Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Wild Card (Bitches)

My new sales strategy is to go into abandoned bars, order a beer demand the Cardinals game be put on and proceed to pimp my product. The thinking is, if the guy knows that I am going to be around for the next 3 hours watching a baseball game and drinking his 2 dollar pints he has to at least entertain me. I'm going to start using my awkwardness against people...

Scenario 1.) This includes asking homeless people for change ("Sir do you have any change?" NO I don't but I see you do! Give me some and then we'll both have a little bit! No? You don't have any change? What about bills? None of that either? There is an ATM down the street!)

Scenario 2.) The little kids from Compton trying to sell me their candy bars (Sir, any donation you make could help lead me towards a life away from crime would you like to help me stay out of jail? "Actually Latifa, I've noticed in my experience that the more money I had, the more crimes I tended to commit...why don't you give me your 5 dollars that you have there and I'll give you my old paperback copy of The Secret and you'll be just fine...oh, I'll take those Sweet Tarts too.)

Scenario 3.) Those guys that follow you and try to hand out their mixtape...(Hey man, hey big man, yo blondie fresh, yo you like music? Check out my tape...yo how about a donation man, that's good music, thats my survival man. $20...ok $10, $5 give me something man. "How about you give me $20 and I'll give this cd to a low level assistant at a record label. That is under the impression that you actually want to make it as a rapper, but if you want to make a career out of scaring tourists into handing you a wad of cash so you will stop chasing them down the boardwalk than thats fine with me too."

Seriously it's time for someone to turn the tables on the dregs of society, they've been causing me more discomfort than an ill placed zit too close to my lip for far too long now. But anyway, the fact that I live in LA and spend hours a day in the car (the thing I hated most about Chicago followed me here, maybe I should have gone to New York) so obviously I've been hearing a lot about the wildcard race lately, and it got me thinking back to that episode of Always Sunny where Charlie is the Wild Card and does all sorts of crazy and unexpected shit. It's amazing, so since I don't know that many people out here, I have scribbled down a few ideas that I think everyone should try.

1. Go out with an Entourage- This idea revolves around your group of friends going out and treating someone like a celebrity. This whole society is so obsessed with starfuckers. Any dumb cunt who is from out of town comes to L.A. exclusively to see Kim Kardashian. Guess what, that's not going to happen. L.A. is just a regular town full of delusional people that are full of themselves. Celebrities probably don't even go out that much so they don't have to deal with the pathetic commoners that harass them. HOWEVER, no one seems to know this except for me. So next time you go out and pool all of your tips you made catering to buy a bottle, pick one guy and call him an actor, or a writer, or a stunt man or some shit. Dumb chicks will eat that shit up.
Oh my GOD, what were you in. "I was in I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, I dated JLH for a while." (It's probably best to use these non-committal movies that everyone saw but can't remember the cast.) Or you could pull some bullshit, "Oh I did re-writes on The Last Song" OMG wasn't that with Miley??? "Yah, she's a total crack whore" OMG I TOTALLY WOULDNT HAVE GUESSED!

...and the best part will be kicking this chick out of bed in the morning and telling her you have to go serve some hungover bros their lattes at the Westwood Coffee Bean. BUT like I thought you were famous?!?

2. The accent. I know this is cliche, but there is probably nothing interesting about you. Your job, not interesting. Your friends, typical. What else is there to talk about on a night out, the emergence of the Tea Party into mainstream politics? Why Ryan Reynolds continues to underperform at the domestic box office? Nope. Bullshit bullshit bullshit. However, if you have a fake Australian accent, a refusal to break character and you aren't retarded, you have a chance to hold some girls attention for more than 2 minutes.
Here's a quick newsflash, no one knows anything about Australia, if you find a girl that studied abroad there, tell her you grew up in Melbourne, NO ONE goes there. They have a tennis tournament and some aborigines, that's it...and the accent isn't that hard to master, just don't over do it, and don't get nervous and start talking like an Irish immigrant. No one wants to have sex with a leprechaun...and in the morning when you tell her from Naperville, well she can't take away consent ex post facto (unless you're in college she can probably cry rape and the stigma will follow you around for the rest of your experience, I've seen lifetime movies about it...I always take the guys side)

