city of bable

In LA you come in contact with people all over the, world, the state, the country. I find myself doing a lot of translation lately. Not the kind where someone speaks another language and I paraphrase in English. It is more that I say one thing and provide its regional counterpart.

I realized this as I was planning my very first white elephant party. It wasn't until I invited someone on the east coast by mistake that I realize that out there they call it a "yankee swap" I had heard the term before but completely forgot about it.

It dawned on me that I actually do a lot of that here when I talk to people. I usually stop mid-sentence and say:

"where you live they call it this"

So in order for us to understand each other better, here is what I found to be true:

white elephant = yankee swap (east coast)
bag = sack (iowa and other parts of the mid-west)
World Market=Cost Plus (california and west coast)
Liquor store=packie (Boston Area)
Quit your job=gone drug up (deep south)

I hope that this will you help you to "overstand" people better.

la hipster podcast

Bon jour hipsters,

This is the news for this morning 10/12/10 (european dating people!!)

Nautical stripes are out, even though we have been loving Brigitte Bardot and all things French New Wave, stripes are out

Ironically big glasses (not sun, what are we the mad men crowd?) are still in, it is up to you if they actually have glass in them.

Bonus word of the day, that you have to work into 4 conversations is the word Goethe.

I hope you have a pleasant day full of judging and hating things for no reason.

(btw went to ArtWalk last night)

If I could bottle it up

The thing that I love about LA and that I am constantly surprised by is that it only takes about an hour separate yourself completely from the city. An hour will bring you to alien landscapes, plop you in the middle of the ocean, provide canyons for you to hike in.

When you land in Minneapolis, an hour will bring you to flat tracks of land followed by another hour of flat land and then perhaps some trees peppered by lakes then more trees and more trees after that. Not that this is bad, but the forests become dense quickly and do not offer a lot in the way of exploring.

A couple weeks ago I ventured north and west to Sycamore Canyon to try to catch some Monarchs rumored to be in the area. Nature never cooperates. That is what I like about it. We saw one Monarch. One. or perhaps it was a mirage.But then again none of us really stopped to survey the Sycamore trees for the firey orange butterflies or to smell the roses. We didn't need to stop because every step in the canyon offered an aroma therapy trip that not even the best of spas could recreate. Every breath in was

inhale-rosemary
inhale-wild sage
inhale-licorice
inhale-dill pickles??

I wish I would have bottled it up.

what you fear the most will meet you half way

I am a cautious hiker. I prefer when it is colder, when I know they are sleeping. I remember my 7th grade teacher telling stories of camping in the southwest and rattlesnakes on cliffs. I never wanted to camp in the sw.

Sometimes though you have to conquer your fear one bite at a time.





___/\/\/\/\/\>-<

dirty lie

What is the biggest dirtiest lie about mankind every told by Hollywood? Can anyone help me find the rest of this interview? I live adjacent to Hollywood and I want to know what they are up to.

Confession or Save Ferris

I am afraid of heights.

I remember back to the day that I walked the switchbacks at Bryce Canyon white knuckling so hard that I almost broke someone's hand. The thought of that glass skyway across the Grand Canyon is my idea of torture. It is not the fear of falling, but the fact that maybe perhaps that I can't stop my self from jumping.

But with the thought of the possibility of relocating looming, I did something that I never thought I would do. I rode the Ferris wheel on Santa Monica Pier.

It was always daunting to me. It is large, so large that you can see it from Malibu at night, me being afraid of heights, it being old and rickety and run by carnies w/ really small hands. (or actually kids who look like they are in high school. I am not sure what is worse.) I couldn't bring myself to do it. And it is not like I hadn't been asked or begged to go on it before, for some reason Ferris wheels are romantic. I see them as a spinning wheel of death. (me being dramatic, but there is a certain passage in "Devil in the White City" that might make you change your mind about Ferris Wheels)

So when my friend visiting friends suggested we go on and I looked up at it and thought, this may be the last time you get this opportunity so I said "f-it, I am riding that Ferris wheel."

And I did. And I was so distracted by the view, the breeze that I didn't think about how high we were, how old it was, how warped the boards were on the boardwalk that was holding us up. We didn't get stuck at the top waiting for other riders to get on, so that was a plus.


And I didn't jump.

If I were you this Thursday

Downtown LA to me is like the Ocean, I always forget how much I like it there, until I go again. Then for some reason mysteriously I don't go again for months.

If I were you this Thursday, I would make visiting Downtown LA a priority during noon-9 for Artwalk

There is a great new space at 438 Main showing work about my favorite subject LA. The show is called Urbanica and it features this great photo series commentary on dating called "It lasted 16 outfits"

It is free and you might see me there.

festival of nations

I knew I didn't want to leave Los Angeles without trying Korean BBQ. The truth is that I never tried it because it was always so daunting. Well over 50 restaurants in a 5 square mile radius with names like Sa Rit Gol, Soot Bull Jeep and Chosun Galbi; I really needed a tour guide for a place I could take a 5 minute bus ride to.

That is a common issue with Los Angeles; I find that there are so many possibilities that you become paralyzed.

I finally found a more than willing tour guide and she chose Shik Do Rak, on 1st and Western and I don't think there could have been a better choice. New to the experience it was great to have someone to hold my hand through the experience.

I make it sound scary and it wasn't. You just need to be adventurous and not afraid to stuff as much as you can into a tiny square of rice paper - again the overwhelming possibilities.

When you sit down little dishes of things are placed across the table, Kimchi of various types (also a first for me) vinegar pickled cucumbers, fish cake (so good) pickled radishes, spicy pepper and peanut sauces, lettuces. You order meats which is always various and wonderful cuts of beef, although for the more daring and non-united states centric palates there are plenty of intestines, stomach and other "nasty bits" to choose from. We didn't choose to go that way. We chose Galbi, which you can see pictured as frozen curls of frozen beef and deckle which is a brisket, skirt steak cut.

There was also plenty of soju (not a first and a staple in most of the bars here that are prevented from serving hard alcohol-Angelenos know this) and this great potato noodle dish that is now calling to me from the refrigerator.


I have been thinking about Korean BBQ since I had Korean BBQ. It is just that good.

