It has begun!

College football starts tonight. Everyone grab a cold can of bud light, settle into a nice, comfy chair and enjoy. And don't forget to call your bookie!

Enough already!

"Sometimes shit just don't work out".
I wish I could quote some honored scholar or author with originating that saying, but I don't believe anyone would want credit for something so downbeat. People always want to be remembered for coining phrases of inspiration and eternal hope. Not a statement that is equal parts negativity, pessimism and awful grammar. But that don't make it not true. Sometimes shit just don't work out.
In honor of the realization that we (J-Cleezy and myself) probably won't be California residents for another full year- probably- I would like to give credit to the things in this town (Los Angeles) that I honestly enjoy. I won't bring up the laundry list of things that are loathesome about southern Cali right now. I'm saving that for right before I skip town.

So, here's my top 5 things about LA I will miss:

1.) The Weather:
It's fitting that the thing I like most about LA is the one that has absolutely nothing to do with the people living here. In the winter months, it is a wonderful perk. In the summer, it is like a Cambodian hot box. But I've been sick ONCE here in 3 years! Dry climates are totally underrated.

2.) Mexican Food/Taco Stands:
There are 5 places within walking distance of my place that are better than the best place back in Michigan. And if you hit up a nice taco stand, you can eat well for under six bucks. Chupas mi huevos!

3.) The Vista:
The Vista Theatre at the corner of Sunset and Hollywood is a single-screen old school gem that is rare in this country. Big, beautiful and cheap (5 bucks for shows before 5pm) with every other row yanked a few years ago for mucho leg room! And it's got an Egyptian theme... and I don't care why.

4.) Avocados:
They put 'em on everything and for good reason. A delicious item that you can get year round. I'll never have a BLT without one again.

5.) The Silverlake Walking Guy:
This guy likes to walk... a lot! From 8 am to 11pm at night he just fucking walks around Silverlake reading a newspaper as he bounces along at a brisk pace. 109 degrees: he's walking. Pitch black out: walkin, and reading the newspaper with a little flashlight. He is amazing. Legend has it that he is a retired surgeon who has a very successful practice but just loves to walk. I hope that's true because although he's in great shape, the constant exposure to sun has turned his skin into a fine-grained leather that would make a catcher's mitt jealous.

David Mamet is a pussy!

Friday nights, for most american citizens these days, is a mixed-bag of bowling leagues, irish car bomb shots, olympic home scoring, missionary sex and netflix. Personally, I went with the latter, having spent my day serving mozzarella stix and glasses of merlot with a splash of coke (no shit) to neck-tattooed silverlakers who thought that the name AUGIE would be proper for their newly birthed son.
Seriously?! Why not scribble "Chicks? No thanks!" onto his birth certificate. You keep naming your kids after household items and civil war heroes, in 20 years we'll be trading Rusted Root LP's for currency and discussing how violent our starch intolerance has become over wooden mugs of lilly water. Never mind what will become of competitive sports and foodies!
Back to Netflix. Earlier this week, they shut down their national distribution centers leaving millions of hipsters sitting in front of their shiny silver apple laptops (as I am doing right now) to wonder "how am I going to watch 'Riffifi' while waiting to have unprotected sex with "that one-in-a-million beauty... what's her name?" before they head out in their bio-diesel benz to see the Black Kids at El Cid.
My shipment arrived uninterrupted, bearing David Mamet's latest 'Redbelt'. 99 minutes later I am sitting on my couch watching olympic highlights wondering what the sweet fuck happened to the guy who wrote Glengary???
Is it the fact that I know that over the last decade he has become a brown belt wearing, conservative card carrying hot douche? Is that tainting my perception when it comes to this film? Fuck no!!! This movie sucks! Almost exclusively. If you were living in the Congo, you would say it sucks one thousand gorilla nuts. Mamet, who famously demanded that every "uh" and "Err" in his plays and scripts be vocalized, and to his credit, correctly, has managed to take an enormous dump on what was an, at the very least intriguing film career. It really bum's me out.
AND he farts in the morning cereal bowl of not only Chieeewttal Ewieejiooour, who deserves better, but also Tim Allen, who in limited duty, does some of the best work he has ever done!
I blame republicans. Ponder this: How come people don't start families and get older and get better jobs and decide that they WANT TO BE LIBERAL. Never happens. They always "decide" to become conservatives when they gain wealth and debt. Politically, Growin' up translates to growin' out. With great power comes great responsibility, right? If 1985 Mamet ran into 2008 Mamet in a Greenwich Village Alley, '85 Mamet would gut '08 Mamet and leave him for dead. With or without a 'rouge' belt. Because starving is tough. Scroungin' is tough. Clawing your way from nothing to something is tough. Mailing it in wearing a straw pork-pie hat... well, it's just not tough.
If Mamet can't write anymore, then I have to go back to Beijing for inspiration. Michael Phelps looks like he has down syndrome and won 42 gold medals. America! Fuck yeah!