June 2010
The Burns are fading
My nose looks like someone took a blow torch to it and the back of my neck is looks basically like a burn that occurred when a chip pan was thrown at me. I won’t ever sit near a burning ball of fire called the sun ever again.
The good news is I love LA and have met loads of awesome people, even the couple who had a big screaming domestic fight on our street (how dare they- we are posh) – but anyway this man and woman had a bust up.
How, I don’t really know as she owned a car and he was on a silver scooter, not an electric one, the kind you push with your feet and should give up doing when you hit puberty. She was a feisty big black lady and he was a skinny dreadlocked black man, they screamed at each other.
At first I thought she had hit him accidentally with the car but that’s wasn’t what happened- anyway they were on our street, him on his scooter and her in the car. I had to stand on a brick fireplace and put my ear to window and shoosh the kids to hear them, I wasn’t really interested but it was a slow blog day.
There is only so much sunburn you can write about.
She got out of her car and shouted at him, he grabbed her car keys and scooted off, she stomped about angrily and then the car sat on the road with its emergency lights flashing, then they both came back, made up, he put his scooter in the boot and the drove off with ‘All the Single ladies’ blasting out the stereo. I love Beyonce; she makes people love each other again.
So other than that I found a cracking sports bar near us and ate a hotdog, drank a beer and sat with big burly redneck looking men and screamed for The Dodgers. I pretended I was American and made wild gestures when things happened at the baseball game on the big screen. I didn’t know what was going on, but it’s easy to copy people when you are with them, you can become them and think like them. That’s probably how Bush got elected so many times; people just drank beer and copied each other.
It was great fun, I kinda want to grow a ponytail and own a flat back truck and swear at baseball on a regular basis, it may help when my menopause kicks in. You know how some women change when they go through their change of life; you know how some women take to knitting jumpers with fluffy tabby cats on the front and grow a small beard? Well I am going to start drinking beer and wearing plaid shirts and punching walls when am full of beer!
Other than that I met up with Gina Yashere who is a wonderful black female comic from London and we know each other from the UK comedy circuit. She is doing awesome in LA she has a regular slot on Jay Leno show and has had a Showtime comedy special, she is amazing. We had a cracking vegetarian lunch, that’s about as LA that I get…eating vegetables.
So I am off to have big adventures this weekend before I go home….watch this space.
Ooops, I got burnt
My favourite thing in Los Angeles is to take a bus, for those of you who saw my show last year you will know what I am talking about. Me and the loonies get on just fine and dandy and the buses are chockfull of loonies.
On the 702 bus there was big fight between a wee man with a walking stick and a driver who wouldn’t ask young Japanese students to get off the disabled seats.
The lame man screamed at the driver “I hate communicating with strangers, you tell the fucking gooks to get off the seats meant for disabled people”
The Japanese students sat en masse passively, they didn’t even blink when the disabled man screamed again at the driver “Tell those impolite fuckers to give me a seat I fought in Vietnam and these fuckers remind me of the gooks”
I sat there gobsmacked.
The driver tried to pacify him “Sir, you have to stop that racist screaming, just ask the kids to move, it’s not my job to tell people to give up their seats”
The disabled man with the stick fell onto the floor of the bus; the Japanese students took pictures of him on their phones. That made him much screamier than ever. Finally an older man who was with the load of Japanese students came down and told them to move, but they wouldn’t move off the seats, they clutched their Hello Kitty purses and big bags tightly refusing to budge.
I got up (of course I did) and helped up the shouty Vietnam Vet (if he was that) I gave him his stick and got him to his feet. I grabbed the tee shirt of one big student on the disabled seat and pulled him off, he didn’t resist, and he glared at me and took a photo of my angry face close up. I stood on his ultra white sneaker. At this point you may ask ‘how did you know they were Japanese?’ which is suggesting am racist, but they had a big tourist banner with them which said ‘Japanese Student Group’ and that cut out the guessing for me.
The students then all moved as one big group and trundled up to the back of the bus, their impoliteness annoyed me and most the girls were wearing mini kilts…why? I don’t know is the answer.
The Vietnam man with one eye and a penchant for casual racism shouted ‘Gooks’ at them. “Hey man stop that” I said to him. He looked at me and screamed “lesbian Scottish bitch”…apparently all Scottish women were lesbians and if I didn’t believe him he said “just look at Martha Stewart!”
I didn’t know she was Scottish or a lesbian but I know she’s been in jail, so what the hell do I know?
