She Was Hot

The Miss Universe pageant was held here in Los Angeles tonight. Miss Puerto Rico won. I'm giving myself kudos for calling her as the winner within the first five minutes of the show...maybe I could have spared myself the two hours of suspense. Her dress was made out of metal and looked like some really fancy chain-mail. I know that sounds bad but even Carson Kressly from Queer Eye thought she had a hot dress.

Yep, her dress was hot. Literally.

It was apparently so hot that the poor woman fainted twenty minutes after she was crowned. The heat from the stage lights must have sizzled the dress up. Put that with the excitement of wearing a $250,000 crown and sitting mere feet away from Mayor Villaraigosa...well, it must have just been too much!

A security guard carried her offstage.

Boring!

You see, Santino from Project Runway was one of the contest judges. It would have been much more interesting if he'd leapt onstage to rescue Miss Puerto Rico and then stuck one of his "What Would Santino Do?" magnets to her metal dress! Now that would have been hot!

Boiling Points

I spent a lot of time at the gym this weekend. Sure, I like to exercise and sure my body (like yours) needs exercise. That wasn't why I went though. Why was I spending hours at Bally Total Fitness? Because yesterday was the hottest day in Los Angeles history and today wasn't much cooler.

Since I don't have air conditioning at home, this weekend's heat has made my apartment feel like a really humid toaster oven. I could have driven around in my air conditioned car but that makes no sense since gas prices are around $3.30 and car emissions are part of the reason why it's sizzling in the first place. You know if I went to the gym to cool off, it's gotta be hot!

How hot?

101 degrees in Downtown and 119 in Woodland Hills in the Valley. Any Angelenos out there that still believe global warming is a bunch of crock have probably now become true believers. The past week found thermometers showing temperatures more appropriate for Las Vegas than Los Angeles and a humidity level more the norm for Houston than Hollywood. It's not that it doesn't get warm here. The temperature does soar above the ninety degree mark every summer, but when it does, I know it'll only last a day or two. All that has changed this summer. We've had more days over 90 degrees this July than in any other summer in Los Angeles history.

My sweat-induced haze is making it difficult for me to keep it all in perspective. Yes, I know I'm lucky that I'm not a potential heat-stroke victim. After all, I don't work outside doing construction or landscaping. Instead, my office is air conditioned. It gets chilly enough that I sometimes wear a sweater when I'm there. Then, there's the fact that I have a car so I don't have to stand on the corner baking while waiting for a bus to take me where I need to go. There's also the crime factor. People trip out and act crazy when it gets hot. There were seven murders in Compton this week alone. Folks are sitting around sweating and their temperatures and tempers boil over.

There's still a week left in July and then all of August and September to bake and broil in the Southern California sun. If the heat keeps up, I'm going to become a regular gym goer again.
Hmm...maybe this sizzling summer isn't such a bad thing after all.

Why I Don't Wear Blue Button-Down Shirts

I was wandering around again in the Vons on Sunset last night (hey, it's air conditioned in there!) and voila, I spotted two scientologists in the grocery store!

We know that scientologists actually do eat. Who can forget the picture of Kirstie Alley chowing down in the In and Out parking lot? Then there were the claims in Star magazine that Kirstie could eat an entire pie from House of Pies by herself. Those are good pies so I can't really blame her for that. And the strawberry cheesecake is something else! Of course, now Kirstie no longer warms the booths at House of Pies because she is on tv, constantly asking us, "Have you called Jenny yet?" My response? "No, beeyotch. Go away!"

Still, I kinda wanted to follow the scientolgists around to see what they had in their shopping cart. Does L. Ron Hubbard allow the consumption of Golden Oreos and baby carrots? Does that Xenu fellow prefer Diet Coke or Coke Zero? My curiousity went unsatisfied. I resisted the temptation to check out their cart and instead, checked out their outfits.

If you are really smart, you are asking yourself, "How the heck did you know those people were scientologists?"

They weren't jumping on couches. They weren't selling Jenny Craig on TV. And they weren't belting out "I Feel For You" on the 2006 BET Awards.

