Golden Silvers

I really like this Londontown band. Especially this song and video. I want to go to London damn it.

Golden Silvers - Band To Watch - Stereogum

You Wanna Get That?

This is funny even though I imagine my mom being the person with the phone ringing.

I'm Alive

Awesome acoustic version of Metric's Help I'm Alive


Cool band I saw this summer. Blind Pilot - One red thread:


Another cool band I saw this summer at Sunset Junction Festival. Really cool band. The Delta Spirit:

I Suck

I realize that I suck. I have been MIA and stupid. I am writing this to let you know that 1)I am alive. 2)I will begin writing more frequently again, it's been a busy summer. 3)Meow meow. 4)This is my warm up post.

Cheers - Talk soon.

I Swear I Don't Think This About any of my Friends. I am really happy for them.

Pregnant Women are Smug by Garfunkel and Oates - watch more funny videos

Random Observance About LA - Lemons

In Philadelphia and NJ and I think NY, restaurants almost always automatically put a lemon in Diet Coke. Here that doesn't happen, you have to ask for it. The places that do automatically put them is are national chain restaurants. It is annoying because I love lemon or like in my refreshing diet coke. More often they put lemons in water, but still not as much as the east. I tried researching for an answer, but at this point we will have to file it away in the book of - "it's a west coast thing". I will also file all the article I just found on how Diet Coke will kill you, in to the "ignore that and it won't be true" book.

I have also found that smaller cafe type places will serve Mexican Coke and the light version. Which to me tastes like a watered down Diet Coke. The different forms of Coke for different countries and cultures is so amazing. It is very cool trying all the different flavors at Coke headquarters in ATL - definitely try if you are ever there.

George Stanford - Meet me in LA

A girl I went to college with is married to this awesome musician George Stanford. I have been a big fan even before I found out she was married to him. He is from Philly and he is really talented. He has gotten screwed over by the labels (of course) and he is trying to do it alone now. Here is an article that talks about it.

I love this new song - for obvious reasons. Besides the fact that is sounds great.

Meet me in LA

It's the Glasses

One of our actresses is the mom in this. It is pretty funny. Check it out.

Celebrity Sighting of the Week - CeCe Peniston

So funny - CeCe Peniston is meeting with my boss right now. She seems cool - but who doesn't love this little ditty.

Finally - CeCe Peniston

Band to Watch - The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

The Pains of Being Pure At Heart is an indie rock band from NYC. Really retro sound, the album is alot of fun, I am really in to them.

Disturbing News

The cute dog Phoebe, the one that looks like the Taco Bell dog, that I told you about last week, died. The circumstances are suspect, but it is quite sad. RIP Phoebe Louise.

New Feature - Random Observance About LA

So LA doesn't sell cheese curls? Am I wrong? Is this true? I have searched and searched to no avail. Do cheese curls really not exist on the west coast. But they are so delicious? They combine all wonderful essential interesting substances - cheese, air, crunchy styrofoamy type substance. Why not LA? If anyone who reads this knows differently - let me know.

Shooting a PSA

My work is involved in producing a public service announcement for anti internet music piracy. Saturday I went to the casting session for the actor. That was really cool because I had never been to one. But I can imagine how tedious it must be if you are a commercial casting director watching the same lines over and over again. Plus I feel like its so hard to make a decision. But I also sucks a making decisions.

The next day I went and helped out on the set. Here are some pictures from my day on the set. I will come back with more info later. It was fun and long and now I am burnt in places where I sucked at putting on sunblock. Yes that is a chicken down there. It was the pet of the family whose house we filmed at. And they had a cat. How did that cat not attack that chicken?

Ba-Caw!!!







You can't tell from this picture - but our actor kind of looked like Hayden Christianson.

Celebs Watching Holly

So tonight Adrian Grenier was standing next to me after the Holly Miranda show, it seems that he is friends with Holly's girlfriend. He was hot, about 5'10 and with a hot blonde model. He is probably the last Entourage person I would want to see - but I know a few people out there love him.

There Is No Place I'd Like To Wake Up But Beside You

Kime - I may steal that idea of song lyrics for my music related blogettes.

Tonight I went and saw Holly Miranda at Home in Silver Lake. It is a really cute restaurant/bar and I would like to hang out there in the future. Holly Miranda is the lead singer of one of my favorite groups, The Jealous Girlfriends. She has a little solo project going on right now, however she is not signed to a record deal. Hopefully that will happen for her soon.



