Paging Robin

While in LA last week I saw this and couldn't help but snap a picture:


Believe it or not, this is not the Batmobile. Incredibly, it seems there are two people in the greater southern California area who felt the need to emblazen the sides of their cars with the Batman insignia.

I like that the insignia is smaller on this Batmobile and that the rims don't match. It kind of gives the Batmobile a je ne sais quoi feeling that says "I'm not all about my superpowers, and the other two spinners are on layaway until the next Batcheck comes in."

Game, Set, Match

I spent Sunday afternoon playing in a tennis tournament to raise funds for the local Asian American Bar Association scholarship program.

There are two obvious problems with this: 1. I am not Asian, and 2. I have never played tennis. Both were equally obvious at the tournament yet, once again, my public humiliation was utilized for the greater good.

Upon arrival at the Pacific Tennis Club I knew I was in trouble. Not only did everyone have their own rackets, they all had cute little tennis outfits on. I had a borrowed racket and was dressed for a run, complete with a "drinking club with a running problem" t-shirt. That always impresses the folks at the racket, or should I say 'racquet', club. To make matters worse there was a superhot tennis pro overseeing our tournament. I immediately confessed that the closest thing to tennis I'd ever done was swat flies in the trailer park for a penny each as a kid. No kidding, my dad would sit on his throne - a lawn chair - Buweiser in hand, and pay each of us kids a penny apiece for dead flies, which we would gleefully swat and collect for payment. Being the youngest of four, I didn't make much money hence my limited skills with racket-like equipment.

The pro asked about my skill level so he could put me with a partner. I told him on a scale of 1 to 10 it was a -42. He promptly set me up on another court with T, the son of a lawyer. T had never played tennis before either. So there we were, supposedly warming up by hitting balls at eachother, then chasing them because we kept missing. Meanwhile, on the court next to us the "real" players were warming up by hitting 90 mph serves and grunting every time they hit the ball. I wanted to grunt too but never seemed to make contact with the ball and didn't think it was appropriate to just be running around chasing balls and grunting.

Finally the tournament started. It was to be "round robin" doubles. There were 16 players on four courts. I was on court #10 - the highest court - paired up with my boss. We played against T and his boss. The losing team would move up a court, the winning down, and each team would split and take opposite sides of the court. This way, presumably, you would never have the same partner twice and you would move around the courts. If you were on court #10, there was no court to move up to so you just stayed there if you lost. I stayed on court #10 for two hours.

Most of the folks were very good-natured and trying to help me learn a few skills. And who knew standing on green concrete swatting little balls over a net could have so many rules and so much shuffling? I was instructed to move here, or there, then switch sides of hte court, then switch back, and move up, no move back, no it's your turn to serve, yes, we won a point, no, it's not over, it's 15 love. It was all very confusing but I did finally figure out how to serve the ball in an underhanded, bounce and lob fashion that I got pretty good at. As for returning the balls, it just wasn't my forte. So I lost round after round with various partners until finally I got the super competitive partner, D. This guy was there to win. He was running and scrambling and slamming that ball every which way. He knew the rules and would loudly assert them. He yelled for me to move so he could play two-on-one against the other team. I moved and marvelled how he could run around with such focus when his pockets were bulging with balls. I just took on the role of the person who runs across the court collecting the balls between serves as he played the French Open in his own mind. Somehow, through no effort by me, I was informed that I finally won and was being moved down to court #9.