Either way I made it to Venice Beach after a 2 hour train/bus trip and then sat on the beach sweated off my factor 30 sun block and managed to burn my face and the back of my neck. I look like a chip pan melted my face.
I spent a whole night swathed in Aloe Vera and that stuff is magical, then I swapped to Sudocreme and now look less toasted and more burnished.
Day Three in LA and all is well
I have the most awesome room with a private loo…things are good. I went out for a walk on day two round the neighbourhood, here in Valley Village and basically there are no pavements or since am in the USA ‘sidewalks’ you are either treading on someone’s manicured lawn or walking on the road. The place is very white picket fence, I imagine there are wives in sticky out skirts making cookies and planning their own suicide in the midday heat. Apparently the ‘Valley’ is the porn making capital of Los Angeles…so who knows what is going on.
I passed a beautiful house and outside they had a yard sale, I have never seen one and decided to dive right in and pick through some nice stuff and believe me the dresses were cute. Just then a young skinny woman in a tight tee shirt and tiny denim skirt came rushing over shouting “What the hell are you doing lady?”
“Er…I thought it was a yard sale?” I said slowly replacing a white dress onto the coat rack.
“This is a film set and those are props, didn’t you see the big van and the lighting crew?” She screeched.
“No, am sorry I didn’t” I sloped off.
So, I presume some white picket porn was taking place and as usual I get in the way of some good sex.
The next day we headed down to Big Boy’s Diner which is a traditional burger joint that has an event every Friday, where classic cars and old fashioned vehicles line up to show off their ‘classic-ness’.
It was amazing, and there were rows and rows of proper old Americana blokes, with fat stomachs, grey pony tails and yard chairs watching people watching their cars.
It seems to be a whole community of folk who turn up to kick wheels, check out old cars and show each other what’s under their bonnets. I have never seen such clean engines, they are all impeccably smart.
One bloke watched me taking some photos and said “You like the cars?”
“Yes, they are pretty amazing eh?” I replied.
“This has been going on since 1958 round here and you know this is the place to pick up guys” he smiled. He was about sixty odd years old with a dyed quiff and a small Chihuahua on a lead.
“Really, this is a hot pick up joint?” I smiled trying to be cool.
“Yeah baby look” he said and with a flourish of his hand he showed me a bunch of really old men in giant denim dungarees with bad hips leaning on walking frames, propped beside cars that were vintage but not as old as them.
“Yeah….but the buffet is hardly fresh is it” I laughed and moved on taking more pictures.
Soon I am going to Venice Beach, my favourite place. It takes almost 2 hours on public transport but I don’t mind as a taxi cab is about $100 from the Valley and that’s just one way! You would think we were miles away from the coast but we aren’t – its just the traffic is so heavy.
Los Angeles has a crap transport system- the problem is there are no dedicated bus lanes to enable the buses through the city. The Metro trains which are awesome and cheap only go downtown (basically half way into the city) they trains don’t go down to the beach or anywhere near the coast. Which means you need to get the bus and it drags slowly through the city behind all the traffic and takes forever.
That’s my fault for not driving is all I can say but why does the city encourage everyone to drive? They don’t make it easy NOT TO!
The other night I went out to see Paul Provenza do his podcast at a small theatre, he is a cracking comic and has a book out called Satiristas! You must check it out. The same night I bumped into my old mate Rick Shapiro, I haven’t seen Rick in ages and he has good news about getting some acting work, in fact its awesome news and I will leave it to him to announce it.
Either way I am enjoying my time and still have adventures to take.
One Long Week.
A week to forget ?
A week to remember ?
Our workshop is a fridge in the winter
and a greenhouse in the summer.
We have been busy and hot.
Which may have contributed to me waking up tuesday feeling groggy.
My body stiffened up rapidly and every part of me hurt.
Weird.
To my rescue came the girls next door.
The most painful, deep and releasing massage ever.
Then I slept for two hours and went back to work.
(I sat still and did nothing - couldnt)
The next day ?
Back to normal.
(whatever that is ?)
Opened an email from my daughter, Grace.
Our communication has been scant and poor.
She was angry - again...
Blah blah.
Shouted at in the street by the Tops Pizza manager.
'Bad man come here'
I guess he read one of my blogs.
I didnt.
His words made me think I am his perfect mirror.
More to come on that one, Im sure.
But, Friday, flee the city and spend time with the girlie.
Relax cool down sleep.
Yahoo.
But Abbies breast is lumpy and she has had pain.
