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happy birthday, America
Happy birthday to my favorite country
a place where a man born to an African man and a midwestern woman
can go to Harvard, run for president, become president
and despite unprecedented Congressional cockblocking and cowardice,
miraculously pull a nation from a deliberating recession,
while killing tyrants, ending wars,
making the nation freer, healthier, and more prosperous
with style and eloquence.
As a Cub fan I look the other way when I remember he’s a Sox fan.
One day I hope his detractors can look the other way
when they remember
he’s not like them.
yours in rock,
busblog
chuck klosterman was on tv, talking about creativity
he said in order to induce creativity he gets himself bored.
he said our problems is that are instantly entertained within seconds thanks to the internet.
he said the best ways, though, to get your mind going is to
go on a long boring walk
with no music in your ears
and no phone in your hand.
what will happen is you might write a little song, you might think of a good topic for a book
you might think of all the things you shoulda said to that one babe
right before she cut off the light
and i thought maybe thats why i think of so many good things in the shower
its the one time when theres not a phone in front of me.
i had such a good day yesterday i could cry
it started out with me getting to interview this guy who has made movie posters for decades.
designs, art directs, sketches, creates, pitches and then makes some of your favorite movie posters
he’s worked with spielberg, saul bass, schwarezenneger, ron howard, you name em.
i was all, i hear ron howard is a monster IRL
people like jokes.
then i started driving.
on thursday uber had some technical problems. neither the drivers or the passengers could use the app
so i switched over to lyft where because of the surge of new businesses, the prices were multiplied
to fit demand. it was great. doubly great because lyft is offering me a bonus right now
because soon they will introduce their luxury car level of pricing and they want me to get ready
so i think i get double the fare no matter what the fare is, so needless to say ive been driving lyft.
most drivers who do both say the lyft passenger is nicer and more laid back and its sorta true.
i never met any passengers like Bobby Tortilla on Uber. So thanks Lyft.
Bobby is a heavy metal stage manager who told me some of the best stories.
We both talked about some weird ass times at Irvine Meadows.
I told him about sneaking into the ACDC / Queensryche show in ’86 where while they were playing Operation Mindcrime we traversed across the abandoned Lion Country Safari and eventually hopped the fence into the rock
And he told me about being chased by a cop and a K9 while carrying a twelve pack of Coors Light – a story that we both agreed would make an excellent music video.
He told me that he was going to be doing a show where Alice Cooper is playing and I told him about “Supermench” and he was stoked to hear about it. When I dropped him off there were two white vans in his driveway. He told me one was the old one and one is the new one. If those tour vans could talk.
Drove a shy french girl from one side of town to the other. She was here for two weeks, staying in a tall apartment building in West LA where I had previously picked up 5 swedish girls and while I was waiting for her there were two scantily clad black girls and if i was still in the LA news biz i’d stick my nose into that building, because what the
tonight i will be driving more Lyft because Uber still hasnt paid me my bonus from last week and they know theyre wrong and wont even answer my emails, pretending that Manilla celebrates the fourth of july.
but the best was lunch.
i had just dropped off this young lady at LAX who was flying to vancouver for the weekend. it took us a half hour to get from the venice blvd chase drive thru next to the cvs next to where the Good Hurt used to be next to where theres a bowling alley i think. it took us a half hour to get from there to the airport door.
so i figured, im not on a bonus, i dont have to be super hustling,
so i did something i never do, i went to kanpai and sat at the sushi bar and just treated myself.
they have a lunch menu before 6pm of enough food the fill you up for sure.
i paid $45 after tip and it was seriously the best lunch ive had all year.
i nearly cried in the parking lot.
happy canada day, america
for most americans, Canada is that place UP THERE that we never visit, barely think aboot and foolishly ignore
but thanks to blogging, i have made friends, kissed girls, drank beers, eaten poutine, and even had the pleasure of devouring Beaver Tails all while saying
why didnt anyone tell me about all of this before.
the idea that canada is nothing more than igloos and hockey rinks and beautiful women and eskimos is only half true
there are also Tim Hortons on every block, government run liquor stores, coins used as actual money, and french used as an actual language
the people say sorry a lot, they are super sweet, and the queen walks down the street during hockey season and gives high fives to the townfolk whenever a goal is scored.
i have had the great good pleasure of visiting americas hat several times and i am overdue for another excellent adventure and i must tell you, america:
canada is also america minus the dingleberries
in vancouver i saw a marijuana store run by hells angels
in toronto i ice skated outside in the snow and everyone, even the children were drunk off love (and molsons)
in ottowa i ate the most delicious indian food and saw the most beautiful gargoyles
in kingston i ate poutine at a kfc and i let out a moan so loud that they gave me a free cookie but told me i had to leave, soorry.
in barrie i soaked in a hot tub with lesbians as thick snowflakes lazily fell upon our heads
in quebec city i felt like i was in a runaway neighborhood of paris that was miraculously transported across the globe
and in montreal i proposed to a girl who said, first lets eat some smoked meats and we danced next to a brick wall while grafitti artists expertly painted our blurry forms
i have been harassed at the border, i have seen fireworks on a river, i have seen baseball played in a dome
i even slept for a night in a honeymoon suite overlooking niagra falls and i wondered,
why does america have buffalo when we could have had all of this?
don cherry, geddy lee, matthew good, neil young, mike meyers, pamela anderson, wayne gretzky
and now justin trudeau’s wife
should all be honorary americans
and by that i mean they should be given a gun and be exempt from paying taxes.
happy canada day, my favorite country in america that doesnt speak even a little bit spanish
unless theyre on vacation in cuba.
but first, a selfie
some days i dont wanna drive.
