My Cup Runneth Over With Swill

The first taste of alcohol begins in church/temple. Yeah, it starts with God. Like it or not. When you go to the house of the holy they pour that wine in your mouth and you're hooked. At the age of ten. Little boys get their first taste of sweet fluids, followed by a divine buzz. Let's thank the Lord and give grace. It starts there and builds into something unholy, of course.

My first booze buzzes began with childish, doggy highs: Southern Comfort (syrupy barf bait), awful Gilbey's Gin, and punk rock heaven circa 1978: MD 20/20, sometimes called Mad Dog 20/20, but really called Mogen David 20/20. I'm sure good King David is turning over in his grave. Another punk (nee puke) rock high: Mickey's Big Mouth (aka "The Green Death").

And those boozy upchucks like the time you mixed Captain Morgan's Spiced Rum with Mickey's Big Mouth (yeah!) and you ended up vomiting in that lucky girl's purse. Hey, don't laugh, I'm sure Tommy Lee's done that dozens of times...and then scored.

Stuff I like (in no particular order):

1. Goldschlager (gold fairy tale flakes drifting in your shot glass for a rockin' cinnamon buzz).

2. Maker's Mark = smoother than Jim Beam, love to break the fake wax seal.

3. Jack Daniels, making me pass out on my anniversary, talk about a Kentucky blackout, wake up and vomit, while the room is spinning watch Tom Servo and Crow rip on Arch Hall, Jr. on Mystery Science Theatre 3000.

4. Domaine de Canton - ginger liqueur mixed with Ginger Ale for a double whammy of ginger.

5. Hennessy cognac, excellent for a cold when you have a chest full of flug and have to cough the green devils out. Once when I was tubercular I lived on cognac and donuts. Rock 'n roll, baby.

6. Greyhounds - Grey Goose vodka with grapefruit juice because orange juice is for babies.

7. Rye - booze of choice in billions of old noir movies and novels and kicks ass harder than bourbon. Tastes best in old Hollywood dives like The Formosa Cafe, aye laddie.

8. Manhattans - classier than martinis and tastier, too. Honest. My drink of choice at Jones Hollywood.

So whatever God hath wrought booze is thy destiny. Blame it on my Jewish upbringing; we have not one, but two holidays that encourage hard drinking: Purim and Simchat Torah. On one Simchat Torah I mixed so many different drinks that I perforated the lining of my stomach! Praise the Lord and pass that bottle, brother.

PS WTF

Palm Springs Walk of the Stars (Palm Canyon Drive)=I love the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but the Palm Springs Walk of the Stars might be just as cool. A lot of c-listers get their just due on this walk, and it’s more than fair.
When you have your coffee and scone at Starbucks you might walk by a star with Nancy Sinatra, Phyllis Diller or Catherine Deneuve inscribed on it. What great choices. I so approve.
Continuing on Museum Drive on the way to the Desert Museum I might pass by Jerry Vale, Kaye Ballard (one of Paul Lynde’s best friends), or Trini Lopez.
When I left the Peppertree Book Store after getting “The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson” (THE Palm Springs book!) I looked down and saw Guy Madison, Liberace, and Connie Stevens.
And let’s hear it for the Mamie Van Doren star…after all, she was Ms. Palm Springs when I was still learning how to walk.

Wherehouse Music (555 S. Palm Canyon Drive)= Now it’s called FYE (For Your Entertainment) but who cares. I like this store, it’s like a rock & roll Pic N Save, you can get a leather CD wallet for $2 DOLLARS!
You can get a junky mp3 speaker system for $10 DOLLARS!!!
Who cares if it sounds like a tinny drive-in movie speaker? What do you want, Bose Acoustics, it’s 10 dollars and does the job! I got a crappy Pirates of the Caribbean watch chain for $4 (such the deal!). This place is a paradise of rocker junk in the desert. I got a used copy of “The Downward Spiral” by NIN for $7. I had a ball listening to Trent scream in my face all through my weekend in Palm Springs. I must be sick.

Ichiban Japanese Steak House & Sushi Bar (1201 E. Palm Canyon Drive)= The first time I heard the word “ichiban” was in the movie “The Naked Kiss” when Griff tells Kelly she’s going to be his ichiban (#1 hooker). I don’t know much about hookers any more than I know about Japanese restaurants, but this place put a smile on my face. Ichiban is a very reasonably priced restaurant – I was surprised with the bill when I got it. We ate well and the wallet didn’t take a spanking in the process.
The décor was kind of cheap: wood paneling, tiled mirrors, chrome furniture, kind of like Dad’s rec room. All that was missing was the Playboy mags buried under the couches.
The food was good, though. An order of Teriyaki Filet Mignon came with tempura vegetables and steamed rice. The Wasabi Caesar Salad had no wasabi in it, I guess they threw the wasabi part in the title to make you feel like you were getting something Japanese. You’re not. I washed it all down with plum wine, a “blush” according to the menu. It was sweet, light, and lovely, like my date. I’ll be coming back. Ichiban scored an ichi with me. Burp!

