Partner Up

When I do the barker position at Hollywood Death Cab, I often see groups of summer camp kids. In LA, you take your summer camp kids out of the camp environment and out to Hollywood Boulevard. I guess it's like camping, there are certainly many who camp out on the boulevard. When I see them on a "field" trip, I always say "Partner up! Grab someone's hand!" Then I tell the grownups immediately preceeding them to do so as well. It takes you back to childhood field trips, when you grabbed someone's hand, before hand-grabbing became frought with weight.

I have found that I need to partner-up when writing project. And, I have found in LA that writing partners are fucking flakes to the n(th) degree. No one in LA has the capacity to say "Hmm, I'm not sure I want to do this." So everyone thinks being positive equals success, they say "yes" to your project, and four months later, in some passive-aggressive way, you find out the true ambivalence they carried the entire time. I am willing to admit, it could be me. Maybe I'm an ass as a partner and drive everyone way.

All I know is, I really need another human being to bounce shit offa. And inevitably, my heart will be broken when they ditch me. I was feeling very gloomy pre-meeting my gay lover, and this has worked out, so maybe there's a writing paramour for me.

My latest writing partner ditched me because she's "too bizzy" to work on our current project. She's FUCKING UNEMPLOYED. All she had to do was write five scripted pages in one week. She's very bright, very knowledeable about the culture we are capturing, but ultimately, flakey-for-daze.

I've been propping this gal up, taking her writing books to help with the process, phone calls, lots of encouragement, trying to understand her hyper-leftist leanings, and when the final curtain fell, I was as stunned as ever. You'd think I'd start seeing these things coming.

On a pleasant note, I've been accepted into a quazi-ESP program at Hollywood Death Cab. ESP is our tour we give to Extra Special People. I thought I had nailed this audition, but was au contraired. Feeling very unsure of myself, I still decided to try out for the newest thing they are trying, a tour where we don't totally do all of our ESP stuff, but some, like take you to an actual embaling facility, the morgue, etc. This tour you do with a partner. A Bing&Bob, Ed&Johnny, Nick&Jessica.

I thought I had given the world's shittiest audition, but got this. The audition called for you to find another guide to partner up with, and display your facility to entertain in this style. I had one of our older guides with me, and she monopolized things when we were in a Q&A phase of the audition. I even raised my hand at one point like a school-boy in class to get heard. The vaguaries of the auditioning process --- your perception is not the one that counts. Bad news: I have to memorize much in a short time span.

It's a seductive life at Hollywood Death Cab. You sit in a break room watching movie and tvs with smart-alecks, you entertain peeps, you go out drinking, etc. The money you make sobers you up, but it's a great hidey-hole from the furious world.