Thursday, December 19, 2013

Single Dude Gift Guide

Pictured: Surprisingly not me!

I found my keys! I found my keys! Sure it came after I called 45 bars, 3 cab companies, rented a car, forced my mom to overnight me the last known key, but alas…I found them, in my outdoor closet where I keep my potato cannon.

How did this come to be? Well remember my boss gave me a fifth of Patron the night before the fifth exchange? He also gave me 5 limes. I only used about 2 of them for my margaritas. Now that I found my cannon out of place I can easily put the pieces together. I came back from the bar crawl with destruction on my mind. If I'm not going to fuck something I am going to launch these limes to the fucking moon. Well somehow in my drunken stupor a lime got stuck in the ignition chamber and I must've pouted by throwing my keys in the closet and going to bed. I guess it's a happy ending because now I have 2 pairs of keys so I can resume blacking out sans catastrophe and also I finished the job last night and launched one of those limes to Mar Vista. Now, on with today's post...

I have a white elephant gift exchange for work tomorrow. The only rule is the item has to be worth between 10 and 20 dollars. I have no fucking idea what to get. I considered a bottle of booze but that could be considered tacky. I pondered something funny like a sriracha t-shirt, but now I'm leaning towards outrageous. For example, what if I procured an Xbox One box and filled it with just a fucking moonrock. Would people flip shit for the Xbox, thinking 'Hey one of the producers must've broken the rules, MUST GET THE XBOX'...only to find out that it was just full of one measly ecstacy pill. Furthermore, how would this person react? Well no Xbox but, hey, Drugs! This will be an interesting midnight mass! Can you imagine rolling your way through Christmas Eve service? The whole lighting of the candles during Silent Night would probably be wild. And then sprinting home to rip open presents and drown egg nog? An EDM Christmas, I demand it. When is Skrillex putting out a holiday album, this kid demands a rave.

So far as I can find an Xbox box gratis, an x pill would technically fit into the ONE rule of ten to twenty bucks.

(Don't worry I probably won't do it)

But this got me thinking, what are the best gifts to give and receive around the holidays. You likely will be exchanging with friends, family and coworkers (if you're not, you'll probably be exchanging your laptop with a pawn shop guy for a gun to blow your brains out.) I have already received some conglomeration of Starbucks cards (the de facto, booze, scratch off tickets and other assorted knick knacks.

I imagine tomorrow I'll probably get more gift cards and hopefully some cash from the producers, and then whatever I procure from the white elephant. I have a few strategies. First is the threat of violence. If me, the youngest guy on the show, gets something that he REALLY REALLY wants and flips shit over it, no asshole locations manager is going to steal it from me when it's his turn. Taking the cool gift from the underpaid PA is like taking Tiny Tim's fucking Christmas turkey. There is also the implied threat of violence. I could beat up every single one of my coworkers blindfolded, and there is also the air that I'm the "cool" assistant, that everyone likes to remain cool with.

I find it unlikely that I will be robbed even though the people in Los Angeles are awful human beings, (by the way I'm assuming everyone knows what a white elephant is, you pick a gift and open it, on the next person's turn they can either steal or draft a new gift) but in the event that I do get fucked over, that assclown isn't getting a script, call sheet or paycheck the rest of the season OOPS. Don't mess with the little guy motherfucker.

All bullshit aside, whether to go the thoughtful route, funny or practical, here are a few gift recommendations, from the Single Dude himself. Happy holidays everyone, and remember it is better to give than to receive (talking to you ladies, and yes I'm referencing blow jobs)

Oh and PS these will all be relatively cheap.

5. A framed picture
You ever have a buddy and notice he has a bunch of pictures of his life in his room and his office and you didn't quite make the cut. Does that piss you off a little bit? Me too! Fret no more my friends, the cheapest and most awesome way to celebrate a friendship with someone is to celebrate one of your most epic memories. I spent about 15 thousand dollars of my parents money abroad, most of it was spent well, traveling, seeing the world, doing once in a lifetime cool shit. They were not thrilled about my spending habits, but that year for Christmas, I blew up awesome photos of me and my friends traveling across the world. They are all over their collective offices. My brother has a year book photo of him in the 2nd grade on a shitty wall. We live in an era where scrap booking and developed film are dead, but trust me, everyone loves an awesome photo, you're basically giving the gift of memories.

4. Tickets to an event
Whatever you buy someone, it's going to probably suck, or they'll hate it. If it's a shirt, they'll never wear it, if it's a copy of the Boo book they'll give it away, humans just aren't good at giving each other gifts. (Unless you are going strictly off a Christmas list, if anyone wants to see my Christmas list, this is all I want $1000 this will pay for my Park City trip and a new pair of decent skis)
But even if you were to give the most awesome gift ever, you will never get to have fun with it, so here is the trick…Tickets to a game/concert/underground sex show!

Now you have to play this one coy, make sure it's an event their girlfriend would hate, because if you get your buddy 2 tickets to Book of Mormon, he's probably going to assume it is intended as date material for he and his significant other. However, you get your buddy 2 tickets to Zedd or Lil' Wayne, the implication is that you not only have secured a night out on the town with your buddy but the two of you are going to RAGE. Also, this person will likely feel weirdly indebted to you for buying them a 40 dollar ticket and pay for all of your booze and drugs in order to even the score. Trust me, you're coming out ahead on this one 100% of the time.

3. Movie screeners
As much as I love going home for break, it is boring as fuck. My family all have to work, leaving me without a car, stuck in my brother's dungeon of a basement. I will rely on other friends that drove home for the holidays to chaeufeurr (not even close on that spelling but fuck it) my lazy ass around. Most days I will probably just watch tv, read and write…oh who am I kidding, I'm going to get bum drunk by myself and watch movies.

But at least I'll be watching movies that are going to win oscars and haven't reached Indiana yet. As someone from LA with unlimited access to this shit, it's very easy for me to load them up on a few drives and maybe even use them as bait to get someone to pick me up all the way out in Geist.

"Hey man, pick me up and we can watch Wolf of Wall Street"

"But that hasn't even come out yet"

"I've got a screener, come get me at my parents' house"

*drives me to broad ripple, I leave*

"Where are you going?"

"Oh, I've already watched that 5 times, I'm going to Kilroy's, enjoy!"

Tricking your friends into driving you places, the real meaning of Christmas.

2. A non-committal fling
As we have covered at length that despite the egg nog, the presents and the beloved family time, the holidays can be pretty boring. Sure I'll make a shitty snowman and throw a lacrosse stick in his hands, call him BROman and get 50 instagram likes, but after that I'm kinda over the whole winter weather thing. I'm skiing in February I don't need Indiana slush. But the good news is that there are going to be a lot of other bored people…and what do bored people do in boring places? They get fucked up and bang! (This is why every person you know from the middle of nowhere had sex before you) There are lots of girls I have varying degrees of sexual tension with. Those varying degrees go from, "we both got drunk and she thought about it once for like half a second and then was so repulsed with herself that she puked" to "it's only a matter of time."

One time in college I had said tension with someone basically all 4 years, one night at Kilroy's she just looked at me and said, "tonight's the night." I immediately knew what she meant, we briefly discussed the terms of our shack, had a couple more drinks and then went back to my place with a PG-13 sleepover. It was wonderful.

I can't recommend this enough, if there is someone from across the country that is also spending the holidays where you are and you are both single and bored, it would be a great mutual gift to one another to spend a night together. When the dust clears you go back to New York, she goes back to Denver and it's never spoken of again, but a nice little holiday memory will always occupy the back of your mind.

1. Nothing!
There is always such pressure to get someone the perfect gift, but what is more perfect than your company. Perhaps you each go out and buy the other person's favorite booze and then meet at your favorite restaurant and then afterward go to your favorite pub. The holidays are about spending time with one another doing what you like to do most. If that means packing bowls on a couch watching Seinfeld, you pack the shit out of those bowls, if it means watching Jimmy Stewart NOT leave town EVER for the 10 millionth time with your family while a fire roars in the back, fucking do that! The holidays are not a time to get stressed out, I have never understood that. Ohhhh added financial strain? I used to care about presents, now I want like some goofy socks and an AMC gift card, I have more fun badly fucking up a recipe for bourbon balls than I do scheming about where I'm going to wear my Burberry quarter-zip first (Note to my mother: if you are reading this, which WHY please stop…do not return any Burberry quarter zips you may have bought me)

I treat the holidays as a time to chill out, clear my mind and rekindle old relationships (both with friends and old flames) it is supposed to be a time of bliss. You get to not go to work, sleep until noon and watch Rick Grimes tell Kiera Knightley he loves her with note cards…it's fucking great. So whatever you do these holidays, if you have had a break up, lost a loved one, just know that it's not a time to be sad, but a time to be thankful for the fucked up traditions of our wonderful country. We celebrate the most famous birthday by giving everyone a shit ton of free vacation, and we tell them to eat turkey, wear funny sweaters and tell them they can consume raw egg! (I KNEW EVERYONE WAS FULL OF SHIT WHEN THEY SAID NOT TO EAT THE COOKIE DOUGH)

But NO MATTER WHAT you remember these holidays…remember that nothing has changed, yes we are still friends, and I would love for you to drive out to Geist and pick me up. I'll give you 5 bucks for gas #highschool

Happy Holidays everyone!

P.S. We are making a FUCK ton of bourbon balls

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Decemberism

Last Saturday I started a hard bender, that should be ending about now…in the last 10 days, I have done 2 bar crawls, a rave, a fifth exchange an open to close, lost a set of car keys, lost 2 credit cards, rented a car and probably eaten about 2.5 meals that weren't late night pizza.

But before we get into that, a few things I wrote into my phone that I thought would be good thing to blog about.

