The cultural wasteland that is Beverly Hills has been manifesting itself this past week in the launch of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (“Real” and “Beverly Hills” – not words you will often find together in the same sentence).
The TV series manages to bring together some of the worst, most vacuous women in various states across America (New Jersey is so far topping the list in terms of grossness), and this lot, like their predecessors, clearly have no idea about the face they are presenting to the world.
Well, I use the word “face” loosely; somewhere, beneath all the surgery and Botox, there probably lurks the semblance of a real face, but it hasn’t seen daylight for at least a decade.
It’s what Beverly Hills is all about – false features, false people, in a city of money-grabbing, intellectual dereliction. It’s a shallow, toxic environment: scratch the surface of the glamorous façade and the hollowness will swallow you up.
As friends had told me, there really is cultural life in LA beyond BH, and the relief at finally finding it has enriched my life here no end.
Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre (whose resident home is London's South Bank) is in Santa Monica at the moment, and their production of The Merry Wives of Windsor at the Broadstage Theater is hilarious. My friend Gerard McCarthy, who I gave rave reviews to during his time in Hollyoaks is in it, and is now sporting luscious long blonde hair.
It was something of a talking point among some Americans in the audience. “Is it real?” they asked him at the after-show party. “Can we touch it?”
Clearly, there had been a busload in from Beverly Hills, because another man asked Gerard: “Why have you all got English accents?” Er, because the play is set in Windsor, knobhead.
Gerard is actually from Belfast, but does a very convincing English accent, and it’s great to see him playing a romantic male after his stint as a transsexual in Hollyoaks.
It’s been something of a cultural week, and yesterday I went to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion downtown, to a Dvorak recital (or Der-vorrack, as one American lady pronounced it). My new friend Francois Chouchan, an award-winning concert pianist, delivered a breathtakingly brilliant performance, and I was once again reminded that there really is nothing like great art to transcend the mundane and nastiness in life.
It was rather a special afternoon: a wonderful recital, followed by a champagne tea and “la conversation”. After the less than mediocre performances I am used to in Beverly Hills hostelries, it was, literally, music to my ears.
Friends had also informed me that if I could tear myself away from the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, there was a rich cultural life awaiting me in San Francisco.
Well, I finally managed to visit the city I had also been assured was “very European” - an observation that completely passed me by, as no matter which way I walked, I always ended up in Chinatown. And as I was walking over ten miles every day, that was something of an achievement. Or maybe I had just reached Hong Kong.
San Francisco Bay isn’t anywhere near as vibrant as Cardiff Bay back home, to be honest, although a boat trip to Alcatraz was a tad more exciting than Cardiff’s hourly water service to Penarth. Having escaped the Alcatraz that was my Beverly Hills life, however, it felt a little too close for comfort.
It was also a pretty unfriendly city. At the Butterfly restaurant in the Bay, I was about to be given a table, until some couples arrived just behind me. I was then informed that there was room “only at the bar or outside” for one person. Alcatraz was the Ritz compared to Butterfly’s outside, and I would have had to lose two stone to cram myself in at the bar, so I left.
I later left a message on the restaurant’s answer-machine, informing them how appalling it was, being treated like a second class citizen just because I was alone, blah, blah, and I was a journalist writing about the city, more blah, blah, blah.
The manager phoned me the next morning, very apologetic and offering to make it up to me on my next visit. He assured me that this really was not their policy. Yeah, right. Too little, too late.
It’s something I am not used to in Europe, and in particular Paris, where women on their own are treated with respect, even reverence. The Parisians also know that a woman by herself is likely to treat herself to a really nice bottle of wine and stuff her face with three courses, thereby spending a lot more than the family who comes in, orders a mixed salad between four, and a jug of tap water.
The King’s Head in Santa Monica appear to know this, but then it is a traditional English pub, run by the Irish. This week alone, I’ve had their Cornish pasty, their chicken curry and, joy of joys, their bangers, mash and gravy. On Saturday, my French friends went for the pasties, the fish and chips, and the chicken pie. They loved them all.
So, all in all, it’s been something of an adventurous week, which is just as well, because the weather has been diabolical. I’ve been listening to the song Rain, from the brilliant Mika album, The Boy Who Knew Too Much (“When it rai rai rains, when it rai rai rains . . . I hate days like this”), as I look out at the permanently cloudy skies.
But while there’s music and moonlight and love and romance, it’s easy to face the music and dance.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Saturday, October 9, 2010
The Underbelly Of Life 10/9/10
The Irish sausages were great.
My mass stocking-up of familiar UK goods from the British Shop next door to the King’s Head, and the Tudor Shop opposite, in Santa Monica, reminded me of all the foodstuffs I missed from home.
I wolfed down the Heinz baked beans like a hog returning from boot camp; the chicken pie flew down my throat like a flying saucer; and the sausages . . . Oh, the sausages.
Until discovering this little corner of a foreign field that is forever England (at least, that’s what I’m hoping), I’ve been living pretty healthily here. The lack of accessible takeaways near my apartment in Beverly Hills ensured that I wasn’t going to bed monosodium glutamated up to the gills three times a week, and I regularly went to the gym and walked pretty much everywhere.
The healthy living looks set to continue in my new life in Santa Monica, with Sports Club LA’s sister gym (which also has a huge pool) in West LA, and the close proximity of several farmers’ markets. I also walk 30 blocks to the beach, a journey that takes only 40 minutes (two days and 40 minutes, if I call into an Irish pub en route).
But now there’s that Brit temptation threatening to put a spanner in my good works when I finally reach the ocean.
I know how to watch what I eat, though, and what I put into my stomach has always been something I have been able to control. But the presence of home food in my cupboards has once more made me aware of just how very differently we eat back in the UK, compared to US folk, who seem to fall into two camps: basically, greedy buggers and nibblers, and it’s not hard to spot the difference.
The greedy buggers flock to chain restaurants such as the Cheesecake Factory or Il Pastaio, and order way too much, but eat it all anyway, for fear of not getting their money’s worth.
