On arrival to the valley floor, I peer out the window to see a small, semi-flattened furry hump on the asphalt…a sure sign of a steel-belted demise. Getting closer I see it’s a squirrel. I mutter my condolences, and give it one last glance before passing it by.
The squirrel appears to smile at me in return.
I viewed the coffee display from top to bottom, wondering which coffee bag to buy. Should I get a light roast? Dark roast? A blend, perhaps? Whole beans or grounds? After some moments of indecision, I settled upon the Papua New Guinea Sigri Estate bag, which claims to be “rich & smooth.” The “roast meter” at the bottom of the colorful front sticker showed a little leaning to the light roast side. No problem. I just needed something to keep me up while working.
I handed the bag to the cashier, deciding not to have the bag ground for me. I usually do have it done, but I figured I might as well put some use to the premium grinding machine I had at home (muchas grácias a Yeni). Besides, they say the best cups of coffee are the ones made immediately after grinding. So after handing my credit card to the cashier, he remarked, “You get a free cup of coffee with your order. Would you like one?”
I perked immediately, and I felt my face flush with the thought of a fresh cup of java. Wow! The veins in my arms pulsed in anticipation of a good caffeine fix. “Yeah! Thanks!” I nodded with a smile. It sounded so good, and it was free. How exciting.
Maybe I need to get out more.
My usual trips to the post office in the evening hours are pretty uneventful. The typical mail drop would have me pulling over to park in the green zone, walking over to the mailbox, opening the noisy blue metal chute, dropping in my letters, closing it, then checking it again to ensure that my mail had indeed been dropped off.
Last night was the same deal. Except when I did that double check, my letter was in the exact same position it was when I dropped it in. This of course warranted a self-muttered wtf?, followed by a quick shut of the chute. A second glance found the letter still there, unmoved. This time I grabbed the letter and noticed that it stuck a little to the metal tray. Turned out that someone had affixed tiny pieces of scotch tape (sticky side up) at the very end of the chute, as an easy steal for letters dropped in. Oh you motherfucker, I chuckled to myself as I stripped the chute of the annoyances. Can you imagine?
KXLU 88.9 FM is, by far, my favorite radio station. And I can’t even begin to mention how many bands and different genres of music I’ve discovered on their radio shows. If I had the chance, I would want to DJ for KXLU. Simply because I love it.
I will say though that I discovered Kimya Dawson on KXLU long, long ago (a couple years). She became an instant favorite and I added her to my Excel wish list of CDs, which keeps growing and growing. I still haven’t purchased a CD of hers, but I will when I get to it. I discovered her on McAllister’s Hostile Makeover show, and she played Kimya Dawson again this morning, mentioning that Dawson had become overexposed due to the overwhelming popularity of the indie feature flick Juno.
I couldn’t agree more. I say to myself, “Man, I was down with Dawson before Juno even got pregnant.” Is that so wrong? I can’t help it. I treasure the treasures that I discover, then can’t stand it when others discover the same riches and they become commonplace. Like the whole retro tiki/lounge/martini thing. I was into that before it got hip in the mid-’90s, then all of a sudden it’s like, people sneer at me when I order a gin martini at the bar. Whatever.
Rather than go on for seemingly endless expanses of time without writing, I’ve decided to drop a dime a day, no matter what. It could be extremely enlightening material, profound prophecies, or, like usual, just plain nonsense. Of course, keep in mind that Lefty Limbo will, now and then, be peppered with the robust morsels of brain meeting ink meeting paper, namely the 99 Doodles project. Who knows what else I’ll come up with.
Anyways, today’s delightful discovery lies in the consumption of a #3 combo at Carl’s Jr. For those of you not in the cow-killing know, it is a Western Bacon Cheeseburger with calorie-laden (Go Medium!) fries and a healthier choice of a Diet Coke (wow). Hey, I try to hug trees and broccoli as much as possible, but sometimes, given the restraint of work and deadlines, a cow must die. Trust me, I still apologize unspoken to whatever animal I’m about to consume, whenever I eat meat. No thanks to Mr. Robbins and his Food Revolution, still the most eye-opening book I’ve ever read (I don’t read many).
See? That wasn’t so bad. Thank you for reading.
Ok, so I’ve been slacking on the doodles. As soon as I get settled I’ll start spitting ‘em out again.
