The following story is true, although several details have been watered down so you don’t get too engaged.

When people speak of desirable social environments, the #1 quality they look for:  “down-to-earth” people.  To me, that’s a peculiar choice.   I prefer “friendly” people, for what am I to do with a surplus of unfriendly down-to-earth people.  In order to embrace their lack of flightiness or realistic outlook (if that’s what down-to-earth means), I need them to first say hello; to be charming, and thus welcoming.

In my experience, there exists an extreme shortage of charming strangers.   Social networking and the isolation that comes from it pretty much killed off the last of ‘em.  In fact, charm isn’t really necessary anymore; people are getting by without it.  Engaging the passerby now has a stigma attached (you’re creepy), but befriending people online, good for you!!!  You’re expanding your network.

So in the rare instance when a stranger charms me a bit, namely a girl, I feel compelled to take action.

Sitting in a coffee shop pretending to write a new script (I was making a To-Do List), the female barista approached me and asked what I was working on.  More importantly, she bore a bright smile… sans incentive.  For anybody who has ever been to a Starbucks/Coffee Bean/Local Spot, you know this never happens.  It’s the stuff of movies.  Someone showing interest in what they typically wouldn’t is the inciting incident to many stories; Character A is shattering Character B’s routine (e.g. being ignored).   Therefore, I instantly felt I was in a movie and assumed the protagonist role.

We only talked for 3 minutes, but many topics were covered:  What I was (theoretically) working on, her opinion about it, me opining about her opinion, and ultimately the abstract idea of speaking to each other again. There was ’something’ special about this girl; something that words COULD describe, but would require a pen from the romantic era.

With phone technology improving every week, it makes sense that we exchanged email addresses.

How long should I wait?  Oh forget it — I couldn’t help it.  I wrote her that night.  Here is the exact body of my message:

“Hey, what’s up?  Hope you didn’t have to work too late.  You seem fun, but… I could be wrong.  I’d love to find out. When can you hang out?”

SOLID.  INQUISITIVE.  MYSTERIOUS.  SHARP-WITTED.  FUNCTIONAL.

PART 2

One day — that’s all it took for her to write me back.  I wrote her on Sunday; she wrote me back Monday morning.  And in LA, one day is warp speed.  Here’s why:

Communication in LA is no longer about efficiency.  Instead, it is a chess game of perception.  One’s reply time (in regards to a phone call, text, or email) carries with it an indicator of one’s preoccupation.  The assumption carried by most people is “Every minute that this person doesn’t respond to me is one more minute that they are doing something better than responding to me.”  In every other city, this thought-process would be dismissed as insecure paranoia (e.g. their cat might be sick)  In LA… this is EXACTLY correct.  Their cat is fine.

Coffee Girl’s email was straightforward:  “I’d be down to hang out.  I’m free on Thursday night.”

I was both elated and upset.  While excited to hang-out, I desired responses to my specific inquiries. For example, I wish she wrote: “Oh I’m fun.  Question is… can you keep up?” (The underline was also part of my fantasy).  But if she had composed such playful rhetoric, I would compulsively keep the chain going and inevitably botch the mission.  Instead, I kept it brief:  “Cool, how about Thai?”

I told some friends about my upcoming Thursday date; how I found this girl charming/witty/ambitious.  They asked how I hit on her.  I said she hit on ME.  From this point on, the conversation played out very much like the bleacher scene in GREASE, except before anything happened.  So unlike John Travolta, everything we said was in future tense.  “Are you going to get very far?” “I hope I do.” “Does she have a car?” “I don’t know, I’m going to pick her up.”

To those that have been in love, you know how it feels to see the world with that magical rosy blur.  I’m not talking to you.

To those that have awaited a date with a true compelling stranger, just the anticipation gives you an undiscovered swagger.  For this isn’t just any date, it’s the beginnings of a fairy tale; and in no fairy tale does the hero or heroine meet their true love through a mutual friend.  It’s all fate, happenstance, and destiny… and that brings a rush.

Thursday night came and I never heard from her.

PART 3

When I taught English in Brazil, even my most advanced students had trouble with the word “flakey”.  I described a lot of Americans as ‘flakey’ (especially Blue-State Americans).  My students asked, “Can you ’splain me flakey?”.  I would try, but at the conclusion of my seminar even I was confused.

I started by describing the literal definition of a ‘flake’ — a small, thin piece that has become detached from a larger piece of mass. (Note:  The pure confusion on one student’s face would have, if pursued, become a classic painting as memorable as the Mona Lisa).

