Public Eyebrow Groomer as seen on a Metro Bus

Since I began my adventures in public transportation earlier this year, I have seen a lot of rude, inappropriate and often strange behavior from my fellow carbon-based life forms. I have seen people carelessly put their shoes on bus seats.  I have seen someone leave a half-eaten sandwich on the floor of the train. I have seen a perfectly nice looking middle-aged woman forcibly push her way to the front of a line of people boarding a bus, just to be the first one on. I have shared personal space with people emitting body odors that would make a mortician gag. Yes my friends, I have been to hell and back and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.

While annoying, I have grown to accept many of these acts of humanness as part of the deal when taking public transportation. Still, when I see something like today’s featured Metro rider, I can’t help but make a public mockery of it.

Today, while making my connection to the Metro Red Line, I sat across from this girl who was plucking her eyebrows. Maybe some of you think this is OK, but let me tell you, YOU ARE WRONG. Some personal grooming is acceptable on public transportation I would say. Like powdering your nose or putting on lipstick. However, anything involving body hair is an absolute disgusting DON’T. You wouldn’t shave your armpits on the bus, would you? Would she? I don’t know. Fortunately, I made my connection before I had to find out.

I exited my dentist’s Miracle Mile office not long after 10 a.m. this morning confronted by the absolute beauty of the day — its comfortable crystal clarity prevented me from beelining it on my bike to work. So I took the long way to Westchester. Instead of heading south to Culver City, I cut through Beverly Hills got up onto Santa Monica Boulevard and rolled that thoroughfare all the way to its end where I paused to enjoy the breathtaking views from the palisades before cranking it south along a near-barren beach bikepath to Venice and its pier from which I observed sea lions and dolphins before snapping the above shot of the solitary surfer surveying his vast empire.

Glorious days like this are enough to bring a tear to my eye.

Younger men are better looking, healthier, have more energy, are more fun, don’t need Viagra, and won’t die on you!

Such is the rationale for tonight’s California Cougar Convention.  While older men are considered men even though they show off their grays in the form of a young blond, society’s answer to the reverse situation is: predatory animals.  So, in the spirit of the jungle kingdom, the Society of Single Professionals (yes) organized tonight’s convention  for cougars and their would-be cubs at the Beverly Hills Crowne Plaza Hotel.  Thirty dollars will buy you access to the stalking, the pouncing, and the purring; in addition, the young cubs will vote to elect a Miss Cougar California (who must be 40 or over (that’s who an “older woman” is, apparently) and “legally single”) during the night’s dance party.

For those of you who want so desperately to cougar, but don’t know how, take the 6:30 class in cougaring at The Cougar School, free for paid convention goers.  I’m not exactly sure what this will entail, but I’m envisioning the scene from The Lion King where Mufasa teaches Simba how to pounce.  Cubs, heed the sign’s warning: If attacked, fight back.  Zazu should have been so lucky.

When mountain lions attack photo taken by jurvetson and used under a Creative Commons license.

Indeed, biking by this morning I was relieved and pleased to find both swastikas (located between Las Palmas and Hudson)had been excised:

Sure, the end results might not be as cosmetically appealing as one might have wished for, but the patched pavement is certainly a great improvement over what was there before, thanks to Councilman LaBonge and the Department of Public Works.

First up I contacted the Bureau of Street Services (BOSS) and filed an online service request, which included an offer to meet personnel at the scene to point out the swastikas’ locations, as they are easily missed. Five days later when my request had not surprisingly been summarily ignored, I followed-up only to be politely told by a BOSS representative that regardless of the reprehensible symbols being in the actual street, such requests were not under their jurisdiction and that as a courtesy they had forwarded it on to the Department of Public Works’ Office of Community Beautification (OCB). How nice of them.

Not willing to believe that, On October 13 I went to the OCB website and filled out a removal request form, again detailing the nature and location of the two swastikas, and offering to meet workers on-site to show them where they were.

Yesterday, I got the following automated e-mail from OCB:

On behalf of the City of Los Angeles and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and your city council, thank you for contacting 3-1-1 to report graffiti in your neighborhood.

According to the contractor servicing the area, the graffiti (346217) you have reported on Oct 13, 2009 at W 4TH ST & S JUNE ST was removed on .

Please let us know if there was any problem with the service or if the graffiti reoccurs at this or any other location.