The nibblers can be seen hanging out in healthy sandwich/salad hostelries where, upon ordering the Caesar salad, they will add: “ . . . but no cheese, no anchovies, no dressing, and easy on the leaves.”
That doesn’t mean that there aren’t fat nibblers, too; there are. They just don’t like to be seen to be eating. They therefore manage a soupcon of kobe beef and take the rest home in a box to stuff during the Letterman Show.
Thin or fat, they all appear to be obsessed with food, and it plays the most enormous part in their lives, even while on the move - driving, walking, even on the treadmill at the gym. As someone who was brought up to eat two good meals a day and nothing in between, I just cannot get used to the snacking culture. I tell you: their mouths are never empty.
Crisps, nuts, olives, breadsticks . . . Their supermarket trolleys are piled high with junk food, which also turns up on every bar counter and restaurant table, and is consumed by the bucket-load in advance of the main meal.
And when the irritating crunch of their salty orchestra briefly pauses for an intermission, their teeth are chomping on gum, which they eat with mouths wide open, saliva dripping onto their lips. It’s like being on the set of Jaws.
It’s easy to see why 72 million Americans are obese (according to the latest statistics), but nobody seems to be doing anything about it. In the UK, the Food Standards agency has come under criticism for not providing sufficient guidelines regarding healthy eating, but there is still general knowledge, and let’s not forget Jamie Oliver, who heightened awareness among schoolchildren and their parents. But it’s just not as big a deal in the US.
I suspect that the main reason is that fast food is cheap, and with 13% to 17% of Americans living below the federal poverty line at any one time, fast food is going to be high on their limited shopping list.
But what of the percentage that does have money? Why aren’t they eating more healthily? One simple reason: the country’s indulgence of one of the seven deadly sins: Gluttony.
The way they eat in the US is a physical manifestation of the greed in so may other areas of life: the money-grabbing, selfish, mean-spiritedness among the Haves that are the very things that keep so large a percentage - the Have Nots - of the population down; it’s the word of capitalism made flesh, and it is sickening to see.
I have met some really great Americans here, and some absolute monsters; but I find the general greed, both literal and metaphorical, that I witness on a daily basis, increasingly disturbing.
In Britain, we blame the division between the Haves and the Have Nots on our class culture; it’s not called class culture in the US, but it is the same thing.
This week, a report stated that racism under Obama is worse than it was before this first black President came to power. I don’t doubt it, and in Beverly Hills in particular, I was appalled to witness the racism towards anyone who wasn’t white, upper middle strata (“class”, as we know it).
It’s disgusting. It’s inhuman. And in a country in which 92% of the population believes in God, it is utterly hypocritical.
They say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Not in the blocked arteries of American gluttony it’s not.
My mass stocking-up of familiar UK goods from the British Shop next door to the King’s Head, and the Tudor Shop opposite, in Santa Monica, reminded me of all the foodstuffs I missed from home.
I wolfed down the Heinz baked beans like a hog returning from boot camp; the chicken pie flew down my throat like a flying saucer; and the sausages . . . Oh, the sausages.
Until discovering this little corner of a foreign field that is forever England (at least, that’s what I’m hoping), I’ve been living pretty healthily here. The lack of accessible takeaways near my apartment in Beverly Hills ensured that I wasn’t going to bed monosodium glutamated up to the gills three times a week, and I regularly went to the gym and walked pretty much everywhere.
The healthy living looks set to continue in my new life in Santa Monica, with Sports Club LA’s sister gym (which also has a huge pool) in West LA, and the close proximity of several farmers’ markets. I also walk 30 blocks to the beach, a journey that takes only 40 minutes (two days and 40 minutes, if I call into an Irish pub en route).
But now there’s that Brit temptation threatening to put a spanner in my good works when I finally reach the ocean.
I know how to watch what I eat, though, and what I put into my stomach has always been something I have been able to control. But the presence of home food in my cupboards has once more made me aware of just how very differently we eat back in the UK, compared to US folk, who seem to fall into two camps: basically, greedy buggers and nibblers, and it’s not hard to spot the difference.
The greedy buggers flock to chain restaurants such as the Cheesecake Factory or Il Pastaio, and order way too much, but eat it all anyway, for fear of not getting their money’s worth.
The nibblers can be seen hanging out in healthy sandwich/salad hostelries where, upon ordering the Caesar salad, they will add: “ . . . but no cheese, no anchovies, no dressing, and easy on the leaves.”
That doesn’t mean that there aren’t fat nibblers, too; there are. They just don’t like to be seen to be eating. They therefore manage a soupcon of kobe beef and take the rest home in a box to stuff during the Letterman Show.
Thin or fat, they all appear to be obsessed with food, and it plays the most enormous part in their lives, even while on the move - driving, walking, even on the treadmill at the gym. As someone who was brought up to eat two good meals a day and nothing in between, I just cannot get used to the snacking culture. I tell you: their mouths are never empty.
Crisps, nuts, olives, breadsticks . . . Their supermarket trolleys are piled high with junk food, which also turns up on every bar counter and restaurant table, and is consumed by the bucket-load in advance of the main meal.
And when the irritating crunch of their salty orchestra briefly pauses for an intermission, their teeth are chomping on gum, which they eat with mouths wide open, saliva dripping onto their lips. It’s like being on the set of Jaws.
It’s easy to see why 72 million Americans are obese (according to the latest statistics), but nobody seems to be doing anything about it. In the UK, the Food Standards agency has come under criticism for not providing sufficient guidelines regarding healthy eating, but there is still general knowledge, and let’s not forget Jamie Oliver, who heightened awareness among schoolchildren and their parents. But it’s just not as big a deal in the US.
I suspect that the main reason is that fast food is cheap, and with 13% to 17% of Americans living below the federal poverty line at any one time, fast food is going to be high on their limited shopping list.
But what of the percentage that does have money? Why aren’t they eating more healthily? One simple reason: the country’s indulgence of one of the seven deadly sins: Gluttony.