When Holly first started out is was basically just her singing acoustic under the name The Jealous Girlfriends, they then added members and morphed into a louder indie rock band, but I have always loved her acoustic stuff.
So tonight I finally got to see just Holly and a guitar. It was awesome and the place was full even though it was a last minute show. She has such a strong, emotional, incredible voice. There was a table of old men who stopped her before a song and said - Who are you. And she told them and they said are you signed to anyone and she said no and the old men said well someone better sign you soon cause you are amazing. Good for her!
Her new songs were produced by Dave Sitek from TV on the Radio and Kanye has blogged about how much her likes her, which made other music blogs take notice. So hopefully something happens for her soon.

She played a multi instrumental show of mostly new solo stuff and it was great. She closed with a cover of Lauryn Hill's Ex-Factor. That is probably my favorite song on that album and I LOVE Lauryn Hill, but I think Holly may have done it better. It was fantastic. A version can be found here.


From last week in Brooklyn when she opened for Nada Surf. Sleep on Fire.

The Dogs I Work With

All of these are rescue dogs and they are so awesome.

Mattie and one of our actors. Mattie is a pitbull and she is my best dog friend here. She is so good and sweet.


The new dog that one of our clients found eating animal carcass on the side of the road and my boss took because he is addicted to chihuahuas. Her name is Phoebe after Friends. Loves it. Oh, she is sitting on my desk and they are my other friends, the fish behind her.


Loretta. This dog was stolen in the middle of the night from a puppy mill by shannon elizabeth and then my boss took her. Really random.

Hike Up to Griffith Observatory

Not much to say about this hike except that my hiking book lied to me again and told me it was easier than it was. And I hadn't planned on walking around Griffith Observatory on Sunday, but it was so darn awesome I got sucked in for 2 hours and can't wait to go back for a star show. Here are some pics:

What IS this? A coyote? A wolf? A dog? He was just walking along the road in griffith.


Griffith from the hike.


Sunset from outside of Griffith with Hollywood sign to the right.


James Dean monument since this is where Rebel Without A Cause was filmed. And because can Hollywood do anything without talking about celebs?


Griffith Observatory from outside it's entrance.


Sunset on the way back down.

The Next Big Thing - Bobby Long

On Saturday night I went to see a British singer songwriter bloke that reminds me of a British Jeff Buckley with maybe a little Amos Lee mixed with Ray LaMontagne.
Bobby Long is very very cute and very shy and a complete charmer. Because of this (and the fact that he is Robert Pattinson's best friend, and he's on the Twilight soundtrack) the audience was mostly girls and also alot of music industry people. You can tell who they are because they are usually older and dressed completely 80's or just completely out there. It is pretty funny. It was neato seeing him so early in his career because people are saying he is the next John Mayer or David Gray or someone like that. He has no label and my boss won't sign him "because it's not her thing", even though his publicist asked my boss to bring him to our office for a meeting. So for me, that is disappointing as that is "my thing". Of course people said the same things about Alexi Murdoch and what the heck happened to him? So I guess we will see.



The show itself was really casual, just him and his guitar. It was his last show in America till the summer and he was only here to play for and meet industry execs so he only went to LA, NY & Nashville. So he just chatted it up with us and each song was a request. He seems really sweet. Definitely see him when he is in your neck of the woods this summer.

Here are a few songs from his Hotel Cafe visits. Someone put basically the entire Saturday concert up on You Tube. i love you tube.

Hotel Cafe on Thursday Night - Who Have You Been Loving


Saturday - Hotel Cafe - The Bounty of Mary Jane


Saturday - Hotel Cafe - This Strange Love

Go Carefully, Carefully

I love this new song by Gomez. Excellent use of the cow bell.

Airstream Driver - Gomez

Weekly Music Roundup

So this week two albums I was really excited about came out. Silversun Pickups & Metric. I am very disappointed with Silversun. It is just more of the same and I was really hoping they would expand on some of their touches of genius on the first album. I don't know, maybe I need to give it a few more listens.
However, I love the Metric. I saw them last year at Coachella and they are so awesome. Emily Haines (lead singer) is the America's hipster boy's #1 crush. Emily was originally in Broken Social Scene which is the Canadian super group that has spawned - Emily Haines, Feist, Kevin Drew, Jason Collett, and Stars lead singer Torquil Campbell.

