Why I hate LA and other cliche's

It is so blase ( I am sure there's a way to accent that last -e- but I don't know how) to hate LA. Everyone Hates LA. I was always the one who said "well, I don't HATE it, it's okay. so now I have joined the masses. I can't find ANYTHING redeemable about it. And when I say that people here look all shocked and say "but the WEATHER! you must at least LOVE the weather!"
nope. hate it. miss the fall. miss wearing tights and jackets and cute furry boots. I wake up and it's just another sunny day. BOR-ING.

and then, there's the freaky people. I can't even post an ad on craigslist without attracting a serial killer who I then invite into my home, as a roommate nonetheless. Harvey. from vegas. mid-forties. an "actor" who works for "central casting" (that's where everyone goes to get put on the EXTRAS list) but he said that was his employer all the while staring at my crotch, asking me if me and my husband lived here while he twitched both his eyes every half second still looking at my crotch.

I deleted my craigslist ad for a roommate so now I am stuck with all the rent. AND I am sharing my perfect spanish pied-a-terre in the city with TERMITES too. I think this is outrageous, while my neighbors think I am being a spoiled diva. here's what peter the downstairs neighbor said "...well YAH, of course there are termites! everyone in LA has termites! you can't just rent a place in LA without termites! In fact, back when I was in college, a termite got into my cable box and just LIVED there forever. I think he just loved it because it was warm, and he could be alone and he would just munch on the particle board. Well, He lived in that box until I moved and turned it in. it was actually kinda cute."

(I am NOT taking poetic license here, this conversation, word for word, actually took place yesterday in my backyard)(if you don't believe me ask the termites. i am SURE they heard)

it got even better when peter went on to say "yah, last year I discovered that they had built a nest in the didning room, so I found their nest and just broke it down. that's just what you do."

Nest? dining room? break it down YOURSELF?!?!??!?!

I think there IS such thing as getting too much sunshine in your life. makes you delusional.

not even white trash...

I have fallen to an all time low. I am not even on the level of white trash because in order to BE white trash, truly and effectively, it is implied that you will have appliances collecting on your front porch. I, on the other hand have NO appliances to put on the porch. I am paying what most people would consider a double mortgage for my perfect 3 bedroom in hancock park, and i have NO fridge, NO a.c. and NO washer/dryer. I paid top dollar because i insisted that I have laundry hook-ups. I do in fact have the hook-ups. And a big empty place in the kitchen wall where sits 2 target ice coolers (that I fully intend on returning when I get my actual fridge) which I have to buy ice for AND drain every 3 days.

So when I went to Trader Joe's last night with my friend I had to just pass the dairy, the frozen goods, basically anything you would need. Her cart was full. I left with 2 bottles of water and a plastic box of fiber muffins. mmmmm. can't WAIT for dinner.

ANGRY MONDAY

I'm having what I would like to call an "ANGRY MONDAY" That's when EVERYTHING is pissing you off and not going your way. And it's monday, so on top of everything being "off" you have a million chores to do. THis is going to be an angry spoiled apathetic brat blog, so I'm just warning you. Because it's only 8:30 AM here in tinselfuck and my "NEW YORK" bagel is dry and stale and cost THREE DOLLARS!*** (Murray's Bagels in NY, one of THE BEST, is only $2.75 and they're THE BEST) and my carmel latte is bitter, too much ice and not enough carmel, and my internet connection is slower than dial up.

***the added bonus here was that I tried to "charm" the new bagel store guy up so that I would get a GOOD bagel and he said "you have a big personality. i bet when you walk into a place everyone notices you...(a pause)...well, when you dress nicer and put on make-up and stuff"

My new dog park that is across the street from Nordstrom's (and you would THINK would be pristine) is totally ghetto and nasty, with garbage and mud and bums everywhere. I don't mind the bums, but in LA you just have to watch out because these bums could be just bums OR they could be violent ex-gang bums from their hey-day in the 80's and early 90's riots who are all pent up, have had too much heroin residue, and are ready to unleash their fury on anyone who walks by. You just never know. SO all bums are potentiallty a threat. AND then this is called the PAN-AMERICAN park so there are about 80 percent OLD asians who are all terrified of dogs. PLUS there are a LOT of runners, who are the yuppie running type who are running with their business partners while discussing hedge funds. SO this so-called morning dog park is like a mine field for me. Oh and I almost forgot, the people who DO bring their dogs are also old and crazy or just crazy and they ALL want to talk to you because you are not 1.asian 2.running 3. a violent bum.