The way they eat in the US is a physical manifestation of the greed in so may other areas of life: the money-grabbing, selfish, mean-spiritedness among the Haves that are the very things that keep so large a percentage - the Have Nots - of the population down; it’s the word of capitalism made flesh, and it is sickening to see.
I have met some really great Americans here, and some absolute monsters; but I find the general greed, both literal and metaphorical, that I witness on a daily basis, increasingly disturbing.
In Britain, we blame the division between the Haves and the Have Nots on our class culture; it’s not called class culture in the US, but it is the same thing.
This week, a report stated that racism under Obama is worse than it was before this first black President came to power. I don’t doubt it, and in Beverly Hills in particular, I was appalled to witness the racism towards anyone who wasn’t white, upper middle strata (“class”, as we know it).
It’s disgusting. It’s inhuman. And in a country in which 92% of the population believes in God, it is utterly hypocritical.
They say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Not in the blocked arteries of American gluttony it’s not.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Life's A Beach 9/28/10
A month is a long time in Hollywood.
There I was, all set to go home, waxing lyrical on September 6th about my family and friends, while declaring my LA life over, and yet here I am. Still. And, what’s more, in a different apartment, with another signed lease, engaged in an enormous writing project.
I can’t divulge the details just yet, but it is hugely exciting and, as I need regular access to the subjects, whose biography I am writing, have decided to stay on, rather than conduct the whole thing via e-mail and phone from back home.
No, I have not emigrated, and will still be back in the UK on two extended trips before Christmas, for all the reasons I detailed in my last blog. But I am yet again going to be an East/West commuter and sharing nights out with my flight crew chums from Virgin and Air New Zealand.
My mother in particular is being incredibly understanding. She knows what a tough year it has been, and this project could really transform my life. She is used to my changes of fortune and also my changes of address, and I could not wish for better support. My friends, also, while probably thinking I am insane, are excited for me.
But I have moved. After 18 months of living in Beverly Hills, I decided to try a different area. In recent months, I have been going to Santa Monica’s ocean front several times a week on the bus: a journey that took over half an hour. Much as I have enjoyed the exclusivity of Beverly Hills, it can hardly be called real life. The nearest supermarket was over a mile away; buying a pint of milk at night was harder than keeping a cow in the bathroom. Although there was a Whole Foods two miles away, I could no longer afford their prices. My screams at the checkout were beginning to frighten the locals.
Having looked at some dire places near the sea front, I decided upon a very high spec, modern apartment about a five-minute drive away from the coast. My new landlord owns the spectacular kitchen store below, so I now have the appliances I have always dreamed of. My fridge is like a second home. I could take in a couple of lodgers in the oven and never bump into them.
Close by and within walking distance, is the store Smart and Final, which is cheap, cheap, cheap; and, a few doors from that, the Star Market, an Oriental store with hundreds of spices and exotic fruits. The Wine Expo one block away has as good a selection of European wines as I ever saw when living in France; on Saturday, they are opening their very nice wine bar. And, opposite, there is Busby’s Sports Bar.
I’m not sure whether I will be a regular in Busby’s, which is a real All Guys Together sort of place - the kind you see in movies, before reaching for the remote to see if there is a rom com on another channel.
The clientele is very tall, they shout at screens showing games that, to me, have incomprehensible rules; they high five each other when someone scores (which appears to be often); they wear baseball hats and drink beer, while wolfing down plates of chicken wings the size of small poultry farms.
Luckily, I don’t hear any of the noise from Busby’s in my apartment, which, being far set back from the road, is unbelievably quiet, and I already feel very settled. I had everything unpacked and in its place within 48 hours, including my alphabetically ordered books – and spices. And I have already been to a cheese and wine evening at an apartment, where my new neighbour was introducing a line of beauty products.
I have also been to the fabulous Wine Lounge at the top of the new Santa Monica shopping mall, and again to my regular haunt the King’s Head, the British pub close to the front.
And who should I see in the King’s Head, but David Beckham. Sitting at the opposite table, in his baseball cap and vest, having lunch with his three kids. I could barely swallow my fries.
It was all rather sweet. David cut up the younger boy’s food and was openly affectionate with them, like any normal doting dad. And what well behaved children. Polite, friendly to the staff, they were adorable and stood patiently by as other diners, clocking the star, moved in for photos and autographs as the party stood up to leave.
Okay, yes, I was one of them. Having seen David in my gym, where Victoria regularly works out, too, I was playing it cool. And then couldn’t. So there he is, on my Blackberry, in a very blurred photo (the female fan taking it was so excited, she was shaking uncontrollably), with me looking like a Lilliputian tucked under David’s well muscled arm.
They were all going next door to the Tudor shop where, joy of joys this week, I was able to buy Heinz baked beans. And proper Irish sausages. And a chicken and mushroom pie. Real British food. You can take the girl out of Wales, but . . .
It is still easy to get around on the bus, which goes from right outside my apartment block, and yesterday I went to West Hollywood, where I saw yet another sports superstar - Mike Tyson, sitting right across from me in a hostelry. I decided not to venture forth in quite the same manner as I had with David. I value my ears. Not to mention my . . . Well, we all know the boxer’s history. He was laughing uproariously with some friends, with his mouth wide open and baring his teeth. All he was missing was a lion tamer.
So, another chapter begins, and the roller-coaster at the end of Santa Monica pier beckons. It’s an appropriate metaphor for the fortunes of my strangely ever-changing life.
There I was, all set to go home, waxing lyrical on September 6th about my family and friends, while declaring my LA life over, and yet here I am. Still. And, what’s more, in a different apartment, with another signed lease, engaged in an enormous writing project.
I can’t divulge the details just yet, but it is hugely exciting and, as I need regular access to the subjects, whose biography I am writing, have decided to stay on, rather than conduct the whole thing via e-mail and phone from back home.
No, I have not emigrated, and will still be back in the UK on two extended trips before Christmas, for all the reasons I detailed in my last blog. But I am yet again going to be an East/West commuter and sharing nights out with my flight crew chums from Virgin and Air New Zealand.
