MY LATE-NIGHT NAUGHTY DIARY
I really do UPDATE my diary of True Tinseltown Tales EVERY DAY. Meaning, once within a 24-hour period. Usually. XXOO -- Rachole
Oct. 29, 2003 3:02 pm - What, and Leave All This?
The world-famous Griffith Observatory and Hollywood Sign! What, you can't see it? Don't feel bad, no one else can either.
 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to sunny California!
This is LA yesterday. The entire city is coated in smoke and ash from the 10 massive wildfires scorching their way across Southern California. Arsonists, ladies and gentlemen; only the finest reside here!
I feel like absolute ass. I can't breathe, my head hurts, my chest is burning. I feel so sorry for old people, sick people, little kids. This is absolutely horrible. It's like waking up on Mars, and the atmosphere, as you knew it, has been replaced by something else. Maybe gasoline.
The whole place smells like ash and burning plastic and rubber. I can't wait to get out of here. I'm so lucky to be leaving! I just feel guilty leaving behind Mr. Tacos and Charles Van Doren. Well, and everyone else in Southern California.
I'm sorry I won't be able to post during my three weeks in Spain. I'll try my best...but probably not. Adios!
 "Fine, go. No, really. Just run off and have a great time in Barcelona while we're choking in the ash, ya fuckin' asshole."
Oct. 29, 2003 12:25 am
My Tee Vee gets no channels. It lacks cable and an antenna. When you turn it on, it makes the sound of wind sweeping across the plains. It gets no picture like the kind you're used to from Tee Vees. However, if you close your eyes and just listen, it does provide you with an image: a sun-bleached bovine skull in the sand, wind whistling through the sockets.
I could listen to that sound forever. I never get tired of it. That sound takes me out of the confines of my little apartment and plunks me on the road to Vegas, or Utah, or the Grand Canyon. It's a cosmic vacation activated just by pressing the "power" button.
It's a huge, bulky Tee Vee, too. It's almost 20 years old. When it came out, it was the biggest, most testosteroney Tee Vee money could buy. It weighs about 5,000 pounds and it's so 1986. It's the mullet of Tee Vees. It probably came with its own hair gel.
This Tee Vee didn't belong to me. It belonged to a bad-tempered ex-boyfriend I lived with in the early '90s. When you took his picture, he always made the "hang loose" sign, and craned his neck so his face looked thinner and more defined. Insecure and angry: a dangerous combination. If he wasn't so homophobic, he would've made a great queen.
He used to yell and break shit and push me around. He had nice qualities too, but not enough. And too much rage. When we split up, I kept the Tee Vee 'cause I thought he owed me. He might have agreed 'cause he didn't try to get it back. Which was weird, 'cause this Tee Vee was his pride and joy. Or more like his alter ego... except the Tee Vee never tried to push my face in.
Anyway, I enjoyed owning this Tee Vee in a nyah, nyah, nyah-nyah, nyah! way, 'cause of the knowledge that I had taken it from him. It was my trophy. Plus, I had Cable.
Years later, the Tee Vee has become something else entirely. It hasn't gotten reception in over a year. It no longer brings me a satisfying feeling of vengeance, nor Sex & the City. Instead, it broadcasts the eternal. Shhhhhh, it says every time I turn it on. Shhhhhh. Reminding me how much of life is dried-up dung; ancient history that we insist on holding onto, even at the expense of our own peace. Why not just let it blow away? Why do we think we need it?
I've learned so much from my Tee Vee. It transforms everything.
Oct. 28, 2003 1:53 am
I went to Planned Parenthood today for some routine maintenance. Yes, at my age, I still go to Planned Parenthood. I also buy Wet 'N WildTM cosmetics for a dollar apiece at the drugstore, which were never intended for anyone other than 14-year-olds and crack whores. Why? 'Cause my dreams haven't come true for me, that's why.
For those of you who haven't been fortunate enough to experience Planned Parenthood, here's what a visit normally entails:
1. Drive 'til you find the dirtiest, dingiest, schlockiest strip mall you've ever seen. Wait 12 minutes for a space to open. Park.