Anyways, in the meantime, I saw Basic Instinct for the first time last night. Yes, I know, as soon as you bring your jaw back to its original position I will continue. Okay. Well, I can definitely see what all the clamor used to be about…there’s more than enough Sharon Stoneage to go around in this movie. But the one thing that struck me bigtime was how film noir-ish it was. I mean, totally film noir, even down to the foreboding score. Even the Beth Garner character (played by Jeanne Tripplehorn looked all ’40s. Weird.
So, it was fun while it lasted. Ending was kinda cheezy though, but once again, total noir-style.
I gave a heads up on my MySpace page that I was doing this blog, and got a whopping 1,442 hits in one day. But afterwards it dwindled to a mere 3-4 hits per diem. Nevertheless, that shows the amazing power of MySpace. Whatevuh…
Anyways, I’m still around, just really busy. I’ll be posting some more doodles later today or tomorrow.
Hasta Loogie.
By the way, the header image was taken one early morning in Pacoima on my way to work, shortly after someone happened to shave a fire hydrant off the sidewalk with their car. Yay.
I get a chance to make myself useful, by participating in a 99 Doodles contest. It’s not so much of a contest but rather a challenge to post 99 doodles on your blog or whatever. I do enough doodling, so it’s about time I put ‘em up somewhere right…stay tuned for #1, coming up soon.
I try to live green as much as possible these days. So, figuring I had some movies to drop off from Netflix, I decided to put some air into the knobby tires of my old Mongoose BMX and take it out for a ride to the Post Office.
It had been quite some time since I last took it out—at least 6-8 months. But it’s always fun to ride, and it’s even better to run into (not literally) people that recognize it as a true vintage ’80s set of wheels. Well it’s actually pretty hard to miss, given that it’s fitted with a number plate, adorned with a big prismatic no. 7 and several stickers surrounding it. That is something you never see these days.
So yeah, it’s great to ride, but while riding I realize how old I really am, despite the joyful juvenile refreshment it offers. For example, I know that when I was young, I would ride at top speed through any and all streets, taking every opportunity to go off any embankment to catch air. Man, this afternoon I must have been going 1/10th that speed, slowing down at every driveway and intersection to make sure there were no oncoming cars, also keeping an eye out for shady characters and juvenile delinquents who just might want to take my bike from me for the hell of it.
It’s pretty sad if you think about it. Why is it that when we grow older, we become so much more paranoid, hesitant and cautionary? Is it because we’ve accumulated the wisdom of all the terrible things that this world has in store for us, instead of embracing its beauty and bountiful opportunities, however numerous and/or scarce they may be?
Having a kid makes this realization all the more vivid. It’s amazing how much imagination and creativity we have at our earliest stages. I mean, as a kid I used to explore the universe (my living room) in my two-stage rocketship (the big cardboard boxes from the Sears washer & dryer), even packing a lunch for my travels through the galaxy. I would think that our imagination and creativity would expand as much as our waistlines over the years. But no, it’s the total opposite. Is this also a result of the realization of reality?
There was an unusual amount of contrails streaking the sky this morning. In fact, the most I’ve ever seen in my life. Is this National Contrail Day? I looked up this morning and thought I was playing a game of Missile Command.
Contrails always fascinated me as a kid, yet I never knew what they were. Dictionary.com defines contrail as:
a visible condensation of water droplets or ice crystals from the atmosphere, occurring in the wake of an aircraft, rocket, or missile under certain conditions.
Actually, I just realized contrail was short for condensation trail. Is today’s weather, then, one of those ultra-rare conditions in which contrails will form on any flying object?
Anyways, back to my childhood contrail fascination. When I was young I used to think that jet planes did those on purpose to show off. Like there was some kind of cool switch or something that the pilot could toggle to make a trail whenever he felt like it. I could totally picture the pilot and co-pilot going across the sky on a long haul, and the co-pilot saying, “Hey man, wanna do a line?” And the pilot would go, “Yeah man, go for it.” And they’d hit a switch. I really thought that because often, I would spot a plane way, way up there, then suddenly a contrail would appear in its wake, as if it were manually activated.
I used to think that only special jet planes had that capability. I noticed that only the ones that flew way, way up there could make the lines. Not commercial 747 jumbo jets. I pictured pilots hanging out in a lounge, talking about what kind of planes they flew. I could see commercial airline pilots getting jealous ‘coz the other pilots told them they could do contrails. Then I wished that I could take one of those special planes whenever we took those long, boring trips to the Philippines. Then I could tell the pilot, “Hey man, do a line!” And I’d look out the rear window (yeah, if they had one) and see this long, fluffy vapor trail. And I’d go, “Neato!” and smile.