1. Who the fuck wears ear plugs at a rave?
I understand, loud music is very hard on your ears. My good friend's father is a world renowned ENT doctor, he would shit himself if he knew that I consistently went to raves without ear plugs, but the problem is, ear plugs make you look uncool. The reason one goes to a rave is to get drunk, do drugs, dance and eventually make out with some equally fucked up sweaty chick.
This becomes much harder to do when you're wearing ear plugs, and can't whisper stimulating conversation on the dance floor such as "What's your name?" or "You got any rolls?"
I get it, you want to be able to hear when you are in your 80's but you will have much more respect from your grandkids if you are obviously falling apart due to years of hard living.

2. What type of dipshit streams a concert?
As previously mentioned, while "going to a show for the music man" is a bullshit line you will hear many a hipster say, it's not true. People go to concerts to party and hopefully have sex in a portopotty, even if you legitimately do not want to imbibe or roll your face off, you still want the pounding bass pulsing through your body and to feel the burn of the flames or the cooling touch of the co2 cannon. Watching on Youtube just sounds like a torturous way to induce FOMO on yourself. At best, it will just piss you off that you aren't there. You won't actually enjoy yourself while you watch a grainy lagging feed on your iPad, but you will make out the fact that some bro is 3 way kissing a couple sluts wearing nothing but pasties but you couldn't afford to buy tickets because you just paid a 6 month car insurance premium. This ends with you masturbating while you cry. If you can't go to the show for whatever reason, it's probably best to avoid it completely. Shut down social media too...people know that hash tag #coachella is guaranteed to get them a ton of likes, it's bound to be everywhere.

3. What the hell do extras talk about?
I work on a tv show and from time to time I spend extensive amounts of time on set. But I'm part of the crew, most of these guys are my friends and coworkers. We talk about our weekends, how the shoot is going or a movie we recently saw. But on certain days we will have hundreds of background actors. These background will have to pretend to be partying or doing some other sort of bullshit act, repeated takes, over several hours. But they literally meet each other a few seconds before the take. An AD will make a white guy stand next to a black guy and an Asian girl, so the scene appears to be "multi-cultural." There you go, that's your social pod for the next 3 hours.
I know what I would do, I would take this opportunity to attempt to nail as many chicks as possible. Here is my rationale. First of all, every extra is a pretty desperate person, they need 75 bucks in a bad way. Most extras are aspiring actors, but even the most delusional of them probably realize they won't be noticed in the background of a pool party scene demonstrating "acting talent."
Also you know that this person doesn't have shit going on. After they wrap the scene, most extras are going home and hoping to get another extra gig in a few days.

And you know what bored, desperate, poor, girls with no ambition are down to do? Get drunk and fuck. But most extra males are themselves pathetic, possessing no game they just start saying the alphabet when they run out of small talk. If they had any game they would at least be getting guest star roles. But still, I can't imagine how hard it would be to put up massive numbers by just taking a bunch of girls to shitty valley bars at wrap, its got to be better than going back to their parent's lower middle class Woodland Hills home.

These are the things that go through my mind when I'm drunk in a basement at my roommate's holiday party whilst A-Trak djs on stage.

So back to matters of importance.

What business does a 26 year old have taking a party bus down to Hermosa and blacking out in the name of the Big Ten? Well apparently not much. As much fun as I would love to claim I had on the crawl, I remember absolutely nothing. Literally, I pre gamed from 9am-11am at my apartment and then walked a couple blocks to get on the bus and remember nothing after that. During this time I lost a credit card and car keys.

Now if you have lost a credit card before you know it sucks, but only like 3 out of 10. Basically you are without access to money for the rest of the weekend. There is a new feature at some Chase banks where they will print you a new debit card on site, but it's just not pleasant. Going to the bank blows, there is always some sort of inherent judgment when I realize a personal banker is looking at my meager account balance realizing that I pissed all my money away the previous weekend and then lost my card. I honestly don't even understand how I can be considered an asset for Chase, I'm just glad they haven't fired me yet.

I started to see some activity on my card Sunday afternoon though so I immediately cancelled it. A few hours later I realized one of my friends had my card (and since all Chase Debit cards look the same, didn't realize it) we had apparently swapped during the mayhem of the crawl.

So whatever, I got a new card and life moved on. (Coincidentally I found an old credit card while tearing my apartment apart, previously thought to have been lost 3 months ago) Losing your car keys however is a 12/10 on the pain in the dick scale.

Oh don't you have a back-up set? Well as a matter of fact I had 3 back-ups, they have all been lost over the years in a similar fashion. So what does one do when you lose keys and need to drive to work?

Your options are as follows:
1. Have the car towed to the dealer and have a new key laser cut with a chip for $400.
2. Rent a car for 2 days and beg your mom to overnight the last remaining key.
3. Go get drunk to take your mind off it and then borrow your roommate's car Monday morning.

I initially chose 3, before finally resorting to option 2 Monday night. I must say, driving a rental car was lovely, I might just treat myself once in a while, or use them for dates. I imagine a girl would be very impressed by a man with a clean car, or even if she could clearly tell it was a rental. Most people that use rental cars are mature, it implies that they have maintenance done on their vehicle. I will simply drive my car until it no longer starts, at which point I will give it to NPR and ask my father to buy me a new one. (I might legit just take hand me down cars from my parents for the rest of my life or until I sell a script...so potentially the rest of my life)

But come Thursday, I had my new keys, I had my new credit card...I'm fucking back baby? How should I celebrate? By going to a rave on Venice Beach and staying out at Townhouse until 2 in the morning of course! Quasi-famous dj Atrak played the Snowglobe/Recess holiday party Thursday night and had an interesting array of free booze. The party was co-sponsored by Colt 45 and some sort of Four Loko-esque energy drink, so if that sounds like a good time, I assure you, it's an even better hangover.

This would of course lead into the Friday of the 3rd annual west coast fifth exchange. You know how this goes, each one of my friends buys a fifth of booze, wraps it and delivers it to our secret santa victim. I had a buddy that works in fashion so I of course got him skinny girl vodka wrapped in an Adam Levine cardigan (has his own line at Kmart now!) I received some Krakken rum and a kit of ingredients for dark and stormy (first time drinking that beverage, big fan!) Out of the 24 bottles of alcohol at the party, we drank about 23.5, and called it quits at 5am...just enough time to sleep until noon and then immediately start pre gaming for the Santa Monica Pub Crawl...

Ugh.

You would think that I had learned my lesson the previous week when I, you know, lost my life. But, fucking Paul Bird was in town, and after Ragegiving, he was ready for an encore. So we all dressed up in Santa outfits and stormed to Main Street. As with most bar crawls, I peaked entirely too early as I was making out with a pair of lipstick lesbians while we were still at our first bar. (It's tough to top that) But my real trouble started when we got to a bar that had a special on Fireball shots. My outfit was incredible, my dance moves impressive, my confidence at an all time high, but nothing can save me from myself. Instead of finding the hottest chick in the bar and directing her straight to my bed, I think I unknowingly stepped outside in a desperate attempt to stop sweating. I was not allowed back in. This is how people get separated on bar crawls, I would never see my team again.

Oof.

The next thing I knew, I had time traveled to Brentwood and I was again partying with Johnathan Martin, this time engaged in a heated game of beer pong. It did not end well for me. Again I resisted the urge to make him get on his face or do some elbows and toes on bottle caps because well, even if he was a bit of a pussy with that whole hazing thing, he is still about 6'7 300 pounds and seems to be a cool enough dude.

The weekend has to end at this point right? Nope, made it to a rooftop bar to pregame the Venice Canal parade and ended the night by drowning a couple bottles of Pinot Noir at Mao's, because the key to not getting hungover is to never stop drinking.

Yesterday was, to say the least, a struggle. But I've realized a few things to help you get through it. Never tell anyone at work a fucking thing, do not run with them in your social circles, and make sure your show has been cancelled before you black out at the wrap party. The key is to set a precedent that you are just a sickly child with bad seasonal allergies.

I currently don't have a voice, I can hardly move, but I set a precedent Friday that I was coming down with some sort of bug. I told my coworkers that I was going to have a holiday gift exchange with my friends and spend the rest of the weekend trying to get healthy. This way when I seem a step behind on Monday, it is because I am clearly recovering from my illness, not going through the various stages of withdrawl. God Forbid I call in sick on Monday, they will immediately think "ohhh he was sick on Friday" not, "That worthless piece of shit is too hungover to come in."

There was a costumes girl that called in sick yesterday, and I truly believe that she had food poisoning, but she set the stage that she was going to a birthday party Sunday and told the whole world how excited she was about it last week while we were at work. When she called in sick Monday with food poisoning, she didn't have a prayer. Everyone assumed the worst. Now it doesn't really matter in entertainment, everyone is a terrible person who drinks, does drugs and cheats on their significant other, but still.

One of the things that living a debaucherous lifestyle is to shroud yourself in a vail of mystery and deceit, no one outside my close circle gets to know who I really am, no one ever knows if I'm serious or joking, and when I make a deliberate effort to lie, I commit to that shit.

The storm is over now, the clouds have settled and the warm weather has returned to Los Angeles. I'll go home in a few days and do lots of wholesome activities in the midwest and when I go out a few times I'll humblebrag about how much better my life is to everyone just enough to make them subconsciously hate themselves. I'll probably go to Chicago for New Years and that's how my 2013 will end. I'll look back and say "Fuck, I'm still an unpaid writer working in a production office, when the fuck am I going to get real about all of this."

But then when you take a moment to stop wallowing in your own misery, I'll think about all the little vacations I took. Mardi Gras, Palm Springs, San Francisco, Vegas x2. All the wild and crazy shit I did last year are memories that will last me a lifetime. Why Am I in such a hurry to be successful. I have plenty of time to scrape by and be irresponsible and build my resume of fun stories I'll be able to use in my writing down the road. And it's not like I'm going into a sales office and making cold calls all day, I fucking drive to the Universal Lot and make tv...then I go home and lay on my couch with the windows open in December and watch tv while I smell the ocean.

