mooks, maoris and .357 magnums

hi kids.

it’s been a tick since i last checked in with you, but i have been up to quite a bit.  i dropped into hong kong for a kip, caught on movies via qantas in demand, went to very many meetings, got a new roommate, took a bus tour up to northland and a boat through a hole in a rock, made friends with a traditional maori dance troupe, accrued 30K frequent flyer miles and shot some guns.

since so much has happned, i guess it’s best to sum up the highlights and key takeaways:

1. qantas has better business class than cathay pacific,
2. spiderman 3 was the biggest let down in my movie going career since, well, ever, i guess,
3. australia and new zealand may only be separated by the tasman sea, but they are worlds apart,
4. kiwis say “awesome” more than americans,
5. the all blacks might be the coolest rugby team on the planet.  but i’m such a poser, i’m basing that statement on the trivia from my bus tour driver and the cute jacket that i bought at the auckland airport,
6. i didn’t go to the “lord of the rings part” of new zealand (of which there are several), but i did go the house where the treaty between nz and england was signed, as well as the world’s biggest war canoe,
7. i am now, officially, a tree hugger.  there’s a kauri tree, somewhat like the american redwood, in new zealand that the maoris believe bring you good energy if you hug it, so i complied,
8. got some good business done,
9. signed on some new agents,
10. took on even more duties since my domestic counterpart is leaving the company, but will get to have some fun with it,
11. nz also has law and order a lot, though i was often too jetlagged to make the 8:30 showtime,
12. yes, flight of the conchords is  popular there,
13. there is a store in australia called mooks.  seriously.  it’s very trendy.  can’t figure out why it hasn’t made it to the us, though…
14. LA still sucks, but having a gps in your car makes it almost bearable,
15. LA kind of rules for having a gun club downtown that you can go to, rent any kind of non-automatic and shoot.  i tried a glock 9 mm (what the coppers in nyc use- thought it might be prudent to give it a test drive in case i go that way).  also tried a .357 magnum revolver with .38 caliber bullets.  MUCH better for target practice,
16. next time i want to try rifles and shotguns,
17. i’ll probably never make it as a sharpshooter,
18. hailed the return of russel crowe during 3:10 to yuma, which needed a better director to handle that star power,
19. ate like crap,
20. watched t.o. devour the giants on sunday night football, which is the only way i could ever tolerate a dallas-led giants loss,
21. saw bubba on letterman whilst in oz.  still love and worship him and need his new book,
22. decided elvis should rise from the dead to take out all those responsible for the “viva viagra” campaign- pfizer, the ad agency and the people in his estate that OKed that deal,
23. was amired by a hot (female) bartender for my choice of drink (whiskey on the rocks) and my job,
24. got worked on by an aussie physiotherapist and was massively impressed.  he thinks i should be much more healed and is going to hunt for someone in new york to help me,
25. i love bubba.  i know it’s a repeat, but i like round numbers.  and i really love him.

oh, and the catalan has been IMing; he can’t wait for me to visit.  i gotta try and swing that.

the (e)star wars girl

so, it’s been a long couple of weeks.  the cb situation continues to spew it’s rumours, budget meetings and consternation.  i had a marathon 36 hours in miami beach with my latin american agents.  i went straight from the airport to say goodbye to a dear friend moving to the left coast.  i got up early to attend a three hour introductory meeting to one of the possible solutions/ possible bad ideas to end the great cb crisis of ’07.  then, a giant storm came in on friday and has knocked my body back about nine months.  (dratted positive post from two days ago, you jinx!)

no worries, though, there has been a very bright silver lining during all this:

twice in the last week i have been told i am referred to as the star wars girl.  or, according to the argentinian, the estar wars girl.  i can’t imagine a greater compliment.

once by bmw, who told me he was talking to his friends about me and said they asked “oh, you mean the star wars girl?” and then from the smoking hot miami-beach located agent.  we had long, draining, but productive meetings on our mutual business, he bickering with his female co-worker and me with my male tv consultant, mr. brekkies. 

