Monday, June 26, 2006

Los Angeles Times

I go so long between entries these days. I'm not quite sure why that is. It was once because I didn't think I was really doing anything all that exciting, not that what I was doing wasn't fun but it just didn't seem like anything worth writing about. Drunken nights, while quite fun, tend to not make very interesting stories so I didn't bother writing about them. However, I have been in Korea for exactly a month today so maybe I should now make an effort to update this thing more regularly.

I had a good time while I was in Whittier. I can't say that I did all that much. My friend, Joey, would go to work at 8:30 when he should've left much earlier and I would sleep in until the mid-afternoon. I guess somedays I woke up a little after 12 but you get the picture. Then it was time for a bean and cheese burrito down the street and to watch back-to-back episodes of Law&Order on TNT. I was pretty much at the whim of my friend's schedule. I was practically a wife or pet dog. Sometimes I would clean up the house out of boredom. There were 5-6 people living in the house and none of them liked to clean so the one time I vacuumed there must have been months worth of dust. I swear I've never actually witnessed the carpet change colours after being vacuumed. Pretty much of all them were gone during the day and I came to the conclusion that if I actually were a housewife and had no car and no company during the day that I would probably want to have a baby. Caillie, the illegal resident, was a sometimes companion during the day but she had classes and work. I thoroughly enjoyed her company though. I was prepared for all that though and had I been in Edmonton I would've been sitting around the house and have it be colder outside and sit around at night also. It's too bad I had to pay for rent and utilities in LA but I guess most people pay rent. In case you didn't know, English teachers in Korea have free accommodation. Anyways, once Joey came home and my tail stopped wagging we'd have a good time. We'd go for sushi with Matt or watch TV at home and drink lots of beer. Sometimes we'd even leave Whittier.

A few days, I had little adventures. I drove down to CBS Television city for a taping of the Late Late Show but I thought was too late to get in so just drove by. It was one of the days of the big immigration protests. I also had to take the bus and subway to downtown LA to go to the Korean Consulate. I had a big fat book so the the 1.5 hour journey (one-way) (3h total) didn't seem that long. I managed to make it to a taping of Real Time with Bill Maher. That was pretty cool but also really surreal. This will sound really stupid but Bill Maher looked exactly the same as he does on television. I expected him to look different in person. Mind you I never saw him out of the stage lights so that may be part of it. The set also seemed really small. Anyways, it was pretty much just like watching the show but from inside the TV but further away and with an unchanging view. Well actually our seats weren't great because cameras blocked my view of the host and all the guests so I actually did watch the monitor most of the time. After we went for Ethiopan food. Interesting as well considering neither of us knew anything about Ethiopian food.

I also went to a Bob Dylan concert in Bakersfield. I got to sit with his mom way at the back of the Robabank Center (something like that) where she fell asleep. Joey meanwhile was 3 rows from the front. Then there was Joey's birthday party at a Latin jazz club, a cinco de mayo/Joey and Matt's combined birthday party, a trip to the Getty Museum and 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica. Then on one of the last days we took a trip downtown and saw historic Los Angeles, Union Station, Koreatown, the tar pits, and maybe something. Also, Jelena, which was nice. I met her one of the other times I was in Whittier. Alex, my friend in Korea, went to Whittier and knows her better than I do so I thought I'd take pictures to weird him out.

I guess that pretty much sums up LA for me. That and a few catchphrases and singing out Wikipedia won't make sense to any but a select few. I guess I didn't mention Korea at all so I should probably change the title of this entry. Anyways, here are some drunken photos.


Joey and Laura, lovely wife of his friend


Laura's lovely husband



A photo of them together too bad not to show.


View from the Getty Centre. Smogarific.


Jelena and Me.


Can you spot the pseudo-penis?


My daytime companion and her boyfriend who account for the 0/1 roommate since he was away for training.


So long, buddy.