The thing was, at court #9 I was pitted against D and his Wimbledon ways. Not only was I against D, I was paired with P, a man who plays tennis once a year and was slightly better than me. But he was pudgy and it was hot and he wouldn't move. It was kind of like being paired with Jabba the Hut - only P wasn't that big. His lack of movement posed a problem because the ball generally wasn't hit directly at him. D chose to pair up with a player even better than him. While it would have been fair to have D with P and me with the other player, W, a woman in a skort with a special ball holster and graphite racquet. That would have been more sportsmanlike but when I mentioned it D refused emphatically saying he needed to catch up in points after having fallen behind when I was his partner. So P and I, basically sat through four games of tennis-dodgeball where we tried to avoid the pummelling of D and W's over-handed, high speed serves. Funny thing was, D and W were trying so hard they kept missing their serves - hitting the net or out of bounds. And W had a great deal of antics involved with her playing. Before she served, she would raise her racket above her head, then point it at me, then hit as if she were trying to kill the ball. She had a grunt too. This resulted in her missing the square more often than not. Then, when it was my turn to serve to her, she took a stance as if I were one of the Williams sisters. She danced and jittered, bouncing on her toes, gripping hte racquet iwth both hands as my sloth-like serve barely cleared the net, with hardly enough energy to even bounce, then she swung with all her might and missed. This happened a few times. It was like I was playing at 33 rpm and she at 45 rpm and she just couldn't fathom that I was hitting so slowly. P and I actually ended up winning two games with our slow-motion meets not-budging tactics.

After playing against D and W the tournament was over and we all gathered for the awards. W's husband won, W came in second, and my boss actually came in third. I came in a respectable 16th and even won a prize. Yes, you guessed it, one free private tennis lesson. I just looked online to see what sort of lesson I won. Here is the photo associated with the pro I'm with:
I'm guesing they put me with the kids' coach for a reason...

Things I never thought I'd see...or hear

I went to visit my parents at the ranch on Saturday. It turned out to be quite an exciting and eventful day. Naturally, it resulted in my seeing something I doubt anyone not living in a trailer in the middle of the high desert on an exotic animal ranch has ever seen:



For those who have never been to the north pole or Australia - that's a reindeer having a conversation with an emu - something I never thought I'd see. Yep, it about sums up my parents' ranch.

After visiting at the ranch a bit my mom and I decided to go into town to an open casting call for The Amazing Race. For those who don't know, it is a reality show where teams of two race around the world. It's actually a cool show. Anyhow, my mom and I have always talked about applying as a dynamic duo and it turns out CBS was holding a casting call in Bakersfield on Saturday so we made a mother-daughter trip of it.

Our big plan was to bring a camel and a zebra from the ranch to show the producers that we are indeed freaks and that we can handle large animals. Good hook, right? As we were loading the camel, seen here:

(Yes, I just figured out how to add photos to my blog with my new camera). Anyhow, as we were trying to load the giant humped beast into the trailer I wondered whether the Chrysler/Jeep dealership in Bakersfield would appreciate us bringing a 12 foot tall, adult male camel by to try to get on a reality show. I decided to call the dealership and ask. Here is the basic phone conversation:

Me: "Hi. Is there an Amazing Race casting call at your dealership today?"
CJ: "Yes, it is being held inside the showroom from 9-4. Please park on the street."
Me: "Would it be okay if I brought a pet camel and zebra to the casting call?"
CJ: "Excuse me, I'm not sure I understand what you are asking."
Me: "Can I bring a camel and a zebra to your showroom?"
Silence. Mumbling over the covered receiver. Another employee gets on the phone.
CJ: "This is X, the manager, can I help you?"
Me: "Yes, I was checking to see if it is okay to bring my pet camel and zebra to the casting call at the dealership today. Is that okay?"
CJ: "Is this some kind of joke?" Click.

I took that as a no. And even though it would have been fun to show up with a camel and zebra in Bakersfield but we decided not to risk having to keep them in the trailer in the blazing heat all day.

So off we went. Upon arrival at the open call we noticed it was an atypical crowd for Bakersfield. You see, Bakersfield is basicall 18 truck stops and endless acres off tract homes interspersed with trailer parks. I think the main industries there are truck stop management and food stamp dispersion. For most folks Bakersfield conjurs up images of unattractive, overweight, less-than-stylish, chain smoking, Pabst-drinking, country-music-listening using rednecks. Nothing wrong with that - they need to live somewhere. And yes, I know there are exceptions so please don't leave comments about the one cultured person you know in Bakersfield. My mom and I were banking on standing out as the exceptions in the crowd...How wrong we were.