My mother in particular is being incredibly understanding. She knows what a tough year it has been, and this project could really transform my life. She is used to my changes of fortune and also my changes of address, and I could not wish for better support. My friends, also, while probably thinking I am insane, are excited for me.
But I have moved. After 18 months of living in Beverly Hills, I decided to try a different area. In recent months, I have been going to Santa Monica’s ocean front several times a week on the bus: a journey that took over half an hour. Much as I have enjoyed the exclusivity of Beverly Hills, it can hardly be called real life. The nearest supermarket was over a mile away; buying a pint of milk at night was harder than keeping a cow in the bathroom. Although there was a Whole Foods two miles away, I could no longer afford their prices. My screams at the checkout were beginning to frighten the locals.
Having looked at some dire places near the sea front, I decided upon a very high spec, modern apartment about a five-minute drive away from the coast. My new landlord owns the spectacular kitchen store below, so I now have the appliances I have always dreamed of. My fridge is like a second home. I could take in a couple of lodgers in the oven and never bump into them.
Close by and within walking distance, is the store Smart and Final, which is cheap, cheap, cheap; and, a few doors from that, the Star Market, an Oriental store with hundreds of spices and exotic fruits. The Wine Expo one block away has as good a selection of European wines as I ever saw when living in France; on Saturday, they are opening their very nice wine bar. And, opposite, there is Busby’s Sports Bar.
I’m not sure whether I will be a regular in Busby’s, which is a real All Guys Together sort of place - the kind you see in movies, before reaching for the remote to see if there is a rom com on another channel.
The clientele is very tall, they shout at screens showing games that, to me, have incomprehensible rules; they high five each other when someone scores (which appears to be often); they wear baseball hats and drink beer, while wolfing down plates of chicken wings the size of small poultry farms.
Luckily, I don’t hear any of the noise from Busby’s in my apartment, which, being far set back from the road, is unbelievably quiet, and I already feel very settled. I had everything unpacked and in its place within 48 hours, including my alphabetically ordered books – and spices. And I have already been to a cheese and wine evening at an apartment, where my new neighbour was introducing a line of beauty products.
I have also been to the fabulous Wine Lounge at the top of the new Santa Monica shopping mall, and again to my regular haunt the King’s Head, the British pub close to the front.
And who should I see in the King’s Head, but David Beckham. Sitting at the opposite table, in his baseball cap and vest, having lunch with his three kids. I could barely swallow my fries.
It was all rather sweet. David cut up the younger boy’s food and was openly affectionate with them, like any normal doting dad. And what well behaved children. Polite, friendly to the staff, they were adorable and stood patiently by as other diners, clocking the star, moved in for photos and autographs as the party stood up to leave.
Okay, yes, I was one of them. Having seen David in my gym, where Victoria regularly works out, too, I was playing it cool. And then couldn’t. So there he is, on my Blackberry, in a very blurred photo (the female fan taking it was so excited, she was shaking uncontrollably), with me looking like a Lilliputian tucked under David’s well muscled arm.
They were all going next door to the Tudor shop where, joy of joys this week, I was able to buy Heinz baked beans. And proper Irish sausages. And a chicken and mushroom pie. Real British food. You can take the girl out of Wales, but . . .
It is still easy to get around on the bus, which goes from right outside my apartment block, and yesterday I went to West Hollywood, where I saw yet another sports superstar - Mike Tyson, sitting right across from me in a hostelry. I decided not to venture forth in quite the same manner as I had with David. I value my ears. Not to mention my . . . Well, we all know the boxer’s history. He was laughing uproariously with some friends, with his mouth wide open and baring his teeth. All he was missing was a lion tamer.
So, another chapter begins, and the roller-coaster at the end of Santa Monica pier beckons. It’s an appropriate metaphor for the fortunes of my strangely ever-changing life.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Tony Blair - My Part In His Book's Downfall 9/6/10
Technical failure, terrorism, another BA strike – we are beset by so many fears in the age of modern flying; and yesterday, I was able to add another to my list. The low-flying book.
I’d been reading extracts from Tony Blair’s memoirs on the train on my way to Heathrow. Leaving his sniping about Gordon Brown aside, his excessive use of the exclamation mark and the awful title, A Journey (living in LA, I am so sick of everybody’s bloody emotional and spiritual journeys), I thought there was enough of interest to warrant my buying a copy for the long flight back to LA.
The problem was, that as it is number one on the WH Smith bestseller list, it was on the top shelf. Not being one for girlie mags, and being a semi-dwarf, I have never been over- familiar with the top shelf, so I took what seemed like the easiest route, stretched up with a kind of little hop, too, and tried to grab a copy.
Big mistake. The book I grappled with flew off the shelf, crashed onto my face, cut my cheek open and left me with a whacking great bruise and in rather a lot of pain.
It’s a big book. Well, it’s a big book for a small cheek and rather delicate cheekbone. It was a veritable weapon of mass destruction, to be honest, and an attack that left me having to fill out a personal injury form while pressing an ice-pack to my face.
I really wish I’d paid more attention to those TV ads fronted by Billy Murray, who used to be in The Bill and EastEnders; he’s now on screen telling you how to get a lawyer to sue the arse off people who piss you off. I vaguely recall that his ads are for criminal lawyers, and I’m not entirely sure whether a book would technically qualify as an assailant, but I’m sure it’s worth a call.
In the Star Alliance lounge, where I went to recover from my attack, John from WH Smith and Susan from Air New Zealand administered to my needs, and the staff on board ANZ checked on my wellbeing throughout the flight.
As for Tony’s book, I never even opened it. It stayed in the overhead locker for the entire 12 hours, as there was no way I was going to risk another mid-air collision with the thing.
I can never decide what to do for entertainment on the plane. I usually buy half a dozen books but never get to read them, because most passengers pull down the window blinds within minutes of being airborne, and leave the cabin in relative darkness.
I’m running out of films, too, as I have made the journey so often (that’s journey with a small “j”, Tony! And that’s the way to use an exclamation mark, by the way!! And that's not.).
