I get in my way, I step in front of myself in my path because I don't fully believe (yet) that I deserve to walk my path. That is only ever the impediment to my success. And I would wage that it is that simple for us all.
For instance, I went to the club the other day, met up with a friend, danced with him for a while and made out with him, and then afterward, I danced with and got to know his incredibly hot friend. At the end of the night, I was standing outside of the club with some friends, and I had two guys come up to me and hit on me and ask for my number and all that. Now, I'm not kidding you with this, this all happened, but the clincher of it all is that I chose to deny myself afterward instead of celebrate myself. I went looking HARDCORE for how I could prove that none of it ever happened. Seriously...'cause I wanted to prove to myself that no man that I find attractive, or of any quality, would actually be attracted to me.....and simply because that's what I've been used to telling myself over the last few years.
Second example: This weekend, I seriously considered moving back to Utah. I knew I didn't want to be in Utah, but I started second-guessing myself and stacking up an immense amount of negative thoughts against myself, and rationalized that going back to Utah was the mature thing to do, and that I could restart my life there, and be a big fish in a small pond instead of a small fish in a HUGE pond. Thankfully, Zeb Knudsen bitch-smacked me into realizing that I've been here, like a week or two or something (and I've been up in Utah or Vegas for like, 5 of those days even), and that I need to lighten up....I feel like a failure down here, as well I should, so I get that out of the way! :) And I feel rejuvenated after this weekend. I feel like I truly did get out of my way the "failure" concept and now I am ready to be a "creator" again (as GL terms it). I've known it was time for me to stop being victim to some shitty circumstances I had going on, and it took some tough-love from a friend to really push through it. So, Zeb, if you're reading this, thank you. You may not really know how much you impacted me in those approx ten minutes you took out of your day to chat with and care about me. Thank you.
"The search ends here where the night is totally clear, when you finally know that though you control where you go, you can't steer."
--Missy Higgins, from her song "Steer" on the album "On A Clear Night"
Showing posts with label LA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LA. Show all posts
7.26.2010
7.18.2010
Day Two of Utah-L.A. Move, Continued: The Heat Is On!
So, I buy: chocolate milk (YUM! Haven't had in years!!), an old-fashioned-style blackberry soda, and a bottle of lemonade. I don't get any water because I think these three will hydrate me enough. So I slam the chocolate milk, and half to two-thirds of the CARBONATED blackberry soda in the desert heat, and then pull out of Chainsaw Market. By the time I get off of the on-ramp back onto I-15, my stomach is killing me...."What," I wonder, "could possibly be wrong with my stomach? The only thing I've really consumed is.....chocolate MILK on a blazing hot day AND 12 oz. of (minimally flavored) carbonated sugar water...it couldn't possibly be that, could it??" Haha! Now, I write that as if I had no idea, but I did....I just write it like that because I felt SOOO stupid for not foreseeing that this would happen. Let's mix an empty stomach, desert heats, milk, carbonation, sugar and dehydration. Bright mix, Apollo. Lol.
So the next town (same mini-market type of situation) is about a half hour away and I am plugging along the best I can with my circumstances. I feel like I'm about to puke AND pass out now (haha!) and luckily I make it to the next town and buy like 2 or 3 waters and chug 1.5 of 'em! My body gratefully soaks up the water and I am on my way again!
As I am driving into areas with real-life now, I have no map. And I am on the freeway. In Los Angeles. Yeah, one thing that I am illuminating about myself through writing these blogs is that I am possibly THE most ill-prepared traveler ever. HAHA. My whole life, I always thought you could take I-15 straight down to L.A. Turns out it actually goes straight to San Diego, which is a surprising distance away from L.A. (in my opinion). Luckily -- seriously, "by the grace of god" defined -- I happened to be exploring Google Maps out of minute curiosity the week before and I remember only that I was surprised to learn I can't take I-15 straight to L.A., and that I need to get onto another freeway somewhere after Barstow. I was in a hurry at the time, so I didn't memorize anything and told myself to come back and search again before I made the drive down. Yeah....if you didn't notice, in the last blog, I said I'd finish Day Two's blog the next day, and here it is, a day late (and that is only because I randomly came back to my blog and saw that I had made a promise about which I'd apparently forgot and felt a little bad so I was motivated to write this blog....therefore, AMPLE evidence that I am not the best at keeping my commitments to focus online. Lol.
So, I'm on the freeway, and I come to a choice: I can either go South to San Diego or West to Pasadena. Wait a minute. Where's my "South to Los Angeles" option??? Shit! Well, I don't want to keep going to San Diego, but I don't know if I'll come across another freeway that will take me away from SD.....so.....I choose to go to Pasadena and hope for the best! HAHA! So I'm pluggin along toward Pasadena, and another choice comes upon me....continue to Pasadena, or go toward....Los Angeles! Yea! This time it is in my favor! Lol. So of course I head toward L.A. and then I have a bit of a mental problem. There are two freeways here that are similarly numbered. The 110 and the 101. Which one is it that takes me into Hollywood? And which one is the devil's freeway?? I can't remember for the life of me! And I'm comin up on the exits for both....oh shit...how do I decide, how do I decide????
Well, thank god California Department of Transportation planned ahead for idiots like me. They nicknamed the 101 "Hollywood Freeway" and even went so far as to publish it on the last "exit now" sign! So I swerve into the exit lane right before it veers off the highway and head into Hollywood. Ahhhhhh, familiar territory....how I love thee....
I get into town (took the wrong exit and drove much longer than I needed to...) and pull up to my lovely place of residence. I jump out of my car, excited to lay my body down and walk up to the gate, where I must put in the code to get in. So, I put it in. And no loud, annoying, make-you-want-to-carve-your-eardrums-out-of-your-ears noise booms. What? So I put the code in again. Once again, no noise. HUH?? So I put it in again (because this makes lots of sense at this point). NO NOISE! What the fuck?!? So I call James (my roommate) and ask what's going on, and he goes into some story about them changing the codes and the codes not working and basically I'm pissed. So I get to sit outside of my own apartment like a panhandler waiting for someone to come who knows how to get in.
