Your World, Boning You

Just got an email breathlessly informing me that I can have a new "Navigator" give me turn-by-turn directions sent to my iPhone for only $9.99 per month!

Why am I not biting?

Well, most of my month is going to work. Here's the directions (when I drive): turn left out of garage. Turn right onto Beverly Blvd. Go straight until you hit Spring St. (10 miles). Turn right, enter garage. Directions home? Exit garage. Turn right on 3rd. Drive 10 miles. Re-enter alley. Park car and get mail.

When you can get me the turn-by-turn directions to find the pen I misplaced in apartment I'll be impressed. Actually, if you can get me service in my apartment I'll be impressed.

Image from the email ATT sent me

Shipping woes

Or, they're all out to get me

another unattractive whinge

One of the promises of the internets is that one can order stuff and have it shipped magically to your home.

Of course, UPS and FedEx are useless if you like me live in an apartment.  You see, the boys at those shipping companies have to make a call as to whether they want to leave your package at your front door, and none of them will do so at my apartment.  Since it can be seen.  Like if you are standing at my front door.  I live you see on the second floor of a Monterey Colonial building that is behind a large Mediterranean; you would have to be about 23 feet tall to see that package left at my door.  If I had a house, they would apparently not have a problem leaving my package.  Even though my front door would be visable from the street.  Which leaves the Post Office.

The Post Office offers all sorts of wonderful features like tracking and priority mail.  I don't capitalize that since I was told by a post office employee that priority mail entails a nice envelope, some marketing and fond hopes.

In any case, I ordered a nice sample of something from the Perfumed Court, tracking its progress.  It arrived about a month ago at my post office.  It never arrived here.  After about 836 phone calls to various disinterested parties from an 800 number to practically the Postmaster General, I finally got a weary call back from the post office letting me know that I would have to tell the shipper that they should make a claim.

So thanks Post Office.  I'll just sit here without my sample of Musc Nomade a week from my birthday.

Oh, and can I have please a job where actual performance of ones only duty isn't factored in to my job description?  Please?

Image: Pegasus Books

Down but not (quite yet) out in Beverly Hills

I wrote in an earlier post about our local drama of over-development in our small city.  I've found a blog that has far more to say on the subject (which has more twists, turns, duplicity and international intrigue that all 200 years of Dallas, Dynasty and Knots Landing put together): you are welcome to peruse Blog Beverly Hills, and marvel at the drama.  marvel also at the XXL-sized cojones of the man that writes it.  I bow to him.

The Quiet Riot of the Adults

Have you noticed that quietly Hollywood has been releasing new thrillers that are rated PG-13? The Eye is one of the newest ones, joining Cloverfield and others in the parade of new movies that are coming out without an "R" rating.

Why do you think that is? Years ago, an "R" rating was de rigeur as the badge of the "adult" thriller. These days, with splatter porn like "Hostel" or "Saw VIII" out there, I think that adults like me just aren't going to subject themselves to what is rated "R" these days. (pulling on his old man pants) Back when I was a kid, movies like "Eyes of Laura Mars", "Cat People", "Ghost Story" and "The Shining" were rated "R" and I think for good reason at the time; not that they were just gory, they were disturbing. I can go to for instance "There Will Be Blood" knowing that I am going to see a movie that's got a point to it, so the "R" is besides the point. The splatter porn "R"'s I am not willing to spend twenty bucks on; Mister Roth might think that the fact that he can bring a degree of realism to his "Cleveland Chain-Saw Enema" previously unavailable to filmmakers doesn't mean that I'm willing to pony up the money for something that looks like a snuff film.

All hail the PG-13!

Lush Bath Bombs

Or, A Good Bath Spoiled

For Christmas a friend of mine gave me a selection of Lush Bath Bombs; she felt bad that her last birthday gift to me bombed and was hoping to make amends, knowing that I loves me some bath.  Well, I used to at my old apartment, which had a huge bathtub that easily swallowed my 6' 2" frame.  The apartment that I have lived in for the last 14 years or so was built in the 50's and has one of those teacup-sized bathtubs that make me look like Rock Hudson in a Doris Day movie.  One of these days, if Lotto winnings ever come across or I write that 8 figure screenplay, I plan on getting a lap pool with endless hot water and hot and cold running Corso Como.  But I still do love my bath, and for New Years I looked forward to a nice hot bath and a glass of champagne.  My inner Joan Crawford would be released.