The Lovely Bones and My Sister’s keeper had me sobbing so uncontrollably throughout, I though I would need paramedics to resuscitate me on arrival. Dying, or already dead young girls are not the stuff of in-flight entertainment, I have decided.
I loved Ricky Gervais’s The Invention of Lying, which has an immense profundity at its comic heart; and yesterday I really enjoyed Sex and the City II, along with The Juliet Letters.
Mind you, it was hard to concentrate on either, as the woman in the opposite aisle was laughing so much throughout the episodes of Only Fools and Horses she was watching, I thought she would have to be sedated.
I’ve been making the journey regularly for nearly two years now, and this one, the penultimate one before returning to the UK at the end of the month, was an emotional one.
I’ve made quite a few friends, both among passengers and staff. I’ve travelled with celebrities – Sharon Osborne, La Toya Jackson, Mel B – and chatted to many writers and producers.
I’ve eaten both great food (ANZ) and not so great (Virgin). I’ve travelled in a wheelchair to the plane when I did my back in, and I’ve lost a hugely expensive tennis bracelet that I still can’t bear to think about.
I’ve seen more films than I ever would have managed to do on dry land, and written thousands upon thousands of words of my book.
I’ve cried when travelling to or from a funeral or memorial service, and I’ve travelled with great excitement when knowing I am going to see family or friends and share in more joyous activities in their lives.
Most significantly, perhaps, the fear I once had of flying has completely disappeared. It certainly feels a lot safer than trying to cross the road in LA.
True, that fear has been replaced by a fear of low-flying books, but you can’t have everything.
I’ll miss the long haul flights, not least because I can’t imagine any other circumstances in which I would have the joyous experience of being forcibly separated from the non-stop ringing of my mobile phone for 12 hours.
But I can again look forward to nipping over to Paris on the Eurostar; the short flight to southern Spain, where I still have an apartment; the easy train access to London’s vast cultural experiences.
And as people keep telling me: LA’s not going anywhere and I can return anytime I like. In the words of Tony Blair . . . Well, I’m not sure I’ll ever find out what they are.
But as journeys go, mine’s been a great one.
I’d been reading extracts from Tony Blair’s memoirs on the train on my way to Heathrow. Leaving his sniping about Gordon Brown aside, his excessive use of the exclamation mark and the awful title, A Journey (living in LA, I am so sick of everybody’s bloody emotional and spiritual journeys), I thought there was enough of interest to warrant my buying a copy for the long flight back to LA.
The problem was, that as it is number one on the WH Smith bestseller list, it was on the top shelf. Not being one for girlie mags, and being a semi-dwarf, I have never been over- familiar with the top shelf, so I took what seemed like the easiest route, stretched up with a kind of little hop, too, and tried to grab a copy.
Big mistake. The book I grappled with flew off the shelf, crashed onto my face, cut my cheek open and left me with a whacking great bruise and in rather a lot of pain.
It’s a big book. Well, it’s a big book for a small cheek and rather delicate cheekbone. It was a veritable weapon of mass destruction, to be honest, and an attack that left me having to fill out a personal injury form while pressing an ice-pack to my face.
I really wish I’d paid more attention to those TV ads fronted by Billy Murray, who used to be in The Bill and EastEnders; he’s now on screen telling you how to get a lawyer to sue the arse off people who piss you off. I vaguely recall that his ads are for criminal lawyers, and I’m not entirely sure whether a book would technically qualify as an assailant, but I’m sure it’s worth a call.
In the Star Alliance lounge, where I went to recover from my attack, John from WH Smith and Susan from Air New Zealand administered to my needs, and the staff on board ANZ checked on my wellbeing throughout the flight.
As for Tony’s book, I never even opened it. It stayed in the overhead locker for the entire 12 hours, as there was no way I was going to risk another mid-air collision with the thing.
I can never decide what to do for entertainment on the plane. I usually buy half a dozen books but never get to read them, because most passengers pull down the window blinds within minutes of being airborne, and leave the cabin in relative darkness.
I’m running out of films, too, as I have made the journey so often (that’s journey with a small “j”, Tony! And that’s the way to use an exclamation mark, by the way!! And that's not.).
The Lovely Bones and My Sister’s keeper had me sobbing so uncontrollably throughout, I though I would need paramedics to resuscitate me on arrival. Dying, or already dead young girls are not the stuff of in-flight entertainment, I have decided.
I loved Ricky Gervais’s The Invention of Lying, which has an immense profundity at its comic heart; and yesterday I really enjoyed Sex and the City II, along with The Juliet Letters.
Mind you, it was hard to concentrate on either, as the woman in the opposite aisle was laughing so much throughout the episodes of Only Fools and Horses she was watching, I thought she would have to be sedated.
I’ve been making the journey regularly for nearly two years now, and this one, the penultimate one before returning to the UK at the end of the month, was an emotional one.
I’ve made quite a few friends, both among passengers and staff. I’ve travelled with celebrities – Sharon Osborne, La Toya Jackson, Mel B – and chatted to many writers and producers.
I’ve eaten both great food (ANZ) and not so great (Virgin). I’ve travelled in a wheelchair to the plane when I did my back in, and I’ve lost a hugely expensive tennis bracelet that I still can’t bear to think about.
I’ve seen more films than I ever would have managed to do on dry land, and written thousands upon thousands of words of my book.
I’ve cried when travelling to or from a funeral or memorial service, and I’ve travelled with great excitement when knowing I am going to see family or friends and share in more joyous activities in their lives.
Most significantly, perhaps, the fear I once had of flying has completely disappeared. It certainly feels a lot safer than trying to cross the road in LA.
True, that fear has been replaced by a fear of low-flying books, but you can’t have everything.
I’ll miss the long haul flights, not least because I can’t imagine any other circumstances in which I would have the joyous experience of being forcibly separated from the non-stop ringing of my mobile phone for 12 hours.
But I can again look forward to nipping over to Paris on the Eurostar; the short flight to southern Spain, where I still have an apartment; the easy train access to London’s vast cultural experiences.
