interns

young people of los angeles and the extended world, stop working for free. it is fucking us all over. and over.

macarthur wiki

Despite the rather poetic homage paid to it in the 1968 song, the real MacArthur Park became known for violence after 1985 when drug-dealing, shoot-outs and the occasional rumored drowning became commonplace, with as many as 30 murders in 1990.^[12] The Westlake area also became famous for the sale of fake identification cards. When the lake was drained in 1973 and 1978 hundreds of handguns and other firearms were found to have been disposed of in the lake.^[13]

Gang-on-gang violence still occurs occasionally in and around the park. In 1995, a small, local gang in the Westlake and Downtown area called the Burlington Street Locos got into an argument with another man who was believed to be in a rival gang called the Crazy Town Locos. A few days before, a member of Crazy Town Locos struck a man from Burlington Street Locos across the face. Seeking revenge, members of the Burlington Street Locos went to look for members of the rival gang and thought that a man that looked like the target was him. Without knowing, they fired a couple rounds into his chest and hid the body in a garbage bag and threw it in the lake.

In 1997, a member of MS 13 was found dead in the MacArthur Park lake. Police found his body two days after he died. Apparently, members of two small time gangs called the Crazy Riders and Drifters shot the victim in the chest and head after they found out he was selling crack on their turf.

In 2001, a couple members of the notorious 18 Street gang had a shootout with their rivals, the MS 13. A 18th Street clique known as MacArthur Park clique got into an argument with members of MS 13 which eventually led to a shootout. There were three deaths and two injuries.

In 2002, members of the 18 Street saw a member of another rival gang and beat the victim until he went into a critical condition. A day later, members of the victim's gang approached members of the 18th Street gang and started firing with semi-auto pistols. This event led to the death of two 18th Street members and an injury to an innocent bystander.

In 2005, three bodies in a trash bag were found in the lake. They were tied together and thrown into the lake after they had been stabbed and beat. One of the bodies was identified as a man that belonged to MS 13.

In 2008, a shooting occurred while a birthday party was being held. Members of the 18th Street started firing towards a crowd filled with rival gang members. This led to the death of three people, a rival gang member and a mother and child.

boiler room

the boiler has been out and i haven't showered in three days. i've gone camping and done yoga in the interim. look and feel like an olsen twin

jeff in venice

The face I saw, the face that was my face, was full of something, trembling like a glass brimful of water, trembling like a whippet. Not out of fear, but out of the simple fact of being alive. To be a whippet was to tremble, and to be me was to tremble like a glass full of water.

dyer 242

hello dolly

Hello, Dolly,
This is Louis, Dolly
It's so nice to have you back where you belong

You lookin' swell, Dolly
I can tell, Dolly
You still glowin', you still crowin'
You still goin' strong
I feel the room swayin'
While the band's playin'
One of our old favorite songs from way back when

So, take her wrap, fellas
Find her an empty lap, fellas
Dolly'll never go away again

牛肉麵

i don't think i've anything but chinese food and ice cream to eat this week. what can i say - whines come true.

sea of love

my spirit animal is a smiling cocker spaniel with gold and white tresses and an unending hunger for more of whatever you're eating

tethered aircraft

i'm in the market for an idiot-proof kite for flying in macarthur park. bonus if this kite is able to dive and attack on command.

hollyhood

night at the roxbury

this paper cut really makes me feel alive

yah-ta-ta

i found a new toy yesterday - Forvo. people recording how they say things.

for example, http://www.forvo.com/word/don%27t_mention_the_war/#en

reddit

This may sound odd, but I had a lot of Indian (south asian) friends when I was a kid and I always wanted my house to smell like theirs. I'm first generation Ukrainian so my house always smelled like cabbage, sausage, and mix of cigarettes and cheap beer. When I was old enough to move out and have my own apartment I tried everything from roasting my own herbs and spices to grind for curry powder to always cooking with cumin, garlic, fenugreek, etc. Nothing worked and I just realized after reading this post how bizarre this is.

death in vernon

worst interview ever. i'm going to go shoot myself in the face now

st petersburg 2012

void

if i don't get chinese food soon i'm going to die

wheek wheek

i've been really frustrated lately. so i painted a guinea pig.

о лошади

norway tunisia

my father, silent man, is always watching travel shows and i sometimes wonder if he'd rather be someplace else

the suburbs

first three things ma said to me when she walked into the house:

1. aaah!! aaaahh!! aaaaaaahh!!
(i let the dog lie on the people blanket)

2. did you gain weight? you look fat and your face is so round.

3. why is your hair so red?

dreams like oceans

at night before i go to sleep i like to survey my bedroom in darkness with my blind eyes. i like to see the things i own and where i've placed them and the enormity and grandeur of my space makes me proud.

last night i drank chamomile tea, which is supposed to promote a more rested sleep. i dreamt of a tupperware full of orandas. i've had dreams of fish my entire life, but i've never thought of them in connection to a greater state of peace.

tell the truth but tell it slant

Yesterday we went back to USC for the LA Times' Festival of Books, where there were far too many children underfoot. for some reason, the festival of books is skewed towards being a small-children-fun-fair and the extreme heat and scampering children (i don't even hate children, but this was Actually too many) made walking around the festival virtually unbearable. the big people who do the actual reading find solace in the panels going on all over campus.

at twelve o'clock we attended the nonfiction panel Tell the Truth but Tell It Slant. the panelists were brilliant (Avrom Bendavid-Val, Geoff Dyer, Pico Iyer, Frank Westerman) and i'd like to read one thing by each of them. i was very excited to hear geoff dyer, whose essays i've enjoyed reading for some time, speak. geoff's mouth moves like a ventriloquist dummy's and he starts off every statement with a dropped-jaw drawn-out, weeeeeellll, and finishes every statement with a big swig of bottled water. we were seated next to an awful, clueless woman who made a racket throughout the entire discussion, zipping and unzipping her purse, shuffling her papers endlessly, rustling her bag of lifesavers and stuffing lollies in her gob. the dyer book i'm reading is an LA public library copy; i had it signed and plan on returning it to circulation.

at one thirty we had chipotle.

at three o'clock we went to the Focus Features screening of Beginners. the movie was excellent, making you sick and confused by toying with your emotions, making you joyous and then miserable but never letting you savor any feeling for more than an instant before changing again. like life. our friend Rey had a few lines in the movie and he looked very beautiful. the entire movie is filmed on the east side of LA, and i enjoyed seeing all my familiar favorite places in it: this scenic hill, that sunset junction, this shabby bookstore, that gay bar, this house party that's just like one i've been to.

halleloo

just when i thought my life was becoming boring, i turned on the tv to see a boy i once met and had a big crush on dressed as a drag queen on RuPaul's Drag Race

blini

without these my entire life is so unfulfilled

the foundation pit

He took long walks, in solitude. Once he stopped on a hill, away from the town and the road. The day was blurred, uncertain, as though time went no further; on such days plants and animals doze, and people remember their parents.