When I finally get inside, I lie down, James gets home and tells me I should go get a box-fan to put into my window. You are a genius, James, because it is blisteringly hot and I was too tired and dead to think of that myself! So I go get a box-fan (for $20...jealous that I can't buy the portable A/C units for $200.......) and come home and put it in my window. I turn my back on it to surf the net and ten minutes later I hear a BANG-CRASH (WTF??) and all of a sudden I no longer feel fanny-goodness. Once again, WTF?? Apparently, my fan was blasting so hard (huh?....) that it fell backward, broke my window screen and fell two stories onto the ground below. Oh, yea!! I am so excited at this point that I spent $20 for ten minutes of a working fan!! HAHAHA. So I begrudgingly go and collect my fan, assuming it's dead and trying to figure out what I can say to Home Depot to get them to give me a refund, and I bring it back upstairs and plug it in, and it works like it's still new! (Well, 'cause it is....but I mean, like it never fell two stories and smashed to the cement! Lol). So, luckily, I have, like, the mini-est side table ever in my room (like, I think the actual circumference is 10 inches.....) and I get the fan somewhat properly set on that so it works, it's halfway as cool as if I'd set the fan in the window sill, and makes the room bearable.
Once again, James being a genius, he comes into my room a couple days later and asks why my fan is not in my window, and I reply that it fell out onto the cement outside after ten minutes and I did not want to have to make that journey to collect it every ten minutes for the rest of the summer....So he asks "Well, did you close the window on it to hold it in?" No. I did not. Of course. And he puts it in the window, closes the window on the top of it to hold it in, and ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you...it has stayed there for 2 days now straight!
Two thumbs up for intellect!!
So the next town (same mini-market type of situation) is about a half hour away and I am plugging along the best I can with my circumstances. I feel like I'm about to puke AND pass out now (haha!) and luckily I make it to the next town and buy like 2 or 3 waters and chug 1.5 of 'em! My body gratefully soaks up the water and I am on my way again!
As I am driving into areas with real-life now, I have no map. And I am on the freeway. In Los Angeles. Yeah, one thing that I am illuminating about myself through writing these blogs is that I am possibly THE most ill-prepared traveler ever. HAHA. My whole life, I always thought you could take I-15 straight down to L.A. Turns out it actually goes straight to San Diego, which is a surprising distance away from L.A. (in my opinion). Luckily -- seriously, "by the grace of god" defined -- I happened to be exploring Google Maps out of minute curiosity the week before and I remember only that I was surprised to learn I can't take I-15 straight to L.A., and that I need to get onto another freeway somewhere after Barstow. I was in a hurry at the time, so I didn't memorize anything and told myself to come back and search again before I made the drive down. Yeah....if you didn't notice, in the last blog, I said I'd finish Day Two's blog the next day, and here it is, a day late (and that is only because I randomly came back to my blog and saw that I had made a promise about which I'd apparently forgot and felt a little bad so I was motivated to write this blog....therefore, AMPLE evidence that I am not the best at keeping my commitments to focus online. Lol.
So, I'm on the freeway, and I come to a choice: I can either go South to San Diego or West to Pasadena. Wait a minute. Where's my "South to Los Angeles" option??? Shit! Well, I don't want to keep going to San Diego, but I don't know if I'll come across another freeway that will take me away from SD.....so.....I choose to go to Pasadena and hope for the best! HAHA! So I'm pluggin along toward Pasadena, and another choice comes upon me....continue to Pasadena, or go toward....Los Angeles! Yea! This time it is in my favor! Lol. So of course I head toward L.A. and then I have a bit of a mental problem. There are two freeways here that are similarly numbered. The 110 and the 101. Which one is it that takes me into Hollywood? And which one is the devil's freeway?? I can't remember for the life of me! And I'm comin up on the exits for both....oh shit...how do I decide, how do I decide????
Well, thank god California Department of Transportation planned ahead for idiots like me. They nicknamed the 101 "Hollywood Freeway" and even went so far as to publish it on the last "exit now" sign! So I swerve into the exit lane right before it veers off the highway and head into Hollywood. Ahhhhhh, familiar territory....how I love thee....
I get into town (took the wrong exit and drove much longer than I needed to...) and pull up to my lovely place of residence. I jump out of my car, excited to lay my body down and walk up to the gate, where I must put in the code to get in. So, I put it in. And no loud, annoying, make-you-want-to-carve-your-eardrums-out-of-your-ears noise booms. What? So I put the code in again. Once again, no noise. HUH?? So I put it in again (because this makes lots of sense at this point). NO NOISE! What the fuck?!? So I call James (my roommate) and ask what's going on, and he goes into some story about them changing the codes and the codes not working and basically I'm pissed. So I get to sit outside of my own apartment like a panhandler waiting for someone to come who knows how to get in.
When I finally get inside, I lie down, James gets home and tells me I should go get a box-fan to put into my window. You are a genius, James, because it is blisteringly hot and I was too tired and dead to think of that myself! So I go get a box-fan (for $20...jealous that I can't buy the portable A/C units for $200.......) and come home and put it in my window. I turn my back on it to surf the net and ten minutes later I hear a BANG-CRASH (WTF??) and all of a sudden I no longer feel fanny-goodness. Once again, WTF?? Apparently, my fan was blasting so hard (huh?....) that it fell backward, broke my window screen and fell two stories onto the ground below. Oh, yea!! I am so excited at this point that I spent $20 for ten minutes of a working fan!! HAHAHA. So I begrudgingly go and collect my fan, assuming it's dead and trying to figure out what I can say to Home Depot to get them to give me a refund, and I bring it back upstairs and plug it in, and it works like it's still new! (Well, 'cause it is....but I mean, like it never fell two stories and smashed to the cement! Lol). So, luckily, I have, like, the mini-est side table ever in my room (like, I think the actual circumference is 10 inches.....) and I get the fan somewhat properly set on that so it works, it's halfway as cool as if I'd set the fan in the window sill, and makes the room bearable.