And as people keep telling me: LA’s not going anywhere and I can return anytime I like. In the words of Tony Blair . . . Well, I’m not sure I’ll ever find out what they are.
But as journeys go, mine’s been a great one.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Marijuana Or Martini? The Choice Is Yours 8/22/10
It’s a thin line between being laid back and being lazy, a fact to which several hundred people I have met here bear witness.
While there are many incredibly hard-working individuals who come to California in search of fame and fortune, there are even more who come in search of a lifestyle that allows them to be even more bone idle than they managed to be back in their home country.
Because the US is a country in which everything seems possible, and anyone can be anything they want to be, the spirit of optimism rides high; the problem is that the spirit of delusion rides equally high, and everyone thinks they are going to make it, irrespective of talent, and irrespective of their ability or desire to put their noses to the grindstone.
Personally, when I arrived, I worked very, very hard, often right through the night. I rediscovered a passion for writing that I had not experienced in some years, the toils of journalism having knocked out some of my creativity for different sorts of projects.
But as time has gone on, I have felt a slight lethargy creeping in, a desire to “chill out” more, which, while being beneficial in many ways to my health, has made me feel increasingly irritable and restless.
Excessive chilling out can be as frustrating as excessive stress, and it can smooth the rough edges of creativity – you only have to look at the crap that Hollywood turns out to know that.
The endless warm weather is undoubtedly a relaxant. In the UK, if the sun shines on a Bank Holiday, we rush to throw ourselves into vats of Stella in pub gardens and beachside bars; but if you drank every time the sun shone here, you would never be sober.
The misery of bad weather makes Brits drink a lot more, and their lifestyle is a lot more stressed. The cycle is one of stress at work/worry about money = drinking to forget and reduce stress = more stress, because nothing has fundamentally changed.
When the sun is permanently shining, it is actually very hard to keep drinking, because dehydration induces a craving for little else other than water or, in my case, gallons of PG Tips.
The vast open spaces of LA in particular, are also contributory to the emotional spaced-out-ness of its residents. You just don’t literally bump into anyone in the streets here; yes, people spend an inordinate amount of time in their cars, but when out and about, there is a feeling of spaciousness that, coupled with the ability to live so much of one’s life outdoors, cannot help but contribute to a feeling well-being. I walk miles every week and love the fact that I see so few people along the way (even if the police are a little suspicious of folk a pied).
When I recently returned to London, I felt like a marching ant in Oxford Street: being hurtled along, against my will, to whatever hell my body was being forced. I was terrified.
This week, however, I discovered another contributing factor in California’s laid-back state of mind: marijuana. Lots of it.
I know a handful of people in the UK who are prescribed marijuana for medical reasons, and others who have taken the drug recreationally. Among the first group, I have seen the benefits; among the latter, I have seen a few people who appeared to function perfectly well taking it.
But I have also witnessed that heavy marijuana use often goes hand in hand with unemployment (and yes, I appreciate that most people are unemployed for a whole host of other reasons) or, at best, under-achievement; I have seen it lead to usage of heavier drugs.
There have also been, sadly, a few in whom I have witnessed increasing use of the drug appearing to induce psychoses, with often tragic results.
As with all drugs, the goal-posts are ever shifting, according to medical research and our own experience, and in the case of marijuana I am no expert as to the short or long term physical effects.
But in California, it is synonymous with the laid back lifestyle, and it's everywhere. When I arrived, a few people told me that they could recommend some doctors where I could obtain “medicinal marijuana”, a phrase that apparently gets around the legalities. I politely declined and haven’t heard or seen much about it since.
Occasionally, it gets a mention in TV court shows, and in one recent People’s Court, a man was suing his ex, because he gave her marijuana, which she smoked but didn’t pay the full amount for – and she was counter-suing him, because it was allegedly inferior stuff. “California! Dontcha love it!” said Judge Milian.
This week, however, I went to Venice Beach, which might as well be called Marijuana Marina, for all the cannabis on offer there.
Every few steps, another man approached, pointing to a doorway, where, apparently, a highly reputable doctor was inside, handing out medicinal marijuana. The smell of the stuff was so intense along the board-walk, I felt I was getting enough already, without having to pay anything for it.
Gosh, it was bad. A really sickly, sweet smell, that seemed to permeate every pore in my body.
Venice is where the really, really lazy people hang out, I discovered. I hadn’t been there for 20 years and thought that maybe it had cleaned up its act, but nothing of the sort. It’s dirty, scruffy, a bit scary, and makes the Kiss Me Quick culture of Blackpool look like Key West.
There was only one place where you could have anything remotely decent to eat or drink along the front: the Sidewalk Café (apparently famous, though heaven knows why), barely better than a roadside caff, and with every table boasting a plastic bottle of Heinz tomato ketchup the size of a small baby.
I walked to nearby Santa Monica, roughly three miles away and a tad more civilised. It still has the air of a slightly downmarket UK seaside town, but at least you can breathe the air there.
But the edginess that inspired me when I first arrived and which sustained me for about six months has definitely diminished. Many of my reasons for leaving I wrote about two weeks ago; but another reason is my feeling increasingly out of kilter with this all too laid back lifestyle - and, in my case, that's nothing to do with the availability of marijuana. The drug is just one of a whole host of factors that keeps large sections of this city in a state bordering on rigor mortis.
As I said, it’s a thin line between laziness and being laid back, and I don’t want that line to get any thinner.
At the end of the day, there’s more to life than sunshine.
While there are many incredibly hard-working individuals who come to California in search of fame and fortune, there are even more who come in search of a lifestyle that allows them to be even more bone idle than they managed to be back in their home country.
Because the US is a country in which everything seems possible, and anyone can be anything they want to be, the spirit of optimism rides high; the problem is that the spirit of delusion rides equally high, and everyone thinks they are going to make it, irrespective of talent, and irrespective of their ability or desire to put their noses to the grindstone.
Personally, when I arrived, I worked very, very hard, often right through the night. I rediscovered a passion for writing that I had not experienced in some years, the toils of journalism having knocked out some of my creativity for different sorts of projects.