Desert Springs Spa Hotel (10805 Palm Drive)= The place rocks. Seriously. Not one, not two, but about eight different pools of varying sizes and temperatures. If you like it cool, they have one. If you like the warm old fogey Jacuzzi pool, they have one.
Lots o’ lockers you can store your schitt away at while you’re hanging in your bikini.
And best of all, nobody’s leering at you in your bathing suit because everybody’s busy having fun in the water. A locker key and admission is dirt cheap: $5 last time I checked. They also have a hotel that wraps around the pool, but if you stayed here you would probably have a nervous breakdown from all the noise.
The pool opens early: get there around 10, have dinner at 6, be back in Hollywood by 10 pm. That’s swanky.

True Value Hardware (233 S. Farrell Drive #8)= Hardware stores rarely score a 10 in the coolness factor, but TV is the exception to the rule. Before you get to the hammers and weather stripping there’s the swanky display of lounge furniture.
TV also has a great selection of tiki gear, any tiki fanatic would go crazy here, not just tiki torches but tiki kitchenware, tiki furniture, etc.
You’ll also find a huge selection of pool paraphernalia, so stylish that even if you don’t own a pool you’ll want to buy all their stuff. I don’t know who their buyer is, but he has a great artistic eye. Amazing taste.
The staff is very friendly, helpful and know their hardware. Very cool people to deal with, like most hardware sales people they have a pretty dry sense of humor. Must be from hanging around all the lumber.
TV is connected to the Palm Springs Mall, the loneliest indoor mall in the world. It always looks empty and abandoned, like a George Romero movie. It might be the creepiest mall ever, and deserves at least one visit for the eerie factor alone.
Bloody hell, I just double-dipped a review again.

Stuff I Burned From TCM, Part 10

TCM has decided to somewhat circumvent the movie burners by issuing a series of DVDs called “The Warner Archive Collection”, which is no better than what we fans do at home. In fact, they’re not even DVDs, but DVD-R’s, just like us, and they’re bare-bones releases, i.e. no special features, no commentaries, nothing. It’s as if TCM/Warner Bros. authorized some guy at home to burn their films and then market it at high profit ($19 each). So for that reason, this will be the last edition of “Stuff I Burned From TCM”.

Roadblock (1951) – Charles McGraw takes a break from playing a cold-blooded killer in “The Killers” to play a cop on the take in “Roadblock”. This quick-paced noir potboiler is classic RKO Studio stuff: McGraw has to keep embezzling stolen money to keep his high price-tag girlfriend happy. Even she sees him getting out of control until he has a final showdown with the LAPD in the middle of the dried-out Los Angeles River. Edmond O’Brien played a similar kind of crooked cop in “Shield For Murder”, but I think I like this one more. Script written by the awesome Steve Fisher.

The Rag Man (1925) – Jackie Coogan (aka “Uncle Fester”) rose to prominence playing the title character in Charlie Chaplin’s “The Kid”, but acquitted himself later on in movies like this, where he plays a pesky runaway orphan who barges in on an old junk vendor’s heart and business. With the name of Timothy Michael Patrick Aloysius Kelly (…”and a few other names I’ve forgotten”), Coogan behaves like a Harvey Comics character in the flesh, performing such unforgivable stunts as convincing a rich man’s son to dump his entire vintage wine collection because the bottles are valuable. Pretty funny stuff.

West of Zanzibar (1928) – There’s a lot of brilliant Lon Chaney films neglected by DVD release, it was a toss-up between this or “He Who Gets Slapped”. This one wins out because in addition to being directed by Tod Browning, it also co-stars Lionel Barrymore. Chaney plays a magician whose wife and child are taken from him by a rival magician. He retires to a remote jungle village playing a character not unlike Marlon Brando’s in “Apocalypse Now”, complete with creepy African slaves. A young girl journeys to his jungle village where he tortures her, gets her hooked on drugs, only to find much too late she’s his long lost daughter! Sick, and has to be seen to be believed.