Once again, James being a genius, he comes into my room a couple days later and asks why my fan is not in my window, and I reply that it fell out onto the cement outside after ten minutes and I did not want to have to make that journey to collect it every ten minutes for the rest of the summer....So he asks "Well, did you close the window on it to hold it in?" No. I did not. Of course. And he puts it in the window, closes the window on the top of it to hold it in, and ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you...it has stayed there for 2 days now straight!
Two thumbs up for intellect!!
7.15.2010
Day One of Utah-L.A. Move: Don't Turn Around!
Today as I was driving down to Vegas, I got to Manti and my stomach felt incredibly sick. I couldn’t decide what it was: that I was homesick already, or because I had driven past such a densely Mormon city (haha, bad joke, I know, whatever, lol).
All kidding aside, I knew there was something going on inside of me -- something that I didn't necessarily want to congront. Because I could tell I didn't want to confront it, I knew that I had to. I immediately picked up the phone and texted Sarah Brown. I told her I wanted to puss out and turn around and it was taking every piece of my fortitude to continue driving South. She coached me around selling out and being in hype and being one with what is, and challenged me to coach myself. That was the key. So many of my friends would simple console (which, by the way, I am grateful for). So many of my friends would simply provide me with bitter feedback (which I am also grateful for, to an extent). The key to my forward movement in my discourse with Sarah is that after she did both of those things, she finished by challenging me to coach myself.
Because of that, I identified for myself that I really wanted to keep going to L.A., I was just scared of the unknown. I was scared of being (virtually, though not wholly) on my own in a new city and I was scared of not being able to take care of (and HELP -- thank you, Sarah's Feedback) my mom and other loved ones in Salt Lake. And I identified that if all of that is REALLY (TRULY) important to me, I will create: I will attract to me the money that is necessary to visit my loved ones whenever I want (or feel the need), and am also right now becoming aware that I can still nurture my relationships via telecommunication (thank god for Facebook and Skype!)
So I finished out my day of driving with a stop in Las Vegas to visit the beautiful one and only Karli Markovitz! I got to relax there and chat (unfortunately briefly) with my Vegas-Love and then headed out to L.A. the next morning as she headed off to work...
All kidding aside, I knew there was something going on inside of me -- something that I didn't necessarily want to congront. Because I could tell I didn't want to confront it, I knew that I had to. I immediately picked up the phone and texted Sarah Brown. I told her I wanted to puss out and turn around and it was taking every piece of my fortitude to continue driving South. She coached me around selling out and being in hype and being one with what is, and challenged me to coach myself. That was the key. So many of my friends would simple console (which, by the way, I am grateful for). So many of my friends would simply provide me with bitter feedback (which I am also grateful for, to an extent). The key to my forward movement in my discourse with Sarah is that after she did both of those things, she finished by challenging me to coach myself.
Because of that, I identified for myself that I really wanted to keep going to L.A., I was just scared of the unknown. I was scared of being (virtually, though not wholly) on my own in a new city and I was scared of not being able to take care of (and HELP -- thank you, Sarah's Feedback) my mom and other loved ones in Salt Lake. And I identified that if all of that is REALLY (TRULY) important to me, I will create: I will attract to me the money that is necessary to visit my loved ones whenever I want (or feel the need), and am also right now becoming aware that I can still nurture my relationships via telecommunication (thank god for Facebook and Skype!)
So I finished out my day of driving with a stop in Las Vegas to visit the beautiful one and only Karli Markovitz! I got to relax there and chat (unfortunately briefly) with my Vegas-Love and then headed out to L.A. the next morning as she headed off to work...
7.08.2010
Day One, Continued (And Day Two): Lost In TransL.A.tion
So, I don't die. Just in case you didn't solve that riddle. Lol.
I am still walking on this "street" that is more like I-15 than a street...and it is now time for our Conference Call as coaches...So I get on the call and mute it for their benefit and participate and it's pretty decent and all the while, people are honking at me, as if I don't know they are rushing by behind me about to kill me, and like I'm completely impeding their ability to drive OVER the speed limit by walking basically in bushes. Sigh....
After the call ends, I finally find an off-ramp and feverishly head up it, not knowing or caring where I am, just that I am off death-street. Lol.
At this point, I'm lost, starving and it's starting to get dark. I text my friend James Ord who lives down here and ask him for advice and he points me in a decent direction. Soon enough I am getting over-priced food and barely sating my appetite. Lol. I am hella tired and just want to catch a bus back to where I'm staying and have no idea where to go. So I ask my server and he points me in a direction. He is incredibly vague, but I think to myself "Eh, I got this, how hard can it be to find my way home?" WHY THE FUCK AM I STILL BEING SO OPTIMISTIC??? LOL! So I start walking, and am a little lost and I decide to go back and ask for the directions again because I do NOT want to get stuck on another street like La Cienega again! Lol. So I ask two more times, and he just repeats the same vague directions. Thank god at that point his supervisor steps into the conversation and is much clearer. So I head toward the bus stop and some random black chick starts talking to me. She is very cool, and really sweet and talkative and we will really click. At this point, I wanna cling on to any hope I may have, and am violently debating in my head whether or not it would seem too creepy to ask her for her number so I can stay in contact with her, and by the time I decide I will, she gets off at her stop. Cool- Lesson learned: Don't wait, or life will pass me by. (Just FYI, I learned this lesson several more times over the course of my stay, so I think it's safe to say, I didn't ACTUALLY learn it that night with the black chick. Lol)
I finally get back to the place I'm staying, and the guy is creepy as ALL get out....he wants to fuck, and massage me (which that one, I'm actually not too against after my retardedly long day lol), and......that's right, people....HE HAD BED BUGS OOHHHHHHH MYYYYY GODDDDDD!!
