The Gurly Life

It's the stupid things

On Saturday, my evening plans fell through so my mom and I decided to have dinner at a local  restaurant. The food is good, and the staff are friendly and welcoming. They do everything they can to compete with the other, similar restaurant down the street. Bless their hearts.

Saturday evening was no exception. They had a violin/erhu/piano player in a full-on tux with tails. His hair was slick, and he played with the passion of a concert violinist. The only problem was that he really was not good at all. When we walked in he was playing some Christmas song on the violin, and he was off-key and flat, to boot. At first I thought I was having a stroke and that the auditory center of my brain had melted, but then I realized my mom was hearing the same thing. Let the giggling begin!

The entertainment moved on to the piano, where he launched into a piece by Mozart, messed it up a few times, stopped and started again, and then trailed into nothing. Ditto with Claire de Lune. After that, it was back to the erhu, which sounded ok to us - we assume he can play that one, and he's dabbling in the other instruments. Then again to his forte, the violin. He played several famous pieces, which we were kind of able to recognize - he would begin by keeping it simple, and do ok (not great, just ok), then his confidence would apparently outswell his skills, and he would take it to the next level, where it all went to shit.

While I realize this makes us horrible people, I have to admit we had the best time and giggled helplessly most of the evening, and walked out with big smiles on our faces. Naturally, we clapped at the end of each number. In fact, I enjoyed the bad playing more than I enjoy good playing: I like to chat with my company during dinner and have fun, not be distracted by good music and then feel obligated to pay attention. This was much, much better. We had no trouble telling the management that we enjoyed the evening's entertainment.

This is how pathetic I am

A few months ago, I was introduced to an HBO series, True Blood. For those of you who follow it, you know how addictive it is -- once you start, there's no turning back. I watched the first and second seasons on DVD as fast as I could, and was dismayed when season 2 ran out. Season 3 was already running on HBO, but not out on DVD yet.

Last Sunday, season 4 began, and season 3 came out on DVD. So I finally decided, that's it, I can't take it anymore. I subscribed to HBO (10 channels, plus on demand, so not a bad deal) and have started to record the new episodes, which will wait for me to be done with season 3 on DVD.

But that's not truly pathetic. What's truly pathetic is that I also upgraded my Netflix membership so that I can have 3 DVD's out at the same time - the long weekend is coming up, and I anticipate that I will want to watch more than 1 disc, right? Once I get done with season 3, I will go back to my 1 disc at a time membership. Once I upgrade to a new TV, I look forward to Netflix on demand, too. And no, I do not like to watch stuff on my laptop.

I put a lot of thought into this.

Cirque du Soleil

Last night my mom and I went to see Kooza, the new Cirque du Soleil show. I cannot describe the show to you, it cannot be described. But the athletic and artistic ability of these artists is breathtaking. Here's the trailer, if you'd like to get a glimpse.

If you've never been to one of their shows, deterred perhaps by the price of the tickets, I urge you to try to save up your pennies and see at least one. It is expensive, but the level of artistry is so inspiring that it will be money well spent.

I loved the whole show but my favorites were the contortionists, three women who appeared to be made of rubber (you can see them a few times in snippets in the trailer), and the two guys on the big wheel.

I watched the contortionists very carefully because their show was a beautifully choreographed advanced yoga routine. I noticed, for example, that they never bent at the lower back when they did those crazy back bends, but they bendt at the higher part of their spine. If you've even tried to do a back bend, you know that the upper spine, that part that is not your lower back and is not your neck, does not bend much at all. It takes years and years of practice to loosen it up.

So there I was, marveling at the contortionists' flexibility and strength, and thinking that I should be able to do all that in about 100 years, and I got all inspired about my yoga practice. What's a 100 years, after all? 40 have already gone by in the blink of an eye. Ok, ok, 41. Jeez.

The other number that totally blew me away involved two large metal circles attached to each other and hinged in the middle so that they circles themselves in a larger circular motion. There is a very brief snippet of this in the trailer, too. The circles were large enough for people to get into. Two guys got in, one in each circle, and started moving the thing by walking. Then they went faster and faster, and started jumping instead of walking. I almost fainted, as did everyone else. There were shrieks and oohs and mad clapping. Then one of them jumped out and as the empty circle zoomed past him again, he grabbed the outside and got on top of it and started doing crazy stuff outside the circle. Huge jumps, skipping rope, OHMYGOD I almost died. Unbelievable. Now that -- not even 100 years of yoga will prevail upon me to even try that.

Fab Four concert

Last night I went to a concert. Don't get all excited, it wasn't an honest-to-goodness rock'n'roll, 30,000 people kind of thing. It was a fund-raiser concert for the Rose Center in Westminster, CA, and the entertainment was a Beatles tribute band called The Fab Four.

I started out the evening at dinner with friends from the city, including the mayor. We went to Outback Steakhouse, where they have a gluten-free menu. That I think is very progressive and awesome, but what I don't understand is why they don't have gluten-free french fries. I mean, they actually bread their fries - wha-? It's not the end of the world, I ended up having a baked potato instead, which is better for me anyway, but WTF??? I also had the most tender, delicious fillet ever. You know, every time I go out to eat with people, I'm amazed at the amount of crap they eat. The bloomin' onion, for example: a giant onion, sliced up "bloom style," dipped in batter and then deep fried. And people actually eat this - bleah! I was dishes such as chicken with bacon and cheese smothered on top, and shrimp on a slice of toast. ?? Weird and gross. In any event, my food was excellent, so I'm certainly not complaining.

