9:45pm El Tatasco
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
I want to tell you about my slice of Americana today
I arrived for the afternoon session at the West Los Angeles Courthouse today just before 1:30pm.
The bailiff had yet to let anyone in the court room so the waiting area was filled with people from all sorts of races, creeds and life forms.
I found myself among these people waiting for this circus experience to begin.
The intensely casual attire was astonishing. Was I in line for some defunct West Hollywood booty bass club? Surely the American judicial system demanded some more formal attire than an Antonio Gates Chargers jersey and a do-rag. Do not think for one second, my faithful reader, that I exaggerate. No. We will have none of that here today for the truth on its own will suffice to entertain or at the very least past time.
By now you, my keen reader, may have asked yourself, "How does my humble narrator find himself in this situation? I have known him to be far less reckless and far away from such disorders."
And normally such would be the case, my dear reader, so I will digress and explain.
State ordinance demands that one keep two working headlamps on all vehicles especially just past dusk.
On one particular evening, I was caught with less than a pair of properly working headlamps and a less than graceful officer saw it fit to not only remind me of my current missing head lamp but to also cite me and continue to use the incorrect address for said citation. Here en lies our predicament for your humble narrator failed to receive any correspondence to remind him that a small fine was demanded in order to be square again with our fair city. Since no correspondence was received, action was not immediately taken much to the disliking of the city who, in turn, proceeded to transform (through the administrative magic that only our fair government posses) a meager $25 fine into a $879 monstrosity! Mind you, had I better financial footing I could easily help to alleviate our city's financial woes but such is not my current situation so one of similar financial status can easily appreciate my emotional disturbance. Hence, we find ourselves the guests within the extremely comfortable confines of the halls belonging to our thankfully blind Lady Justice.
Our bailiff let us into the court room which I found to be in a less-than-Hollywood-movie state reminding me again of our city's financial misfortunes. It made it extremely difficult to imagine Tom Cruise thundering away at Kendrick. We were all seated in alphabetical order which found your then extremely nervous narrator seated 10th in line for arraignment.
Our bailiff was a blonde, middle-aged, handsome, motherly looking woman with extreme and obvious experience with just the right touch of being jaded from years of repetitive sessions. Once we were all seated, she reminded us of the difference between "guilty", "not guilty" and "no contest" which most of my current colleagues completely forgot once they were standing tall before the judge. She then informed us that we were not allowed to ask questions or argue until the very end of the session once the honorable judge Carol had arraigned all those waiting first. Again this information eluded a couple of my colleagues once front and center which made for a couple of interesting confrontations.
The session is run with the precision of a drunk baker's rusted cookie cutter with good intentions. The way the court is primed before the session eludes to the pending controlled chaos that will ensue. Two separate but equally emphatic speeches are given instructing us on procedure. One by the bailiff and one immediately afterwards by the judge herself. I found this funny.
Both speeches informed us that the judge did not have control of the amount of the fines given to us by the state but that she had power to control the entire fine itself using the correct wording before the judge. One can see how this may be confusing since lawyer speak is no one's native tongue. However, paying close attention to the emphasis on the wording in both speeches, a reasonable person could stand before the judge and get exactly what they needed. Both speeches also stated that the "I Never Got the Paperwork" excuse will not carry any sort of weight this day in court. My case was now in shambles and with no further evidence or witnesses my case felt like was on very thin ice with a drunk Coca-Cola polar bear playing hop scotch.
A young man wearing a pair of Dickie's painter's shorts, a white t-shirt, red back pack and black house shoes being arraigned on a speeding and tinted windows charge changed his plea three times before he understood what the fucking hell was going on for fuck's sake! The judge can't tell you what to plea, man.
A young lady in leggings that had jeans painted on them with black Uggs and a less-than-designer-brand sweater was almost forcefully escorted out of the court room because she not only forgot that questions were to be held at the end but also that she wasn't on the set of Jerry Springer and no really cared how much of a thug she thinks she was. The judge in a cool and respective manner asked the young lady if she liked handcuffs. Her emotion subsided gently like a cool receding wave hitting off a Malibu cliff. The painted leggings quickly found a spot in one of our grey plastic chairs in the audience and waited.
But there were bright spots in today's session as well.
