What I Learned While on Vacation With My Mother in Oregon

1.) I smirk like Michael C. Hall. Not in pictures, not to people, but in those little self-gratifying "a-ha" moments which typically occur in public and most likely make me look smug. The problem is, I hate that smirk. I hated when he did it on "Six Feet Under" and I hate how he does it on "Dexter". Why did I develop this problem? Why?

2.) This is the first time I've seen my mother in 9 months and I was confused and disappointed to discover that the phrase, "Cool beans!" comes out of her mouth after each excitable moment. I casually mentioned to her that it's not 1998 anymore but she says she can't help it. I love her nonetheless.

3.) Some breed of fly has taken over coastal Oregon. They swarm onto you by the dozens and stick to your body. It makes you realize what rotten fruit must feel like.

4.) Oregon is way too clean. Look, I lived in the state where three of the dirtiest beaches in the country are located. I'm used to a little poop in my drinking water. My first introduction to Venice Beach? Digging up a syringe in the sand. Now, that is a beach! Forget all this no cigarette butts and crystal blue water shit.

5.) I don't want to get old. We had to be the only people under 70 traveling the Oregon Coast this week. It was an enigma. Every single place we stopped at had a bunch of blue hairs with brightly colored placards draped around their neck so they wouldn't stray too far from the tour bus. They all walked very slowly and looked angry. I want no part of it.

6.) Trendy boutique hotels in top-rated hipsters cities are not suitable for mothers. It wasn't the condom sitting by the bedside that bothered her, but the Ikea furniture, box-like sauna of a room, and lack of elevator. Yeah, but Mom, you can go drink a Pabst Blue Ribbon with a bike mechanic named Spider downstairs at the bar.

7.) The people who own what is affectionately known as "Mikey's House" from Goonies are really cool. They invite you to come up their drive-way and gawk at their house.

8.) I've seen heaven and it looks like a giant cheese factory off the coast of Oregon.

I Left My Stomach in Oregon

I'm sick.
Sicker than dirt.
No, wait.
Sicker than a dog.
I take my first real vacation, well, almost ever, to the Oregon Coast and I get sick exactly two hours after I land in Portland.
Mouth ajar, snot trickling out nose, mumbling intelligible words to my mother.
"What did you just say?!" she barks.
"Slememenemen", I respond back.

Then after eating at Mo's about three hours ago, I get cramps.
So right now I'm being a whiny little bitch.
I can't close my mouth and my stomach sounds like whales mating.
Enjoy these pictures below. I'm too weak to explain fully what they are. First person who figures out what they're from gets...uh...a coupon for 75 cents f(2) Morningstar frozen food items.

I'll give you a hint.
It's something from your childhood (unless you're an old person).

The Only Time It's Appropriate to Dance Like David Byrne, Is At a David Byrne Concert

You know what day it is? It's David Byrne Friday again! About once a month I unsystematically write a blog entry about my future ex-husband. This month, Mr. DB will be at the Paramount Theatre in Austin discussing his new book, "The Bicycle Diaries", and bicycling in Austin. RSVP here. 

OF COURSE I WILL BE MO-FO'ING OUT OF TOWN! 

That's ok though. 

I've gotten me some good Byrne lovin' in the past....

9/28/08
Number #12 on the list of life's greatest pleasures?
Watching David Byrne in concert.
The man has still got it. He never lost it.
The only difference is the replacement of gray instead of brown on that mop of hair.
Every other bit of him is the same. The body, the voice, the leg jerks and awkward hand gestures...

Like a child waiting anxiously for Christmas morning to arrive, I stood at the front of the stage an hour before David Byrne was to come on. I was at the Austin City Limits festival and he was the only reason I was there. I moved to Austin on this day specifically to see David Byrne. He is to be my familiar welcome to this strange new city I just uprooted my life to.

I've seen David Byrne twice prior. Once at the charming State Theatre in Ithaca, New York and the second time at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. In Ithaca, he wandered around the theater after the show, conversing with the few stragglers that hung around. I was genuinely surprised at how strange he was. I don't know why. I don't know why I thought a man who lacks any facial expression and sings about inanimate objects wouldn't be odd. I asked if I can take a picture with him and he blankly stared at me and mumbled. When the flash came up, he lit up like a circus. He looks like a proud papa hugging his daughter who just won the State spelling bee contest. In the picture his top hat is pushed down his head, smooshing his ears under the lobes.