some days i dont wanna write.
some days i just wanna go home, collect my dirty laundry and go to the coin laundry.
i wrote my landlady at the beginning of the year to see if i can get a washer dryer. she never responded.
probably because she knows she cant legally say no and it will break her heart to say yes because im paying maybe 1/2 what the going rate is for this apartment and she wants me out.
on the other hand a washer dryer, a good one, costs about a grand.
my trips to the coin laundry costs maybe $8. which means i would have to do laundry 125 times to break even.
currently i go to the laundry about once a month. maybe every three weeks.
so maybe i go 18 times a year.
so i wouldnt break even for 7 years.
on one hand its a royal pain to go to the coin laundry but on the other hand you see things there you wouldnt see in the back of your apartment.
yesterday i saw a man sitting on a bench enjoying his chicken and a tall bud light.
a nice mexican man wearing a cowboy hat.
was he doing his laundry? who knows.
i was, and i put a brown towel in with my whites, i poured some bleach in there
and now i have a peach towel.
upgrade.
the cubs are going to win the world series
the Cubs did something yesterday that ive never seen before, which is saying something because ive watched baseball every day for several decades now.
it was the 14th inning. game was tied. their pitcher was getting tired so Joe Maddon the genius manager of the Cubs, and my hero, put in a relief pitcher
but he didnt put him on the mound, he put him in left field.
he let an out get recorded and then he brought that “left fielder” in to pitch and put the original pitcher in left field.
another out was recorded and he did the left field / pitcher switch again.
that way he could do the Lefty/Righty thing
it totally worked.
then in the next inning he did a similar thing with a new pitcher. he put Pedro Strop (pictured, above) in LF so he could be used as a pitcher, if needed.
there was no need because not only were the Reds flabbergasted by this, but their hitters kept trying to push the ball to left field instead of pulling it and their superpowers were taken away.
it was the most brilliant bit of managing i have ever seen in my life.
here’s how the professionals wrote about it on MLB.com
this game was proof that the Cubs will win the World Series because often champs win games like this. tough games. close games. games that losers lose. even though the Cubs are only about .500 in 1-run games i feel like this is a turning point. they believe even more in their skipper now than ever because they too have now seen him do something that most of us have never seen.
and it worked. and no one challenged it. and the umps even let the pitcher/LF warm up properly and it was entertaining
and it was solidified by a G-D grand slam by Javy Baez our secret power hitting utility man
i love this team so much i cant wait to see what happens next.
update: how some dude on reddit laid it out
Matt Welch is stepping down from being Editor in Chief of Reason
The man has a wife and two lovely daughters to support. So what will he do next?
Because the typically transparent Lakewoodian has been unusually tight lipped, one can only assume he already has something in the works.
Here are the Busblog Speculations:
1. he will be the Campaign Manager for the Tony Villar for Governor campaign
2. he will replace Albert Pujols at first base for the Angels (cant do any worse)
3. he will play rhythm guitar in the Ringo Starr All Starr Band
4. he will return to UCSB to finish his degree, become sports editor of the Nexus, and bring back the Good Morning Goleta radio show on KCSB.
5. he will replace the outgoing Skip Bayless and square off against Stephen A. Smith every morning on a new ESPN show called “Loudmouth and Whitey”.
6. he will return to his beloved Eastern Europe, along with his pal Tony Pierce, where they will roll out a chain of taco joints called Del Playa Taqueria.
7. he will be a producer on the next Morgan J. Freeman MTV series called Strapped about teen NRA members who love hip hop.
8. he will go into business helping gentrification-focused real estate flippers install Conversation Pits into Craftsman homes.
9. he will return to a life of crime, by which I mean letting his hair grow out and panhandling Euros from tourists on the Charles Bridge
10. Two words: Tronc VP
ten years ago today i was about two weeks into my reign at LAist
i was up all night, i was trying new things, i was writing my booty off
i was trying to recruit people to write for us for free
i was trying to get photographers and even copy editors
but one thing i was having no problem getting and that was bad reviews.
on Wednesday, HBO debuted a new weekly series hosted by Bill Simmons where he talks to a sports person and an entertainment person. a few days later the LA Times ran a review about the first episode and was super harsh about it.
i found it strange that they would go after a guy who had never hosted a show before and pounce on his first night out of the blocks.
i remember how the Food Desk would never review a restaurant the day it opened. instead they would let it get the kinks out, and then go 3-4 times during different parts of the day. theyd go on a weekend and then a weekday. that way their findings would be, in a way, scientific.
on this day ten years ago i was about ten days into my rule over LAist and i can tell you, things were far from ironed out
but still i posted some of the harshest comments that were being left by people who did not like my style.
behind the scenes i would write emails to the staff, sometimes daily, telling them that its ok, to hang in there.
keep writing, i would say, it’s the only way we can make it to where we want to go.
i felt like i was a captain of a ship that had to go through a huge terrible storm to get to the paradise on the other side, and there was no other route that could get us there quickly
either the ship would be sunk trying or it would sink not trying so we had to try
and i was going to yell at the storm as we did it and curse it out and give it the finger and moon it and dare it all along the way
but i needed the writers sooooo sooooo badly. without them i couldnt do it alone. so i begged them to be patient
and they were.
and of course i put the negative comments on the world famous, because f the haters. if anything they are the hot air in our sails.
blow, fuckers, blow.
and i hope Bill Simmons and his crew do likewise.
so thats what i was doing ten years ago today.
today im walking down robertson in beverly hills about to eat some sushi with anna kournikova because she cant stop loving me. and maybe i feel the same.
drove noine hours yesterday
did what i had to do and even took a picture for you