Life: But The Cat Came Back

That my first day at the office was unusually hectic for them was a solid truth I would come to discover in attending my next three days of work. Everyone had more time to sit back and chat, I met new people, and learned new things. Relatively new, at least. I'd be a poor excuse for an art-school graduate if I didn't already know the vague concepts of scanning and copying things - but each machine is slightly different, so they took me through the steps.

As it turns out - and as most of you probably already knew or guessed - interning generally comes down to "sit over there, and if I need something I'll ask you". This is beneficial to all teams because they have an assistant who can do the time-consuming jobs they don't have the multitasking concentration for, and the interns get to sit at a desk and work on their own projects in the meantime. Meaning, no one's wasting time. Well, not too much. For a while there, I was nervous about opening something of my own, like I should be somehow more dedicated, but even asking if there was anything I could do brought up no responses so I began to relax.

Among my miscellaneous tasks during those first three days, I was asked to do a "run" - basically, I was asked to drive around on some errands. Mike gave me a Mapquest picture of an area and circled where I was to drop off a certain package, and also visit a nearby bank to pick up their money. He also requested that I not give into the urge to take this petty cash and make a run for the border. I made no promises ( but was fairly certain I didn't have the gas nor the patience to make it all the way to Mexico anyway; I didn't even consider Canada at the time. )



Since my task took me straight to Rodeo Drive, I was promptly in the midst of LA-style and immediately underdressed. By the third day, I'd gotten very used to wearing comfortable, warm clothes for the office, so being sent back out onto the streets reminded me of my lax wardrobe. Oh well. I was only the messenger.

Picking up money at the bank was a strange experience. Not because I felt suspicious standing at the teller waiting for them to confirm I really was from where I claimed I was from, but because as soon as I slid that plastic bag in my purse and walked outside, I was fairly certain everyone for miles could immediately sense that I was carrying very large sums of money. Even though I was underdressed. Kept me on my toes.

The second task was to drop off the package. Right. I had another little map that was to show me where, just a few blocks away, I could find a talent agency this package was meant for. Since I had to make a quick phone call to my ever-helpful mother to find out the street the map didn't name for me, she also took the time to inform me that this company catered to some high-minded individuals and I should keep my eyes open. Ah haha. Yeah, okay, mom.... ( but secretly I am keeping these eyelids peeled, man. )



There comes a moment where, once you know you're in Possible Sighting Territory, every single person that passes you by starts to look familiar. You catch yourself staring at completely random faces in an attempt to squint hard enough and turn them into some passer-by on some network show once. It really plays with your mind. As does hordes of cameras.

This discreet photo-taking opportunity of mine happened as I was strolling casually down the sidewalk and suddenly walked into this pod of camera people glued to the glass window of a Nail parlor. My furtive glance inside as I realized what was happening produced nothing of interest and I wasn't really of the mind to stop and geekishly ask them who they were waiting for, so I passed on and just flashed my phone at them as I went to get this reminder. They were still there later, freaking out as the person left the store, but all I saw was a woman with dark hair from the back. One of LA's paparazzi mysteries.





Driving back was full of traffic and more traffic, so I took my leisure time enjoying the sites. Including this incredibly large Bloomingdale's. These two quickly snapped pictures cannot really capture its grand size - or, at least, what I presume to be its size, unless it's part of a larger mall, but still. The building seriously loomed. And went on for a while in a wall of neutral cream off to the left. I also wondered if the store was actually on top of the parking ramp like it appeared, or if that hulking addition of hunk on top of it was just so they could more monstrously swamp their slightly less grandly sized font.



I also noticed this sign here. Maybe you can't read it, but it's an advertisement for a speech coach teaching people not to talk with their accents anymore. Found that pretty interesting, and not something I've ever really spotted anywhere else.



Speaking of which... driving along did not prepare me for this sight, either. Don't be fooled by the apparent skirt and bra - that is a man, as a surprised glimpse into my rearview mirror as I passed revealed to me. The bra conveniently opens up at the boob area, generously revealing man-nipples in all their glory for us.

Henceforth, this picture is dedicated to my friend, Owen. Not because he has sagging man-nipples and a penchant for bras... but because he has an appreciation for people who do. Rock on, Owen. Until China shuts you down.

Life & Hollywood: I Haven't Got Him

So I joined Twitter, right. This is just a small example of that community of crazy - an experiment, if you will. ( I also started watching "Glee", more on that later ) I happened to notice that hash-tags, or whatever these # things are called, sometimes show up on the sidebar, I guess by popularity that day. Anyway, I clicked on the #Glee one out of curiosity and sort of scanned through the options. Actually, I didn't even get that far - a couple of seconds if - and that little notice popped up. Since I'd clicked on the link, 53 more people had used that tag in their tweet. 53. .... fifty-three.

I know that's not a huge amount of people in comparison to how many there are in the world or anything, but, to me, that's still an impressive number to be talking about the same thing, using the tag, and all in the last second. Says something about the world. That I am now a part of.



