Also,

I was doing some math while I was waiting for my friend to get her book signed. Anthony Bourdain's going to be 70 when his daughter is 20.

In case you were wondering...

DSC05693
Originally uploaded by neonspecs

who would win in a knife fight between Giada de Laurentiis and Nigela Lawson, Anthony Bourdain (pictured in the super blurry picture above) is pretty sure about Nigela taking it.

King Wimp

I've been cleaning out my purse again and found a receipt on which I scrawled "to have and have not Rex Wimpy." After some quick googling, I now know that Rex Wimpy did the special effects cinematography for many films including one of my favorites, To Have and Have Not, with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall (I believe that's the film on which they first met). Anyways, what a silly name, Rex (King) Wimpy!

Holsum

Holsum
Originally uploaded by neonspecs

This is one of my favorite signs in Las Vegas currently lit, which I guess is saying a lot because there are tons o' signs in that town. Of note is the apparent need to shorten Italiano with an apostrophe, getting rid of only one letter but a whole syllable.

According to a pretty fantastic campaign from 1910, home-made bread is slavery! See more at the grand Daily Mirror blog (not connected to the UK tabloid).

I always joke that a lot of today's fashion is clothing my grandmother would wear. Here, in fact, is a jacket my grandmother actually owns and wears all the time. Strange.

I saw Fred Armisen at the Silverlake Jubilee this past weekend.
1. I was surprised I remembered his name, considering I rarely watch SNL, because it is terrible.
2. Why is he in LA?
3. After reading the Wikipedia article on him, he plays drums on a Les Savy Fav album. What?!

Anyways, he lost out, though, 'cause he left before The Living Sisters even started. Loser.

I really, really want a Mr. Jones Watch.

After the glow, the scene, the stage, the set

I saw Pavement this past Thursday night in Pomona and it was definitely magical, that is until we were stranded on the side of a freeway, but I'll get to that later. Most important information on that evening is that they played five out of my top seven pavement songs:

1. Spit on a Stranger
2. Roll with the Wind
3. Shady Lane
4. Cut Your Hair
5. Range Life
6. Harness Your Hopes
7. Stereo

I'm pretty satisfied with that outcome, as the italicized ones are B-sides I probably should never have hoped them to play (but can we just all agree that Roll with the Wind is spectacular?).

So then my friend's car has some sort of issue, in which the car fills with smoke and loses power breaking capability. Let me tell you, that is some scary stuff. And then we stand, freezing, on the side of a freeway in the middle of the night waiting for a tow truck. I obviously did not envision this occasion in choosing to wear a dress that morning. It's a good thing everyone bought shirts at the show; wearing three shirts did help a little. This situation would probably have been less frightening had I not watched so many Law & Orders and or film noirs that include scenes similar to these.

All in all, however, it was a pretty successful Nochella weekend: Pavement, first day of new job, long shift at old job (money!), Record Store Day (including buying a Robyn Hitchcock album I somehow missed which has a song titled "Raymond Chandler Evening"--what could be more perfect?!), pizzza I hadn't had in 14 years, square dance, maybe the best donuts in L.A., and learning how to make bagels.

Listomania

Awesome. Louis Armstrong.
Buy me this book please.
I now know what a pot walloper is.
Nancy Pelosi, the Anna Wintour of Congress!
"Bank Failures Strike a Blow to City's Art"
DO clap between movements!
Y'all know how much I love maps. Here's an interesting one. All of USA could fit into New Hampshire!
The Yet-But

Zombie!

Me and Sahr from Fela dancing from Terry Richardson on Vimeo.

Duck tape or duct tape? Is there a difference?

Y'all know how much I love the L.A. River. WSJ discusses the Pasadena Museum of Art's current exhibit (Lillian, we still have to go!)

Can freeways have character? Do they deserve to be preserved?

Pretender, contender, or defender? I don't like any of them.

In other news, I encountered one of the kids from that newish Parenthood show at Royce last week, and she was not cool. As I guess I sorta expected. The show was alright but now I'll just think about her ridiculous eye rolling and expectation of preferential treatment.

Caspar Milquetoast

To start out the 2010 book list, I just finished Webster Unabridged, a compendium of comic panes and strips by H.T. Webster, published in 1945. The humor is SO outdated, which is humorous in itself. It's so America 1940s. I checked this book out of the library, however, because of Caspar Milquetoast. 

Some of you long-time readers of this blog, if you exist, may remember the blog subtitle: "It always comes back to David Niven." I had to take that down because it hadn't been coming back to him in a while (Although the title and url both stem from Niven film Around the World in 80 Days (1954)). Well, now it has! I first heard the word milquetoast when I professed my love of David Niven to my mother. She responded: "That milquetoast?!" His foppish top hat and umbrella cane probably irked my mother, while these accessories are probably what I liked best about him. Consequently, I began to associate the term with formal, serious people. 

In case you don't know, it actually means timid or bland. And it is purely an American word, appearing in American English dictionaries but not British English ones. So, it turns out my mother's description of Niven, the ultimate Brit, was not quite ironic, but whatever is the appropriate term here, coincidentally incorrect? The word comes from the aforementioned character in H.T. Webster's series of The Timid Soul single-pane comics. In turn, he got the name from milk toast, a food often eaten at the time by people with ill or sensitive stomachs, a calming, mild food. Caspar is always afraid, worried, and meek (Check out the page I scanned in for you). Exactly what David Niven isn't. 

A more appropriate character would be Mr. Limpet of the children's classic, The Incredible Mr. Limpet. Don Knotts! Such a great movie. (Edit: I was spot on. I just checked Netflix and they even describe him as "a bespectacled, milquetoast bookkeeper.")