Graffiti abatement requests may also be submitted to OCB at the following website:  www.lacity.org/BPW/OCS/grsr.htm

If you would like to provide any feedback on this request, you may e-mail communitybeautification@lacity.org

Office of Community Beautification
Department of Public Works
200 N. Spring Street, Suite 356
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Phone:  213/978-0228

Despite the email only addressing one of the two swastikas and also failing to list the date the alleged contractor allegedly removed it, I have to say I was half-way impressed… right up until this morning when I biked by and found the hateful thing entirely untouched:

Naturally I’ve both emailed the OCB and left a voicemail message enthusiastically looking for an explanation as to why on behalf of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and my city council they would declare a job done that it hadn’t even started. I expect they’ll be in no rush to reply so in the interim I’m going to find out if the Hancock Park Homeowners Association and Councilman Tom LaBonge are interested in ignoring me, too.

Updates of either progress or continuing bureaucratic stagnation to come, as they develop.

In summary, Haggis’ initial frustration arose from the San Diego branch’s support of Proposition 8, and, in spite of his appeals, the Church’s inaction over condemning the support of the anti-gay legislation.

“I told you I could not, in good conscience, be a member of an organization where gay-bashing was tolerated,” Haggis writes.

Haggis goes on to verify and condemn that the Church used private information gathered during an auditing session to smear a Church defector, a tactic the Church has long denied ever using.

“So, I am now painfully aware that you might see this an attack and just as easily use things I have confessed over the years to smear my name.”

The letter ends, “I hereby resign my membership in the Church of Scientology.”

But one thing he never does is recant any of the core teaching or beliefs of Scientology. His bone lies only with how the Church is run.

Additionally, the site this first appeared on, the writer, by former Scientologist Marty Rathbun, notes that the Church of Scientology is not anti-gay, and that L Ron Hubbard even had long time staff who were homosexual.

More importantly, both Rathbun and Haggis, while they have strong issues with the Church itself, both continue to have strong beliefs in Scientology itself. These aren’t people who ran from the Church, believing they were duped by a bunch of alien hogwash, but true believers who take issue with a system and leadership they argue is taking advantage of its members.

Which begs the question… have former members of the Church of Scientology yet tried to create a their own church, using the same materials, but without the cultish tactics that Scientology is currently synonymous? And if not, could the comments from as high profile member as Haggis become the spark for such an effort?

—

On a related note, during an interview on Nightline last Thursday, the same Scientology spokesman who Haggis’ letter was addressed to, stormed off set in the middle of an interview. At the end of the clip below, you can see spokesman Tommy Davis yanking off his microphone and walking away after reporter Martin Bashir asked him about some core beliefs relating to Xenu, Thetans, and other topics that are allegedly priviliged information only for those among Scientology’s highest ranks.

And by asking about these beliefs, Bashir was simply asking if Davis believed in them. (fast forward to the 3:15 mark to get to this portion of the report).

I was too busy celebrating my birthday to get my act together in time to post so you could get to tonight’s showing of “LEGACY OF BLOOD,” but look at it this way: Now you’re even more motivated to go see the other four movies.

What the heck am I even talking about, say ye? Well gather round and I’ll tell ye about the latest Joel (Mystery Science Theater) Hodgson and his gang, doing their now famous schtick-along to some classic film offerings.

MONDAY OCT. 26th,  7:30pm –  “DANGER ON TIKI ISLAND”
Living on an island near a nuclear testing zone has its downsides – i.e. being terrorized by one of the worst movie monsters ever!

TUESDAY OCT. 27th ,  7:30pm – “SANTA CLAUS CONQUERS THE MARTIANS”
See the fully re-riffed version of an MST3K classic…

WEDNESDAY  OCT. 28th,  7:30pm – “THE ALIEN FACTOR”
Aliens invade Baltimore, and they have no budget!

THURSDAY OCT. 29th,  7:30pm – “EAST MEETS WATTS”
Stud Brown and Larry Chin take on a drug cartel in this “Kung-sploitation” classi…uh, movie.

Tickets available NOW!
$35.00 – available by calling 310-855-0350 (visa/mastercard only)
or drop by the Largo box office mon,wed,fri 2-7pm
366 N. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles CA 90048
Largo at the Coronet – www.largo-la.com
Doors 6.30 show 7.30

Each night will be an event as they have different special guests lined up too!  Not to mention the warm-up artistry of Dave (Gruber) Allen (on his home turf)!

As for the film itself, I understood more the second time around.  “Mulholland Drive” simply cannot be viewed only once (unless you are in the category of unfortunate people who don’t like David Lynch films, in which case once is probably too much).  But then I did some research, and found out some really interesting things.  Since I rented and do not own the dvd, I did not know that Lynch inserted ten clues to watching the movie inside the back cover of the dvd box.
  I would encourage anyone who is about to watch the movie, whether for the first time or not, to check out Lynch’s clues beforehand.  But, for dvd renters with no access to the box, be warned that every link to the clues that I found online also contains people’s interpretations of the answers, which you should skip until after you concoct your own.