And I cant get no sleep.
L A’s fine the sun shines most the time
I have arrived…in Los Angeles. The flight was amazing, as I got upgraded to club class and lay down, slept, nibbled on lobster…had a reaction, took an anti histamine and slept more. Yes, rock and roll hives that’s my life. I know I can’t eat shell fish, but it was too good not to itch over is all I am saying.
On landing in LA you have to wait ominous queues to get through customs and every second woman was a wee Indian lady in ethnic dress with no command of English and the Americans just pissed themselves with excitement holding them back and shouting out “Can anyone speak Urdu?”
A woman from the back of the queue came forward and translated. I laughed, as it doesn’t take high intelligence to understand that if they are using passengers on the same flight as people to translate the potential ‘immigrant liars’ then…who knows…isn’t this an old plot line from 24?
Anyway more queues happened. We then had to line up to get out of the airport and get more immigration checks. My mate Daryl was on the other side waiting on me as he was driving me to my friend’s house. I couldn’t call Daryl as there is no signal to use phones in immigration.
Anyway I finally got out of the airport and INTO the HEAT of LA.
Daryl and his lovely girlfriend and I had a leisurely drive up to my mate’s house, which by the way is amazing. They have a pool and I have a new swimming costume…what’s not to love?
So I have had a full nights sleep, had some nice food and am now sitting by the pool deck writing a blog. By the way I heard England managed to score a goal….is that actually true?
Lots of stuff to say
London was awesome and I am now home. I stayed in the Groucho club which has rooms and they are awesome. It really isn’t as noisy as it used to be since they redecorated, and the beds are just…dreamy!
Staying right in the heart of Soho has its plusses and negatives, for one you are so central your name could just be called LONDON the down side is the madness that you witness going for a midnight stroll.
When you live in Soho you have to accept the place and not be too snooty about what you see with your own eyeballs.
For one, the homeless who beg on your doorstep will engage, harass and bug you and blame you for being ON THEIR PATCH…and I fully accept that. They were there before you. They need money and you clearly have it…so come on fat lady pay up! I don’t give cash anymore to the people who beg, not because I am some snooty up my own ass capitalist, but because there is a credit crunch on and they don’t like pennies being foisted on them. They look at your petty change the way Prince Phillip looks at Chinese people but without the casual racism.
“Can you give me £4 to get into a hostel?” one man asked.
“No, sorry I can’t give you four pounds, would you like fifteen pence?” I replied.
“You Scottish tight fisted fuckwit” he snapped at me, his dog even sneered.
I was insulted, spat at and harangued by a fake poet who claims to be the ‘Bard of Soho’ I have to give him cash for his really shit poems, apparently he couldn’t make a rhyme out of my suggestion of ‘I am paying ten grand for a fringe show why don’t you give me cash for my art’.
He kicked me on the back…yes…he lifted his heroin abscessed leg and booted my back, leaving my white linen shit filthy. I accepted the mark gracefully and wore the boot stain with pride. I felt accepted.
Now before you think am giving Soho a bad name, there is the amazing side to it. The sheer buzz, the noise, the lights, the fabulous west end shows, the gay men who promenade, the children who play footie in the street, the ‘models’ who ply their wares with gusto and the total London vibe with of all manners of life sitting cheek by jowl with the fancy restaurants, private clubs and sex shops. I love it.
I love watching the black cabs trying to run down the ‘illegal unlicensed uninsured’ rickshaws that peddle their business in central London. Taxi cabs HATE them and if you ever want to hear a taxi driver swear talk about them….they go MENTAL…its fun.
The Groucho club itself is awesome, but you are not allowed to talk about what happens inside it; finally I feel like I am a mason and have a secretive code to abide by. You can’t take photos or mention famous people or twitter about them or give information about what happens inside, to be honest nothing bad happens, its not Sodom and Gomorra…its just famous people having drinks with non famous people like me sitting about.
Suffice to say I met a musical hero and called him by the wrong name, I am crap at being amongst very famous people. Two things happen, I either think I know them personally because I have seen them on telly or I don’t know them at all and get them mixed up with someone I went to school with. I am no Perez Hilton. I am more ‘Magrit the over friendly cleaner’.
The worst thing is-when you pop out for a ciggie and chat to some anonymous bloke and the paparazzi turn up and flash into his face, blinding you and leave you wondering who the hell you just spoke to!
