Time and Eric Awesome Show Live

Last night I got to go to Tim and Eric Awesome Show Live 2009 and I was not disappointed. I was a little uneasy with the idea of the comedic duo performing live, but I should’ve known better. With Bob Odenkirk lending his experience and support, the show had all the polish and lustre I could have hoped for.

It was my first time to Club Nokia (or to LA Live for that matter) and we got slightly disoriented finding the venue. Parking was relatively inexpensive ($10, compared to the $25 I’d normally pay to park near Staples on the night of a Lakers game) and plentiful, just a short walk from the center of the complex.

We had to dodge a large crowd queued up for the Conga Room, and got to peek inside the Lucky Strike Lounge.

I really enjoyed the performance. I won’t ruin the ending, but let me just say I’m seriously considering buying a hot tub.

Some PERY History

I just found this neat little piece of info.

For a while now I’d been aware that the big bus depot down in Venice was originally built as a train depot for the old trolley lines. You can still see the railroad tracks on Rose between Main and Pacific, as well as in a few other spots. I’ve been reading that there was also a spot in south Santa Monica where another train depot had been located. There’s no obvious evidence of it now. The Pacific / Neilson thoroughfare had originally been reserved for the Pacific Electric trolley (hence the name Pacific Avenue).

I found this on the MTA website:

There was another facility beside the Ocean Park Car House with a yard on Ashland Street, north of Kinney Avenue, between the Trolleyway (now Neilson Way) and Main Street. It was used to store Pacific Electric buses (probably the Brentwood line) and the Los Angeles Motor Coach Co. line to Santa Monica. There was a building at 174 Kinney Ave, Ocean Park, just inside the Santa Monica city limits that still existed in 2001. The other end of the building was on Pier Ave, which might have been the Ocean Park station for Pacific Electric service. The original Kinney Avenue street name is for Abbot Kinney, the visionary who founded Venice as a resort. Just south in Venice there is an Abbot Kinney Blvd (formerly Washington Blvd.). The Venice Short Line buses operated out of this facility from 1950 to 1951.

Updated: I think this might be a photo of that railyard.

Obama’s Legacy: Cleaning Up After 43

I just read this article over at Salon.

I’m a little bummed. I guess, somewhat, because, after the re-election in 2004, I knew this would be the best possible scenario. That after trashing a budget surplus and a supersizing a downsized defense budget, the 43rd POTUS was going to leave my country in such a mess that even if a really great guy got elected, he wasn’t going to be able to do much good. We probably wouldn’t get to address universal healthcare or greenhouse gas emissions. We’d be too busy fixing everything that got messed up over the last eight years.

No, the legacy of Obama is probably going to be cleaning up the mess left by the administration of the 43rd President. With a little luck, we might get things back to 1999 levels just in time for another neo-con administration to steal its way into the White House.

Don’t get me wrong, I think 41 did a heckuva job in his four years in the Oval Office. He seems like a nice enough guy, even if he is an elitist member of the ruling class. I don’t think I’d shun my legacy if I’d be born to a US Senator from Connecticut. Even Nixon, the former arch-nemesis of the left, seems like, if anything, a victim of a system that had grown so out of control that it needed to chew up a commander in chief. The war crime atrocities of which it’s purported that he’s responsible, don’t seem as nasty compared to the invasion of Iraq, Abu Ghraib and the Extraordinary Rendition program.

And that’s just on the foreign policy side. I’m not even going to get into the domestic stuff.

I’ll start stress-eating again.

The Power of Christ Compels You – To Get the F*$% Out of My Way!

Last night I was heading back from a quick post-workday trip to run some errands. This was somewhere around 5:15. Exciting stuff. I had to hit up the locksmith to get a copy of the laundry room key. And I desperately needed to pick up some toilet paper.

Like I said, action packed.

Anyway, keys and TP in hand, we headed back to my apartment in Ocean Park, taking the Colorado to Main St. route through south Santa Monica. This is the very northernmost part that goes in front of the city hall and the municipal courthouse. It was just around the start of rush hour.

We were waiting to turn left behind a half-dozen cars at the intersection of Main Street and Colorado Avenue. Right when the light turned green I heard what sounded like a little honk come from behind me. I glanced in the rearview and saw a little A3 back there. I wasn’t holding them up and, not having anywhere to go, I just proceeded through the intersection with the rest of the traffic.

I always closely match the speed limit through that part of Main Street, mostly because it sits right in front of the Department of Public Safety, which is the closest thing to a police station we have in the city, but also because there is one of those DIY radar guns sitting across from city hall. If one were to get pulled over, the I-didn’t-realize-how-fast-I-was-going excuse goes right out the window.

Apparently, that was not nearly speedy enough for the woman in the car to my rear. I normally don’t even like bumper stickers that close. Right as we started passing in front of RAND the honking restarts. I’m treated to the added bonus of flashing high beams. Like we’re on the autobahn and she’s going to pass me at twice my speed. The posted speed limit through here is 30 mph. I might have been going 3 mph slower than that.

At this point, I’m thrilled to let this woman pass me. I pull into the center turning lane (as if I were going to turn left into a driveway) and she zooms past me. Zoom zoom zoom. Around the corner and four-hundred feet away. All the way to the limit line at the next intersection. Where the light has turned red.

I pulled up next to her. She’d pulled the sun visor down and to the left to partially block her face. I tried my best to establish communication, but it was useless. She was not having it. I did get the opportunity to appreciate the nice crucifix she had dangling from her rear view mirror. It appeared to be made of wood and humble.