One nuisance at a time.

Arrived home about 6:30 to find a property management note on the door: "Please be advised that starting on Wednesday, July 1, 2009 through Wednesday, July 29, 2009 between the hours of 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. maintenance will be entering the apartments for some necessary repairs to be made. ... Please consider this your 24 hour notice." Not happening. Sorry Lazy Ass Property Manager. 24-hour notice does not mean full access 24/7.

An hour later, Mr. Ranchero in the corner B-Unit apartment cranked it up again during the dinner hour. All of us in the two buildings across the pool couldn't help but hear it unless we stayed indoors with our doors and windows closed and air conditioners running. But it was cool and I didn't feel like keeping my air conditioner running.

I walked out on the deck with my dog to see where the music was coming from and Mr. Ranchero was sitting on his deck below and waved up to me; he's not just disrespectful to neighbors, he's proud of his rudeness and defiance. He's trying to cause trouble.

Bring it on, baby! At 7:25 p.m., I called the cops as I was walking out the building to take my dog to the dog park. I gave them my name and number, and an hour and a half later, I got a call from a dispatcher who invited me out to speak to a supervisor parked outside.

I explained the situation, history, refusal of the property manager to do anything about it, and showed him where the offenders live. He's now in there explaining to them about nuisance laws, about how the next time someone calls and complains, they're going to be cited. And after they are cited, that amazing sound system of theirs can be confiscated. Sweet.

I'll keep you posted about the blow back. I'm sure Mr. Ranchero's macho won't be happy with this affront. (Too bad I just had all the dental work done that my insurance is going to cover for the year.)

Since I called the cops, Ms. Lazy Ass Property Manager has been gone, leaving her sharp-barked Pomeranian mix mutt to yelp incessantly. I love dogs, but I wish I could kick this one into the ocean! One nuisance at a time. One nuisance at a time.

FATHER'S DAY BLAST

I love a good Mexican fiesta as much as anyone -- but if the music is going to be blasted at concert levels, I'd prefer it to be on Olvera Street or in a park. Or back in Mexico. Not in my apartment complex so loud that I have to turn my TV volume to maximum and close all my windows and doors to actually hear the dialogue! (Not much fun on a hot night like Father's Day Sunday in Hollywood.)

Okay, maybe I don't really love a good Mexican fiesta as much as anyone. Once every year or so is plenty. Not almost every Sunday.

Actually, I can take or leave Mexican fiestas -- one or two are enough for a lifetime. And I'm willing to bet that in an apartment complex with 60 plus apartments, I'm not the only one. Even among the 40-50% of the residents who are Latino, I'm willing to bet that many of those would be just thrilled if they didn't have to wear earplugs in their own homes to avoid ear damage from the ranchero-disco-BBQ across the pool in Building B.

Yes, I'm impressed that they can afford an audio system that vies with U-2's arena sound (though I wonder why they don't spend it moving to a nicer complex!) And who could possibly begrudge any family the fun of celebrating Father's Day, or Mother's Day, or Cinco de Mayo, or a sunny Sunday, or Super Bowl, or the Feast of the Virgin of Tacos and Enchiladas, etc. But aren't the screaming children running around the complex enough noise to celebrate? Wouldn't NORMAL volume party music be sufficient -- you know, the kind that everyone IN the party can't really talk over, but that people who live 100 feet away CAN still talk over? Huh?

I don't know the inconsiderate assholes across the complex in Building B who keep having these super loud parties -- there don't seem to be that many people at the parties on their patio, they're just REALLY LOUD.

Any property manager with common sense and half her hearing could tell it's WAY TOO LOUD and would ask them to take it down a couple of notches without needing anyone to complain about it first. But not the on-site manager in my apartment complex.

Last night's Father's Day fiesta at the B Building was too loud for too long. I left a message about the extreme volume of the music on the property manager's voice mail at 8:30 after putting up with the extreme volume for two hours. Sure, she may not have been home then, and if that wasn't her slamming her screen door soon after I called, then I guess someone else was probably at her door trying to get the music shut down, too. The super high volume music continued until 10:15 and general party noise continued for another hour or so. Not terribly late, just terribly loud. And unnecessary. And illegal. And yet another violation of our leases. And common human decency.

Enough.

I don't need to continue being put in a position of complaining about EXTREMELY loud music. The thumping from the upstairs neighbor's bass is a judgment call and something I may just have to grin and bear (so I turn my own volume up a bit, I don't like it but I can deal with it). But no one should have to put up with neighbors who are so inconsiderate or so stupid that they think their EXTREMELY LOUD MUSIC at weekly Sunday cook-outs and holiday parties takes precedence over everyone else's.

Enough, damn it!