WHAT???
How could the situation with dude get any worse??? Oh, yeah, let's throw some bed bugs into the mix! Why not?!? GUH!
So I kinda scream and he's like "What??" and I'm like "Dude, you have BED BUGS!" And he goes on to ferociously debate it, all the while pulling out this HUGE container of bed bug spray and starts spraying all around and on the bed. Um, I'm sorry, sir, but how are you going to debate the validity of your bed bugs and then pull out a HUGE FUCKING CONTAINER of bug spray that in HUGE letters says that it is specifically designed for BED BUGS. Nothing else, JUST BED BUGS.???!!!??!?!?!?!? WHAAAATTTT????? Yeah, so eff him!
I had spotted that there was a mattress on the floor of his living room just chilling there so I said "Well, I don't mean to be disrespectful in any way, but would you mind if I just slept on the mattress out there?..." thinking to myself: Even if you DO mind, I'm sleeping on that fucking mattress. Why didn't you offer it to me in the first place???"
So he tries to weasle his way out, and I'm just like "Yeah, I don't mean to disrespect you at all, but I'm sleeping out there. Good night!"
OH MY GOD, RIGHT???
So, it's freezing all night. I've got no blanket with me, 'cause I assumed I'd be sleeping somewhere nicer...with less bugs and more blankets....but I'm not, so alright, I'll make the best of what I've got...I toss and turn all night and I finally get up and text James (who I was going to stay with after my stay at bedbug-mansion had ended) and asked him to please let me stay with him a couple days earlier so I could get the hell out of this place. THANK YOU, JAMES, FOR LETTING ME STAY WITH YOU A COUPLE DAYS EARLIER!!
So that afternoon, I go out on another venture into the city, for 6 more hours, walking everywhere...only this time, I created more pain for myself -- literally. I thought, "Well, I'll go out dressed up a bit, like, business casual type of clothes, so that when I go into prospective employers, I will look better than in my board shorts or cut-offs. So in this dress-nice-decision, I choose to wear my brown dress shoes. Yeah, let's just cut to the chase and say that they are not meant, whatsoever, to wear for more than maybe an hour's worth of walking. Period.
So after all my blister-creating-dress-shoe-walking comes to an end, I am in Hollywood, and it's getting dark. I'm on Santa Monica Blvd, thinking, "Well, Sheryl Crow sang about this street, so I'm sure it's one of the most used streets in Hollywood, so I'm sure a bus will come down this street pretty frequently" so I start walking toward my destination along SMB, so I'm not wasting time just sitting around. Oh my god, I see TONSSSSS of buses! Just none going my way. Oh, wait, yeah, I DID see several heading my way. You know, all the ones that said "Not In Service."
So I continue plodding along, and get into West Hollywood. Still no buses. Well, whatever, I'll just keep walking. Soon, my feet are literally killing me. They are sliced up into tiny little fragments of blisterization and hurt like hell to walk on. But at this point, seeing all the buses saying "Not In Service," I think I'm going to have to walk all the way home, so I might as well just keep walking. I mean, I'm puzzled as to why it's 9:00 and all the buses are already going back to their hub, but whatever, L.A. has been nothing like I expected at this point, so why not believe that their bus system ends at 9 PM? People everywhere do say how bad their transit system sucks. So I sigh (heavily) and continue walking. And walking. And walking. And now I cross into Beverly Hills. Always the optimistic sucker (lol), I think "Well, at least I'm in the pretty neighborhood now, and maybe I'll at least see Katherine Heigl or someone jogging past me." The trouble with BH is, well, four-fold:
First: the regular, PAVED sidewalk turns into a nice dirt pathway. It's beautiful, if it weren't for the fact that I'd been walking on blisters all day, and pretty much mashed down any sole that was left on my shoes, so I could actually feel every ROCK and aberrantly patterned grain of dirt on the path.
Second: they don't find it wise to have any ramps on their curbs at the intersections, so I have to muster every piece of un-maxed-out muscle left in my thighs (which is like, maybe .2% at this point) just to step down the curb at the intersection and then step back up on the other side.
Third: I don't see anyone remotely famous or beautiful along this pathway. Fuck Katherine Heigl. Lol.
Fourth: There are ABSOLUTELY NO bus stops along SMB once you get into BH. NONE! And it stretches forever -- using Utah as an example, just the pretty, non-bussy BH part of SMB would stretch from about 1300 S. to 2700 S.
So I think "I need to stop being optimistic and believing I can walk the rest of this like Jesus did on water and just turn back now." So I stop. And I debate. Should I give up? No, I don't give up! But, Ryan, look at the facts... No! I've ben optimistic this far along and haven't died (yet), what should stop me from continuing to be optimistic?? Ryan, look at the fucking facts. Guh, fine, I give in, I'll turn around! So I turn around. And I make it back to the edge of BH and West Hollywood (abbreviated WeHo). I sit down on the curb and start crying.
No, I didn't really start crying, it just felt like the right way to start wrapping this story up. Haha.
OMG, ALL I DO IS WRITE MOVIES IN MY HEAD ALL THE TIME NOW LOL.
Anyhow, I sit down on the curb and think about crying. Lol. (Seriously) Instead, I just lay down on the grass, and go over my day. I mean, other than the blisters (that are actually STILL healing as I write this.....), the day wasn't TOO bad. And I'm sure it wasn't worse than a Mormon missionary's. So life can't be too bad if my day isn't as bad as theirs, doing what they choose to do for two full years. So I sit up, text James and ask him to do me the favor of just picking me up where I'm at, take me to bed-bug-mansion to get my stuff, and bring me back to his place, and he does.