What I didn't know is that these bath bombs come with stuff in them.  Lots of stuff.  The blue one I chose had bits of dried leaves, small plastic cutouts and glitter.

Yes, glitter.

Since I don't have a personal maid and a 24 hour on-call plumber to snake the bits of Lush detritus from my pipes, I tried to strain out most of the stuff.  I personally don't find attacking ones ablutions with a tea strainer adds to the restful, contemplative portion of our evenings program.  I can't even tell you whether the stuff was decent bath goo- by the time I had managed to skim most of it off my hands and forearms were covered by so much glitter that it took a fair amount of Kiehls grapefruit scrub and a brush to get rid of it.  Needless to say, By that time I didn't want to actually immerse the rest of me in it.  Down the drain went the whole lurid cobalt mess, and I spent another half hour scouring the dregs out of my tub.  Apparently according to the website if one doesn't want the "surprise" of the various bits of fluff, one should enrobe the whole mess in a nylon before you bathe.  Like most gay men and contrary to popular belief, I don't have a pair of panty hose available to rein in the Pamela Anderson portions of the whole affair, and the hose will not contain the hugely over-concentrated coloring, which if you are like me (and Joan) you will be bleaching out of your tub the instant you step out. 

They do smell kind of nice, which led me to a use for them.  I threw one into the toilet.  I get the benefit of the nice scent without having to worry that I'm going to have to pick lavender lint or glitter out of my netherlands for the next day or so.

I sent my friend a thank-you note; I know she meant well and honestly wanted to please (and thanks be, never reads blogs; don't tell her, k?).  Maybe there are other things in their line that work better; with me, the whole trendy Westside stripper-pole Yogalatese esthetic of these bombs bombed.

Photo from Lush.com

Whining in a Winter Wonderland...

The holidays are coming up like a runaway train. Are you feeling a bit like you're stuck on the tracks?

It's a wet Tuesday here in the City of the Angels, chilly and grey with that patented LA light drizzle of rain that guarantees that SUV's will go merrily sailing sideways through intersections, their terrified drivers clutching the wheel, finally paying attention to the now 360 degree view of the road rather than the cell phone, latte or the crackberry.

I guess I am having a Scrooge moment.

There was a Nor'Easter hitting the East this week, dumping tons of the white stuff and looking disgustingly picturesque. Mind you, after 20 years in the sunny Hills of Beverly, I still have vivid memories of actually having to live with all that snow- not only having to shovel it or walking (and you have to learn how to walk in it) around wearing half your closet to keep, well, alive from your house to the grocery store, which will invariably be about the same temperature inside as your average bread oven, meaning that you will work up a sweat just in time to get back out in that arctic chill. No, I mean the later part of it, the part that they never take pictures of where the snowbanks turn to greyish black slush and you think that spring might just never come.

Our Winters might look like a rather drab version of Autumn in other areas, but I can at least look at the snowcapped peaks of the distant mountains from the comfort and warmth of the intersection of Santa Monica Boulevard and Palm Drive while wearing a light sweater. Although I perhaps can't really work up the appropriate level of Christmas Spirit without the possibility of going sledding, I wouldn't change that cashmere-clad fact for the world...

An Open Letter to a Helicopter Pilot

A Hallowe'en Lament

I don't know who you are, or for whom you work, but I do know at this point I pretty much hate you. From the time I got home at about 5 to the time I typed this at about 8, you have been hovering without moving an inch about 100 feet above the intersection of Doheny and Santa Monica. I know you don't work for BHPD, since they don't have helicopters. If you work for the Sherrif's department or the LAPD, I don't know what you are there for since the only crime that I could see were some of the Halloween costumes, and it's difficult to direct traffic from 10 storeys up. If you are from a news channel, I know you have to justify the expense of SkyCamWhatever but I seem to have missed your 30 second shot of stalled traffic. Which, just as an FYI is not news- certainly not news that needs hours of hovering closely over a residential neighborhood.