Sometimes you have to let things go to bring things toward

Remember when I asked you what you would make sure that you accomplished if you ever had to leave Los Angeles. I think I put it as before LA fell into the sea. I almost had that experience a few weeks back. I thought I almost had to leave this place, my home, I love.

The story above would be long and complicated. So I did what you couldn't tell me about. I did the things I wanted to do before I left this place or things that I loved doing here. Soak it all up before I was gone.

And I will tell you about that next and then I will move on from this episode of my life because thinking about the past keeps you in the past.

But you know that don't you.

Crystal ball

I am still having a lot of firsts in Los Angeles, even after 4 + years. Upon a friends suggestion, because of all I have been going through in my search for a roommate and love here, I went to a psychic.

Psychics,like therapists, are everywhere in LA and the surrounding areas. I guess there are more people out here looking for answers. Like all things you should take what they say with a grain of salt and although she may very well have the gift, I felt more like she was a good advice giver and when I kind of needed a direction to focus my energies.

When we sat down she asked if we could sit for a couple minutes so that she could get a feeling about me. While we sat, I was supposed to write questions I had for two minutes.

Here is what she said:
I have a generous spirit- agree
I am kind-check
sweet energy-check
I feel grounded in nature- umm yes, I love tide pooling but camping is not something I look forward to with any type of fondness.
I have a tenderness toward animals-ummm, I like to eat them especially when they are tender-I guess a stretch

So at that point, I wasn't really sure what to think.

Also, I sort of thought that when cards were pulled she would tell me what they meant, and I wouldn't have to look through the little glossy books to see what they meant myself.

I won't go into what I asked her or whether or not I feel like it will come to fruition, but I just want to say that before I saw her, I was having panic attacks about my life and that after I felt like I had something to focus on. And whether or not it is true it is nice to hear that I won't die alone in a studio apartment, childless with 10 cats.

MN roommate story

I am hoping that once this is posted that all of my roommate problems will be solved and my blogging mind would not be so fixated on this topic.

Since I shared a Los Angeles roommate story, I thought I would dig through the mental vaults for a horrible Minnesota roommate story. There are so many... but I remembered this one specifically.

It was my first year of college at a state school that will remain nameless, mainly because I think it changed its name. I was sharing a dorm room with this girl who couldn't be more different than I was, Just Do It! posters plastered all over her side of the room, she was a cheerleader for the school team, eating disorder written across her face and generally just unpleasant. She for sure didn't want my goth punky self in the room with her. I always wondered how they put us together in the first place.

She took a few opportunities to lock me out of our room when she left for class early during the time I was in the shower. But hey I could have brought my key and I shouldn't have underestimated the power that someone has to go from dead sleep to out the door in less than 10 minutes.

But all these things were not why this made this a horrible experience it was this one thing, this one afternoon, this one phone call that made this something that will always be one of the most speech sucking experiences in my life.

I was done with classes for the afternoon and I was studying in the room when the phone rang. This was pre-caller i.d. and cell phones so this phone call had a 50-50 chance it was for me. It turned out it was her sister, her family never called because it seemed to be a strained relationship.

I said to the sister "She is not here right now, can I take a message?"
As I searched for a pen and paper and I could her her hesitate for a second and her reply was "Yes, can you tell her to call home right away, her mother killed herself"

trifecta of lameness

There are three things that I hate, looking for a job, dating and finding a roommate. It all holds some basic principals:

Putting yourself out there and telling the same stories about yourself

Rejection for reasons you can't understand nor will never hear about because the other person just disappears

Flakes and no shows

Feeling the need to have your phone close in case of phone calls, texts or emails from the other person that can come at any time (Like a call for potential interview at the Huffington Post that came in the middle of the 7 o'clock showing of a movie I can't even remember the name of)

Waiting up in a Bavarian Beer Wench costume, because you were asked to specifically to keep it on after the Oktoberfest party you went to earlier that he couldn't make, only to get an 11th hour cancellation-oh wait, that is just dating

Not even

I would not wish looking for a roommate in Los Angeles on my worst enemy. Actually that did happen and I am afraid that he probably had more luck than I have had. I digress.

This search has been one of the most frustrating of my life. Writing to people who never write back, scams, taking days off of work to be stood up, people who think you are crazy for wanting them to sign a lease and people who want to get around pet deposits. I also had a sneaking suspicion that this one woman was pretending to be a different girl with the same name in case I googled her. And I did and she so wasn't.

This has become my part time job for three weeks and I really quite frankly want to quit, it doesn't pay well. I really just want my life back.

I am wondering if anyone is falling for the scam out right now you will get an email from someone in the worst grammatical English with tons of spelling errors from a girl who is looking for a place in LA but cannot come to see the place because her uncle/benefactor is sick. She is a good person and you know that because she is a high school teacher and her uncle said there are plenty of jobs in Los Angeles. 1) teachers are being laid off at staggering rates here and 2) you can't spell and English is supposed to be your first language

Meet Lee Smith from Ireland. I kindly said no and good luck with your search.

Then later the fun loving, yoga, beach bunny with a dog ended up being from Europe, with a sick uncle/benefactor, with horrible English who you know is a good person because she was a nurse with the Red Cross in Paris.

Meet Julia from France. I asked if she by chance knew Lee from Ireland and I wrote in equally broke French. "Good luck with your story"

I should have asked if she knew the exiled prince of Nigeria, but I only thought of that later.

I want to go to there

Bus blog-La fuerza de sino-segundo parte

My fridge broke mysteriously and I had to leave in the middle of the day.

I got on an there he was. . . .

But the strange thing was that a miscommunication of vendor/landlord made the whole thing moot. I went home for no reason. Or did I?

At least I got an apology smoothie.

Happiness isn't

One of the experiences I do not wish on anyone living in Los Angeles is looking for a roommate. It is a very hope crushing task actually. You cross your fingers hoping that one of your friends might know someone normal for you, because what you are left with is...

The "sex-therapist" who can't pay a lot of money in rent and hopes that you have a dungeon like room for her to conduct her "therapy"

(I know that if I type dominatrix, that guy from scranton will check out this blog)

The laid back artist type who wants only a girl to share his studio apartment with a view of the Hollywood sign. By the way, she will be paying all the rent. If she feels that she will need some privacy there could be a divider fashioned so they aren't in each others face 24/7.

or the person who can only pay $200.

