It's just Glendale

P1060355
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

Saving Lives

So this week I did my part as a super citizen and future aerobics instructor and went and got myself CPR certified at the local Red Cross chapter. This event was frightening and enlightening.

First of all, did you know that many people successfully perform CPR from just what they see on TV? On shows like House, ER, and CSI? That's one of the first tidbits the instructor told us at the beginning of the four and a half hour course. If I hadn't have already paid my 42 bucks, I would have raced home and checked my VHS collection for some old Clooney ER episodes and just forgot about spending four and a half hours in a room full or randoms.

When I say randoms I mean myself, one larger bearded lady, two loudmouth personal trainers wearing blue track suits, one guy from Cal-OSHA and a roomful of Armenian, only half English speaking, women getting certified to work in childcare.

For class demonstrations the instructor used the one guy as the victim and the large lady as the rescuer (it was her fifth year renewing the certification). There is just something so uncomfortable about watching strangers touch each other in a non-emergency and non-errotic situation. Yeah, so I'd never be a nurse. I think I had really low blood sugar because I felt, for most of the class, like passing out. It's likely that I would have been saved but, I wasn't so sure at the time.

The Armenian ladies paired up so that one of them would translate to the other while the instructor read over the booklet and played the instructional (and well-acted I must say) videos. They did this throughout the whole class, most of them at full volume. I was worried because the instructor could not have possibly be monitoring if the correct safety information was being translated.

This became very clear when they broke the mannequins out at the end of the class. If I wouldn't have had my own certification looming over my head, I would have performed a citizens arrest on at least three of the women for what they were doing to the mannequins. They were wrapping the mouth guards all over the face and neck and laying on top of the plastic half bodies, all in an effort to perform CPR. The loudmouth know-it-all personal trainer kept going ahead of the instructor and she was screaming to her partner, "30 compressions! 2 Beaths!" It was complete mayhem. I was getting so frustrated for the instructor but it also angered me that she didn't know her own power. She could kick all these people out, they could go home and watch ER and hope that practicing on a teddy bear will give them the skills to save the lives of people they love. INstead she just plowed through the instructions and we all, in our own special way, completed the practical part of the training.

In the end, we all read the written test out loud and got 100% of the answers right. Strong as a group. We all came as different people, but we all left CPR certified.

Money can buy you anything! California is so accepting that you don't have to put your blow-up girlfriends in the trunk when you go to the grocer.

Today I dropped my phone in the toilet, saw a lexus with a mannequin in the passenger seat parked behind anthropology in Pasadena, and I got a new ipod.

It was really a day of firsts. I've never dropped my phone in the toilet before but I have made fun of people for doing it. Nor have I ever actually seen someone with a mannequin in their car, who hasn't thought about doing that for the HOV lane? But I would think that you would trunk it for public parking situations. The other first today is the ipod. I never ever had one before, well N gave me a hand me down that broke a few months ago. Mine is so cute. I can watch an entire episode of Gossip Girl on a two inch screen.

I fixed my blackberry by letting it sit in a bowl of rice. The chick at the verizon store told me to do this. I asked her if it mattered if I only had minute rice and she said it did and that I should just put it in a bowl of white rice. So I went home and empitied the rest of a half box of brown minute rice over my phone and put it in the oven for 40 minutes at 350 and now I am back in action. Feel free to email or text me between civil twilight and radical dawn.

Place: Kyles.
Purpose: Top secret pilot shoot

Rod doesn't like flash photography when the camera is rolling so there isn't much to do but write my thoughts. I've learned a lot today dressed like Ally Sheedy from the breakfast club. Now I know what it is like to be an outsider. A pre-goth outsider with dark feelings that nobody understands. Someone that shows up without invitation. Someone that is unliked, even considered weird. Until today I had no idea how it felt. Thanks guys for opening my mind.

You wouldn't believe how the Sheedy BFast Club uniform (baggy black sweater, giant skirt, dark tights, black chucks) still works amongst the WBN (why be normal) underground. K and I walked to starbucks between scenes for some fresh air and fresh joe. We'd only been there for three minutes when a young dude wearing suspenders and a hat (fedora? Reporters? Ducky?) Started in with me.
'Haha sometimes I think the best part about coffee is mixing the stuff in after'
'Me niether'
'I like it more than drinking coffee.'
'Go away'
'It's like ooooh what will happen if I put in four sugar packs?'
'It tastes like throw up'

Anyway. I think I've found my fashion message. My brand. My story.

My hot water heater broke and I had to shower at the gym today. I now think that I didn't really get all the shampoo out of my hair because my head feels odd, and I'm not just talking about my insane headache. Maybe it was just a problem with the shampoo supplied at my gym - it was for dry hair. I don't have dry hair. I have fine, bouncy, lively hair. It's not moist or anything but it sure isn't dry. Before you feel too bad for me showering at the gym, you should know that I belong to a fancy one. It's got a spa attached to it and those don't get attached to or affiliated with just any ol' place.

Last night A and I went to see "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" and uh, its really good. Besides how Schnabel pulled off the POV shots, which make up most of the movie, the repetition of the special alphabet makes for an oddly engaging soundtrack. The kind of thing where you begin to anticipate the next sound. Like listening to shoegazer rock. It's really awesome.

I just reminded myself that I meant to make it my New Years resolution to stop using the word awesome to describe things.

Ruined Blow Out

P1060253
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

There are things I start to ask myself after an extended stay in Michigan. One of those questions is, "How many times can I watch 'The Departed' on cable tv?" And another is "How did I ever drive in snow before?" And another is "When did my mom stop complaining about the toilet seat being left up?" Because that rule is being broken like crazy around here. People just don't care. Manners aren't important anymore, common courtosey is up for debate. I am the only civilized person in mid-michigan now and I leave tomorrow. Good luck people.

New Years was fun. We had dinner at Sweet Georgia Brown's which had crappy service but a nice atmosphere and a frightened chubby keyboardist and then to LJs which had low-budget drinks and free party hats. Can't complain - even the heavy indoor smoking added a little character and a scent my coat and I will remember forever. It was a hard evening to plan at first because everyone kept saying 'I don't want to do anything too crazy' as if saying that would prevent a spontaneous rave from happening. It's good that we settled up on the crazy ahead of time because it got real snowy and if we had decided to get a helicopter we would have been grounded on Belle Isle for hours.

I hope we all get what we want in 2008 (especially the Dodgers) A new car for E, a new job for N, Mo money for all and less work and more fishing for me.

I resolve to return library books on time and to go to the racetrack and movies more, and the doctors office and bills liquor less. What about the rest of you?