But as time has gone on, I have felt a slight lethargy creeping in, a desire to “chill out” more, which, while being beneficial in many ways to my health, has made me feel increasingly irritable and restless.
Excessive chilling out can be as frustrating as excessive stress, and it can smooth the rough edges of creativity – you only have to look at the crap that Hollywood turns out to know that.
The endless warm weather is undoubtedly a relaxant. In the UK, if the sun shines on a Bank Holiday, we rush to throw ourselves into vats of Stella in pub gardens and beachside bars; but if you drank every time the sun shone here, you would never be sober.
The misery of bad weather makes Brits drink a lot more, and their lifestyle is a lot more stressed. The cycle is one of stress at work/worry about money = drinking to forget and reduce stress = more stress, because nothing has fundamentally changed.
When the sun is permanently shining, it is actually very hard to keep drinking, because dehydration induces a craving for little else other than water or, in my case, gallons of PG Tips.
The vast open spaces of LA in particular, are also contributory to the emotional spaced-out-ness of its residents. You just don’t literally bump into anyone in the streets here; yes, people spend an inordinate amount of time in their cars, but when out and about, there is a feeling of spaciousness that, coupled with the ability to live so much of one’s life outdoors, cannot help but contribute to a feeling well-being. I walk miles every week and love the fact that I see so few people along the way (even if the police are a little suspicious of folk a pied).
When I recently returned to London, I felt like a marching ant in Oxford Street: being hurtled along, against my will, to whatever hell my body was being forced. I was terrified.
This week, however, I discovered another contributing factor in California’s laid-back state of mind: marijuana. Lots of it.
I know a handful of people in the UK who are prescribed marijuana for medical reasons, and others who have taken the drug recreationally. Among the first group, I have seen the benefits; among the latter, I have seen a few people who appeared to function perfectly well taking it.
But I have also witnessed that heavy marijuana use often goes hand in hand with unemployment (and yes, I appreciate that most people are unemployed for a whole host of other reasons) or, at best, under-achievement; I have seen it lead to usage of heavier drugs.
There have also been, sadly, a few in whom I have witnessed increasing use of the drug appearing to induce psychoses, with often tragic results.
As with all drugs, the goal-posts are ever shifting, according to medical research and our own experience, and in the case of marijuana I am no expert as to the short or long term physical effects.
But in California, it is synonymous with the laid back lifestyle, and it's everywhere. When I arrived, a few people told me that they could recommend some doctors where I could obtain “medicinal marijuana”, a phrase that apparently gets around the legalities. I politely declined and haven’t heard or seen much about it since.
Occasionally, it gets a mention in TV court shows, and in one recent People’s Court, a man was suing his ex, because he gave her marijuana, which she smoked but didn’t pay the full amount for – and she was counter-suing him, because it was allegedly inferior stuff. “California! Dontcha love it!” said Judge Milian.
This week, however, I went to Venice Beach, which might as well be called Marijuana Marina, for all the cannabis on offer there.
Every few steps, another man approached, pointing to a doorway, where, apparently, a highly reputable doctor was inside, handing out medicinal marijuana. The smell of the stuff was so intense along the board-walk, I felt I was getting enough already, without having to pay anything for it.
Gosh, it was bad. A really sickly, sweet smell, that seemed to permeate every pore in my body.
Venice is where the really, really lazy people hang out, I discovered. I hadn’t been there for 20 years and thought that maybe it had cleaned up its act, but nothing of the sort. It’s dirty, scruffy, a bit scary, and makes the Kiss Me Quick culture of Blackpool look like Key West.
There was only one place where you could have anything remotely decent to eat or drink along the front: the Sidewalk Café (apparently famous, though heaven knows why), barely better than a roadside caff, and with every table boasting a plastic bottle of Heinz tomato ketchup the size of a small baby.
I walked to nearby Santa Monica, roughly three miles away and a tad more civilised. It still has the air of a slightly downmarket UK seaside town, but at least you can breathe the air there.
But the edginess that inspired me when I first arrived and which sustained me for about six months has definitely diminished. Many of my reasons for leaving I wrote about two weeks ago; but another reason is my feeling increasingly out of kilter with this all too laid back lifestyle - and, in my case, that's nothing to do with the availability of marijuana. The drug is just one of a whole host of factors that keeps large sections of this city in a state bordering on rigor mortis.
As I said, it’s a thin line between laziness and being laid back, and I don’t want that line to get any thinner.
At the end of the day, there’s more to life than sunshine.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
That's Another Fine Mess . . . 8/21/10
Has there ever been a nation in the history of civilisation that opened its mouth so much and yet said so very little as the USA?
Yes, it’s been another nightmare week in the LA service industry that so enamoured me when I first arrived.
Having finally managed to sort out my ongoing saga too boring to detail with Best Buy, this week it was the turn of the grocery store, Vons.
As I do not have a car, I have been mostly using the store’s online delivery service. Vons, like its sister store, Pavilions, is, in fact, Safeway, and far cheaper than, say, Ralph’s or Wholefoods. Every few weeks, Vons will deliver your groceries for free, although this is usually dependent upon your purchasing five items from whatever their specials of the week happen to be.
So, for example, when they had a healthy options week, you could get a free delivery if you bought things such as vegetable juice, bran flakes, oatmeal bars – stuff you would never normally touch, let alone swallow, but, for the sake of saving $6.95, were prepared to spend three times that amount on the useless products.
I was having a party and therefore bought the wine in bulk, when I saw a special offer allowing you free delivery on an order over $150. So far, so good – well, almost. Apart from the defrosted pizzas, the bulk order of creamed corn instead of peas, and soft drinks clearly belonging to another order. Customer service ignored my complaining e-mail.
When the party came around some weeks later, two of the bottles of Pinto Grigio turned out to be corked, so I contacted the store to see how they might be replaced.
