the guy at the one we knew so we could get in. This will end up working for the rest of the week. Then came Wednesday, June 29th. My two friends, the only two who are legally sanctioned to drive the Contour, had an internship to go to, so me and my other friend wandered Rodeo Drive for some hours. This was interesting because we encountered a very nattily-appointed man who introduced himself as "The Ambassador" and welcomed us to Beverly Hills. Not sure if he actually worked for anyone. We asked him where we could find a bookstore and he directed us to a very fancy narrow hallway of a store that sold a lot of gigantic books. This was the day I realized Beverly Hills contains nothing practical. However, we did find some swanky green couches made of hard plastic, which may or may not have glowed in the dark. I also thought I saw Stan Lee. My friend yelled "Stan!" but he didn't turn, either because I had creeped him out by staring at him when he initially walked by, or because he wasn't Stan Lee. That night, we attended the screening of WAR OF THE WORLDS at Grauman's. We screwed up and only showed up an hour early, so the line was already around the block like the day we showed up for the premiere. While in line, my friend overheard an unsubstantiated comment from one patron to another, claiming that they had just shaken hands with Lisa Kudrow. So this marked our second time standing outside a theater that Lisa Kudrow was possibly inside of. When we got inside, there was only one concessions stand. Seems a little deranged to me if you're going to house thousands of people, but whatever works for you guys. Afterwards, we looked around on the pavement outside, where we saw the hand and footprints of all the great stars, plus Martin Lawrence and Steven Seagal. I also discovered that I am identical hand twins with Michael Keaton. Which will possibly come in handy later in life. Then came Thursday, June 30th. I went to my second day of work at my internship, where I was entrusted with the crucial task of answering phones and delivering packages to buildings. I was also accosted by a homeless man on my lunch break. He got within two inches of my face and delivered a speech that was rehearsed to the point that sadly created a few minor inconsistencies (for example, he claimed to be looking me in the eyes, but I was wearing sunglasses). I gave him all my pocket change so he would leave me the hell alone. While I was doing this, my friend started her first day at her new internship, where she made friends with McG, provided notes to McG on his latest projects, and was given an office next to the office of McG. My two other friends went home and watched Full House. Now, if you were to ask me, which would I rather do-- continue fortifying my position of relative strength at this production office, or stay home and watch Full House-- I don't know, take one wild god damn guess. It was around this time that I realized that while I was doing pointless bullshit, all my friends were being given the opportunity of providing script coverage. I figured this was a problem because, as a screenwriter, it might be beneficial for me to be doing something vaguely related to screenwriting. That night, we went up to the organizer guy and told him how Maverick fucked us in the ass, so the four of us needed a new second internship, and I also needed a replacement first one. The next day, he slapped together a motley list of random contacts, most of which didn't seem to have anything to do with screenwriting, and sent it to everyone in the program. So that was a nice big help. Due to an asininely-timed colloquium, we were unable to partake of our meal plan that night, so we dined at a place called "Jerry's Deli," where they served us meals in massive portions. At the end of the meal, we requested separate checks, but our waiter informed us that we should have requested that at the beginning of the meal, because now he couldn't separate the checks. Oh, darn. We will remember that for next time. By the way, this guy is a DIRTY FUCKING LIAR. Then came Friday, July 1st. I feel this day was somewhat lacking. Maybe it was because I did not achieve the psychological satisfaction of turning a calendar, but most likely it was because I didn't really do anything. My one friend had to fly away to a wedding, so my driving friend and I drove to the airport first as a test run, then we came back. Then we drove him to the airport for real. This took less time, so we drove around for a bit, discussing the possibility of doing something, but ending up not having done anything. While driving through Inglewood, I rolled down the window and blasted Snoop Dogg, which made my friends nervous that we were going to die very soon, so they kept turning it down. What pussies, I remarked. During this, our other friend went to hang out with her other friend. In the process, she photographed D.L. Hughley and got her picture taken with Donald Faison. Later that night, she went back out with her friend to a club, so I went with my driving friend