This is my Late-Night Naughty Diary, updated daily! Well, not really, but that's 'cause I don't believe in "filler". At the bottom of the page is a link to past diaries. Enjoy! XXOO -- Rachole
Nov. 24, 2004 15:58 - "La juventud es un tesoro"
At first I thought she was a drag queen, but she wasn't. She was just another old lady dressed to the nines like many of the old people in Barcelona: tailored suit, pantyhose, nice shoes with a heel, a tweed coat, perfect hair and makeup. Very dignified. But the way she grabbed the owner's shoulders from behind as she entered the fruit store, sinking her claws into his back and delivering a garrulous salute in a gravelly, resonant voice, was frankly a bit shocking. The Catalán people are a polite, formal and reserved people. They don't go for the big football hugs and the grabbing and touching and yelling (although, as I've said earlier this spring, they are perfectly comfortable colliding with you on the street ... maybe 'cause it gives them a chance to say, "Ahh, perdón.").
The señora was with her husband, also dressed very nicely, in a fine suit. He waited outside the fruit store, staring into the street as if he'd been through this routine many times before. As the fruit store man rang up my produce, the señora got next to me in line and started crowing into my left ear in the local language, Catalán. I don't understand Catalán, so I said nothing, probably giving her that panicked look I'm used to giving the old ladies when they start chatting to me in Catalán. It was also at that moment that I realized she may be a few sheets to the wind.
Then, putting her face close to mine, she graciously switched to Castellano. Mechanically, as if reciting a poem, she said, "La ju-ven-tud es un te-so-ro, lá-sti-ma que esté en las manos de irresponsables."
I understood that: "Youth is a treasure; too bad it's put in the hands of the irresponsable." Fixing me with her eyes, she said, "¿Comprendes?" "Sí, " I said. It was hard to look into her eyes because the huge purple bags underneath them kept demanding my attention. Each one was bigger than the eye above it, filled with fluid; amniotic sacks of alcoholic regret. "When I was your age, I didn't think about anything. Now that I realize how precious every moment is, I'm old."
"Seven eighty five," the fruit store man broke in. Though he and the old lady obviously knew each other, he wasn't sharing in the moment but rather avoiding it, refusing to even look at her. Maybe he was sad for her.
Or maybe he was just tired of it. Catalán people don't like put up with a lot of nonsense.
Nov. 11, 2004 0:33 - F Lynard Skynard!
This is a sculpture in a Barcelona park by Joan Miró. Just a modest little park... with this unbelievable sculpture. That's how they do things here. Modest little parks; big, huge pieces of sexual art. Marvelous!
The beauty of art is that you can interpret it to say what you want. I believe this piece is saying, "Fuck the South ... and I'll give you something to F it with, too." No, not the South of Spain. The South of the United States. Maybe that wasn't Miró's intention, but that's what it means now. 'Cause I said so, and I read the paper.
Anyway, my friend Phil has a friend named Jerry Joseph who has a website called Fuck the South. It's not a big fancy site; it's just a one-page rant that I think is great, and you will too, if you're, like, not an ape.
In other news, Yasir Arafat is in a deep coma from which he'll never wake. According to his spokespeople, though the Palestinian Authority is planning his funeral, taking him off life support is a violation of Islamic principles. I say the fact that he's still alive is a violation of scientific principles ... and definitely the rules of etiquette. The man just refuses to go. A pain in the ass to the end!
If his body does eventually give out and he dies, Arafat will be buried in the West Bank. If not, a stake will be driven through his heart and he'll be interred at Hollywood Forever, next to Douglas Fairbanks.
Nov. 9, 2004 12:54 - Smokin' Grandma in Spain!
Jordi, Telly, and Smoking Grandma
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Smoking GrandmaTM made a special trip from New YorkTM to Barcelona. Photos coming soon!
Smoking GrandmaTM vino especialmente de New YorkTM a Barcelona para actuar con Rachole en el Teatro Llantiol el 5 y 8 de noviembre.
¡Era de putamadre! Fotos vendrán pronto!
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The Original Smokin' Grandma (Amy Daulton) has been in Barcelona for a week and will leave tomorrow for her home in New York. We did two shows at the Llantiol Theater in Barcelona, Friday and last night, and they were a blast! Grandma got to display her varied repertoire of jazz, tap, and Solid GoldTM dance moves for the appreciative Spanish audience. She also got to show off her Spanish language ability, declaring her disgust for the Brits ("Brit pop sucks") and love for Mexican wrestlers 'cause they "know how to fuck." Drummer Jordi Güell made the big career move to pianist, and Rachel to drummer, on their version of the Spanish classic, "La chocolatera." (Video soon to come.)
All in all, a resounding success ... and further fuel to Rachole's fantasies of opening her own club in Barcelona where she can import her friends from the States to perform. This is all part of her Deluxe Fantasy Package, in which she also dreams of running a karaoke room/24-hour diner with authentic, kick-ass L.A. hamburgers! (The burgers in Barcelona blow.)
T
Nov. 4, 2004 4:09 am - From the EATS! Gallery
This says it better than I could, and let's just leave it at that.
Oh, and do check out John Skipp's EATS! gallery to enjoy his other eloquent expressions of the human condition, all artfully executed on labels from frozen dinners. You can even subscribe (for free, of course) to receive a new EATS! inspiration via email, every working day of your life. And at the rate we're going, trust me, you will be working every day for the rest of your life.
However, the good news is, it may not last very long. Enjoy!
Nov. 2, 2004 19:39 pm - Welcome to the New 50's!
Ahh... remember the Fifties?
Poodle skirts? Sock hops? Voter intimidation?
As a native Milwaukean, I'm particularly proud. It really is the new Fifties.
Happy election day, America!