The Hollywood Bowl show was pure magic. The cosmos aligned and brought together two larger than life acts- David Byrne and Arcade Fire. I remember thinking during the show that I could have been struck by lightening and been happy. The encore was my number one favorite song "This Must be the Place (Naive Melody)" sung by both acts. Oh, and there was some sort of burlesque marching band fornicating with brass instruments too.

Enough of things past.

At 6:30PM on Friday, September 26th, a somber character dressed all in white entered the stage. David Byrne picked up his guitar, said a quick hello, and jumped into his new single with Brian Eno, "Strange Overtones" from Everything That Happens Will Happen Today. Normally, a very catchy song, I didn't recognize it until halfway through. This was not a good sign and I was nervous. My anxiety quickly faded when the recognizable beats of "I Zimbra" began. Interpretative dancers dressed in white filled the stage and I knew we were in for something different.

My attempt at writing a professional review is going to end right here. I honestly don't remember how the rest of the playlist went. I was on a fucking cloud, floating high above the stage. I know he played half of "Remain in Light"much to my delight. The crowd pleasers were "Once in a Lifetime" and "Life During Wartime". Though two of Talking Heads' most popular songs, they never ever ever get old. He even treated us to his famous "dance moves" made popular in STOP MAKING SENSE ("treat" being used loosely). A surprising song on the list was "Help Me Somebody" from Byrne and Eno's My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. David Byrne sang the part that was originally a sample of Rev. Paul Morton giving a sermon on the album. It worked great! The dancers were silly and all over the place, but it only added to the informality of his shows. Everyone was happy and it bounced back and forth between the performer and his audience. I called as many people as I could and held the phone up to the air. "It's David Byrne!" I screamed and continued dancing like a fool. I was sticky, my armpits smelled, but I was happy. I was so unbelievably happy.

I looked up at the big screen above me and remembered when I was 16 and first saw David Byrne. I rented STOP MAKING SENSE and thought it was the awe-inspiring footage that I had ever seen. Who was this guy? What were these songs? I learned every lyric, every dance move. For the past 10 years, Talking Heads have been my favorite band.
And to have the opportunity to stand in front of the singer, singing the words along with him, well, it's one of the greatest pleasures in life.

Writing Reviews for Filmmakers That You Dated Not That Long Ago is Not Awkward at All

Check out this movie tonight if you can. You'll poop your pants you'll be crying so much.

From East Austinite website....

If you weren’t able to check out the amazing documentary, “Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo“, at South by Southwestthis year, well now is your chance! Local Austin director Bradley Beesley’s documentary about the Oklahoma prison rodeo premieres tonight on Cinemax Reel Life at 7PM. A fan favorite at SXSW, Beesley’s movie was quickly snapped up by HBO during the festival. Beesley is no stranger to documentary filmmaking. His curriculum vitae boasts the Oklahoma hand fishing doc, “Okie Noodling”, and the quintessential Flaming Lips film biography, “Fearless Freaks”, amongst many others. 

I had the pleasure of seeing “Sweethearts” at the festival this year. I mostly cried through the whole gosh dang movie. Not a bad, “I feel like crap and want to eat a tub of ice cream” kind of cry, but rather a warm, “I now feel motivated to go out and do something selfless” kind of cry. The film highlights four female prisoners and one male prisoner and their day-to-day struggles leading up to the yearly prison rodeo. Beesley does a tremendous job telling their individual stories and educating us with the seemingly unfair statistics surrounding female prisoners in Oklahoma. This movie is a must-see for sure.

"True Blood" Season Finale Left Me Angry and Confused (Enough Spoilers to Ruin the Whole Episode)

As Lafayette would say, "That was some mother-f*ckin' sh*t, bitches." (I don't really feel like swearing this morning).

WHAT HAPPENED?! Did the writers take a vacation the last few weeks of "True Blood"? How did the beginning of the season start so promising , yet end up as a directionless mess? The season definitely plateaued at episode 9," "I Will Rise Up" (when Godric dies, Eric's crying looks like he's laughing like Jerry Lewis, and Sookie wears a tacky red Gingham dress from Forever 21). Now that was some powerful sh*t right there.

