shes the reason the birds sing
shes the reason airplanes fly
shes the reason the blogosphere exploded and everyone wanted in
she is the real deal, the inspiration and the source.
the sun revolves around her.
shes the reason the birds sing
shes the reason airplanes fly
shes the reason the blogosphere exploded and everyone wanted in
she is the real deal, the inspiration and the source.
the sun revolves around her.
because of numerous reasons i didnt go see U2 with my brother in Vegas for any of the Sphere shows
people are calling it the greatest show ever
i wanted to go. i should have gone. i should have done whatever it took.
i thought this would happen or that or this other thing and none of them came through.
still i shoulda done the thing.
now i regret it because now it feels like that moment is gone and wont come back.
on the other hand u2 reportedly made $4 million a show with minimal overhead.
so maybe u2 will return to that gravy train again one day. which would be beautiful.
until then i will learn from this mistake and live for the day instead of waiting for miracles to happen tomorrow.
so i knew it had to drive longer and further, luckily traffic was as light as a three gram eigth.
she asked how? do you fly?
driving through silver lake to get to the freeway she said something like i love the east side
she said but why not the east side, it’s east of the beach.
everythings east of the beach i thought in my head knowing i had probably already lost the tip, which sucks because new yorkers are reliably good at tipping.
she was not dumb, she was jetlagged from jetting here the night before, working all day, dinner and drinks with friends at Horses
finally i said, but it’s not what angelenos call the east side unless they want to get into a fight – a verbal fight – with someone.
she was not happy with this conversation which made me sad because there we were so smart, so sexy, both smelling my jack in the box curly fries poorly hidden in the glove box
she was probably falling in love with me and if i had just let her be wrong we’d be texting selfies right now saying lol and omg after each photo
two lanes of cars in the slow lanes were a parade of red brake lights along the hollywood freeway east as it crept to the 110 and 5 interchanges. stay left as long as you can, drafting the cars on the fast lane, soon the backup on the right will die down and you can merge over with ease, skating into the off ramp and into the hells mouth of the 110 south through DTLA
she was not impressed and soon we were met with another set of tail lights. these in the alleged faster lanes.
traffic she tapped.
opportunity, i sang and turned down the bee gees
why had i sat out so many days? the podcast for one, which was tardy, and without rest my arms and hands get sore. i felt great.
also driving at night in LA, calling your shots to a super sharp new yorker who hates you so much bc youre now being cocky, is extremely fun because thank god im finally good at something. and for once profitable.
$29 to LAX for a 41 minute trip? do you know how many ive taken for $20? $21 that take an hour? desperately? gambling a tip would be involved or a sweet ass fat ride out of LAX?
$29? did uber see i was driving way more for Lyft lately? of course they track us. we give them that permission so we can use the app. if they’re not tracking then shame on them.
as everyone merged to the left of the already congested harbor freeway in front of the beautiful westin bonaventure, i kept to the right where the only assignment is not to get hit. thats it. survive long enough to get to the magical overpass thing around 6th street / Wilshire.
i did all those things and got back on the 110 with ease and turned up foghat. she was still not awed enough to say im yours.
and with her hate now directed elsewhere, we sped onto the upper deck carpool lanes above the 110 next to USC and talked shit about our Black mayors with mutual disgust, topping each other’s tales with our miseries.
was if you got taken to Farrell’s with all your friends.
these dudes in straw hats would come running out with a giant bowl of ice cream on a faux stretcher. bells would ring, people would shout. was there music?
these guys would run around the whole restaurant and place the bowl on your table. the large one was called The Zoo bc it had all these plastic animals in there and about 19 scoops of different flavors and chocolate sauce and whipped cream.
this photo makes the bowl look small. it was enormous.
at least in my memory.
which is fading.
getting the photos that are missing on the busblog back on
the uber stories substack
moving hear in LA to substack
detailing the inside of the car
registering the car
getting my sleep schedule fixed
way more farting
Weezer played a secret show and i never put in a request for anything.
i learned a long time ago not to ask for favors but this was different bc =w= was gonna play the blue album
i had taken karisa to the Memories Tour in like 2010? at the universal amphitheater and it was ok. but this was way better.
earlier this week Rivers talked on KROQ about why Keanu’s band Dogstar was gonna open and why it was important for them to play a small club to kick it all off.
if im lucky ill get to write about it for setlist.
afterwards i ran into Beth and Keith Shapiro and we had drinks
WHAT A GREAT NIGHT
Near the very end of this piece is the line: “Tens of thousands of humans could lose jobs in the future — from taxi to truck drivers.”
