2005-04-12
Walkin' in LA, part ONE
All right. Mark's birthday party was the CAT'S ASS, even if he makes you play stupid parlor games, and the new Negativland CD is the TITS, but the rest of you chickens won't get to hear it until May, ha ha HA! More on that later. What you all REALLY wanna know about is my trip to LA, right? So without further doodoo...
The first thing one notices about Los Angeles is the utterly fucked-up neon. More to the point, that is what you notice if you've arrived at night, after a six hour JetBlue flight wherein you are trapped in a row with a couple and their vomit cannon of a child. Yes, since as we all know by now that I am now - and forever will be - the Poster Child for Murphy's Law, I had the distinct pleasure of flying under those exact circumstances.
Let it not be said that I dislike small children. Indeed - some of my very favorite people in the world are under the age of 8, and they -- oddly -- seem to enjoy MY company as well. Nay, small children are not a problem. What IS a problem is a child that is just a tad too large to be making a cross-country flight without its own seat. We're not talking a gurgling, cooing infant here. We are talking about a child that talks, walks AND pukes, and parents that clearly could have shelled out the 99 bucks to secure that third seat, judging by the array of expensive, bleating toys that they carried on board to keep Barfsy occupied. Further, judging by the conversation they were having while Yaksy slumbered for all of 15 minutes, which was largely focused on the placement and color scheme of a great deal of new furniture they'd acquired, it wouldn't have killed them to just RESERVE THE WHOLE ROW.
I digress. About two hours into the flight, I managed to ignore the beeping and tooting of Glarfsy's "educational" toys, and had just settled into the book I'd brought along, when I noticed an odor not unlike that of Spaghetti-O's and....yogurt. I turned slightly to witness the father holding Pukesy at just-about-arm's length, eyes wide in terror as the child continued to let loose like a Gymboree-clad geyser of partially digested "fun shaped" pasta pieces and curdled milk.
What does one do in this situation? I went up to the front of the cabin, grabbed a fistful of paper towels from the lavatory, and calmly informed a flight attendant that there was a small child puking the hell all over my row.
It was as I made my way back that I surveyed the rest of the cabin. Full flight. Not a chance in Haedes of switching my seat, and 4 more hours left in the flight.
The mother turned to me and smiled. "Sorry about the smell."
It is here, chickens, that all the things about patience and "letting things go" that I have absorbed in countless church basement meetings took hold, because what I WANTED to say in reply was: "Yeah, sorry about your HELLSPAWN." Instead -- I simply smiled back. "Well, these things happen."
Paula met me at the Long Beach airport, resplendent in one of the matching set of Mr. Happy Crack shirts I'd bought for our birthdays last fall, and I promptly realized that I'd forgotten to pack mine. Fuck.
So, yeah, there are some crazy fuckin' signs in Los Angeles.
This one rather begs the question -- do they deliver? And if so, does a tiny-assed car pull up to your house, emptying out a dozen clowns bearing cases of Michelob?
lisamcc at 9:44 p.m.
4 comments so far
Gilgongo
2005-04-13 14:20:17
Los Angeles. Once you've suckled at her neon knockers you'll never get the taste of night out of your mouth.
-------------------------------
jerrbear
2005-04-13 15:21:32
Ooh, did you get to see The First McDonald's sign? That one's actually kinda obscene.
-------------------------------
Paula
2005-04-13 20:25:25
Oh yeah, the one with the huge neon cheeseburger head and the "swiveling" pants? 'Member that one, Lees?
-------------------------------
Lisa
2005-04-14 14:36:01
Is that the one where Maila Nurmi still hangs out at?
-------------------------------
Stumble It!