Last night's episode, "Beyond Here Lies Nothin'", was quite possibly the worst episode of the season. The ridiculous Maryanne story line ended 30 minutes too early with a David Lynch-esque scene involving blue filters and a bull. After that, the writers bade their time with pointless dialogue and non-story driving scenes. I kept waiting for Maryanne to spring back from the dead, but no such luck. Instead we got dialogue along the lines of, "I don't know about you, but last night was kind of hard for me too" (Said by Sam to Sookie the day after he had his guts cut out by a devil-worshipping Maenad, turned into a bull, and then pierced said Maenad through the heart with his antlers.) Thankfully, Bill didn't have enough scenes to annoy the living sh*t out of us. The Lawrence Oliver deliveries were kept to a minimum and luckily for us, he was kidnapped at the end of the episode. Currently on the HBO homepage, lies an image of Bill and Sookie in an embrace with the words, "Who Captured Bill?" at the top. The answer is, "Nobody cares".

Lowlights:

-What in God's name was the point of Queen Sophie-Anne (Evan Rachel Wood)? Her character did absolutely nothing to the story line. Her house was more fascinating than her. Unless she's coming back for the third season, that was the worst use of a character since, since...nothing! She tops it! Secondly, as beautiful and charming as Evan Rachel Wood is, she's highly unbelievable as a centuries old, ball-busting vixen. Though she may have dated Marilyn Manson, the 22 year-old actress really showed her age trying to force a maturity that only seasoned actresses have.

-The scenes with Eric were pointless. He had absolutely nothing to do with the story line involving Maryanne but was nonetheless forced into it. Let's face it, Eric has become one of the driving forces of the show. The writers know that if he's not in an episode, True Blood fans will most likely throw bottles of overly-priced "Tru Blood" at their windows.

-Eggs' death was forced. We all know he was going to die. Our little Tara could never have true happiness, but why not kill him off during the sacrifice scene? That would have made more sense. But no, you had to fill the holes of the last 30 minutes by making him occasionally pop out of the woods, bat sh*t crazy, and yielding a large knife.

Highlights:

-Jason's single tear that ran down his cheek as he watched his Gran's house get defiled by the townspeople.

-Sam's abs post getting stabbed in them.

-Jane Bodehouse's smile (the crazy lady who cut off her finger). She deserves the award for "Best Shit Eating Grin".

-Bill courting Sookie. It was nice to see the characters get back to the way they were before we ever discovered how annoying they actually are.

Crosseyed and Painless

Maybe I shouldn't have gone to the taco stand for the third day in a row... 

It's Friday and it's raining in Austin! What a marvelous day! Mama Jewess is coming into town this weekend (before we embark on our trip to Portland), I'm mostly moved in to my new place, and I'm trying to think of ways to avoid talking to the guy I last dated who will be walking into my office in 80 minutes. I was going to run an "errand" while he is here and put Mannequin Baby or Glenda in my place. Any suggestions would be nice.

Today I posted my first post on East Austinite. 

East Austin is the South's version of LES. Except instead of punks and graffiti artists, it's men who love their bikes more than women and women who love American Apparel more than men. Wait, I guess that could qualify as LES too. Well, you won't see a bunch of dudes with beards playing techno-folk on a front porch in New York, will you?

Anyways, I'm really excited about joining the East Austinite team. Their blog is the best place to follow the East Austin scene.

BTW- Check out this cool map of the East Side from Progress Coffee.

Also, I won Cinema Obsessed's "Guess Who" this week. The two lovelies running the site are movie geeks after my own heart. They have THE BEST taste and are always on top of the latest movie news and gossip. It's a great source to get all your movie news.

My prize for winning? A post of my favorite scene from my favorite movie...

(I'll give you a hint, before the movie came out, the character in the movie was a popular sketch show on the Sunset Strip)

And how I've managed to get so caught up in my day that I only brief thought about September 11th, 2001 this morning, is beyond me. I need to get my head out of my ass.

Home is Where I Want to Be, Pick Me Up and Turn Me 'Round....

I've been working a lot. A LOT. So I'm recycling old stuff. I'm sorry. Here you go.

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I wrote an essay arguing the quote, "You can never go home again". I stated that Thomas Wolfe didn't know what the hell he was talking about and you can indeed go home again. In fact, I wrote that home can be in multiple places and I took the opportunity to quote my favorite Talking Heads song in the title, "Home is where I want to be, but I guess I'm already there" (I will use any excuse to quote Talking Heads in my writing).

Actually, I think I'm the one who's full of shit. I'm 25. Why I thought I was an expert on this matter is beyond me.

As I write this, I'm in Upstate New York at the "home" I grew up in. I'm visiting from where my current "home" is in Austin, TX. However, I'm missing my "home" in L.A. where I have left most of my large possessions and a brick-walled studio apartment in Koreatown. So, one could say that my heart is in three places- New York, California, and Texas. However, my heart is broken into three little pieces and doesn't feel whole anywhere I go. 

