The Occasional Blog of Jonah Weiland

I love the rain.

Living in Los Angeles I don’t get to see rain very often. We average between ten to fifteen inches of the stuff a year, so it doesn’t rain all that much. When it does rain it usually comes all at one time. We can go an entire summer without rain. It actually gets a bit annoying. I’m sure those of you in the more wet climates will find this nuts, but too much sun can be a drag. Frankly, it gets boring.

Saturday night it rained in Los Angeles. That’s the first rain of the season. It was cloudy all day, but it just wasn’t cold enough until the late night hours for it to rain. Last week was one of the hottest weeks on record, then Saturday night it rains. Gotta love it.

There’s really no better time in Los Angeles than on a clear day after it rains. Saturday it rained. It cleared up the horrendous smog we’ve been having lately. Sunday the skies were wide open with a few clouds here and there and the smog was gone. Bright, deep blue skies. The kind of skies you see in movies. Today the air was as close to mountain fresh as it ever gets in Los Angeles. It was cool all day today with a bright sun beaming down on us. The one-thing smog gives us is some damn beautiful sunsets, but I prefer the clean air myself.

That first rain of the season also cleans the streets of Los Angeles. Gone are all the nasty stains and trash that’s accumulated over the summer months. When the roads dry they’re no longer slick and the tires of your car stick nicely to the asphalt. Sunday was a good day to drive in Los Angeles. Nice clean roads. Nice clean air. Perfect day for a drive with the sunroof open.

The first rain of the season followed by a sunny day like today also sees an instant greening of the city. It’s very slight, but it’s noticeable. Plants perk up. Lawns look a bit fuller. Palm trees reach for the sky with greater vigor.

Today Los Angeles was amazing.

Of course that first rain of the season turns our beaches into festering pits of nastiness. It seriously shit fucks our coastline. Discarded cigarette butts, fast food cups, used rubbers. They all end up on our beaches after the first rain.

I love LA.

About 3 or 4 years ago I saw the movie “Spinal Tap” for the first time. This was right before they released their Special Edition DVD, so they played it for a few weeks in select theaters. I heard about this, thought it was the perfect opportunity to see the film and got a group together to see it. I’m glad I got to see it with a crowd because I think it made the experience all that much better.

I can’t tell you how depressed I was after seeing this film.

For those of you who, like myself, have apparently been living in a barrel and know very little about this movie here goes. “Spinal Tap” is a mock documentary, or mockumentary if you will, of a fake English rock band called Spinal Tap. The movie stars Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer and Rob Reiner. Spinal Tap is Reiner’s directorial debut. It follows “Tap” from their heights to their absolute lowest point and then their subsequent rise to sorta-prominence again. It’s the funniest movie ever.

The reason why I was so depressed after watching this film for the first time is I instantly realized I would never see a funnier movie. Ever. I’m serious. This movie struck me then, as it does today, as one of the most brilliant pieces of comedy ever. On the surface the comedy seems silly and juvenile, yet it’s far more than simple shtick. Every character in this movie is extremely well realized, which helps suck you in and never lets go. It’s fast paced, original and completely unpredictable. They NEVER go for the obvious joke. It’s sheer brilliance.

The current DVD available has an amazing commentary track by the three stars in character and they catch you up on what they’ve been doing for the last 20 years. It’s as if they’ve made an entirely new film. If you haven’t seen the flick, rent the DVD, watch the movie, then watch it with the commentary track. The DVD is full of amazing content.

About a year ago a friend scored two tickets to see “Tap” at the Greek Theater in Los Angeles. She took me and I was blown away by the show. The live presentation of “Stonehenge” was phenomenal. My friend had NEVER seen “Tap” before and found herself lost almost the entire time. Thankfully she watched it a week later, but the show was entirely lost on her.

Now you ask, why do I bring this up today? Well my snarky little monkeys it’s because of this article in the London Times. A big deal’s being made about the first new edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary being offered in ten years so there are articles everywhere which list many of the new words and phrases they’ve included in the tome. In the newest edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary you can find the following entry:

Lately when I work I realize I really need music to help keep me focused. Not sure how or why that is, but I find a high-impact soundtrack for my day keeps me upbeat and the dreaded 4 O’Clock coma doesn’t come around as often. Some days I like the Internet radio, places like Digitally Imported, Streaming Soundtracks or KCRW if they’re playing the music. Other days, like today, I need to be in control of what I listen to. This is my current playlist, put together very randomly in a five minute period:

Chemical Brothers - Setting Sun Instrumental
BT - Satellite
Fat Boy Slim - Kalifornia
Crystal Method - Name Of The Game
BT - Running Down the Way Up
Cream - I feel free
Crystal Method - Over The Line
Live - Lightning Crashes
Crystal Method - The Crystal Method - Blast
Fat Boy Slim - Brimful of Asha
Crystal Method - Comin’ Back
Tom Cochrane - Life is a Highway
Crystal Method - Tweekend
Gravity Kills - Guilty
Crystal Method - High Roller
Fatboy Slim - Praise You
Fluke - Atom Bomb
Crystal Method - Keep Hope Alive
FrankSinatra - LuckBeALady
Live - Simple Creed
Spinal Tap - Big Bottom
Underworld - Pearls Girl
Snatch Soundtrack - Fuckin in the bushes - Oasis
Pink Martini - Amado Mio
Chemical Brothers - Elektrobank
Pink Martini - Donde Estas, Yolanda
BT - Mercury and Solace (Transa Mix)
Pink Martini - Je ne veux pas travailler
Powerman 5000 - When Worlds Colide

Now, sleep.

