After a horrible Friday in which I took a test written by Satan himself, we decided to head on over to Koreatown participate in some karaoke in order to blow off some steam, as well as celebrate Nat’s birthday. We took off around 9 p.m. and began to navigate the Los Angeles freeway system, thinking traffic must have died down by that time. We were right, for the most part, however as always, there were a couple pockets of traffic that almost made us turn back and go home. When we arrived in the strip mall complex off of Normandie that housed the karaoke studio, we weren’t quite sure what to expect. We were lead to our own private room, complete with a pistachio green booth, an orange-red table and a television set. Two microphones and tambourines, as well as three song books (mostly all in Korean) sat on the table.

Although it is now a Koreatown staple, karaoke is actually a Japanese word, with kara meaning “empty” and okesutora meaning “orchestra.” It took a couple minutes for us to get used to the set up, and navigate the t.v., but once we got going, we just couldn’t stop.

Our set list included such classics as “Unbreak My Heart,” “Super Trooper,” “Devil Woman,” “2 Become 1″ and many more cheesy pop songs, including my absolute favorite, Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana.”

Excuse the shoddy photo quality, as these were taken with my iPhone. And also excuse the shoddy appearance quality, as I was exhausted by the end of an incredibly fun night. My test didn’t go too well. In my opinion, tests like these have no measure on how a student performs in school whatsoever, and they’re a complete waste of time. I might try again, but after more hardcore studying perhaps. Either way, karaoke in Koreatown took my mind off it, and as Martha Stewart would say, that was a good thing.

This weekend was windy. Very windy. God listened to my prayers and decided to distribute some cold weather to the deprived residents of Los Angeles.

It was so windy in fact, that I had no choice but to make some ginger bread crusted pumpkin pie. It came out well, except my brown sugar was very dry before I put it in the pie and that was upsetting.

I love pomegranate.

Friday cannot come any sooner. I feel as if I have already done enough with my hours and now I want to allow the week some time off. Thursday and Friday, can you please disappear? Don’t bring me more work, more traffic and less sleep. Why don’t you join Saturday and Sunday and give me a a nice, long weekend to look forward to?

My day started at 5:30 a.m. yesterday and ended at 10:30 p.m. By the time I got home, I more or less collapsed in my bed. I was so tired. I was the kind of restless tired. The kind of tired when you can feel your eyeballs in their sockets, where if you stay up just a bit longer, the loopy, crazy, insane behavior might start and you wont be able to stop it.

As per usual, Los Angeles traffic was relentless. It still boggles my mind on how people can come to this city and survive its strange behavior and customs. If the Iranian Revolution hadn’t taken place and I had lived my life in Tehran, was forced to wear a head scarf and then one day my parents decided to take a trip to Los Angeles, I think I would have lost my mind. How does one come here from Minnesota and manage to drive to and from work and home on a gridlocked 405 freeway. I am from here and I barely survive it. I’ve learned to tune it out a bit I guess and I am sure that this is what most people do, newcomers and locals alike and that’s how we all survive together, but I can imagine how shocking the idea of spending that long of a time in your car before you get to work can seem.

After work, I had to run over across town to see a press screening of “Ghost Town,” the new film starring Ricky Gervais, or as I like to perpetually call him David Brent. No matter how good you think it is, the American version of the The Office has absolutely NOTHING on the U.K. Office. David Brent rules the world and me and you just live in it. Stapler in jelly, redundancies, Keith, Sergio Georgini, can it get any better than this? I think not.

But I digress. The movie was quite funny, just your typical comedy, with a few twists and turns, but nothing absolutely spectacular, except for Ricky Gervais’ shark tooth. I couldn’t help but think about David Brent throughout the whole film, albeit a grouchy, loner David Brent. I hate when I go to press screenings, and they’ve combined the press with a gazillion other normal movie-goers who just happened to get invited to an early screening. I can’t stand it. It takes away from the professionalism of it all. I guess it’s a good way to judge how the film is perceived by others as you watch it, but I still get annoyed.

Earlier this year, when I attended the press screening for “The Wackness” at Sony Studios, it was so…professional. I hate to use that word again, but it’s the way it felt. I was going where normal people didn’t get to go, to a private movie studio lot, where I was handed an identification card to put on my car and had to maneuver my way through the buildings, check in with the publicist from the public relations firm, and sit in the theater, with other journalists. It was so fulfilling. I felt like a real writer, with other writers, in a special place just for us, so that we can watch this film, and either love it or hate it. I don’t mean to romanticize the whole thing, but I love being a member of the press.