I think back to the scariest roommate experience I had when I first moved here. (Given I have had my share of winners) I moved half way across the country to close the distance on a long distance relationship, moved in with my then boyfriend and his roommate of 7 years. The roommate was a known binge drinker, who after a dry spell, revved up his activities shortly after my move in date. There were nights that he would get so drunk, he would get into physical fights with his female friends. I would mainly stay away when this happened and ask my then boyfriend to do something about it.

One afternoon the roommate came home slurring and fall down drunk with a girl I had never seen before. We chatted for a while, or rather words fell out of his mouth,I think about what he was wearing and then they excused themselves to his room. I busied myself with correspondence to my Minnesota friends.

Then I heard something, mistaken for something else at first.

"click, click...click, click"

And I thought to myself as I was in the midst of an email-Is that what I think it is? I heard from my boyfriend once before I moved that he kept one, loaded in his closet. I ask rather loudly

"Sweetie, do you have your gun out?"
"Yeah, she's cool I thought she might like to see it"? (paraphrased from drunkese)
"Is it loaded"
"Yeah"
"Put it away, please"
And she blurts out a very nervous agreement that he should put it away. No one likes a loaded gun pointed in their face by a clumsy drunk man.

I hear him play with it a while more and perhaps put it away. When he goes to the bathroom, I watch her run out of our apartment. I take my queue to lock myself into the bathroom until I can get in touch with then boyfriend.

We move out a week or so later.

A thing of "pure beauty"

You totally missed it, it was fantastic and instead you found other things to do.

I should have marketed the hell out of the John Baldessari show since he is one of my favs, but I didn't. I love his tongue and cheek, art is not serious style. But hey, LACMA could have done a much better job at showing his brilliance. "simone kissing a palm tree" probably wasn't the best choice for drawing people in, except if you like 1970s pretty girls in unflattering white pants. I brought a potential suitor to LACMA to see it and he said..

" I am glad you know something about this show, because that is the most unappealing advertising ever"

Which I agree.

What I like about Baldessari is that secretly he has inspired me. From the compositions of photos that I don't know why I like that I take, from my laughter at modern art that takes itself just a little too seriously and I also really like pointing.

But I guess this is all moot because you missed it.

bus blog- I hope you didn't need that

I am feeling a bit masticated by LA lately. I thought this was a related story.

I was riding on the 720 last Friday on the way to Santa Monica to see the Ocean. I needed a bit of solace from the heaviness of the last week and spilling over to the half week. I sat staring out the window weighing my options, figuring out what I could have done differently, flags that were raised that I ignored. Watching the businesses going by, my peripheral landed on a crumpled up white piece of paper. Then it slid closer to me.

It was in fact a human tooth.

I guess it took my mind off of things, thanks MTA.

you know this much is true

Sorry, I couldn't resist. What I had wanted to say is that... It is true, you can't go home again, but the 80's called, and I answered.

Kitty Cattaraugus' Things that aren't there anymore:

The Uptown Bar- The dinner that helped launch bands like the Replacements, Soul Asylum and with employees that inspired songs by Golden Smog is now the United State's largest Apple Store and a Columbia brand clothing store. I couldn't even take a picture. It made me too sad.


Let it Be Records- I think that this closed as I was leaving town. Let it Be was one of the best record stores in Minneapolis. Rare, out of print, re-releases, underground, it never really pandered to what was trendy and playing on the radio. I bought a lot of great stuff there that is still in my rotation.

And now it is nothing.

Sad to have something go away and have nothing in its place.

Well, that is enough of the depressing updates of Minneapolis. Back to my love affair with Los Angeles.

It is true...

I decided to take a trip to Minnesota in summer, the first time in 3 years. Prompted by nostalgia and someone's sweet nothings.

A lot has changed, good, bad angering a bit. I found that what I was looking for can no longer be found, what I wanted was a certain encapsulated moment in time that no longer exists.This is not to say that I do not have a special place in my heart for mpls (As I wear my "I heart MPLS nice" t-shirt) I will go into all these at a later date/time.

There is this great show about LA that is called "Things That Aren't Here Anymore" Los Angeles iconic locations leveled for "progress" of shopping malls, condo's etc. When I was in the mini-apple I felt like I could do a Minneapolis version of the show.

Kitty Cattaraugus' "Things that aren't there anymore"

Susan's Church:
Close to MCAD Susan's Church was a space turned into student studios and basically flop house. This was not, I believe, affiliated with the school, because you always had the feeling that it might just collapse with you in it. Late Saturday nights we would close down the bars and go and hear local bands, like Tulip Sweet (another thing not here/hear anymore), Hondo (to which I was the official president of their fan club) and other bands that usually involved a key board and experimental sounds. Kegs pf Grain Belt were always flowing. (I guess the historic Grain Belt Sign that is next to the re-constructed 35 W bridge is now for sale)

See a choose your own adventure of TTAHA .

Susan's church is now, as you see pictured a parking garage for Abbot Northwestern Hospital. I am sure that the neighborhood was sad to see it go.

I will leave you with my favorite Tulip Sweet song in memory of the good times at Susan's:




I didn't even contact mr. sweet nothings, btw, but maybe should have.

Stay tuned, for more things that aren't there.

bus blog- la fuerza del sino

I met a man in the witness protection program.

We both weren't supposed to be there. I went home sick, he missed his bus.

Were inseparable for a while, but then he disappeared.

I never had the opportunity to learn his last name.

back from the middle of nowhere

As I take the time to get my thoughts together, please take a look at my latest Los Angeles blog obsession:

it ain't pretty

Calling Skid Row America's Calcutta is brilliant.

r & r

When the masseuse at wholefoods picks me up and cracks my neck while he moans "oh, minnesota" makes me feel both homesick and dirty.

So I am off to see how minnesota feels like in summer.

Have fun secret admirers.

reconciling the truth

(a photoless post because I would probably be fined for copyright infringement)

Believe me there was a time when photography was focused on something other than catching celebrities with Starbucks in hand. There was a time when photography exposed you to worlds never seen... ring elongated necks of the Masai, fish with no eyes, moments captured in ironic juxtapositions that helped you think about the world just a little differently.