This didn’t work, so I tried a different approach.  I asked them to close their eyes and imagine a leaf on a tree — then picture a very small part of that leaf breaking off in a strong wind.  As the piece of leaf descends to the ground, the wind will blow it east, west, southeast, up, down, diagonal, etc…  The direction of the flake is unpredictable; it has no clear path or control, and tends to be at the mercy of its surrounding environment.

I will get back to this, but first I want to tell you what happened with Coffee Girl.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday all passed without contact, and I chalked the encounter up to the aphorism: “If you don’t try, you can’t win” (which is, by the way, a graveyard for frustration; one that periodically has zombie-like attacks on the mind).  And after all… it was only a 3-minute conversation.

Then, Monday afternoon, I opened my email to find the following message from Coffee Girl:

“Hey, SO sorry I didn’t get back to you.  Things have been crazy, but I can do THIS Thursday night.  How about 7:30 at Cherry Cafe?”

With its myriad meanings, “Crazy” is one of the most utilized words in English.    However, only recently has “Crazy” become a synonym for “Busy”.   My linguistics assumption:  This usage was conceived by Gen-X, strongly maintained by the current Gen-Z, and most definitely popularized by my generation:  Gen-Peter Pan.  I’m no history buff, but I’m guessing Dr. King never described his protest schedule as “crazy”.

I won’t tell you what I wrote back, because dating experts will find fault in my word choices, but I will say that I confirmed.  We’d meet there.

Thursday night came and I decided to be fashionably late.   Ohhhhhh yeah, my life is crazy too.  You can’t nail down a time on ME!  I’ll be there when I’m there, honey.

I showed up at 7:46, the hostess handed me a menu, and sat me down, alone… at a table for two.

7:46, 7:52, 8:00, 8:03, 8:07 and I still had only one means of contacting her:  Email — for why did I need to force her number with the place and time already set.  I fired off a quick one from my phone, and this time… the response came in seconds.

“Oh no!  I totally forgot about this.  Can we reschedule?  Yikes!”

And so I explained to my Brazilian students that a flake being whisked away by a breeze is akin to external forces affecting people’s ability to follow-thru.  They are “flakey” because, like a flake falling from a tree, they’re helpless to the direction life takes them.  No big deal really, except sometimes there are victims in the process.

(Note:  They got it, but didn’t.  For example, they kept calling slightly tardy students ‘flakey’)

I didn’t get up right away because that would be too telling to the couples sitting around me.  Instead I kept reading the menu, ordered an iced tea, and texted “what’s up?” to many MANY people.

So it caught me off-guard when someone said my name.  I figured an old co-worker spotted me and decided to take action.  But no… it was her.

Remembering she worked/lived in this neighborhood, and chose the locale, I realized this was possible.

“Oh, hey”, I said theatrically.  But Coffee Girl spoke with an intense urgency:  “Listen, I’m so sorry I forgot about this, but my brother is going through some serious issues right now and I absolutely have to go see him tonight.  He called me earlier today and invited me to his house for dinner.  That hasn’t happened in over 8 months!  Something is wrong with him, and I know he needs me there.  I’m very worried about him.  Look, I know this is weird, but can you come with me?  I thought we could talk at his house.”

Amidst telling this story from hindsight with a skewed perspective in my favor, I failed to mention something of concrete truth.  I will say it now:  Coffee Girl… was remarkably pretty.  And that can kick pride and a value system right in the teeth.

I hesitated (just to give the impression that I had a backbone), then agreed to come.  And once again her smile hit me hard.

“Great!”, she said.  “My boyfriend is pulling the car around front.  You can ride with us.”

PART 4

An oft criticism about LA is that it’s ‘fake’.  Cosmetically, sure, but when people talk about ‘LA fake’ they are referring to people’s inability to be ‘real’ (which is ironic because one would need an absolute stronghold on their identity in order to ‘fake’ it — and that ain’t the case out here)   New Yorkers hate Los Angelinos and vice versa.   LAers are thought of as disingenuous, always wearing a veneer, and NYers are thought of as snobs who love New York and think they’re better than everyone.  When the Knicks play the Lakers, each respective fan hopes to win a battle against a facet of humanity they dislike (arrogance/artificiality).

I don’t fully agree with New York’s claim, but they were definitely a little bit right when I told her boyfriend “it was great to meet him”.

He cleared room in the backseat for me.  And, as it turned out, I wasn’t the only +1 of the evening.  When my date sat up front with her boyfriend, their brown pitbull joined me in the back.  This dog… was mean, but, thankfully, came with an oral instruction manual.  I was (kindly) told he doesn’t trust new people, and I shouldn’t sit too close.  Not knowing the ‘biting threshold of distance’, I scooched closer to the door, providing me with an extra 1.5 inches of precaution.  The dog let out a huffy, angry growl, implying, from his point of view, that something in this car was bad wrong.