Maybe Thomas Wolfe was right. You can't go home again. You just lay your baggage wherever you go.

September 17th, 2008....

They say, "You can never go home again."

Who says that?

I want to know!

According to Quoteland.com, it's a dude name Thomas Wolfe, but that's not confirmed.

Ok, so Thomas Wolfe maybe once said, "You can never go home again."

Well, Thomas Wolfe, you're wrong!

I think you meant childhood. If you actually wrote "childhood", you'd be spot on.

Because I'm discovering something, Thomas Wolfe- you can go home again!

When I first moved to L.A., I immediately transformed into a discombobulated head floating in the smoggy atmosphere of the city. As I waved good-bye to familiarity, I continued swimming deeper and deeper into the grey-orange abyss, only occasionally brushing against solidity. I'd touch down for a moment or two, only to be shot back up into the clouds, letting them take me wherever they'd like. My feet weren't planted here, but they were no longer planted in my hometown either. Every trip back to New York, I felt a deeper disconnect all the while reading "Less Than Zero". While I was in NY, I'd long for the bustle of L.A. traffic, the lights under Mulholland, and the smells of Venice Beach (no matter how good or bad they may be). And though I could barely wait for my plane to land at Long Beach Airport, I'd feel the energy instantly sucked out with the opening of the plane door. From there, I'd climb back into my little empty, plastic bubble waiting curbside that would carry me back through town and into daily life, always keeping my feet from touching the ground.

It wasn't until 3 years in, I noticed that the plastic film had shed away. I looked down and saw that both feet were firmly planted in the Los Angeles dirt. How my roots penetrated that compacted, dry dirt is beyond me, but they had forced through, wrapping tightly amongst the few stable anchors I could find. And there those roots have laid and will continue to lie, though I'm moving to a new city in a few days. I can't pry them, I can't sever them, I can only extend them. In contemplating this, it was then I realized that I had roots still firmly planted somewhere else too. In the place I thought I had pulled up in years ago. I traced back to my hometown, where I did some much needed cleaning and nurturing of my roots. And for the first time, I saw the beauty that lies in my hometown, in Central NY, in the place I once so desperately wanted to leave, but now felt such an undying connection to. Appropriately, I spent the entire trip looking at the grass. Something L.A. doesn't have.

Then I realized that you can have more than one home...and you can go back any time you like.

Pic-o-rama

A few posts back, I wrote about my friends' Ranch that burned down during the recent string of Los Angeles fires. The group was finally allowed to go up to their house. This is all that remains (all pictures owned/by the amazing and very talented (and employable) Andy Rydzewski and whomever was taking pictures of Andy).

Check out the last picture of a lawn chair that melted in form to the ground.

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On a lighter note, while I was shuffling through my pile o' shit from moving last night, I found this X-mas card I received from Paul Reubens tucked away in a notebook. For those of you in L.A., don't forget, the Pee-Wee Herman Show will be premiering this November at the Henry Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles.

By the way, that's Glenda. She sits next to my bed. Say hi, Glenda!

Robert Evans' Skank Tried to Slug Me

I had completely forgotten about the above statement until today, when I was talking to Adrian about the wonderful documentary THE KID STAYS IN THE PICTURE. If you've never seen it, it is the documentary-style adaptation of Hollywood producer Robert Evans' autobiography of the same name. Evans was and is a colorful character, having epotimized Hollywood cool in the 1970's (he was married to Ali MacGraw, friends with Jack Nicholson and produced THE GODFATHER, CHINATOWN, and ROSEMARY'S BABY) and Hollywood down-and-out in the 1980's (he was convicted of trying to buy cocaine and linked to the murder of an investor).

Here is a little backstory...

I was a featured player on a barely known TLC reality series called "Going Hollywood". The show chronicled the day-to-day adventures of three fresh-of-the-bus interns working at Robert Evans', Method Man's, and my boss' respective production companies. My role was to help show our intern, Ian, the ropes. Ian ended up working at our company after the show ended and becoming a dear friend. He is quite possibly one of the most stand-up individuals I have ever met.

On the last day of shooting, the producers decided to have a wrap party at the interns' Real World-style house over-looking the Hollywood Hills. Everyone who participated on the show was invited and of course the cameras were rolling. It was the first time during the shoot that I had seen the house. Posters of movies produced by the interns' respective bosses lined the walls. I noticed a poster of Val Kilmer's THE SAINT and chuckled. "Why is there a THE SAINT poster up on the wall?" I said to no one in particular.

