As an inhibited Englishman I very rarely display my body. You can read all about my shorts dilema from my Coachella blog from the other year. I don't even wear sunglasses here. 1) As I am not used to wearing them and have no idea what shape looks 'cool' on me and 2) I think I look like a dick in them. I remember someone once came up to me in a club and asked me to be in his band. I wasn't going to be in someone's band who wore sunglasses in a club. It was a safety hazard think what it would have been like on stage with him. He'd be knocking wires out resulting in electrocuting and audience member and a I don't want to go through all that again.
Here in LA though it's hot. And sometimes an Englishman abroad has to say to himself 'When in Rome' even if he isn't in Rome. So in the privacy of my own apartment I drew up the blind opened the window and felt the sun on my half naked body. I thought this might happend once my skin had been exposed to sunlight for the first time in a year.
So there I was lying in the sun getting comfortable on my bed and I just put my hands across my chest and linking fingers and before I knew it I'd gone off into the land of nod.
Imagine my surprise when I woke up an hour and half later to find the sun had moved (would you believe it!) and left me with a nice imprint burn across my body and the other half isn't even burnt!
I am now attempting to fill it in by covering up 2/4 of my torso by various methods in order to fill this gap. As i'm going to look like a complete idiot when I plan to go to the Standard swimming pool next week!
Los Angeles is full of people trying to promote themselves as the next Jonny Depp, Angelina Jolie or Brian Blessed. If you are advertising your busniess though what better way than doing live Karaoke in the middle of the street!
This was for the new store opened on Sunset and Hillhurst 'The Vintage Vortex' which currently has for sale a great Hugh Hefner Playboy pinball machine.
Talking of Actors and Actresses was having a drink with some friends and in walks Kirsten Dunst. I would not have known who this diminutive lady was if it wasn't for the immediate whispers and hand covering mouth gestures. What should be my move here? Should I go over pretend that I don't know who she is and say 'hello can I buy you a drink'? Should I accidentally bump into her and introduce myself that way. OR shall I go over and say one of these three lines.
1) Hello I look extremely good in a Spiderman outift (I did when I was 5 in my Spiderman PJ's)
2) Fancy being caught in my web
3) Just sing the old theme tune to Spiderman to her (spider man, spider man does whatever a spider can).
Of course I did none of the above and just watched her escape my advances. My spidey sense told me it wasn't a good idea after all.
Last week I was suffering from Saturday Night Fever so I saw this guy
Every country has it's crazy people. In my hometown of Worthing I remember there used to be a man who stood on a street corner dressed in a stripped blazer, boater hat and just waved at traffic going 'cooeeeee' and lifting his left leg up behind him and a camp limping of the wrist. He had a couple of names such as 'The Duke' & 'Burlington Bertie'.
Burlington Bertie
There was also the 'Bag Lady' who I think just had bags wrapped around her hands and feet (we used think she had alien hands and feet underneath).
I've seen my fair share of this sort in Los Angeles. On Friday night I traveled along Sunset on the bus and sat next to an old woman who kept telling me about her arm (and showing it to me) and her eye. She then told me she had a gun. I immediately thought 'Brilliant I'm going to be shot by a one eyed woman who can't aim straight - this is how I would have wanted to go'. The best 'character' i've ever seen here was when I was waiting for the underground train (Yes LA does have a subway system). He had long hair wore a black top and skirt. Fair enough nothing too strange about that a man in a skirt you may say. It was more the fact that on his front he had clinging to him round his neck and waist an effigy of HIMSELF looking back at him. a full effigy with it's arms around his neck and it's legs around his waist.
I've also been walking along Hollywood Boulevard with my Itouch on (see Itouch myself post). I got it out to switch from Geneva to Tame Impala when a man walking towards me starts shouting at me along the lines of 'You stinking little dirty CUNT', he repeat this over and over again by carefully using the words in a slightly different order so I don't get bored by his abuse. How he knew I was listening to Geneva I don't know.
This week i sat outside Morning Nights coffee place having a tea when we noticed a small guy walking across the street in a motorcycle helmet and one glovecarrying a $1 store bag. There was no motorbike to be seen and his walk was a little odd. He proceeded to do one lap of the grass triangle (in 23 degree heat) before plopping himself down on a rock. He then drank from his $1 store bag through his helmet.
I like to think this was the guy who played Street Hawk
On my way home I noticed this bohemoth of a dog.
The At-At dog
It seems the new trend is now to go the opposite way to having a small dog to go in your hangbag.
The WEIRDEST thing i've seen in Los Angeles is this!
An auction sign for a plot of land with two posters of the band Styx on it
PS whilst tracking down Burlington Bertie I came across this local character The Shipley dancer.. Enjoy.