Then this pitbull started barking ferociously and instantly got a scolding from his parents:  “No, no… no”.   My date’s boyfriend followed this up with the least surprising sentence I’ve heard in LA:  “He’s a rescue dog.”

Now laid back and comfortable, Coffee Girl apologized again about forgetting our dinner, and said she’s really bad about making and keeping plans.  The car suffered a silent awkward beat when I told her I was the exact opposite.

During the ride to the mysterious brother’s house, I engaged in superficial conversation with the boyfriend (which I initiated).  The topics:

1. Where I was from.

2. Where he was from.

3. Respective attributes about where I was from (primarily about temperature).

4. Contrasting qualities about where he was from and where he currently resides (primarily about temperature)

5. Mutually summarizing the above discourse as ‘cool’.

And then we arrived.

Before going up to the brother’s apartment, I received a brief report on his character.  “Brother” (as we’ll call him) drinks a lot.  He never has people over.  Anger comes easy to him.  He’s perpetually depressed due to a chemical imbalance and just regular shit.  He views life as a curse.

I said, “He sounds like a great guy”.  My date said… “He is”.  And my date’s boyfriend said, “Try and get out of the car slowly — our dog gets nervous”.

We headed up the steps to the brother’s apartment, each with different feelings.  My date:  Concern.  Date’s boyfriend:  Confusion.  Me:  Curiosity and self-loathing.

The brother answered the door, hugged his sister tight and shook her boyfriend’s hand.  Upon seeing me, his face transformed into bewilderment.  He and I had one thing in common:  We had no idea who I was.

OH BOY — more rescue dogs!!!!   This time 2 Junkyard Rottweilers.  I was proud to be greeted with chaotic snapping and barking.  These were the sweetest rabid dogs I had ever met — and the brother said something fascinating about Chucky and Yo-Yo not knowing me yet.

The four of us ate tacos and drank wine, and the brother definitely seemed fragile. Tonight was an important night for him in some way.   Would you like me to describe his vibe in one word?  I’ll use ‘grave’.

The conversation was unpretentious — lighthearted dialogue RE: the best ways to prepare taco meat.  I wanted to weigh in, but was highly unsettled by the brother’s stoic rage and piercing stare.  He did not want me there on suicide night.

I’m pretty sure the brother downed 2 bottles of Syrah himself, my date drank 6 glasses, and my date’s boyfriend only drank 5 because he was driving.

Apparently less worried now, my date and her boyfriend headed to the couch, turned on an iPod, selected a track from Radiohead’s heroic ‘free’ album… and proceeded to make-out softly.

The bad news:  This stung.  My date, the coffee barista, was merely a stranger now… not a charming one.  The good news:  The brother found someone to talk to.

FINAL PART

Carpe Diem is a commonly used expression by those fearing the end.  Every last drop of each day must be maximized and savored.  If you say ”I’m a Carpe Diem kinda guy/gal”, people instantly comprehend your attitude and are perhaps a little inspired. But why isn’t there a familiar and accepted antonym for Carpe Diem?  What if, come sunrise, you are straight-up pissed that father time is forcing a day upon you?  Or despise the mere existence of yourself?  What do you call that?

Whatever it is… my date’s brother can identify.

The first beat of our conversation:  Pixar’s The Incredibles.  If you, the reader, have kids — know that their love for The Incredibles is inferior to my date’s brother’s passion for this cartoon.    The dialogue came about when I motioned to the framed red poster.  He interpreted my line “Oh, you like The Incredibles?” as “If you’ve got a disturbed soul, now is the time to speak of it”.

To the brother, The Incredibles was robbed of an Oscar, should have a sequel, and acted as a passageway into the chamber of his angst.  Topics he covered:

1. Everybody at his old job hated him.

2. Everybody at his new job hates him.

3. His job is boring, and only made worse by #2.

4. He hates himself.

The Incredibles was the only beacon of hope he had for humanity; a metaphor for something pure, special, and innocent; a direct contrast to the nefarious nature of everything else:  Wall Street greed, BP Oil, crooked D.C., etc, etc, etc.

For clarity, please note that the above paragraph was HIS point, not mine.  I thought he was fucking nuts, and was distracted watching my date slide her tongue across her boyfriend’s gums.

After twenty more minutes of commentary on “The State of Things — i.e. atheism, the death penalty, his mother, pesticides”, I just told him everything would be fine — and he appeared to take solace in that; perhaps because the trite advice came from a fresh source.

“Time to go”, I said, startling my date and her boyfriend.  They giggled, as if they had been caught necking by the school’s vice principal.

Heading downstairs, my date said something I am still trying to decode.  My intelligence simply can’t crack it, and I ask the reader for any and all input:

Earnestly, she turned to me, put a hand on my shoulder, and said… “Thanks for coming”.

The ride back was quiet, save for a little empty conversation and the pitbull.

The boyfriend slowed to a stop in front of my car.  The night was over; this was all over.

The boyfriend turned to face me.  I thought he would tell me off, say something to the effect of ‘This is MY girl, ya understand?’.  But he said nothing so cinema-like, only asking “Is that it? (in reference to my sedan).

Then Coffee Girl twisted for goodnight mode.  She said she hoped to see me again at the coffee shop.   Given the circumstances, I decided I’d kiss her on the second date.

BEST MOVIE OF THE DECADE

With a decade of films behind us, I’ve seen a lot of “Best of The Decade” lists recently.  Most of them I dismissed as if they submitted an inaccurate scan-tron.  Many tried to intentionally separate themselves from the masses “i.e. #1 Film:  David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive”.  But, fact is, big Blockbuster movies united the country during the in-your-face Bush years.  Lord of The Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Spiderman, Transformers, et al ruled the box office, and we ultimately  appointed the #1 spot to The Dark Knight — a movie which oddly seems to have taken on sacred status.  If you express even the slightest shortcoming of The Dark Knight, or worse, opine that The Joker really isn’t that interesting of a character, most people will grit their teeth in a quiet rage.  It’s fascinating that in a decade when the country was extremely divided  (Bush/Gore, red state/blue state, Aiken/Studdard, stay in Iraq/leave Iraq,  Palin/Obama) probably the only thing EVERYONE agreed upon was that Heath Ledger gave a good performance.  The universal likability of Ledger’s Joker, if affixed to important matters, could have put everyone on the same page.

Why So Serious? We Should All Vote For Gay Marriage

With the (absolute) truth of the above paragraph, let’s not even try and pick a different #1 of the decade.  There is no room for dissidence on this.   For the sake of possible domestic harmony, lets just say it was The Dark Knight and be done with it — regardless of how stupid it was.

Therefore, this year, instead of composing a Best of The Year list, which would have included The Girlfriend Experience, The Informant, The Hurt Locker, The White Ribbon, 500 Days of Summer, and Paranormal Activity (proudly starring BLANK PRESS alum Micah Sloat of “Science & Faith” which you should watch after reading this), I want to discuss something more interesting about the decade in film:  The Worst Trends.  Sure, we saw a surge in comic book/fan boy type movies, but those have been attacked ad nauseum. So here then are the (3) Worst Movie trends of the past ten years which need discussion:

WORST TREND #3:  SOPHISTICATED ANIMATION

These aren’t bad movies per say; in fact some of them are great.  But enough is enough.   Over the past decade, much of the praise has been for the characters increasingly “lifelike” features, but where are we going with this?  Isn’t the apex of this progress… an actor?   Ultimately, this year you saw the culmination of the rising tide of incredible animation and CGI.  James Cameron said he dreamt up his blue masterpiece 30 years ago, but the technology wasn’t possible yet to make it.   I assume this graphic I’ve made is representative of the evolution he foresaw.

James Cameron’s Vision Wasn’t Possible For 30 Years.

WORST TREND #2:  AVERAGE GUY PROTAGONISTS

On the cinema landscape this decade, a word I’ve heard frequently is “escapist”.  People tend to pardon the most disposable movies as escapism.  The logic suggests that your life is an existential mess and spending time with Jay Baruchel for 106 minutes could possibly assuage these feelings.   The irony is many of these average guy protagonist films (Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, She’s Out of My League, 40 Year-Old-Virgin) have an intentional main character starting point of “This could be YOU”.   Furthermore, the protagonist’s friends in the film usually just hang out and have guy talk.   That guy talk is supposed to mirror the theoretical conversations that YOU and YOUR friends probably have (and while smoking the same pot smoked by the reflection of yourself in the movie).  And for girls, these are type of conversations they THINK average guys are having.  So it’s a projected realism.   Ultimately (and esoterically) you’re going to the theater with your friends to watch a movie about you and your friends.  How is that escapist?

