KAISER CHIEFS Video

My cousin Corinne started a show and tell session yesterday and this Kaiser Chiefs video she shared ROCKS!

Who knew balancing a tennis ball and philosophizing could go hand in hand (or nose and eye socket ;) :

KOREATOWN MUSINGS and MUSICAL SENIORS

The condo we moved to in Koreatown (known to the locals as K-town) is an eclectic mix of all ages, all ethnicities and bad plumbing.  Definitely an explosive combination ;)  

And -since I've been housebound - I've had loads of time to observe the neighbors, perched from my balcony looking out at others like Jimmy Stewart in REAR WINDOW.  There's the gray ponytailed hippie dude who owns a weathered Craftsman across the street.  He mows his dying brown lawn with a manual push mower and leaves his door wide open on hot nights.  I'm glad he and the 2 other Craftsman owners  are holding out on developers - because we have a clear view of the sky and sunsets over palm trees and the mountains.  It's a reminder that we live in Southern California - a view that's constantly being threatened as bungalows and historical bldgs are mowed down for modern hi-rises that leave you in the shadows.  

There's a halfway house down the street here too - a cute little gingerbread house packed with tense strangers trying to get clean and get along.  One woman there just sits on the grass and pouts, staring at passers-by like she wants to stir up trouble.  Look at her a second too long and she'll wave and make ruder gestures.  Further down - older Korean women sit on stoops and chat while little kids run in the sprinklers and skateboards skid along the pavement.  

And in my building - for some reason - the seniors that live here like to sing and sing LOUD! Yesterday the resident mayor of the bldg was belting out Jewish/Fiddler on the Roof type tunes in the laundry room.  It echoed into the pkng garage.  I don't really know how to handle spontaneous singing in real life and so I did what anyone would do... I walked around the bldg and came in a different entrance.  

My friend Leslie encountered another older woman from our bldg fervently singing patriotic tunes as she exited the Ralph's grocery shuttle bus.  Leslie and the bus driver shared a "holy shit" look.   We appreciate patriotic standards in the company of others, but individually it's a harder sell.  

And the 60+ woman who lives next to me (and wears flowing Mrs. Roper mu-mus all day - I'd probably be her if fuzzy pajamas weren't more in fashion now) came out on her porch on the 4th and didn't sing, but waved a flag slowly and deliberately - like a beauty queen on a float.  Again, it was awkward to behold, but it was real.  And maybe we need to see real and not just flashy a little bit more so we get used to it again.  Maybe.  

ER Tales

Just got my bill from my Emergency Room visit - $1700+.  Ugh!  Basically - as everyone knows - health insurance really sucks these days!  

The ER is a strange world of its own - from the "seen it all" desk workers/security guards/nurses and doctors to all the crazies coming in to the just plain old sick waiting HOURS to be admitted.  

And they really should do something about their choice of channels.  I desperately tried to zone out the colon cleanse sagas on the TV infomercials (do we really need to hear how one man saw his daughter's healthy poop in the toilet and it made him realize it was time to hydro-jet his insides?), but the informercial kept playing over and over and over.   It was like being in one of Dante's circles of hell.    

There was more drama in the waiting room than on the TV.  A middle-aged Hispanic man screaming at the laid-back Jamaican security guard - waving a finger in his face and calling him "a LIAR."  A youngish woman in spandex sobbing like a baby - she seemed to be a prostitute who was hit by her pimp.  But if anyone paid attention to her, her sobbing would stop and she'd glow and pose and strut. And a well groomed but burn-out type dude with a bloody, broken nose sitting next to us who exclaimed aloud about how he'd just been pistol whipped by men wearing handkerchiefs over their faces outside Jones - which is a club in a decent West Hollywood neighborhood.  The police showed up and we didn't see the burn-out dude again...  

Those are my ER tales.  Anyone else?????  

Peggie - I know you have some!