to CVS and picked up a new scent of Axe (I've had Marine, Apollo, and Orion-- now is the time for Phoenix) and Old Spice (bye bye, Mountain Blast-- hello, Glacial Falls). While there, I picked up the latest issue of People magazine as an impulse buy. My reasons for this were two-fold: One, it contained an article on Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes (or TomKat, as they are called by the people who invented such words as Bennifer and Brangelina-- reporters are idiots). And two, it contained an article on a couple who put a helmet on their baby so that his flat head would develop into a perfect dome-- haven't read that one yet). So when I got back to my room, I read about this place called the Spider Club. People reproduced a seating chart based on the guest list from June 17th, and basically, all the big stars go there to party. On the morning of Saturday, July 2nd, our clubbing friend informed us that she had been to some place called the Spider Room last night, and it was all full of-- "You mean the Spider CLUB?" I asked, holding up the magazine article dramatically. She told us about how she miraculously got in and attended a triple party being thrown for Avril Lavigne, Lindsay Lohan, and Ashlee Simpson. She then informed us that there is no way we could ever get into any clubs like that, because we are not hot girls. It makes sense to me. But they can't keep me from reading about it. Or maybe they can. Which is why I'm careful about who I flash this thing around to. My other driving friend left town that day to go to San Diego with his other friend, so I went to the beach with my friend and her friend, where we witnessed a supposedly former Harlem Globetrotter perform basketball dance tricks while begging for money, claiming that this was his only source of income. We also saw a monkey and touched the Pacific Ocean, which was rather thrilling, because I'd never done it before. I mean, I'd of course seen a monkey before, but not touched the Pacific Ocean, and certainly not on the same day that I saw a monkey and a Harlem Globetrotter (supposedly)! Then my friend and her friend went to a party, so I had some alone time. I walked to Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash, which is Kevin Smith's comic book store. This place goes to show that a man can make shitty movie after shitty movie, but still slap together a really good comic book store. I also went to Borders and observed that Jenny McCarthy was on the cover of the latest FHM. Ordinarily, a discovery like this would dictate my purchasing of said magazine, but I'm trying to watch my budget, so I read the article about Jenny McCarthy and went home. No longer hindered by my impatient dining partners, I asked the lady at the dining hall that wasn't ours where my real dining hall was. I asked her several times, because if there's one thing that UCLA takes pride in, besides having lots of Asians (and I'll be honest, I haven't seen this many Asians since Lost in Translation), it's the fact that nobody here can give directions that are not fucking terrible. After running around like a horse's ass, I arrived at my correct dining hall at 8pm. I soon learned that the dining hall I'd been eating at all week is the only one that closes at 9pm, and that all the other ones close at 8pm. So I ran around and grabbed random plates of things as they were being thrown away. Not the best of meals. I then ran back to my room to watch my superhero cartoons, but found that this Cartoon Network is on Atlantic time. This is information I will treasure forever. Later that night, I went back out and re-watched WAR OF THE WORLDS, a movie so good that I will not only pay to see it twice, I will capitalize every single letter of its name when I write about it. I then came back home and spent four hours writing about my week on livejournal. After completing the entry, I wondered what song I should list on the top, because I wasn't really listening to music at the time. Then I realized that Joey Scarbury's "Believe It or Not" was still running through my head from when I heard it at Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash. So I wrote it down, but I realized that I had accidentally written the song name before the artist name. So I hit backspace, but I hadn't clicked in the text box, so it made the server go back. When I hit forward, the entire entry was gone. That's right, the one that took me four hours to write. This utterly decimated my Sunday-- but more on that next week. 3 BAD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Large groups of people who don't speak English. 2. Reproducing four hours of irrelevant stream-of-consciousness sprawlings nearly verbatim, but not remembering the second god damn thing on this list. 3. Livejournal. 3 GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE 1. Graphic novels. 2. Spielberg movies. 3. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes on a motorcycle. Cheers, Diego 6 comments|post comment

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