Back to reality: I went in for my first, equally experimental, day at the production office. Naturally, I was nervous as all get out, but at least I knew the way there ( sort of ) and knew where I could park without feeding the meter ( I hoped ).



This is my noble stead, Red Three. It's a 2005 Chevy Aveo. I think. We got it at a Mazda dealer, so I am sometimes confused. The car's used, but the speedometer works and, really, that's all I can ask for. Also, not white. There's a super abundance of white cars in LA and, practicality and all that but, I'm sorry, I don't really like white on cars. ALSO, the radio face was already taken out so I'm gonna leave it in my room lest anyone come by hoping to steal such things. ALSO, it's cute. Come on. I fulfilled my main goal of getting a pretty short car so I could feel extra comfortable parallel parking anywhere, and it definitely worked.



So, after arriving for work an easy half an hour or more early, I chilled in my car then went up. This is what the courtyard looks like on the third floor - I'd been in this part before because of the interview. For the record, I still don't enjoy that the elevator doesn't light up the number floor it's on, but I have determined that it makes a loud, obnoxious beeping sound for every floor it passes, so. You just have to be paying attention. For loud obnoxiousness.

When I went in, things weren't crazy yet, lulling me into a false sense of security. ... Who am I kidding, it could've been a day spa, and I still would've been crying inside. The point is, things were quiet, almost no one else was in -- including the guy supposed to be "showing me around". Since all of the rooms are visible from the main one, it turned out later that this wasn't such a huge task for him, but oh well. I was given a script and told to sit in that intern room and read it. Can do.



I spent a good four+ hours in this room reading scripts, taking me through lunch-time, but not much after. For all that time, however, I sat here, on this couch, with this view. I could hear as other people came in and took phone-calls - let me say right now, I jumped every time the phone rang and my stomach dropped, even though the two planted in this room didn't ring on the same lines. So I wasn't even responsible for them yet and I was already dying whenever it happened. Go start, right?

Anyway, I went through the scripts. The first one was one they are currently putting through and the second one... I'm not sure. They're looking at? Maybe. He didn't have to write or give my opinion, so I just sort of took notes in my booklet just in case and moved on every time.



More view. The desk I decided not to use ( come on... couch! ), some movie posters that distracted me, and a SUCCESS! motivational list of things you should remember that just made me more nervous. Wooo, motivation.



This is the absurdly blank wall on the other side. I guess... that's supposed to be a window there. I don't know. The blank white boards on the floor remind me of art school and all the canvases lying about.

Lunch is at 1:00 PM, and you're given free reign until 2:00 to spend it how you please. I decided I would get out of that room, despite the decided comfyness of the couch, and take a stroll around the block. It was a gorgeous day, I'm in LA, why not, right? Here's your picture-guided tour of the neighborhood behind our building. I'm going to call this, Know What's Cool?: Eagle Dive. It has to do with housing architecture being so cool. Observe:









I don't know what these are, but I saw them under at least one or two trees while I went. There were others like them later on, but they were spiky instead of fuzzy. I think I like the fuzzies. They're like... baby tribbles. Or those dust-mites from Spirited Away. Whichever you prefer.



I think my phone camera has a finger-print on it...



Home-stretch! After this, I put my camera away and called my sister to wish you a happy birthday. Since all of that only took up about half of my time, I spent the rest of back in the room taking those earlier pictures you saw of my surroundings. Look at me, shaking all this chronology up. It's like I don't even recognize myself.

The rest of the day was probably even more dramatic than the first, because there was some deal that was supposed to have closed at 5, or then maybe it was 6 and then it was 20 after 6 and nobody knew what was happening yet. Lots of loud talking into the phone and listening in on other people's conference calls. Also it was more dramatic because I was technically "at the phones". This involved me sitting at a desk with nothing else to do but get the phone if Mike didn't get it first. Mike is, like, supernaturally fast at answering the phone, but sometimes he's already on it, or he's off doing something else. As it turned out, one of the other interns took pity on me and moved herself to a phone station after seeing my looks of desperation. So half the time, she got it instead, and I sort of just let her. I did answer it a few times, and had to be corrected twice on my protocol. I doubt anyone will remember those mistakes come next week, but I still found it in myself to be ashamed.

Anyway, that's how four more hours went by. Four hours. I was so nervous about the phone ringing that I couldn't even use the computer in front of me to browse the internet. Actually, that's a lie, I checked my mail, but then I didn't have anything to do that I didn't care about an entire office of people seeing me do, so. Yeah. I sat there. And hoped the phone wouldn't ring. Fun freakin' times. I'm clearly going to go far in this business.

I'm refraining from going into detail because apparently in Hollywood you should never tell anyone more than they have to know. That's what my intern pamphlet told me. Kind of like the show "Lost", where the first response is always "Doesn't matter." or, that failing, "It's not important."


THIS IS NOT HOW IT WORKS.