2. Press the button for the elevator. The clinic's only on the second floor, but in all your years of coming here, you've never been able to find any evidence of a stairwell. And let's face it, it's probably for your own good. While you're waiting forever for the elevator to come, study the color-copied poster taped to the wall. It's a snapshot of a dark-haired, dark-eyed man, woman, and 5-year-old girl. Then, scrawled across the page: MISSING. Reward for Information. 323-487-9375. Who's missing? you wonder. The child? The whole family? Goosebumps form on your arms. Then you jump and scream 'cause something right near you has just groaned in agony: "Aaaaaahhhh." Oh -- it's just the elevator shuddering onto the ground floor. The doors open and you walk in, whirling around so the thugs or demons or whatever are waiting to stab you in the back or strangle you can't do it. You punch "2" over and over and over, 22222222222 until a sharp pain shoots up your finger. The doors slowly "Aaaaaahhhh" shut. Inside the scariest elevator in the world, a filthy fluorescent light hums above the cracked plastic protective panel. Graffitti covers the walls of the 'vator. Trash litters the floor. Today it's Jack in the Box containers and a tragic, melted chocolate ice cream cone. Ghosts from a thousand murders share the ride with you, and you're certain that you've just caught syphilis from all of them.
3. Vault from the elevator when the doors open and hit the buzzer so the nice ladies in the clinic can let you in for your appointment while (hopefully) keeping the nutbag, Molotov cocktail-wielding, anti-abortion Soldiers of Christ out.
4. Enter a 110-degree waiting room and meet eyes with several wilted women and girls. It's hard times for Planned Parenthood -- especially under this present administration, if you haven't been reading the fricking paper like at all -- and they can only use the precious AC in the back of the clinic, where it matters the most.
5. Get your first round of paperwork and get ready to wait 4 freaking hours for a simple refill.
6. Pick the seat you're gonna be sitting on for the rest of the day very carefully. You want one that's out of the blazing sunlight, yet also with the fewest disturbing stains on the fabric seat. It's harder than you think, 'cause every single one of them has the telltale, dark-ringed stain of some kind of human seepage. Every one! Were these chairs recycled from a home of incontinent elderly? Or perhaps from abortion post-op, where the poor girls were never given the sanitary pads necessary after such a procedure. As I said, it is hard times at the P.P.
7. As you fill out the form, chuckle at the questions that shouldn't make you laugh anymore, you've only been reading them for the last half of your life, you should be used to them by now. But you do laugh. You always do, 'cause they make you feel soooo hilariously old!
"Is it okay to call you at home?"
"Should we use a fake name? Alias: ____"
"Will your mom get mad?"
Come to think of it, my mom would get mad. "You're 30-something years old and you're still going to Planned Parenthood?" she might say. "Could you get it together for once and fuck someone who could actually take care of you and send you to a real doctor? Do that for your father and me."
8. For the next four hours, i) call all your friends on your cell phone, ii) make To Do lists for your upcoming trip, iii) pay all your bills, iv) try not to read the battered People, Oprah, or Cosmo magazines flung around the room; they always make you feel like you've had a head injury, v) listen to the conversations of the other women in the room. They're a pretty friendly group today; the kind you'd invite to a party if you ever had one. Consider going around the room and getting their email addresses, then decide against it. vi) visit the restroom and pick your face in the mirror for five minutes. Note that, as always, the rolls of toilet paper are still sitting on the floor, and, as always, the perfectly-working, wall-mounted toilet-paper holder is empty. vii) Repeat 4.78 times.
9. FOUR HOURS LATER, walk out of the clinic with the goods. A surge of triumph... then emptiness. You needed to get so many things done. This sucked up the whole day. Wait 18 minutes for the car trapping you in your parking space to back up and let you leave. Start fantasizing about different varieties of mixed drinks. Much better.
Oct. 25, 2003 9:36 pm - Finally, for the Spaniards!
For over a month, I've wanted to put this up for the lovely Spanish people I'm about to visit, but I didn't know how, and dicked around 'til my friend Jeff finally converted the video for me tonight. So... Hey! Wanna see me and my fellow comedian friend Maria Bamford talking all Spanish and shit? Of course you do!
Maria Bamford is a brilliant comedian who just got back from touring England. She's my buddy and neighbor, too. If she's ever playing in your town, don't f*cking miss her! (I use an asterisk around her 'cause she's a classy f*cking lady.)
Oct. 25, 2003 1:44 am - House of Pies: Home of the WORST Pie!
