The training for the Victims' Advocate program at Woodbury was OK, I suppose. It was a rough 8 hours to sit through, though. And we're not through. There's another training session next Sunday. And I have my 8 AM-Noon class on Saturday, too. And transportation worries were another added wrinkle. Richie will be playing in San Francisco with Saccharine Trust this coming weekend, so my normal transportation situation is not an option.

I had several Hobson's choices in his absence: 1.) get up ridiculously early to take the hated Metro buses there; 2.) take hideously expensive cab rides -- $25! -- to Woodbury; or 3.) get a cheesy motel room for the princely sum of $51/night on Friday and Saturday nearby to Woodbury. Fortunately I don't have to deal with any of these situations: one of the people taking the training also is one of my fellow students in the Saturday class, and she lives pretty close to here. So I have rides both days.

The band'll be leaving LA Friday night, and back Sunday night or Monday morning. The one gig which the band will be playing that I have information for will be Saturday Night, 11/12, at the Hemlock Tavern in San Francisco. Admission is $7. There's a Sunday Afternoon gig at some gallery somewhere in Oakland but I don't have the info. If any of you reading this are up in the East Bay area and want to check out the Sunday gig, I suspect the local freebie paper should have updated info.

However, before that, Richie will also be playing with FreeHead in Hollywood. Here are the particulars:

HUGE SIGNING WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 9th!
6:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.
MELTDOWN COMICS
7522 Sunset Blvd LA CA 90046 (323)-851-7223
"SATAN's 3-RING CIRCUS of HELL"
meets
“CARNIVAL of SOULS"
Featuring an outdoor rock concert by JIM SMITH’s band FREEHEAD.

Since we have been having cooler nights of late, dress warmly. Hopefully there won't be a rainout. Apparently the experts are hedging their bets on their "La Nada" predictions for an absolutely normal Winter rainy season in Los Angeles this year, and are now saying that there may be increased "tropical fetch" activity bringing the so-called "pineapple express" rains up from the South Pacific. Confused yet? Me too. Here's a little more info.

Oh yeah, how was my birthday? OK, I guess. The Star Wars costume exhibit was pretty amazing, and it's interesting to see how cheesy the props for the first movie (Episode IV) looked by comparison to the opulent costumes and props for the Prequel Trilogy. On the latter stuff, they did a lot of detail work that you really can't see well on screen. Seeing it all up close was a thrilling experience for this old-school Star Wars geek. There was even a life-sized XWing fighter on display, apparently from Episode IV. Yeah, it was a bit cheesy, but it was cool. It looked ready to do another run on the Death Star. Or maybe on Darth Cheney's Undisclosed Location. (just kidding!)

Since the costuming and propmaking workshops at Anime LA this year are Star Wars inspired, I was looking at the Jedi robes for a bit of inspiration. The originals have a wool over robe and homespun-looking linen for the under robes. I think that I will instead go with crinkly Madras cotton for mine. All the fabrics used for Jedi robes (and the Darth Sidious and Darth Maul Sith robes, for that matter) had a "homespun" look to them, and so does the stuff I'm thinking of. Imagine trying to wear woolen robes at Comic-Con in July! Not a good idea. Cotton's better. The drive to FIDM for the exhibit also revealed just how cool the fabric bazaars in the shmatte district of Downtown LA are. I should definitely visit there when I look for the 11 yards of fabric I need for this project.

Oh yeah: another reminder to end this entry:



NO on EVERYTHING. This is all about rubbing Herr Gropenfuhrer's nose in this big brown stinky mess of an election. Don't express your disgust by staying away from the polls...that is precisely what the Gropinator wants us libs to do. Show your disgust by turning up at the polls and vote everything down. We need more comprehensive solutions to the Health Care and Energy issues...the piecemeal approach won't do. That's for another election at another time. And the rest of 'em...everyone knows they are pure evil, from the revenant "Squeal Rule" of Prop 73 to the Big Pharma giveaway of Prop 78. Don't just nix the first six...tell Ah-nuld NEIN by nuking the whole lot of them.

I'm not sure whether I'll get a chance to write in here before the election, so there you go.