I love it. It’s what I live for. The power we have just overwhelms me at times. Granted, it’s not something many would think of as ‘power’ but it is influence nonetheless.

After the screening, I got on the road with a bladder so full that if I had some how made a sharp turn, I would have burst. As you can imagine, I went straight for the toilet when I arrived home. And then after that, I went straight to my bed, and the lines of vision between the real world and sleep world became blurry and I eventually and quickly dozed off.

I dreamt about writing and typewriters and Jack Kerouac and Anderson Cooper and the New York Times. I saw myself talking to the homeless of Los Angeles, trying to tell their stories. I thought about my byline appearing in a national magazine. My visits to the Educational Testing Service website the day before to find out more about the GRE (Graduate Record Examination) danced around in my head and made me just as nervous thinking about exams and scores and no.2 pencils as I had been in high school.

Today, I got up the nerve to register for the test. I will face my doom in a month’s time. Needless to say, I am frightened. Very frightened. Standardized tests don’t sit well with me, but then again, who do they sit well with? This is the first step I must take to continue my education. A first, very scary step. A step that will lead me to a Master of Arts in Journalism or English. It’s now or never. I am ready to take the plunge. I am not, however, ready to take a rigid test that has no bearing on my skills as a writer, reporter, editor or decision maker at all. That’s the harsh reality of it, I hope it isn’t taken too much into consideration by my prospective institutions of higher learning. On the other hand, there are a couple of Universities I’m looking into at the moment in London. Fortunately, these schools do not require silly tests like the GRE. Thank God for the British. There are many decisions to be made in the coming months, many late nights, many stressful situations, many doubts and hopes and fears and dreams all rolled into one, about education, life and love. I’m ready to face it. I’m quite ready. Being a journalist, making a difference somehow, someway in someone’s life means more to me now, than it ever did before. I’m hungry for it and I don’t think I will ever get full.

Rose Bowl Flea Market, Pasadena, April 2007, by Keeg

405 – Pit of Hell. This is what I do in traffic. Take photos.

My boyfriend doesn’t understand traffic. Why should he? He’s from London, where mass transit is the norm and readily available to any Londoner at will. In London, there are buses at every stop, taxis at every corner and a metro with comfortable seating. What more can you ask for? Unlike Los Angeles, London is not a particularly spread out city. You can probably travel across it in less than an hour. L.A on the other hand is a vast land of freeway, suburb and city. I’ve said this before, but I don’t understand how anyone can travel to this city for vacation. How do you figure out where to go? And most importantly, how do you manage to get there? You can drive here, but what if you’re coming from Sweden? You can rent a car, but how would you even figure out our convoluted freeway system? 10 east, 5 south, 405 north, como what? I’ve lived in this city practically all my life and even I can’t figure it out completely (although if I needed to, I could find my way home using surface streets – this is what driving across town does to you)

This morning I thought I’d try something new by waking up extremely early to try and beat traffic. I got on the freeway at 6:50 a.m. In a normal city, this would mean that there would be a NORMAL amount of cars on the road. In Los Angeles, it means getting to work at 8:10 a.m.

No matter what I do, it doesn’t go away. It exists to make my life hell, even before I get to my cube. Tomorrow, I might try 6:30 a.m., although seeing as to it’s a Friday, I don’t know if it will be an accurate experiment.

The Los Angeles freeway system was my lady all Summer long. Now that school has started, it is a complete mess on the concrete jungle. This won’t ease up, I’m suspecting, until after Christmas. How lovely!

It was a bit difficult waking up this morning. Even Henry didn’t want to budge. He stayed in bed until even after I came back to my room after a shower. However, once he saw me put pants on, he went wild, gnawing at my feet, hopping arond like a miniature gazelle. That’s his cue, he knows that when the pants come on, we exist the room, make our way to the kitchen, where he’ll sniff around and either run to the living room to bark at INVISIBLENESS outside or trot to my parents’ bedroom to steal some socks for his morning breakfast. I can just foresee how hard the coming months will be to wake up – even harder than it is now that the days are getting shorter, and it’s pretty dark when I get home. Ugh.