i got to geek out with the smokin hot, suave, hilarious argentinian out over an extremely expensive, tantric themed dinner (poor ximena will never live that choice down) while mr. brekkies and ximena looked on with stoic silence. 

the next morning, when picking us up for the second day of meetings, señor caliente showed me all the light sabres, action figures, replicas, comic books he’d traslated into neutral spanish for marvel (of course) and his titanium web slingers.  he let me raid his toys for some souvenirs.  quite delighted, we left the office for the airport and the flight home.

while in the elevator, señor caliente told us all how he went home the previous night and told him how his boss at insert licensing company here (me) was an estar wars girl.  we laughed.  mr. brekkies asked what she said.  señor caliente: i cannot repeat it.

awesome.  i’m a virtual homewrecker- i unnerve wives, but never get any action.

then, to put a cherry on the sundae, there was a bulldog in the lobby, ending my bulldog-spotting-drought of nearly five months.  i did the usual giggle, jump, clap and point routine, which was pretty much a repeat of my reaction to all the toys in the office upstairs.

both of these things will tide me over for weeks.

it’s the little things, friends, the little things.

stab! bang! aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh

well, kiddies, it’s happened.  i’ve finally gotten over the first hump: i acutally feel better.  my physical therapy has begun to have a lasting, measurable effect.

i noticed this going in to stab therapy on thursday.  i was walking in, and while not pain free, the pain was less pervasive and less severe than normal.  despite the utter teddy bear debacle that rained down on monday and all the associated stress that came with it, i wasn’t a complete wreck. 

i mean, you can only imagine.  i have my most important brand in my most important territory rocking, rolling and generally kicking aussie ass when my local agency goes bankrupt.  with a whole lotta my dough in the bank.  bucks that have already been spent to make the most amazing program- something i was planning on wowing my company and the industry with.  and bam!  lockdown.  and here i am on the other side of the world, holding the bills and not much else.  to top it off, try explaining to anyone that you’re staying up past midnight and feeling severely pressured because the freaking teddy bears are in crisis.  you don’t exactly engender a lot of sympathy.  or credibility, for that matter.

anyway.  i won’t go into detail because it just sounds more and more ridiculous.  the point is, people, that i feel the difference.  despite the stress and the travel and the irregular schedules and all of it.  i feel better.  i’ve been going to stab therapy for nearly nine months and was beginning to lose hope.

little by little, i’ve been healing.  i guess i just got to the point that it was appreciable enough for me to notice. 

or maybe it’s just due to all the sex.  whatever.  i’ll take it.

(total aside: spinal tap is on.  it’s the mini-bread scene.  christopher guest is genius.  i don’t know how they even get through the takes without losing it)

it happened again.

i had another desperately sad deja vu this week when a wonderful,  gorgeous, funny, nice guy i work with asked about my boyfriend and when i said  i had nothing, he couldn’t believe it.  he was shocked that i’m single and told me that all the guys on his team think i’m the coolest.  he couldn’t imagine a world in which i was single.  if he wasn’t engaged…

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
 
it wasn’t sleazy, and i know he meant it as a compliment, but i really hate it when they say that.

but, it’s not just me. 

a lovely, fun and beautiful friend of mine, ms. savory, has had her share of troubles.  she was telling me just last night that she met this funny, nice guy who was pursuing her.  they had talked about maybe taking a next step towards exclusivity and after spending a few fun and margarita filled hours with me at our hell’s kitchen local discussing rimmers with our flirty, friendly, irish bartender, she went off to meet him so they could make the advances they’d discussed.

fast forward to this morning.  i receive a text from ms. savory:

last night he asked me if i wanted to be exclusive and take the next step.  i said yes.  then he said his ex moved back on tuesday and they’re giving it another shot.

no shit.

i mean what the?  why’d he ask? 

me confused.

things to do on a rainy day

that is if you’re an enormous nerd like me.

