Results tagged “laistrants”

Dear Tony Kornheiser,

An Op-Ed follow up to this morning's news...

The Guardian has an irritating blog post about LA writers. The gist: LA poet and novelist Rob Woodard wonders where all the good novelists in LA have gone. He points to the well-known "great" LA writers (Chandler, Nathaniel West, John Fante, Bukowski) and a few others, then deems LA literature mostly dead for the past thirty years.

So Merriam-Webster's word of the year is w00t. Sort of uninspiring, right? As in, aren't there thousands of other words that communicate so much more, mean so much more than the gamer battle-cry for "yes! i just killed your guy and i still have seven lives left!"?!?!? Surely there are more important things that happened in the word world than this, we kept thinking. Surely there were actual words that should have won. "Facebook" was...

Last year I challenged myself to stop using plastic bags at grocery stores by bringing my own reusable ones. After months of forgetting to bring my own bags and kicking my own arse mentally, it is now a natural habit when heading out the door. Now it's time to challenge myself again with reusables. It may make me look like an old crazy bag lady, but it must be done. I must start to make...

I've written e-mails, made phone calls, and pledged. I even wrote a two-page essay at their 3-hour (paid) market research session at the Hyatt. And still, every morning I'm summoned from my slumber by a soft voice announcing in code-like rhyme that my public radio station is having an orgy on the Web. Sixty-three degrees at seven-thirty-three, on eighty-nine-Point-three, KP-CC, I'm Steve Julian.... Online at K-P....C-C dot O-R-G. "Dot O-R-G?" You mean "dot org," I...

While it is hard for most to understand or imagine, once you have become entrenched in the archipelagic enclave of skyscrapers and bona fide mass transit that is Manhattan Island, it is difficult to leave. For a New Yorker, geographic displacement can fester into a self-induced internalized affront (even if just for a few short days). But the compelling lure of a free trip to Los Angeles to accompany my aunt on a business trip...

Travel + Leisure's November 2007 issue features a fun little ditty called America's Favorite Cities. They've asked people from all over the country to rate 25 well-known cities on everything from culture and nightlife to public transportation and weather. We're not quite sure who these 60,000 respondents think they are, but they don't have anything nice to say about our fair city. Oh, except for the fact that we have nice shops. Los Angeles...

The beauty of baseball is constantly marred by the voice of Joe Buck on Fox. I say this because I love the game: Through his monotonous, steely voice, his lack of originality, and general smugness, Joe Buck is ruining the playoffs.

Ok maybe it's not the worst DVR ever made Oh yes it's the worst. And it's not just me, customers hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it. I'm writing this post to let Time Warner LA know that this cannot stand for long before customers such as myself switch back to satellite providers. I'm talking very soon, like as soon as I can get a day off from work to have...

I try to avoid rants here, but some of the cavalier responses to the recent taser stories have made me feel like I need to go above and beyond a simple comment. Accusations were made that the agonized screams of people being tasered were just the person being "dramatic". One commentor actually said, "Torture?" LOL! LOL? Are you kidding me? Try getting tasered LOL! Of the three recent incidents, there is not a single...

What a waste of a quarter billion dollars. For the same amount that the Galaxy promised David Beckham to come to Los Angeles, they could have paid the salaries of all 26 New York Yankees in 2007 -- plus the Florida Marlins and Tampa Bay Devil Rays. In the NFL, they could have covered an entire team operating at the salary cap for almost two and a half seasons. Granted, it's a five year...

Last week I texted my friend Dals to see what she was doing for the evening. "Chillin' at home, smokin' hookah. My power went out," she responded. I texted back, "Ahaha you loser," and then I thought about just how much it sucked being her. On Monday afternoon, I arrived to LA from Las Vegas and was greeted by a sweltering apartment. I don't have A/C. Usually it's not cold inside my place, but fans...

I generally despise the local newscasts. I’ll tolerate a traffic report in the morning if I have to drive to work, and I’ll tune into the weather forecast on Channel 7’s 11 pm news because I like to watch Dallas Raines’ crouching routine against the Doppler 7000+. (And he wears these superb suits – I swear, no one can pull off a double-breasted electric blue better.) But this week, in light of the Minnesota...

Today the DEA raided 10 marijuana dispensaries, made five arrests, and seized large quantities of marijuana and cash. All of this taking place the same day the Los Angeles City Council whipped out an ordinance calling for the federal government to stop singling out marujuana clinics that are legal under state law.

It's summer in Los Angeles and everyone knows that means heat, rising temps, dryness, wind and dust, which of course results in dirty cars.

