LA Confidential

Here it is - my first post from sunny California!

It's been a crazy and hectic few days, and now, finally, things have sttled down a bit, at least for the time being. My dad and I flew in to LA on Thursday, and had a very exhausting day after our early morning, very long, and somewhat turbulant flight, followed by a long line for the car rental, and heavy freeway traffic to get to Burbank from the airport. The next few days after that were an insane blur of supply and grocery shopping, driving around Burbank, and the biggest task of all - finding an inexpensive but solid used car. I ended up lucking out by finding a pretty sweet 99 Oldsmobile Alero for a good price at a local dealer. Of course, just when it looked like we had that purchase all wrapped up, there were problems with getting the car insurance, which was a big headache. Suffice to say that Saturday, which ideally would have been spent touring around LA, was instead spent visiting the insurance office and chewing out the incompetent woman who we were dealing with (though we did get in quick trips to Mann's Chinese Theater / the Walk of Fame and the Universal Studios City Walk for dinner ...). Overall though, despite the great weather (high 70's all week so far) and a number of excellent meals, I'd have to say that it was a pretty stressful first few days in CA. Just a lot to take care of and of course my dad wanted everything all set before he returned to CT (just in time to take my brother back to BU -- not the most fun thing after a 7 hour red-eye flight). But today I finally got to take it easy, set up my apt to my liking, and drive around on my own a little and get the lay of the land.

I really like Burbank so far. It is more suburban and less flashy than LA (and as everyone keeps saying, less exciting), but it is a very nice area with a ton of shops and restaurants. The downtown area is great, and there's everything you could want in terms of stores and places to eat within a very short distance. Plus where I am now (staying a month at an extended-stay inn in Burbank) is just a few minutes from NBC and the other big Burbank studios (WB and Disney). The truth is that Hollywood and LA are not technically far at all, it is just a question of how bad the traffic is when driving there (and it's usually bad).

The place I'm staying is okay so far - don't think I'd want to stay here more than a month though. The location is perfect, right on a main road and close to everything. But the place itself is slightly ghetto. The walls are pretty thin for one thing, you can hear every conversation outside for example. Plus the windows are arranged in a way that it feels like people outside can see right into your room even with the blinds closed, which is a little annoying. Plus, I of course ended up in a room that as soon as I moved in, realized that there was some kind of problem with the shower. It works fine for me, but apparently whenever I use the shower water leaks as it goes down the pipes to the floor below me. So the repairs are going to take three whole days, during which I don't think I'm going to be able to use the shower. Dammit, they better let me use someone else's or something, because I don't want to start work this week without being able to take a shower ... that would suck. I will say that the people who run the place are extremely nice and apologetic about everything, but still ... why did it have to be MY room?

Still, I am getting pretty psyched for the start of the page program on Tuesday. I'm a little worried about giving tours, since I've never really done that before (guess maybe I should have done Shield and Dragon (this group that gave prospective students tours) in high school ... or not. I figure that it'll be like being a camp counselor, only instead of leading around a bunch of eight year olds all day it'll be a bunch of middle aged women from Texas who reeaaaally like Jay Leno, or something. I don't know. I did give a pretty good tour of BU by senior year, whenever someone I knew was looking at the school.

Oh, speaking of BU, I was looking on their website and saw the page about the new cable TV. Damn, they are really going all out with that, and really promoting it too. Never would have happened under Silber.

I am also realizing how uneven I've been with telling people about my move to California. It is really hard to keep track of who exactly I've talked to, and, though hard to believe as it is, not everyone reads my blog religiously, as they should ... haha well anyways, yeah, it is getting hard to tell everyone I know about the move and remember who I have and haven't talked to. I want to send out a mass email, but since I've mostly been using AOL for email lately, I don't have many ppl's new emails, since the stupid, old version of AOL I was using at home doesn't save contact info. Plus, I don't think I even have a lot of people's updated email addresses anymore, now that many of my friends have stopped using BU accounts. So as a stopgap measure I resorted to a kind of dumb, cheesy way of contacting people, which was a mass message over Facebook.com ... I don't know how many ppl even check that site anymore now that they've graduated, but hey, that site does it all. I wish I had invented it -- I'd be rolling in sweet, sweet cash right about now.