3. Just lie. It's fun, play a role. Everyone has watched Wedding Crashers and been like, that's so tite, I want to do that. No one ever does. Try it, if you get caught whatever you are an aspiring actor trying to get into character. And the lies don't have to just be sleazy age, wealth stereotypes. You can come up with some crazy captivating life story that should be chronicled by 60 minutes, like you fought off a large Asian man mugging an old woman and it turned out to be Justin Bieber's grandmother. Make it creative and engaging and at the end of the night you will both be so drunk that if she goes home with you in the morning she probably won't remember the bullshit lies you fed her, and if you two do end up taking the relationship further and she brings it up months down the road you could come clean and have a good laugh or take it to the grave. First rule of persuasion, own your lie. So kill the monotony of the every day and go do something crazy and unexpected, it doesn't make you a terrible person, it makes you adventurous and those who tell you otherwise probably like Tim Tebow.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

A million dollars isn't cool

You know what is? Not fucking talking about your next get rich quick scheme all the time. One of the worst things about talking to humans is that everyone thinks they are always one idea away from a life of luxury on a yacht pouring champagne on some beautiful babe who is the perfect mix of white and exoticness (I'm assuming this would be someone who is like 50% German, 25% Brazilian, 25% Persian...and no I can't imagine what would have to happen for that crazy ethnic orgy to go down. It was probably like an ex-nazi flew to Brazil to hide from war crimes and met a Jewish Brazilian and they fell in love, whatever, this is my blog)

I suppose it's true. You are always one thought away from the next big idea, and there are probably millions of visionaries out there who didn't chase their dreams because some cynic like me said "that will never fucking work, you are retarded." And clearly I have nothing against people who make their money by lucking into it and putting forth no effort, I applaud trust fund babies and those who marry up. That said, I think most of the assholes that run around talking about the next big thing think that all you have to do is come up with an idea, tell some vc guy about it and he writes you a check for your intellectual property and you live happily ever after.

Out here it's not about the next stupid as seen on tv invention, it's about the next show or the next script. I always talk about how great it would be to be a studio exec, but it must be so exhausting listening to these assholes pitch their bullshit ideas all day, "It's like Airbud, but it's a ferret and he plays competitive squash, I think we have a 7 film franchise here." The worst though is the people who talk about all their crazy ideas and never do it. Like me. I am not a writer, I will be a writer when I sell something. I am an outside sales person for a media company who happens to blog in his free time. You are not an actor, you are a waitress, you can call yourself an actor when you have an agent. You can say you work at an agency when you are an agent, you can call yourself a manager when you have clients. Fucking assistants drive me nuts. I guess if I can encapsulate in one sentence, stop fucking talking about it and do. I'm just as guilty as the rest, but at the bar don't go on and on about some pilot idea your old frat brother used to have, sit down for 2 hours and fucking write it and send to me and I'll tell you if it sucks or not. Because those who can do, and those who talk about their great ideas and then get drunk on a Tuesday and do nothing about it...well they wake up with a hangover and my spite.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Check out my ap bro

The worst part about moving to a city and being the new guy is that you have like 5 friends tops. When those 5 people are busy you're fucked, and if it is the Wednesday before payday you can't even treat yourself to a nice steak on the grill or an arthouse movie or even drinks with someone from your absolute d-list of people that you could possibly hang out with. Add that to a shitty internet connection and lack of television, you find yourself in quite the predicament. Whatever, I'll work late, I'll kick it in Westwood until like 8 o clock, go home attempt to watch something on Hulu, write a short and go to bed. It sounds like a reasonable plan. There is just one hiccup...the homeless people.

The homeless people in Westwood get a little aggressive as the day wears on, they successfully raise about 6 bucks by 5pm and that's enough for some hooch that makes them a little rowdy. That and they have begun to recognize me since I walk by their shopping cart and benches every day. At first, I didn't have any change, then it was fake phone calls, but now the level of anxiety that I experience from walking within 20 meters of these folk is so extreme that I've had to change my routes. I will find myself walking 4 blocks so I don't have to walk by the banjo man, or the coughing guy or wheels who will literally chase after me and ask me why I won't buy him a cheeseburger.