I am a polite, mild-mannered person. Laid-back would be a good L.A. way of saying it - I say duuude a lot, about as much as I say "please" and "thank you". I hold doors open for people. I am kind to the elderly, even those who try to strike up conversations with me in elevators, despite my extraordinary claustrophobia. The peccadilloes and perversities of human nature that draw other, less mellow people to...

Flipping through the mix of canned news releases and advertorials in the monthly Santa Clarita Magazine last week (what up, SCV!), I came across an ad for a 30-minute reflexology session with foot massage at a local spa/salon for $20. Yeah. You read that right. $20. Now that's a bargain.

Namely, how did Victoria manage to brainwash 80% of the adolescents in LA into thinking that this is cool? The Pink line came out in 2004 and was geared toward college co-eds who like to flounce around the dorms in their pajamas. This would explain this idiotic "PHI BETA PINK" and "Pink University" crap. When I see this, my head nearly explodes with a deluge of unanswered questions. For example: Who buys this stuff? Some...

I'm a Dodger die-hard. It's in my blood. So I can't like the Angels. But do you know who I hate even more? That jackass who was sitting behind me at the game today. He and his Angel ass-kissing buddy did not stop speaking throughout the entire game. They seriously thought they were placed on this earth to be the walking and talking media guides and for three and a half hours they didn't...

Since it appears that some of my prior posts have infuriated readers enough to call me something along the lines of "a poison to society," I have come to realize that I must be extremely influential and powerful in my role of (as one person called me), "Queen of the Retards." Otherwise, people wouldn't be so upset, would they? They would shake their heads and say "moron" and click on one of the other,...

Our wedding is three months away. Yes, we should have figured out the cake bit sooner, but we’re having our wedding on a warehouse rooftop downtown, so we’re not exactly doing the traditional do. Our wedding is so offbeat that we recently decided we should probably do something that will give the family a sense of structure, of formality, of “weddingness” just so they don’t lose their way among the techno jazz, shredded chiffon dress (mine) and crazy striped suit (his). In short, give them cake so they feel like it is a wedding after all. And who doesn’t love cake?

Q: What do you call a road with five to seven lanes of traffic in one direction, if the only way to exit this road is by going to the right?

Fuck Kobe Bryant and his whining bitchass OC spoiled brat yuppiefuck bullshit. The myopic, unwavering love of Kobe by so many Laker fans is baffling. Eclipsed only by the kool-aid drinking adoration of George Bush by his equally retardulous base. Here's what Kobe has been given while having the honor of being a Laker: - the best coach ever - the best center of his era - the best owner ever - the best...

As most people in the blogosphere know, Flickr is a very (very) popular photo sharing site. It contains over half a BILLION images taken by people from every corner of the earth, and has become a meeting place for professional photographers, photo enthusiasts, and people who just want to share photos of their cats and kids. Recently, Flickr decided to invoke a new filtering system, which rates photos according to their level of safety:...

I am probably in the minority here, and I couldn't care less. I am sick and tired of these solid as a rock tittie implants that women in LA are boldly carrying around on their chests like camels with cement humps.

The Good News: Nancy Grace will no longer be on Court TV, at least not until she finally gets to sit in the defendant's seat herself. The Bad News: The diminutive Southern blond rabble-rouser will continue her work as a nightly nuisance on the one-time news channel known as CNN Headline News. In her career as a talking head taking on all kinds of imagined and otherwise biased and inaccurately portrayed wrongdoers, Nancy Grace has...

Today we will look at one of my least favorite fashion occurrences. This has been going on for far too long, and I have lost the self-control to tolerate it. As with all moronic fashion trends, for months I patiently photographed the idiocy and awaited its disappearance. The problem we face today is that the Sausage Mc Muffins simply are not going away. So I must ask you Los Angeles: how can we eliminate...

Over the past few years, an odd phenomenon has taken over Los Angeles. Outfits no longer make sense. People's feet are dressed for winter and their bellies are dressed for summer (yes, that's a mere 5 degree difference here in LA, but you know what I'm getting at). I honestly hoped this would wear off over time, and as the feet got warmer and the butts got colder (and the funny tan lines became...

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Dodger Stadium parking fiascoes are old news now. I probably shouldn't even be bringing this up right now, but yesterday the spark re-ignited my Dodger Parking kindling and I'm back on the rampage. You see, I thought I'd come up with a good system, as one night last week I waited for less than 6 minutes to get out of the lot and I was very very proud of my ingenuity...