Check out one from the new album:

Help I'm Alive - Metric

Escondido Falls

This very lovely Easter I slept in and then went to IHOP and had a two of everything breakfast. At IHOP they do not mess around with 2 of everythings. 2 eggs, 2 pancakes, 2 bacon, 2 sausage, 2 ham and home fries. Most places only give you 2 pancakes, 2 eggs, 2 meat. I was very excited, though I did not eat it all and was quite stuffed. OK I ate most of it. All but one ham. It was delish.
So after that I drove down to Malibu and went to this place I had been wanting to go to for awhile. A hike to the Escondido Falls. When you get there you park in this lot right off the PCH and then walk a mile to the trail. You walk through a neighborhood of ridiculous mansions that overlook the ocean. It was really beautiful and I wish I lived there. When you get to the end of the neighborhood, the trail begins. The trail itself was pretty easy. In fact I think the walk through the neighborhood was harder cause it was mostly uphill. The trail to the falls is mostly flat but really pretty and I had a lot less fear about wild animals or reptiles getting me than when I was at the Grotto. There was alot more people too. So I walked about 25-30 minutes and then arrived at the bottom of the falls. There wasn't really any falls actually happening. It was more the Escondido Drips. I imagine it must be very pretty after alot of rain.
So once there, you have the choice to climb up the mountain to the the middle and top of the falls. The hiking book calls it scrambling which I guess is the step before rock climbing? Who knows. I climbed as far as I could but I think I somehow got lost. I made it to the middle falls, I think, and there was a really cute area and I just chilled on the rocks for a bit and listened to the waterfall and creek. Then I climbed back down and dipped my feet in the basin of the falls to cool off. I have never gone climbing before and it was so fun. I loved it. I am going to try to go back and see where I messed up and make it to the top. There is supposedly a tree swing at the top. I got cuts and scrapes all over myself from almost falling down the mountain and my body hurt for 3 days, but it was so fun. Here are some pictures.

The road through the neighborhood by the Pacific.


A ranchsion (ranch+mansion, get it?) that had a stable full of horses.


The house I would like to live in. At least they could let me live in their gate house, which was bigger than most of my friends houses in Philly. Definitely bigger than my mom's twin.



The scrambling zone. This was basically straight down. You can't really tell.


The middle falls.


Bottom of the middle falls.


Bottom of Escondido. I told you there wasn't a lot of water.


These are not my pictures, but I wanted to show you what the falls look like when it's wetter out.

Top of the falls which will be my goal next time, hopefully if I don't get lost.


Bottom of the falls what I waded around in. Sooooo cold!

Phoenix - Brat Pack Mashup

OK, this song, Lisztomania, and the other Phoenix song that I put up here last week, 1901, has been on repeat for me - I am obsessed with it. Someone put this song over a brat pack mashup and it is pretty much perfect. Pretty in Pink Perfect. Yes I said it.

Celebrity Spotting

Today I saw Jane Lynch walking out of the Barnes & Noble in Studio City. For those of y'all that don't recognize, Jane Lynch is in most of the Christopher Guest movies (Best in Show, A Mighty Wind) and about 1000 other things. She is really funny. She was very tall and very Jane Lynch-y.

Roommate Update: The day after posting my rant, I wrote a note asking her to remove the trash. 3 days later, trash, cutting board, dishes - all done. And on the 3rd day - she has risen. Hallelujah.

Madonna Remake of The Day

Flaming Lips Cover Madonna's Borderline -
It starts out slow and then culminates in an electric guitar, percussion crescendo. It's pretty awesome.

March Madness

For the past few weeks I've been playing a little game called - How long will it take my roommate to clean anything in the kitchen. Included in these games are:

Take Out The Trash
Clean the Cutting Board
Turn on and/or Empty the Dishwasher
Do the Dishes
Wipe the Counter
Clean the Area by Your TV Watching Area

I am so sick at being such a natural athlete and excelling at all of them that I decided to rest myself for bigger and better cleaning games also known as the "2009 Moving Out of this Hellhole Event". I felt the rookie really needed some practice in these areas since I would not be here to take care of it for Shoeless Joe Roommate. Especially in the very difficult trash event which she has only completed twice in one year and is in dire need of practice.

What did you say? You have questions/comments?

You're being immature - Yes I am.
You are cutting your nose off to spite your face - Indeed.
You are going to attract bugs unless something is done soon - You are correct, sir.