ONE DRUMBEAT TOO MANY

What kind of apartment dwelling parent buys an electric drum kit for their teenage daughter?

My upstairs neighbor, that's who. I've gone upstairs and nicely pointed out that the drum beats right through my ceiling and into my apartment like the temple throb of a headache. They look at me like I'm stupid. And continue. For hours.

So on the rare occasions when I actually come home from work and stay home, the odds of my enjoying a quiet night alone watching television, web surfing, and hanging out with my dog, I will have an unrequested, unwelcome backbeat. It's usually right over my computer, and I like to spend a lot of time on my computer. It really pisses me off.

Having complained repeatedly, both nicely and emphatically, and having gotten no results, tonight I asked the resident property manager to intervene.

"I'll go up and note it," she assured me. By "note it" she meant she would put a written note on their door, which doubles as a written record of the complaint.

That was two hours ago. Teenage drumbitch is still pounding at 8:11 p.m.

(She must have read my mind and just to annoy me turned up the volume. I have a hard ebony cane which I used to pound the ceiling. At what point does it become permissible for me to go pound the shit out of her drum kit?)

Blogger Blahs

These things are self-dating, so there's no hiding the fact that I've neglected my blog. I've been distracted by the economic meltdown, annoyed by my neighbors and unwilling to permanently record my bitching about them, busy with work, and I'd really rather be playing with my dog, going yoga classes, or cruising internet dating and porn sites (I may never stop being amazed at how many people are masturbating on cam, posting snapshots of their asses -- with and without various objects inserted therein -- and describing in vivid detail what it takes to spark their libidos. Yikes!)

I could even hide behind the confession that I am just plain lazy, which isn't really true at all.

The truth behind all these excuses is that I'm afraid. Lately it seems so many people are posting, Twittering, emailing and blogging so much trivial crap (kinda like this!) and I don't see the point in joining them. Nothing I have to say seems interesting anymore; I'm so jaded, I now bore myself! Almost everything I think about writing seems likely to offend someone (the fact that there are so many thin-skinned and numb-skulled people around me is more than a little disconcerting, too!).

Well, the only way out is through. Trite as it may be, it's probably true that the best way to deal with fear is to face it head on.

So this is the gratuitious post that blocked and blahhed writers like me do when we just have to post something. Done.

P.S. Remind me when I make my next move -- which will be the second my current lease runs out -- to make sure that the upstairs neighbors do NOT have a teenage daughter with an electronic drum kit. Loud mouthed ghetto girls next door aren't good idea either. (BTW is there an official count anywhere for the most times a drunk woman has said "motherfucker" in 30 minutes loudly enough to be clearly heard through apartment walls?)

EDGE ON MORTALITY: WHERE L.A. GOES TO DIE

The blonde 50-something woman held it together until she had walked about 50 feet down the block from Kaiser’s front door. I hadn’t quite passed her when I glimpsed her hand rise to her face to stop the gurgle of her first sob from escaping. She slumped forward as the sadness deflated her; she turned to hide her weeping face in the wall.

Was it her own diagnosis that had upset her? She was coming out of the building with the oncology center; had her cancer come back despite the agonizing rigors of months of chemo? Had she just left the bedside of a daughter who miscarried for the third time; was she losing hope of ever having a grandchild? Or perhaps the boyfriend that she had never told any of her closest friends about had died before she could leave work, and his wife and children had already sent the body to a mortuary before she could touch his still warm cheek for the last time.

The intersection of Sunset and Vermont is ground zero for death and dying in L.A. Three of the cities largest hospitals are here -- Kaiser Foundation Hospital, Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles and Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center. Each has an emergency room, one of which -- Children’s -- is also a trauma center. Altogether, they have 1,159 hospital beds. Nearby are skilled nursing facilities with more than 200 beds.

Most mornings, as I walk to the Red Line subway station, I see the coroner’s van parked at a loading dock at Kaiser and wonder how many bodies it is hauling away. On my walk home each evening, I see sad and anxious visitors coming to sit with loved ones and wonder who among them will leave in grief.

Probably more people die each day within a half mile of this intersection than any other square mile in Los Angeles, so it is not surprising that the area is also home to a so many religious -- and anti-religious -- centers.

Most prominent and unavoidable is the garish worldwide headquarters of Scientology on Sunset (kudos to sci-fi writer L. Ron Hubbard for making a mockery of tax loopholes for churches, and thanks to his drones for cleaning up the neighborhood on the south side of Sunset!).

Next door and low-key by comparison is the beautiful Self Realization Fellowship Temple and Ashram Center of Hollywood, where Hindu inspired metaphysics meets Western liturgy in kind of a spicier version of Unitarian-Universalism.

