Friday, August 8, 2008

And We're Back!

After a fantastic holiday, Soccerboy is back in LA! Getting back to LA after being gone for a minute always reminds me of one basic fact. Los Angeles is weird! Obviously, being the center of the Entertainment Universe sets this city apart, but more on that later.

More than any other city I’ve been to, LA has an unusually high percentage of beautiful people. And they’re everywhere! Serving you coffee, pumping your gas, making your copies and generally stopping traffic with their incredibly stupid/selfish decisions. I was at Rock N’Roll Ralph’s early one morning when some dude ran his cart into mine. Accidentally? Absentmindedly? He looked like what can only be described as a bum. Dirty as hell, three months of bedhead and a darkness around his eyes that conjured sleepless nights. As I untangled our carts and moved on, I noticed something. He smelled like shampoo and cologne! I turned around and realized that he was wearing AG Jeans, a shirt from Maxfield and was taking an iphone from his pocket to look at his grocery list. That darkness around the eyes may have been eyeliner! And then it hit me, he chose this look on purpose! I am still surprised that someone was working it so well so early in the morning. I almost applauded.

That’s another thing – this town gets up seriously early. That is mainly because so many people have early calls on set. It’s true, working entertainment professionals make up a very large percentage of this city. So much that when we were hit by the writer’s strike last year, LA had estimated losses that are north of $100 million. My point is, on the weekends, I go hiking early to beat the crowd. I am generally on the hill by 6:30 AM at the latest, and I am in no way alone. At all. This early-to-rise phenomenon complicates other matters as well. In New York City I could roll out of bed at eight to get some breakfast at a restaurant and we’d be one of the five people there. Here, if I get to some restaurants at 8:30, we have to wait in a line that goes out the door! What? You have to be on your game even on Saturday morning!

I will say getting away is an essential aspect of living anywhere for me, and I really had the best time. But – there is nothing like landing in Burbank (the kind of airport where you have to walk on the runway and climb stairs to get to the plane. A pretty fabulous feeling) and seeing the mountains and feeling the soft evening sun and knowing that in twelve hours you’ll be at the beach in your home city to make you ask yourself why the hell you ever needed to leave in the first place.



© 2008 MD TOTAL all rights reserved.

1 comment:

NB said...

This is SUCH a good post.