I just met my friends Kevin and Tammy at "House of Pies", an all-night diner in LA. Though I've had many chances to go to House of Pies, I never do, because, simply said, their pie sucks elephant balls. Their pie is so bad, it's like a mockery of pies. Actually, it's more like a blatant fuck you to pies. Maybe in ten years, when the neighborhood's even hipper, the new, punky owners will change the name. Then the revolving sign will still have that big, steaming pie, but with a middle finger rising out of it, and the words, "Fuck You Pies". Or maybe just a pair of delicious, succulent elephant balls...in a flaky pastry crust. I'm telling you, their pies would taste better if they did have elephant balls in them. They have the worst pies!!!
So what did I have? Pie.
Sorry this is it for tonight, and I'm sorry I made you hungry, but all of Southern California is currently on fire, and I don't feel well. I can't get enough air. Earlier today, a shitload of cigarette smoke began wafting into my apartment. It annoyed me. So I went outside to see who was smoking outside my window. You know who it was? All of California, that's who. Hollywood's just one big fucking ashtray!
And then there's the cinders on everything. Yeah, real cinders, polluted fallout from the sky, which has gone from blue to pus-yellow. Happy holidays. It's so 9-11, but not. It's like Mother Nature's little 9-11!
That means, in retalition, we should attack. Who? The oceans, who else? 'Cause they've got to have something to do with the forest fires. We've got evidence that the manatees were obtaining BicTM lighters to set the Santa Anas afire. Actually, that "evidence" was bullshit based on bad intelligence, and i was supposed to take that 16-word sentence out, but there was an oversight. Oh well! Welcome to World War 3, SoCal style. Now that we're in we might as well kick ass. So what if the octopi don't want us there? As far as I'm concerned, now that we've stirred shit up, I'd just as soon bail and let all them sea creatures kill each other. Good riddance. Besides, my family has a scuba-diving franchise that we've been looking to expand into an worldwide oceanic monopoly, so it's all working out pret-ty sweet!
Anyway, that's why I feel like ass tonight and tonight's entry is ass, but maybe before I leave for Spain I'll tell you a good story, like the one about when I was accused of date rape. Maybe that'll bring it back up to snuff, but goodnight for now, children.
Oct. 24, 2003 12:20 am - Why, Lord, Why?
I just spent the last 2 hours in Photoshop agony over this bloody image: Why, Lord. Why? Why do I waste my time so?
Because I'm making bizness cards for Spain! Woo-hoo!
Today's results from the Caption Contest:
"Looks like the auditing process at the L. Ron Hubbard center just got a whole lot sexier..." -Jonathan
1) Poster for SEX LAB '64!
2) Patricia Arquette leeches soul from personal trainer, stays youthful forever
3) "'Sentimental Journey', in G flat. HIT IT, DEBBIE!"
4) "You're sure this is the House of Pies?" -Skipp
Send in your caption! Everyone's a winner!
Oct. 21, 2003 11:29 pm - I'm Turning Into Dr. Phil!
This lady's letter blew me away. It really made me happy.
Hey Rachel,
I just wanted to drop you a quick little diddy of a note to let you know how cool I think you are. Your album has single-handedly pulled me out of my post-partum depression and made me feel oh-so-happy. So, many many thanks to you and the Smileytown Boys! I think the best thing about your songs is that I can tell you are smiling while you sing them...and that makes me smile too! Plus, the jumpy music and happy-voice makes my little 8 month old son very happy in the backseat. He always smiles when I sing, "I'm happy to be happy all da time!"
Thanks so much. My only lament is that I live on the eastcoast and alas will probably never see you live. I'll keep checking your website just in case.
Thanks,
Kim (& Baby Max)
This is nice, 'cause it compensates a little bit for how unhappy it makes my own mother...
Thought you'd enjoy this pic as much as I do. Caption Contest, Everybody!
"This'll cure your lesbian tendencies once and for all, Jenny!"
Oct. 21, 2003 11:26 pm
Today on my walk, I saw that someone had put a nice dresser out on the street. "FREE" the sign said. I need a dresser. So I walked home and came back with my car, but it wouldn't fit. So I came back with a hand truck and carted the dresser through the hills in the blazing sun back to my apartment. I did it barefooted. I looked like a dirty hippy. (My sandals were getting too sweaty and slippery, making me lose my footing on the steep hills.) Sweat streamed down from my head to my feet. Then I went to tap dancing class.