Anyways, the book linked in the list is not this book, because Amazon doesn't carry it, but a similar looking collection and one that is only 50 cents! You should definitely get it or find one at your library.

It's that time again.

 

It's "mistakes" like these that make Thom Andersen mad. 

Removing the 2008 Edition to make room for the 2010 Edition. 2008 was either a year I actually read a lot or I actually remember to at least list them here. Of course, I highly recommend all Chandler, but my favorite is still The Long Goodbye. Read it, stat! Also, the L.A. River book is really illuminating. Y'all know how much I love the L.A. River. (Everytime I write LA now, since watching Los Angeles Plays Itself, I feel a pang of guilt and have to put in the periods).

Books I Read: 2008 Edition

• Blake Gumprecht - The Los Angeles River: Its Life, Death, and Possible Rebirth
• Edna Bonacich & Jake B. Wilson - Getting the Goods: Ports, Labor, and the Logistics Revolution
• Edward Thorpe - Chandlertown
• Elizabeth Ward & Alain Silver - Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles
• Gordon G. Whitney - From Coastal Wilderness to Fruited Plan: A History of Environmental Change in Temperate North America from 1500 to Present
• K. Bruce Newbold - Six Billion Plus: World Population in the Twenty-First Century
• Massimo Livi-Bacci - A Concise History of World Population
• Philip Durham - Down These Mean Streats a Man Must Go: Raymond Chandler's Knight
• Raymond Chandler & Robert B. Parker - Poodle Springs
• Raymond Chandler - Farewell, My Lovely
• Raymond Chandler - Little Sister
• Raymond Chandler - The High Window
• Raymond Chandler - The Lady in the Lake
• Raymond Chandler - The Long Goodbye
• Raymond Chandler - Trouble is My Business
• Ruth Wilson Gilmore - Golden Gulag
• Stephen Ambrose - Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West
• The Imagineers - Walt Disney Imagineering: A Behind the Dreams Look at Making the Magic Real

Subtitle Award of the Week

Sundance Channel, from French:

"You see how beautiful the models are? Well, beautiful in inverted commas."

Yessss, inverted commas. So great.

Evolution of the Telephone.

Thank you, State Library of New South Wales.

"Big chunky phone because you need a big serious phone for the world war. You can't be texting about the Third Reich. You cant be sayin' 'Hitler just invaded the Sudetenland omg omg'" - Craig Ferguson

If there is an adjective I really hate, it's "directional." What kind of useless word is that? Ummm, it's going in a direction? Yes, I know in fashion it is supposed to mean "pointing toward the future," but it is stupid and silly, and its usage should cease promptly.

Dear Silverlake Lounge,

Your reasonably priced $6 gimlet surprises me. 1) It is a real gimlet! Made with gin! and Rose's Lime Juice! and that's it! 2) It tastes good. So shocking.

I commend you,
Laura

I saw Warren Christopher at the mall on Thursday and he was super adorable, although I feel like that may be an inappropriate way to describe a man who was not so long ago the United States Secretary of State. Anyways, he is super adorable and immaculately dressed. A man with much panache.

In other celebrity news (Warren Christopher is a celebrity, right?), Leonard Nimoy went to see Patti Smith at the Hammer and I got really excited about this. Eric McCormack (Will, really, he won't ever be able to be anything else) went to hear Neil Gaiman at Royce, and so did Eric J. Lawrence, your Local Public Radio Music Librarian (KCRW, at which I volunteered this morn, takin' your moneyyyyy) [If you happen to read this and it weirds you out that I am reporting this and increasing your celebrity to my four, maybe five loyal readers, EJL, let me know and I will delete it].

Finally, as also a member of KCET (yeah, look at me, your unemployed friend so liberally donating her time and money [I want to use the word "largesse" but can't figure out how]), I attended a "gala" at the California Science Center and California African American Museum with Tavis Smiley (whom Greg hates for reasons unbeknownst to me). I actually like Smiley a little less after I heard him speak this evening. He just seemed so not happy to be there, plus he complained about a lack of appreciation for culture in Los Angeles, which was just annoying. Eh, but the food was great (Creole, Jamaican, Ethiopian, and something else), and a few of the exhibits were nice. I especially recommend "Harlem of the West: Jazz, Bebop, and Beatnik" at CAAM and the awesome paintings/carvings of musicians that are from the walls of an old jazz club in Texas, of all places (Jake Morrow, you don't read my blog, but you should go check out this exhibition to see the section of Harry Smith. Hurry, it closes soon!). Smiley's America I Am at the Science Center was whatever. It's probably great if it's been a while since you were in high school or if your school was racist. It's never bad to be reminded of the things covered in the exhibition but it wasn't mind-blowing or anything like that.

As a result of this post, I looked up the origin of "panache." Wikipedia says it was once a marker of character worthy of suspect, until Cyrano de Bergerac. Literally, it means plume. FYI.

Sometimes I really want to buy something from eBay, but then I just can't because the seller includes prayers and random apostrophes in the description. This is quite unfortunate.

Dear Facebook readers,

You may have noticed, if you are reading this on Facebook, that in my last post all the movies were missing. That is because you aren't reading it on blogspot. So get to it, folks, and see this blog in all it's unemployment-time-filling splendor. http://followthatostrich.blogspot.com

Laura

I watched 149 movies in 2009.

What follows is a list of my top films from each month. This took me several hours to make. Complete waste of time, but I didn't realize it was going to take so long until about an hour into it and then it was too late. I had already started! Apparently, I don't like current movies. Only ten of these did I see in theaters or, in the case of PBS documentaries, when they debuted on PBS.

January:


February: I only watched one movie in February and it wasn't amazing.

March:


April:


May:


June:


July (this may have been the best month of my movie-viewing. so many to list!):


August:


September:


October:


November:


December: