Month: July 2021

Museum Of Death – CLOSED
Museums
6031 Hollywood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90028

About 24,999 out of 25,000 people who currently die are not murdered so this Museum of Death is not for them!

To the one, I am glad that there are no actual dead bodies here. Just a lot of blood, hair, letters, and -pictures- of dead bodies from the 20th (and some 19th) century. Old gore. I came here on my birthday. I live down the street from it and was curious to see it for the sake of passing it by hundreds of times. I got someone to buy me a ticket as a birthday present and we went. They are located across the street from a busy hostel and the clientele is not much different than that – younger people who are on a day trip to Hollywood. It fills up with a bunch of smelly midwesterners, European midwesterners, and a hispanic mom with her baby in a stroller. Surprisingly, this place held a lot of people at 2pm on a weekday. Agoraphobics and claustrophobics – watch out. The inside of this place is built like a narrow maze that is cluttered and stuffy. If there was a fire, there would be many deaths in The Museum of Death! And the thought of this place as a potential fire hazard freaked me out as much as the graphic stuff.

The presentation of this place offers no focused direction. You can sufficiently see everything within an hour and they offer at least something from almost all of the famous murders in American history. The first thing I thought upon entering the serial killer drawing room was that it smelled musty. Many of the things here are kind of aged and yellowed and appear as if they would probably be difficult to remove off the wall that they are stuck on. Everything in here is at least 15 or 20 years old. Actually – to come to think of it – nothing in here really dates past 2000. Everything dates from the late Victorian era (coffins/embalming/specimens) to black-and-white era murder photos (like the Black Dahlia) to the 1980s and 1990s ‘contemporary’ murders, blurry point-and-shoot glossy photographs of dead mullet-heads. There were also late 20th century drawings from serial killers. The most vivid to me was the newest stuff – watching a video of a guy’s jaw getting blown off from an execution-style shooting I think in Iran in the 1990s. I believe the owner of this place probably lost his passion for collecting this stuff at some point 15 years ago or was in jail for dabbling in the murder paraphernalia black market. The owner had to flee San Diego and take his museum goodies to Hollywood after getting in trouble for acquiring a set of bunk beds from the Heaven’s Gate cult murders.

This place can not only use more updating, like bloody bullet-holed textbooks from Columbine High School or Luka Magnotta’s one-way ticket to Berlin, for example, but it needs more ventilation and a lot more cleaning. We went in at the same time when some guy with A LOT of cologne came in. Something about looking at bones, hair, and drawings from serial killers in a narrow, winding, and unventilated room while smelling this guy’s heavy cologne made me feel nauseous. Something dreadful is in the air and it isn’t bad juju – it is stench and it collects.

Useful: 9  Funny: 7  Cool: 3

5/9/2016

MySpace
121 2nd Street
San Francisco, CA 94105

The year 2003 was the year of the internet. Half the people in the Web 2.0 digital world didn’t own their own digital camera yet and relied on scanned prints or webcam images of themselves to represent their avatars. The cool people had their own two or three megapixel cameras. It began as the year of Friendster and ended as the year of MySpace.

MySpace wouldn’t have become MySpace if the stupid Friendster servers didn’t stop working in the middle of summer 2003. You got all the bored teenagers addicted to Web 2.0 like crack and then you take it away from them by not investing in more efficient servers. Bad bad Friendster. On top of that, a rumor spread that you considered charging users to contact people. Bad bad bad Friendster!

So after the Friendster exodus occurred around Summer 2003, MySpace became as popular as Yelp is today. It was comfortably popular. Rockstars in Los Angeles who currently own hundreds of thousands of friends on their MySpace page owned a mere few hundred and that was a high number compared to Friendster. Friendster limited the number of friends you can add and MySpace was no-holds-barred.

On top of that, MySpace was in general A LOT better than Friendster. The servers weren’t slow. There was a blog, a message board, and the ability to edit your own html on your page. You carried more confidence that the website wouldn’t abruptly fail when you were writing your friend a long message so communication between friends was a lot better. The teenagers who were addicted to the internet went fanatical over the new website. I was 20-years-old and the website was fun and pretentious. Pretentiousness that wasn’t profitable.