That is called burying the lede.
When you read stories about Waymo and other robot cars bum rushing the show, watch how good journalists and reputable media outlets treat these bots and their alleged inevitably in away that is so much different than how they write about ChatGPT being tested by Sports Illustrated, Gannet, and LAist
.
It’s the Same exact thing, except this bot isn’t coming for their job, it’s coming for the struggling middle class gig workers grinding at all hours of the day and night to make ends meet. So it’s ok. And cute.
And “omg my backseat driving reflex is on high alert.”
While readers are thankful for all the details about how terrible these cars have rolled out onto the streets – smashing into people and property, clogging narrow streets of Frisco when they malfunction – and learn how the politicians claim to be concerned but magically these vehicles have appeared without any public consent, something’s missing in the narrative.
Namely how the humans who take these journalists to lunch and work and from LAX in the rain and to LAX in the dark – are being fucked by two new foes: lawmakers and now the press.
It took decades of voting and red tape and hand wringing to finally get first medical and then recreational marijuana in California – and we still can’t smoke a joint in a park or on the sidewalk. Meanwhile many cities have refused to listen to the voice of the people and have outlawed the sale of the Devil’s cabbage in their precious burb.
But robot cars on the streets? NBD? Get used to it? That’s the tone from every news outlet on TV, print and online. “Look everyone the rides are free this month!”
As great journos like Jon Healey, Ben Welsh, and Michelle Maltais and others are well aware, ChatGPT in online news is 1,000% easier to pull off than robot taxis.
Given a fraction of the seed money Waymo and the others have received even a dope like me could lead a team to create bots that could spit out “news” with precision SEO, tantalizing copyright free AI art to go with every story, and corresponding social media posts effortlessly deployed at the exact time the algo says they should be published.
But when the media writes about *their* precarious jobs being targeted by zeros and ones the tone is far more dark and far less giddy.
The entire entertainment industry went on strike less than a year ago over the fear of AI and ChatGPT replacing extras and screenwriters and the media supported that industry, their strike, and their cause.
That same media quietly cheered when SI folded shortly after it was revealed that they had been partnering with a startup built solely to replace human journalists with bots.
But robot taxis replacing humans and our Priuses? A yawn louder than a typical reaction from a Plaschke column.
The LA Times needs a regular rideshare column to bring home the human damage this technology can’t wait to sink its teeth into. A column where a not-so-humble driver takes fellow humans around this vast city and has human interactions with them and reports back who Angelenos truly are and shares examples of ways bots could never replace souls.
Yesterday I picked up a woman who needed to go from Mid City to Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital because she had a mild stroke and didn’t want to call an ambulance because she feared it would only take her to Cedars and she hated how long the wait at the ER was.
So when I arrived she begged me to come around to the alley to get her because walking was difficult. When we realized the back gate had accidently closed and locked, she had me walk all around the giant building to the front area and meet her at her apartment where I was asked to hold her as she gently made her way down her rickety staircase.
She smelled of urine. She was shaking. She yelled out a few times terrified she was going to fall. You’re not going to fall I assured her. I am right here.
When we made it across town she asked me to get her a wheelchair and help her out of the car and into the waiting room. Which I gladly did. Of course. This woman was younger than my mother.
There are things robots are great at. And there are some things the human touch is ideal for.
Carrying Angelenos around this beautiful town isn’t for everyone. And it sure as hell isn’t the place for an untested bot in 2024. Unless you want to find a safe space to light up, piss or puke.