I get home....and I think I ate? I don't know, I can't remember...If not, I must've been WAY too tired, 'cause I know my body was fiending.
Sleep could not have come soon enough.
I am still walking on this "street" that is more like I-15 than a street...and it is now time for our Conference Call as coaches...So I get on the call and mute it for their benefit and participate and it's pretty decent and all the while, people are honking at me, as if I don't know they are rushing by behind me about to kill me, and like I'm completely impeding their ability to drive OVER the speed limit by walking basically in bushes. Sigh....
After the call ends, I finally find an off-ramp and feverishly head up it, not knowing or caring where I am, just that I am off death-street. Lol.
At this point, I'm lost, starving and it's starting to get dark. I text my friend James Ord who lives down here and ask him for advice and he points me in a decent direction. Soon enough I am getting over-priced food and barely sating my appetite. Lol. I am hella tired and just want to catch a bus back to where I'm staying and have no idea where to go. So I ask my server and he points me in a direction. He is incredibly vague, but I think to myself "Eh, I got this, how hard can it be to find my way home?" WHY THE FUCK AM I STILL BEING SO OPTIMISTIC??? LOL! So I start walking, and am a little lost and I decide to go back and ask for the directions again because I do NOT want to get stuck on another street like La Cienega again! Lol. So I ask two more times, and he just repeats the same vague directions. Thank god at that point his supervisor steps into the conversation and is much clearer. So I head toward the bus stop and some random black chick starts talking to me. She is very cool, and really sweet and talkative and we will really click. At this point, I wanna cling on to any hope I may have, and am violently debating in my head whether or not it would seem too creepy to ask her for her number so I can stay in contact with her, and by the time I decide I will, she gets off at her stop. Cool- Lesson learned: Don't wait, or life will pass me by. (Just FYI, I learned this lesson several more times over the course of my stay, so I think it's safe to say, I didn't ACTUALLY learn it that night with the black chick. Lol)
I finally get back to the place I'm staying, and the guy is creepy as ALL get out....he wants to fuck, and massage me (which that one, I'm actually not too against after my retardedly long day lol), and......that's right, people....HE HAD BED BUGS OOHHHHHHH MYYYYY GODDDDDD!!
WHAT???
How could the situation with dude get any worse??? Oh, yeah, let's throw some bed bugs into the mix! Why not?!? GUH!
So I kinda scream and he's like "What??" and I'm like "Dude, you have BED BUGS!" And he goes on to ferociously debate it, all the while pulling out this HUGE container of bed bug spray and starts spraying all around and on the bed. Um, I'm sorry, sir, but how are you going to debate the validity of your bed bugs and then pull out a HUGE FUCKING CONTAINER of bug spray that in HUGE letters says that it is specifically designed for BED BUGS. Nothing else, JUST BED BUGS.???!!!??!?!?!?!? WHAAAATTTT????? Yeah, so eff him!
I had spotted that there was a mattress on the floor of his living room just chilling there so I said "Well, I don't mean to be disrespectful in any way, but would you mind if I just slept on the mattress out there?..." thinking to myself: Even if you DO mind, I'm sleeping on that fucking mattress. Why didn't you offer it to me in the first place???"
So he tries to weasle his way out, and I'm just like "Yeah, I don't mean to disrespect you at all, but I'm sleeping out there. Good night!"
OH MY GOD, RIGHT???
So, it's freezing all night. I've got no blanket with me, 'cause I assumed I'd be sleeping somewhere nicer...with less bugs and more blankets....but I'm not, so alright, I'll make the best of what I've got...I toss and turn all night and I finally get up and text James (who I was going to stay with after my stay at bedbug-mansion had ended) and asked him to please let me stay with him a couple days earlier so I could get the hell out of this place. THANK YOU, JAMES, FOR LETTING ME STAY WITH YOU A COUPLE DAYS EARLIER!!
So that afternoon, I go out on another venture into the city, for 6 more hours, walking everywhere...only this time, I created more pain for myself -- literally. I thought, "Well, I'll go out dressed up a bit, like, business casual type of clothes, so that when I go into prospective employers, I will look better than in my board shorts or cut-offs. So in this dress-nice-decision, I choose to wear my brown dress shoes. Yeah, let's just cut to the chase and say that they are not meant, whatsoever, to wear for more than maybe an hour's worth of walking. Period.
So after all my blister-creating-dress-shoe-walking comes to an end, I am in Hollywood, and it's getting dark. I'm on Santa Monica Blvd, thinking, "Well, Sheryl Crow sang about this street, so I'm sure it's one of the most used streets in Hollywood, so I'm sure a bus will come down this street pretty frequently" so I start walking toward my destination along SMB, so I'm not wasting time just sitting around. Oh my god, I see TONSSSSS of buses! Just none going my way. Oh, wait, yeah, I DID see several heading my way. You know, all the ones that said "Not In Service."
So I continue plodding along, and get into West Hollywood. Still no buses. Well, whatever, I'll just keep walking. Soon, my feet are literally killing me. They are sliced up into tiny little fragments of blisterization and hurt like hell to walk on. But at this point, seeing all the buses saying "Not In Service," I think I'm going to have to walk all the way home, so I might as well just keep walking. I mean, I'm puzzled as to why it's 9:00 and all the buses are already going back to their hub, but whatever, L.A. has been nothing like I expected at this point, so why not believe that their bus system ends at 9 PM? People everywhere do say how bad their transit system sucks. So I sigh (heavily) and continue walking. And walking. And walking. And now I cross into Beverly Hills. Always the optimistic sucker (lol), I think "Well, at least I'm in the pretty neighborhood now, and maybe I'll at least see Katherine Heigl or someone jogging past me." The trouble with BH is, well, four-fold:
First: the regular, PAVED sidewalk turns into a nice dirt pathway. It's beautiful, if it weren't for the fact that I'd been walking on blisters all day, and pretty much mashed down any sole that was left on my shoes, so I could actually feel every ROCK and aberrantly patterned grain of dirt on the path.
