(if you read this before, for the new stuff , click here)
Week one. July 9, 2001. So, yes kitties, the rumors are true. I’ve moved to LA.
I have been threatening to move out of San Fran (that’s what Angelinos call my ex-town) about every summer for the 16 years since I took a Greyhound bus out to Frisko from Virginia in 1985. It’s a ritual. And this year I made a little trip with my friend Sage, was gonna stay a week and think about moving down in a couple months…I landed at my friend Newt’s house (Newt is the singer in Insecto: http://www.insecto.org ) and immediately liked it.
I
bought a car. A 1966
Barracuda. Black. It was previously
(I painted it since this photo was taken...fixed the bondo on the left and the scuff on the top). Big fishbowl back window. Picture me in a 60s muscle car tooling around LA. Dig.
Got a room. I share a HOUSE with one other guy. Off the street (not even a main street, and we’re in back of another house.) Quiet. Mellow. Front and back lawn. Roses. Morning glories. Two cats. Black, sleek, sweet, twins, Siamese (not Siamese twins though). The cats' names are Sabrina and Tess (God has a sense of humor. I just broke up with a Tess.)
My roommate is Jeff. Tall, mellow, in recovery, respectful, musician, blond. His mother died this year also. We call each other “brother.” He has great taste in music, similar to mine: Tones on Tail, Killing Joke, Echo and the Bunnymen, Joy Division, The Fall, etc.
My rent is $450 a month. $100 security deposit. Sleepy residential neighborhood. HUGE room (twice the size of my SF apartment). Carpet. Private entrance. Driveway. (I should have done this years ago. SF has been dying for a while).
I went to the Lotus Festival in Echo Park. Met a kid who had a 3-chip mini-Dv camera. He may make movies with me. Am meeting with another DV guy Saturday in Hollywood. Also jamming with a guy there. (I’m not moving here to “make it” at all. I am moving here to live. But I do art. I love art. And this town is opening up form me like a horny young girl. Also went to an NA meeting ad went out for sushi after. Met a guy who really liked me and turns out he’s a script reader for Paramount. Also took my books around to put in stores and they seemed really interested rather than the jaded response I have been butting my head against in SF. And some bought them outright for cash rather than taking them on consignment. And sold a bunch to people too. Dig it. And people know me from cat too. And not just my rockstar buddies at meetings. People I don’t know too….
Newt gave me a futon, table and chair.
Then we went to a work party for Gigsville, one of the camps at burning man. The immediately adopted me as a member and named me “kittyfeet.” I am not going to go to Burning Man (I melt in the desert…hate heat, tho LA is nice after a decade and a half of shivering in SF) I am gonna stay here and watch kitties for the people in my new adopted family who go (Like it says on the Burning Man web site “Don’t even THINK of bringing a cat….” That applies to felines as well as kittyfeet.)
I have a tan, I’m mellow and happy. It’s warm and I actually leave the house now. I have been stressing a lot in San Fran about general floundering as well as getting away from my violent wife-beating upstairs neighbor in San Fran who has been making my life miserable for three years. I finally called Child Protective Services on him (the couple has a 2 year old kid and beat each other in front of her) and they are following up on the couple. The man and his wife threatened me two weeks ago and I put a restraining order on them. Went to court and went and got my stuff from San Fran this past Wednesday. Did it all in 24 hours. Learned to drive a stick on the way. Went to court on one hour sleep. Won. Got the restraining order.
Adam and Alex in San Fran came over and helped me (thank you so much, guys….) pack and carry my stuff down five flights of stairs to the truck. (Of course the elevator was out again). We packed up and were on our way. Got in at 1 am (Newt and I were too tired to drive on the desert and I rented a motel room half way through, we stayed 4 hours, showered and slept an hour). Got in at 1 am, loaded it in my big new room and I slept. Woke up yesterday at noon to the sound of birds and children and started my new life.
Tomorrow is an Insecto gig (I am now the marketing consultant, as well as the shill who is gonna heckle Newt) Newt sez I can sell my books at the t-shirt table, and he’s gonna set me up with a gal who will be there.
I love this life. And humbly thank God for all these gifts and the ability to make the occasional good decision.
My friend BlackVan put it well, "In San Francisco, it's considered tacky to have ambition. In LA it's tacky not to have ambition".
I have ambition.
Amen from the Land o' Cars, the place where they sell “Variety” and “Billboard” in all the 7-11s.
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Week Three: Interesting town. Have made some cool friends. Have met some famous people. Have had a venture capitalist (Sandton Financial in Woodland Hills) send me a letter of intent offering to raise $525,000 for kittyfeet Media, and then it turned out to be a scam. (I turned them into their chamber of commerce and to the Better Business Bureau.) When i called them, they asked ME for money. I believe they are not on the up and up and my lawyer thought the same. Their one page "contract" is ridiculous, offers nothing, is all puffery. Real venture capitalists do not operate this way. They sent me a bunch of press stuff with magazine covers that they did not seem to have write ups in.
But my brain works so quickly, I am more tripping on the girl who wouldn't give me her phone number. Fuck money. Love and art are all that matter. I have passed trials by fire, and become pure of heart. Time to suceed in solving the goals................
I'm working a million art projects. Am doing a recording project with my roommate. We're called "two ex-jukies who dress like slobs". Sorta sounds like Tones on Tail, Killing Joke, Echo and the Bunnymen, Joy Division, The Fall, etc.
This week I'm hard at work on my screenplay. (and someone gave me a free laptop! So I can take it with me.....Also I'm gonna edit the trailer for the film, but may just try to get a big studio to buy the screenplay. Wish me luck.
There is a joke that in LA, you can walk up to anyone and say, "Hey, how's your screenplay coming along?" and they will tell you.
I was in my favorite coffee house in Echo Park the other day and two guys were, yup, working on a screenplay. I said, "Hey, how's your screenplay coming along?" and they earnestly launched into their pitch. (This is the only place in the world where you can actually meet someone in line at the 7-11 who can help your career in huge ways. Not a bad place for a glad-handing guy like me with art coming out my pores.)
It's also the only place in the world where you would hear a beer commercial (in-between blasting down the 5 South blasting "Highway Star" by Deep Purple on the car radio…oh yea, I bought new speakers) with Matt Damon and Ben Afflick endorsing the beer company's contest called "Operation Green Light", whereby you buy the beer and get to enter a contest to get your screenplay seen by a producer. In most cities, your average beer drinker would scratch his balls and say, "Duh, what's a scream play?"
Someone is trying to get me an interview to be a writer for a new men's mag started by Larry Flint.
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click for update several months later
photos of my old room, my old housemate, and the cats