But all in all Soho is an amazing place and if I ever wanted to live somewhere it would be right there, so I can understand why the homeless like it so much. Like the late Robert Palmer once sang ‘It takes every kind of people’.
Publishing of the Book
Finally got the book, Juan Ponce de Leon His new and Revised genealogy published.
You can go to Google Book Search and type in the book's title to get a limited preview of the book there:
Type in: Juan Ponce de Leon His new and Revised Genealogy or copy and paste this above within your browser.
I also have the book within Barnes and Nobel. Again, all you have to do is to type in the title of the book.
Enjoy!
My Life and it is
I think am not a bad daughter, I try hard to make sure I get to see my dad and talk to him most days. He has been widowed for over a year now and he is a bit lost. Last week I popped into town, I had called dad but he wasn’t in, he goes out most days. Just as I walked down Buchanan street, I spotted him on a street bench and he was talking to a wee old woman.
They were nodding and chatting, they looked like strangers talking but still they were at ease with each other. As I approached him, my heart thudded as I thought “My God, he is so lonely he is talking to a strange wee lady, it’s my fault he has no one to speak to, I never visited him enough”
“Hi dad” I said and he got up laughing and said “this is my beautiful daughter, what a surprise, I didn’t know you were in the country”
My dad is used me not always being in Scotland, despite me telling him constantly my movements, he still gets surprised even when I land on his doorstep.
The wee woman smiled and got up saying goodbye, she made room for me to sit with him.
“You ok Da?” I asked him.
“Yes, I needed a wee rest, I was meeting up with my buddies earlier and fancied a wee coffee and sit down, the weather is good eh?” he answered.
“You are not terribly lonely are you?” I asked him nodding towards the wee lady who trotted off down the street.
He looked at me and said “I did speak to people before you were born, I know how to chat to folk, and no I am not that lonely I have taken to harassing pensioners”
I laughed and he laughed and we sat there in the street catching up with each other. I miss him and worry terrible that I am not with him enough or doing enough. He has an adorable step daughter who visits him and looks after his shopping needs. I am grateful to her beyond belief.
“Are you still a comedian?” he asked me, (he does this all the time, it’s our private joke)
“Yes, I am and are you still an old man obsessed with wheelie bins?” I replied.
“Aye I am” he sniggered.
Today I called him and we chatted again. I thought what it would be like not to be able to see him in the street of be able to call him up. I think about him all alone in his house or sitting in the dark missing my step mum and I get so upset. I hope I am a good daughter, I hope he doesn’t think I have no time for him in my busy life.
I was once told that the best thing you can give an elderly relative is your time, they just want some of your time to spend it with you.
I am lucky I have a good dad and am going to see him tomorrow.
Meanwhile life is consumed by all things Edinburgh Fringe…getting posters made, hiring a flyering team and making sure all is well with my to-do list. I dream about the to-do list as husband makes me add and amend it constantly. His Aspergers makes him wake up at 5am and say “Did you write down that thing I told you to” and I stare at him in the dark and say “What thing?” and then he starts switching on lights and fumbling with a pen. Yes, my life is truly awesome.
Am off to London this weekend to work and to catch up with pals, if you fancy a peek at my show listings for Edinburgh here are the links.
The Godley Hour At:http://tinyurl.com/35kubr4
Tall Storrie Wee Godley At: http://tinyurl.com/32cad3p
Pentagon Arrests Wikileaks Whistleblower
I didnt think the Pentagon would be so stupid to go after Wikileaks.
How wrong was I ?
Pentagon officials have announced the detention of Army private Bradley Manning, as well as stepped-up efforts to locate Julian Assange, the founder of the WikiLeaks web site, in a security crackdown sparked by the release of politically damaging video of a US military massacre in Iraq.
On June 7, Defense Department officials confirmed that Manning was in confinement in Kuwait “for allegedly releasing classified information.” Three days later, Pentagon investigators told the web site Daily Beast that they were looking for Assange in connection with the Manning investigation. The Australian-born WikiLeaks founder had scheduled speaking engagements in New York City and Las Vegas last week, but canceled them, citing “security considerations.”
WikiLeaks, which solicits leaks of government and corporate criminality worldwide and makes them public to a global audience on the Internet, published a decrypted and edited version of the video footage in April, using a special web site entitled “Collateral Murder.” The original video was shot by the US military in 2007 in the course of a helicopter assault in eastern Baghdad which left some 15 people dead, including two Reuters journalists.