Right now at the Getty is one of the best photography exhibits I have had the pleasure of seeing. Engaged Observers is a 200 piece exhibition of documentary photography that has a artist list that reads like a dream team of thought provoking masters.

It captures what it is like to be a adolescent girl (shout out to the girls getting ready for a dance in Edina, MN) exposes you to the corporate irresponsibility of the Chisso plant that wiped out residents of a fishing village in Japan by taking away their only way of life and to add salt to the wound crippled them physically, shows you the face of homeless children in Seattle, a and a German's view of the deep south and separation of the races pre-integration.

These are not pretty pictures, they make you speechless all the same.

The most controversial piece being James Nachtwey's 60 photo montage "The Sacrifice" a collection from a medi-vac unit in Iraq in 2006. My recommendation is to really visually digest these photos for yourself, all 60, step back and watch people for a while as they start computing images 1-8, they perhaps linger just a little more, before it becomes a little too much for them and they walk away. I think this is part of the experience of this piece. It is one thing to have an idea of something that is far far away in a distant land and it is another all together to see it. The blood, the tubes snaking from frame to frame, a hole in stomach, the concentration tinged with fear.

I guess I don't make it sound like the most uplifting sell of this show, but sometimes things aren't meant to lift you up, it is meant to take you in and chew you up a bit.

It is hard to reconcile the truth.

(now until November 12th)

digging around in your gray matter

In my life I seek collaborative experiences. Sometimes this blog is a collaborative space for you and I to interact in the cyber-sea. I know you are reading, I can see you. (Thanks Aodhan)

A question I posed a few weeks only resulted in one verbal yes on "Diary of a Mental Dominatrix" so it stays as is...

a MN girl in LA and other nonsense.

Thank you and keep reading secret admirers.

control

There is an exchange in one of my favorite movies of all time and echoed into another

Chow Mo-wan: In the old days, if someone had a secret they didn't want to share... you know what they did?
Ah Ping: Have no idea.
Chow Mo-wan: They went up a mountain, found a tree, carved a hole in it, and whispered the secret into the hole. Then they covered it with mud. And leave the secret there forever.

Lately I feel like this is my personal metaphor, I am that tree and I am a hollowed out woman.

Sometimes I am bogged down by other people's secrets, sometimes people do not have an inner monologue, sometimes people just want to share a lot, with me.

At times, this becomes too much. All these secrets I can't share floating around and staying my body. The only thing that I have felt that makes a difference in filling in my mud covered hollowness is this

Sometimes you need to figure things out without talking, sometimes you need someone there to keep you in the moment and to derail my propensity to wander off, and just when my mind goes to

unpaid bills..there is a hand on my forehead
the fear of a foster child taken away....there is a hand on my hand
the revealing of favoritism in a job consistently done wrong.. .there is a hand on my stomach
and the words of cesar moro playing over again...there is a hand on my knee

And at the end it is exactly what I needed. Visit her, she works wonders and one of the last people to make me feel unbridled joy.

(I also feel like the android hostess who has been at it too long and now has delayed emotion, but that is a story I know too well and is for another time.)

Bus blog-Good clear sound

I have noticed a lot more people speaking Nahuatl on the Sunset bus.

revisitation on an old meditation

So what if it is true?

So what if an earthquake comes and cracks off the part of the continent that holds LA. What if you knew about it two months in advance? What would you try to see before it washes out into the sea?

I have another couple friends who are packing it up and leaving Lala land for new adventures and having a hard time deciding what to see before they leave.

So I pose this question to you...
What would you recommend seeing if you knew that you could never see it again?

kcattaraugus at gmail dot com or comment or follow me into the cyber-sea.

LA on the cheap-oil barons really know how to do it up

There is a white city on a hill, a hill you can only get to by taking a train into the sky.

Sounds like the beginning of a puff-esque children's story, but in actuality it is just the Getty Center, which by far is one of the greatest places to see in LA on the cheap. Sure the cost of parking goes up and up, but if you bring friends it isn't so bad.

When you get to see the views of ocean, mountains, city it is worth it. When you get to see the Irises it is worth it. When you see something made by hand in 1100 a.d. it is worth it. The blueberry apple pie is worth it. Then you forget the $15 for a car full of your friends.

I highly recommend spending a couple hours devouring the 200 piece "engaged observers", by far my favorite photo exhibit I have seen and it is so much to digest that it will get its very own post.

This weekend the Getty continues with their Saturdays off the 405 with a free concert from Bomba Estereo

cost: $15 for parking, but after 5:PM it is Freeeeeeeeeeee! (coincidentally the concert starts after 5)
Also on the 761 line, (but this is consistently inconsistent)

make-up and tongues

This is a shameless ploy for my oldest friend. Our friendship has survived jealous girls, moves to cities we both love on opposite sides of the continent, periods of quiet and band camp. He helps me navigate my periods of insomnia with text messages. I need you to help him open for Kiss.

Please vote and put your zip code as 10003 for the dirty pearls.

And read his blog Fucker's Lament

Here's to another 18 years!

skinny

The heatwave is over and that was not televised.

About a year after I was jumping off of cliffs, I moved to Minneapolis, leaving my friends, to finish high school, then I moved away from MPLS, moved back, moved to the deep south and moved back and then moved away again and came back.

When I was working myself through my last two years college I worked at an italian american restaurant feeding the beautiful people of Uptown. It was hard work, I worked with my share of hard working people and those who made my life hell. But as everyone knows restaurant people do not have problems unwinding from the workday, it usually involves stimulants or depressants or perhaps a little bit of both.

So on the hot and humid days of July and August when we closed the place down the BOH-ers would pile into a car at and go to Hidden Beach strip off our restaurant clothes and do some naked swimming, dive into the water without the feeling of drag, play in the mud like dirty little hippies.

We'd meet other clothing optional folks, drink, talk, swim. I loved those nights the best.

The thing is that I can never go back to Hidden Beach. Sure it is there and I can go back to its physical space, but since I left the city has thinned out the trees to try to stop the very act that I was so nostalgic about. I think it was because of all of the drunk swimming/drowning and that it was smack dab in the middle of a residential area and everyone knows drunk have a really hard time lowering their voices.