THIS is escapist

WORST TREND #1:  EASY COMEDY

Think on it — if a movie makes you laugh a lot, is it therefore a good movie?  Obviously that’s dictated by your sense of humor.  But recently, we’ve seen a wave of comedies that have hit their market perfectly.  This year The Hangover was a whopping success and was lauded as the funniest movie of the decade.  In pop culture conversations, the only possible movie you could bring up for debate was Old School (by the same director).  Other movies in this category — Superbad, Anchorman, Pineapple Express, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Wedding Crashers, Knocked Up, 40 Year Old Virgin — were beloved by America too, and expressing contention to their greatness will only make you feel extremely isolated.  That’s why I’ve decided to join the club.  I have since watched The Hangover 6 times, and with each viewing, I notice a funny part that slid past me before.  Like last night I realized that Mike Tyson was singing a Phil Collins song.  I don’t know why, but it doesn’t matter.  I just saw an advanced screening (rough cut) of The Hangover 2.  My friends and I LOVED it.  It helped us escape.  Here’s the just released trailer:

THE HANGOVER 2 – Trailer

The system has been broken for centuries.  Today, convenience items such as iPhones, Blackberrys have destroyed attention spans.   Other industries have taken this into account (take stupid movies for example, or CNN.com’s abridging of already short articles).  Basically, parties who care what WE think — have gone great lengths to condense their message.  So why shouldn’t this apply to the synagogue as well?  Could bangin’ it out and gettin’ it done with be applied to shul.  Here are 6 methods to improve High Holiday services.

1) Not 85, not 90, but 100% of congregants have no clue about the logic and order of the prayers.  They stand when told, and then wait to sit… when told.  If you’re a rabbi, you can bet everyone standing is praying for a speedy return to their seat.  As a religious leader, you should take authority to excise unneeded prayers from the set list.  Take the time, and truly analyze each prayer as a journalist would their article.   What’s important?  Ask the basic questions:  ‘How will this prayer affect the lives of my congregants?’  ‘Will this prayer help my congregation’s existential truths?’  And… ‘Does this prayer have too many verses, and not enough choruses?’  Really think about these — then cut the fat.

2) Reward congregants who are on the right page… literally.  In my extensive career of forcing myself into shul on Yom Kippur, I have never been on the correct page of a Siddur.  I easily lose track, and see no benefit or logic to scrolling my eyes across text I can’t read or seems needlessly esoteric.  Plus, every now and then somebody asks me what page WE’RE on, and I never know to whom they’re referring.   So, perhaps, a reward system needs to be in place.  There should be a ‘what page are we on’ pop quiz every 20 minutes, submitted through silent voting (a la America’s Funniest Home Videos).  If you get it right three times, you are off the hook for atoning.

3) Let people wager on how many times we say “King of The Universe”.

4) Consider the medley.  Recall, if you will, going to a concert of an iconic band; one with myriad chart-toppers and a surplus of good material.  There is no way they can play every smash hit, so they occasionally combine five or six big numbers into a short medley – hitting one verse and one chorus each, and then… on to the next one.  Well, some of these prayers have around 76 verses and the chorus repeats 79 times (the final three choruses being stylistic, manual fade-outs at the end).  So just go ahead and combine a few.  Everybody’s happy, and will be pumped when you make a cool, yet subtle transition into Ma’Oh’Tzor.

5) Eliminate the new-age, plastic ‘say-hello-to-the-person-next-to-you’ segment.    This is not only time consuming, but also re-affirms how disconnected we’ve become as Jewish people.   Seriously, this is a relatively new feature.  It makes everyone feel painfully awkward, and on a deeper lever, causes realizations of our averse nature towards strangers.  The setting of temple, a locale built for community and togetherness, exacerbates (the shit out of) this feeling.  Perhaps replace this segment with a high-energy reprise of Sha’ma.

6) Stop charging a cover.  Jewish guilt is one of the strongest natural forces.  We feel we NEED to be in synagogue on a certain two days every year, and if we’re not, we have successfully shamed our ancestors.   Suddenly, we feel retroactively responsible for the whole ‘thing’.  Last year, some synagogues were charging $200 to get in.   I do understand the fee pays salary for the rabbi, the canter, synagogue administration, etc… But – instead of exploiting this guilt with money, perhaps we should exploit the sensation of leaving synagogue.  That’s right – an exit fee.  First off, extend the service to the five-hour orthodox length.  Then, if you can’t take anymore after an hour, you have to pay $250 to leave.  Stay 2 – 3 hours, and it’s $150.  The synagogue could make big money this way, and it also provides a nice litmus test for rabbi contract renewal.

Next year, lets give these a shot, and atone for centuries of self-induced masochism.