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.