So here is my idea for the ap. It's an iPhone game thats kind of like Frogger or Pac Man, basically the character is a guy who is running from these people and if they catch him you lose. He could be armed with things like empty Burger King wrappers or 40's to throw in different directions to distract his angry pursuers...I'm not really sure what the goal of the game is, maybe make it across campus to the Trader Joe's and get back to your car with at least one bottle of 2 buck Chuck...I realize I am going straight to hell for these terrible tirades, but I would rather give my spare change to a starving actor before some guy who prays on white people that are afraid of him for nickels and dimes.

It is interesting though to look at these people and think what went wrong...mental illness? Most likely. Ex-military? I hope our government would take better care of its veterans. Ex-cons who can't get a job? Possibly. Guys that were bro's 40 years ago and alienated everyone that ever cared about them, destroyed their lives with booze and now are mumbling to themselves about the glory days? God I hope not...

Anyway, long story short. I need a TV and more people to hang out with immediately. But first, off to Trader Joe's...at least if you read a script and drink a bottle of wine your night sounds cool.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Season Finale

Today is the last official day of summer, tomorrow there will be exactly 12 hours of light and 12 hours of dark and if you are 9 years old you can balance an egg upside down. Sometimes times like these are a good time to reflect. For example, I myself have had a roller coaster 3 months. I got to deal with being dismissed by my old job pretty much balling all summer on my severance checks, moving back home and moving to LA. I went from August 1st, to last week without actually having my own place (literally my parents got rid of my old bedroom, it was either sleep in the ferret's cave in the basement or find somewhere in Broad Ripple to sleep/live) I guess the word that would best describe my summer is chaotic.

But what a fucking summer, right? We killed Bin Laden's ass, Chicago had 2 Lollapaloozas (I'm counting the caravan, not North Coast) and we took 235 shots of whiskey on Independence day...well done everyone, well fucking done. As we move into fall and closer to seasonal depression there will be a few highlights: football, tailgates, road trips, Halloween, homecoming and new episodes of Gossip Girl but the pure ecstasy of warm weather and swimsuits is gone. If you are in Chicago, you are probably done with Castaways for the summer. Maslanka is probably dry docking his boat pretty soon, and you can feel free to go hang out in the front yard of Burling because Jake will probably start wearing shirts again. While these are all quasi upsetting issues, whenever there is a season finale, there is a season premiere.

Hoodies, bonfires, barbeques, carving pumpkins, jeans. Fall is bad ass. It is constantly the most underrated season. I think that is ingrained in our minds because we had to go back to school and until college that blows donkey dick. And yes, unlike spring the weather slowly deteriorates into winter instead of ramping up into summer, but there is still plenty of fun to have in 2011. In fact I am ready to argue that the only thing wrong with the weather cooling off is females will trade in their low cut tops and short shorts for baggy sweaters and uggs a crime that they will all overcompensate for when they dress like massive skanks the 3 nights you celebrate Halloween.

Long story short: you have a lot to look forward to the next 3 months, autumn is the tits, and ya it will cool down a bit but now you can walk places without worrying about how sweaty you will get, you can rock the sweater/shorts outfit and toss a football around on a Sunday while drinking some Oktoberfest, win!

But that said, this post was called season finale, not season premiere...something dramatic and awesome usually comes at the end of a tv season, a cliffhanger, a death, two people that you have been waiting for to do it all season finally get it on...well this site is social satire not a narrative, so I can't give that to you, but you write your own story. Go out tonight, the last night of summer and make a memory make a mistake, fuck it go to Joe's on Weed and bring home a latina fireball or if you are in LA go to Westwood and bring home a Freshman from Maloney's. If you are one of my female readers call that guy you know has a crush on you and see if he wants to grab a drink. Be spontaneous, go crazy, because tomorrow morning when you wake up you can kick them out of bed and say sorry bro, it was just a summer fling.