Paris Blues (1961) – The only reason I can see for this movie’s inability of DVD release are the music rights for Duke Ellington tracks or possibly Louis Armstrong’s estate maybe blocking this. Otherwise, this film’s chock full of excitement, Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier portraying expatriate American jazz musicians making the beat club scene with Barbie Doll tourists Joanne Woodward and Diahann Carroll falling for them. The bohemian night club scene is handled nicely with some gorgeous black and white cinematography. I found the faux Django Reinhardt dude with the heroin monkey on his back character fairly droll. This is one of the best jazz movies ever and a class act all the way. But hey, let’s not release this amazing burst of superfine coolness, let’s release more Jennifer Aniston chick flick crap. The decline of Western civilization continues.

Yeah, I'm Lame

Yeah, I'm lame. After posting a blog every week for three years I missed a week. I'm sorry. I'm too busy reading Patricia Highsmith's lesbian classic "The Price of Salt". Brilliant shit. Now I'm reading Chester Himes' "The Real Cool Killers". Damn!

Before you decide to hate me I posted some cool pictures of Veronica Lake, a woman who could look funny and totally slammin' at the same time. All those Alan Ladd films, crap, she made him look cool, once she was off the screen he looked like a damp rag.

Later this week I'll post something great. I promise. Don't hate me, I'll even take a day off work to stay home and write something cool for you. In the meantime listen to the best album of 2009, "Invisible Girl" by King Khan and The BBQ Show. Genius. Or rent the best film of 2009, "A Serious Man" by Joel & Ethan Coen. Or just wait. I'll be back!

I Was A Juvenile Delinquent For The JDL

In 1972 I went to Rambam Torah Institute, a division of Yeshiva University. Not a big school, but infamous in teenage Jewish circles. When word got around that Rabbi Meir Kahane was scheduled to speak at our school you could have knocked us over with a feather. Rabbi Kahane was a legendary figure in the Jewish scene, one who was controversial in a world that disdained controversy. Orthodox Jews, for the most part, want to be left alone in their own little world and don’t want to rock the boat, but Rabbi Kahane couldn’t rock the boat hard enough. He was fed up with Jews being depicted as eternal victims and punching bags for every angry minority that needed an easy target for their frustration.

In the late Sixties there were too many incidents involving Jews being attacked in New York by rabid minorities deluded into thinking that Jews were meant to be shoved into ovens for the rest of their lives. Rabbi Kahane was angry as hell and fed up with this shit, forming the Jewish Defense League and fighting back every Anti-Semitic dickhead in New York. He was coming to LA’s most psychopathic yeshiva ready to recruit a West Coast chapter, and I was in on the ground floor.

Our assembly hall was a tiny chapel at the top floor of the school. When you looked out the window all you saw were clouds, birds, the sky and the sun. Nearer thy God to thee. As we filed in Rabbi Kahane was already on stage, nervously pacing up and down. Instead of seeing an old codger with a long, white beard I saw a dead ringer for Tyrone Power in “Nightmare Alley” (with a yarmulke).

“An elderly Chasidic Rabbi was attacked by three Puerto Rican thugs as he was going home from shul on Erev Shabbos (Friday night). Jewish Defense League members saw this happening and fought back with baseball bats. The police arrived at the scene and arrested these criminals who had a history of robbing and beating innocent citizens in the past. The Holocaust was a despicable chapter in Jewish history and has unfortunately given the goyishe (non-Jewish) world the mistaken impression that we’re chronic victims. Well, the JDL is here to show that Jews aren’t targets for anyone.

Just like the Maccabees we believe in fighting back. Our motto is ‘Never Again’ – never again will we allow goyim to attack our people, and in keeping with that philosophy we have neighborhood watch groups patrolling yiddishe neighborhoods like Crown Heights , Queens, just like the Guardian Angels. We’re here to expand our chapters nationwide. Volunteers are encouraged - a sheet will be passed around for signing. I look forward to each and every one of you volunteering for this great mitzvah (good deed) – the mitzvah of protecting the world’s oldest civilization from being crushed by vicious criminals. Yasha Koach (more power to you”.

Of course, I signed. A lot of kids signed but many “disappeared” from JDL activities, partially out of apathy and some because their parents hit the ceiling after hearing about their new commitment (ha,ha). The first JDL activity was at the Hillel Hebrew Academy (9120 W. Olympic Blvd.) gym for Boxing Class. Teaching skinny yeshiva scholars how to fight. As we filed in a very non-Jewish looking pug was skipping rope furiously, kinda showing off if you ask me because he kept at it for five minutes after we came in. Once he got bored being the Big Man of the Gym he paired us all off and had us put on boxing gloves.

