2007-06-30 - 8:01 p.m.
We are all a-twizzle up here in the Library Computer Commons today, because I have been listening to the Security Walky Talkie, and do you know – there’s a flasher loose in the building!
No, seriously: I have been totally glued to the wacky walky talkie, listening as the security guards describe spreading out through the building to search for the malefactor, who apparently exposed himself to some woman here on the 2nd floor, probably in the Foreign Language Fiction section, which is where a whole lot of loathsome behavior goes on. German books, you know – Inspires that sort of thing.
I can point you to any number of folks who are sitting here in the Computer Commons who might be likely candidates for such filthiness, including, if not particularly, myself. But I must admit, that as wicked I as I am, I have never found myself in the position of being pursued through the building by security guards, my shlong flapping through my fly. People really do the most appalling things when they have freedom.
Alas! The flasher, like Elvis, has left the building. I really do wish I knew more about what is going on, but even the guards are keeping mum, and are not saying much over the walky talkie’s “public” channel. But all the other library people I am talking with are all giggling madly whenever they hear about this filthy pervert. Just so you know, nothing seems to delight a library mouse more than when some flasher is nabbed plying his trade in the stacks or in one of the restrooms.
It’s not just because the flasher is going to be nabbed, either: It’s because someone was actually using his god-given freedom to flash his gonads at someone that delights us. One pruny old librarian I was just joking with about this cackled when I mentioned the flasher. She crowed, “Ohhhh! And me without my camera today! I would have loved to have gotten a shot of the flasher!” And another young male page whom I told about the flasher just laughed, “Ah ha ha ha! I hope it’s a female flasher – that would be COOL, man!”
So the librarians’ relation to the flasher is really more ambivalent than you’d expect. The guards are at present assembling downstairs to watch security camera footage of the entrance. I expect they will print out a photo from the camera, and make sure that it’s posted all over the building, so we all know just what the flasher looks like and will identify him if he returns.
Oh, so what was I talking about before all this nonsense started. Ah, yes, I was about to talk about My New Favorite Wacko at The Novel Café. Have I mentioned yet about the Angry Horny Buddhist? No? Well, that’s because I have been lazy and have not been chatting with you for a while, my dearest blog-a-licious blog.
But you see, at the Novel Café, that charmant coffeehouse on the border of Santa Monica and Venice, which smells in this heat of turkey grease and sweat, the Angry Horny Bald Buddhist is the current Whacko-du-jour. Oh, he’s delightful! I adore him! He is this horrendously creepy fellow, as bald as a Roman patrician, in his late 40s or early 50s, with a beaky nose, and creepy glaring eyes, which sneer and leer at one. He is usually caparisoned in linen pants, and a Hawaiian-style button up shirt that’s traditionally open all the way down to his belly, which, in turn, is covered with creepy green tattoos.
But, my dears – I don’t think I have ever seen a man who is as mean or as lustful as the Angry Horny Buddhist. I mean, you sort of expect Buddhism to give you a kind of inner peace, don’t you? You expect it to turn you into a much nicer person – gentler, sweeter, more affable – as you embrace a doctrine of “lack of detachment” and “enlightenment.” Alas! It is not so.
For it is now the most common thing in all the world to see the Angry Horny Buddhist cornering some 21 year old college student girl at her table, jabbering to her about his Buddhist philosophy, all the while licking his lips and staring at her titties. Oh, I wish I could describe the gibberish that vomits from his mouth – all about how he was once a rich, powerful corporate executive, but when he went on a fancy vacation to a Buddhist philosophy he had an epiphany and saw God or Buddha or something. The inference is that he is a Holy Man – and a Rich Man, so if a college girl wants a hot date, he’ll be more than pleased to pay to play.
By contrast, when he sees a guy, working on some business project or other, he corners him and makes all sorts of passive aggressive, snide comments about “working” and “greed,” which really only imply that he himself feels completely insecure and ashamed of not having a job and a life. He always babbles about how he feels driven to spread the word about Buddhism and how he walks the path of holiness and enlightenment. Yet, when he’s asked to expand on it, he just sputters and murmurs about how he was an executive and had an epiphany. My! Is he a creepy space case. He’s almost as offensive as fat boy.
Ah, aren’t I clever. You see, dear blog-a-licious blog, I just went shopping for some new shirts! And, really, when I say “new,” what I mean is they are probably newly stripped off the corpses of some old guy who’s died of TB.
For, as I think I might have mentioned, I buy most of my shirts at that center of high couture known as The Goodwill, kitty corner from the library and across the street from my gym. Le Goodwill, as we say in the fashion pages. But believe me, I needed some new shirts, particularly since summer is here and I can no longer war a sweater at the library.