There were a lot of bad choices that led to this point but I have to accept that there were probably a couple good ones too. Some people hide what they are or want to be, I've accepted that I'm just a single guy living the dream in LA that has an exaggerated misogynistic version of himself as an alter-ego that he writes with, and that's ok. I live hard and it's starting to get a little out of hand, but it's going to be ok in the long run, because I keep it real with you and I keep it real with myself.

That was a rough 10 days, and I am dehydrated...both physically and emotionally, but hey, that's why the Arrowhead guy delivers water 4 times a week, to put me back on the road to recovery.

Monday, December 16, 2013

Ragegiving part 2

Everyone has left for a sexual harassment meeting and I am in charge for the next hour. It's funny that I am the one person exempt from going (I did it on my last show, you get a year) because I think not a week later, I was violating some of those policies. Hooking up with a coworker is kind of like a bad snl sketch. In theory it's fucking amazing, why would I not want to spend the 13th hour of my shift banging it out in the copy room. Work and play concurrently, it's a win/win! Well the 10th iteration of the Californians wasn't funny either. So when the flirty girl at work starts batting her eyelashes at you, choose cheese instead and then go out that night and find some random slut at The Whaler in Marrrrrrina Del Rey (That's almost Long Beach man!)

One more thing on the Toluca Lake Trader Joe's. Gays, I'm rooting for you. I really really am. But after I have suffered an hour in the suffocating pretentious smugness of Burbank's worst…not the best time to ask me to sign a petition for anything. The midwest comes out in me and I just want to yell out to everyone. EAT BREAD AND RED MEAT AND FUCK CHICKS AGHHHHHHHHH!!!!

Enough of that…where were we? Ah yes, Beautiful San Francisco.

So let's just go ahead and skip to Saturday shall we? Friday was kind of a non-event, it climaxed in me and all of my friends chickening out on a rub n tug parlor. (One could argue there was no climax at all heyoooo) We ended up at some sort of booze less night club that literally has the mission statement "come here blacked out or sneak in your own booze, because we don't have a liquor license."

This place, cleverly named "The End Up" (OMG it's like the hangge uppe lollllz) was home to 2 major subgroups. Shirtless gays (to be expected) and Asians. Has anyone ever realized that almost every mid 20's Asian girl is a hard 7. They are small and cute, with no boobs or ass, but they're skinny. Literally they have a floor of 6 and a ceiling of 8, it's amazing. That is right in my wheelhouse. Watch, I'll marry an Asian. (Sidenote: LOTS of Asians in SF, you would've thought after the whole WW2 internment camp thing they would've GTFO, but apparently Silicon Valley pays THAT well.)

Wtf, we were going to skip this. Ok. Saturday.

Saturday started off like any other normal day, we were nearing black out drunk before noon at an Alabama bar in the marina district. "Crossroads" for those of you in the know. Anyone that knows how Saturday went down won't be surprised when I say I was standing on top of a table, doing key bumps, screaming War Damn Eagle! Much to the chagrin of all of the Bama fans. In most towns I would have been beaten badly, but I believe the San Francisco folk are a more socially conscious peaceful people. I think someone made a comment, "You can be as obnoxious as you want as long as your car has low emissions."

We stayed at the bar through the greatest game in college football history and into the USC game. It was at this point that there was a secret pact made behind my back.

"If we get Dave super fucked up and have hot chicks talk to him, maybe he will forget about the Pretty Lights concert."

Let me backtrack a little bit.

The whole point of this trip was to go to a Pretty Lights concert and roll balls.

My friends didn't see it that way. In fact, I was brought to SF on false pretenses. We will avoid the clubs, we'll get super drunk, eat chicken wings and then go to Pretty Lights. At this point in the trip, I felt like I was in charge. I usually am, just because I am the loudest and tallest in the group, little did I know this sabotage mission was in place.

Somehow, at some point in the day, people start feeding me shots, gorgeous blonds start approaching me. This never happens to me. It wasn't until it was in a cab heading to Ruby Skye that I knew it was too late. I had been sabotaged.

You can imagine what happens next. 3 bottles and a group of dick hungry sluts orbiting my table like some sort of unruly comets, just ready to armageddon into our table and steal all of our booze.

But that's why you do it, right? That's the idea in buying bottle service. You look cool, and hot chicks come hang out with you in exchange for the privilege of being behind a rope. Mark my words, if there is a fucking rope, there are people that want to be behind it. And when you're in the 12th hour of a bender you really begin to stop caring.

"Should we get another bottle? Just $200 more each!" Fuck it, why not? Maybe one of us will get laid.

A lot of what I tell you on this blog is made up for the purpose of telling a better story, but I shit you not I talked to a girl on the dance floor for 2 hours not knowing that the girl I was grinding on was from a different hemisphere and didn't speak english. Does it make me rapey that I just assumed she was just too drunk to talk and yet I continued to pursue?

Turns out she was Brazillian, also turns out Brazillians speak Portuguese and not Spanish. Lastly, when trying to pantomime your intentions to someone with which you have a language gap, putting your right pointer finger into a simulated hole made with your left hand is ineffective.

Also ineffective moves tried by me last weekend:
- I'm from out of town, what's fun around here? (Oh where? LA! Oh, FUCK LA)
- I'm locked out of my hotel, I have no place to sleep (sucks, I think I saw a park bench outside)
- I'm having an after party at my hotel room (oh really, you and who else)

My night comes to an end and I am financially and morally bankrupt. I made my way to a late night massage parlor and I was in such a pathetic state that the overweight Taiwanese masseuse/prostitute refused to service me. I didn't even know this was legal. Probably for the best though, I can't imagine the shame in failing to achieve an erection during a rub and tug and still having to pay full freight.

During my 10 hour drive home from Sacramento to Los Angeles (Yes it was a top 5 terrible day of my life) I had plenty of time to reflect on my trip. I realized the happiest part of my trip wasn't crawling around SF in search of hedonism, or torturing 19 year olds in the name of war re-enactment, or even the shot of vodka I took ocularly at the bar because I heard it would get me drunk faster.

The best part of the trip was sitting around the dinner table telling funny stories from years passed with close friends and family. Recounting all my misadventures from abroad and razzing on buddies about fat chicks they hooked up with once can be much more fulfilling that chasing a bunch of tail and trying to see how blacked out I can get the fastest.

Thanksgiving will always be one of my favorite holidays, and this one will be no exception…from the Vietnam War to being denied a happy ending in SF's underworld.

When you go as hard on the weekend's as I do, people look at you a little funny at work on Monday. What is this guy's real story? Why does he show up with a hoarse voice and mysterious cuts, why is he so quiet and out of it until 2pm…

Because that's when my BAC returns to 0 and I can be a functioning member of society again.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Ragegiving part 1

People may argue that certain parts of the Middle East, or a war concentration camp or possibly Cleveland is "the worst place in the world." But make no mistake, that distinction belongs to the Trader Joe's in Toluca Lake, California. This is not an affront to the Trader Joe's franchise in general, in fact I am a regular shopper at 33rd and Pico. I drink a bottle of 2 buck chuck every night I write and genuinely think that Joe O's are better than Cheerios. I am arguing that this specific Trader Joe's is far worse than the institution of communicable disease (can we just accept that EVERYONE has had someone close to them die of cancer and therefore it universally sucks and just know that the phrase "worse than cancer" is therefor inoffensive? No? Ok.)

First of all what is Toluca Lake? Toluca Lake is a community full of moderately successful studio folk who are too pretentious to admit they live in Burbank. They still live in the valley which is in itself embarrassing, but apparently it's less embarrassing when you live in the self proclaimed "Pacific Palisades" of the 818. By the way, it's not. It's a marginally nicer area than surrounding North Hollywood, Studio City and Burbank. But I digress.

The people that eat raw/vegan/gluten free in most areas do it because they think they gain some sort of competitive advantage from doing so. Maybe you live by the beach and think it will make you skinnier and thus more fuckable come summer. Maybe you saw a documentary on how slaughterhouses work and you get physically ill when you think about consuming meat. These motherfuckers do it simply so they can judge those who don't. You either grab a piece of bread and some guy says, "you know the human body wasn't built to handle gluten" or "ever since I gave up meat my colon operates so much better."

Well first of all thanks for sharing with me your shitting habits. I'm fairly certain the human ass wasn't programmed to have shit shoved up it? But that didn't stop you. Look man, I don't give a fuck what you eat but don't you spew your liberal bullshit at me about how you feel great ever since you started eating exclusively nuts. I'm sure I would feel great if I didn't drink 5 nights a week and engage in reckless behavior that resulted in varying bodily injury. So when I walk in with a bagel in the morning don't fucking ask me:

"Oh that looks so good, is it GF"

No actually it's GFY. Go fuck yourself loser.

Now let's get to what you really want to read about, how much blow I did in San Francisco.

Doing Thanksgiving with a friend's family is a strange experience. Of course there is a ton of drunken family drama and you want to pick a side and get involved, but it's not really your place. I limped into Sacramento after an extra debaucherous Wednesday night. I believe I drank about 30 shots of whiskey before finally waking up to find out I had again woken up alone, on top of a pile of my clean clothes staring at a note I had left myself before going out.

"Don't even think about passing out before you pack for NorCal faggot."

The shame of not being able to listen to a sober version of myself poured over me as I peered into my empty bag. (Note: this is a lie, because that would mean I unpacked after the Red Wedding)

So I threw a bunch of wrinkly clothes into a bag and ubered it to the airport, JUST in time to make the earlier Southwest flight. Only it turns out Southwest doesn't do standby flights so I had to buy a new ticket just to get on a plane 3 hours earlier. THANKS FOR NOTHING OBAMA.