Despite popular opinion, most scientologists aren't celebrities. They are your average everyday Angelenos. No, that's not true. The average Angeleno isn't a cult member with a really bad sense of fashion. You see, I knew the young man and the young woman in the Vons were scientologists because they were in the scientologist outfit: Light blue, long-sleeved, button-down oxford shirt. Navy blue pants. Conservative hair-do.

If you drive west on Fountain Avenue, just past Vermont, you'll spot lots of scientologists, all in their matching blue outfits, walking to and fro the various scientology buildings around there. I think the outfit has something to do with the L.Ron's obsession with the sea/naval stuff. I read that they call some of the folks sea orgs. Yes. You read that correctly.

So, you see why it's impossible for me to wear the blue shirt like theirs, don't you? If I lived in any other city, I'd possibly do it. But here, someone may mistake me for one of their members and try out some electric shock memory reducer or something.

And blogging here would probably not be allowed by Xenu's rules.

Surrender

I can't get this song out of my head today. No, not out of my head. I can't get it out of my heart. Depeche Mode, of course.

I'm Obviously a Follower

Yes, I was front row at the 8:15 pm showing of at Pirates of the Carribean II last Friday night at The Grove. The front row was not intentional. Although I did adore the close-ups of Orlando Bloom and Johnny Depp, there were simply no longer enough seats for three people to sit together in the rest of the theatre. I wish I had a photo of my friend Malav trying to sit on the floor and tilt his neck back. I kept repeating, "Don't worry, your eyes will adjust eventually." There are certain scenes where I have no idea what happened because my eyes were a bit slow on the refocusing and adjusting. Sitting front row also meant slight motion sickness during the Transformers preview. Nausea also became a problem during the gigantic water-wheel sword fight scene.

The film made about $135 million over the weekend. I paid $12.75 for a ticket. But we also know that every theatre in Los Angeles is not as expensive as The Grove, and every city in the United States is not as expensive as Los Angeles. (Why am I living here?) So, if I take an estimated national average of $9.50 for tickets, that means that approximately 14.2 million people went to see the movie.

This must officially categorize me as a sheep. A follower. The pied piper whistled and I ponied up the money to line producer Jerry Bruckheimer's pockets. I was one of the fourteen million sucked in by the prospect of Orlando's improved acting and the promise of getting a long distance calls from my sister that went something like this:

C-smooth (my sis): We went to see Pirates.
Liz: Yeah? What'd you think?
C: I liked it. It was good. You're right though. It's a little long.
L: Orlando was hot. Wasn't he?

And, despite Captain Jack Sparrow's hot kiss with Keira Knightly, here's what America REALLY wants to know

C: So is Johnny Depp's character gay or what?
L: I dunno. Maybe we'll find out in the third one that he's bi.

We then launched into a conversation about Hollywood's subliminal messaging. Next thing you know, there'll be a book about how Pirates are the original "brotha's" on the down low. Think about it...they spend loads of time on boats on the open sea with no women around them. Hmm. And baaaaa.

Ease On Down The Road

The "Wizard of Oz" is one of those movies that is only shown on tv at certain times of the year, kinda like how "It's a Wonderful Life" gets shown at Christmas. I guess the 4th of July is one of the appointed times for us to all follow the yellow brick road. The film was on AMC movie classics on Monday and my channel surfing children found it. They were absolutely crazy about Dorothy and Toto.

I remember my high school physics teacher talking about how there were several accidents and a death on the set. She said the most famous was the "hanging" scene when they are leaving the Tin Man's cottage. None of us students believed her so she actually rented the tape and brought it in to show it to us. We flipped out! You could actually see a body swinging back and forth as the trio sings, "We're off to see the Wizard..." Nowadays I can google 'Wizard of Oz hanging' and read how the official story is that it's not a stage-hand that accidentally hung himself. And it's not a munchkin that got caught in a rope accidentally either.

It's a bird.

Yes, it's a bird and it only looks like a person on the small screen because of pixelation issues. Mmm. Hmm. Right now, I am a prime example of what happens when someone is confronted with the truth but doesn't want to believe it. The hanging story is just so much more interesting. More morbid, but definitely more interesting.