And as I am writing and doing the research I just found out that the restaurant I worked at closed. I'll let you go so I can shed a single tear.

"Good afternoon, the mud pit is ready!"

Legs and all

The heatwave is in effect and has been televised.

Lately I have been waxing nostalgic on what I would do to beat the heat when I lived in Minnesota. Where it is not just hot, but humid as fuck.

I grew up on the Iron Range, best exemplified in North Country (When that movie came out, "they" said that Charlize Theron was too pretty to play an Iron Range girl. Take it from me we aren't just a bunch of homely girls, "they")

I digress.

Dead mining towns scatter that area, including a couple of flooded ones that my friends and I would frequent when it was too hot and humid. We used to climb up the side of the mining crater, jump from great heights and do that over and over again until our arms no longer functioned. (Which if they stopped you were s.o.l. because the only thing waiting for you was 100 feet of more water.)

I remember when danger wasn't anything we ever thought about, when the only thing hopefully keeping us from dying was crossing our fingers when we jumped. Always a cautious girl I kept myself from jumping the 100' foot cliff because you always had to play your cards right because if you didn't get your timing you would trip over the exposed root and surely plummet 200 feet to your drowning death.

The only rule I remember is to keep your arms in, because leaving them out would leave you an intricate patch work of gorgeous purply bruises and the pain made it hard to swim for your life.

There is really nothing more beautiful than the color that leaching iron ore makes in water.

bus blog- interesting tattoos

I was on the bus yesterday with a charming young man with a tattoo that read "fuck a bitch" on his neck.

I hope he is blessed with many daughters.

a survey of midwestern moms

Even here we flock together.

I have noticed that a lot of the people I spend time with here are from Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Why did we all come from there to find each other here? Why is that? We posed this question to a mid-western mom and she replied because people here do not stand by their word.

Mid-western people are people of their word.

If they tell you something that they are going to do, they do it.
If we say we are going to be somewhere, we are. (and will usually call you to say we are going to be 5 minutes late if that is what we think will happen)
We are usually the first to RSVP to any event.
If we say we are going to call, we do.

I remember in my first year of college, I had a friend names Kotoko who asked me why Americans ask how you are, when they really don't care about your answer...or why they say that they will call to set up time to study, when they never do. I never knew it was a cultural thing.

Am I a foreign exchange student in my own city?

I have learned that people don't respond to your events because they are waiting for something better to shake out. That when you tell somebody that you want an apartment and you don't put the money down, they won't take you at your word and give the apartment away.

Have I changed? as I write this I realize that I should call Rachel, a fellow foodie who wants to go and eat.

And Moon I know it has been over a year, but if you are still interested I would love to go to Baazar.

Do you think I am full of shit, I love being humbled, email me.

poll

I was hanging with my soccer loving friends yesterday and we were talking blogs when it came up that perhaps I should change my tag line to something else. What I came up with inspired by their creativity, perhaps some "arrogant bastard" and my acerbic wit is something along the lines of..

"Diary of a mental dominatrix"

what do you think?

If you comment I will change it.

Don't tell me what to do!

be careful you might miss it

If you haven't paid attention which is possible, because it is a very small change, I provided the link to my blog when I was a blogger in Minnesota a couple weeks ago.

I just wondered if anyone noticed or had been reading about my other self 6 + years ago.

Reading back, it makes me miss the people I was blog toddlers with:
Hookers on Stilts, Treat Williams, Scholar of Souled On , who I owe so much of my music taste and the Erebus and Terror.

You might find the voice familiar.

Songs stuck in my head has moved to @cerebraldjitis

Love, LL

Happy 4th!!!

Don't be one of those assholes that drink and drive.

Bus blog-La rubia, la morena, la peliroja

No me mires asi, siempre como chips en mi corset y minifalda con mis amigas bellas. Cual es tu problema?

I love transit tv commercials in Spanish.

"we are a nation of forgetters" -ld

Wailing of the Birds

LA on the cheap HHH

Cost: $8
Where is it? Between Hollywood and Sunset, between Edgemont and Vermont, hidden behind ugly stripmalls

I finally found a willing participant to tour Aline Barnsdall's Hollyhock House with me a few weeks ago. It is a sprawling estate on top of Barnsdall Hill, in the Los Feliz neighborhood, built for the oil heiress in the '20s. You can tell by the quote from Frank Lloyd Wright that he and Aline did not see eye to eye. (We thought lovers spat) I think he was fired and re-hired from the project at least once.

We unfortunately got a tour guide that had only done the tour once before, that day. She couldn't really elaborate beyond what her white 4 x6 note cards said. Also, the tour was colored by these two yokels who loved loved loved puns and joking around. So whenever the guide told us to..

"watch our heads"
They replied "Well, I think we would need a mirror for that."
They were in their 50s, no excuse.

Hollyhock is a gorgeous maze of a house that has been fantastically restored. Frank Lloyd Wright has great attention to detail and made a lot of interesting functional pieces. This house was built in what I call his mexic-amerindian phase as you can see with the "abstraction" of the Hollyhock seen below:

(Do you see the flower in the geometrical shapes, I don't)

And the other houses he built in the area like the Ennis House and Sowden House which you may have seen in a couple commercials and a season of America's next top model. (by the way you can rent Sowden house for $3,900 a night, 3 night minimum)

A lot of what we saw were replicas and adjustments, since the house went through some ownership changes after Barnsdall left, including the USO who demolished the kitchen and turned it into a formica hell.

Aline had envisioned an artist compound with a theater, gallery and studio, much of which is still standing and is being used for that very purpose. (see my post on Excavated Shellac)

I recommend going at $8 a ticket. I think I will do it again soon, maybe the tour guide will be off book/cards.

sometimes wherever you go, it is right in front of you

It is strange the way when I start reading something, all of what I do coincidentally relates to it. I hear people at dinner parties talking about it, I see it written in the margins of notebooks, it is mentioned in international symposiums I attend (that last part makes me sound really smart, doesn't it?) It is a name I have heard uttered so many times over the past month and a half.

Roberto Bolaño

The book everyone is reading is the Savage Detectives.

Why now, why is everyone reading this book? Is it because we have this strange obsession with Visceral Realism?