(I did get mistakenly upgraded to business select though where I drank 4 cocktails in 45 minutes thus earning back 20 dollars from those greedy bastards)

Anyway flash forward to Thanksgiving dinner. I grew up in a family where I spent all of Thanksgiving getting scolded for how much I party.
"When are you going to get a nice girlfriend?" I suppose when I'm done railing out random sluts in bathrooms, that's when I'll settle down.

Eventually I go downstairs where I can freely drink my whiskey while playing Karaoke Revolution with all my 5 year old cousins and they don't give a shit. That is a judgment free zone. As long as I sing Miley songs with them, I can get as drunk as I want.

This family was not like that at all. We were required to take a shot between every course and then a shot after every person said for what they were thankful. All in, I finished dinner about 12 deep. But that was just the beginning. From there, the party moves to the garage and after about 60 games of Civil War and even more You Got Served, when everyone is good and blacked out and my phone is completely destroyed (ya thats why I haven't been answering your texts) then comes the real fun.

My friend has a younger brother and he invited his rag tag of friends over...then the old guys (us) and the young guys (them) do a re-enactment of the Vietnam War.

When I say a re-enactment of the Vietnam War, it is more like an all out brawl akin to the battle scene from Anchorman. People weaponize any available household object and begin to violently brawl.
There was blood everywhere, thousands of dollars of damage done, and I couldn't help myself thinking, "is this real life?" There was literally a trash can aflame in the corner and a 18 year old vomitting blood and crying.

I imagine this is partially what real war looks like.

We captured one of the Vietcong and our Marine buddy proceeded to water board him for information. What information you ask? It doesn't really matter, we were just torturing him until the Vietnamese side decided to surrender, which happened after about 5 minutes of bloodcurdling screams from a 19 year old. On a driveway. Of a 20,000 square foot home. In a gated community. Of suburban Sacramento.

Then in the spirit of the first Thanksgiving when the Pilgrims and Indians settled their differences over turkey and masked potatoes; we shook hands with the enemy and had drunken Thanksgiving dos in the garage.

Something about drunkenly eating leftovers amongst the carnage of the battle scene is supposed to signify a deep level of respect among the combatants. Needless to say a "peace pipe" was passed around the table and I immediately went to a room to pass out face down on the floor.

Unfortunately, a little later in the evening, Vietnam 2 broke out and I think my buddy broke a bottle over his little brother's head and I had to pretend to be asleep face down in the corner while my friend's mother berated him for 2 hours about how it's not ok to break bottles over your brother's head, even in the heated passion of war re-enactment. I've been tweaking on weed before. This was the worst. I remember stumbling through the house in between reality and dreams. One of my buddies was fucking an Asian in the movie theater, one had a face covered in blood and then there were the girls we had invited over, jaws dropped, unsure how to handle the animals that their high school friends had become. It was surreal.

I came out of a blackout in the corner, crying, eating leftover turkey, and trying to use my broken phone's Siri to call my ex girlfriend. It was equal parts horrifying and incredible. Thursday came to a close and my weekend looked like it was nearing rock bottom, but I think I can save it...Sure I'm 0 for 2 thus far on the trip. Black Wednesday and Thanksgiving couldn't have ended more pitifully for me. But you know as they say, 2 outta 4 ain't bad (do they say that?) Whatever, motherfuckers...I can turn this around.

We hadn't even departed for San Francisco yet. This was just the wholesome family holiday portion of the trip. What would happen when we got 7 bros in a hotel room in the marina district?
Will there be cable cars? Alcatraz Tours? Fun group photos on the Golden Gate Bridge?
Or...just a bunch of drugs, hookers and 48 hours of straight drinking?

FIND OUT TOMORROW in the thrilling conclusion to Ragegiving!

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

5 Natural disasters that I'm not afraid of, and neither are you

Oy, tonight was supposed to be the night of relaxation and laundry before the big bender, but then I bought a 3 dollar bottle of wine and some 30 dollar pretentious tofu burrito and now I am not doing a fucking thing. I just took a hit of some medically legal marijuana, they might as well call that shit lethal, I can hardly pick up the remote without considerate effort. Yep I live in a country where I can watch movies that haven't come out yet on my couch while I drink red wine alone on a Tuesday. That's what I'm thankful for.

Oh, ya that. Thanksgiving, you'll get a Thanksgiving blog later, it will start out about how I'm thankful for sluts and drug dealers that deliver and shit but then I'll totally redeem the whole thing in the last 2 paragraphs by realizing some sort of deeper meaning or some shit, it's crazy, you'll never see it coming.

I also have topics on the horizon ranging from the 7 deadly sins to how to end a blowjob embargo, but today I want to talk about fucking earthquakes. Because well I think that people that die in earthquakes are pussies and you know what? I'd like to explain why. Here are the top 5 natural disasters you can survive by not being retarded.

5. Earthquakes
Do you know how many fucking dorks in Los Angeles have little "earthquake preparedness" kits. It's like a bag of flashlights, some rope and some chicken noodle soup. Is that really what you're going to fucking want if a hole opens up in the middle of the street and swallows your car, all while your shitty track style home's roof is caving in on you? What are you going to do, convert the rope into a lasso and snag your Xbox before it is crushed by an unruly brick?

Look in all actuality the walls will shake and cause some structural damage to your home, it will annoy you. The power and cable will go out, but you might get sell service. What your disaster kit should have is a fifth of whiskey and an extra battery so you can get drunk and charge your phone while you wait for Twitter to load (and instagram and tinder, best believe I would be swiping right in the wake of a natural disaster...that "the world might be ending" shit is the world's strongest aphrodisiac)

But let's say even if it's a really bad earthquake right? You are hurt, roads around you are destroyed, you're house is ruined and you're devastated about your lack of adequate insurance, it's not like the zombie apocalypse is underway. You walk down the street and grab a banana, or loot! How much fun does it look like to loot! Sure there is a luck factor on this one, even the biggest bro couldn't survive a tree branch impaling him in the middle of the night, but honestly, only idiots live in earthquake zones. The west side of LA is relatively safe. The people that need to worry are pretty much in the valley and the hills. The people in the hills and the people in the valley. The folks that live in the hills live in homes made of stilts, they understand the risk, they know that they are fucked either way, but are just too damn cocky and rich to give a fuck. The people in the valley well, have you ever heard the phrase there's no such thing as a free lunch? Did you think you could live in a shitty area, adjacent to paradise, pay a substantial discount and not have to incur a risk? Move to the beach, ain't no earthquake fucking with Venice. But what about...

Survival rating: 4 moonrocks out of 5. You would have to get some terrible Final Destination luck to dies in an earthquake.

4. A Tsunami
I saw the movie The Impossible. Based on this alone I consider myself an expert. In that movie they make a tidal wave look pretty damn frightening, and they tease the death of every character and then take a major cop out and reveal that everyone actually survived and lived happily ever after. And that's exactly what would happen if a massive storm surge hit America. Do you know why tens of thousands of people die when a tsunami hits Malaysia or some comparable third world country? Because they live in huts made of mud and leaves. Not the most resilient against several tons of water pressure from a giant wave. Also these cultures lack high def television and smart phones with weather alert systems. If a 10 foot storm surge was actually threatening Venice, I would simply walk to Mar Vista and then catch that wave to West Hollywood, where I would brag about my exploits and eventually get domed up by some Jewish UTA mailroom girl.

It's a tragedy when 3rd world countries are wiped out by mother natures tour de force, but it just wouldn't happen here. The before and after shots are compelling, but in America, we have infrastructure. The only excuse for dying in a tsunami as an American, is you were out to see trying to catch a sick wave like that of the hundred year storm, like Bodhi at the end of Point Break. But I'm pretty sure he actually survived, and the studio is just sitting on that sequel. Most Americans can swim, and if you are a moderate swimmer, a tsunami poses little threat to you. The water damage would be annoying, and all the hipstery east siders would preach about how they were right about the west side being awful. There would be one casualty. A black guy that would singlehandedly set a stereotype back 20 years and bread horrible twitter jokes.

Survival rating: 4 fireball shots out of 5.

3. A Hurricane
I am shocked, SHOCKED that there isn't more backlash over natural disasters being associated with fun. Six Flags: Hurricane Harbor, the Johnny Tsunami movie franchise. Hell a city that was nearly WIPED OUT by a hurricane a few years ago, claims that disaster as it's official drink. With all the Indians bitching about the trail of tears and the Washington Redskins, you would think there would be one bleeding heart Katrina survivor that would like the name of the drink changed to something like "The Bourbon Blast." I'm glad this hasn't happened yet, because I would hate to berate a disaster survivor by telling them that they are what's wrong with the country.

Hurricanes suck. They bring lots of rain, flooding and general shittiness. From what I have heard about New Orleans in 2005, it sounds like it was not a pleasant experience. But this is not a blog entry on the top 5 most unpleasant natural disasters. It's a list of you are a pussy if you can't survive _____. When a hurricane comes, you literally have WEEKS of warning. But people are like too fucking proud to leave. That is dumb. Some people want to "ride out the storm" and have hurricane parties. That is dumb (but also fucking awesome) I'm assuming the people that die in hurricanes are really old and poor. But even if you are old and poor I feel like you can ride a bike out of the danger zone if given enough time. Or maybe solicit a ride from a family member up to Arkansas, that state might suck but it is SAFE. That place is so fucking boring, that disasters don't even want to hang out there.

Are you in the midst of a hurricane warning? Here is an idea, road trip out of the fucking danger zone. Think of it as a free week off from work. Send your boss emails about "how you're safe" but really you're partying in Austin every night and couldn't give a shit less what's going on back home.
Sure you go back and a bunch of your shit is fucked up, but you RENT. Make your landlord fix it while you check into a hotel for a few weeks. Sounds like a lovely little vacation, why do people complain so much about having to leave town for a little while?