Ironically, evolution has taken it’s toll on some former bastions of creationism in the neighborhood. At Edgemont and Fountain one of those happy Christian rock congregations has taken what was once a Baptist church building and turned it into a “Hope Center” while up Edgemont a Korean congregation has done the same with a former synagogue or a church built without the usual Christian ornamentation. Ditto west on Sunset at Alexandria, where the dark brick Lutheran church building on the corner has become another Korean congregation’s Full Grace Church. Not sure why we have all these Korean churches up here in a neighborhood that is mostly Armenian and other Caucasians. Cool old church buildings are probably in short supply in Koreatown

Two blocks north, the Metropolitan Community Church, a denomination that caters to the LGBT community, has taken over the former Methodist church building at Kenmore and Franklin. I can’t fathom why my gay sisters haven’t rejected Christianity completely. Christians may not have invented homophobia, but they sure are quick to make sure it remains alive and well. Let’s face it, Muslims didn’t finance a single ad against Prop 8, but the Mormons and Catholics poured something like $30 million into making sure it passed. Girls, wake up and smell the incense!

The two remaining mainstream Protestant churches in the hood -- the Lutheran Church on New Hampshire and the Congregationalist Church at Prospect and Rodney are “welcoming” churches, which is code for “Gay-Okay.” Both host gay AA, NA and CMA meetings, so I know them well.

While a few Christian denominations now give lip service to respect for other religious faiths, Sikhism has been embracing pluralism and equality for 500 years, so it’s nice to have Vermont Gurdwara Sikh, a stunning, simple white and gold structure on Vermont. To me it exemplifies the diversity of our neighborhood, and if I were a theist, I’d probably want to be a Sikh.

Classic high liturgical rites remain alive at the Armenian Catholic Church and school two blocks over on Alexandria. Up Vermont there’s a huge Catholic church and an Anglican church quietly serves the better-than-your-average-Episcopalians.

And at the other end of the spectrum, there’s a couple of holy roller Mexican Pentecostal churches within two blocks of here -- one wedged in between a Christian Science Reading Room and the Center for Inquiry (CFI), which seems to be positioning itself as “the atheist church,” and in fact, does host monthly meetings of United Atheists at its Hollywood Blvd. building, which is also home to the Steve Allen Theater.

I am an atheist, myself (I haven’t yet attended any events at CFI, but I’m sure I will eventually). After considerable exploration, experience and evaluation, I am comfortable in my conclusion that there is no omnipotent, omniscient deity that affects or is affected by the thoughts, words or deeds of humans. I’ve come to view most religious teaching and practice as superstitious at best, exploitive at worst. But I understand and respect the quest, the need to make sense of who we are, how we find meaning and purpose, how we cope with the challenges of life, especially the painful ones like illness and death.

So my neighborhood “church” is a place I rarely go inside, but see from my deck every day and acknowledge as a powerful symbol of scientific inquiry -- the Griffith Observatory. When times are tough and I’m taking the little successes or failures of my life too seriously, a visit to the planetarium is just the reminder I need that in this vast universe that has existed for billions of years, my accomplishments and tragedies aren’t such a big deal after all! And that lets me rest in peace before I die.

SHOP TALK

She smiled at me warmly the first time I came into her donut shop on the corner of Hollywood Blvd. and N. Edgemont St.. That was two months ago when, on my way to drop off the apartment deposit check, I dashed in to buy a soda to legitimize parking in the shop’s parking lot, where signs every few feet warn that parking is for customers only and all others will be towed by the Melrose Towing Company.

A former boyfriend got me to stop there for maple crullers once and despite my usual disdain for deep fried pastries, the ones we bought there were better than Krispy Kreme’s. So I’ve bought several more maple crullers there since moving here last month. And each time I go in, she smiles like she’s genuinely happy to see me.

I didn’t realize until this morning that her English is limited to the names of donuts, sizes of coffee cups, and counting out change.

The old Armenian man ahead of me spent an inordinate amount of time choosing his pastries. Back and forth in front of the display case he drifted, occasionally mumbling a question, even less occasionally making a choice. My patience wore thin faster than usual because my dog, tied to the table out front, was barking at everything that moved outside. The old man didn’t buy much -- his tab came to $5 even -- but it seemed to take him 10 minutes to do it, and even after he paid, he mumbled more questions.

“It’s funny how hard it is for some people to choose their donuts, isn’t it?” I asked the shop girl while she unwrapped my ham and egg bagel for the toaster oven.

“You don’t want it toasted?” she asked back.

“Yes, toast it. I was talking about the guy who just left, how long it took him to pick his donuts,” I said.

“Wha?” she replied.

I made the gestures of someone picking out first one donut, then changing their mind and picking another, and then changing their minds again, and again, until she realized what I meant.

She laughed a little, smiled broadly and asked, “You want mustard?”