Second: they don't find it wise to have any ramps on their curbs at the intersections, so I have to muster every piece of un-maxed-out muscle left in my thighs (which is like, maybe .2% at this point) just to step down the curb at the intersection and then step back up on the other side.
Third: I don't see anyone remotely famous or beautiful along this pathway. Fuck Katherine Heigl. Lol.
Fourth: There are ABSOLUTELY NO bus stops along SMB once you get into BH. NONE! And it stretches forever -- using Utah as an example, just the pretty, non-bussy BH part of SMB would stretch from about 1300 S. to 2700 S.
So I think "I need to stop being optimistic and believing I can walk the rest of this like Jesus did on water and just turn back now." So I stop. And I debate. Should I give up? No, I don't give up! But, Ryan, look at the facts... No! I've ben optimistic this far along and haven't died (yet), what should stop me from continuing to be optimistic?? Ryan, look at the fucking facts. Guh, fine, I give in, I'll turn around! So I turn around. And I make it back to the edge of BH and West Hollywood (abbreviated WeHo). I sit down on the curb and start crying.
No, I didn't really start crying, it just felt like the right way to start wrapping this story up. Haha.
OMG, ALL I DO IS WRITE MOVIES IN MY HEAD ALL THE TIME NOW LOL.
Anyhow, I sit down on the curb and think about crying. Lol. (Seriously) Instead, I just lay down on the grass, and go over my day. I mean, other than the blisters (that are actually STILL healing as I write this.....), the day wasn't TOO bad. And I'm sure it wasn't worse than a Mormon missionary's. So life can't be too bad if my day isn't as bad as theirs, doing what they choose to do for two full years. So I sit up, text James and ask him to do me the favor of just picking me up where I'm at, take me to bed-bug-mansion to get my stuff, and bring me back to his place, and he does.
I get home....and I think I ate? I don't know, I can't remember...If not, I must've been WAY too tired, 'cause I know my body was fiending.
Sleep could not have come soon enough.
7.02.2010
Day One: Planes, Trains and Automobiles
I can't believe I've only been here 3 days...I feel like it's already been a week!
THE FIRST DAY:
I landed (obviously lol). After collecting my bags, I called the guy with whom I'd be staying for the first couple of nights to get an address and ask if he could pick me up so I wouldn't have to find a way to lug my 3 bags and pillow all the way from LAX to Culver City...
Oh, by the way, here's a map link, in case you wanna follow my specific traveling. I don't know exactly if this will work, but if not, just go to Google Maps, type in "Los Angeles, CA" and center on the western side of LA where you will find Culver City, West Hollywood, Hollywood, Beverly Hills and LAX. Those are the only places to which I'll be traveling and thereby mentioning.
MAP!
So, I get a hold of the guy, and he's incredibly jaded (and possibly a little mentally ill?) and won't pick me up unless I pay him $50. Nice. Thank you, Capitalist Training 101. I have $240 with me for the whole 10 days, so I'm not about to blow fifty of it on a simple car ride. So, I walk outside after he chats my ear off and I come across a man who is dressed as if he works at the airport and says "You need directions to where you're going?" and I think "Oh God: thank you, you really do love me, you've directed me straight to someone who can assist me in finding my way around the city!" So I ask dude how to get to Sepulveda and Venice Blvds, and he says lost of stuff that I can't understand, and I think "OL, minus one point, God, because you gave me a slightly retarded (or homeless?) airport worker."
So after fishing out what exactly his words meant, I am still in mystery and am hoping that grace and intuition will put together his words and my circumstances in the most beneficial manner. So I start to leave with this hope in my heart and he turns and says "Now, maybe you can do something for me" and starts to tell me all about The Salvation Army or homeless youth or something charitable like that that I didn't pay attention to because I was still trying to record to my brain his previously mangled directions. And I think "Well, he told me how to take the bus all the way to Culver City for only $1. So I might as well give him a couple bucks, 'cause I'd be paying $20 for a taxi otherwise." So I do. And then I leave and find whatever bus I'm supposed to get on.
So. I get on the bus after a couple of chance mistakes, and I find my way to the apt in Culver. As I'm walking up to where I think it is at, I marvel at the beauty and cleanliness of the apt building. Then I randomly look up to my right and see the address I am looking for is actually on the building right before it -- MY address is placed on the dirty, creepy looking one. And NO JOKE, I stopped walking and looked over to the beautiful one, and then looked back up at the 2-foot address numbers staring me in the face and looked back over at the beautiful one like a puppy missing his master...and I almost continued to walk over to the beautiful complex anyhow, like I was in denial: "NO, THIS IS NOT WHERE I'M STAYING! I GET TO STAY AT THE BEAUTIFUL ONE, DAMN IT!!!" ran through my head and my body followed suit until I came back to consciousness and reluctantly turned 90 degrees to suspiciously enter the gross apt complex.
At this point, I've been traveling all afternoon, and I just wanna get my huge, heavy baggage into his place, and I look ahead of me and there's a humongous stairway to climb to 2 of the 5 apartments I see. Naturally, odds are in my favor that his apt is NOT one of the two up the stairs. So I search and search and search for the number 5 next to the doors of the apartments on the bottom. And when I can't find that this is the case, I sigh and start lugging my shit up the stairs.