This working from home thing is fucking awesome.
Oct. 21, 2003 2:01 am - My Life as a Commercial
This probably isn't the most exciting stuff to hear, but I had a very nice day. I shot a commercial (my first ever), a holiday spot for an international home improvement retailer that I'll just refer to as "Hearth Station". I was dressed in a wool sweater, a down winter jacket, hat, scarf, mittens, and boots. And it was 90-something degrees outside. What I'm saying is, when Steve the sound guy went down the back of my pants to wire me, I deeply regretted my choice of nylon panties. (These panties have a history, too, which is in the June 30th entry and also includes my sociopolitical Stance On Panties, or "SOP".) But maybe they helped me sweat out a couple pounds. Oh, I hope, i hope!
We shot at a Cape Cod-style home in Beverly Hills or Bel Air or one of those rich neighborhoods. They put fake snow & Xmas lights on the house. They covered the lawn in plasticky sheeting and then dumped snow all on top of it. It was amazing. The weirdest thing was the white foam "snow" they sprayed on the tree, which after a half hour started to melt like hair mousse, glopping off the trees onto the cameramen's heads. It was gross. It made me want a hot fudge sundae.
When I auditioned for this, there was no script. I was asked what I like most about Hearth Station. I said the paint aisle, where they have the reject paints that they sell for like $5 a gallon. I talked about how you never know what colors they're gonna have, and how I went crazy with the colors, and now my roommate's complaining that the apartment looks like Pee Wee's Playhouse.
This is a true story, with one minor variation: I don't have a roommate. But I used to. Ya see, where I live now used to be my ex-husband's apartment. This is the place he moved into when we split up. Then he decided to move back to NY, and I moved into the apartment 'cause it's incredibly cheap. But it used to be an office, so it was all an awful, blinding white. So I bought the paints from Hearth Station (yes, I really did!) and went to work. Bless his heart, he let me start painting the place a month before I moved in, while he was still living here. Instead of painting with a roller, I'd just dip a kitchen sponge in paint and press it onto the walls, so they look like they're covered in freaky wallpaper. One day my ex came home from work. I'd just finished covering the room with yellow ovals. He took a good, long look around the room and asked, "Are you ovulating?". Then he added, "I feel like I'm living in Pee Wee's Playhouse." So thanks to him, I got the inspiration for that riff at the audition, which led to the commercial.
The funny thing about the commercial was, I played a woman talking about how much her husband's gonna love the holiday gift she got him from Hearth Station.
So I guess everything's come full circle. Thanks, Hearth StationTM!
Oct. 20, 2003 4:05 am - Carl's Crazy Karaoke!
Whoever doesn't come down to Carl's Crazy Karaoke after Discotown at the Ramada, well, I feel sorry for you. I really do.
Carl's Crazy Karaoke is THE SHIT. Tonight was a freaking nuthouse! Joe Wagner wore my bathing cap. Jen Kirkman wore my electric-blue wig and fat pearl necklace and boa and PLAYED THE PIANO while people sang, absolutely stunning, and then sang "Piece of My Heart" as good as Janis. Crooner Kevin Kataoka sang so well that he got shorts and a bra thrown at him! It was an awesome night. But no one but my friends knows about it. It felt like someone's mom was throwing them a birthday party in their rec room, and hired a really awesome DJ with top-notch equipment. And a bartender. So let's have more people come down to karaoke night and then we can bump this thing up a notch from a birthday party to a school dance!
Okay, I don't think I'm making sense anymore. It's 4:30 in the morning, I blew out my voice at karaoke, and I have to shoot a commercial tomorrow. Nice planning! And yesterday I picked a zit in the corner of my mouth and now it looks like I have biological weapons-grade herpes.
What, me sabotage?
And where the fock is my bra?
Oct. 19, 2003 7:31 pm - My Fucking Awesome Salad!