And, can I just say, I have become a total label queen! But only if the clothes come from dead people. I bought myself a lovely green shirt by Liz Claiborne, a sort of striped thing from Calvin Klein, and a lovely blue one from Brooks Brothers. And every one of them must have been scraped right off of an old man lying in his coffin! But you see, I needed some decent looking shirts as summer is here, and I am public constantly.
I must say, I find some of the odd customs of being in customer service to be really quite alien to me -- one of them being the fact that if one meets the public every day, one wants to look sort of civilized and well dressed, rather than being some sloppy old fool in a pair of sweatpants and a stained T-shirt. So here I go, buying decent-looking shirts so I can fool the visitors to the library into thinking that I am a Decent Man. I cut a nice figure in these shirts, I must say.
They cost two bucks each! And it’s very funny, because I know that everyone who sees me thinks that I bought them all at full price somewhere. Of course, that’s what they think. Do I not look like I might play The President on TV? Or at least your kindly, well intentioned Uncle. The one who always says the right thing and is sanity in human form.
Ahh, but if they truly knew me as you know me, dear big blue blog-a-roo-ni. For I am as mad as the fellows who push their shopping carts down the street muttering at the moon! I am as mad as the folks who come into the library and start howling and snoring in the stacks! I think that is why I get along quite so well at the library as all that: It’s because I am as crazy and as deranged as the folks whom I am “shooshing” all day.
Yes, dear blog, it has been a while, but I assure you that I have been exceedingly busy and that is why you have not heard from me. Do you know what I have been doing lately? You will be very pleased. I am writing a screenplay! No, I am serious. I am! It’s a funny thing, but since I have put a lot of my dealings in the movie biz on a back burner, I have discovered that I am more able to pursue my own writing than I ever was before. I am 59 pages into the script – and, in my humble opinion, it’s quite good. Well, it’s all right. It will do, I daresay.
What is odd, and this I will admit, is that I am writing on a subject matter that could not interest me less. However, it’s a commission. Someone came up to me one day and asked if I could write the first act of a script for her. And so I decided, “what the heck, it would be a good exercise,” and I sat down and started working.
For the sake of confidentiality, I really don’t want to go into too much detail about the script – let’s just say it’s a biopic of a totally and justly forgotten 18th century female intellectual. Yet, I am having fun with the development of the story and the dialogue and the characterizations. It’s delightful! I worry that it might be rather boring, but even you will admit that this blog has been excellent practice for the habit of describing boring things in ways that adds a little bit of quirk to them, and that is how I am approaching this script as well.
What also is funny is that I am writing a woman’s story from a woman’s point of view. I mean, I have less experience with women than just about any one I know! Still, I maintain that it’s not bad – or at least, I seem to be doing adequately with it. I shall present the producer with the first 40 pages in a few days, and then we’ll see what happens. You and I both know it shall come to nothing: In the best case scenario, the producer, who is none too trustworthy, will cheat me, steal the script, sell it, and pocket the cash all for himself. That is the best case scenario. That is why I am just regarding this as an interim exercise – a journeyman writing chore on my way to writing something more serious.
I’m going to finish the script as quick as I can, and then move on to another script that’s on a subject that’s more to my liking. And then, after that, I shall write another and another until I sell one for a million dollars. And then, dear pets, I shall kick you all to the kerb and forget all about you. Oh, I shall be vicious in the way that I cut all my ties with my past. It shall be as though you all had never existed! I shall be the original “kiss up” and “piss down” creep. That shall teach you all a lesson!
I was just crossing the street, where I have a script to cover, a most casual aquaintence passed me in his car. As he drove by, he called out, “Hey dude! Happy Summer of Love!”
I could not help myself, so I replied, “Well, in my case, it’s more of a Summer of Sex with an Ambivalent Lack of Commitment!”
They are calling this the Summer of Love here in Santa Monica and Venice. I have to confess that I consider this more than presumptuous. What if I don’t want this to be the Summer of Love? What if I just want this to be the Summer of Peace and Quiet? I guess I just have to move to the mountains if that’s what I want.
So what else have I been up to in the last week or so. Well, not too much, I suppose. A bit of this, and a bit of that. I just received a big box of movies to review for the upcoming OUTFEST film festival, which will be taking place here in LA in a few weeks, and so I shall be busy with that in the near future. I also have been very recently (like today) contacted by a small production company on one of the studio lots, where they are looking for another freelance reader. That would be rather good news if they used me – even though I am no longer depending on story analysis for the bulk of my income. During the weekends, I also go to the theater a lot, as I have to review a play for the Big Paper and also see another thing or two so I can qualify to vote in their awards.
Meanwhile, every time I go to the gym, I am still having sex with the cute little janitor boy who always makes sure to be lurking somewhere near the entrance to the locker room just when I am arriving so he can catch my eye! Can you imagine anything more convenient? I must confess that I am now going to the gym more than ever before. And, believe me, if you could be guaranteed some hot young Latino sex with every workout, you, too, would pretty much go to the gym every day as well.