So I get in, minimally set up my stuff, and meet him. And he is even more crazy and creepy in real life than over the phone. I am filled with sadness and regret. Lol. I meet a nice, VERY CUTE Polish guy that's staying there also, and I strike up some conversation before we leave in our own directions, and it reminds me of my time in Iceland and I'm in heaven momentarily. Then he says "Well, I gotta leave so I can make sure I get to Santa Monica in time" and I say "Oh, yeah, have fun!" and think "No, don't leave me alone here!!!" HAHAHA. So I decide "I'm gonna go out and search for jobs and get away from this creep-loaded area." At this point, I have not looked at any map of the city, FYI. Spoiler alert! Lesson learned: study a map of a new city before you venture into it.
I leave the house at about 2pm, and I know I have my Great Life conference call with my fellow coaches at 6:45pm. Oh, how easy! I should be able to get down to Hollywood, check out some jobs, and get back to my place so I can charge my dying phone by then, no problem! (Sarcastic spoiler alert right there...lol). So, I start walking the way I came by bus from LAX because I am under the impression that LAX is toward the center of the city, that Culver is North of LAX and that Hollywood and West Hollywood are South of LAX. This is the point at which it would have been AMAZING if I had a map -- and where I encourage you to look one up to follow me along my (fun?) adventure....
As I'm walking along Sepulveda Blvd for about an hour and a half, I start thinking "Why does everything here look so gangster, and very un-Hollywood-like?" I pass a sign from which I gleam that I am in Los Angeles proper, and think "Oh, okay, so I can't be too far from Hollywood now." Now, I've been walking for an hour and a half, and think "Okay, I've got basically no idea where I'm at, and I now have approx 3 hours to get to Hollywood and back before my call starts...maybe I should ask for directions..." so I go into a gas station and ask the desk clerk how I get to West Hollywood. He of course doesn't know (I say "of course" because SOMEHOW NONE of the gas station workers seem to know where anything is in LA, including themselves...), but thank GOD, the lady buying goods knows everything about the LA county map, lol. So she draws me a diagram in the air and basically tells me "You're almost to LAX now...which is not where you want to be" -- (GREEEEEAAATT....) -- "and you're still in Culver City, not in LA proper" -- (WHAT??? How is one dingy city so fucking big???) -- "and that it's only about twenty minutes to WeHo if I take Slauson [the street I was on at that point] to La Cienega North and then when that street splits into La Cienega and Fairfax, right after Jefferson, I continue on Fairfax and I'll be taken straight into WeHo." "AWESOME," I say. "Thank you so much for your assistance!" Twenty minutes, with all those directions, sounds a little short, but then again, I have the mindset that the LA area is not sprawling at all. Yeah, all I can say is hindsight is 20/20.
So, I'm walkin' down Slauson, groovin' to my iPod, excited that I only have 20 minutes to WeHo, so I'll for sure make it back in time to charge my phone and ascertain the conference call number and access code I'll need. As I approach La Cienega, I notice it looks kinda like an aqueduct, I think they're called?...the thing that the "good guys" and the bad guys" raced the cars through in Grease...it looks like one of those that was refurbished into a freeway system. And it doesn't seem to have much sidewalk. But why would this lady recommend that I walk down a street that has no sidewalks?? SHE can't be crazy too, she seemed so normal! And then I remember: "It'll only take twenty minutes if you follow these directions" and it's been about 10 and I'm just barely turning onto La Cienega. So, naturally, I ignore my intuition that says "Hey, you retard, she was under the impression that you were driving and not walking!!" and my optimistic Ryan thinks "Yeah, but I'm sure there's a sidewalk somewhere on this road. I mean, it is a road, after all." So with that, I groove myself down the on-ramp onto the street...disregarding that I'm walking down an ON-RAMP, meaning it's probably a fucking freeway...
And I plug on.
All of a sudden the shoulder ends...and the sides are covered by bushes...leaving my only option as walking on the very side of the lane, hugging the bushes...so I don't get killed by 60-mph drivers. I walk, and walk, and walk, still optimistically under the impression that this road will come to an end soon. And it doesn't. So at this point, it's like, 430 or 5, and I think "I am fucked. Please give me a long enough charge on my phone to hold for the entire conference call. And please let me get off this long freeway soon enough...and please don't let me die here while I'm trying to accomplish those other two things..."
TO BE CONTINUED...
THE FIRST DAY:
I landed (obviously lol). After collecting my bags, I called the guy with whom I'd be staying for the first couple of nights to get an address and ask if he could pick me up so I wouldn't have to find a way to lug my 3 bags and pillow all the way from LAX to Culver City...
Oh, by the way, here's a map link, in case you wanna follow my specific traveling. I don't know exactly if this will work, but if not, just go to Google Maps, type in "Los Angeles, CA" and center on the western side of LA where you will find Culver City, West Hollywood, Hollywood, Beverly Hills and LAX. Those are the only places to which I'll be traveling and thereby mentioning.
MAP!
So, I get a hold of the guy, and he's incredibly jaded (and possibly a little mentally ill?) and won't pick me up unless I pay him $50. Nice. Thank you, Capitalist Training 101. I have $240 with me for the whole 10 days, so I'm not about to blow fifty of it on a simple car ride. So, I walk outside after he chats my ear off and I come across a man who is dressed as if he works at the airport and says "You need directions to where you're going?" and I think "Oh God: thank you, you really do love me, you've directed me straight to someone who can assist me in finding my way around the city!" So I ask dude how to get to Sepulveda and Venice Blvds, and he says lost of stuff that I can't understand, and I think "OL, minus one point, God, because you gave me a slightly retarded (or homeless?) airport worker."
So after fishing out what exactly his words meant, I am still in mystery and am hoping that grace and intuition will put together his words and my circumstances in the most beneficial manner. So I start to leave with this hope in my heart and he turns and says "Now, maybe you can do something for me" and starts to tell me all about The Salvation Army or homeless youth or something charitable like that that I didn't pay attention to because I was still trying to record to my brain his previously mangled directions. And I think "Well, he told me how to take the bus all the way to Culver City for only $1. So I might as well give him a couple bucks, 'cause I'd be paying $20 for a taxi otherwise." So I do. And then I leave and find whatever bus I'm supposed to get on.