So after all this drama this morning all I wanted was a nice perfect coffee, and a nice perfect bagel while I surfed the net. Nature is clearly against me. ALSO the chores facing me today are the kind you avoid until you can avoid no longer. LIKE....setting up the cable appt, trying to figure out WHICH 9 hour block of day you have to staple yourself home and wait and wait and wait until the last 5 mins of the 9 hour block when they show up only to tell you that you need a special wire that they have to order so when would you like to re-schedule another hook-up appt?

...applying for a parking permit for the street and having to provide every legal document to prove that you do in fact live on that block so you can be ALLOWED a permit that costs $125 to park which you just KNOW will require you to change your address at the DMV which will be a WHOLE OTHER ANNOYING CHORE!!

... and last but certainly not least on my TODO list is the unavoidable (but I've SO been trying to avoid) trip to....to....HOME DEPOT. I don't even know where it is. I don't WANT to know where it is. It was bad ENOUGH last monday when I had to go to, gulp, SEARS, but this is SO. MUCH. WORSE. Why can't I just be a lesbian and have a nice butch lesbo girlfriend to do all this FOR ME? I am not geared for Home depot. I grew up in a single MOM household. we had handy men, gardners, people who did this stuff for us. And back then, if and when we did need say, a nail or hammer, we had a local hardware store, where you walked in, told them what you needed (a nail thingy for wood stuff) they KNEW what you needed, got it for you and wrapped it up so you never had to actually look at it or anything, and you certainly never needed to look for it yourself.

Best if you don't try to contact me today. oh and also, all the plants that my mom forbid me to take, but I took anyway cuz they are SUPER CUTE (potted orange and lemon trees...adorable! and potted ficus trees...super cute pots. and the pretty pink bouganvelia) are all dying because I just notcied that they haven't been watered since I moved. oops. I just figured my new gardeners would just KNOW that I don't DO that. SO on top of all these annoying chores I also have to WATER MY PLANTS!!!!

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My new "hood"

I seem to constantly find myself where I don't technically belong, per se.

I lived in south pas. in the 70's when everyone was catholic, rich and a FAMILY, we were protestant and poor and latch key kids.
I lived in Utah when I was not at all a mormon or a hippie or a skier.
lived in harlem when I was clearly not a blaxican.
lived in pasadena where I was clearly not a married yuppie with 2 kids in private schools.
lived in stockton when i was clearly NOT white tra...okay. stockton kinda fit.

So yet again, I find myself out of my element. I tried to avoid this too. on THIS apartment hunt I kinda tried to avoid West Hollywood, because as my so so wise mother said "WHAT? WEST HOLLYWOOD? don't you EVER want to get married?! Are you just gonna hang out with the gays your whole life?!"

enough said.

SO. I moved to the sweetest neighborhood on the sweetest street in the best location...but I started to look around. It was ALMOST wisteria lane. almost. except for "syd's pharmacy" on the corner, "Brenco judaica bookstore" across from starbucks, and why is coffe bean closed on a saturday? i wondered. Oh and why is everyone wearing those funny big black hats?
oh.
I am in a hasidic Jewish neighborhood.

perfect.