Since no one was telling me to go home or stay, I hovered around there until Mike dismissed us ( it was at 7:00 PM, a mere hour since I bothered to go move my car to parking that lasted later ). The other interns left at the same time, so we were able to chat it up a bit. We bonded some when I had to give my cell-phone number and no one recognized where my area code was from. Neither of them are from Cali either.

Driving home at night has an advantage of that there are far less pedestrians to be cautious about, but the disadvantage that it's darker and harder to notice streets you aren't used to yet. But I made it - clearly - and the trip seems to be getting shorter every time. Huzza.

Life: Estimated Time Till Destination

I didn't take this picture. I did, however, drive into ( and past ) LA to talk with the fine people at a production office today. Having been liberally warned about the state of California driving, I allowed myself an hour and a half to get to my destination which was clocked at being "29 minutes" away, without traffic. I looked up the directions beforehand so I'd generally know the freeways it would suggest without solely relying on my GPS, which I wouldn't be able to see at all times without staring obsessively at my lap and, well, common sense informs me that might not be the best technique on the road.

As it turned out, I still made several wrong decisions but, since the GPS had been telling me to head towards a street labeled "Buses Only" while a cop car drove steadily behind me, I'm okay with that. I also ended up making the route easier for myself, so, more power to wrongness. Making the various twists and turns and more turns and sharp turns and mergings that were required of me, I began to get the odd sensation like John Cleese ( my GPS voice of choice ) was attempting to teach me how to lose a tail instead of arrive at a destination.

At one point, I cheered up as I neared a street with several impressively sized studios with their featured movie posters displayed all along the side in larger-than-life form... but was led right past them. I was going to take a picture of these, but even as I began to pull out my cell-phone I remembered that using it in my car in California was one of those newly prohibited things, so I tossed it away. No studio photos for you. Sorry.

Once at the building, I did the vulture-circle dance around the block to find parking - most of it was residential and therefore off-limits without a permit - and eventually realized I was going past three craftily placed meters. Two of them appeared out of order, so I took the one in the middle that was not. Go me.

After nearly getting off the elevator on the wrong floor because it didn't display any numbers that told you what floor it was on, I arrived at Suite 306. I wandered inside and was asked by a man if I was there to meet 'Mike'. Oh, yes, I was. Oh, well, what do you know, he was Mike. Okay, great. Sit here on the couch? Sure, I'll do that.

THREE HOURS LATER -- no, just kidding. But, it was, like, thirty phone calls. Following the first handful of check-ins and reroutes, I started to wonder if this was some kind of test, was I expected to behave a certain way when left alone to wait. Should I look patient? Should I be... doing something to show I'm productive? Should I-- blarrrgh! What should I do?! ... So I was very importantly jotting down a map for myself about where I'd found the available parking when one of the men from the front office went in to help a woman claiming to be doing something involving the "three-act structure". Oh ho ho. But now my writer senses are tingling!

I shamelessly eaves-dropped on their conversation - come on, the door was still open and everything - when I heard the "f" word dropped. Several times.

... A sense of comfort and belonging fell over me in that moment.

No, but, really - casual swearing makes me feel better inside. 1) You can talk like yourself there, 2) They are normal people who talk like normal people. Pleasant conversation has its place, I'm not saying that, it's just nice to be able to relax in a work environment.

Anyway, I got in to have a chat with Mike and he laid out the basics of what interning would be like, where I could find free parking, etc, etc. Those important details. I drove home after that in the lovely backed up but not unmoving LA evening traffic, where I was glad for the slow pace because it allows me to get my bearings without people honking, and turn up my music because I don't need to hear the GPS as often. And maybe it's the slowness of the traffic already, but I found people to be fairly considerate so far when it comes to merging. They are, however, less considerate when they think you had time to make your right turn and you didn't.


In celebration of driving, I present the first installment of What Does This Remind Me Of: California Rivers



I spotted these particular structures the first time my parents and I were driving to our hotel. This view isn't very beneficial to the game, but what these are is cement "rivers" moving alongside the street that collect water when it rains. However, when they are dry, they are just "V"-shaped pathways conveniently out of traffic, sometimes when provided bike paths that perhaps... a bike, or a motorcycle... or a hijacked semi might travel.

Guess away, all 4 faithful blog-followers. What do these remind me of?

wish they all could be california girls

What's this? Is it... perhaps, my departure time for a flight to California, where I will be hacking out an experimental living for several months before destiny or bankruptcy claim me?

INDEED.

The general plan is to live at a friend's and/or find an apartment where I can do my best to find a job. The experience so far has been that people want you to be local so as to conduct instantaneous interviews. It is, indeed, easier for everyone to be in the same place, so I'm taking that first step. We'll see where it takes me.

Plane, housing, and car expenses are being helped along by my very supportive parents -- so, should it happen, I really owe them everything.


EDIT: Have now checked the weather in Pasadena. Sunny across the board. Highs above 80, lows above 50. Wtf, plane ticket, why aren't you for TOMORROW?

Seriously. This is what I'm working with ( courtesy of thefuckingweather.com. most accurate weather site ever )