Well, maybe Roomie is preparing for other competitions - That's right, they are called 1997 90210, 2008 90210, American Idol, random VH1 reality show, and 20 other shows that are saved on DVR. There's also the "All I ever do is Work" Relay Medley (AKA "I Work 3 Days a Week Medley"), and the "I can't get up before 12:00" Backstroke and last but not least the latest event just completed 3 hours ago - "I can't vote for American Idol because my phone is in my bedroom which coincidentally shares the wall that my lazy ass is sitting against." Open.
Why not just say something to the Great Roommate - I am a sissy la la and am afraid of confrontation. And how would we have these games if I did?

How is Mr Roomtober doing with the events, well let's take a look and see.

1. In the trash event - we are at 1.5 weeks since I last completed that event. The trash has been over flowing for 1 week total.


2. This cutting board has now had oil and pesto on it for a grand total of 2 weeks.


3. Dishwasher - Tag team completion by myself because I needed dishes in it.

4. Dishes - COMPLETE. Dishes with disgusting mac and cheese and guacamole sat on our counter for three weeks before getting done. It was a tough road but the Sultan of Wash got through. Way to go! CONGRATS! That's GOT to be a record.


5. Counter Wipe - Complete. It went four days of Wonder Roommate preparing food on a dirty counter before I needed to make PBB's on it. Therefore another designated hitter for the big winner. Better luck next time champ.

This particular bowl sat on the counter for two days before our hero was able to complete that heat.


6. Living room area coffee table - Ongoing mess. There is never a time when there is a soda can, bowl, or cup on it. Besides total astonishment that someone watches TV next to dirty dishes and trash all week - This does not bother me because I don't enter that area, and so far we have not gotten any little guests.


I am really pulling for the Trash competition to be completed, as I believe that is integral to the purity of the apartment and to the games as a whole. The fact that little flying or crawling judges have not come in to review the event is beyond my comprehension. But The Mighty Mate will go on to fight another day.

In honor of the extremely competitive, strenuous, fast paced, back breaking fight the Might's got ahead of them - I give you ~ the Rocky Theme.

Gonna Fly Now (Theme From "Roc...

Disclaimer - I do not excel at all areas of personal cleanliness, however, I keep my clutter and disorganization in my room, not in common living areas. And my mess does not include 3 week old food. However I cannot promise you that my cats don't have a blog complaining about the disorganization of my closet.

Peanut Butter Balls

I thought I would share with you the Easter present I made for my moms. Hopefully she doesn't look on here before she gets them. My coworker made them at her chocolate party and I thought my mom would enjoy them because it is basically peanut butter and chocolate and my mom eats a reece's peanut butter cup like once a day. She eats one of them along with her blood pressure medicine.

This was during making them - I just think it looks cool.



And here they are post making. As you can tell some have crunchier chocolate on them then others - they are my mistakes in learning how to melt chocolate. I now know it is much easier to do in the microwave. Thanks life lessons. However, like some mistakes in life, the mistake chocolate was sooo good. I don't even really like chocolate and it is was delicious. Now I kinda feel sick though.
These guys look like little peanut butter south park guys, with chocolate hats.

I Won't Be The Lighter

I was just listening to a playlist from Holly Miranda (from the Jealous Girlfriends) and it reminded me of this song that I was obsessed with a year or two ago. Eternal Flame by a very kooky Brit, Joan As Policewoman. She is so cool and so is Holly Miranda. Cheers

Eternal Flame - Joan As Police...

Celebrity Sighting

There seems to be a theme for my celebrity sightings this month. Jonathan Bennett had a meeting with my boss today. He was Aaron Samuels in Mean Girls. Hopefully I can collect all of the Mean Girls actor sightings. Anyway, he was very friendly, very hot and a lot taller than I expected. God, I love these Mean Girls sightings.

Meow

This is a little ditty I bought at Buffalo Exchange, which is a high class version of a salvation army. It has everything you could ever want in a shirt.

Torn off sleeves - Check
Fluffy Cat - Check
Gold Glitter - Check
Already used and bought at a "vintage" store - Check

I can't wait to rock this in Vegas when my friends are out here.

Song of Your Direct French to English Translation Day

This song is by the French pop/rock band Phoenix. It is very fun. They are on SNL tomorrow. I love indie SNL has been this season. OK enjoy.