1.  Watch a Lifetime movie starring Jenna Elfman as a woman obsessed with a surgeon who has invented an entire relationship in her head (as well as a gauzily-lit psychiatrist and a contempt of court-prone journalist).  Best line from the court-appointed psychiatrist: “she has seven of the ten traits of an assassin.”  …?  I didn’t know these had been catalogued.  Fortunately, the good people at Lifetime TV have their eyes on things.

Aside: Thank god people don’t diagnose themselves with imagined illnesses based on Lifetime plots like they do on WebMD.  My friend Christina jokes that she hates that website because somehow, whenever she feels ill and researches her symptoms, she ends up with a diagnosis of testicular cancer and the prognosis does not look good.  The Lifetime result would be neuro-eroticism (Jenna’s official diagnosis) or imaginary child syndrome (featured in an excellent production starring Rita Wilson and Victor Garber, by the way).

2. Color in your coloring books.  Yeah, you heard me.  I do indeed have coloring books.  And man, do I need some new ones.  At this point I’m pretty much down to the German Sesame Street coloring book I got as a freebie at an old job.  It’s not very challenging, but it is awesomely sterotypical as several of the scenes face pages that firmly instruct kiddies on exaclty which colors to use and how one must play properly. 

3.  Brush your teeth a lot.  For some reason, being lazy makes my mouth feel dirty.  God help me if a Freudian gets a hold of this sentence.

4.  Watch Empire Strikes Back.  Awesome, it is.

5.  Play word games on a website designed for seven year olds.  It’s not that I’m looking for easy- I can usually nail the Sunday Times crossword in half an hour flat- I just need enough points to buy my virtual pet some food and books.  I don’t want my red, bowtie wearing penguin to be considered stupid, after all.

6. Whatever you do, don’t clean, organize, balance your check book, pay bills, write to people or make overdue phone calls.  That sounds like work, man.  And we cannot have that on our rainy day off. 

7. Write inconsequential entries on your blog to bide time until the Psychic Detectives marathon begins. 

fleeing (to) the cleve

so, all of you 30 Rock fans out there- which should be all of you- must have loved the season finale, “Cleveland.”  it was typically hilarious and ridiculous and, as usual, has creepy parallels to rather specific things in my life.

like liz’s cell phone ring is wagner.  the cell goes off.  the english avian bone chick says “oh, you like vagner?”  and liz says “no, i like elmer fudd.”  and so, dawn turns to me and says “damn.  she is you.”  which i like, because I like to pretend i’m as successful, smart or funny as tina fey or liz lemon.  we do have a lot in common, though I do have the better name and am not pretending to vote for Barack Obama.

so then, the episode goes on to be all about cleveland and the excellence of ‘the cleve’ in relation to nyc.  and where would i be traveling to eight (EIGHT!) times in the next three weeks?  you get the gold star, kids!  the cleve. 

several of these fantastic trips filled with cash and prizes (read: marathon meetings and getting lost at HQ) involve the 6:30 am flight out of laguardia and coming back later that night.  next week, i’m actually coming home for 20 or so hours on wednesday, just to remind myself what my bed is like, and get my body a little un-twisted at the doc’s. 

yesterday’s first taste bodes well for the merry, merry month of may, as i sat on the runway at cleveland hopkins airport for hours because of thunderstorms.  not the ones that were actually happening in cleveland (as we were getting on the plane, i was watching lightning hit the runways), but the ones that might be happening in new york later.  might. be. happening.

the upside is that i do get to see a game at the jake (weather permitting), but as yet see no lunch with little richard at the r&r hall of fame on my itinerary.

also, there’s no alec baldwin involved.  i know, i know.  but he makes me laugh and has the best voice on the planet.  and trust me, my dad’s said way worse.  so get off my back.

excellent things about today

1.  i woke up to the sound of the mediterranean lapping against the pier of my hotel in juan les pins on the cote d’azur.

2.  my co-worker colin drove me to the airport and asked me if i’d had my “brekkies.”

3.  my flight into munich was late, causing me to miss my connection, but this afforded me the opportunity to use the lufthansa lounge where you can get masse of bier for free.  and it’s on tap.