So here I am in Burbank, CA. I'm sure I'll have a lot more to talk about soon once I start at NBC. Hmmm, I wonder if I now have to speak the company line now that I'm an employee of NBC-Universal? Well, probably more than half the TV I watch is on FOX (Simpsons, 24, The OC, Arrested Development, etc) and I have to admit I don't think I have watched a primetime show regularly on NBC since Seinfeld ended (never been a Friends fan, not really into Law and Order). Still, I am a huge fan of old-school SNL (it completely sucks now and has progressively gotten worse since the last heyday of Myers-Carvey-Hartman-Spade-Farley-Sandler, etc) and of course Conan. I'm still bitter that NBC screwed up and cancelled one of the all time greatest ever shows (even though it had so few episodes), Freaks and Geeks. What were they thinking? Now, as far as other NBC-Universal stations, I'm not a big Sci Fi channel fan despite being a sci fi fan. Sure, they have reruns of the Twilight Zone (greatest show ever), but I never got into any of their original stuff like Stargate or Farscape, except for when they aired the last season of Sliders, one of my all time faves (even though that last season was pretty lame). They seem to do well with the occasional big budget miniseries like Taken, but overall I think they need to overhaul the network and get some more original, quality stuff. Now I used to be a loyal viewer of USA. Yep, USA. I mean, hey, they were the home of WWF wrestling throughout my childhood years. Ah, those early Sunday mornings waking up to watch Mean Gene and Bobby the Brain hosting All-American Wrestling ... those were the days. And also USA, once home to an endless stream of B-level exploitation shows (Silk Stalkings, Pacific Blue, In the Heat of the Night, etc) seems to churn out a kickass cult classic show like the awesome La Femme Nikita, a very much missed favorite of mine. Anyways, from now on I'm going to be a company man, so ... watch LAW AND ORDER ... JOEY IS AWESOME ... LENO IS HILARIOUS, BETTER THAN LETTERMAN ... and yes, MEDIUM IS THE YEAR'S BEST NEW SHOW!

Now that those NBC suits are off my back, time for some ...

RANDOM THOUGHTS:

- saw the last half of this week's OC. This was kind of a breather episode after the heavy soap opera of the last few weeks, but it seems like they might be leading up to a huge Kirsten Cohen as alcoholic storyline, or I could be wrong, but I think that's where they are going to go down the line.

- FOX Sunday Night thoughts: King of the Hill had a great episode tonight, the ones with Hank's dad Cotton are always hilarious yet also kind of poignant, and this one was no exception. Malcolm was also extremely good, one of the best episodes of the season I think. Again, the Hal-centric episodes are some of the funniest, and this one was another example of how great a character Hal is on the show. Then, a trifecta - The Simpsons had a legitimately excellent episode! Why was it good? Let me break it down:

Why this Simpsons episode was different, and thus BETTER than the typical nu-Simpons ep:
- one consistent main plot / theme that spanned the ENTIRE episode
- humor from clever dialogue and character moments, not just total absurdity
- a theme (prescription drugs) that was timely but done in a well-thought out fashion
- used many characters well and in the natural flow of the episode
- had an actual point to the humor and plot, a beginning, middle, and end
- felt mostly new and not like an idea that's been recycled a million times

Nice, three for three ... then Arrested Development came and delivered a pretty solid episode, again, not quite up to Season 1 standards, but funny and clever nonetheless. They are getting away from Tobias too much (his bits were easily the episode's funniest), and Buster as well. Still, this was overall maybe the best FOX Sunday in a while - plus we got some classic Family Guy at 9, rather than some terrible reality show or whatever. See, even in CA, ya gotta keep some old traditions alive.

- Whoah, in the Sunday LA Times they have TWO comics sections, filled with tons of strips I've never heard of before along old favorites. No Zippy though, but still that's kinda cool. Now I just need to find a good bagel place to make my Sunday mornings / afternoons complete.

- So many freakin' fast food chains over here. And here I am trying to eat healthy. All I know is that the logo for the Carl's Jr. chain (a weird cartoon star-shaped guy who's giving a perpetual wink) really freaks me out for some reason. Also I have never seen so many donut shops as here, I wonder why that is.

Well, I'm finally starting to get settled in. I'm stocked up on the essentials (yep, got my Special K cereal in the kitchen), and starting to learn my way around. If you're reading this and in the LA area, or plan on visiting, drop me a line.