an official i-love-la post. a couple of my friends came to town this past week and i forget the ideas people have about los angeles - that it’s full of sprawl and you have to drive everywhere and people are pretentious and it’s full of pollution. actually…all those are true. BUT it’s also not so bad sometimes. so in an attempt to take up for los angeles as the city i mostly live in, i’m going to be periodically posting reasons to like los angeles.

and please, angelinos, feel free to send me your own ideas. just fill in this sentence –

los angeles is not so bad because:

the silent movie theatre and cinefamily. when trying to think of a cool place to take my film-savvy friend this week, i thought of these emails i get weekly about cinefamily. i had only been once but they were showing If… and my friend seemed interested. it was pretty awesome. first of all, the movie theatre in itself is a cool place. second, the guy who runs it seems really enthusiastic about all the events they are having. third, the crowd was just one step cooler than your general los angeles crowd.

basically, they show weird and unusual films five or six days a week. and if you can’t see a good movie in los angeles, we’ve really lost the whole point of the city.

if oprah can do a list of favorite things, so can i. number one on brea’s favorite things: the los angeles public library.

reasons why i love the los angeles public library.

1. i can order any book online and get it shipped to the library that is only five blocks from my house. generally, they come very fast unless it’s from the new york times best sellers and then i’m number 150 on the list. but they do come eventually when i forget about them so it’s a nice surprise.

2. they have free public wi-fi which was very helpful when i first moved to los angeles.

3. there is an art museum in the downtown one.

4. you don’t have to wait in line to check out books because they have a self-checker machine to make things fast and easy. and it works better than the one at the grocery store.

5. they always have a copy of the l.a. weekly.

6. i can get books for free instead of buying them. saving me lots of time and money packing them up every time i move.

no. i’m not working for the library. i just think it’s a great place. and one of my friends has this theory that if we don’t use public resources, they’ll just disappear. so i encourage everyone to go out and get a library card.

band i’m really into right now: los campesinos! they are both happy and dance-able.

i keep forgetting to post a link to chioke’s page so i’m devoting a whole post to it.

this is a link to chioke nassor’s website - chiokenassor.com he writes funny blogs, makes good movies (”the gina gershon sex tape” is bomb) and he is a general funny guy. he also gets mad at me when i don’t call him back. but not too mad, just peeved.

i also use his business card as a bookmark so every time i read, i think of him.

no posts for a few days due to friends in town, working and a brief brush with a cold. i am thoroughly convinced though that if i can drink enough orange juice and sleep enough hours, i can rid myself of any illness in two days.

just finished:

tuberculosis and the politics of exclusion by emily k. abel - all about how los angeles proclaimed to be a great place for healing from tuberculosis leading to an influx of sick people and how the city started excluding specific groups (poor people, immigrants, young men with wanderlust) from health care and even started sending them out of los angeles (specifically Mexican immigrants). this is a great book for my recent quest to learn more about los angeles history and it explained some of the myths about la. it is not such a good book to be reading while sick because i just kept thinking that i might have tuberculosis.

the plain janes by cecil castellucci and jim rugg - my friend brazos gave me this a while back and it sat on my shelf for a long time. he’s visiting this weekend so i figured i should read it in order to give it back to him. i loved it. i heard there is a sequel. if you like art, comics, or cool girl high school rejects, you should check it out.

website that’s kind of rad: badastronomy.com - i read about it recently and checked it out. it’s sassy and science-y. and i don’t feel dumb reading it.

also - check out my friend michelle’s video on the front page of funny or die today. it’s called “loosen up my butthole” (what can i say? the girl comes up with classy video titles). or the direct link here.

when the world is destroyed, all kitties will look like this!!

(he got in a fight)

quick plug for another UCB show - this wednesday at 9:30, two of the best improv troupes in los angeles are performing at the Upright Citizens Brigade- Convoy and Last Day of School. reserve tickets at ucbtheatre.com

go check it out. i’ll be there.

just watched: Be Kind Rewind and Escape from New York (what? i’m sick. i can watch two movies in one day)

neil gaiman made a list of the best monsters for entertainment weekly - here. sadly, i was not familiar with a lot of them.

so i made my own. which is not nearly as interesting as gaiman’s. but here it is (with the help of my brother).

1. tremors worms. these scared the crap out of me as a kid. i was scared to walk too loudly because i thought they might come up out of the ground and eat me. now, they are not as scary.
2. sack faces. from The Strangers. my friends and i refer to these guys so often that they have developed the nickname sack faces. they’re scary because they could be real.
3. The Wheelers from Return to Oz - my brother reminded me that i was very scared of these as a kid and these still hold up as super scary even if you watch it today
4. The Gentlemen from Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the episode Hush. nuff said.
5. that girl in the well from The Ring (the Japanese verion i think is scarier than the American one)
6. the running zombies from 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks later and generally things that run at you
7. Bloody Mary - where you look in the mirror and say “Bloody Mary” three times. i never did it because i was too scared.
8. Jack Nicholson as the Joker in Batman - i used to imagine as a kid that he would release that gas and i would end up with a scary smile plastered to my face
9. Freddy Krueger - i always found him far more scary than Jason because he can get in your head - this is limited to, however, Nightmare on Elm Street one through four
10. The Nothing from the Neverending Story - in fact, i still think this is real.

can i just say that Palms Thai has some of the best lunch specials in los angeles? if not the best?

just watched: The Good Shepherd - loved Angelina Jolie

just finished: X-Factor: The Longest Night - i’m really about this comic

my family is awesome: my brother also keeps a blog. zanegrant.org he is funnier and smarter than me so it’s worth a peek.

if anyone has any good suggestions for the la film fest, let me know. i’ll post them on here too.

website i’ve been reading: Lunch Break - my friend clay writes this on his…well, lunch break. all the stuff he’s reading online.

a project my friend Gabriel Saint did with my face on it is below.

it’s very hot here which only makes me miss texas because in texas it stays hot all night long. there’s something very fun about tank tops at night.

the hulk is pretty awesome. the first chase scene is pretty brilliant. and liv tyler has now been in two movies i really liked this summer. i constantly want to save her.

current album obsessions: santogold - “l.e.s. artistes,” the ting tings - “we started nothing”

website i’m excited about: still twitter.com. i had no idea how many of my friends were on there.

a quick plug for some of my friends who do comedy. my friend, michelle, is doing a show this week at Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre on wednesday called Girls Gone Blue. she’s a funny lady and i’m sure the show is great. it’s sharing the slot with some other very funny ladies and Molly Prather’s show, “That Girl,” which is also hilarious and a little sad.

it’ll be a good night if you’re looking for some comedy in los angeles. you can make reservations here.