“Okay, kid, you cover your face like this with yr. left glove, and then you hit, Hit, HIT with yr. right. That’s the way, champ! Okey doke!” he instructed in his Texas beat-down drawl. I was paired off with a kid I used to see leaving the Reiss-Davis Childrens Institute, a sort of psychiatric clinic for disturbed Jewish kids. I know cause I went there myself. We squared off and this nerdy kid with the crazed elf face started swinging wildly and punching everything in sight, my shoulder, my arm, my collar, my ribs, everything but my face.

“Punch harder, kid, harder! Aim harder!” the Dallas nutcase roared, jumping around like an epileptic referee. Since this monkfish swung with both arms and didn’t cover his face I took a clear right hook to his cheek and flattened him. The horse trader made a disgusted face because he didn’t want me to win, so he pushed me away and spat, “That’s enough with you two! Next!”

Boxing lessons didn’t last long because the kids got bored and the check from the JDL probably bounced, so it came and went. We had bigger fish to fry, anyway. Dr. Linus Pauling was going to speak at a banquet held by the Russian Consulate in Hancock Park . We, along with fifty other Jews were there to protest the inhuman treatment Russian Jews were suffering by their government. Any Soviet Jew applying for a visa to Israel was arrested and placed in an asylum for the criminally insane, and the American government, not smelling a profit, typically turned their backs. We carried placards saying “Save Soviet Jewry” and “Let My People Go”.

We demonstrated in front of the building and chanted “Shame on you, Mother Russia” and “Let the Jews Go”. Russians spat at us and screamed at us in Lithuanian (Litvak), Armenian, Ukrainian, and every other Russki dialect they could think of. Bottom line, it was Anti-Semitic. When we chanted “Never Again” the color would drain from their faces because we were Jews who wouldn’t take it lying down. We had TV exposure on the news and Rabbi Marvin Hier, later of the Simon Wiesenthal Institute, commented on the protest.

Besides raising the hackles of the Jewish community we also made enemies with the White People’s Party, headed by head Nazi Joe Tomassi. They were located on Peck Road in the city of El Monte, and they followed us around in their Nazi uniforms and their spaced out German Shepherds, too stupid to scare a six-year old. They even had a hot line you could call where Tomassi had his Hate Message of the Week, e.g. “Niggers are led by evil Jew devils to wreck schools and churches. We must stop their sleazy deviltry right now. My message next week: shipping those taco eating wetbacks back where they came from. Please leave a message when you hear the tone:” And of course we’d crank the asshole.

We managed to also get their direct line and crank them like crazy; because of our “deviltry” they had to change their phone number on a regular basis. We also kept track of every demonstration those pigs attended, at L.A. City Hall, at Olvera Street, they even tried to demonstrate at Jew Central, Fairfax High School. We ran up their asses and made life hell for them. It was a waste of time, though; if there’s anything Nazis do best its kill their own. Just like George Lincoln Rockwell was killed by a fellow Nazi, Joe Tomassi suffered a similar fate by being shot to death by a rival Nazi Party drone.

By the late Seventies/early Eighties my involvement in all things militant had waned. Shucks, punk rock was as militant as I could get back then. Besides, by that point in time, many civil rights groups like the Black Panthers, Womens Liberation, and the JDL evolved into such an extreme reactionary caricature of all the things that made them valid in the first place.

Many of the original followers of those groups moved away as quickly as possible because their original agendas had been replaced with an extremist slant. Rabbi Kahane spoke less about defending the Jewish community in America and more about racial discrimination towards black Jews in Israel. Whatever happened to the “defense” in Jewish defense???

But the most horrifying vision was in 1981 at a Passover seder where I saw some punk-ass creep bragging loudly about his work with the JDL, his voice rising to get attention. I finally turned around to take a look at an ugly kid with a yarmulke in a brown shirt, a little moustache, and his hair parted to the side almost resembling Adolf You-Know-Who. Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss. L.A. got its own JDL leader, too, the unfortunate Irv Rubin. Irv meant well when he wasn’t screaming at everyone and shoving them out of the way, which was fairly often. My last memory of him was when I was waiting for a bus on Fairfax and espied him chasing some stupid black kid down the street because he made the mistake of grabbing some kid’s yarmulke within ten feet of Rubin.

Violence begets violence, of course: Rubin ended up brutally murdered in County Jail. Kahane was assassinated in a New York hotel by one of the Palestinian rats that blew up the World Trade Center parking lot in 1993,and Kahane’s son and daughter-in-law were ambushed by Palestinian terrorists. So now you ask me, was it worth it? Was all the fighting worth it? Absolutely. Before and even after Kahane’s death there are too many Jews that refuse to fight back or even stand up to discrimination. The world gets too comfortable accepting the fate of a race that too often has been beaten down, and we need more leaders that teach us the importance of self-defense, because birds do it, bees do it, even Jews must do it. Never again.