I just made a fucking awesome salad! I know you're dying to know how, 'cause you'd like some. Here it is:
1. Open a brand-new jar of all-natural peanut butter. It has to be all-natural, or this step won't work.
2. There'll be a ton of oil, totally separated, sitting on the top. DRAIN THIS OIL into a little, eensy bowl.
3. Mix about a teaspoon or less of pure, white horseradish into the peanut oil. Mix it well. DO IT -- TRUST ME!
4. BUY A SALAD from a cheap, convenient neighborhood eatery. The one I bought had lettuce, cukes, tomatoes, avocado (yum!), chickpeas (yummier!) and canned black olives (ick! I always throw those out; they taste like the can). MAKE SURE TO SPECIFY "NO DAMN DRESSING"!
5. Dump the salad into a giant bowl. Now get to work. Dump the peanut/horseradish oil over the salad. Mix everything thoroughly.
6. Splash some APPLE CIDER VINEGAR onto the oily greens. I also like to add just a tiny splash of BRAGG'S LIQUID AMINOS* or DR. BRONNER'S MINERAL BOULLION* (they're the same thing). It looks like soy sauce but tastes so much better! MIX EVERYTHING AGAIN.
7. Mix in a BIG SCOOP OF COTTAGE CHEESE. I like the 4% milkfat, with the fat curds. 'Cause I'm from Wisconsin, yo!
8. Last, sprinkle about a tablespoon of BREWER'S YEAST FLAKES* (or "nutritional yeast"). If you've never had this before, it's bright yellow w/ a yummy, nutty flavor. Mix the shit out of everything again.
9. JUICE SQUEEZED FROM A NICE, FRESH LEMON would be the perfect finish. But I didn't have it. So fuck it.
10. POUR SOME GOOD, CHEAP PINOT NOIR into a big fat wineglass. If you don't have one, use a coffee cup. Beer's also nice. Or a crisp white wine. But for fuck's sake, don't use RumpelminzeTM!
NOW YOU'RE READY TO EAT YOUR FUCKING AWESOME SALAD!
Let me know how you like it. It might sound weird to the conventional palate, but you gotta take risks to get the great things. I'm telling you, it's FUCKIN'...well, you know.
Love, Rachole
*You can get this at the health food store.
Oct. 18, 2003 12:53 am - Why Kids Become Killers
I just emailed my friend Jonathan, who alerted me to the subject of tonight's entry. I wrote that the subject at hand was so awful that I wasn't gonna sully my dear readers with this abomination. But darn it, it's such a toxic attack on humanity that, for the common good, I'd better.
It's the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board's "Alcohol Education" web page for kids. Scratch that -- I just looked again -- for the "Under 21" crowd. Meaning kids and adults up to 20 years of age. Okay. Got it? The setup's important.
Now I'm just copying directly from their page:
 Hi boys and girls. Have you ever seen the L.C. Bee?
The Bee travels to different schools throughout the state and also to other fairs. When the Bee goes to a school, she dances to her own songs made especially for her. Would you like to hear her special songs? You can listen and you can also sing along. Just look at the words below for the Kids March and the Pop Shuffle. Which is your favorite? Send the Bee a message RA-LBEducation@state.pa.us
"L.C. Bee" as in, uh, "Liquor Control...Bee". Kinda grim and clunky, ain't it? Doesn't the State of Pennsylvania PR team employ anybody with a basic awareness of terms that don't lend themselves to cute nicknames? The "Euthanization Unicorn" and the "9-11 Nightcrawler" would also fall into this category. But that's nothing. Ohhh, you have no idea.
Now get ready for the lyrics.
Hello to you my name is L.C. Bee.
Won't you please come sing along with me?
I've got something I'd like to share with you.
So listen closely 'cause what I say is true.
Wow, that's pret-ty lazy songwriting. If I were an English teacher and my student wrote that, I'd make them write it over. That's the songwriting equivalent of that little essay-writing trick that the teacher used to bust us on: "Puppies are many different things to many different people. There are many different varieties of puppies for the many different varities of people. The world has an unlimited selection of puppies..." But let's continue:
Alcohol it's not for you and me.
It makes you dizzy and unhappy.
I am special and so are you.
So don't drink alcohol, its bad for you.
Alcohol it's not for you and me.
It makes you dizzy and unhappy.
I am special and so are you.
So don't drink alcohol, its bad for you.
You know what makes me dizzy and unhappy? These lyrics. Christ almighty, if I was a kid, I'd go straight to mom and dad's liquor cabinet after reading that. "This, from our leaders? There's no hope. -Glug, glug, glug, glug."
