Yoshinoya, Not Glad to Know Ya

I spent most of yesterday with Rockstar. He had to work in the morning, so I just did laundry and picked up my shithole of an apartment.

He got home and immediately had bad news. He lost his cell phone while working. He called it several times, but no one picked it up and no one at Warner Brothers Studio had turned it in to the lost and found.

We had planned on going to get our haircut right when he got home, but he was emailing people about his episode of Blind Date that was airing that night. So, we were running behind schedule, which I was not happy about.

About a month ago, we both catered the same event and they gave us t-shirts to wear as part of our uniform. I happened to be wearing that t-shirt to go get my haircut and Rockstar became obsessed about wearing the same t-shirt so we would look like twins. I was adamant that we don’t wear the same t-shirt so we had a three-minute argument that went exactly like this.

“Bryan, come on”

“No”

“Come on!”

“No”

“Come on, Bryan”

“No”

“Come on”

“No”

You get the idea.

He took the shirt off and then pouted for the next few minutes about us not being “haircut twins”

We both went to this Supercuts the last time we got our haircut and Rockstar was very unhappy with how the girl cut his hair. What made it worse was that he was very jealous because he thought I got an awesome haircut. When we got there he was the first to be called and the same girl that gave him the bad haircut was going to be cutting his hair again. So he asked if I could go first and they said yes. I got in the chair and proceeded to get yet another fantastic haircut. He went to a different woman and again got a haircut that he was unhappy with.

Then we went to a fast food place called Yoshinoya that specialized in Japanese bowls. In Chicago, I would go too this Japanese place that made beef and chicken bowls for lunch and I had been telling him how good they were. We walked into the restaurant and immediately were disgusted. It was filthy and looked like they had really bad food. But since we were there, we decided to try it. It might have been the worst food I have eaten in a long time. I got a beef bowl and I am not sure if the meat they gave me was beef, but it did not resemble any kind of beef that I have ever had. Rockstar got a beef and chicken combo bowl and the chicken was equally as bad. The rice was really mushy and the vegetables were way overcooked. On top of that, nothing had any flavor. It was hard to distinguish the beef from the rice and vegetables because they all tasted the same. And that was how the Yoshinoya experiment ended.

I worked the Antonio Villariagosa election party last night at a studio right near our apartments. I had to be there at 6pm, and figured that it wouldn’t last much longer than midnight. At 2:45 am, we finally called it a night. It was really long and there wasn’t much for me to do because I was a roving bar back. Just in case the bar backs assigned to the bars had too much to handle, which they didn’t. The only thing that made it fun was the guy in charge of all of the bars was really funny. He loved to say the word “fuck” and had a lot of funny things to say about how the even was handled. The best one was when he was given inventory lists for the bartenders to fill out after the event. His words about it were exactly these.

“This is about as helpful as getting a fucking blowjob while trying to hit a fucking golf ball”

But everyone got a decent tip and a little overtime, so that was much appreciated.

Funny Stories

Funny Stories

Story #1

I was working at a hotel in Palm Desert a couple of months ago. The event was for an insurance company and they were having some sort of company get together. I was bussing a couple of tables in the front of the room when one of the bigwigs got on the stage and proceeded to introduce some other people from their leadership group. I wasn’t really listening and I was bending over one of my tables picking up a plate when all of a sudden everyone in the room began to applaud. I looked up and they were all staring at me. For a split second I began to think that this was the moment you see in all of the movies when the underdog hero is finally recognized by the other people in the movie for being so great. I was about to give a little wave to the crowd when I felt something behind me. I turned around and the woman whose plate I was picking up was waving to the crowd and I realized they were all applauding for her. She was a member of the leadership group. I hid my embarrassment and took her plate to the back. I am a moron.

Story #2

One of my pet peeves is when normal white people start talking like rap artists whenever a black person they know come by. I was working one event and I was having a normal conversation with a guy when a black friend of his came up to say hello. Here is what happened.

White Guy: “So I decided to try and check out this theater that holds auditions once a month and (his black friend approaches us) ……Yo Patrick what’s happnin’ dawg. You know I’m just chillin with my peeps ova here, fo real”.

Because of this pet peeve, I guess I try not to change my language style no matter whom I am talking to. But one time I was washing dishes at an event and it was close to the end of the night and a black security guard came up to me to see how things were going. Here is the conversation.

Guy: “Hey man, how you doing?”

Me: “Hey, how’s it going?”

Guy: “How are things going here?”

Me: (becoming the whitest person on the planet) “Well, I think things are progressing quite nicely, thank you”

I guess subconsciously I became even whiter than I am to counteract the need to speak like a rap artist. As soon as he walked away, I said to myself “I am the whitest person ever, in the history of the world.” I am a moron.

Story #3

I was in the beginning improv class a few weeks ago and there is a woman name Laurie that is kind of strange. I have written about her before in this blog. We were doing a character game where three people come on stage and are experts in some sort of area. The audience gets to ask them questions about their expertise and they are supposed to give funny answers. Most of the questions were pretty simple, just dealing with whatever the person might know a lot about. But Laurie jumped up and asked this question.