The man wearing the Antonio Gates jersey turned out to be homeless and was cited twice for sleeping on the Santa Monica beach. The judge asked if he had anywhere else he could sleep and he assured her that he found a spot where he wouldn't be bothered or bother anyone else. The judge was really grateful that he took the time to actually make it into court, thanked him and dismissed both cases.
The judge displayed both her comedic and compassionate dispositions when dropping a hefty fine for a man wearing an over-sized grey Chicago Bears sweatshirt, plaid shorts, flip flops and aviator sunglasses on his blond bed-head from $500 to $50. When asked if he could pay that today, he asked to get an extension because he was $2 short.
"Really? Two dollars?"
"I'm sorry your honor. I thought I had it all."
"Jesus! Are you serious? OK. Hold on."
The judge got up, briskly walked to her chambers and came back with the balance of the man's fine to which he replied, "Thank you very much your honor but it looks like I'm actually short $5."
"Ah, jeez!"
At which point, a couple of black-haired pretty ladies wearing high heels, form fitting jeans and even tighter blouses properly exposing a cleavage even Selma Hayek would admire took up a small collection and the man was able to pay his complete fine today. Our bailiff chuckled that this was the first time she'd ever been a part of something like this. This made me feel fortunate to witness this little quirk of LA. As for the two well endowed young ladies, I suspect they were preferring a male judge but our judge was compassionate when their case came up for having an unsettled 1-1/2 year-old case of a dog off its leash. $50 fine.
At one point the bailiff quiets the rowdy audience down by reminding them that there is no talking in the court room. Two minutes later she walks up to a well dressed young man in a blue collared shirt and tells him to say hi to his mom. "I'm Gavin's mom," she reminded him.
And what of your fair narrator you may be asking. How did he manage out of all this?
Ah, well the fair judge did make a fair ruling on this young lad even though I tried to use my original case. And while she did not completely dismiss all the fines, she did bring my fine down to a reasonable $150. Not exactly a case of Law & Order but with a sigh of relief I felt that Justice prevailed today. DUN-DUN
All in all, if I take what happened today as a learning experience with some comedic relief, I find it very difficult to call it a complete waste of LA time. Don't get me wrong though. Fuck if I ever have to go through this horse shit infested circus again.
The bailiff had yet to let anyone in the court room so the waiting area was filled with people from all sorts of races, creeds and life forms.
I found myself among these people waiting for this circus experience to begin.
The intensely casual attire was astonishing. Was I in line for some defunct West Hollywood booty bass club? Surely the American judicial system demanded some more formal attire than an Antonio Gates Chargers jersey and a do-rag. Do not think for one second, my faithful reader, that I exaggerate. No. We will have none of that here today for the truth on its own will suffice to entertain or at the very least past time.
By now you, my keen reader, may have asked yourself, "How does my humble narrator find himself in this situation? I have known him to be far less reckless and far away from such disorders."
And normally such would be the case, my dear reader, so I will digress and explain.
State ordinance demands that one keep two working headlamps on all vehicles especially just past dusk.
On one particular evening, I was caught with less than a pair of properly working headlamps and a less than graceful officer saw it fit to not only remind me of my current missing head lamp but to also cite me and continue to use the incorrect address for said citation. Here en lies our predicament for your humble narrator failed to receive any correspondence to remind him that a small fine was demanded in order to be square again with our fair city. Since no correspondence was received, action was not immediately taken much to the disliking of the city who, in turn, proceeded to transform (through the administrative magic that only our fair government posses) a meager $25 fine into a $879 monstrosity! Mind you, had I better financial footing I could easily help to alleviate our city's financial woes but such is not my current situation so one of similar financial status can easily appreciate my emotional disturbance. Hence, we find ourselves the guests within the extremely comfortable confines of the halls belonging to our thankfully blind Lady Justice.
Our bailiff let us into the court room which I found to be in a less-than-Hollywood-movie state reminding me again of our city's financial misfortunes. It made it extremely difficult to imagine Tom Cruise thundering away at Kendrick. We were all seated in alphabetical order which found your then extremely nervous narrator seated 10th in line for arraignment.
Our bailiff was a blonde, middle-aged, handsome, motherly looking woman with extreme and obvious experience with just the right touch of being jaded from years of repetitive sessions. Once we were all seated, she reminded us of the difference between "guilty", "not guilty" and "no contest" which most of my current colleagues completely forgot once they were standing tall before the judge. She then informed us that we were not allowed to ask questions or argue until the very end of the session once the honorable judge Carol had arraigned all those waiting first. Again this information eluded a couple of my colleagues once front and center which made for a couple of interesting confrontations.