Survival rating: 4 cocaine lines out of 5. Mark my words the Carolina Hurricanes will change their name before the Redskins.

2. Tornado
Was anything more thrilling in high school than a tornado warning? I have to admit I was always disappointed when nothing bad really happened, just a few trees ripped out of the ground in Greenfield. I was always secretly rooting for the tornado. What if it rips through my school and I get to stay home for a month, like a perpetual snow day!

But the thing is...that shit never fucking happens. We were all spoiled by growing up with the movie Twister, I thought for sure one day I would get to experience the thrill of outrunning an F5 on a high speed chase down the highway. One day when I was 11 years old I got the chance. A mid-sized tornado crossed the street in front of my dad and me on the way home from baseball practice. I was all "ahh fuck ya dad, let's run for our lives." He was unimpressed. Apparently Iowa tornadoes > Indiana tornadoes, we drove right past it while it unimpressively ripped a few branches off a tree and piddled out in a corn field. You cannot imagine my disappointment.

The reason you always hear about MASS DEATH and DESTRUCTION due to tornadoes is because they attack middle America. Some of the deepest poverty is in middle America. You hear about a tornado slicing through a trailer park and obliterating everything. But do you know what would happen if a tornado ran right over your nice brick house? Not much. Roof damage. If you are in the basement playing video games you could potentially lose power, but no reason to stop drinking the beer, just make sure you have an extra keg, tornadoes like to "attack" in groups, you could be down there a while.

Survival rating: 5 illegal prescription pills out of 5.

Before number 1, a few that JUST missed the cut.

- Flood: This is pitiful, just don't drive into a river and if you do, tread water, you learn this when you're 4.

-Mudslide: Really only affects cardboard box villages in central America.

-Avalanche: If you die in an avalanche you're a fucking badasss, the only bigger badass is one who survives said avalanche.

-Wildfire: Again, watching your home burn down from across the street must be shitty, but it's not like if you refuse to leave the fire will let it go, the old tie yourself to a tree in front of a bulldozer approach is invalid here.

1. Blizzard
I love snow. I love snow days. I love snow skiing. I liked sledding and building forts, and having snowball fights when I was younger. It's pretty much the greatest thing in the world (in the midwest, in winter...80 degrees and sunny every day in Venice is better)

I was ALWAYS let down by snow forecasts as a child. Some dipshit weatherman would predict like 18 inches and I would get SO fired up, and then you know what? Fucking nothing. Actually worse than nothing. We would get a pesky inch and my dad would make me shovel the driveway. And then go to school. FUCK that. Then we would get to school and bitch and moan about the lack of snow day. We had so many plans, we were going to build a sick jump at the Butler hill, then go do donuts and shit and maybe get fucked up in someone's basement. RUINED!

Once I moved to Chicago the stakes were upped a bit. They get legit snow there, but also a lot of annoying shit like freezing rain and gross slushy shit that doesn't lead to work cancellation. Then snowmageddon came. We literally got like 25 inches of snow. 4000 people abandoned their cars on Lake Shore Drive, we had 2 days off of work and I got SO fucked up both days. Like with reckless abandon I stormed around Chicago in the middle of a blizzard carrying a 40 up Halsted on my way to the bar.

Yet.

PEOPLE DIED. How?!?!?! All you have to do during a blizzard is stay inside. It's not that hard! Just keep the door closed, lay around and be lazy. If you feel like going out and trying to find some equally ambitious lass to slay, that's your business, but if a little snow causes your death, you are pathetic. This is not the Donner party we're talking about, no cannibalism going through the Oregon pass, just some snow and some bad roads. Even if you are like me and have nothing but Sriracha and beer in your fridge, that shit should sustain you at least for a week. There isn't even lasting damage from a blizzard. I guess if your car slides off the road and into a tree that will hurt in the morning, but whatever. Safety first, saddle up at the nearest bar as soon as you see a flurry, that's what I say. Or find a nice warm basement somewhere and do some blow being sure to make every possible snow/cocaine joke.

Survival rating: 5 drunk texts out of 5.

The moral of the story is that if you rent an apartment somewhere you could never afford to buy and an awful tragedy befells your town, it will be someone else's problem. There are at least 3 top notch cities in this country, if the one you are in goes down, just rotate to one of the other 2. If you're butthurt about leaving all your friends and life then come back after the mess has been cleaned up. Obviously this semi-nomadic lifestyle works best if you have few tangible possessions and no significant others or children. But that's the best part, there are sluts to bang all over the world, and Venice is not the only place it's chronically sunny with a chance of rage.

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Single Dude Daily

This morning in the car on the way to work I had 3 revelations.

1. Angelenos cannot drive in the rain for shit. I assure you there were 20 fatal car accidents this morning, and really we're all better for it. If some schmuck can't text his mistress whilst driving in mist and not drive his car off the freeway, ending in a fiery death; then he deserves to die.

2. Why the fuck is the sports media so overwhelmingly sympathetic to the plight of the gay athlete or the bullied athlete or the multiracial athlete. Even my favorite sports blogger, Drew Magary, spends 3000 words once a month crying about a bunch of gays that can't get jobs in the NFL. There are probably a lot of chronic masturbators that can't get jobs in the NFL either, but why is there no emphatic plea for the monkey spankers? What about the privileged white kid who can't get a job in the NBA? I want a story about the Will Sheeheys of the world and how it's all a conspiracy to oppress him because he got to drive a BMW to high school so now he has to suffer! Look, no one cares how much cock you gobble or if you're a huge pussy or whatever. It's a fucking excuse for a lack of talent.

3. I don't necessarily need to write 3000 word dissertations every time I have something to say. It's hard to build a brand or a following when you only post something once every 10 days, when I happened to drive by a Trader Joe's and think "I should get a bottle of 2 buck Chuck and spend an hour writing something horribly offensive." I should just do something short once in a while, something you can read at a traffic light. Actually don't look at your phone and drive, unless you are sealing a deal with some Tinderette who is on the fast track to riding your cock.

Today's random thought is as follows:
Is Thanksgiving to January 2nd the greatest month and a half of the year? In the stretch of about 40 days, I personally have Thanksgiving (aka a monster trip to San Francisco with the sketchiest guys I know) The Big Ten Bar Crawl, The annual secret santa fifth exchange, The Santa Crawl, 2 weeks off of work, Christmas, a possible impromptu ski trip and new Years.

Every single one of those are worthy of an epic blog post on their own. Sure, the weather isn't great, but any time I have a drink in my hand instead of a script and a handful of brads, it's a good day. I will probably be drunk for at least 3/4 of this stretch, and go on long periods of wearing an ugly Christmas sweater whilst holding a mug of egg nog, and I couldn't be happier.

Nothing brings a smile to my face like themed drinking events, and I assure you there will be plenty of slutty drunken mdma elves to go around for everyone. Every weekend has the potential for greatness, every night could be the greatest of your life. You get presents just for survivng until a certain day from friends, family and everyone above your pay grade at work.

You know what? Fuck summer, this is what life is all about.

So get ready for a Holiday season full of inappropriate blogs about my youthful exploits, and if you have some good stories of your own, send them my way, maybe I'll enshrine them in internet immortality, enjoy the games everyone.

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Interactive Dude in LA

Pictured: Shoes that will make women so moist the overall humidity of your town will change.

Shit that I'm pretty certain is bullshit but I'm not positive...

Round trip flights are bullshit. I think a long time ago some powerful marketing officer convinced mainstream America that there was value in booking flights round trip. The government took this a step further by randomly checking more people with a one way ticket because, hey if you're planning on running a plane into a tower, you likely don't need a return fare!

But it's a FUCKING lie. Buying a round trip ticket is like what Cartman said last week on South Park. It's a big dick in your mouth, it's a promise to pay for something that doesn't even exist yet. Sure airlines have adjusted their algorithms to adjust for last minute purchasing, but that doesn't mean that buying your return when you purchase your initial flight out will in any way benefit you. In fact, it is much more likely to fuck you in the ass.

Want to change your flight? Every airline except one will rape you with a splintery wooden dildo for this. What if there is some girl you almost fuck the night before you have to go home, but whiskey dick prevents it? Can't stay another day and give it another try, because you bought a round trip flight. What if you like cocaine and want to stay up busting rails until 5 in the morning and then sleep until Sunday Night Football. Oops. You missed your flight and now you don't have enough money to get back.

Round trip flights are for people with families, people with responsibilities, boring people. If you are single, young and like to fucking win it...you purchase that one way my friend. And you fly southwest, because they let you do whatever the fuck you want.

I just purchased my flights home for Christmas. I almost booked a flight from Palm Springs to Chicago for 120 dollars. That would have forced me to take a bus to palm springs, fly to Minneapolis with a 12 hour layover and then arrive in Chicago, only to take another bus to Indiana and still miss the bball game I have tickets to on 12/22 in Btown.

Once upon a time I would have done that, because that was my dedication to travel. But after one to many miserable Vegas busses home, I have decided that it's worth the 500 dollar one way ticket to land safely in Indianapolis where my mom will pick me up with 2 rockstars and STeak n Shake. My mom is the shit.

I don't have a return flight because there are so many reasons within 300 miles of the 317 that would cause me to change my travel plans. An ex-fling, an impromptu ski trip, or a last minute deal on flights to Australia. I don't think 2 steps ahead, I think 2 minutes ahead, and I suggest you guys try it once in a while. It's exhilarating.

Now, onto more important things. A few weeks ago I was at a TJ Maxx. I go once every 2 weeks to check out the men's shoe section. I do this because much of their selection looks like a mixture between something that came out of a frat guys closet or a gay thrift store. It's FUCKING great.
Pink sperry's, Tye Dye sneakers, white rainbows. Basically it is my wet dream. Most of America would get made fun of for wearing such colorful attire but when you are a tall, white alpha male with extreme arrogance, these shoes tell the world, Fuck you, I'm better than you...or at least I know I can wear these shoes and rail your girlfriend.