I think it is because this book makes anyone's life story interesting. We all just want to tell our stories right? To have meaning, make an impact on the world, isn’t this why we tweet, blog, let out our inner monologues out on facebook, without regard that it is insanely immature or an invitation to stalk.

It is just about these kids running around town, telling you what they did, who they have unrequited love for, what cafes they have gone to, which of their friends are full of crap, how many orgasms they have had, time spent interviewing each other and writing sub-par poetry.

Hidden in there though is a list of the who’s who of counter-tradition literature, surrealist authors, that some times sounds a bit name-droppy, but is really a primer of who you should be reading. (according to him at least, an original hipster of sorts)

The overall consensus being, I might bore you, but you will learn something.

I guess the same is true, for me, I might bore you, but you will learn something.

"Unrequited love is the only love I know, the other doesn't belong to me"- Cesar Moro

trying to make sense of the non-sensicle

Your team won LA....Riots? Really?

bus blog-not for the masse transit

On July 1st bus fares will go up, yet again.

single fare: $1.50
day pass: $6
monthly pass: $75

So if you work minimum wage a day pass will be almost an hours worth of your pay.

All that M-ing might make you want to buy a car. Which kind of defeats the purpose of mass transit.

middle

I book-ended the week of my birth with a band. Both shows being the antithesis of the other.

Show one a sedated crowd in a field at the jazzreggae festival at UCLA which should have had the name r&bundergroundjazzjamreggae stare fest, but not as catchy I suppose. LA crowds treat their performers which such ambivalence.

"So I paid money to see you, I don't give a fuck, you bore me and I am probably better than you blindfolded"

Mainly I felt under-prepared for the event, not enough sunscreen, no blanket, not prepared for the discrepancies in sound. POP!

Seeing Q-tip made me nostalgic for my Minneapolis hip-hop days, but it made me realize that it was more the crowd I missed than Miss Bonita Applebaum.

Show 2 was extremely intimate and my first time attheecho.com (side note that rainbow ^arabia is there every Monday night this month) The crowd was small and all that KCRW could muster. It was better this way a show for people who actually like music then liking the scene although it was echo park, so maybe I was oblivious to the scene-sters

The band was Quadron my new favorites and masters in genre jumping. Each song on their album is different and catchy for being somewhat off beat. Coco has an amazing sense of soul for someone who is so very young and I feel that it will only get better with age. I will leave you with what I feel like might be their most popular hit, but keep in mind only one other song shares a similar feel, but the rest of it is equally good.



If I wet your appetite at all for them, the rest of the album is better.

Happy birthday to me!

If I were you this weekend-doing good tastes good

It is on again kids.

The 4th annual No Cookie Left Behind Bake sale to raise money for Share our Strength

If I were you I would buy extra for me because I can't make it this time and this is one of the greatest events that will happen this weekend.

that and my friend T getting her MLIS.

um

I have a case of writer's block and the mean reds.

untitled

LA on the cheap-volume 1

Sometimes LA is about finding unique experiences, I don't think you can find a more unique experience than seeing an event at Machine Project on Sunset and Alvarado. It is a creative and interactive gallery space that has performance art, installations, music, poetry readings and I hear that they once turned the space into a living forest.

Events are Freee!, but it would be nice if you donated something. They have a vacuum tube donation machine, that is fun to watch if it isn't dark.

From there you can ruminate about your experience three blocks away at El Prado, which I think is one of the cheapest places I have seen to get a glass of wine or crazy named beer since I moved here. No wine was over $8 and no beer over $7. It is all up to you how lushy you want to get, or not lushy at all, by choosing chocolate dipped strawberries ($6) or anything off of their ever changing menu.

My Malbec was $6

Take a date have a night of it and it is even conveniently located on the 2/302 line.

Total evening can cost you $7.50.

I'm in love w/ a blogger

So, I have had this crush on this blog and I am not afraid to admit it. It is sweet, informational, quenches my fix for beauty tips, socially responsible and make me hungry all at the same time.

Stop reading and do not pass go to directly to Oranges and Avocados

Also, farmers marketing is really inexpensive and you can take your basket of goodies home and read her blog and cook and sit on the couch in bliss of having a really great meal.

I know I have.

economic woes

Not to long ago I was just like you, looking for a job, writing resumes, crossing my fingers. Four and a half months and over 100 submissions later I finally got a job. I know many of you have gone longer and are still out there looking.

I remember when I moved here and I was unemployed for a month and a half. It was hard and it really made me doubt my decision to move here. LA is a hard city to afford, that is if you do not live beyond your means.

I remember the two jobs I had in a month and a half.

The first was writing an eviction letter for an Iranian tailor and teaching the wife and sister how to use mail merge while their Yorkie sat at my feet and they all chain smoked.

The second one I was tricked into wearing a "not to be mentioned" sportswear companies new dance line and parade around in front of UCLA students. Maybe it was called "gypsy dance of a thousand nights". I still have the bell-bottomed burgandy and neon pink spandex pants, bell-sleeved crop top and shoes as a reminder of how far I have come. (The girl who worked with me returned the clothes to the store for $200)

I think that the one thing I forgot to do my second time around being unemployed in LA was enjoy not having anywhere to be. I never went to the beach, I never sat a coffee shop and read (I couldn't find the non-starbucks coffee shops until lately) I never ventured to Chinatown to have cheap dim sum. I felt so very connected to my computer and phone. (btw the two phone calls I did get were while I was in a movie at 7:PM and while I was checking out at a grocery store)

My advice is enjoy it if you can, and I will give you recommendations on how to do that.

Missing

I am looking for someone who writes LA like Colum McCann, Paul Auster, Jonathan Lethem write New York.

Any suggestions?

Found

Last weekend after a Q & A for Scott Caan's movie Mercy (a great LA story in the vein of Woody Allen's early New York Films) I know this makes me sound fancy and snobby, but Q & As are very common here, it wasn't like I was invited to a special screening or anything, just lucky.

This is not why I have written this post, but as a writer I must provide exposition.

I am writing this post because on my way to the Sunset 5 I saw something that made me happy, imprinted on the window of a restaurant, my new two favorite words, "gluten free."