I hope you read this and at least let us know if this new Halloween trick is going to be an yearly "treat". If you are going to make the naighborhood kids feel like extras in "Apocalypse Now", we'll at least want know to dress for it and to put some Wagner on our iPods, which you will be drowning out.

Real Housewives of Orange County

or, White People Can't Jump, But They Can Bore

Anybody caught any of this? It's one of those shows Bravo has foisted off on us in between seasons of "Project Runway". It's premise, I suppose was originally an answer to "The O.C.", showing that in addition to being vapid, self-serving idiots (as the denizens of Newport Beach are portrayed on the now cancelled Fox series) they are also clueless, unnatractive dolts, living in some gated community called "Cota de Craptastic" or something (which is like a larger version of "Knots Landing"'s Seaview Circle, but without the wit, humor or hotness of early Alec Baldwin). intermarrying, driving expensive cars, drinking like fishes and in general being very, very dull.

I know people in Orange County. They are warm, wise, witty people who have interests rangeing a bit further than which fake-bake is less orange and whether Slade really likes the underage brunette bimbo or the older blonde who looks like a drag queen. One episode was enough. I'd rather watch Rachael Ray. I'd rather watch lint. I'd rather iron, and those of you who know me know exactly how little of a recommendation that is.

We're having a heat wave

I hate heat. I really hate heat with humidity. I hate how I get when it's too freaking hot out: I just want to bite people. I do (thanks to my good friend and fellow heat-o-phobe Sue) have an air-conditioner, but when your building has been marinating in 100 plus temps for the better part of the day, the only AC that's going to make a difference better be the size of a Camaro.

This weekend was freaking NASTY. I hid out as I could, went to the movies and wished that I had a big old Cadillac to drive around in, one of those ones with the automatic climate control that basically throws shaved ice at you.

I cannot wait for winter, failing that, to get back to work with it's arctic AC.

I have a new instant addicton: Fox's new show "Anchorwoman"

It's the story of a lovely lady..

Well it's the story of Fox drumming up ratings by sending an awfully sweet but totally naive swimsuit model from LA to anchor the 5pm newscast at a station in Tyler, Texas. What makes it sooooo addictive is that nobody comes off unscathed: the model is an amusing ditz who is clearly there because of her blonde tanned breast to boost ratings and is clearly at sea, but the newspeople at the station don't fare better: for a station that has an elderly poodle doing the weather, they have a sense of self importance more inflated than the Hindenburg. Only Stormy the Weather Dog comes off unscathed, and then only because she seems embarrassed to be there. As should the denizens of Primetime at 5.

This just in:

Fox has pulled the plug on this after one episode, citing poor ratings. I might be the only person in the universe who cares.

What is it about his country?

I just saw another ad for that worthy ABC show "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" for the next episode where they swoop in and build a large house with a sub-zero and a sun porch and a plasma TV for one lucky family touched by tragedy. All I could think of was, is this where we're at? The gulf coast is still in ruins, a Kansas town is leveled (and our President waits 5 days until visiting, because dinner with the Queen takes four days of prep, apparently) and this is the end result: if you are lucky or telegenic, Ty Pennington will drop in to build you a new house. The National Guard is off in Iraq, whose government is taking a two months vacation while letting us run their war and sacrifice out children to the great god Oil. What realy strikes me is that these are "Red States" and this is the treatment they get. I can only imagine how long it will take for help to get here when the big one hits.

Note to Ty: I photograph decently and have a really photogenic godchlld.

And a desire for a Viking range.

A quintessentially Los Angeles moment...

Walking down Beverly Boulevard after having some ice cream at "Milk": a muscular semi-biker dude chatting on his cell phone on a smoke break. Bicepts bigger than my head, tattoos, ripped jeans, painted on blue-grey t-shirt and biker boots.

And foils because he's having his highlights touched up.