We Have a Hostel Situation

It’s another bright and sunny day in California. How depressing. It’s always so sunny here. Do they not believe in overcast days and rain here? What can you do? Wipe off the superficial makeup of grass and green trees not indigenous to the area and you’re left with a desert.

For the third time since moving into the hostel four days ago, I switched rooms. This time, I have to carry all my personal belongings (two suitcases, a backpack, and a shoebox) upstairs where I’ll share a room with three other tenants. The room is the same size as my previous two rooms, but this one has more bunk beds and more people. It’s worth it though because I’ll be literally saving three dollars a day on my rent. My inner Jew never ceases to amaze me.

Now would be a good time to introduce the new cast of characters that will show up in future posts. I know this, because I have already written those blog entries. So it would be wise to give you a little information on them so when they show up, you, the reader, can go, “Hey, I remember him mentioning them. Hooray exposition.” Some might even recognize their own name, assuming Rose is still reading this.

Ruby & Rose:

Ruby and Rose are sisters from Ohio and very cool people. They might be the coolest people in Ohio, for all I know. If someone else would like to contest this statement and provide circumstantial evidence that would make he or she cooler than Ruby and Rose, by all means they may. But until that time, Ruby and Rose will be known as the coolest people in Ohio. Ruby is going to school here for the next six weeks, taking classes in makeup for film and theater, and Rose is here to make sure Ruby doesn’t get hit on by creepy bloggers such as myself. So far, she’s doing a good job at her job. We’ll end up hanging out a lot together. I will be sad to see them go and lost at the hostel when they leave to return to Ohio.

Matt:

Matt is one of my new roommates. He does post-production work on a variety of media projects, and is very good at what he does. Originally from Utah, he comes to California to make large sums of money doing contract work. Matt is a worldly traveler. He has a girlfriend in Peru and spends a good part of the year traveling the globe, much like I assume Christian Bale’s father did.

Gweat’s, a.k.a. Buckwheat, a.k.a. Pass’ta Weats, a.k.a. Brent

The first conversation I had with Gweat’s (pronounced Gweet us) had something to do with helicopters flying overhead and how you have to wave flares around all willy-nilly like in Jurassic Park, throw them in one direction so the helicopter follow them like a T-Rex, while you take off in the other direction. Don’t believe this conversation took place? Ruby can confirm that it did. Considering the future conversations I’ve had with Gweat’s, I can also say this is probably the sanest conversation we’ve had together. Ruby can attest to this, too.

Hiro Nakamura:

My third roommate, I actually don’t know his real name. I asked Matt if he knew and he didn’t. I asked Gweat’s and he started crawling on the ground yelling something about ocean jellyfish. So I call my fourth roommate Hiro Nakamura, because he looks exactly like the character Masi Oka plays on the show, Heroes.

The Hipsters:

I won’t describe the hipsters, because if you know one hipster, you know them all. Their style and personalities are completely interchangeable with one another. They all have poorly colored hair, tattoos, too tight of jeans, and drink Pabst Blue Ribbon. I hate hipsters. There are two of them living in my hall.

Marko & Sait:

Marko and Sait live on the first floor, but come upstairs to use the Internet, so I see them a lot. Marko is from Greece and Sait is from Turkey. They both moved into the hostel at the same time and just hit it off right away. Everyone thinks they are gay because they do everything together, and because Sait oftentimes wears a pink shirt, and sometimes Sait wakes up to find Marko sleeping in the same bed as him. But I assure you they are not gay.

There you go—a quick rundown of the cast of characters to appear in upcoming blogs. You might want to consider printing this page off so you can return to it for easy reference later.

Sorry we’ve spent the past few paragraphs not talking about me (again, I apologize), and have probably isolated the majority of my blog’s audience (me) through this controversial decision, but I’m going to make it right to you (me) now by talking more about me and what I’m up to.

On this Saturday, I looked at another apartment—this time in North Hollywood. After seeing the place and meeting the potential roommates, I have a pretty good feeling about this one. It’s a nice neighborhood, the price is right, the roommates are really swell people, and I desperately want my mailing address to be North Hollywood. How cool would that be? Unfortunately, a few days from when this blog took place, I will find out one of the roommates wants another female roommate, so it’s a no-go. Clearly, they don’t know my mannerisms too well.

However, not knowing that, I was feeling pretty good about California and things in particular. The prospect of not having to live in the hostel was enough to be elated by in and of itself.

Later that night, I drove up to Burbank to meet up with Ben, who, to refresh your memory, is my friend I graduated college with. After getting lost due to a fork at an exit leading to Burbank Blvd., Ben, Ben’s roommate Matt, and I went to see the comedy troupe, “A Side of Fries,” show.

A little about, “A Side of Fries”:

They perform in a small theater in downtown Burbank. A few hours before the show, they decide which scripts they are going to perform, build any sets, costumes, or props they might need, and then rehearse with the time that is left. They have a teleprompter to look at if they forget their lines, but doing so results in heckling from the crowd.

At the show, they handed out free Pabst Blue Ribbon. As always, anywhere there is Pabst, hipsters abound. Fortunately, when the house lights go down, you don’t have to look at them—all you have to do then is listen to them jeer the performers.

Aside from that, the show was okay. There were a few funny skits, but I was mostly underwhelmed. Ben and Matt assured me past shows had them busting guts right and left. However, the musical interlude was performed by an artist whose music will be featured in Target commercials this fall the nation over. It was pretty good. That’s one nice thing about Los Angeles—the musical acts don’t suck. It’s not the Midwest screamo-shitty bands that have for some reason become so popular around Iowa. I blame it on the Midwest being so desperate for a musical style of their own they’re willing to settle for awful music that anyone with an instrument and a penchant for the taste of paint thinner can produce. California, not lacking from a drought of musical talent, sets the bar pretty high and doesn’t stoop this low—although by nature, most musicians do love to sip paint thinner. It’s just a character flaw.

After the show, everyone took to the sidewalk out in front of the theater to finish off the rest of the Blue Ribbons. Imagine everyone just standing outside, drinking. Some bike cops drove by, fully aware a crowd was standing on a public sidewalk drinking, and didn’t bat an eye. They just kept pedaling. I can assume this is because cops in California have bigger things to worry about than public intoxication.

Ben, Matt, and I said our goodbyes for the evening. I drove back to the hostel, and then past the hostel, because there was nowhere to park close by. Parking three streets away, I walked back to the hostel and my new room, which housed my new roommates. Everyone was asleep when I got there. Gweat’s hangs sheets up around his bed, making it look like he sleeps in some pneumonia patient’s opaque group tent. This is not important information—just something you should know about Gweat’s.