Les La BouilLAbaise I

"LA, it's a nice place to visit...but a better place to leave, right? All those palm trees are such a bore."
- Steve Coogan in Jim Jarmusch's "Coffee and Cigarrettes" (2004)

Friday, June 25th, 10:50pm (Sunset Blvd.)
Returning from seeing the sadly mediocre (respite from writer's block) "Coffee and Cigarrettes" in Pasadena, we're sneaking back the frontside of the Echo Park hills, avoiding the Friday night freeway frenzy. Sunset is an open road until Silverlake. Except, that is, for the silver Buick approaching quickly in the rearview, the outline of a driver (solo) doing a strange jerk behind the wheel -- blissfully oblivious or an accident waiting to happen, most likely both. Cars being self-contained pods here, people exhibit very little control over their actions inside vehicular private spaces. Of both the stop-sign pedicure and the air-guitar audition variety. I used to get the evil eye over my walkmania, feeling a groove so hard I'd scare/piss off/amuse half the IRT. Here, everyone's too busy within their own pod -- a fact RJ also alluded to when discussing the California artist mind-set. The Buick accelerates past us in the passing lane, ready to make a screeching left onto Manon, but slow enough for the answer to be revealed: A youngish, mightily overweight black kid rocking Dizzee's "Fix Up Look Sharp."

A popular California pastime I'll pass on: driving all night, getting nowhere, enjoyed by Generations V - Z.

"I got 99 problems but my car ain't one."
- used auto lot advert jingle on Power 106, local hip-hop behemoth, on Tuesday (6/29) morning.