Mid-way through dinner we were joined by a councilman from another city, who's on a board for this city. He's the nicest man, and lots of fun, but the first few times I met him he was kinda scary. He's a loud, blustery kinda guy who doesn't take any crap. He reminds me of my favorite commissioner, who's now retired, who scared the pants off everyone from the bench. I went to chambers when he first arrived to introduce myself and discovered he was totally awesome. Every week I'd get to court a few minutes early and we'd have a cup of coffee together in chambers, then he'd go out and scare the pants off everyone (except me). Anywho, this councilmember is very nice, and we ended up chatting and hanging out most of the night. He also knew all the words to the Beatles songs, so we sang a bunch together.

The concert was very nice. As I mentioned, it was a fund-raiser for the Rose Center, so nothing too wild. The Fab Four are very good, and they played a range of songs, some very famous, some not famous at all - they play to the fans, who want them to sing not just the hits but also the amazing tunes that didn't become hits. They played songs chronologically, more or less, and changed their look as they went. Here's a shot from the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band era.

 

They were introduced by Ed Sullivan (an impersonator, obvy), who was quite good. For anyone who's not sure why, the Beatles' first tv appearance in the U.S. was on the Ed Sullivan Show. Here's "Ed Sullivan":

All in all, a really fun evening. There was not much dancing in the aisles, a very staid audience for the most part (how can you not dance to Beatles tunes?), except some aging rockers sitting behind us, bless their rock'n'roll hearts.  I sang and danced for much of the show, sealing my reputation for being a crazy person - although I think it's not that I'm crazy, it's that most people are just boring. Well, not boring, but certainly fully in the grip of feeling self-conscious and trying to avoid looking bad. Or maybe I'm just crazy - hahahaha!

Anyway, good fun was had by all, and I got home around midnite, so I got enough sleep to go to my 9am yoga class.

An unexpected treat

Yesterday I received a check in the mail for almost $500. It is from a class action lawsuit settlement against UCLA, where I went to law school. I'm sure I received some notice about it in the mail, like, 2 years ago. Whatever, the most I've ever received from any class action settlement has been $40 or so. I was therefore quite pleasantly surprised to get this check.

I went out and got me and my mom tickets to see Wicked before it closes. I got us the best seats they had, and we're going on New Year's Eve at 2pm.

While I was there, I met G.W. Bailey, from the cast of my favorite series, The Closer. Bailey plays Lt. Provenza on the show. I, being very uncool, told him I'm a huge fan of the show. He was very gracious.

Anywho, on with the show!

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

I know I've posted this before, but it's too good. Thanks Deirdre for the reminder!

Current episode of Monk filmed down the street from my place!

There's a tv show on USA Network, Monk, which I like and therefore TiVo. The show is set in San Francisco. Today I watched Friday's episode, and the opening sequence was filmed down the street from where I live, here in LA, so I guess the exteriors are shot here. When the episode is online, I'll link to it so you can see my street - it's only the first few seconds.

By the way, I went to Google Maps and this is the street view of my building.

View Larger Map

My building is the one to the right of the photograph, the nondescript gray thing.

A night at the theater

Last night, a Saturday night, I actually had plans. Oh yes. Some Saturday nights, I have plans. I went with Anne and John to see Christina in a play. Christina, like Anne, is a law school buddy, and is also a former tv child star. She was in a series called Out Of This World and other things. She has a bit of a following, which is amusing since she has not done any acting since the early 90's, so these fans probably could stand to move into the present, but that's a whole other issue.

Anyway, she recently decided to get back into acting, and was cast as Curley's Wife in Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, which ran at the Long Beach Playhouse until last night. The LBP seems to be next door to a senior center of some sort, so it was not clear whether all the people there were waiting to get into the theater, or if there were also some seniors hanging out and getting interrupted by the theather-goers.

It was awesome to see Chrstina in a play, and it was fun to do something different. But. And you know there had to be a but, right? But, I must say I found Of Mice and Men to be somewhat dated. Tragic, but dated. I just didn't connect with the story or the characters. I understand it's all very sad and poignant, but it's a bit like The Scarlet Letter - a classic, but somehow it has lost its original resonance.

I can't quite put my finger on why these two works fall flat for me, while Shakespeare's tragedies, for example, are just as emotionally vivid as if they had been written today. Perhaps this simply illustrates the difference between a great writer and a superlative writer. Suffice it to say that while I enjoyed being at the theater and thrilled to see my very talented friend perform, I found the play itself to be too far removed from my own experience of life to be of much relevance.

Regardless of my opinion of the material (everyone's a critic, right?), it was a fun night out. I drove to Anne and John's place, and rode down to Long Beach with them, so we got to catch up in the car on the way there and on the way back. I have not really had much of a chance to get to know John, and it was fun to have the time there and back to chat with both of them. They are perfect for each other, by the way. (You might remember them from this post.)

As we were leaving, I asked John to snap a shot of us in front of the Long Beach Playhouse marquee.

Anne is much taller than I am, but I'm wearing 12" platform clogs, so you can't tell how much taller she really is. I thought I was going to post this photo on my 365 portraits album, but I'd forgotten I'd already posted the "I just woke up" shot earlier. Nevermind, I'm posting it here, now. Same thing.

Believe it or not, I got home at about midnite (I know, right?) and didn't go to sleep till, like 1am. OMG! Dee woke me this morning at about 8:30, inquiring whether I was planning to swing her way to hit the beach, but given the slow start and the marine layer, I passed for today. Which is just as well, because Dee is taking antibiotics and really should not be out in the sun, what was she thinking?

Then, I went to the movies. But more of that in the next post.