4. my replacement flight boards in only an hour and is operated by air dolomite, which amuses me for no identifiable reason.

5. i woke up in france, am lunching in germany and will be sleeping in italy. 

6.  it’s kenbo’s birthday.  happy birthday, kennyboy! joyeux anniversaire, kennygarcon!  alles Gute zum Geburtstag, kennyJunge! buon compleanno, kennyregazzo!

one not so excellent thing: i’m pudging due to all the food.  good thing my holiday inn bologna has a pool and a gym.

ciao, mons amie

mt. fuji is a very shy mountain. hai! aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh hai!

cue up the Vapors, it’s time for my “observations on tokyo” email.

Shortly after writing my last entry, I got up, got out and went shopping in Shinjuku. This led to three, no four, observations:

1. Nearly everyone in Tokyo is really well dressed. At all times. For all occasions.
2. Shopping seems to be the national sport as all the centers, malls and department stores were stuffed to the gills with browsers and buyers.
3. This place is not nearly as Americanized as is portrayed in the media. Aside from the proliferation of Starbucks, of course.
4. Hai! It’s like “smurf.” It seems to mean everything. You hear it all the time. At the beginning of sentences, as punctuation, in the middle of words…

Also, people are a lot louder than I expected. I was in a trendy store called Laundry buying the expected hilariously translated t-shirts. There was a sales girl, very nice, helping me out with her arsenal of english language shopping phrases so that I could use my inane hand gestures a wee bit less. Anyway, when not helping me, she was just yelling. Of course I have no idea what she was saying, but I could tell that she wasn’t talking to anyone in particular and all the sentences trailed off in a “aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh hai!”

I took one of those guided tours that I generally avoid like the plague, this one to see Mt. Fuji and the hot springs at Hakone. My well earned “day off.” We drove out to see the mountain, which is way cooler even than it looks in photos and on TV. It totally stands out from the mountains around it, and seems ultra special. Apparently, it’s also a very shy mountain, as it likes to hide behind the clouds, so if you see it, you’d better take pictures immediately. Since it rained like crazy yesterday, there were mudslides and we couldn’t get too close. We went to a peace shrine instead, which was beautiful.

Then off to lunch at a hotel (I was the only person on a bus of forty that chose not to have “western style” chicken, but opted for the Japanese lunch instead. Weird.) then cable cars over the mountain to the springs. Any of you who know me well are going to be very proud when you see the photos of this thing.

Then, we got to Owakudani Valley with all the springs, reeking like sulphur as hot springs tend to do. The draw for this place, though, is that they boil eggs in the sulphur and iron filled springs, which turn black from the combination of minerals. They say if you eat an egg, you add seven years to your life. I bought “one” (which turned out to be six) for the novelty, convinced it would be disgusting. It tasted just like a regular hard boiled egg. Score seven years for me, without foul effects. I shared four of them with French Canadian pilots and stewards and then brought the last one back to the hotel for a snack (14 years!!!); my bag may never be rid of the smell.

Then we took a “pirate ship” across Lake Ashi. I don’t know why it’s a pirate ship. Our guide suggested because the other company runs plain boats, it gives them an edge. Ridiculous.

Finally, I took a bullet train back to the city and then walked around for a while looking for that section of Tokyo that you always see in the movies- you know, the Blade Runner looking part. I think I found it, but I’m not sure. This city has so many downtowns.

I lucked into a subway station (my own line, no less). Lucked into guessing which might be my stop by comparing general locations of landmarks and ended up a block from my hotel. Oh, and I found the gaijin. They’re on the subway. I was wondering where all the whiteys were.

That’s all for today. I have real business meetings tomorrow, all day. Then Harajuku for ridiculous souvenir shopping on Weds before I head out.

Ah, Tokyo, I barely knew ye.

Ciao, kiddies.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, no Law & Order, at least not yet. These people are clearly missing out.

it’s raining in tokyo

….boo!