Click to read the latest vintage tactics of the Racist Right!
It's a rule of physics: no matter where you live, they're gonna build a shopping mall. This one just happens to be a former bullfighting ring ... and also where Leif Garrett played to a sold-out crowd in the ´70s!
Oct. 31, 2004 3:07 am - My Cute Neighbor! Pt.1
I am still living in Barcelona, in a nice little neighborhood heavily dominated by families and old people -- which, coming from Hollywood, totally freaked me out when I first arrived here (see June 18th entry).
Anyway, I have the cutest next-door neighbor in the world! I first noticed him in the springtime, when I'd go out on the terrace (wonderfully, almost every apartment in Barcelona has a terrace) and he'd be on his terrace, in the neighboring building to my right, half a floor below me. In the summer he'd wear a wife beater, like all the senior gentlemen do in Barcelona when they relax on their terraces. However, when these men go into the street, they're impeccably dressed in pressed slacks and oxford shirts. Home's for relaxation; the street is for seeing people!
On his terrace, my neighbor would lean on the rail, eagerly looking bck and forth down onto the street... looking for action. I never saw anyone else with him on the terrace, so I assumed he lived alone. Maybe a widower. But he never looked sad or lonely. Besides, he'd just put on his good clothes and go down into the street and hang out in front of the fruit-and-vegetable store and talk animatedly to the owners and customers, waving his arms all over the place as he talked, smiling, full of energy. He seemed to know everybody.
Sometimes he'd vary the routine and go down from his apartment and sit on the bench in the bus shelter: leaning forward with his elbows on his knees in anticipation, looking up and down the street, looking for people to say hello to. One lonely hot Sunday in August he went down to the bus shelter ... and there was already a very pretty, 70-something year old lady sitting there, in a red dress and and a floppy hat and bright red lipstick! When my neighbor appeared, her face lit right up and they sat together and talked... until another old lady appeared, and she smiled and sat down, and they all talked and laughed. I figured he must have girlfriends all over the neighborhood.
In the summer time, my neighbor kept a parakeet in a teeny, tiny cage on his terrace. They were a team, him and the bird -- which, like him, was very hyper, always flapping about and twittering, as if to say, "LET ME OUT OF HERE OH JESUS LET ME THE FUCK OUT I'M GOING NUTS I'M GOING INSANE PLEASE JUST KILL ME OH HOLY CHRIST ALMIGHTY IT'S FUCKING UNBEARABLE" -- and my cute little neighbor always in front of the cage, leaning over the terrace with a child's anticipation always on his face that said, "Ain't life great?"
Indeed it is.
Oct. 27, 2004 3:07 am - Letter from a Reader
Dated Monday, October 25th, 2004:
"Anne Coulter was recently in my sister's showroom buying material. and I too thought of throwing something in her face!"
Small world, ain't it?
Oct. 23, 2004 3:22 am - Concealer, Anyone?
This is right-wing neocon sex symbol/"media personality" Ann Coulter. Today she was hit by pies while giving a speech at the University of Arizona.
The students who threw the pies were arrested. I think that's unfair. In my opinion, the pies are an improvement.
How exactly were doctors able to botox a scowl into this face?
October 22, 2004 12:11 am - Office Inspirations ... from Spain!
This is a real town on the Costa Brava in Spain. Isn't it pretty? I think it's so pretty, it belongs in a PowerPointTM presentation.
In my show, "Cómo ser feliz todo el tiempo" ("How to Be Happy All the Time"), which I do every Monday in Barcelona, in the Spanish Language, I recite a number of rules guaranteed to bring happiness. Like, "How to be happy all the time: Contemplate the higher power," and then I launch into a bit trashing The Church. And such. So here's one for you, from my personal files:
How To Be Happy All the Time: Be Successful.
One day in Los Angeles, as I was driving to my typing job in the Valley, just as I exited the Lankershim ramp off the 101 freeway, I accidentally crapped my pants a little. Not a lot; just a little. But as most of us know, a little goes a long way.
Sure, I thought about turning around and going back home to change. But dammit, I'd just gotten off the freeway. And LA freeways are a bitch! It's like a miracle when you finally glide off your exit at rush hour. Besides, I was just minutes from work. It wasn't a good job; it was a low-paying, carpel-tunnel sweatshop that I relied on to pay the bills while I tried to get my career going in Show BizTM. Darn it, it wasn't a job that deserved to have me arrive super-hygienic every day. Besides, I didn't want to draw undue negative attention by being late. Nor miss an hour of pay. I was poor!
So I pulled up in front of the building with a little poop in my pants and a lot of enthusiasm. Then I remembered: there was a pair of my ex-husband's pants in the trunk! They were like 5 sizes too big, but whatever. I brought them in with me, made a beeline for the bathroom, changed pants, and went around all day with these huge, gansta-rapper pants swirling around my ankles and falling down because I didn't have a belt. "What's up with those pants?" my supervisor asked. "I crapped myself on the way to work," I replied, and she didn't talk to me ... ever again. And that was a nice side benefit, which was ironic, 'cause at this job no one got any benefits.
Yeah, I'd had my moments of success. I'd been on Tee Vee, I'd been in a movie or two. But you can't measure success by your best moments, but rather, how you handle all the rest of it.
And that morning, I had succeeded in shitting my pants on the way to work without it being a problem.
And that's what real success is all about.
October 5, 2004 13:08 pm
MY HAIR IS TURNING WHITE.
It's also falling out. Though I don't have any big bald patches yet, it comes out in clumps when I shampoo or brush it. I have no idea why. I'm not living next to a dry cleaner or a nuclear reactor or a Burger King.
A possible culprit? My hairspray. It's an economical European brand which, while providing good hold, works just as effectively for killing roaches.
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