Laurie: “Yes, this question is for the dating expert. I used to work for Kentucky Fried Chicken and I would be in the restaurant and I would give people samples of extra crispy chicken to see if they liked it. I had rubber gloves on my hand and they would yell at me because I would use my hand to open the door to the back when I would need more samples. They said that I kept getting the gloves dirty because I would touch the door handle. How am I supposed to get the door open if I have gloves on and I can’t take them off because I can’t not have the gloves on when I am giving people the samples of the chicken? So what am I supposed to do with the gloves”?

The dating expert had no answer that satisfied Laurie. I guess I am not the biggest moron.

My Kind of Town

My Kind of Town

I went back to Chicago two weekends ago to perform at the Chicago Really Short Film Festival. I was super pumped to go back and see the city that I love. I am beginning to like L.A. more and more, but this city cannot compare to Chi-town.

I took the Blue line from O’Hare to meet my friend Patel at her place so that we could rehearse. Even though I haven’t seen her in a couple of months, we got right back into the groove of creating together. Since we have performed almost all of the sketches numerous times, we really didn’t have to rehearse that long. We did include one brand new sketch that we had to go over and I can’t describe the feeling when you are with someone that makes everything you say better and you never feel quite as good performing as you do when you are with her.

After rehearsal I went back to my sister’s place. I got to see her new ride and she took my by the place that she is buying. I am really proud of her. She is so much more grown-up than I am. She has a steady, relatively high-paying job, and she is about to buy her first place. Not bad for a 27 year old. We always have a pretty good time together, except that we can drive each other crazy in no time flat. We hung out and then went to bed. She had to work in the morning, so I had nothing to do all day. Let me tell you, it was great. I slept really late and then just watched TV. She has cable so there were plenty of movies to watch. She came home and the plan was that we were going to go to a nice restaurant for dinner. Right when she got home, she got a call from her friend that lives down the street from her. He had locked himself out of his apartment again, and needed her to drive him to where his landlord was so he could get a spare key. The landlord was way up on the North side, so we had to sit in traffic, get the key, then sit in traffic on the way home. We didn’t get to the restaurant until close to 8:30, and then for some reason we didn’t get seated right away. I am positive that the way I dress has an impact on how I get treated. Maybe it is my imagination, but it seems like when we go to fancy places I kind of get the cold shoulder. I might just be paranoid, or the whole world is against me. We had a nice dinner and then went back home to sleep.

I got up on Friday and took the train to my former roommate, Elvis’s place. The red line goes right by Wrigley Field and it was really cool to see it again. Elvis was in work mode since she is one of the creators and organizers of the Film Festival. She had a ton of stuff to do, but I jumped in and helped her out. It was awesome to see her and her cat Presley. We had a fun time together and it made the work go by quickly.

Friday night, I went to see my friends perform a show called the Dollar Store. It is a really neat concept created by Patel’s boyfriend, Buchanan. He goes to a Dollar Store and buys some crap for a dollar and then gives it to artists to create a piece inspired by the item they were given. The piece could be anything at all. A story, a performance piece, a song, a character monologue, anything. The place was packed and it was a really great show. I was kind of jealous that my friends were doing cool things without me since I moved, but I knew that was going to happen.

We met up with two guys that are moving to L.A. this summer and we all discussed our plans on performing when they get here. Then we all went up to Improv Olympic where I was going to be performing with a team called Rattlesnake High School that all of my friends are on. My sister brought a bunch of friends to watch the show then we all went out to a bar afterwards. I love going back because it is so easy to just go get a beer with a bunch of friends and hang out and not worry about anything.

Saturday was the big day. I got up early and helped Elvis with some last minute things. Then I went to Patel’s and we got one last rehearsal in before we left for the theater. We were not sure exactly where we needed to go when we got off of the train, but me being a guy said “I know the way, follow me” and then I proceeded to take us in the exact opposite direction the we needed to go, and didn’t discover that we were going the wrong way until 15 minutes later. Patel is never going to let me live this down.

We got to the theater and set about getting the stage and all of our props together for the show. There was this techie chick that was in charge of all of the sound and lights for the evening. She was all business and didn’t seem to like us at all. She had to get the stage ready for two bands plus our sketch show and didn’t seem like she wanted to give us much help. For some reason I decided to start joking around with her, and then it was like a light went off and she was really, really nice to us. She made all sorts of modifications to the stage, watched us rehearse and made lighting suggestions to make the show better. When Patel and I were done we went to get something to eat in the Irish bar right next door. They had excellent food! Patel said something to me that made me feel really good. She said

“I know you are going to make it because you are so charming when you want to be, without even making it seem like you are doing it on purpose. Did you see the way you charmed the techie? She wasn’t going to help us at all until you started joking with her”

That made me feel really confident about my abilities, since I always have doubts about them.