After reading Lynch’s clues and different interpretations of them, I have come to my own satisfying conclusions about what happened in the movie, when it happened, and what was represented.  I really like this video of Lynch explaining (or not explaining, in typically Lynch fashion) to an English teacher who says she didn’t understand the film, “you do know, you do know for yourself, and what you know is valid.”

But beyond the satisfying task of interpreting “Mulholland Drive” lie the film’s lessons about the mythical and real “Hollywood.”  Certainly, these themes are not new, having been explored in many previous films about the movie business, such as “Sunset Boulevard,” “Barton Fink,” and “The Player.” We know them by heart: Hollywood is where naive dreams come crashing against cynical reality, often represented by the loss of innocence of the starlet or the screenwriter fresh off the bus from Kansas, etc.  But I believe that living in the Los Angeles area, where many people work in or with the film industry and all of us know people who do, gives us a different lens through which to view “Mulholland Drive” and other films about Hollywood, and thus another level of satisfaction.

For me, watching a David Lynch movie is like Hollywood itself: it both attracts and repels, sometimes simultaneously.  But at least in the case of Lynch, the attraction always wins out.

A few weeks ago, Los Angeles County Supervisor Gloria Molina announced a $45 million renovation of this memorial to the nearly-extinct doughboy veterans of WW I. (God bless them all–my own late father-in-law included.) I’d hoped her plans would include some suggestions for more and better use of this handsome but obsolete facility, but not so….… Molina did promise a new kitchen and plumbing and that the renovated Hall would meet national LEED (Leadership in Energy Efficiency and Design) standards. These standards are usually brought to new buildings at their planning stage and cost a whole lot to attain. I’ve never heard of them being applied to the rehabbing of an 83-year old masonry pile built in the dawn of America’s  energy glut. So this part of the proposal  sounds like trying to turn a 1926 Hupmobile into a plug-in hybrid.

Patriotic Hall has long been a structure in search of a day-to-day function. It’s got a library and a fine 660-seat auditorium (the perfect size for chamber music concerts and small elementary-school graduations, but not much else) and galleries of pictures and displays from America’s wars going back nearly 150 years. It also houses the American Society of Military History, LA Chapter No. 5 of Disabled Veterans, the LA County Council of the American Legion, the Military Order of the Purple Heart and The Friends of Patriotic Hall. Not many  tenants for a building this size.

The problem is location. The 1800 block of South Fig St. is far from Civic Center and well off the downtown tourist trail. And LA County  veterans are served well enough by their local VFW and American Legion posts–plus the VA of course. The last time Patriotic Hall was really in the news was when it was renamed in 2003 after the late Bob Hope (My father-in-law, Capt. (ret’d) Min Hamilton of the  Army’s 42nd “Rainbow” Division, would surely have preferred that it be renamed after his own 1917 commander, Gen. John J. Pershing). Before that, I recall its being used in the early `80s as a shelter for homeless veterans. Maybe that was its best-ever use. But  you suspect the true purpose of this renovation is to create jobs, rather than to enhance a county public facility. The rehab plans had been lying around for a while and somehow the money was suddenly there. Now it will go into pay envelopes and the economy and help keep working people fed. That’s fine  with me. These recession days, none dare say “Pork.”

But Molina’s press release didn’t offer a clue as to where that $45 million fixerup money suddenly came from. Asking elsewhere around the county offices, I discovered this is in fact, funding from the ARRA or ‘‘American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009’’ – better known as the U.S. Stimulus Act that President Obama signed into law on February 17, 2009.  It’s odd that Supervisor Molina, one of the region’s top Democrats, wouldn’t mention where her funding originated. And maybe–even– show some gratitude.

By contrast, Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe, a registered Republican, made it very clear earlier this year that $160 million in Stimulus funds now available to LA County for pure employment creation came right out of the ARRA. (These funds will make for 10,000 varied temporary jobs lasting at least until September 2010).  Just last week, the county voted a couple more 7-figure public-works style programs, also confessedly funded with ARRA money. It’s not, you might think,  something you’d want to hide.

Politics being what it is, the more you express your gratitude to  the president and the members the congress people who got the act passed, the more likely you are to see more of said money. That apart, what’s wrong with the ancient  custom of just saying “thank you?”  Even if you happen to be the almighty Supervisor of LA County’s First District?