Happy Birthday to MEEE

I had the Hollywoodiest last few days EVAH.

1. Thursday, as I mentioned, I went to the premiere of The Darjeeling Limited. It was star-studded affair -- I'm sure you heard that Owen Wilson was there, and indeed he was, and looked very sad, I thought. Something in his eyes -- heck, its in his performance in this one too, you'll love the film but he looks rather haunted. After the movie, I saw who I *thought * was Wallace Shawn -- you know, from the Princess Bride? But in fact, it was one of my acting idols, BUD CORT from Harold and Maude, who has sorta morphed into Wallace Shawn. I shoulda known considering he was in Life Aquatic, but, y'know, its a disconnect.

2. Afterwards, we went to the Rolling Stone "HOT PARTY" -- dunno if you noticed but our dear Diablo is in the "Hot Issue" as "Hot Screenwriter," and indeed I think she's rather hot, myself. There were celebs there, but I only recognized a few -- both Ando and Hiro from "Heroes" were there (Ando was getting his grind on with a very hot chick, Hiro was chatting with friends), and Juliette Lewis, and Perez Hilton, and apparently Ja'net from "Good Times," wonder what she's accomplished since? But my favorite was actually getting to meet and talk with one of my heroes, Billy Duffy of The Cult. Now, understand -- I was a goth, right? I had a black leather biker jacket, and on the back was painted THE CULT, because they were my absolute favorite band in the late 80s and early 90s. I was too chickenshit to talk to him, but Diablo knows no fear, and dragged me over to meet him. And he was absolutely 100% sweet, friendly and gracious.

3. Saturday night, as a day-early birthday present, Diablo got me tix to Morrissey, who's doing a ten-night residency at the Palladium. It was absolutely great. I have some observations about the show which I'll post under a seperate entry. Afterwards we hit an LA strip club, the Body Shop on Sunset. Lemme just say: compared to a few great Minneapolis strip clubs, the LA clubs are LAAAAAME. Sure, the girls are cute, but its all about who can throw the most dollars down on the tip rail, and that honor is usually held by rich, flashy middle-eastern men. I can't compete without the oil dollars, so we got ignored mostly.

4. Last night we got to view the incredible private art collection of one David Gersh, head of the Gersh agency who represents our Ms. Cody. It absolutely blew me away to see this stuff up close -- he had Lichtensteins, Johns, Stellas, Currans -- utterly amazing, a remarkable collection. It was incredibly kind of him to let us look around, and even kinder for he and his lovely wife to act as tour guides for us.

So yeah -- it was a BLAST. Great birthday weekend. Heck, I don't even FEEL 30! (heh heh)