Let’s jump five years later. All the teenagers are in their early to mid-20s now. They’ve become slightly wrinkled around the eyes and fatter. Pretentiousness became profitable. Bands and miscellaneous groups that are dependent on the website for promotion are almost as prevalent as the number of people that are actually on the website. The website is a large gentrified digital mall now. It’s lost its edge.

A few days ago, I was offered money to give up my MySpace handle to a hip-hop artist. Do you want to know what I said? I said I’m interested. If I can cash in from what MySpace has become today, I say this is a catalyst to buck Yahoo 2.0. I’m under surveillance when I click on each page and I imagine five vulture companies that separately advertise “VEGAN GOODS CLICK HERE” or something else based on my interests (in other words, MySpace allows advertisers to record my information to profit off me) are making a moneybag.

Besides the dynamics of the website, I can’t rant about the people on here because they represent the normal demographic of the US population. I did get contacted by my biological mother. Problem was, I already have one.

Useful: 6  Funny: 7  Cool: 7

6/3/2008

Alta Coffee
$ Coffee & Tea, Breakfast & Brunch
506 31st St
Newport Beach, CA 92663

The two baristas at Alta were the dichotomy to an ancient Greek Tragedy and Comedy the night I went. It was the tale of two baristas. The guy with a beard and tattoos was so jovial while the guy with a cast on his hand was so jaded that both were in stark contrast to each other.

While I preferred jovial with tattoos, jaded I was sympathetic to. Jovial was so helpful, he gave me three alternative routes to getting out of the peninsula if I was to get lost and somehow miss the very obvious bridge.

Jaded was so miserable, I purposely took an extra second to get my money out a little longer to watch him get increasingly irritated. He was so moody while he was making the drinks, it was funny to watch his uninhibited emotions and curt responses to the demanding atmosphere around him. Hey, it’s tough to steam drinks with a cast and it’s impossible to do much else like swim, hold beer, jack off and use TiVo with your left hand. There are probably too many lonely nights with his five huskies at his parents’ mansion off Newport Coast. Cheer up, sad one.

Alta is okay. I give the gimp unfriendly guy credit for sufficiently warming the soy chai. (No foam but I didn’t expect any.) The lack of reliable wifi and power outlets was somewhat of a disillusion. It seems like more of an enjoyable place to come during the day than at night.

Useful: 5  Funny: 10  Cool: 5

3/24/2008

The Getty Villa
Botanical Gardens, Art Museums
17985 Pacific Coast Hwy
Pacific Palisades, CA 90272

These turkeys really, really want you to DRIVE here.

No, this turkey is not driving. This turkey took the two-hour number 2 Sunset bus from Sunset and Western all the way over here, to Sunset and Pacific Coast Highway. Be sure you take the Sunset bus that says P.C.H. and not to U.C.L.A./Westwood. Be sleepy, as the bus ride is long but only costs $1.50. Also be sure to give yourself a lot of room to get here when you book your reservation and print out your ticket. I left at 1:30 p.m. for my 4 p.m. ticket.

Once I got there, I walked about 1/3 of a mile from the end of Sunset and Pacific Coast Highway to the pearly gates of The Getty Villa. Tip: Get your feet sandy, rather than run over. If walking to The Getty Villa from Sunset, be sure to walk along the beach and not along the east side of the highway. The sidewalk abruptly ends and becomes all Pacific Coast Highway with fast-moving cars, which is dangerous to navigate. Great city planning, LA. There are a lot of ruins in this region due to the mudslides. Be ready to traverse around jagged concrete slabs that jut towards the ocean and stop.

When you reach The Getty Villa, there is a restricted staircase and next to it, a long driveway with a security guard ready to check your ticket stub. If you didn’t drive, you have to cross the street three times to get across. You need to cross Pacific Coast Highway along the pedestrian walkway that yields to pedestrians once every 10 minutes. Then you have to cross the driveway after all of the cars that are forced to park in the Getty Villa cross it. Add another 5 minutes. You have to cross into an open gated area and an empty driveway and up the driveway to talk to the security guard. It takes a minute to figure out where you’re going. It states in the front entrance to be prepared to show a receipt of bus fare to ‘prove’ that you didn’t park along the coast.

