As promised yesterday, here are my panorama images of Los Angeles from the top of a peak in Griffith Park. Thanks to Ken Walz for his post-production help.
Tuesday morning (today is Tuesday, right? I guess it’s easy to lose track of what day it is when everyone around you is livin’ free and easy with absolutely no concern for worldly issues). Awaken, wash up, and head for Chango, an Echo Park hipster haven where one often overhears thrillingly disheveled cool kids conversing about the analog synth sound on a particular German drone-rock album, or what that character should have said to his cohort at the climax of a recently screened indie comedy flick. No one talks of jobs; there is no mention of anything even remotely related to labor. This is at eleven o’clock in the AM, when the majority of the city’s population is doing inexplicably crazy shit…like earning a living.
After Chango, it’s back to Ilya’s house, where Craigslist has had eighteen hours to accrue new housing posts. One hour and five outgoing e-mails later, a sense of satisfaction washes over me, and I feel as if I’ve completed all my chores for the day. At last, relaxation time. Ilya is dropped off at work, and I proceed to drive around Mid-Wilshire and then West Hollywood. A quick e-mail check at Borders, three phone calls, and then the phone’s battery dies. Effectively cut off from outside forces, now is as good a time as any to explore Amoeba Records.
$40 later, it’s back to the house for a half-hour to let the dead cell phone recharge. Once the urge to do something (anything) returns, it’s out the door and back into the car. Hung out on Vermont in Los Feliz, soaking in the local flavor. It’s a more gentrified ‘hood than Echo Park; what it lacks in weird, ethnic style it makes up for in countless chic, trendy boutiques, and a Starbucks. Unfortunately, this is not the year 2505; my latte didn’t come with a handjob.
An invite to dinner. The fettuccine and meatballs at Lyz and Steve’s is tasty and filling. If tonight was the motion picture sequel to last evening, the trailer would intercut bold phrases such as: MORE beers consumed. MORE costumes adorned. MORE uncouth jokes.
A complete day. A return to the couch-bed. No responses to any of my daily apartment inquiries. Perhaps tomorrow, or so I keep telling myself.