By some miracle, either all the attractive people of Bakersfield had converged on the Jeep dealership to attend the casting call. As we soon learned, the majority of people were from Los Angeles - aspiring actresses and actors willing to drive the few hours to the desert to try to get discovered at a car dealership in Bakersfield. We took our numbers and nervously waited to be called.

While we were waiting we watched non-desript duo after non-descript duo give three minute spieles on why they should be chosen to the camera. We watched about 25 couples do their videos. I think 23 out of the 25 looked identical: the tall, muscular, almost good-looking guy with the petite blond-and-blue gym rat girl trying to figure out what the next step of their relationship is through the race.

As the clones rattled on, my mom and I worked on our own spiele. At first we were going to say our relationship was at an impasse and we needed this time to figure out whether or not we would stay together, thus mocking the other applicants. We decided that was too easy and might look unsportsmanlike. By the time we were called we hade decided we should just have a rough beginning and ending and just ad lib the middle.

The beginning consisted of me joking about how I was already somewhat famous and perhaps they recognized me as the girl in the elf hat with the baby zebra from the Osbourne's Christmas Special or my more global role as the American Fried Chicken girl in Chinese TV commercials. This got the casting folks' attention and they were laughing. Then my mom started in on her typical day on the ranch. Then she kept talking. In fact, she wouldn't stop. And somehow, before I knew it, she was talking about ranch duties involving rubber gloves - she gestured as if putting on a glove as she said, "Some things require a little glove, up to about here (pointing to upper wrist), and others require a BIG glove (thrusting arm up and pointing to bicep). Everyone was practically in tears laughing. Then she went to a topic I am certain has never been discussed in a reality show application: collecting the afterbirth from the pasture. I nearly died. But she said it in such a way that it was funny. I looked on in wonder and noticed we had an audience. We said a bit more about our mutual fear of needles and then ended by saying we would leave them with a shot of what the competition would be seeing, advised to shoot with a wide angle, and turned around and ran in place in a very dorky fashion.

The poor cameraperson could hardly contain herself. The crowd was somewhere between being amused and being frightened - still processing my mother's ranch life lessons. The casting lady said we were great - very fun and original. ON the way home we decided the camel definitely would have been overkill.

Yo quero...

I spent all day yesterday in a mediation conference in downtown LA. The case is a real pain in the arse...Our client is an uber-rich guy who was having a multi-million dollar custom home built. A couple of the contractors screwed up royally - like placing the entire foundation in the wrong place. Now they want to be paid for the work - which had to be torn out and redone. Boring stuff.

During the course of the mediation my client and I were sequestered in our own conference room. The mediator spent about 30 minutes of the four hours we were there speaking with us. This means I spent three and a half hours alone in a room with our client, a multi-multi-multi-millionaire that I have probably spoken with for a total of 45 minutes in my life. I got to hear his life story, which is actually quite impressive, and witness his unique habit of compulsively writing words he's just said in columns on a piece of paper. I'm not kidding, out of almost every sentence he spoke he would fixate on one word and being writing it in a column on a piece of paper about five times consecutively. Then he would stop writing for a minute and begin with another word just spoken. He did this as he kept speaking but would sometimes continue to write the word while repeating the word. It was fascinatingly frightening to watch. By the end of four hours he had completely filled three pieces of paper, front and back with various nouns, verbs and adjectives. He completely filled each page before moving on to the next. At first I found his behavior somewhat amusing in that Howard Hughes kind of way. By then end of the day I just wanted out of the room before he lost it completely. I just hope my name stays off his list.