NOW what will I do with my waving santa figurine? My christmas tree that lights up when you walk by? My stuffed snowman that sings "it's beginning to look a lot like christmas..." Will I get vandalized? Will my neighbors hate me? Why the big black hat? why? I saw fiddler on the roof, but they didn't wear the hat. And coffee bean closing on sat? I thought it was bad in utah when stuff was closed on sunday....but the big chains stayed neutral. You could alway go to Barnes and Noble say. or Nordstrom. But coffee bean? that's serious shit. (luckily Starbux has satyed true to the corporate heathen profit dollar and is open) And now I am going to have to be aware of all those weird holidays becasue I am SURE I will be so confused when my bank is closed on rosh hoshana (sp?) and all that other stuff I can't spell.

Oh well. I guess this too will make me well rounded. And my mom will just have to be disappointed yet again, i probably had a better change of finding a kinda straight guy in WEHO than ANYthing here!

ho hum...

This blog brought to you by "THE NEW DIET" infomercial.

I have found THE diet secret. Seriously. It's free, actually SAVES you money, AND I have lost about 20** lbs in 3 days! how? you ask. Wellll....here is it....

GET rid of your refrigerator AND cable just for a few days, 2 or 3 even. This limits you to foods that are sustainable only for a few hours, and or food that can live on a counter, like wheat bread and bananas. Now you may be saying to yourself, "yah, but kiki, I would just eat fast food, the perfect excuse for a McDonalds bender!"

ahhhh, you would be WRONG round eye, so so wrong. This is where the NO CABLE comes in. When there is nothing to watch on TV, and NO REASON to plop onto your couch, you become so depressed that even McDonalds is no longer appealling, cuz really, where are you gonna eat it? inside the actual McDonalds???? GOD NO! You haven't been INSIDE one of those since they had the big plastic Ronald and Hamburglar figurines all around. No, instead you will become sooo frustrated with life, and all the limitations no cable and no fridge put upon you that you will just sigh, grab a stupid protein bar and throw in the towel.

Now you think this is all of it....BUT WAIT! as an ADDED bonus, turn off your electricity too! Without that, there are no night munchies, cuz you can't see anything, and your days of watching nick at nite with a bag of oreos in bed are OVER! Then with nothing to do and nothing to see and no cell phone or computer (they have all lost power too) you have no choice but to get a good night's sleep. AND THEN when dawn breaks, you are UP because you are SO excited that there is LIGHT!! And since no one else is up, and you can't cook any breakfast, or surf the net, or call anyone, you just go out for a walk, given all other opportnities are now exhausted.

AND you just keep walking, cuz really, there's nothing to come home to anyway, so may as well.

SO you see folks, THIS is the foolproof diet we americans have been needing, and it costs you nothing AND your electric bill is nothing!!!

and I am proof cuz my pants all fit now, and it has only been 3 days!!***


**results a-typical

***as an added enhancement to this diet, and for faster weight loss, move out of your 3 bedroom overly furnished house to an upstairs apartment.

the prison yard

"hey hey pretty lady. why dont you come over here so we can get a good look at ya. are those space pants you wearin' cuz your ass looks OUTTA this world!"

you probably thought I was exaggerating...

bedroom gets GREAT sunlight!

what? me? dogs? Never!

MORE creative advertising...

"steps to the mall"= IF and only IF you're King Kong.

"Terraces at the grove..."= By "at" we mean that IF you rent the top unti on a sunny clear day and have 20/40 vision you may be able to catch a glimpse of "THE GROVE" sign.

"completely renovated!"=home depot had a "last chance" clearance sale so things don't MATCH per se, but still, they're new!

"luxury!"=if you were once homeless, and squatted in an adobe hut with a clay floor and no running water and couldn't see the light of day, then you will find a popcorn ceiling, plush shag carpeting, mirrored closets AND doors (pretty girl) and brass trim on EVERYTHING luxurious.

"ultra luxury"=bigger words equal bigger shiny things made of materials from the sixties that have been banned due to toxic shock.

"Courtyard"=couch and/or appliances on porch.

"laundry on premises!" ="now the laundry is right here in the buliding! Just 4 flights down these stairs, turn left, walk around the building, through the alley, and then down the basement stairs, then through the crawlspace, go right and then continue all the way under the building, then double back track through the boiler room, and then right behind the water heater and incinerator, you'll see TWO! washers and dryers! Don't forget your quarters!!"