Today's offering is a pair of purple Chucks. I can't tell you how excited I was for these, I just wanted someone to say "your shoes" so I could say, Purple is the color of royalty bitch and then drop a metaphorical microphone. These shoes are the short cut to any pair of black stretch pants south of Sunset. They might as well have tiny Pikachus on them.

BUT I CAN'T WEAR THEM.

They were CLEARLY marked size 13 on the heal, but unfortunately for me, the folks that work at the Burbank town center are poor meth head valley kids. Seriously for every Beverly Hills 90210 there should be a companion series called Burbank High where a different character slits their wrists every week because Burbank sucks so much.

Regardless. What do I do with my quandary. Take the shoes back? They were like 10 bucks. Not worth my time to go to that hellish diaspora, I would rather pass the shoes onto a more suitable owner. The shoes have never been worn, I just want someone to conquer a whole lot of snatch or dick in these shoes instead of them collecting dust in my closet.

So.

If you are a guy or girl that wear a men's 11 and will rock these shoes harder than Chris Brown hits Rihanna, leave me a note on my wall or shoot me a text/e-mail and they are yours. I am willing to even ship these within the contiguous United States, just leave your mailing address and the postage is on me.

Please, these shoes must live on. They need their own story, they need a good home. Will you please adopt my rad purple shoes?

Monday, November 18, 2013

Hindsight Bias: 5 Ways I would use Time Travel to Change the World

I can't imagine anyone looking through my phone. It's not because of all the anime porn google searches and tits that I've screenshotted off of Snap Chat but because of my last 3 texts.

They are...
1. Heil Hitler!
2. Mein Fuhrer!
3. How many times can I watch Love Actually in the months of November/December without actually becoming gay?

Now on the nose 2 long standing assumptions about me would be confirmed. I'm a raging antisemite and a total gay. But that's not quite true. I'm currently reading one of the best books ever written called The Book Thief. It takes place in Nazi Germany where all the normal German citizens were forced to salute each other on the streets by saying absurd shit like Mein Fuhrer and Heil Hitler or they would be gassed along with all the other Jews/Catholics/Gays/Blacks/Gypsies or whoever the fuck else the Nazis felt like killing that day. Myself and my twisted book club members have adopted this as a way of addressing eachother. Fucked up? Maybe, but not anti Jew. (A Jew is the hero of the book, I'm rooting for him...I give him a 50/50 shot of surviving.)

As for the Love Actually thing, well there is no excuse, except to just admit it's the greatest fucking movie ever made. So under that assumption of course I was going to see that director's recent rom com offering, About Time.

I went to a pre release screening on the Universal Lot (because I have a more interesting life than you) and while I wasn't blown away like I was at Love Actually, it was a lovely film.

The movie tracks a schlubby red head in his somewhat creepy pursuit of Rachel McAdams, the wrinkle is he can travel back in time, so any time he slightly fucks up with this chick he goes back and tries again, knowing the proper decision to make. It's kind of like an R rated British Groundhog Day.

I left the movie wondering what I would do with the power of time travel. I assume that I would probably use it to acquire a modest fortune and then track down the girl of my dreams (after obviously using the power for a 2 year fuck fest with every hot girl I ever wanted to bang) but I also think I could change the world in 5 quick trips through time. Make the world a better place for everyone, because with great power comes great responsibility. And it would be a shame to use time travel exclusively for the benefit of MY wallet and penis.

5. Where: Silicon Valley, CA Time: Circa 2011

Sometime around the advent of the iPhone 4 a new app allowed for emotes to be sent from phone to phone through iMessage. These emotes would grow to be compatible with twitter, instagram and ALL CHICKS. Literally, if you are a guy...the quickest way to get your dick in a chick's mouth is to blow her shit up with emotes. You don't even have to type words, enough winky faces, it's a done deal.

However, there are some VERY OBVIOUS omissions on the current iteration of iPhone's Emoji app, and in a society of painful tinder conversations is there any awkward silence that wouldn't be completely saved by a winking Pikachu? Girls love the wink, and everyone fucking loves Pikachu, he is adorable. Make that motherfucker wink??? Panties = soaked.

I would merely suggest this to the programmers and those Japanese-culture obsessed nerds would put that in there right away and probably give me 10% of the company. Big win for everyone involved.

The Impact: Nerds everywhere are getting laid, there is a national reduction in sexual frustration. National tragedies are avoided because instead of plotting mass murders, people that were previously in their basement playing World of Warcraft are riding Pikachu's winking coattails to Grand Central Station of the Pussytown express.

4. Where:  Standford University Time: Fall of 2009

A week ago I had this idea to write an entire thesis about how the reason Jonathan Martin quit the NFL was the exact same thing as a pledge quitting a frat during pledgeship. But since John Martin was like a triple legacy (NFL player) nationals was going to get involved (the commissioner) and fire some people in the Miami Dolphins organization (brotherhood review)

You like that fucking metaphor? Mic drop.

Anyway, I decided against it because I'm not a sports blogger and I'm already too fratty. I needn't focus the attention on my prior awesomeness, you were all there...as Drake would say "if you ain't been a part of it at least you got to witness" God my arrogance is almost too much for me to even handle...

So I wasn't going to write the blog. Flash forward to Saturday. I get all fucked up at the USC/Standford tailgate, then high tail it to an IU party in Brentwood. As soon as I get there I am immediately sequestered in a bedroom.

"Are you drunk?"

Very.

"Ok, I'm going to tell you something and I really need you not to be an asshole about this. You can blog all about it Monday but don't make this weird."

What.

"You know that guy that quit the Dolphins because he was being bullied or whatever?"

Ya.

"He's here."

What do you mean he's here...

"He knows my new roommate, he is here, at this party drinking."

Isn't he on suicide watch in a mental institution or something?

"No his buddy brought that Fireball."

So ya, I was at a party with Jonathan Martin Saturday night. Hitting on white women. I pondered all sorts of fucked up schemes. Ordering a bunch of coke and somehow implicating him, convincing one of my female friends to bang him, or just get him extraordinarily drunk and see what happened."

As it would go, I did none of the following. I said what up to him, cheers'd a beer maybe and watched him get on his hands and knees when he spilled a whiskey coke. I can't confirm that he was drunk but there was a drink in his hand, clearly not the look of a guy going through deep emotional distress. Moreso the look of a guy that quit the frat because he didn't like getting yelled at and was now happy to be at a house party with gdi's off campus.

See because that's what happened. This Martin guy grew up wealthy, was always bigger and better than everyone else and probably never got picked on until he was 22. When he did join the Miami Dolphins and a bunch of Seniors told his faggot ass to get on his fucking face and do push ups until he puked, he didn't know how to react.

Now more than ever "hazing" is in the national spot light. Sure once in a while a frat kills a pledge, or a black school band beats a Freshman trumpeter into a coma, but no one really cares...because the departed are nobodies. This is a NFL STAR, BULLYING IS A BIG DEAL. Richie Incognito is just a guy that was following a culture of hazing the pledges, and this one couldn't handle it. And now because we live in a reactionary society, Greek life as we know it will probably end in the next 20 years. No more hazing in the military, no more hazing in secret societies or any organization and the PUSSIFICATION of AMERICA is COMPLETE!

Unless...

I travel back in time and convince Freshman John Martin to join a fraternity. Yes, it will suck John, but think about the white girls you get to fuck by being an athlete. If you join a frat you can quadruple that, and it will be all sorority girls, you can run nightly trains! Then when you show up to training camp and old Richie gives you some lip, you tell him to "eat a gaggle of dicks you fucking hick" and this whole devolution of our society is avoided.

Impact: Greek Systems thrive for another 1000 years, churning out the leaders of the world, despite some push ups and a little light water boarding. Leaders that otherwise would have grown up to be huge wimps and lead us into silly wars, leading to the destruction of life as we know it.

3. Place: Miami, FL Time: November 27, 2007.
Obviously one would want to use the power to save so many single people, but remember there are drastic consequences every time you go back, it affects the future that you presently live in. Remember the Butterfly Effect? Anyway, this was a tough one. Part of me wants to get back to Vegas and tell 2pac that maybe he should skip the fight, or invest in a bulletrproof car. But honestly, he would have probably just gotten hit a week later, it wasn't like that was the first time he had been shot at multiple times.

No, if I'm going to limit the celebrity saving to one, it goes to Sean Taylor, the greatest that never was. This guy would have probably gone on to be the greatest NFL safety of all time, but some cunt shot him in the leg whilst trying to rob him. Shot him in the leg because he specifically wanted to NOT kill him, but start the large man with a machete from slicing him in half. YES, in lieu of a gun in the bedroom, Sean Taylor kept a 28 inch SWORD under his bed to stave off intruders. But unfortunately for Sean, the thigh contains some pretty heavy duty arteries.

Sean was however not one to shy away from the party though. In his brief career, he managed to get a dui and an aggrevated assault charge. I'm thinking on the night of the 27th I convince him to get a table at the Fontainebleau and we party together until 7 in the morning.

Impact: Sean Taylor goes on to have the best defensive career of all time. The Redskins are so good that Native Americans stop bitching about the racist connotation and embrace the nick name. The alternative to this dream scenario was that I secretly wrap Sean's thighs in kevlar and he weathers the bullet and then slices the assailant in half with the machete. He would then surpass Ray Lewis as best NFL player to ever murder someone with a knife.