It took about three minutes to convince the guard that I didn’t somehow park my car along the coast and avoid the $15 parking fee. He said he saw me coming from the southern side and it obviously appeared that I parked there. I said I didn’t. He said prove it. So I needed to somehow ‘prove’ that I didn’t drive to The Getty Villa. Since I didn’t even expect to have to get a receipt from my bus driver (I paid cash), I told him I used a TAP card and showed him that. He then asked about the bus I used and why I didn’t use some other bus that drops people off closer. (Sunset was more direct and I didn’t want to pay another $1.50 to transfer). I explained to him that I lived in Hollywood, showed him my ID and explained the proximity of Hollywood Blvd. to Sunset Blvd., hence taking the Sunset bus. He conceded, since he couldn’t really prove that I parked on the coast for free. Although there was a button to call a van to pick you up, the guard insisted that I wait and I don’t call it.

About ten minutes later, the van came. It took me up to the top. From there is another clusterfuck of weird navigation. You need to take an elevator to an empty hallway that leads to a stairwell that leads to the museum. After one hour of seeing ancient artifacts from civilizations that have been in existence for thousands of years and had time to make a lot of statues, plates and trinkets, I was satisfied and left. The docents are knowledgeable and can answer questions. I read on Wikipedia about one of their directors or trustees having some type of sketchy relationship with acquiring museum objects on the black market, but got caught and had to give back millions of dollars worth of stuff to the respective countries. Sadly, that bit of history about this museum interested me more than the work that was displayed here.

Okay heading back down SHOULD have been easier. But the van that picked us up and drove back down, instead of sensibly using the driveway to drop people off at the bottom, decided to take a long, meandering scenic route from an adjacent and empty private road to Sunset Blvd. This drive took about 15 minutes. They’ve got a ton of unused land surrounding this tiny museum and apparently it’s all made for driving to and from it. We basically passed my bus stop from Sunset Blvd. and then got stuck in traffic after turning right on Pacific Coast Highway. Sadly, I hope they realize that walking and alternative methods of transportation are slowly beginning to triumph car culture in Los Angeles.

All in all, a nice museum in a horrific psycho-geographical layout. It is definitely worth it, for a one time visit.

Useful: 7  Funny: 6  Cool: 3

9/6/2014

Graffiti Sublime Coffee – CLOSED
$$ Coffee & Tea, American (New)
180 S La Brea Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90036

When I first entered this place, it was very white, postmodern and musty.

An awful up-beat jazz saxophone solo blasts in the background, which jars the kind of sedate people sitting on laptops kind of atmosphere; and the baristas, especially the male, were nice to me. He waved as I left! Iced tea is the cheapest drink at $4. The wifi passcode was jeSSIca lAnge or someone with a celEbRIty’s name. PtUi pTuI!

In general, it was such a jarring place that my visceral reaction kicked in an endorphin rush like successful conceptual artwork. I was looking at edgy pop art across the street, and the feeling could be best described when I saw a painting of Queen Elizabeth portrait from British £ and her face was painted with rouge, lipstick, light blue eyeshadow and blonde hair. The Queen looked like a transvestite Marilyn Monroe screen print by Warhol.

Despite how weird this place is, I didn’t hate it. I stayed well after my wifi expired, which is probably against the rules. (Note: European-style coffee shop rules, no extras, no appeasement to breaking them.) I totally saw someone ‘sneak’ into the coffee shop by jumping the tiny black gate through the patio in front to meet his friend and not pay for a mandatory drink first. I didn’t stay long enough to see if he was tortured and beheaded.

The iced tea was good. The patio, where the loud saxo-mo-phone playing wasn’t playing, was attractive.

Useful: 6  Funny: 11  Cool: 2

4/16/2015