Oh, quickly, “The West Wing” season premiere kicked ass. It took a while to get there, but Sorkin pulled all the stories together wonderfully in the end. Dule Hill is the stand-out in this episode nailing the “Big Brother” scene. The kid’s got that acting thing down. It’s that kind of scene that causes you to hold your breath for a moment, just so you don’t miss a single moment.

In my search for the official “West Wing” Web site I came upon JoshLyman.com. I can’t comment on the site content as I haven’t checked it out fully, but the fact that someone has registered that name is just … oh fuck it, who am I to bag on a fellow “West Wing” fan. Preach it, brutha!

Okay, call me a geek, nerd, weirdo, goon, gomer, whatever you will, but don’t tell me when you watch the newest trailer for Star Trek: Nemesis and see what they do to the Enterprise you don’t get just a little giddy.

Man that looks good. It’ll surely make up for that last piece of manure they made.

Accoridng to this news report, that N’Sync twit Lance Bass may yet make it into space. While there’s no official word it’s a go, the fact that’s he’s training at the Star City Cosmonaut center again says a lot.

Now, I hate the band this guy is in and really don’t give a crap about him, but if I were in his position, had a load of money and could manage to bring together investors to foot the bill for a flight into space, I’d do it too! The guy is 23 years old and will likely be visiting the International Space Station in under a year.

Now that I’ve had a moment to think about it, I hate him even more now.

Ugh. LONG story short my main computer system is taking a crap on me. It’s become terribly unstable, crashes regularly and is generally unrealiable. What would be best is to wipe this system clean and start over from scratch (it’s almost three years old), but I have a lot of data on this machine and I’m concerned upgrading from Windows98 to WinXP will create a whole slew of new problems.

In the first two hours of working today programs on this system randomly crashed and the system completely crashed four times. For someone who makes his living with computers, you don’t have time to mess with a system actively taking a crap on you.

So today was spent going and picking up parts and assembling a new system. After two trips to Fry’s and two trips to PC Club I’ve managed to pull together a decent system. WinXP is installing tihs very instant. The system is:

Fun looking case (will take a picture when it’s finished) w/ 350 Watt Power Supply
AMD Athlon 1800+
Gigabyte Motherboard with onboard Lan/Sound
80 Gig WD Hard Drive with 8 Meg buffer (ohhhh fast)
256 Megs DDR Ram (will upgrade to 512 later when I have more money)
MSI GF2 MX Video Carp (It’s a good, older video card. Don’t need anything super special since I don’t play video games)

I have 133 e-mails in my inbox that I need to get to. Yesterday I was only at 40. I have two client projects I need to get to that I need to get work done on today. My apartment is a mess of computer parts and boxes. I have laundry and dishes to do. I have bills to pay.

I will be up very late. Drive by and you’ll see the candle burning into the late darkness.

This weekend has turned out to be most entertaining and bizarre. While I won’t share every detail (I’d like to keep some of it for myself, thank you), there are some choice moments that need to be shared, picked up by a search engine and ultimately used in some screenplay by a Hollywood hack who trolls the Internet for good ideas (which is a bad fucking idea to start with).

Friday night, at the Hollywood Bowl. It was the night where they play clips from movies and the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra plays along. During the “Beauty and the Beast” segment with the big dance scene a group of girls, maybe 14-16, about ten rows ahead showed their appreciation for the music in a so L.A. way. They didn’t have lighters to light and hold up in the air, so they activated the screens on their Nokia cell phones and held them up high.

During the second encore the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra playing along to the final flight and award ceremony sequence from “Star Wars” and Emiliano singing along as the part of Chewbaca.

The rest all takes place on Saturday night.

The drunk german dude who approaches me with,

“Do you drive a Train?”

“What?” It was loud and I wasn’t certain I heard him correctly.

“Do you drive a Train?” Even more serious this time.

“WHAT?”

“Do you drive a Train?!?” This last time he asked the question he was very serious and I realized I had heard him properly.

“No.”

I realize the proper and correct answer would have been “Yes,” but I really didn’t want to engage the drunk German tourist any longer than I needed to.

And no, I was not wearing a fucking conductor’s uniform.

The guy walking around the bar with the World War II helmet on. I guess he was concerned about incoming projectiles.

The sexually ambiguous named Ricky the Transvestite who approached my group of friends.

“What’s your name?” I asked stupidly.

“Ricky.”

“Oh, great. Where are you from?”

“Gardena!”

“Oh yeah? I dated a girl from Gardena for a while. She was a real bitch.”

“Heh, you know, I’m a bitch, too.”

I promise you I never dated Ricky.

As we’re walking to the car we heard the black man say, “I ain’t paying no $20 dollars for a lap dance and not gettin’ any pussy!” He notices us. “How you doin’?”

Now in fact I’m not certain he acknowledge us, but that ending just makes the story better.

The weirdness hovered over Los Angeles this weekend. May it never leave.