Doin' it and doin' it and doin' it well.

If I write it down, it must be true. Here is my list of what I must do before I leave California:

1) Eat in Little Ethiopia

2) See Point Break Live 

3) Visit The Broad Museum, The Getty (not Getty Villa), and MONA

4) Go back to Pinks, and maybe Sprinkles one last time. Maybe a few more favorite places.

5) Possible trapeze lesson on the Santa Monica Pier. 

6) Aquarium? San Diego Zoo?

7) Finish my frickin' script. Or at least get to a point where I'm happy with it. 

8) So much more. 

Also, to blog about:

1) View of LA based on 90s music videos?

2) At the end of my time here, I will do a review of every place I've eaten at here. Or, at least the ones worth mentioning. Trust.

3) Like Mo, things that aren't just recaps of how I spend my days. 

Bye for now, kids,

Sarah

Listening to: (and watching) Weeds

On a side note...

I've realized that my blogs have become a simple list of "what I did today." Must work on that...

Less-Than-Three You, Monique

Listening to: a truck

My Blog(y Wog)

So I'm back from Vermont, a little sunburned, a little wiser. I left for Long Island (where Alex and Christy live) on Thursday so that we could head down to Vermont first thing in the morning, literally - 4 a.m. Surprisingly, I was pretty awake in the morning and along the way we stopped for doughnuts and coffee (yes). The 6 hour ride was pretty entertaining: we listened to music, read from Russel Brand's hilariously titled "My Booky Wook", listened to Jim Gaffigin's stand up, and looked at the epic scenery that is Vermont. Joe should've shot "The Wind and the Hills" there, it was just that epic.

When we hit Vermont, we headed to Alex's house. His brother, Jeremy, (yes, he is exactly the same as he was in Alex's documentary) made us ecstasy - I'm not even gonna bother explaining this. But, just know, if he ever offers you it, take it - maybe.

Afterwards, we went over to Christy's house and hung out in (and around) the pool. Alex thought it would be a fun idea to put Russell in the middle of the pool on a raft. Bottom line, I thought it was too. We got rained out and went downtown to try and check out the heart of their town. But, sadly, the rain was terrible, so we grabbed some ice cream and headed back to Alex's for his brother's birthday dinner.*

In Burlington, they celebrate the 4th on the 3rd, so we headed down to Christy's dads boat to watch the fireworks. It was absolutely beautiful. Imagine, thirty minutes of non stop fireworks so close that it made the boat shake. Sexy, right? Moving on... We headed over to Alex's friend, Quinn's house for a lil party. We drank, we talked, they played music. It was really chill.

On Saturday, Alex's mom made us french toast* and homemade Mocha's.* Thank you. We went back downtown again in an attempt to dodge the rain. We did for a while. I bought a ridiculous shirt and a bunch of earrings. We got these epic sandwiches called "Red Onion" sandwiches at a store called [surprisingly] "Red Onion." We grabbed "Gran Torino" (you know, that movie where Clint growls and kills people) We headed back to Christy's to play with Russell, eat our grub and watch the goods. She has a home theater in her basement, perfect for escaping the rain. Later that night, we headed back to Alex's where his mom made us burgers.* The night continued to flourish with a game of Donkey Conga (win), a bonfire (fail), fireflies (mild fail) and the drinking version of scrabble (win). Before long, we headed back to Quinn's for another night of good conversation, good music, and good drinks. It filled my Tucson nostalgia.

Sunday, we rolled out of bed and headed to the lake. Christy's dad took us out on his boat and we got these really bomb mozzarella sticks. The boat ride was amazing. I was in heaven - I love a good thrill. And then it was done. We packed up and hit the road. The ride, once again, was amazing. 6 hours of nonstop conversation... everything from submission to sex (by the way, they aren't the same thing). Before I knew it, I was back in the grungy city, standing with my suitcase, outside of my 8 floor walk up.

So that's the tale - but it isn't the story. Great moments in VT weekend:

1. "You traded him for what?" "An IPod."

2. "Having a finger up your butt while getting a blow job. It's an interesting way to live."

3. "Is that a penis in your pants?" "Yes" "You lied to me!"

4. "He spite pooped in your bed."

5. "They were coming after my children!!"

6. "I was committed."

7. "Oh my God, that town is named Coxsacie!"