Interestingly enough, one of the words on his paper was Taco. Taco is his pet chihuahua. He had a lot to say about Taco. He envied Taco for his simple life, which consists of waking him up early each morning to go outside and pee (Taco, that is), watching Taco go to his bed and go back to sleep, then returning home to Taco in the evening whereupon they begin the evening ritual of making Taco's dinner. Mind you, the client has three maids that live at his house. Still, the cient and Taco have a special bond so he spends two hours each evening preparing a meal for Taco. He begins by boiling an oxtail in a pot. Once sufficiently boiled, he removes the oxtail, cleans the meat from the bone, cuts the meat into little pieces - because Taco has a little mouth - and then puts it in Taco's special dish - no, it's not a dog bowl it's a crystal platter - and watches Taco eat it. After Taco is done eating, Taco asks twice for the bone by barking and is given the bone to take and hide under a chair. Our client then sits across from the chair and watches Taco gnaw on the bone for a while. He spent a good hour talking about Taco and I spent at least two hours envisioning this multi millionaire catering to a six pound yapping rat-like animal.

In the end my client walked out angry - probably headed home to feed Taco. I was left wondering how a man who has everything can end up envying a chihuahua.

Do not try this at home

Yesterday afternoon I got a wild hair and decided to buy a home waxing kit. No, not for my car. I usually shave but have heard how great waxing is, how it lasts for weeks, and how it is so much better than shaving. Being summertime I figured it was time to try it out.

Of course, I could go to a professional hair removal expert and pay her to do it but I would feel silly about that. After all, would I really want to pay a strange woman to apply hot wax to my southern region, stick a muslin strip to the wax, and then rip my hair out? That seems ridiculous! However, doing it myself, or better yet, getting JP to do it, sounded completely reasonable and even a bit fun. That was yesterday.

I went to a beauty supply store after work and asked the clerk for the best at-home kit. She, of course, sold me the biggest kit. As we have learned, bigger is not always better, right? I then called JP and told him what our plans for the evening were. He was thrilled. Really, he was. I think he's a closet depilator.

A few hours later I was sprawled out on the kitchen table, hot wax being applied (which was quite nice), reading the directions as we went along (which was a bad idea).

The process is quite simple: First, you heat the wax in the microwave. Next you use a popsicle stick-type thing to apply the wax in the manner you would apply paste to construction paper as a child. Then you press a muslin strip onto the wax. Then there was a step missing - the how-long-do-you-wait-before-pulling step. Kind of crucial. We try to go ahead and remove one strip. No good - just a bunch of wax, three hairs that were probably so scared they uprooted themselves, and bit of pain. A few tugs later I called my friend D, who is well-versed in these things, for some advice.

So now I'm on the kitchen table with wax and muslin strips stuck to me, JP attempting to reread the directions and my friend D laughing at me over the phone. She informs me that I must have bought an advanced kit because she just buys pre-waxed strips or pays someone to do it with wax and strips like mine. Apparantly professionals melt their own wax and paint it on using advanced techniques that are not meant for amateurs. So she told us how her waxing lady does her thing. Then she told her she's not sure how it's really done because she usually has a few shots of tequila before her appointment to dull the pain. Great. In the meantime, JP has gotten impatient and decides it's time to start clearcutting via the old yank-a-bandage-off technique. Note: you don't pull straight up. JP pulls straight up on the strip. I scream. D laughs. JP marvels at the waxy strip covered with hair from one small patch. I need a drink. D laughs some more and yells at JP to pull another. This goes on for a few minutes until all the muslin has been yanked off and a bunch of wax and hair remains and D and JP are on the phone laughing at me.

Conveniently enough, the kit came with "Wax Off" - presumably some sort of agent used to remove residual wax. We apply this and it doesn't work. JP attempts rigorous scrubbing, which is just what you want on your freshly terrorized skin. We end up in the hot tub attempting to melt the wax off. At this time I've decided that I'll have grown back what few hairs were pulled by the time all the wax is entirely off.