"Because Robert Evans produced THE SAINT," someone shouted from the crowd.

"Oh yeah, because THE SAINT is Robert Evans best work, isn't it?" I said sarcastically.

The turntables came to a screeching halt. Storm clouds drifted in and a tornado of bleached blonde hair and red lipstick marched up to me.

"Who the hell is this girl? Why are you disrespectin' Robert Evans?

I quietly looked down. Written across the woman's wife-beater was the screenprint, "I Have Issues."

"Who the hell do you think you are!? Go back to film school! Don't you know who Robert Evans is??"

I sure did know who Robert Evans was, but I had no idea who she was.

After some stares from the producers, I quickly put together she was the president of Robert Evans' company.

I apologized but politely tried to explain to her that I wasn't "disrespectin''" Robert Evans, but rather was making a point that of all the amazing movies he has produced, CHINATOWN, MARATHON MAN, THE GODFATHER, LOVE STORY, ROSEMARY'S BABY, HAROLD AND MAUDE, URBAN COWBOY (well, that's questionable), THE COTTON CLUB (highly questionable), that the one poster they put up, was THE SAINT?! I was on Robert Evans side for Christ's sake! Do you think he wants to be immortalized by THE SAINT!?

It didn't matter. The damage was already done and there was no going back. Skank Ho was flailing her arms and yelling belligerently at me. My boss caught wind of what was going on and came over to see what the problem was. He cooly tried to calm her down but she started going at him too, eventually telling him to "suck my dick!". When my boss threw his hands up in the air as if to say, "This chick is bat shit crazy!", she took it as a sign to start fistacuffs and pulled her arm back to swing at him. My boss was swiftly carried away by the producers and we were all rushed downstairs away from Trainwreck. All the meanwhile the cameras were still rolling.

We tried to get comfortable on the first floor of the house, but couldn't concentrate over all the screaming our little friend was doing upstairs. "They can all just suck my dick, those fucking wet noodles!" Figuring that Ms. Penis Envy wasn't going to shut up anytime soon, we all decided to leave.

Later in the evening Ian IMed me to say that she still hadn't left and that she just grabbed one of the party-goers by their hair.

After that evening, I lost track of Miss Piggy and unfortunately the tape of that spectacular evening never aired. Sometimes I think about Robert Evans' lady friend and what she's doing. I'm sure she's still running his company, sucking his cock, and making some wonderful B-list trash. It makes me sad. Hollywood has a lot of woman who feel like they need to overcompensate working in a male-driven industry. Note to females in Hollywood- wearing an "I Have Issues" wife-beater, getting drunk, and telling people to suck your dick doesn't make you tough, it makes you a drunk chick with a "I Have Issues" wife-beater on.

Au revoir, mon Ranch

You were one of the lead characters in the chapter I wrote about Los Angeles.

When I left that vague city behind me, you were mostly what I thought about. A entity of substance floating amongst the vapid ghosts of my memories.

Remember the nights when we'd stay up late talking, your whole body creating music, art; you expelling an intricate web between the souls that came to you for inspiration?

And though everything about you was slightly unhinged, I found comfort in your lack of symmetry. 

How do you mourn a house? Especially one that was completely annihilated by a fast and purposeful fire? Do you grieve for it like you would a person? Dwelling on the fanciful memories that blow the subject up like a balloon, wildly out of proportion and heavy on the heart?

In every way, The Ranch was what you set out to make it, Kevin. It was that place. The place where artists and musicians and filmmakers came and did what they did best- create. I know you wanted so much more for it, but in hindsight, I hope you see that you achieved it and maybe this was the way The Ranch was meant to go. It reached it's purpose and just simply imploded.

Photos by Lauren Modery, Eylene Pirez, Aaron Lomeli, Melissa Rauso, and varied news sources

Hipsters on a Boat

The other day, the entire office committed a minor coup d'etat and decided to have a boat party.

See? Look how much FUN we're having!

It got even better when Ben took off his shirt.

I brought my bondage gear...

And Cameron and Leah approved. Oh YEAH.

People held hands....

And danced, danced, DANCED!

But then violence broke out.

And a hurricane swept through.

People started to jump ship.

And fearing a shipwreck, ate everything that they could get their hands on.

But then God shone down his beautiful rays.

And we sailed off onto the rainbow of love.