Now, you have to know this about every single American in LA (at least, the ones I have met): they know nothing, nada, zilch, about wine. Every restaurant, every bar, every snooty bloke sitting down once a month with his mates for a blind “tasting” (basically: rich, ignorant, old guys with nothing better to do - and you see them in many hostelries) – they wouldn’t know a decent wine if it spat at them.
On the few occasions when I have had to send back a corked bottle, the members of staff have examined the glass, declaring that they cannot see any cork floating in it; or they have just looked at me blankly.
And it's not just a problem with corked wine. This week, I had to send back a 2007 Tavel because it had, quite simply, been kept too long in the wrong temperature and had turned to sherry; I know that Tavel is a dark rose, but honestly, I’ve seen more attractive diverticulitis.
The waiter was polite in removing the offending receptacle, but with the comment: “Well, if you don’t like it.” “No,” I said. “It’s not that I don’t like it; it’s bad.” More blank stares.
Bar, restaurant, or five star hotel, it’s been the same story every time, so I wasn’t holding out much hope for the Vons sommelier.
Sure enough, after being put through to various people on the phone, each claiming to be a different branch of Customer Service, I tracked down the store from which my wine had originated. But no. I could not return it, as it had been bought online. More calls. This time: no, any goods had to be returned within 48 hours; it was “company policy”.
So, I said, if I buy 20 bottles of wine, I have to taste them all within 48 hours, purely to ascertain whether they are corked, in order to be allowed to bring them back? Apparently, yes. But then, according to the small print, no; I discovered that it’s not even that easy. Once wine has been delivered for an online order, it cannot be returned – for any reason.
None of the people I spoke to knew what a corked wine was, anyway, so I have downloaded the Wikipedia definition, which I intend to show to everyone I meet who pleads ignorance on the matter.
It’s an awful lot of effort to go to for the presence of a bit of 2,4,6-trichloroanisole (TCA) (that’s corked, for those of you still in the dark; and smell a wet dog, if you’re still confused as to what you should be sniffing for); but why should anyone lose their money because Vons has a policy on refusing to accept returns on what are, essentially, damaged goods?
So, my disillusionment with the service industry that so impressed me when I arrived, continues. The “Yes, ma’am, I can help you with that today” continues to mean “No chance” with every single company I am trying to wind up my affairs with.
I’m going to need more alcohol just to get me through it. I’m just not going to be buying it from Vons.
I’ll just head for the Napa Valley, hook myself up to a vine and cut out the middle man.
Yes, it’s been another nightmare week in the LA service industry that so enamoured me when I first arrived.
Having finally managed to sort out my ongoing saga too boring to detail with Best Buy, this week it was the turn of the grocery store, Vons.
As I do not have a car, I have been mostly using the store’s online delivery service. Vons, like its sister store, Pavilions, is, in fact, Safeway, and far cheaper than, say, Ralph’s or Wholefoods. Every few weeks, Vons will deliver your groceries for free, although this is usually dependent upon your purchasing five items from whatever their specials of the week happen to be.
So, for example, when they had a healthy options week, you could get a free delivery if you bought things such as vegetable juice, bran flakes, oatmeal bars – stuff you would never normally touch, let alone swallow, but, for the sake of saving $6.95, were prepared to spend three times that amount on the useless products.
I was having a party and therefore bought the wine in bulk, when I saw a special offer allowing you free delivery on an order over $150. So far, so good – well, almost. Apart from the defrosted pizzas, the bulk order of creamed corn instead of peas, and soft drinks clearly belonging to another order. Customer service ignored my complaining e-mail.
When the party came around some weeks later, two of the bottles of Pinto Grigio turned out to be corked, so I contacted the store to see how they might be replaced.
Now, you have to know this about every single American in LA (at least, the ones I have met): they know nothing, nada, zilch, about wine. Every restaurant, every bar, every snooty bloke sitting down once a month with his mates for a blind “tasting” (basically: rich, ignorant, old guys with nothing better to do - and you see them in many hostelries) – they wouldn’t know a decent wine if it spat at them.
On the few occasions when I have had to send back a corked bottle, the members of staff have examined the glass, declaring that they cannot see any cork floating in it; or they have just looked at me blankly.
And it's not just a problem with corked wine. This week, I had to send back a 2007 Tavel because it had, quite simply, been kept too long in the wrong temperature and had turned to sherry; I know that Tavel is a dark rose, but honestly, I’ve seen more attractive diverticulitis.
The waiter was polite in removing the offending receptacle, but with the comment: “Well, if you don’t like it.” “No,” I said. “It’s not that I don’t like it; it’s bad.” More blank stares.
Bar, restaurant, or five star hotel, it’s been the same story every time, so I wasn’t holding out much hope for the Vons sommelier.
Sure enough, after being put through to various people on the phone, each claiming to be a different branch of Customer Service, I tracked down the store from which my wine had originated. But no. I could not return it, as it had been bought online. More calls. This time: no, any goods had to be returned within 48 hours; it was “company policy”.
So, I said, if I buy 20 bottles of wine, I have to taste them all within 48 hours, purely to ascertain whether they are corked, in order to be allowed to bring them back? Apparently, yes. But then, according to the small print, no; I discovered that it’s not even that easy. Once wine has been delivered for an online order, it cannot be returned – for any reason.
None of the people I spoke to knew what a corked wine was, anyway, so I have downloaded the Wikipedia definition, which I intend to show to everyone I meet who pleads ignorance on the matter.
It’s an awful lot of effort to go to for the presence of a bit of 2,4,6-trichloroanisole (TCA) (that’s corked, for those of you still in the dark; and smell a wet dog, if you’re still confused as to what you should be sniffing for); but why should anyone lose their money because Vons has a policy on refusing to accept returns on what are, essentially, damaged goods?
So, my disillusionment with the service industry that so impressed me when I arrived, continues. The “Yes, ma’am, I can help you with that today” continues to mean “No chance” with every single company I am trying to wind up my affairs with.
I’m going to need more alcohol just to get me through it. I’m just not going to be buying it from Vons.
I’ll just head for the Napa Valley, hook myself up to a vine and cut out the middle man.
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