If someone asks you "Do you want some beer?"
You just say "No, I don't want it near!"
'Cause I am special and so are you.
So don't drink alcohol, its bad for you.
Wow. Atrocious. Can anyone tie me off while I do some junk?
If someone tells you "Getting drunk is fun!"
Just remember you are number one.
'Cause I am special and so are you.
So don't drink alcohol, its bad for you.
Seriously, if you were a kid reading this, wouldn't you be cracking up? Wouldn't you think the Liquor Control Board's website had been viciously hacked, and the content replaced by these ridiculous, "prank" lyrics? If these lyrics were satirical, I'd roll my eyes and say, "C'mon. They're too over-the-top-awful. They gotta be a little bit believable." But no, they're real.
And now we get to the most gruesome part: the music.
The link to the "L.C. Bee" page is below. You'll find the songs at the top of the page. I didn't want to upload the songs onto my site 'cause, seriously, I was terrified they'd cause my FTP browser to explode and possibly even bring on the Apocalypse.
I'm warning you: if you're pregnant, elderly, seriously depressed or have a heart condition, do not listen. And if you have children, for God's sake, don't play these in front of them! Good luck. And God be with you.
Click to Go to Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board's
"Under 21" Page of Abominable "Songs"
I've listened to the songs already. There's two styles of the same song: a "Pop Shuffle" version for ghetto kids, and a "Kids March" for wan, pale children who are used to being raped by circus clowns. I mean, I guess they are... The "Children's March" conjures up nothing else for me.
The songs? Truly horrific. An affront to so many things: intelligence, culture, style, and, above all, music and children. Horrible! I cannot stress that enough. These songs aren't even tuneful or musical. They're nightmarish in their awfulness. They sound like something Donald Rumsfeld would’ve written. --No, he’s got too much personality. How 'bout Dick Cheney? How 'bout a slab of HalliburtonTM concrete? Someone with absolutely no understanding of music, humanity, psychology, children, or art — yet with the arrogance to think no one would notice!
When I read the lyrics, I thought they were hilarious enough to quote. But then I listened to the songs, and they were so bad, I think I'm gonna need to see a doctor. I'm convinced that it's stuff like this that turns kids into murderers.
To conclude: No wonder Europe thinks we're maroons.
The L.C. Bee Says, "Write to the Liquor Control Board and tell them how much you like my music!!!"
Oct. 17, 2003 2:59 am
It sure feels good starting a brand-new diary page. It's like wiping your butt clean. I'll spare you the rest of this analogy, although it's really too late, isn't it? But it has to do with my elderly Greek landlords telling me never to flush my toilet paper down the toilet. Troe it in da waste-paper basket, Richie. Because the toilet get clogged. O-kay, Richie? They call me Richie 'cause they can't pronounce Rachel. It's cute, though I do resent it a little since I take pains to pronounce their sandwich Yeero instead of Guy-ro.
They're nice people, so you'd think they'd be thrilled to let me take advantage of the fabulously effective plumbing facilities this country has to offer. The problem is, they still think they've got old, Third-World plumbing. It doesn't matter what you tell them. They're convinced that toilet paper is still made from hemp or papyrus or goat tails or pita bread or whatever they make it from over there. If you think this sounds racist then thank you 'cause I'm trying to see if anyone at all is paying attention to this diary business. Thanks for being there. Anyway, back to the souvlaki-eaters. I've got your baklava right here, buddy. Hey, you got a problem with me? Well then maybe we better take it up to Mount Olympus...where I'll whoop yo' ass in da parking lot, right in front of all dem gods! And then I'll key your chariot, bee-yatch...before I turn yo' ass into a burnt offering! Where the hell am I? Why can't I stop? ANNNYWAY... I try to tell my landlords that the toilet paper's flushable and water soluble and more benign than the music of Sting, but they don't believe me. Because they're they're trapped - nay, invested -in their fear. But they've gotta aim higher. And that's the first part of my message for today: Aim Higher.
The second part is that the past months' diary entries are like used wads of Charmin. Good morning. I'm going to bed now. It's 5 AM and in exactly 2.5 hours my landlord will start hammering right outside my bedroom window.
WANNA READ MORE OF MY DIARY?
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