So for my first day out in Los Angeles I decide to take a walk along Sunset Boulevard and into Silverlake area. This is the 'hipster' type area along with Echo Park. I hate using that term hipster and how on earth has it travelled across the ocean and into the Enlgish language? What were hipsters before they were called this? I'm sure it's the same with Chavs that they were called something else in before being called chavs (was it hoodies?). Anyway being a hipster seems to consist of having a beard and a cheque shirt and tattoos. So I have some stubble and cheque shirt and I did some drawings on my arm of a the film Legend with Tom Cruise just to fit in before I left. I've also been called 'Bro' twice since I've been here and one fist pump. I shuddered after each incident.
I found two lovely mid century furniture shops The Living Room and Danish Modern.
The Living Room had a lovely picture of Mark Spitz which you can just see in my pic. And a very large picture of the Beatles.
Danish Modern had such a vast amount of lovely stuff I nearly just wanted to move into the shop and call it my home.
After this I started my walk back to Los Feliz when I noticed two guys holding aloft a large square canvas with some pattern on it. The guy infront of them was filming as they were walking down Sunset. In my head I immediately thought 'oh it's that David Bowie The Next Day square symbol'. This design had been put infront of objects by fans etc and posted up on the internet. So there was me thinking 'oh I'm going to be in some David Bowie video that will be immortalised forever like Courtney Cox in Bruce Springsteens Dancing in the Dark. As they got closer to my path of glory, I looked up at the square canvas and then realised it wasn't the Bowie design but it was the Prop 8 symbol for getting gay marriage through Congress. I think my appearance will now help push it through.
Well I keep being urged to write again while I'm over so I'll start at the beginning. With my flight over.
The past 3 times over to LA my plane has not been full allowing me to pick a seat with no one next to me and thus with my height I can fully extend across the seats and then laugh at business class who have paid 3 times as much to do exactly the same thing.
This journey I went online and saw many seats filled but the three in the middle at the back free so I picked the end of the three imagining I'd be able to stretch out again and sleep for the journey. However on getting to check-in I was told that the plane was full now so I'm now stuck at the back on an isle seat so I'll be one of the last off and last in the queue for customs.
On getting to check-in with Virgin I try and hide by on board bag as it's a British Airways vintage flight back. However I have to put if on the scales to be weighed. The check-in woman says she shouldn't really allow me on with 'that' bag. So I tell her that she should upgrade me as I'm defecting from flying with BA and that's how much I like Virgin. This doesn't work.
BA Bag
So on the seat next to me is a nice looking lady. It then dawns on me to watch something 'intelligent' from the selection of films on my screen. I chose 'Cloud Atlas'. Which, I have to say wasn't as mental as I hoped it would be. But I did enjoy Jim Broadbent in it and Tom Hanks playing and Irish gangster was pretty bizarre. After this I decided to watch the sequel to the best film ever*
I will find you...again and I will kill you....erm...again. Goodbye
Taken 2 with Liam Neeson as you can tell now I'm trying to show the lady next to me that I am a bit manly by watching some violence. I always wanted to see this film at the cinema thinking it can't be bad as it will just be as good as the first Taken? But it really was Taken the piss (ha!).
The first hour of acting was so bad - it was like Liam Neeson was doing his comedy bit from 'Life's Too Short'. And the best character from the first film (the new husband of Neesons divorced wife) is immediately written out as the first meeting of his wife is still upset over something he did and left (can't remember what).
This leaves the door open for a reconciliation. Anyway it was almost like a comedy in the first part as Liam plays a sort of sitcom character in being 'the worlds most possessive dad'. He's even fed the line 'Don't go checking up on her new boyfriend'. Cut to him banging on his front door.
Later on Liam and his wife get 'Taken' and I don't know whether she had something written in her contract that she would only be able to say 10 lines in the film but she is pretty much out cold for about half the film being left in the dungeon then carried around then dumped on a floor again. There were about 3 times when he went back to her body where you just thought she was dead.
His daughter also from not being able to pass her test manages to circumnavigate Istanbul in a presumable right hand drive and not crash. She also runs around Istanbul throwing grenades every 15 minutes and not alert the police or army or anti terrorist unit. She has to throw them where 'nobody is around' but I expected her to throw it see a dead body and then just shout 'Sorry'.
Anyway you'll be glad to know she passes her test at the end of the film. So the moral of the film as far as I can gather is to go to Istanbul have your mum and dad kidnapped. Throw some grenades about and then put yourself under pressure to drive around Istanbul being chased by the police and gangsters in order to definitely pass your test.
One time I traveled to LA I decided to watch the film 'Next' with Nicolas Cage'. This film featured a plane crash and it's aftermath. I was pretty shocked when I saw it (not the film which is bad but the scene). When I arrived home I wrote to the airline company complaining that I was shaken up by this scene and thought it was inappropriate to show this film on a plane. I wasn't actually bothered I was just trying to get some free airmiles as compenstation. Anyway here's the clip and can anyone tell me why Nic Cage just shouts 'Hey' at the first passenger who runs past him who is also burning alive?