Funny how two words can change your outlook on life. Sometimes I feel like when I say that I am gluten free, I feel like people look at me like I am trying to be difficult or special or Sally in "When Harry Met Sally" It was nice to not have to think about it. Thank you Pizza Fusion .

It has been a year and a half since I have had pizza and a beer. I was happy to finally try Green's Amber, a little solace to a girl who misses New Castle and Old Peculiar. Sometimes GF beer can just be so watery.

The pizza was fantastic and didn't taste like pizza toppings on a sope crust, like Deano's. PF's crust was thin, crackery, my favorite. My other gluten free friend and I shared the BBQ chicken, coated in BBQ sauce, not bbq spiced chicken in a strange chemical way like I remember CPK being and the Founders, chicken gorgonzola and olives. I guess they have added gluten free personal sizes to their repertoire, a common complaint among early visitors.

It is possible to be gluten free and vegan there too, which I am sure is extremely difficult. Also, it looks like Pizza Fusion has great politics, which I admire in a restaurant. I would really be happy if it stayed open. (hint, hint)

If you are looking for gluten free blog that talks gluten free in LA go to < href="http://www.glutenfreeways.com/"> glutenfreeways.com It seems like they really like a place in Manhattan. (Which is a bit of a schlep)

I am hardly a resource for things gluten free, but will blog about it from time to time.

Words I still can't say

I was talking to someone this week about the words that give my (chicago/mn)accent away. After four and a half years the words I still can't say are:

Hot Dog
Wisconsin
Costume
Don't
pants

Different variations will fall out of my mouth, especially when tired or after a steady night of drinking.

Also, like most Chicagoans I do still use unnecessary propositions:
Can I come with?
Where are you going to?
Where did you get that from?

Do you think that the "eliminate your accent" signs all over LA are meant for me?

forgotten rumination

Renoir really loved to paint his wife.

ruminations on a LACMA visit

I really wanted to see the Renoir exhibit at LACMA. It ends on Sunday....Maybe this is a sort of an if I were you post.

I headed to LACMA and ate lunch and have to say that I need to stop. I get fooled every time. The food is hideous and extremely overpriced. Hence the row of food trucks across the street.

I listened to two attractive girls chatting loudly about finding a good man. I am wondering where he is too as I sit at my table for 1 eating airplane food at the only table w/o an umbrella.

Upon reading the artist statement... Umm... I am pretty sure that there aren't African Americans in the Bahamas because it is a British Commonwealth ....?

Does listening to my ipod make me anti-social?

If I were you this weekend-GCI

If I were you tomorrow I would march my little hiney down to the Grilled Cheese Invitational tomorrow. It is not too late to share in the grilled cheese love. You can still get your tickets, but how can you put a price on nostalgia?

I remember coming in from building snow forts on a cold January afternoon and eating grilled cheese and potato chips. I never got into the tomato soup thing until I was much much older. But since we are talking grilled cheese...does anyone have a tomato soup truck?

Maybe you will see a religious figure appear to us all in the burn marks of a grilled cheese. Cross your fingers! Or you will see me volunteering, I'll be the one in the grilled cheese invitational t-shirt.

(Note: the rights information is not listed for this picture. I would give credit but I don't know how. By the way, this little girl is creepy)

bus blog-crystal ball

Today I rode the bus with Mexican Sylvia Browne.

If I were you tis weekend-April 17th

I know that the big music event this weekend in LA is definitely Coachella or maybe the Atoms for Peace show in Santa Barbara, but did you also know that Saturday is
National Record Store Day ?

So head down to your local record store, hear some free in-store performances and show some support.

CA: Amoeba Records on Sunset and Ivar (Smashing Pumpkins and Spinderella)

MN: The Electric Fetus of course, with Dr. Dog and one of my Minneapolis Favorites, Idle Hands.

blog doppleganger

I was sitting with a group of people at the Overland Cafe a few weeks ago chatting over some $5 bottomless Champagne and happened to mention that I was a blogger.

"Oh, I thought I recognized you...

egotistical me thought maybe it was for a post on my former blog that was used as a letter to the editor for Filter magazine...

"you write that I'm boycrazy blog don't you?"
"No, but that sounds fantastic, what is it?"
"It's this great blog about what love is and what love isn't"

With that description I was hooked.

IM BOYCRAZY

Some questions can't be answered

only in la

will you hear the following sentences:

"I have to shave off my beard to audition for the part of Tony Soprano in an improv dinner theater production"

"God Dammit, Nicole Kidman cut me off!"

Strip malls

After spending any time in Los Angeles and its greater la area it isn't hard to believe that the Strip Mall was invented in California. Sometimes when you are standing on street corners you are surrounded by them. Nail places, sushi, dry cleaning, cell phone carriers, mom and pop falafel joints. The best strip mall concentration is on La Cienega between 3rd and Beverly.

I don't frequent them. They look rundown, dirty and generally unclean. Something about being served food in a strip mall gives me the general heebs. I know I shouldn't feel that way and have heard that there are some excellent restaurants like Lou that resides in a strip mall and there is always a line outside of Mario's Peruvian Seafood on Rossmore. (which is by far the dirtiest looking strip mall I have seen. They should just bulldoze the Popeye's and Radio Shack and just put in a Mario's restaurant)

Many Californians laugh at my strip mall phobia, but is it Californian to love something so Californian?

Related exhibit: Urban Panoramas at the Getty Center
You will notice that one of the strip malls in Opie's portion of the show has recently been torn down, possibly to add more lofts to Loftopolis located along Wilshire in the Miracle mile.

My Minnesota counterpart: Dumpy Strip Malls

music

I learned a lot about music today did you?

Thank you to Excavated Shellac for teaching me about early recorded music from around the world.

Until next year.

If I were you-Sunday 3/28

If I were you this Sunday, I would march myself to Barnsdall Park and see the events for actions, conversations and intersections

I don't think that there is a better way to spend your Sunday than to be outdoors, view photography, gazing at the Hollyhock House and discovering music .

It is oh so economical too.

What's a girl to do

I encourage you to break up with things like I did Umami. It is not a giving over to anger, but a way to release your feelings of being unheard.