2. Place: Washington DC Time: September 1, 2011
After the wedding last Saturday (which I did not get laid at by the way almost everyone had a date, and I kept forgetting the names of the girls I didn't already know. The quickest way to shoot yourself in the foot is to forget a girls name. Whatever, when the fireballs in the system, ain't no tellin. I did get Steak n Shake at 4 in the morning, and that's all that really matters) I spent 8 hours at a b dubbs next door to the Bloomington, IL airport. I got really drunk and then watched the Colts get ass raped by the Rams.

In my drunken stupor I bought a thing of beef jerky and a Rockstar which I intended to smash right before I got on the plane so I could sober up enough to read some more of The Book Thief. Then I got to security and I was taken to some terrorist room for additional screening. They tested me for bomb residue, gunpowder, all the usual terrorist shit. I'm thinking, what the fuck, am I really that drunk that they thought this all necessary. Then my immediate thought goes to drugs. Fuck, this is the bag I took to Vegas, what could possibly be in there.

But you know what prompted all this shit? It wasn't even the Ambian I had in my bag, it was that fucking Rockstar because REMEMBER? No liquids.

Which is fucking retarded anyway, does the FAA think I am going to smuggle on a vat of acid and poor it on the flight attendant's face in order to highjack the plane? They probably just used national tragedy as an excuse to make people buy the plane's 7 dollar beers. (This can be avoided by filling your bag with the little shot bottles fyi)

But I digress. They threw out my Rockstar and out of principal I refused to buy another, so I got shit faced at the airport bar and slept all the way back to LA...which was fine I guess.

But America should be the land of the free. I should be able to take a pregnant ferret on my shitty Spirit Airlines flights and no one should be able to say a god damn thing.

Actually scratch that last thought from the record, anyone that isn't skinny and silent on aircrafts I want to fucking murder. Babies, I will shake you. Fat people? Get off my plane and into the gym. Strangers that talk? I'M WATCHING PITCH PERFECT ON MY iPAD, PLEASE FUCK OFF.

But I should be able to quietly drink my Rockstar.

And I would have been able to until a couple jack asses crashed some planes into the World Trade Center and took several thousand people out with them.

Dicks.

And if you watch documentaries about the events leading up to it, it sounds like it was maybe kinda sorta preventable, but a few things slipped through the cracks because people aren't perfect.

I fuck up at work all the time, but if I screw up, an actor doesn't get the newest copy of the script. If those people in Washington screw up? Terrorism.

So what could I do to prevent 9/11? Run into the Pentagon screaming? Nein. Wouldn't work, I'd be thrown in the pre 9/11 version of Guantanomo and never be heard from again. (Y'all watch that 60 minutes? Fucked up shit)

So I have to prevent the attack without telling anyone there would be an attack. Basically I have to ensure that everyone does their job perfectly, with no potential for fuck up.

You know who NEVER fucks up? People on Adderall.

In the early ages of these amphetamine salts that have become so famous and seemingly readily available, they were only intended for children with severe hyperactivity problems. But eventually they became to take over the mainstream. College kids adopted it, ibankers subbed prescription drugs for cocaine, and now I'm sure almost anyone in a high stress, high importance job gets through the day with the help of amphetamines.

If I could have flooded capital hill with 2 million miligrams of orange goodness, 9/11 would never have happened and you would have to pick your girlfriend up at her gate instead of waiting in the car outside the airport. (I stole that joke from Daniel Tosh)

Impact: The Hurt Locker never gets made, Avatar wins Best Picture spawning a new Fern Gully environmentally conscious sub genre of film and John Kerry probably would've become president with no war on terror for Bush to run. (This is a negative fringe effect, I fucking love W)

1. Place: Los Angeles, CA Time: Pilot Season 2007
My college career was pretty great but after Sophomore year I was kind of in a rut. People were doing cool shit and I was stuck in Indianapolis interning at an insurance company, using my shitty fake ID to go to the Broad Ripple Tavern every night. I filled that summer by driving down to Bloomington every weekend and getting drunk with the Tri Delts at Frat West (The White House) It was a marvelous summer. We became great friends, got boats all the time, and logged several thousand hours at Kilroy's.

In fact I probably thought I was as happy as I could possibly be doing this. However, 2000 miles away, TBS had given a series order to the most obscure guy from the Blue Collar Comedy Tour...well maybe 2nd most. There was Larry the Cable Guy, Foxworthy and then the other 2.

Being 19, I could have spent the summer in LA and maybe through some miracle I could have landed a job as a PA on this pilot. (It's very fucking hard to get a job on a tv show without a connection, but remember I have the ability to travel through time, I can just show up and try every day until it works)

Working in the production office I would have eventually met one of the actors, Jen, she would introduce herself as. She being 17 and by no means being a star, wouldn't have any trouble hanging out with a PA. She would also be new to town and we would kind of spend the summer exploring Los Angeles together. Time would come to go back to school but I would decide to stick around because I had recently been promoted to staff writer. (Remember I could travel to like 2010 and just steal the Modern Family pilot and turn it into this showrunner and he would think it was the greatest writing sample ever, I might be selling myself short at JUST staff writer) So I work on this show for like 3 years and start dating this no name actress and become a somewhat well known writer myself.

I would never know have the memories of Shingles or Europe or being the most socially relevant person in a city of 80,000 people...but I would have my girlfriend Jen and we would go on Saturday hikes through Runyan canyon and buy a boat in Marina Del Rey.

Impact: After the cancellation of the Bill Engvall Show she would get cast in an obscure Indie which would lead to an Oscar nomination. Afterward she would land the role of Katniss Everdeen. So yes, I would use my time travel ability to marry Jennifer Lawrence. We would be the craziest Hollywood power couple since whoever the last guy to dump Taylor Swift was.

But wait...
So If I could travel through time we would live in a pre 9-11 utopia where Jonathan Martin wasn't a pussy, nerds got laid, Sean Taylor was still wrecking fools and I was banging J Law? That sounds pretty great, but honestly...I wouldn't trade any of it for what actually happened. I think that was supposed to be the takeaway of the movie. All of us have made mistakes, or perhaps have regrets about decisions we did or did not make. But this is the life we've got, and typically it's pretty amazing. (Well my life is slightly more amazing because I get to go to screenings on studio lots) And I've been dumped too, I've done awful things that I wish I could take back, but I can't. Life is about moving forward, and yes it's funny to pontificate about the shit that I would do if I had superpowers, but at the end of the day, would I want to miss out on one unique memory? One joke, one laugh, one day spent with a good friend. The answer has to be know, you move forward and try to improve upon your current situation while cherishing old memories. Shitty things will always happen in the world, but it's our job to find a way to make sure they don't happen again. And let's be honest...certain things are still in play for me!

I'm still young enough where I can find a certain amount of success in this town, I already run in circles with a few quasi famous folk. Hey, fucking Jessica Alba married an assistant, who says Jennifer Lawrence is above giving her number to a random guy she meets at a party. And when she does, best believe she will be getting blown the FUCK up with winking pikachus...if I have to program that adorable little thunder rodent myself.




Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Red Wedding

The next several paragraphs I write at very great personal risk. It has nothing to do with the fact that I JUST started a new job with nobody I know, but because I am going to outline my weekend plans for you, and I must confess, my intentions are cruel.

So I have this wedding on Saturday, in Illinois. Not only is it a wedding but it's a frat wedding. A guy from my frat is hanging out with a girl from a sorority we used to hang out with. I have MASSIVE expectations, in fact to set the stage, let me briefly incapsulate the last time something like this happened.

In August 2009, my first pledge brother got married. I kicked the day off by smashing a case of beer at my pool with a couple of buddies and then threw on a seersucker suit and a fresh pair of Air Force Ones. I then forced my mother at Jaegerpoint (where you threaten to drink a bottle of Jaeger and drive somewhere if the accosted doesn't do your bidding) to drive my drunk ass from Geist to Carmel so I could go to this wedding. At said wedding I proceeded to drink triple whiskey cokes and aggressively grind with every girl from that sorority I had ever hooked up with until the bar ran out of booze. Then we cabbed it to broad ripple, drank until the bars stopped serving me and then recruited my mother to drive me, 3 buddies and a very lucky girl back to the Indianapolis Yacht Club where we proceeded to drink for 4 more hours and then pass out on a boat. In fact my last memory was finishing a bottle of blue Boone's Farm and watching the sun rise while two of my pals took turns getting to 2nd base with the aforementioned girl. It was magnificent.

When I woke up it felt like we had just been to a really awesome frat party with a wedding theme, but when the dust cleared one of my friends was married. And so began the slow desolation of my single buddies that eventually began to drop like flies.

So sure that was 4 years ago...mere days after graduation, who could fault us for acting like we were still in college?

Flash forward to this past Saturday, I am in a field of 60,000 people wearing my 5th Halloween costume of the season with my took firmly down the throat of a Junior at Chico State.

Her: "Do you want more?"

Me: "Uh, I probably shouldn't"

Her: "You want to be peaking during Skrillex."

Me: "Ok, fuck it..."

Reach into her bag and throw down one more "moon rock."

See while most people that will be attending this wedding were probably planning out their outfit or spending some quality time with their plus one, I was rolling my balls off and trying to find a secluded place at this rave to go fuck this 21 year old corpse bride before "Bangarang" came on.

So ya...not much has changed.

But it leads me to question how this weekend will play out.

The Hollywood version obviously has the bad boy from the west coast showing up without a date looking for a one night stand until he connects with some girl from his past with whom he always shared a romantic tension but the timing was never right. (Depending on how big this wedding is, there are probably at least 3 candidates for this) They spend all night talking about the past and future and what a shame it was that they never got together. They share a passionate slow dance and right before they kiss...HER douchebag boyfriend shows up. It's time to head back to the hotel babe.

Our protagonist is heart broken but then when he is at the airport the next day HE SITS DOWN NEXT TO HER ON HIS PLANE BACK TO LA.

Him: WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?

Her: I don't know.