The end result was terrible: it looked like a poorly planned deforestation project had taken place on my right bikini area. The left has one missing patch. My fear is that I'll be in an automobile accident and for some reason some stranger will discover this and laugh. I know it makes no sense to be concerned about that, but neither does pouring hot wax on yourself in order to more efficiently pluck hairs from a region that only one other person ever sees. Sometimes I wonder if I should seek help.

Am I genetically predisposed to this?

Wednesday night my stepdad called to report that my mother had fled the ranch in a psychotic state after attempting to save a premature baby llama for four hours and he was certain she had lost her marbles. The llama died, she cried, he yelled, and she took off in the van. So he called to yell at me about how screwed up my mother and brother are. I just wanted to watch the season finale of Beauty and the Geek.

About five minutes later I called my mom to check on her. She can't drive at night. Well, she really shouldn't drive at any time because of the vertigo but that's another story...Anyhow, she said she was pulled over on the side of the road down the street from the ranch and was just going to burrow into the hay in the back of the van and sleep like and animal for the night because the next day she was planning to divorce my stepfather. Believe it or not, this was the most rational sentence to emerge from her during the call.

I called my stepdad back and told him she'd be okay and to just get some rest.

An hour later my mom called me to rant about my brother and stepfather and how I wasn't doing enough, or I was doing too much, or that I should just go on with my life and quit helping, or that I should save everyone. Then she began dividing up the animals at the ranch and estimating how much it would cost to get out of her marriage. She came up with $25k. Twenty-five years of marriage = $25,000. At 11:00 pm I didn't feel like arguing and just waited for her battery to die or hay fever-induced insomnia to kick in. She eventually lost steam in time for another round from stepdad. I eventually unplugged the phone.

Thursday morning at about 6:00 am my mom called to tell me she had snuck back in the trailer and stolen my stepdad's cell phone battery and was heading to my brother's house to confront the drug addicts. She hadn't eaten in at least 24 hours, had just spent the night in a bed of hay, and was on a rampage so I advised that she at least take a shower before heading the two hours to my brother's house so she'd be clean when she got arrested. She hung up on me.

Thursday at 11:00 my stepdad called from a payphone to tell on my mom for stealing the cell phone battery. I guess stealing the battery didn't work too well because he was able to call me. I listened and affirmed that she was crazy. I then declared that he, however, had stopped taking his medication for his bipolar condition and was equally insane.

At 11:30 my mom called to tell me she was at my brother's house and he was high. No kidding. She had a hauling company there to remove the three tons of junkie garbage that had accumulated in the past two years but didn't realize they charged so much. She needed $350 to pay them and couldn't go to the bank to get it because she didn't have that much money and would have to move some things around in different accounts. I told her I'd handle it and to go to my house and take a nap.

At 7:00 on Thursday my mom called again. Now speaking of just abandoning her life, taking two dogs and living in the van forever. Makes perfect sense to me. I called her best friend and asked her to call and talk to mom to determine whether authorities should be brought in (she has been down this road before). Friend called me back and said my mom is crazy, but no more crazy than any other 59 year old woman who lives in a trailer with 100 animals and a man with three toes. Point taken.

This morning, after a call to check in on mom in the van, I went to wrap things up at my brother's house. Escrow now closes Tuesday. He thinks they are paying him in cash, $143,000 in cash. Yep. I told him it'll be a check and require about 10 days for clearance. He doesn't have a bank account. Owns a half million dollar home and doesn't have a bank account. At least the trash has been hauled away.

My mother has since taken her digital camera, taken pictures and listed all her and my stepfather's worldly possessions for sale so she can buy a trailer on five acres she actually went and looked at with a realtor today. She plans to borrow the money for it from my brother. Now, there's a plan.

I don't even have to embellish this stuff to make it funny. At least it's Friday and I'll be applying for an attorney general position on the island nation of Palau this weekend. Sounds about as sane as anything I've heard all week...