1901 - Phoenix

The Grotto

I am starting to learn that when my hiking book tells me the hike is easy - it means it's easy for someone like Lance Armstrong. My hike this weekend led me to The Grotto, which is a hiking trail in mountains above Malibu. The weather was kind of weird in LA on Sunday, but it was good for a hike because it wasn't too hot. As you can tell from the pictures it was really overcast plus I was at a high elevation and being so close to the ocean, the clouds were right above me. It was pretty cool. I was actually kind of scared though because there were not a lot of people on the trail and paranoid me thought I was going to get attacked by a snake or mountain lion or fall in to the canyon. Luckily that did not happen. I met a scientist on the way back up who was in town doing research and having conferences about deadly disease outbreaks, which I thought was an interesting job until he nonchalantly said "There was an emergency in Oxnard (about an hour from LA) that I had to check out" That is probably normal for him, but I definitely took a double take. But he just kept on talking. So anyway, aside from impending doom, the grotto trail leads down to a bunch of huge rocks that were formed from a volcanic eruption (actually that is doomy, where is this volcano?). Depending on the season a creek runs through the rocks and forms water falls. There was water running through, but it wasn't high. I didn't climb a ton around the rocks because I was scared about my foot, but I would like to go back and check it out. It was like a natural playground.

This was at the top of the canyon at the ranger station. I feel like it looks really eerie.


Looking out in to the canyon.


The Canyon


A meadow that you pass through on the way down.


You can't tell from this, but these rocks were the size of freight trucks.

Wiggity Weekend

This weekend was pretty cool. Friday night I went on a mini movie marathon and saw Sunshine Cleaning and Duplicity. Both were good. Sunshine Cleaning was good, I just think it may have been missing something. Duplicity was very good. Very consistent, very Ocean's Elevenish.

Saturday I participated in Earth Hour, which was kind of interesting. You are supposed to be electricity-less for one hour. I was pretty bored and waiting until the time when I could use electricity again. I sat outside and drank a beer and read by candle light and flash light. I played on the internet until it ran out of battery. I ate dinner by candlelight. I listened to the people below me talk about the TV show - It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia, which I really need to rent. I played with the cats using one of those laser beam pointer things. So I was basically playing laser cats. Ha ha. Then my roommate came home and ruined everything cause she HAD to use electricity. She couldn't wait 10 minutes? So anyway, I did all of these things in an hour and still I was kind of bored at times. I think I am just way too addicted to the internet and TV and lights.
I will post a separate entry with pictures from my Sunday hike.

This Is Just Insane

I have no idea what this is or what is going on, I think it is an old soap opera star. I do know that this is freaking hysterical. Kudos Me!

Celebrity Sighting

This week's celebrity sighting is brought to you by the psychiatrists in my building.
As I was walking out of my office, Lizzy Caplan was walking out of a psychiatrist's office. Incidentally, the same one I saw Sarah Silverman go to. I love Lizzy Caplan, however I had no idea what her name was because I only know her as Janis Ian from Mean Girls. If you don't know her from that she was also in True Blood and in a new show that is starting soon I think. It looks good. But I was pretty excited since Mean Girls is one of my faves. She looked at me and smiled and I said - "You smell like a baby prostitute". Just kidding I didn't say that. I didn't say anything actually, I just smiled back. Oh for those who don't have lines memorized from Mean Girls, the baby prostitute line comes from the movie.

In honor of this sighting I give you "Built This Way" that is in the movie. I love this song. Ironically it's written/sung by Lindsey's gf Sam Ronson. I wonder if that's how they met back in 2004.

Hiking Up to the Hollywood Sign

Today I went hiking up to the Hollywood sign. It was so cool. The trail gives 360 views of LA and it was a pretty clear day so pictures turned out pretty cool.
First of all the neighborhood that leads up to this trail is so cute. It's called Beachwood Canyon. It had ridiculously huge mansions mixed with little cottages that you would see in a little Irish village. It was very unique and diverse. Much like LA. Here are pictures from my hike.


This is in the little area called Beachwood Village that leads up to the trail. The Hollywood sign used to be HOLLYWOODLAND because it was an advertisement for the home development they were building in 1923.





This is the valley which is the side of the hills that I live in. You can see Burbank and the Verdugo Mountaint and the San Gabriel Mountains in the distance, that still have snow on them. You can't really see that in the picture.



The Hollywood Reservoir with Century City in the distance.



Downtown LA in the distance.



Downtown LA



The chain link fence that stops people from getting close to the sign.



The cameras that watch the sign. There are also motion detectors, alarms and audio warning systems. They really don't want people near there.



This is a dog I accosted on the way out. He is so handsome. The lady holding him couldn't speak english and I think she was a little scared when I pulled out my camera.