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Fuck your letter jacket

I had one in middle school, it was super douchey, but whatever. I was in 7th grade on the football team, I was the fucking man. Sure I got cut from basketball and baseball, but I went to a public school in the ghetto, we had black people, no way was I making the basketball team (even though I played for an AAU state champion in 6th grade...this was probably the height of my athletic ability 5'6 12 years old with a 58 mph fastball, a sick knuckleball toebash in soccer and I could hit 8/10 free throws) Anyway, I wore that Belzer Bruins Red and White with pride. Even after I transferred to St. Simon in 8th grade I still rocked that shit to put forth the image that I was the new mysterious kid with a troubled past...and amidst first kisses, sneaking out and trying to convince girls to show me their tits I snuck in 4 competitive sports in 8th grade. Clearly I was destined for greatness.

Begin high school, I play football for the Freshman team, obviously, and then I play lacrosse in the spring (because I have tremendous foresight that I will be able to put this on my bro resume come college) nope because baseball players can't go on spring break...fuck that noise. I'm a very mediocre talent at football, tennis, lacrosse throughout high school, but I still have to play, because that's what you do in high school...or you go home and are a fucking loser, or you go to theatre practice and are a fucking weirdo (I secretly wanted to be doing this the whole time.)

I never did get a letter jacket in high school, I'm fairly certain at the time I was too obsessed with new cz earrings and baggy jeans to worry about how to iron on a varsity letter. But I did walk away with a state ring, some good memories and a reasonable social relevance. Sports did me well-ish. Because that's really how your popularity is judged in high school, what team are you on, how good are you and did you get to 3rd base with a cheerleader (no one has sex at Cathedral except for like 5 people...you can probably guess who they were)

College comes and people join frats and get somewhat into intramurals but by Senior year are so over it. Flag football is a burden, soccer isn't fun anymore and some walk-on rejects will hurt you on the basketball courts so fuck it, let's drink. It's not like social relevance is influenced by your Greek League A record. What matters is relevance of your frat, money you spend, and how many top tier sorority semi-formals you go to. (At this point this article seems so so douchey, I was considering stopping here, but I promise this is not going to turn into an essay about how to be cool in college. Many of you probably hated me and accuse me of social climbing, I just "get it" and even if this seems wrong to you, this is the way college works.)

Graduation happened, that sucked. I don't care how much you love your job, you would rather be on a patio somewhere at happy hour with 0 responsibility. I don't care if you are changing the world by teaching Nigerians how to read, or volunteering for a political campaign it would be easier to sleep until noon and then go play golf...and btw, people that do the aforementioned two things and love to talk about it, fuck you.

So you're in the real world, in a big city, you get to go out on the weekends and be morally reprehensible still but then what about the other 5 days a week. The "Meh." You could just go through the motions of your life and have 2/7 of an existence. But no, that simply won't do. You could go through the denial of growing up and go out 5 nights a week...that works for a while, until everyone else gets sick of it...what you need are activities. Organized fun to break up the week, something to look forward to...like a smoker counts down the minutes to his next scheduled cigarette break. What you need is softball.

Softball is fucking great. So is beach volleyball, bowling...any semi-competitive league sport post college is the best. You hear those stories of old men tearing an ACL rounding 3rd and you think to yourself...what an asshole? Why is he taking this shit so seriously? Oh I get it...the same reason ESPN has 4 hours of programming for fantasy football. These are the little things that keep life exciting. It must be some crazy phenomenon that somehow the stupidest dykiest sport from high school becomes the life blood for 20-40something year old males. (Scratch that women's lacrosse is worse) But it happened, and I fucking love it. Some friends and I were trying to pinpoint the age at which softball becomes more fun than baseball...it must be 20. Because 20 must be the age that you stop caring about your stat line for the game and worry more about how many pitchers you are going to smash after the game.

And how great is that? Bars will pay for your league registration, your uniforms and even GIVE you alcohol to rock their logo and party at their place. It's really capitalism at its best. They know that by giving us a sense of entitlement that we run the show at their bar, we will in turn triple their investment and get all of our friends to go there all the time...the extremes people will go to for one free beer. But I fucking love it, you can use me as a pawn in the system all day. Because I can still crank it 300 feet and I wear my old softball league shirts jogging just to let people know that this scene is for me and they probably think to themselves, this dude is probably pretty sweet, he still plays sports with his friends and goes out drinking after...yep...fucking right I do.

It's kind of like the high school letter jacket in a way. A point of pride, extremely douchey (not as bad as wearing your old frat tees after you graduate) a slight reminder to the rest of the population that you are involved in an activity that you believe makes you awesome. Maybe it's not for everyone, maybe people should give up on the glory once they realize they aren't going to go pro. That said, I assure you that if I hit a home run tonight, I'm going straight to Third Stop and buying a bottle.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Encino Man 2

After an lengthy stay on a series of couches our hero DAVE approaches his new home. He stands before a large Mediterranean style mansion on the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. After moving his MASSIVE BAG OF SHIT into an empty room save for a ratty mattress in the corner, he cracks a beer and goes to explore the grounds of his new abode. While fucking around the pool he discovers a trampoline in the woods behind him. Bored and longing for the sensation of his childhood back in the midwest he begins jumping up and down on the trampoline and trying out the tricks that he had mastered as a youth. Time has not been kind to our protagonist, as he attempts a backflip he rotates three quarters of a full rotation, hits his head on the steel rim and falls off plummeting down a steep hill. When his body comes to rest he realizes that he is at the base of a large ravine, but he notices a small cavern opening. As he brushes himself off and moves to investigate further he realizes that the small crack in the rock opens up to a MASSIVE CAVE. The cave contains a small stream that empties into another smaller room. It is in that room that DAVE discovers a rock structure that resembles a sarcophagus of sort. But upon closer inspection it is a GIANT BLOCK OF ICE containing that actor guy from Monkey Bone.

SMASH CUT TO: ROLL THE FUCKING OPENING CREDITS




I agree, it's not the most original thing I've ever written but Fraser could use the career boost, it's not like he's in that high of demand ever since Furry Vengeance. And honestly, if they can remake Point Break without Patrick Swayzee than nothing is sacred, so fuck you Samwise Gangee and Paulie Shore I'm remaking your stupid teen angst movie about high school losers and a Caveman as a buddy comedy with me and BF running around slaying valley girls and lording over West Hollywood clubs.

Ok, I'm not really writing a sequel and I don't even think it would be fun to hang out with Brendan Fraser, after he failed to close Liz Hurley in Bedazzled, I kinda lost interest in him anyway. That said, I do live in Encino now with two alternate life styled women and 2 30 year old guys...pretty random. But I have a pool, trampoline and ping pong table and they said they wouldn't be bothered if they found me passed out in the kitchen after a Friday night bender, so that's nice...and we don't cable, so I'll be forced to write more of my self-indulgent blogs and semi-autobiographical ruminations of how awesome college was, maybe I'll get famous after all.

So yeah, I kinda sorta live in the valley, but not really. I technically live on the north slope of the mountain. I think the fairest way to put it is "yes, I live west of the highway, but I'm in Bucktown." But fuck it, it's not like I'm a struggling actor in Burbank, although I do think that the fact that I work on a college campus is Benjamin Buttoning me a bit. I went to the USC tailgate last week and crushed between 40-50 beers including doing a keg stand at a Phi Psi tailgate. Yes, I was that guy (although not until I had exhausted all of my own booze)

"Hey man, I was a phi psi can I take a shot of that 4 dollar per handle vodka?"
"FUCK YA MAN!!!!"
"Can you also introduce me to all of those skinny girls dancing on the table in frat tanks and tell them that I am your 21 year old friend from UCLA...nevermind, I'll handle my own lies."

But honestly, tailgating is so great. I remember in college, I fucking hated it. I would DREAD home games for a litany of reasons. People would stay in Friday night, I would be cold and miserable Saturday mornings since IU was treacherous, god forbid we get an afternoon game. Then everyone would go home and die at like 4 o'clock and the weekend was over. (Sidenote: This didn't apply to Senior year when heroes like myself saved the day and had rocking after parties once the game started)
But that said, unless you were some sort of MacGuyver and good successfully broker a day shack after tailgate your cock was almost always locked down without the opportunity to take a drunken rando home on Friday or Saturday night. But it didn't really matter that much because whatever it's college people go out like 5 nights a week anyway.