So. I get on the bus after a couple of chance mistakes, and I find my way to the apt in Culver. As I'm walking up to where I think it is at, I marvel at the beauty and cleanliness of the apt building. Then I randomly look up to my right and see the address I am looking for is actually on the building right before it -- MY address is placed on the dirty, creepy looking one. And NO JOKE, I stopped walking and looked over to the beautiful one, and then looked back up at the 2-foot address numbers staring me in the face and looked back over at the beautiful one like a puppy missing his master...and I almost continued to walk over to the beautiful complex anyhow, like I was in denial: "NO, THIS IS NOT WHERE I'M STAYING! I GET TO STAY AT THE BEAUTIFUL ONE, DAMN IT!!!" ran through my head and my body followed suit until I came back to consciousness and reluctantly turned 90 degrees to suspiciously enter the gross apt complex.
At this point, I've been traveling all afternoon, and I just wanna get my huge, heavy baggage into his place, and I look ahead of me and there's a humongous stairway to climb to 2 of the 5 apartments I see. Naturally, odds are in my favor that his apt is NOT one of the two up the stairs. So I search and search and search for the number 5 next to the doors of the apartments on the bottom. And when I can't find that this is the case, I sigh and start lugging my shit up the stairs.
So I get in, minimally set up my stuff, and meet him. And he is even more crazy and creepy in real life than over the phone. I am filled with sadness and regret. Lol. I meet a nice, VERY CUTE Polish guy that's staying there also, and I strike up some conversation before we leave in our own directions, and it reminds me of my time in Iceland and I'm in heaven momentarily. Then he says "Well, I gotta leave so I can make sure I get to Santa Monica in time" and I say "Oh, yeah, have fun!" and think "No, don't leave me alone here!!!" HAHAHA. So I decide "I'm gonna go out and search for jobs and get away from this creep-loaded area." At this point, I have not looked at any map of the city, FYI. Spoiler alert! Lesson learned: study a map of a new city before you venture into it.
I leave the house at about 2pm, and I know I have my Great Life conference call with my fellow coaches at 6:45pm. Oh, how easy! I should be able to get down to Hollywood, check out some jobs, and get back to my place so I can charge my dying phone by then, no problem! (Sarcastic spoiler alert right there...lol). So, I start walking the way I came by bus from LAX because I am under the impression that LAX is toward the center of the city, that Culver is North of LAX and that Hollywood and West Hollywood are South of LAX. This is the point at which it would have been AMAZING if I had a map -- and where I encourage you to look one up to follow me along my (fun?) adventure....
As I'm walking along Sepulveda Blvd for about an hour and a half, I start thinking "Why does everything here look so gangster, and very un-Hollywood-like?" I pass a sign from which I gleam that I am in Los Angeles proper, and think "Oh, okay, so I can't be too far from Hollywood now." Now, I've been walking for an hour and a half, and think "Okay, I've got basically no idea where I'm at, and I now have approx 3 hours to get to Hollywood and back before my call starts...maybe I should ask for directions..." so I go into a gas station and ask the desk clerk how I get to West Hollywood. He of course doesn't know (I say "of course" because SOMEHOW NONE of the gas station workers seem to know where anything is in LA, including themselves...), but thank GOD, the lady buying goods knows everything about the LA county map, lol. So she draws me a diagram in the air and basically tells me "You're almost to LAX now...which is not where you want to be" -- (GREEEEEAAATT....) -- "and you're still in Culver City, not in LA proper" -- (WHAT??? How is one dingy city so fucking big???) -- "and that it's only about twenty minutes to WeHo if I take Slauson [the street I was on at that point] to La Cienega North and then when that street splits into La Cienega and Fairfax, right after Jefferson, I continue on Fairfax and I'll be taken straight into WeHo." "AWESOME," I say. "Thank you so much for your assistance!" Twenty minutes, with all those directions, sounds a little short, but then again, I have the mindset that the LA area is not sprawling at all. Yeah, all I can say is hindsight is 20/20.
So, I'm walkin' down Slauson, groovin' to my iPod, excited that I only have 20 minutes to WeHo, so I'll for sure make it back in time to charge my phone and ascertain the conference call number and access code I'll need. As I approach La Cienega, I notice it looks kinda like an aqueduct, I think they're called?...the thing that the "good guys" and the bad guys" raced the cars through in Grease...it looks like one of those that was refurbished into a freeway system. And it doesn't seem to have much sidewalk. But why would this lady recommend that I walk down a street that has no sidewalks?? SHE can't be crazy too, she seemed so normal! And then I remember: "It'll only take twenty minutes if you follow these directions" and it's been about 10 and I'm just barely turning onto La Cienega. So, naturally, I ignore my intuition that says "Hey, you retard, she was under the impression that you were driving and not walking!!" and my optimistic Ryan thinks "Yeah, but I'm sure there's a sidewalk somewhere on this road. I mean, it is a road, after all." So with that, I groove myself down the on-ramp onto the street...disregarding that I'm walking down an ON-RAMP, meaning it's probably a fucking freeway...
And I plug on.
All of a sudden the shoulder ends...and the sides are covered by bushes...leaving my only option as walking on the very side of the lane, hugging the bushes...so I don't get killed by 60-mph drivers. I walk, and walk, and walk, still optimistically under the impression that this road will come to an end soon. And it doesn't. So at this point, it's like, 430 or 5, and I think "I am fucked. Please give me a long enough charge on my phone to hold for the entire conference call. And please let me get off this long freeway soon enough...and please don't let me die here while I'm trying to accomplish those other two things..."
TO BE CONTINUED...
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