Less-Than-Thee You, Monique

Listening to: Joel sing renditions of Hair - amazing, yet disturbing(ly good)

Footnotes:

*If a French woman ever asks you to cook for her, say yes. You are guaranteed to food-gasm**

** yes, I stole the word food-gasm from you, Sarah.

Sand and Sangria, Hot Dogs and Fireworks

Our fourth of July celebration started with the ladies (Alisha, Melissa, Katie and myself) heading over to the farmers market - which was unfortunately about half the size of the Wednesday one, now we know - to buy some fruit for sangria. We ended up with a meyer lemon, 3 blood oranges (for a dollar!) and some fresh lemonade which we ended up giving to John instead of using for the sangria. We then stopped for a pizza lunch, bought some wine as well as some cheap water bottles to make the sangria, and headed back to our place. 

John showed up and the five of us hung out at our place for a while, watching music videos and waiting for Brandon to drive down from Malibu. After Brando's arrival we went and bought sandwiches which we took down to the Santa Monica beach. We picnic'd, swam (not Melissa and me, we were on stuff-watching duty and by the time they came back to let us go in we were too cold from the wind), and had a beach photo shoot. 

Filled with sangria and covered with sand, we came back to our place to drop some stuff off and giggle and be merry. We had missed the Santa Monica fireworks - they were on the 3rd. We actually noticed them the night before while walking to see Up but assumed they would have them two nights in a row. Incorrect. - So we drove down to Venice to try to catch the Marina del Rey fireworks from the beach.

Venice, which is pretty sleazy any day of the year, was a colorful and entertaining choice for the 4th of July. There were illegal fireworks going off everywhere, and the plethora of cops just stood and watched them go without doing anything. From the spot we selected on the beach we were able to see not only the illegal ones exploding right over our heads every few minutes, and not only the Marina del Rey displace, but we could see two other firework shows down the Coast including the Manhattan Beach ones. 

Alisha, Brandon, and I grabbed some customary 4th of July hot dogs  while we made our way back to the car, and then the whole lot of us decided to head over to Brando's to sit in his hot tub. Turns out that his building closes the hot tub at 10pm, and we were all so disappointed and exhausted at that point that we just headed home and passed out. 

All in all, a very delightful 4th of July with good company and good fun. See the 'book and flickr (latter is linked above) for photos. 

Bye kids,

Sarah

Happy 4th!

We may have missed our chances for fireworks. More on this development after the day is done. 

-S

Snow Bunnies

Day three of the internship: 6 hours of (you guessed it) typing transcripts. I'm supposed to be doing some casting stuff for Internship 1 on Monday and will be talking to the Art Director (hopefully) in the next couple of days... Dear God, I want this film stuff to pick up.

I tried to spice up my day a little by trying a new place for lunch: "Grey's Papaya" where they serve a Recession Special that consists of 2 hot dogs and papaya juice for $4.45. Done and done. I knocked out my lunch in about 10 minutes, so I took another 10 and walked around the block. I saw hanging meat in a window and got nostalgic for Sarah. On my way back to the office, I passed two construction workers. This brings us to my new blog special: NEW YORK PHRASES!

Encounter 1 -

Guy 1: *winks* hey

Me (to myself): you're my dad's age

Guy 2: Leave that young girl alone, you old perv.

Guy 3: (walking in my direction) you know they were gonna say something right?

Me: Yeah

Guy 3: Now that I'm walking with you, they won't say anything. I'm Michael, by the way...

Me (to myself): you're pretty old, too.

After work, I decided to head over to Bryant Park to work on my film. I'm thinking about switching to a short story adaptation... I fell in love with "Teddy" by J.D. Salinger yesterday, so we'll see how that goes. Before I got into the park, I stopped at Crumbs to get a Blackout cupcake and an iced coffee. Food in tow, I found a nice table and annotated the story for an hour. I think I've spent too much time with Jillian, because a bird decided to shit on my book and hand. Yes. (And when I told my mother and aunt the story later, their first reply was "I hear that's good luck." I responded by saying, "that's probably a lie to make people who got shit on feel better.").

Anyway, after the poop incident, I headed toward the Hudson. Along the way I passed a live concert/benefit show. It was super intense (please refer to picture). As I continued my journey, I passed a group of dudes. NEW YORK PHRASES!

Encounter 2 -

Guy 1: Hey there, Snow Bunny

Me (to myself): what the fuck? [long pause] I'll take it!

On my way to the Hudson, Alex called and confirmed the Vermont trip. I'm heading to Long Island tomorrow so we can drive up to Vermont first thing Friday morning. His parting words were "don't forget a swimsuit." I brought one with me, but it's mildly skank and doesn't fit properly (the bottom's too loose and the tops to small) - so I headed over to Macy's to find one of those one pieces with the backs chopped out so that my suit won't fall off in the lake. Long story short - that place is huge... after searching 5 floors, I couldn't find the bathing suits so I gave up and headed back to the Bronx. NEW YORK PHRASES!