BUT NOW...we work during the week. Friday comes around and it is a 48 hour spring break. Everyone can hold it together for 48 hours. Go to an event on Friday (a concert, a show, an art exhibit and bar afterward)

Saturday at 8am...It is Little 5, wake up at 5am and start drinking, make sure you are on campus by 10am...make sure you have lied about your age 30 times by noon, it helps if you have an old frat tee laying around from undergrad...great convo starter. (Oh, I'm visiting blah blah no strings attached hook up, see ya) The best part is they literally tailgate in their quad, it would be as if we got the entire IU Greek System in Dunn Meadow and had a rager. I'm not by any means complaining of our set up, it was much rowdier, but this next part is pretty money. Instead of going to the Kilroy's or insert your campus awesome bar here, they walk into a school building...to study? Fuck no...they have a bar in the basement called Traddies that rages for the rest of the day. I guess what I'm saying is that I still hate USC but they exceeded my opinion of them by lightyears...well done Trojans.

Anyway, from there you get your buddy's girlfriend to pick you up, go home take a nap by the pool and start re-pregaming around 9, then out until 2, then sleep til 8am Sunday and then if you are on the west coast you have NFL football starting almost immediately...so ya, limp to the liquor store, and start all over again.

But won't I be hungover on Monday morning if I do this every week? This isn't the blog for pussy ass bitches, go take an excedrin and sack up.

Next tailgate is this Saturday...and it's a night game, seriously hide your kids hide your wife, because this Angelino is coming strong.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

The Craigslist Killer

Life update: Still living on a couch, although I did their dishes today to endear myself and my friend's little brother has 3 queen mattresses pushed together in a Westwood apartment and assures me that the I will always be welcome to crash in the Superbed. (While 99% of people may think crashing on said superbed with 3 other frat guys would be weird, I find it strangely awesome)
Since I am too cheap to pay Westside rentals $60 to find a place for me I have been doing most of the legwork myself, clearly it's not going too well. The only places in my price range seem to be weirdos seeking roommates in Burbank and lonely cat women that want to treat me like the son they never had. Another major issue I am having is the descriptions of these units.

Super quiet neighborhood, not a party house, expect a clean respectful roommate, no drugs, no excess drinking, no drama. Cats ok, meow.

Are you fucking kidding me? Why do you think people move to LA, to enjoy a quiet read on the balcony during a sunny day? If I wanted a super quiet alcohol free existence I would have moved to Provo, Utah and gotten a job delivering milk door to door. This is LA, if you aren't raging hard and hosting at least one after party a month you're doing it wrong. Drugs are basically legal here, the coffee shops serve beer, aspiring industry people are required by law to go out 5 nights a week to "network." In fact, I think the only thing worse than living alone would be living with a pretentious roommate who judged me for cracking that second bottle of wine on a Monday night. Where is this Craigslist ad...

3 ex-USC frat guys seeking 4th roommate to live in broom closet, not because we want to pay less rent, but we need one more dude to play in our weekly golf foursome. Utilities included except for our $300 cable bill, must like to stay up extremely late listening to 80's music drinking 40's and buy at least one keg a month for our Sunday pool parties.

Do those people exist? They probably do, they just don't need to stoop to the depths of Craigslist to recruit. They can probably have a strict interview process and put potential roommates up to all sorts of exciting challenges like how fast your tennis serve is or how good your goalie shot is in foosball.

It's shocking how many people in LA just suck, I might have come to the conclusion that the people that are celebrities just for being naturally awesome, are probably just the cool kids from LA, like they were just being generally awesome and some kid's dad owned a production company and said "let's make you famous."

That said I press on and on searching for even a place to live for 90 days before I find something more permanent with actual friends. Some guy in Beverly Hills tried to scam me today and asked me to "wire him money and then he'll make sure that a courier brings me the house key." Are you kidding me pal, I wouldn't wire anyone money even if my daughter was being held hostage. You're a college professor teaching in the Philippines? There were enough misplaced modifiers in your craigslist ad that you clearly didn't graduate middle school.

Alas, at this point it looks like I'll be living with some Latin Kings in Long Beach or I may just have to murder one of my friends so I can take their room in their current housing situation. I really don't want to do that so I may just have to move to Newport and move in with a rich Jewish family looking to help out a blonde kid from the other side of the tracks.