Our (Nonsexually) Hot Day: A Story of Triumph

I’ll say one thing: this global warming may be destroying our planet, but it does make for some hilarious social situations. We decided to go to brunch at Truly Vegan today, an idea that normally would occasion no more than a 20-190 minute drive (LA HUMOR). Today, however, it also occasioned our near-death, due to the temperature. I don’t know exactly how hot it was, but if pressed, I would estimate 135 degrees (Fahrenheit). The car was a remorseless oven filled with a trillion burning flames pressing into every pore of my skin. My body was drenched as though God himself had dumped slimy, fetid, burning oil all over me and then lit it on fire with his cigarette. It felt like I had wet my pants, that’s how wet my pants were. “If I could pee ice water, I would do it right now,” said my old man. We found out later it was a record-breaking heat wave. That’ll teach us to avoid local news.

At Truly Vegan, we inexplicably ate enormous plates of hot, starchy food. When it was over, we were even more sweaty, anxious and exhausted. On the drive down Sunset I started feeling like I was going to puke, and, due to my infamous recent experience of puking in the car while actually moving, I ordered Gary to empty out my bag in case the worst should occur (it did not). Our end goal was the Museum of Television and Radio in Beverly Hills, for several reasons: 1) free admission, 2) we like to learn about television and 3) we figured there was more than a passing chance that it would be air conditioned. Traffic was terrible, as usual, but not horrendous, as sometimes. The sun beat down on us without pity, and even in the smoggy din of the underpass shade, we found no succor, for the airless vacuum–being devoid of even the stinking, humid breeze–sought to suck the breath directly from our lungs and spit it back at us in the form of dirt, smoke, and particles of tar. It was as though we were living directly in the center of the earth–an earth filled to the brim with the shrieking roar of semi trucks on all sides, and the thundering, raging war-cries of a million cars driving together at one mile per hour for as far as the eye could see.

Turning onto fashionable Rodeo Drive, we found a parking space behind a Bentley.

The starting price for a Bentley is apparently $100,000.

Walking up Rodeo Drive toward the museum, we passed innumerable fancy boutiques and expensive designer whatever-you-call-ums, all of them with their majestic glass double doors thrown open, dumping frigid, air conditioned air outside like money and energy grows on trees (“I’m not paying to cool the out-of-doors!”). The people staggered about in their 4 inch heels and their leather belts, sipping Jamba Juice and lugging shopping bags branded with the names of the stores from which the items contained inside of them had been purchased, thus acting as a sort of social badge. Surely no one who has seen Juliet Robertson in the fabulous film “Pretty Lady” could ever forget the stern scorning she received at the hands of the snobby salesgirls in some big fancy store, so quick to denigrate one of their own due to the deeply-internalized self-hatred brought about by life in an appearance-valuing patriarchy in which they play an all-too real part. Truly, can a seven foot tall prostitute find no solace in the bosom of her sisters? I, although not resembling a prostitute but really more a 14 year old boy, would still no doubt suffer a similar shunning were I to walk in to one of these places and loudly announce my feelings regarding the massive amounts of air conditioning being wasted due to the open doors. But I guess that goes without saying, because that would just be rude (of me).

When we finally found the museum, its gleaming white turrets rose before us like a literal oasis in a literal desert. We opened the doors and stepped inside, and we had but a split second to register the delicious, almost orgasmic feeling of freezing, freezing air wafting upon us from all possible angles, before we were immediately greeted with utter shock and consternation by the two people working the desk, who called out “Oh my god!” from across the gleaming cathedral-like lobby, both of them leaping to their feet as though an ambulance might need to be called. “You look AWFUL,” said the woman with great concern. I replied, “it’s bad news out there,” and lay my forehead down on the cool granite counter behind which she perched. Our clothing was visibly soaked and we had the wide-staring eyes of convalescents not yet ready to be up on their feet. “May I make an exception for them and get them some glasses of water?” asked the man, “oh–I’LL do it,” the woman responded, and leapt off to run into some kitchen where there was ice water. My forehead had left a gross wet foggy patch on the counter. My old man was trying to explain to the man that we didn’t just come in here to die, but that the reason we looked this bad was precisely because we had driven 15 miles with no air conditioning JUST TO SEE the museum of television and radio. The man looked nervous, like at any minute we might have strokes. He told us where the bathrooms were, and said we were welcome to stay as long as we liked. The lady came back with ice water, and as I drank it I started feeling like I might faint. In the bathroom, I took a picture of myself, which does not even begin to do justice to the haggardness of my appearance, so I won’t even post it because it would do a disservice to the great indignities suffered by my body today. The indignities were not on the same level as, say, the indignities suffered by an Iraqi civilian, or, say, by Angela Merkel at the G8 summit when our President manhandled her, forcing her to use a women’s self-defense move I remember learning in college, in women’s self defense class. However, I was very, very uncomfortable.

We watched a preview for “David Copperfield,” then went upstairs to the amazing library/archive, where you can create your own list of stuff to view, and then they escort you to your own little cubicle, and they load everything for you, and you just watch for as long as you want!! We watched a McDonald’s commercial from the 70’s which depicts the sufferings of a girl going through puberty (literally), complete with a personalized song about trying to get her hair right, and liking a boy who didn’t notice her, and reading notes in class, and school being hard. I could not understand what was being advertised until the last 2 seconds of the commercial, when the girl is sitting in McDonald’s and the boy she likes comes up and sits next to her. Then the copy onscreen reads: “McDonald’s: WE DO IT ALL FOR YOU.”

Ah, if only it were true. If only one simply went to McDonald’s, ordered a milkshake, told the counterperson your deepest dreams and wishes, and then if one were pure of heart those wishes would be instantly gratified. False advertising? Well….maybe not. Not if your deepest wish is to become a fat diabetic.

We watched a great commercial from the 50’s for Kool cigarettes in which the announcer kept repeating in a slow, “hypnotist-style” voice, over a photograph of a snowy river: “Kools……..it’s like a BREATH…..of….FRESH AIR.”

We watched a lot of Wieden and Kennedy Nike commercials that were pretty funny, and these weird ones for “Oregon” that pretty much just involved mentioning how it rains literally all of the time in Oregon, which I thought was pretty brilliant.

Then we went to the screening room and watched an episode of “DARK SHADOWS” and an episode of All My Children, because they are doing a big “SHE MADE IT” exhibit about shit made by women. Turns out, Dark Shadows is totally awesome. There was a commercial for Mrs. Butterworth’s in which Mrs. Butterworth was played by a mustachioed man in old-lady drag. This was absolutely baffling and I do not understand. When we left, the people at the counter laughed affectionately at us. We kept imagining them whispering, “there’s those POOR PEOPLE” at each other and exchanging loaded glances, like they knew we only had six months to live and yet there we were, blithely going along without this knowledge.

Now we’re at home, and I swear to God I’m not leaving my house again until November. If I wanted to live in Phoenix, I’d be living there, right?? I’m probably going to go to sleep in one hour. Remember the old days, when people crowed about how it was “seventy-five year round” in los angeles? Yeah right. That was before Al Gore destroyed the ozone layer. Thanks a lot, Beardo.