Today was a terrible day for traffic. I know that sounds redundant, but to give you an idea of how bad it was, I left my house at 7:40 a.m. and got to Santa Monica at 9:10 a.m. I doubt it will ease up before January, as school is in session and the holidays are coming up. One thing is for sure, if I can get Halloween off, I am. Last year, it took be three hours to get home. Three hours. THREE HOURS. I could have been in Mexico in that amount of time. Coming back home tonight was slightly better, if you consider an hour and 10 minute drive for 34 miles better. After doing this for almost a year, I would consider that a good day.

The heat is easing up. I was slightly “cold” while I drove this morning, a miracle in Los Angeles. I thought about how deeply I’m contemplating moving to Europe if I come upon news that John McCain has become  President, how annoying I find the names “Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,” how much nicer the 405 would be without any cars on it and how badly I want a cup of tea and a blanket right at this moment.

It still ceases to amaze me why traffic exists. I’ve read the science behind it, yet I still don’t understand it. The roads don’t change. They don’t get smaller or bigger, so unless there is a major accident backing up cars, I don’t understand why people just can’t accelerate and drive. Don’t they want to be home soon? I don’t buy the excuse of too many cars being on the road because as I said, the roads always stay the same. The days are getting shorter and I am not looking forward to being stuck in traffic in the dark.

I made it home, as I do every day. All the stress of driving, the stupidity of Los Angeles drivers, all the unnecessary stops and gos, they all melt away when I get to my doorstep and a 6lb Maltese named Henry greets me like he hasn’t seen me in 10 years.

Sometimes, I secretly enjoy Los Angeles traffic becomes it not only gives me time to listen to all the wonderful, insightful and interesting news and feature reports on NPR, but it gives me time to think. And it also gives me time to do my makeup. Yea, sometimes I do my makeup while I drive, always in heavy traffic and for always less than 15 minutes tops. Don’t scoff. It takes me 1 hour and 15 minutes to get to work. And I’m a girl. I’m allowed to do my makeup in my car by default. At least I’m doing something constructive with dead time. What are you doing, picking your nose? I thought so.

Graduate school

When will I apply? Where will I go? Most importantly, how much will it cost? And what about Henry? I have to sit and map out a 2-year-plan.

Barack Obama

I don’t know how anyone in their right mind can vote for John McCain. I don’t know. I swear to God, if he becomes president, I am packing up and moving to Europe. Maybe France, I don’t know. Sacrebleu!

Bollywood

I wonder what film we will watch this weekend. I keep forgetting to Netflix Khabi Alvida Na Khena. Nat hasn’t seen it. She must. She must see it immediately. I wonder how Aishwarya Rai is so beautiful. That face, that hair, those eyes. I could stare at her all day long. They’re all pretty. All of them! Priyanka Chopra, Bipasha Basu, Preity Zenta. How is this possible, Universe?

Reading

I have so many books that I’ve bought but haven’t read yet. I want to read. I really want to read. But every night I come home, I am either too tired or have other things to do. I must have at least 10 books waiting for me. I can’t even remember at this point what the last book I read was. How upsetting.

Manicures

I need one. And a pedicure. I wish I had the time and energy and patience to professionally get my nails done, at least once a month. It’s nice to have clean and nice hands, and feet for that matter.

Life

I wish I was at home, sewing and knitting instead of driving to work. When will they day come that I can work from home? I need to plant more vegetables in my garden. I need to paint my room. I wish I had a house to call my own, instead of just a room. Jeez, I need to pluck my eyebrows, they grow at the speed of light. I probably need to shave too. If someone handed me a lump sum of money right now, the first thing I would do is go to the nearest laser hair removal center and purchase head to toe body treatments.

So about half an hour ago, we had an earthquake here in Los Angeles. It registered on the scale at 5.8, with its epicenter about 2 miles from Chino Hills. It started off like there was a big truck rattling outside. Someone yelled, “Earthquake!” as a joke, we all laughed for about 2 seconds and then, it got a bit worse. “Oh no, it really is an earthquake.” I saw about 10 heads darting up from cubicles. No one ducked and covered, we all just stared at each other as if to say, “Is this really happening right now?”

The United State’s Geological Survey reported it at being 29 miles from the Los Angeles Civic Center. Having been through the Northridge earthquake, this was nothing. Somewhere, somehow, Victoria Beckham is implementing the Earthquake safety she learned on “Coming to America.” Transplants, welcome (officially) to Los Angeles.