The festival started and they had a fantastic crowd. I was really proud of Elvis, she had worked really, really hard and it paid off. My other friend, the Ricker also did a fantastic job, but he MC’s the event, so everyone knows him. I wanted to give some credit to someone that many people may not know about.

I always get incredible nervous before I perform. Patel always has to calm me down before we go out on stage. But, once I set foot on the stage I am fine. We had a great show and the crowd really seemed to like what we did. We had a lot of people come up to us afterwards and tell us how much they liked our stuff. Including a really drunk girl, who told me she was going to be in L.A. in a couple of months and wanted my phone number. She was very demanding and wouldn’t take no, for an answer. Even when I wrote down the website where she can get in touch with me, that wasn’t enough. So I had that going for me, which is nice.

I drove Patel home in Elvis’s car with she and her boyfriend in the back seat. It is always sad when I say good-bye to Patel because I have a really good time with her. I could tell that she felt the same way, because when she leaned over to hug me good-bye she punched me in the face. She really got me right in my eye and it started tearing up and I couldn’t see very well. She said it was an accident, but I am sure it was some payback for me moving to L.A. without her.

I drove us home and got about 2 hours of sleep before I had to be at the airport. Elvis drove me and we said good-bye.

I slept all of the way to L.A. and because it was Mother’s Day, there was no one available to pick me up from the airport. So I took the crappy L.A. train system and it took me over two hours to get back to my apartment.

I love being in Chicago, but I need to get back to work here.

If At First You Don't Succeed......

The past couple of days have been pretty good in some ways, and pretty bad in others.

The Good
On Saturday night I performed with the 7:00pm group at L.A.Connection Comedy Theater. We started out performing for 1 person in the audience, and she was there to tape the show for someone in the show. But by the middle of the show we were performing to 4 people so we quadrupled our attendance in a matter of minutes. Still the show went okay and we went out afterwards to a Sushi place. I only had a beer because I had to be back at the theater for the 10:30 show. During the meal, the team asked me if I was going to be a permanent member of the cast. I told them that I didn't know because of what was going on with the 10:30 cast, and that I might join them if asked. Then I performed with the 10:30 cast. The Reverend came and brought 3 other people and the show went very well. I was happy with everything that we did. There were four other people "trying out" for the team during that show and when we were getting notes afterwards all four of us were asked to become permanent members of the group. I really like performing with them, but it is a little disheartening that this theater never seems to draw more than 20 people and most of them are friends of people in the show. Never the less, I was happy to be asked. The other problem is that I have to pay to be a member of this theater and I just don't have the money to keep paying to perform. I will have to make a difficult decision whether or not to continue there.

I got a package from my friend Taiwan on Saturday. He told me a couple of weeks back that he was mailing me my DVD of "Fight Club" and a couple of Oklahoma Sooner football cards. He is a huge fan of Oklahoma and they are pretty cool cards. He also sent me his copies of "Field of Dreams" and "The Thin Red Line" which are both really good movies. Last, but not least, he sent me a little rubber key chain of a member of G-Force, which is a cartoon that we both watched when we were kids. The cartoon was called "Battle of the planets" and it was a Japanese cartoon dubbed into English. I still think you can see it on The Cartoon Network. I just realized I wrote the word cartoon four times in the last few sentences.

I also got a message from my friend and former roommate Elvis in Chicago. She is one of the producers of The Chicago Really Short Film Festival. I will be performing there next weekend with my friend Patel. Elvis also produces short films for Maia Entertainment. It is something that she started doing a couple of years ago and has quite a knack for it. The message was that the film that she produced is finally finished and will debut at the film festival. Last year was the first year that the festival was held and it was a HUGE success. She worked on it really hard, along with other people, and I was very impressed and proud at the job that she did. It was good to hear her voice and I am looking forward to seeing her in a few days. Information for the film festival is at www.maia-entertainment.com

Sunday, I auditioned again for Improv Olympic West. Before the audition, the guy running it told all of us that there were no open team slots right now on the schedule and they were not looking to add a new team, but maybe some people might be put on existing teams or if there were enough good new people, they would form a new team and put them on the schedule when there was an open slot. The first audition went very well. The call back went well again and I made it to the second call back. I didn't feel that I performed very well in the second call back, but I left feeling good about all of the auditions as a whole. Then at 9:30 this evening I got a call from a guy at IO that told me that I was a member of a new team. I don't know if they were just telling us there was no open slot at the audition to make people less nervous, or if we really were that good that they had to make a new team. Whatever the case may be, I was pumped that I made a team and will be performing at IO in the future.


The Bad
I have been working my ass of the last couple of weeks at the catering job. I got my paycheck on Friday and I might as well have been working at McDonald's. It is really disheartening when you work so hard for so little money. I know I am not curing cancer out here, but a little financial cushion is not to much to ask, is it? I have to find something else to make ends meet, but it is going to be hard to find a job quickly that pays well and has the flexibility in the schedule that I am looking for. All in all there is much more good than bad, so I can't complain.

Plus I will be in Chicago performing in a week, and that really is good.