"art deco"=you will PAY, oh yes you will.



I am still apartment hunting.
well, actually "hunting" would be a good word because that would mean you have a chance in hell of "catching" your prey.
but no.
not so in LA.
it's apartment stalking.

at this point my skills are getting so honed that I could be a P.I. Yesterday Starr and I went about our now daily trek
because I THOUGHT I had found my perfect apartment. I THOUGHT I was done. I just wanted her to see it to make sure that even though it wasn't THE BEST neighborhood, I wasn't crazy to pay $2,200 for it. See once you see soooo many laughable shitholes, you start to lose perspective...you get REAL excited at the mere sight of a real wood floor and running water, and are then willing to pay top dollar for it even if there ARE a few bums in your garage space, even if there ARE two "jewish retirement hotels" on either side of you, even if there ARE no stores with english writing on them in the neighborhood.

So she kinda turned her nose up at it, but we couldn't get inside because of course it's impossible to even get anyone LIVE to actually return your calls, so I tried to break in, and then I tried to break into the "manager's" apt because i KNEW she was home but wasn't answering her door. So all that failing, we decided to walk around the neighborhood, to see if I felt safe. I kept trying to justify everything to starr "see! look! there's a nice building way down there!" "see! look! a nail place where pedicures are only 10 bucks!!!!" "see! a market...or something..okay, a fruit market, but I mean, everyone needs fruit!" "see, how close we are to the grove? the neighborhood is BOUND to get better!" "see, I am surrounded by two retirement homes, yah one is a shelter, but old people are harmless..." I barely got those words outta my mouth when, and i am NOT kidding here, a gun shot went off. We both ducked. I looked at her and said "uhhh, what the fuck WAS that? was that....was that...a GUNSHOT????" She said "YAH! probably!"

We walked in silence. I said " are you sure? you really think that was a GUNHSOT?"

"YEEEEEES!" And then we heard all kinds of police sirens rolling towards us. so she continued "and those are probably the police coming to see who just got murdered."

There goes my "perfect" apartment. (I might still get it)

THIS is how my apartment hunt is going. and this is only ONE episode. Others include such highlights as....

...being invited in to a russian mafia lady's house (it was THE cutest apartment complex ever) and she was sitting in her wheelchair holding a cane, patted the couch and commanded "SIT." I sat. SHe looked me up and down. she looked starr up and down in silence, then turned to me "YOU HAVE PETS?" I choked out in a high pitch "me? noooooo. no pets. nope. none. never had a pet. not me." She squinted at me "NO CATS? NO DOGS?" I gulped. "nope. no pets. just me. heh. heh. just, um, me." I couldn't even look at starr. So she approved of us being able to LOOK at the apartment. Of course it was HEAVEN and a great (2,100) price. The perfect place. For someone with no pets that is.

...(on the phone)...yah, I am a yoga teacher, good income, VERY quiet. Pets? um, yah, I have A dogtwodogs.

...looking at the "lovely 2 bedroom guesthouse" as we walked through the main house, littered with trash and STUFF crammed everywhere. The hippie bi-racial couple was nice as could be, hemp and incence candles burning everywhere, to mask the smell of the TWO INDUSTRIAL WASTE bins and their no-door-garage that was literally cramed floor to ceiling with STUFF, which all happened to be on the walk to the "lovely 2 bedroom guesthouse." They showed me everything and when I said "sooooo, there's TWO bedrooms?" they walked me through the kitchen to where would be an entryway to a backdoor and he said "this is the second bedroom, well, it could be you know, an office, or a...a...guest room, you know, it could fit, a futon or something." He stopped then. even he knew he was lying. On the way out, past the Industrial waste bins that most people only have when they're renovating, but I suspect these guys use for storage, starr said 'PLEASE! you cannot live with those hippie packrats!"

...the toothless manager who "wasn't exactly the manager" (his words) saying "yah, these units is REAL NICE. they got them nice REAL PREGO (not a typo) floors!