Because I am a total jackass, I did not check the dollar to yen conversion rate before I left Melbourne,  Sydney, New York or wherever.  Cut to me getting to the Citibank ATM after 11 hours of flying and arriving in Tokyo at about 8:30 pm.  or 10:30 Melbourne time.  Or 9:30 am yesterday in New York.  Or whatever.  I go to the ATM machine, put in my card, and for the first time in the long history of my travels have absolutely no idea what to do.  I had to cancel my transaction, go check out the Thomas Cook rates, come back, stand in line and get money.  I  still didn’t quite understand because I barely got enough to pay for my train ticket to the city.  Then I had to go back again, wait for some seriously confused Brits to get their cash and withdraw about ten times the amount I’d originally done.

Incidentally, and oddly enough, shit’s a lot cheaper here than in Australia, as least as far as food is concerned.  I’m waiting for that illusion to be shattered.

so, Japan is getting all the rain Australia so desperately needs.  It is pouring.  I was planning on retailling (like shopping, but you take notes instead of buy things) or go on a day trip.  now, i’m thinking of renting movies in my room for 2500 Yen a pop (no, I have NO idea what that is).  maybe read finish my horrible crime thriller.  Take a shower.  Watch Barack Obama on CNN International (man, are people as or more obessessed with the election as Americans are). 

Or maybe I should just buy an umbrella?

I have good news and irrelevant news OR Even in Australia, Law & Order is always on

First, the good news:

Flying to Australia is not too traumatic.  Granted, I was in business class on both legs- New York to LA and LA to Sydney, but that’s not really the key factor.  The essential thing is two-fold: a) break it up.  Fly to LA, hang out with Howard (or whomever your local LA yokel is) and take the second leg on a different day.  Second: take drugs.  Ambien or Xanax or Valium, or whatever your doc will supply.  It helps fend off boredom for 14 hours, aids you in not noticing that you’ve been in the same position for almost two work days, and it will also help in alleviating jet lag. 

I had delays on all four ends of my trip, so got to Sydney (hold on, gotta do some serious math) about 24 hours after I left JFK, went to the hotel, peeled off my clothes and then went to see what absolutely, positively “had to be seen” if one had one day in Sydney, which, incidentally is what I had thanks to the “St. Paddy’s Day storm of 2007.” 

I walked all along the harbour, saw the Opera House (amazing) and Harbour Bridge, took a ferry from Circular Quay to Darling Harbour (if it weren’t so beautiful and laid-back, the precious names would make you vomit), grabbed some food, walked around, went to a zoo and aquarium and hobbled back to my hotel for food and rest.  I probably passed out around 7 pm, about three minutes after Law & Order came on.  It was like a baby blanket, or a warm bath; it put me right at home and out I went.

Now, I never sleep well the first night I’m away in a fancy hotel, so I woke up several times during the night.  And everytime I did, L&O* was there, on the screen, waiting to lull me back to sleep.  It seriously happened four or five times.  And every time I was only awake long enough to recognize the episode, recall the ending, put my head back down and shut my wee peepers.

I flew to Melbourne this morning (LA to Sydney’s NY), had meetings all day, ate dinner and settled in to check email.  Pop on the telly and, well, you’llneverguesswhat: Law & Order. Hopefully I’ll stay awake long enough to finish typing this out.

So, to sum up:

a) 14 hours from LA to Sydney, or only a couple more hours than to Athens.  Worth every minute to arrive in this beautiful, friendly country. 

2) It’s hot here, even in “autumn.”  Tomorrow it will be 33 degrees.  The mere mention of it melted my brain so fast that it took even longer than usual to do the conversion to Faranheit. 

Third) Law & Order is the tie that binds, even on the other end of the planet.

IV)  Traveling to a place for business may be great as far as the ride is concerned, but you don’t really see the place.  I have NO idea what things cost in Australia because all I do is go to meetings and pay hotel prices, which are thoroughly outrageous.

and, finally:

The US Dollar sucks.  Seriously.

* The irrelevant news, in case you were wondering, or paying attention at the beginning.