Encounter 3 -

Guy 1 (to Guy 2): It's like having sex with a roc ho

Me (to myself ): I wonder what exactly is comparable to sex with a roc ho...

On the subway, I heard a woman sing that Whitney Houston song from "The Bodyguard" and a dude do a drum cover of "Smooth Criminal." Yes.

So, that's it today. I won't write until after the VT trip so you get a reprieve for the next few days.

In the end, I'm having a blast in this city, I really am. But I'm starting to ache for certain people. Being here is so bitter sweet.

Less-Than-Three You, Snow Bunny... I mean Monique

Listening to: nothing, nothing at all

*EDIT* I just heard a gunshot and screams. Welcome to the Bronx.

Kumquats and Other Silly Things

I still can't believe that it took me a whole month to get myself to the Santa Monica Farmers' Market. I still can't believe I've already been here a whole month - but that's a different story. In another example of how living in Santa Monica is like living with rose colored glasses (that block out the view of smog, traffic, homeless people) and will certainly give me a jaded view of living in LA, Katie and I walked to the farmers market. The fact that we have places to walk to (with nice scenery on the way) is impressive enough, but being walking distance from good food puts me over the top. 

I assumed that since the Farmers' Market is every Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday that the Wednesday turn out would be light, but instead it was packed and there were so many tents in all different directions that Katie and I decided to do a loop around the entire place before buying anything. It was all a big tease, considering that the guest house we're living in has a kitchen consisting of a hot plate, toaster over, microwave, and mini-fridge which freezes half of our food (we were thrilled to discover that our milk had frozen yet our ice cream was completely melted). It was a little upsetting being around all that amazing food and knowing that we have no way to prepare or cook any of it in our little home. 

We ended up buying some fresh guacamole - I considered buying the ingredients to make guacamole instead but Katie pointed out we lack bowls and knives scarp enough to cut anything beyond butter. I also bought a bag of Kumquats and a variety of stone fruit. I was always a berry girl, but since I can't eat them too often anymore I've been venturing out in my fruit buying. There must have been at leave 20 stands with plums, peaches, nectarines, and apricots and we had at least 1 sample at all of them. I also had my first raw oyster after finding a booth that was shucking fresh ones. I've been reading Saucier's Apprentice, which not only makes me extremely hungry every time I pick it up, but after a scene describing the author's first raw oyster experience I couldn't resist getting one, even if they were 2 dollars per 1 little half shell. It was delicious. 

The halfway point of the summer is pretty mellow. Ellie and Tarreyn came down last weekend and the girls all went out for a cupcake raid of Sprinkles and Crumbs. Box, Jesse, and Mike are all possible visitors for the next month, and there is also rumored excitement about a triumphant return of Mr. Alex. I've fell into a nice rhythm here. I'm comfortable at my internship, I go for a walk by the beach every afternoon, and I have time to read and work on my script without feeling rushed.

Still, when I contemplate if I could live here in a year I start to get nervous. I could definitely call this city home for some amount of time. When I'm honest with myself, I could probably get used to living in any big city, but there are certainly things here that I really enjoy. But despite enjoying my internship it's given me some perspective about how the industry really works here and I don't know how happy it makes me. 

There are three routes: 1) You move out and say "I want to direct and only direct" and less than 1% of people who say this actually succeed and the rest fall back on something else. 2) You can work your way up the production ladder starting as a PA. The problem with this is a lot of people who aspired to be directors or DPs get stuck as grips and ACs permanently because they get too good at the jobs in the middle.  3) You can get a job at a production company and work your way up in the office. This is what I'm experiencing first hand, an office filled with people who mostly wanted to work in production or Direct but instead work closely with planning and dealing with productions but are never on set. Even if you work your way up in the company you pretty much get a bigger paycheck, but no real set time. The people in the office in their mid-20s all seem so bogged down that it's like they forgot or don't have the energy to pursue their original goals. This last option seems the most likely for me, but I'm not exactly sure I like what I'm observing and people who've gone down that road. 

During a long phone call with George the other night he said that most of what people stress about can be divided into F's: Friends, Family,  Food, Funds, Fucking, Film, Future.  This post has gotten absurdly long, and really should have been two separate entries, but I guess it properly sums up my current thoughts, though: food and future. Oh, and Free Willy, which Katie is currently watching. 

Bye kids,

Sarah