I have only just now got in from a week of debauchery and SHIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!! I've got stories to tell!!! The title of this piece though is perhaps such a great story I will not actually tell it here because it really is such a stunner I have to tell you in person to do it justice. You may remember that I predicted that something VERY weird was gonna happen in the next year, the pub story to end all pub stories. Well something VERY weird has happened in this last week and all I'm gonna say is that it is a story to end all others, but next year will be THE one to end all others.
Although part of me is dying to tell you now I won't. This is a story I won't tell unless you ask. I won't tell you it on the phone and I won't tell you it by e-mail. And I probably won't tell Slit at all - It really is that good.
I'm not really sure where to start with the summary of the last week - it's been so damn good it's all been quite a blur to be honest, as it flashed by but I will try my best. Brace yourselves...
The week started on wednesday with a phone call from my exceedingly rich uncle in LA. He'd just bought a new pool table and wanted to *ahem* show me how it was played. Most of you know about the legendary AndyJayPool league, that J++ and Me ran as an excuse for not doing any real work while at uni. So I promptly went round and the bets flew in thick and fast against the stupid Brit who probably hadn't seen a pool table on his cold, wet island. Naturally I threw the first game to get the hopes (and stakes) up, but it was pretty much clear skies from thereon in, so cue our hero escaping into the night with his hard earned winnings with Khiem, my newfound cousin who up until this point I had never met before, to this TGI Fridays to sing Karaoke and get drunk.
I've never sang karaoke before and the hip LA crowd were clearly in for a treat, not so much vocally as I sing like a fish, but definitely visually cos I dance like a swan. On acid. So there I was 50 pints down the way and toying with the idea of singing Poison by Alice Cooper but being too blind drunk to remember any of the words when Khiem bribes the guy to let me on next before I sober up and change my mind, but it was too late I had already changed it...to Fast Car by Tracy Chapman. I was fucked...
The music comes on and I'm thrust in front of this blue screen with a load of white writing on it. Now if any of you ever get into karaoke design I'd just like to point out that having writing that changes from white to yellow on a dark blue background does not work. Especially if you're drunk.
Being too drunk to be able to read, I had this microphone thrust into my hands and for the life of me I couldn't understand the connection between Me, the microphone in my hands, the music in the background and the words that kept changing colour on the screen in front of me. Bit like Britney Spears then.
"Erm don't you think you should start singing dude?"
"Pleazhe excushe me, I'm British and drunk and I don't remember any of the wordsh..."
*Big cheer from the audience*
I join in at the beginning of the second verse or thereabouts, having wased the first verse hyping up the crowd
"You got a fast car, we go cruisin' entertain ourselves..."
*The crowd go WILD!*
I give up the pretence of singing cos I'm off key and seem to be chasin words that keep gettin away and bust out with a classic line that goes...
"Look guys, I know I can't sing, but fuckin hell I can dance! Shall I just fuck the singin and dance for y'all?"
*Andy busts the moves. The crowd goes ballistic and some wide boys get the hump goes I get all the chicks*
I think I might have attempted one more verse but gave up halfway through and left the stage into the arms of a very fine Vietnamese bird and some blonde girl kissed me on the cheek. All in a nights work.
Thursday was the national holiday that the yanks call Thanksgiving, which is a bit like watered-down christmas. It's got turkey but no presents and people thank other people for stuff. Strange country. It was cool though, a day for straight-up chillin out on the pool table, rackin up hundreds and hundreds of games. We also decided to watch an absolutely diabolical film called Solaris, a George Clooney film which Khiem said was "a thriller that got great reviews on Movies.com" - Oh boy did we rip the piss out of him when we left that cinema or what! Nice one Khiem, we'll all just ignore you next time yeah. I think we watched a film called Brotherhood of the Wolf that night, a fantastic piece of French Filmmaking that more than made up for that shite, and later in the week I saw The Godfather part 2 and Die Another Day, which means I've seen more movies in the last week than I have all year round. I still haven't got around to seein Spiderman and I'm such a big comic fan that that is vital viewing even if it was crap. Daredevil is out on Valentines Day so I may have to miss that launch by virtue that I'll probably overdose on narcotics or take enough sleeping pills so I don't have to be on this planet.
Busy Boy, Busy life to lead
Got no time for the TV
Never an hour in my diary
I'll live to the day of my expiry
How can I sit when there's work needs doin?
Who gives a shit who Bond is screwin?
The work and the play are pastimes worth pursuin
A dark room is no good for your own development
Still I'm on holiday so it's nice to be able to catch up on all these things I don't really have time for at home. Die Another Day was fairly good actually although I will tell you the plot just to spoil it. This guy called Bond, James Bond, saves the world from a megalomaniac who has enough power to annoy a lot of people. He uses an ingenious new device developed by John Cleese to narrowly escape death and shags all the fit birds. There that's fucked it up for you hasn't it?
Godfather Part 2 is an amazing film on the other hand. It really is a classic piece of celluloid and Coppola exceeds the first film by far. Woah.
Enough reviews, you don't give a shit what I think anyway, back to the misbehaviour or we're loggin off!
Friday night, Khiems house and we go down to The Petersons who are like a second family to Khiem. They were also original 60s hippies which is the coolest thing. We take Matt out to The Press at Claremont and have a fuckin wicked night out hangin out with LAs coolest - not the trendys but genuinely hip, cool and down to earth people. Seriously good vibes abound and there's a live band, ex's are all over the place, the bar is full of fine ladies, we talk about everything under the sun, Matt stands on one leg and Khiem drops Matt in the shit with his ex etc etc.
Half of Saturday is spent trying to wake up and when we did we busted down to Los Angeles County Museum of Art at about 5 o clock, where we had the whole place virtually to ourselves and we ran around being obnoxious. The classic line of that night has got to be when Khiem goes up to buy a Picasso mug.
"Are you a member here sir?"
"Erm..."
"You get a discount if you are"
"...yes"
"Could I have your name please?"
"Smith"
I'm killin myself giggling at this point
"oh alright it's Tran"
She types in Tran, still not catchin on that we are only jokin and a list of names comes up conveniently on the screen in front of our eyes
"...and your first name?"
We both see it on the screen and he says
"Anthony"
I could have died laughin
Sunday - chillin out and playin pool.
Monday - oh Monday. Oh. My. God.
Khiems back at work after the long thanksgiving weekend so leaves me round at the Petersons which was all good with me. Sean has got us all invites for the reopening of the magazine that he works for, a skaters magazine called Strength, which is reopening on Sunset Boulevard. It's a free bar and free food and the place is packed with skaters and media types. Woah.
On the way to the party the croc in the box incident happens.
The party was absolutely brilliant, in the open air under a huge Spearmint Rhino poster. Life is good. Line of the night award goes to one of the hostesses who just made me feel like I had finally arrived in LA. "I saw you bustin' a move, you'd better take two". So it is possible to have a great time in LA.
Thanks Khiem