Like breaking up with:

The 10 because it is always late or
Pinkberry for getting rid of their green tea flavor or
that one place that is always closed for some reason when you go or
that dry cleaner who you think is taking extra long because you think that the daughter is wearing your clothes

Write it, get it out there and send it to me.

What's A Girl To Do? - Bat For...

drop me a line

I have an email address if you want to write me and tell me I am full of crap or otherwise. You will notice it on your right or by clicking here kcattaraugus@gmail.com

Burger Nazi?

Everyone in my immediate circle knows that I have a love/hate relationship with Umami Burger. The mere mention of its name makes my face furrow with distain and scorn.

The first time I tried the Umami burger it was very much like burger love. Perfection between two pieces of lettuce (I am gluten free) The juicy stewed tomato, the crispy Parmesan disk and slimy mushroom, heaven for anyone who marvels in food texture as much as layering of flavor. Umami, I recommend you to many friends and visitors, but now we have to break up because you are just too much work.

Umami burger is like that episode of Seinfield, you know the one, with the Soup Nazi. I must stand here when I order, I must order exactly this way, I must not make eye contact, I must have exact change. I have to go through similar lengths when ordering a to go order from Umami

Case study one:
I had just moved into my new apartment and was celebrating my move and turned to my roommate and said:

"oh my god, have you tried Umami burger, it is fan-fucking-tastic"

She said no.

So we walked there and decided to take food to the bar down the street. We decided to share two burgers, the Umami and the Truffle burger.

"Can we have it without buns, wrapped in lettuce?"
"Umami doesn't wrap in lettuce'
"I've had it before" I replied and his side kick at the counter confirmed that Umami did in fact wrap in lettuce.
"Can we have it cut in half?"
"Umami doesn't cut in half"
"Oh, can you put paper plates in the bag?"

You probably know what they said next....

Case study 2:
We were meeting friends at a bar on a Thursday night and decided again to order from Umami and pick up. Running late we decided to call ahead, like most restaurant will let you do. I called, I ordered and as he was repeating my order I hear whispering and then...

"We are not taking phone orders right now"
"but I just put in my order"
"We will not be taking orders for another 20 minutes"

So I waited 20 minutes and called as we were walking out the door.

"Umami will not be taking phone orders for 45 minutes"
"I'll be there in 5 minutes" was my reply.

So we ordered, were then immediately ordered to stand outside, so we left went to the bar, waited went back to pick up our burgers and went back to the bar.

At this point I have begun to make fun of the Umami snobbery. "Umami won't do this, Umami won't do that, Umami only refers to itself in the 3rd person, if they were to re-make LA Story Umami Burger would be the snobby restaurant that the main character cannot get into and of course NO BURGER FOR YOU!!

Case study 3:
I was helping friends move last weekend. They were helping me find an option to gluteny pizza and I had asked if they had ever tried Umami burger since they were now living so close. The way I described it made their mouth water, but I also warned that they are snobs, but the burger is worth the pain.

So after running a post move Target run we went to pick up pizza for the men and were going to order meat for the ladies. We ordered the pizza and I called to order our burgers.

"Umami doesn't take phone orders on the weekends"

This time I actually hung up on them.

So we drove from La Brea and Beverly to La Brea and 9th.
I marched in there and said:"Is Umami taking to go orders if I am right in front of you?"
"Yes, but we do not take phone orders on the weekend"
I ordered
Drove back to pick up the pizzas on Beverly
Picked up Umami and drove two blocks to my friend's new apartment.

Such a waste of time and so much work, plus they gave my pregnant friend the raw burger and mine was well done. At least if you are going to be snobby, get it right.

Umami, it is over between us and....

Its not me it's you.

How are things on the west coast?

I hope you have been enjoying the beautiful March weather and not sitting at home reading my blog.

shaky, shaky

Did you feel the earthquake?

Debra

I love that in LA you can go to your local bar put a dime in the juke box and half of the bar will sing this song along with you:

Bus blog-things are not always as they seem

Riding down Hollywood Boulevard is always an interesting experience, as any of you know who have ever visited this area as a tourist or native. This day in particular I was riding the 212 or the 217, I can't remember, from the heart of touristville on Hollywood and Highland. I was listening to my ipod but bookless this time. (I like to have both usually, because crazy people are attracted to me. I had someone come up to me once that was convinced that I was Dulcinea del Toboso ) When I am sans book, I like to watch the people who come and go, as I am sure most people do. Especially in this area because you never quite know which character (literally) will join the bus riders.

Somewhere on Sunset a young mother, with a baby bjorn strapped to her chest, got on the bus. What attracted me to this young mother out of all of the other hundreds of young mothers that ride the bus daily, was that she was dressed very much like Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez(In the aint 2 proud 2 beg days), even down to the pacifier on a string around her neck, now a functioning piece of jewelery for the wee one she was carrying. What kept me drawn to her was how loudly she was fussing over her baby, almost like she was showing off her new motherhood to everyone who was within listening distance. I noticed how the mother and daughter had the same hat, how cute. I was realizing that I was obviously staring and looked away, but thought about how throughout the entire coo-fest that the baby never made a sound, not a squeal, laugh or anything which is odd.

I turned back to look at the mother and child and saw that the baby had blond hair and as I looked closer she didn't even have the same skin color as her mother and as the mother rocked back and forth, I realized that the baby was in fact a doll.

two museums two days

This is what you see when you lay down in my childhood room in Northern Minnesota. Winter time was always my favorite to lay and bed and watch these branches break up the sky. I had forgotten I had taken this picture to gaze at when I get homesick until I went to the Luisa Lambri exhibit at the Hammer Museum.

These pictures remind me of home.

This was my first Hammer visit and due to impending weather, I pretty much had the place to myself.

Day 2:
Pouring rain and the last hour of viewing, or rather 45 minutes because the want you out early. I only had the chance to appreciate the swirling loopy rusted metal sculpture in the ground floor of BCAM. Its labyrinth reminds me of a futuristic sci-fy movie, like Logan's Run. The Art of the Pacific (Even back then men felt that they were better endowed than they actually were) and the German Impressionists, who I feel have more daring senses of color than their French counterparts.

I need to go back and see the Renoir and American Stories exhibits, but at a steep $20 a pop, I needed much more than 45 minutes.