Three things I do every time I read these curious stories in my favorite paper.
it was oscar sunday, griffith park. two babes in their 20s sporting skin tight outfits heading to venice. first time to LA. from utah.
the best way to describe the outfits are aerobicise, parachute gear, no bra, white nikes. but mostly power rangers.and sunglasses.
because it was a few hours before the oscars, hollywood was a mess. roads were closed. demonstrators. clogged freeways, so i was more than happy to take a ride to the beach even though i would only get $28. fuck it. waze said it would only take 45 minutes.
i knew it was a lie. ended up being an hour but immediately we were talking sex drugs and youtube.
blonde in the back, 22, told me she wants to be a sugar baby “my tastes are very expensive. i need a sugar daddy who understands that.” she stated as her friend, pre med, also blonde but maybe more natural? thus darker? giggled, clearly having heard this proclamation more than once.
are you down for whatever from this man?
i mean if he takes care of me, i’ll take care of him.
you’re 22? how old are you willing to go?
40? maybe 42?
i hate to tell you this, miss utah, but the 40 year old sugar daddies wouldnt appreciate you. could you go older? wiser? easier to please?
50?
have you heard of anna nicole smith before, ladies?
they hadnt so i told them the tale. when it was over they were blown away. as was i. how did none of it ring a bell? the legend of anna has died with gen z? mama mia.
by the time we got on the 101 near coldwater miss utah had settled on 60 as her ceiling.
what if he wanted you to bring a friend or two home from the club? i asked
why would he want something more than what i can give? she asked, seriously.
lets pretend this man is truly wealthy. and has traveled the world. and has seen and done some things we cant even imagine, he might request some things that don’t make a lot of sense on paper, but in this uber we dont kink shame. life is fleeting.
fine, she sighed looking out at a wee bit of traffic as we approached the 405.
the ladies were headed to a bar in santa monica they accidentally thought was in venice.
so i had them change the destination on their app, which lost me a few bucks but who’s counting. they were on a mission to retrieve the blonde’s wallet which they had accidentally left behind Oscar Saturday because their outfits had no pockets
first time in LA you say? did the men of santa monica beach pay you any mind?
oh yes. free drinks all night. thats why we left without knowing we had no wallet, miss pre-med said. but ive been checking the cards online and no one has charged anything on them, so we are hoping the manager found it last night.
tell me about utah.
it’s terrible.
i hear it’s pretty.
this is pretty, one of them said while we cruised in the fast lane between the unusually green hills of bel air and brentwood.
we had established early that one was catholic the other was agnostic and neither had boyfriends. so i asked, whats it like dating mormon guys.
so weird they both said in perfect harmony then laughed
i hear they do everything but, i asked.
EVERYTHING BUTT, miss utah laughed and kept laughing cracking herself up. her friend joined in.
because they think only pee-pee to pee-pee sex is sex?
yes they said and asked if i had ever heard of soaking?
is that where the dude goes in slowly but then just lays there without moving?
yes! they screamed, startling me as we took the curve from the 405 to the 10 west, sin in our eyes, i mean sun.
but here’s the weird part, the blonde said, there’s a friend who’s The Shaker. she laughed
so hard she farted. then her friend laughed. i rolled down the windows and they laughed more. perfect day.
The Shaker, the future doctor explained, shakes the bed so neither party engaged in the lovin can be held accountable bc they arent the ones moving… they just happen to be on a bed being rattled around by the pal who has to feel a bit awkward.
we got stuck exiting onto the 4th street off ramp so i took off my cubs cap and said out loud, Lord, these are two lovely young ladies. please help them find their wallet, and eventually realize their dreams in the nicest ways.
A-men!
$12.45 tip.
sometimes i wonder if its a huge mistake but i doubt myself too much
my brain says i should write new people. people who might be down to go to the barn dance with me
sometimes its just nice to close your eyes and write what you really feel to the people who are on your mind and in your heart
of which i have been blessed with many fond memories
and incredible souls to write or call or send telegrams to.
today i ate a red meat burger from jack in the box
something i hardly ever do
and half way through eating it i felt a little sick but i kept eating
and i also go paid double something for something i really enjoyed doing
which is a blessing from above bc i need it right now whoo boy