After Dorothy clicked her heels together, went home and swore there's no place like home, AMC showed another classic that my kids had not seen before, "The Wiz". I know, I know! Shame! Shame! My Black card is gonna get revoked! Let's face it though, when's the last time you saw "The Wiz" on tv? It's been years! We do have a tape of it, but no VCR to watch it on.

All in all, the kids loved it, although Olinga did not believe that Michael Jackson was the Scarecrow. This is the pre "Off the Wall" Michael. This is Michael without nose-jobs and skin bleaching. Everybody should drive through Michael's hometown, Gary, Indiana. Drive through just once to see if you'd be singing, "There's no place like home" if you lived there. For some reason, I think you'd pick Auntie Em's farm any day.

You May Think It's Corny....But

I'm going to write it down anyway! At around 7:00 tonight, I ran up to the Vons on Sunset and Virgil to buy some carrots and some water. I'd been in the store for all of 30 seconds when voila! Guess what gets played over the soundsystem? Oh, it was only the song I'd had in my head all day long, Precious by Depeche Mode. Talk about serendipity. If you click on the link, you can watch the video. Sometimes I am amazed by how such little things can make my day.

Sparks Were Flying

I always felt very adventurous on the Fourth of July. I have memories of running mindlessly through my front yard with a sparkler in each hand. I am paranoid about fire so I always made sure to stand the farthest from the assortment of erupting volcanic cones, whistling fountains of exploding red and blue sparks, bombs that simply smoked (good for driving away mosquitoes), and spinners that gave off eerie green and gold lights as they whirled in the center of our driveway. Does that sound like your childhood as well? Good memories there for many of us. However, this yearly childhood ritual of exploding fireworks in celebration of a national holiday hasn't been officially shared with my children. Why? Because we live in Los Angeles.

The official stance on the fireworks issue is fantastically worded. " The Los Angeles Fire Department reminds you that all fireworks, even the so-called "safe and sane" variety are illegal in the City of Los Angeles! Those who use, possess or merely transport any type of fireworks are subject to severe penalty."

Hmm. It sounds good. It makes sense in such a fire-prone area of the world. In theory, parents here don't have to worry about blowing their hands off because they don't know how to properly light the fuse to some exploding volcanic cone. Maybe I'm lucky that I can't go to the local Rite Aid, Sav-on, Vons or Albertsons and purchase fireworks.

Instead of blowing stuff up, we have a yearly Fourth of July ritual where we drive over to Reservoir Street, just east of Coronado, and watch the fireworks blasting off from Dodger Stadium. Last night, we had to stop several times because folks were lighting the same fountains, cones and whirling spinners I enjoyed as a child. Except, they were lighting them in the middle of the street. Going eastbound up Bellevue was an impossibility because of all the fireworks being set off in the streets. For a minute there, I thought the city-wide ban on fireworks had ended. Of course, it hasn't.

We finally arrived, parked and got ready for the moment the lights dim in the stadium and the first rumble of the fireworks begins. This year, the fireworks from Dodger Stadium were nice, but they were being rivaled in size and beauty by the rockets being set off simultaneously from private residences around us. The general Silverlake/Echo Park/East Hollywood area last night was ablaze with the cascading sparks of exploding bottle rockets and the popping and whistling of a thousand fountains of light.

But where does everyone else get their stash of sparklers? I don't have to cross state lines or anything. I can simply drive a half hour south to the City of Lakewood and buy some fantastic stuff. In fact, I think most of my neighbors must have done this in preparation for the 4th this year. It makes me wonder though, why have the law if the city won't enforce it? Would my sons do so much damage if they had some sparklers to run around with? Would they set the neighborhood on fire with the "safe and sane" variety of fireworks?

I've seen a definite increase in the amount of fireworks being set off in my neighborhood, but I still want to obey the law. Every year there are probably people who want to enjoy some fireworks but they don't want to break the law. Then they see that half their neighbors are breaking the law, and nothing happens to those neighbors. People decide that next year, they will get the fireworks too, because everybody's doing it. I'm still not driving to Lakewood anytime soon so I'll keep on enjoying the sparks flying from other people's houses.