The video and the accompanying voiceover of radio traffic, in which American soldiers joked about exterminating Iraqis, sparked widespread international outrage and a furious counterattack by the American military/intelligence apparatus. Defense Secretary Robert Gates denounced the release of the video, although he conceded that the footage was produced by the US military and had not been doctored.
According to press accounts, Manning was detained May 26 after he made the mistake of confiding in an online acquaintance, Adrian Lamo, an experienced hacker. Manning told Lamo that, in the course of his work as an Army military intelligence analyst at Forward Operating Base Hammer, east of Baghdad, he had been able to acquire a vast stockpile of internal military and State Department documents and communications, including the original footage from which “Collateral Murder” was produced. Lamo turned Manning in to the Army and FBI.
Manning is reportedly being held at a military facility in Kuwait. Several computer hard drives taken from him arrived in Washington Thursday and are now being analyzed by government computer experts to determine what documents Manning downloaded and what he did with them.
Manning enlisted in the Army in 2007 and held a Top Secret/SCI clearance. He reportedly told Lamo that he had been looking through military and government networks for more than a year and found “incredible things, awful things… that belonged in the public domain, and not on some server stored in a dark room in Washington DC.”
Besides the video which became “Collateral Murder,” Manning said he supplied WikiLeaks with a second video showing a May 2009 US air strike near the village of Garani in Afghanistan, in which more than 100 people were killed, including many children.
The main focus of the military/FBI investigation is Manning’s claim to have downloaded some 260,000 secret diplomatic cables, which he described as showing “almost criminal political back dealings.” Manning added, according to an e-mail to Lamo, “Hillary Clinton and several thousand diplomats around the world are going to have a heart attack when they wake up one morning and find an entire repository of classified foreign policy is available, in searchable format, to the public.”
WikiLeaks has denied being in possession of the 260,000 secret cables. Assange has reportedly offered to help finance Manning’s legal defense.
The detention of Manning and the pursuit of Assange must be opposed by all those who defend democratic rights. The American people, and the people of the entire world, have a right to know of the crimes committed by the American military/intelligence apparatus under the orders of the American president.
The attack on WikiLeaks and its collaborators is part of a broader security crackdown by the Obama administration. As reported by the New York Times this week, the White House has decided to go ahead with the prosecution of Thomas Drake, a whistleblower at the National Security Agency, who sought to expose financial mismanagement at the NSA by providing information to a reporter for the Baltimore Sun.
According to the Times article, “The indictment of Mr. Drake was the latest evidence that the Obama administration is proving more aggressive than the Bush administration in seeking to punish unauthorized leaks. In 17 months in office, President Obama has already outdone every previous president in pursuing leak prosecutions.”
This stepped-up crackdown on leaks came the same week as the issuance of a report by Physicians for Human Rights that doctors working for the CIA collaborated with interrogators who conducted torture of prisoners. The doctors monitored the torture sessions to make sure the prisoners did not die—so they could be interrogated and tortured further—and to refine the methods used to make them more painful and effective. The report’s title speaks for itself: “Experiments in Torture: Human Subject Research and Evidence of Experimentation in the ‘Enhanced’ Interrogation Program.”
The Obama administration is striving to plug leaks, not out of concern that the lives of American soldiers could be endangered, as it habitually claims, but for the same reasons that motivated the Bush administration: top government officials—in the Pentagon, CIA, NSA and in the White House itself—could face war crimes charges, either in the United States or before an international tribunal, based on the evidence produced by such revelations.
Relatives of those killed in the helicopter gunship attack in Iraq criticized Manning’s detention. Nabil Noor-Eldeen, whose brother Namir was one of the Reuters employees killed in the assault, told the press, “Justice was what this US soldier did by uncovering this crime against humanity. The American military should reward him, not arrest him.”
Manning is not a criminal, but someone evidently motivated by revulsion against the crimes committed by “his” military and “his” government. The World Socialist Web Site joins with all those demanding that Manning be released without any charges being brought against him. We further demand the dropping of all efforts to investigate and suppress the activities of Julian Assange and other WikiLeaks activists.
Patrick Martin
Cut and pasted from The World Socialist Web Site
BMW R80 RT - London
A customer turned up with a running issue on his BMW R80 rt.
BMW couldnt solve the problem without spending loads of money on it.
(ie swapping parts rather than diagnosing the problem)
In desperation he found his way to us.
Three hours later, he left with the problem sorted.
I do love it when we can help people and their bikes.
But why is there such a dearth of good mechanics in London ?
Kinglake Motorcycles
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