Him: What happened to (thinks of douchey name) Ted?

Her: Ya it wasn't gonna work out

He doesn't say anything, but grabs her hand and smiles as they both travel off into the great unknown. The credits roll and a Shins song plays.

But that won't happen because...

A. Respectable young women don't like to associate with guys that lost their wallet whilst skinny dipping at 4am last Thursday.

B. I am not Dermot Mulroney (or Dylan McDermott?)

In fact, a far more likely scenario is that I show up and every girl there has a date and I feel like a massive tool that is until I find the younger sister of the bride's long lost cousin bored at the bar.  Game on.

See at first glimpse I am extremely interesting and appear to have my shit together. I write. I work on a television show, I live near the beach in Los Angeles, I'm 6 foot 3 and I haven't gotten fat yet. I'm basically god to all bored distant cousin's younger sisters out there. The key to my success is to keep it extremely vague. We don't have to bring up the fact that I'm 26, I write on a blog that averages a couple hundred viewers, I'm still an assistant or that I chose to not fix my air conditioning all summer in order to have more money for drugs.

Eh...details.

But then again, is that fulfilling? Is that how I want people to view me? Weddings are also a sort of check-in game. See how everyone is doing. If you're a girl it's about how much weight you've gained, if you've stopped working yet and how big your ring is. If you're a guy it's about what your job is, how hot is your date and if you still go out on Thursdays.

So clearly it's a much more stressful event for a girl. I'm certain a fair share of people will shit talk me for the way I continue to live my life and my questionable morals, but at the same time, most people respect that I sacked up and moved 2000 miles from home to attempt to do something I love. The girl that slept with her married coworker and now everyone knows about it??? Oh she's much more fucked than me.

Ok, enough pontificating...what's the play? Black out and act a fool, try to bed a stranger? Try to rekindle and old fling? Clearly the right move is to just go and have fun. The night is not about me. Sure I'm on vacation, and I will certainly go to Pretty Lights at the Aragon Ballroom Friday night in Chicago and then close down Butch McGuires...but Saturday, go spend some time with old friends. Tell stories of abroad of college, make fun of the groom, marvel at the bride who will be the most beautiful woman in the room and genuinely enjoy the moment. It's not my job to paint Springfield, IL red and party it into oblivion. I'll still host a pre game in my hotel room for those that want to come, that's fine...respectable even. But when you leave, you never want to be a story, at least a bad one...because that story will never die. It will be repeated at every wedding to come, the rest of your life (that's if you are even invited)

But let's say I'm casually sipping a vodka tonic and a girl I used to know sits down to me and asks, "Why didn't you ever ask me out?"

Or maybe a cute girl taking fireball shots by herself offers me one...

"Bride or Groom?"

"Groom."

"Where you from dude? Chicago like everyone else here?"

"Venice beach, I'm a writer."

2 more fireballs.

Sunday, October 20, 2013

What its like to get cancelled

It was a Friday afternoon at 1pm and I was standing in the line at Jamba Juice making the most important decision of my life. Which energy boost should I rock in my Strawberries Wild? Energy is simply B12, there is a lot of it in 5 hour energies. It is quasi effective and also slides under the banner of healthy because, hey, it's a vitamin, must be an organic surge. But there is also the caffeine shot...they both cost the same requisite 25 cents and more or less cause the same effect, but for whatever reason this is always a very hard choice for me.

Caffeine just seems like it has a better chance of working, but California law also stipulates that the menu let me know that this will cause me to be ingesting an extra 25 calories...sorry I know I'm stalling and the line of impatient customers behind me is growing, god dammit.

*iPhone 5 with the new iOS text sound*

I look at my phone in a desperate move to find an answer.

"You owe me three bucks."

I knew immediately. I had lost my job.

See, I wasn't just out getting a smoothie for sport on a Friday afternoon, I was depositing my boss's paycheck at a Wells Fargo. It just happens by fortunate coincidence that there is a Jamba Juice next door. My boss and I have a cursory understanding that if I do her a personal favor and deposit her check, I can take an extra 5 minutes and get myself some fruity goodness.

I left the line, the gay aspiring actor asked me if I was all right? "You can have an energy and a caffeine, I'll only charge you for one." But I needed to go outside and sit on a bench to process the gravity of what had just happened.

6 Months ago I made 3 bets with one of my best friends:
1. Ironside would see episode 6.
2. Ironside would receive a back 9.
3. Ironside would be renewed for season 2.

We had oft made jokes about these bets and even that day I had told him, "if we survive the day, I think I'll owe you 2."

We did not survive the day, and while you might assume it was a shitty way to console a friend, there is no way he could have assumed that I had not heard. By the time I got in line at Jamba, Deadline was already announcing our doom.

Texts started flooding in from my coworkers, "fuck" literally within 5 minutes of our producer telling us it was over, the entire town knew.

Immediately everyone goes into a subtle depression. Even if you kind of expected it, you never see it coming. While working on a show everyone sort of brainwashes themselves into thinking, "this is it, this is the next big thing." You think of how you will rise the ranks season to season and eventually achieve your goal which is a vastly different position than whatever you are doing at that moment.

I got back and the doomsday mentality had already set in. A sense of shock transforming into "What now?"

I got back to my work and was immediately handed an adult beverage. While I sipped my champagne, I read the comments on ratings blog TVbythenumbers. Comments heralded the move by NBC, thrashing our numbers and lamenting the fact that it hadn't happened sooner.

"Thank God NBC woke up and cancelled that stinker, good riddance, what were they thinking even greenlighting this remake that NO ONE was asking for."

I have no idea who the fuck these people are that comment on tv blogs, because it is certainly no one in the industry. Because people in the industry would know that 300 people that were working their ass off at their respective careers just lost their jobs. It's morbid really to celebrate the cancellation of a television show. Can you imagine if an American company went under, letting go of all of its employees, followed by a comment section that said "Toldja Toldja Toldja!!!"

But it's the nature of the beast. I don't contend that the show was the greatest thing ever, but people gave it their all. I imagine folks unfamiliar with TV thinking that NBC execs just throw some money at a half assed idea, pick up 8 of their friends off the street and tell them to make it happen.

That's not how it works. Network writers make a lot of money to do what they do. But they are not hacks. 50% of the people in LA want to be writers, there is a reason the people that get paid to do it are employed. But sometimes, for whatever reason, it just doesn't work.

I've been "relieved of my duties" 3 times in my life. The first time it was my last day at The Gap before I started my Freshman year at IU. I was carrying a 50 pound metal sign and my boss did not like the form in which I was carrying it. I threw it over my back and said "I'll carry it like Jesus carried the cross then, God forbid I knock over any urban plaids." She fired me for insulting her Jewish heritage. The second time I was fired for writing this blog (which was totally warranted) and the third was after I was reassigned once one of my projects had ended.

There is a quote in The Mighty Ducks that goes, "Losing isn't that bad once you get the hang of it." And really it rings true. No one should ever aspire to lose, but the initial sting numbs and you learn to carry on.

No one on my show deserved to lose their job, but it happened. It's the nature of the beast. No matter how bad our ratings were, the construction guys were still building amazing sets. The special effects guys were making it look like people really were getting shot and the costumers were outfitting the cast in realistic hip modern outfits.

But it doesn't matter, because this is what you sign up for.

Once we realized that Friday would be our last shooting day, shit just kinda went off the rails. Our props guy informed us that all the "prop booze" was in fact real and we poured cocktail after cocktail telling stories about the past and what we planned to do next.

I am one of the lucky ones, I'm an office guy, so I will have 3 more weeks of employment to pack up the office and figure out my next move. Others were slowly sipping drinks while updating their resume and desperately making calls to see if they could maybe have a job on Monday.

It's a fucked up game. There is a reason so many people wash out of entertainment, it really is a crap shoot and the nature of the beast is soul crushing...but

There will be another show. Someday. If not tomorrow, television as a medium of entertainment is unlikely to cease to exist. There will be a bit of panic, but if you truly believe that everything will be ok, people are more than likely to land on their feet.

And sure, it sucks to start over. When you spend 70 hours a week with people, with one goal, it does become a family dynamic. Some of the people from the show I will never see again. But they'll rebound, or maybe they won't. Maybe all of this nonsense will leave them disillusioned to the point that they pack up their bags and head home.

But for me, that is not an option.

Everyone comes to LA dough eyed with dreams of becoming a star. Obviously it doesn't work out for most of them, if it was that easy everyone would do it. But for the people that KNOW, eventually, things will work out...their time is coming. Life is a war of attrition. A lot of people will decide that either their goals are too difficult or just not worth it, but if you find yourself in the minority of people that know they will succeed, it's only a matter of time before that rings true.

At 7pm I went to a buddy's place and played drinking games until the rose. Largely similar to any other Friday night.

"What are you gonna do now?"

I'll figure it out.

There is always a way to figure it out. Maybe you go back to shopping at the dollar store. Perhaps you file for unemployment, but if you keep on trucking there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

This is a small town and you never know could happen. If networks could read the future first season shows wouldn't have an 80% cancellation rate. Nor would a guy that pitches a series about show choirs have been laughed out of his first meeting.

It's a roller coaster ride for sure, and definitely not for the faint of heart.

So Monday morning I'll go to work and start carrying thousands of files out of the office and load them onto trucks that will take them God knows where. I'll answer all of the texts and emails offering me condolences by saying "it's all good, shit happens." And I'll start sending my resume to every show in town with a 1% response rate.

But in the mean time I'll be hanging out at the beach, writing my own material and then I'll unexpectedly get a call one day from a guy who was an assistant in the writer's office.

"Hey man, I sold a pitch, it's going to pilot, do you want to come work with me?"

10 seasons later we're vacationing on our yachts off the coast of Cyprus, because ya...that's how it works.

Keep your head up.