that i dont often do. i went outside.

i didnt make it out there until 3:45p but i made it. i nearly turned around when i realized id still be in hollywood at 4pm which is really when the traffic starts getting thick but i took a left down la brea and it was smooth sailing till pico where i turned west toward the beach.

i called karisa and hung out with her for 12 minutes. twelve minutes because thats all the change i had for the meter. i took some pictures of her blackberry and kept rolling. i went to venice beach, walked around, talked to people including the daughter of the owner of a storefront on the boardwalk who complained that she works 70 hours a week and i almost asked if i could cover the weekends for her until she asked me first.

i was buying three tshirts for $15. a Rolling Stones ’72, a black sabbath, and a led zep. all black. all old looking. all on sale because locals know that if you go during the week its cheaper. i also bought sun glasses and this dude started talking to me about the lakers.

i have no problem talking about the lakers and what was nice is los angelinos havent had much to say about the lakers other than fuck kobe so when phil jackson returned everyone wanted to talk about the lakers again.

and then we were rudely interrupted by some visiting texans who asked us how on earth we could stand there in the hot sun eating pizza and talking about the lakers for 20 minutes when we were all headed to a game seven of the nba finals and no one had said shit about the san antonio spurs who were widely predicted at the begining of the season to win the west, which they did, or the pistons, the current nba champs who beat the lakers last year thanks to the refs who allowed the bad boys from the motor city to tie down the big fella as kobe kept missing from outside.

but they were right.

i was in 10 nba fantasy leagues this year which means that every day of the season i looked at everyones stats and knew who was in the IL who was hot who was sick and who was not available due to a death in the family

last year the busblog covered nearly every game in the finals. this year i dont think ive mentioned the playoffs even once.

the truth is i was so shocked by the tragic collapse of the lakers who went from the prospect of payton malone shaq and kobe to a team who wasnt even the best nba club in la. and even though kobe’s rape trial went his way, no longer was a laker game at staples a classy cool fun place to go. it had turned overnight into the pretty boy’s vanity team.

when shaq played here he was loved by the kids and the mexicans and thats it. fucker was mvp and people called him fat. he rapped while getting his third ring and people called him crosseyed and lazy. even sammy sosa was loved before he was unfairly booted out of chicago, but i dont remember any true love for diesel other than his first year.

and now, even though they still might not admit it, los angeles misses its big aristotle and would trade kobe to the heat for shaq in a second.

but the texas tourists were right, i havent talked about san antone or the pistons or these finals for the simple reason that it doesnt interest me. ginobli and duncan have no heart and even dennis rodman could play defense so detroit has still yet to earn my respect especially when they as the defending champs cant win at home which is the biggest diss ive ever seen hit motown, the most unfortunate of american cities.

i’ll probably go see batman.

xtx + leah is the girl below + flagrant

yes this is the tony pierce that you saw on Envoyé Spécial (which I understand will be rebroadcast on Friday at 2:15a so set your Le Tivo).

i am typing you from the closet that i was interviewed in. i am wearing pajamas but a different set of pajamas.

when i was interviewed by those very nice men of the award winning French tv show i was gainfully employed. today i am unemployed. so what i do is i wake up at noon, have a croissant, click around the web for twenty minutes, and then write for twenty minutes nonstop.

one of the places that i clicked today during the first twenty minutes was my stats.

when i saw that i had 250 visitors last hour, and many had come from http://fr.search.yahoo.com i scratched my bald head and said wtf which translated means Who let The French out.

my first guess was i had insulted you in some way and there was a campaign to attack me and leave nasty comments on my blog.

but then i remembered the camera crew that was out here so long ago who promised that the show would be broadcast in May. once may came and went i assumed that i was not exciting enough for the French tv audience and i was edited out of the presentation.

this is one of my fondest memories from that interview:

in television production there are shots that they call B-Roll, its like when you see someone walking down the street talking with the interviewer as the narrator speaks in the background. since i was being interviewed about blogging they said Antoine, would you please pretend that you are blogging and we will shoot b roll of you from a variety of angles.

i said, must i pretend? I would love to actually blog since I havent been able to do so all night?

They said, fine, blog. And sure enough they put the camera far away from me and filmed me from way back over there, they put the camera under my legs and filmed me from down there. they got on a chair above me, they flooded my livingroom and shot me underwater, they rented a blimp, they even pretended to take a break and filmed me to catch me “unawares”.

i didnt care, i had shit to blog. or merde a bloggue as you say.

ah france, i love ya. ive been there three times. once as a 20 year old boy, alone. i sailed in from Dover to Calais, then i took a train in the morning to Paris. I was headed for Octoberfest but i delayed my plans when i saw your beautiful city. i know not all of you are from paris, but lets pretend. oh paris, oh france. of course i met some americans on the rain to paris which isnt hard because we’re the ones trying to be as loud as the australians. we roamed the streets hungry looking for bread and wine and cheese and a grassy area in which to picnic. thankfully paris is freaking bursting with such places and just as the tourbook warned, we were greeted with hat-tipping smiling parisians wishing us “bonne appitite”. fucking class. god i love you.

i returned a few weeks later and spent an entire week with a very rich family who couldnt have been more hospitible. if i could speak better french i would move there and open up a taco stand. i couldnt find many good fish taco stands there and i have a feeling that youd really like a true ensenada-style spicy fish taco after a long night of dancing instead of one of those fatting crepes.

i would also open a store called Cold Sodas. i know that you know how we love our coke, sprite, and pepsi cold but you refuse to acknowledge our preferences. i think thats fine. youve done everything else right. perfect in fact. and as a tourist i would be suspicious of a cold soda from a real frenchman, so allow me, the american, to cater to the silly needs of my people. and yes i will overcharge them and wear a beret.

the second time i went to france was for matt and emmanuelle’s wedding. we were in Joncy where em’s father is the mayor of the town. we stayed up all night and drank all the wine in france and danced and looked at the stars and sang to the stars and sang to the white cows who were mooing to us in french which sounded like singing but em told us later was not singing at all, they were saying, she informed us, that they were going to wait until we fell asleep and they were going to eat our shoes. but theres nothing like walking barefoot through a 500 year old town in the summertime in france. so i love you, je t’aime, bonne anniversarrie.

le ding.

emmanuelle + France 2 + Buzznet evidence of the French invasion in Feb