The session is run with the precision of a drunk baker's rusted cookie cutter with good intentions. The way the court is primed before the session eludes to the pending controlled chaos that will ensue. Two separate but equally emphatic speeches are given instructing us on procedure. One by the bailiff and one immediately afterwards by the judge herself. I found this funny.
Both speeches informed us that the judge did not have control of the amount of the fines given to us by the state but that she had power to control the entire fine itself using the correct wording before the judge. One can see how this may be confusing since lawyer speak is no one's native tongue. However, paying close attention to the emphasis on the wording in both speeches, a reasonable person could stand before the judge and get exactly what they needed. Both speeches also stated that the "I Never Got the Paperwork" excuse will not carry any sort of weight this day in court. My case was now in shambles and with no further evidence or witnesses my case felt like was on very thin ice with a drunk Coca-Cola polar bear playing hop scotch.
A young man wearing a pair of Dickie's painter's shorts, a white t-shirt, red back pack and black house shoes being arraigned on a speeding and tinted windows charge changed his plea three times before he understood what the fucking hell was going on for fuck's sake! The judge can't tell you what to plea, man.
A young lady in leggings that had jeans painted on them with black Uggs and a less-than-designer-brand sweater was almost forcefully escorted out of the court room because she not only forgot that questions were to be held at the end but also that she wasn't on the set of Jerry Springer and no really cared how much of a thug she thinks she was. The judge in a cool and respective manner asked the young lady if she liked handcuffs. Her emotion subsided gently like a cool receding wave hitting off a Malibu cliff. The painted leggings quickly found a spot in one of our grey plastic chairs in the audience and waited.
But there were bright spots in today's session as well.
The man wearing the Antonio Gates jersey turned out to be homeless and was cited twice for sleeping on the Santa Monica beach. The judge asked if he had anywhere else he could sleep and he assured her that he found a spot where he wouldn't be bothered or bother anyone else. The judge was really grateful that he took the time to actually make it into court, thanked him and dismissed both cases.
The judge displayed both her comedic and compassionate dispositions when dropping a hefty fine for a man wearing an over-sized grey Chicago Bears sweatshirt, plaid shorts, flip flops and aviator sunglasses on his blond bed-head from $500 to $50. When asked if he could pay that today, he asked to get an extension because he was $2 short.
"Really? Two dollars?"
"I'm sorry your honor. I thought I had it all."
"Jesus! Are you serious? OK. Hold on."
The judge got up, briskly walked to her chambers and came back with the balance of the man's fine to which he replied, "Thank you very much your honor but it looks like I'm actually short $5."
"Ah, jeez!"
At which point, a couple of black-haired pretty ladies wearing high heels, form fitting jeans and even tighter blouses properly exposing a cleavage even Selma Hayek would admire took up a small collection and the man was able to pay his complete fine today. Our bailiff chuckled that this was the first time she'd ever been a part of something like this. This made me feel fortunate to witness this little quirk of LA. As for the two well endowed young ladies, I suspect they were preferring a male judge but our judge was compassionate when their case came up for having an unsettled 1-1/2 year-old case of a dog off its leash. $50 fine.
At one point the bailiff quiets the rowdy audience down by reminding them that there is no talking in the court room. Two minutes later she walks up to a well dressed young man in a blue collared shirt and tells him to say hi to his mom. "I'm Gavin's mom," she reminded him.
And what of your fair narrator you may be asking. How did he manage out of all this?
Ah, well the fair judge did make a fair ruling on this young lad even though I tried to use my original case. And while she did not completely dismiss all the fines, she did bring my fine down to a reasonable $150. Not exactly a case of Law & Order but with a sigh of relief I felt that Justice prevailed today. DUN-DUN
All in all, if I take what happened today as a learning experience with some comedic relief, I find it very difficult to call it a complete waste of LA time. Don't get me wrong though. Fuck if I ever have to go through this horse shit infested circus again.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Friday, January 13, 2012
Friday, January 6, 2012
Friday, December 30, 2011
Thursday, December 29, 2011
3:15 AM
It was 3:15 AM and I was thinking of you...
Original music by Danny De La Cruz
Photo by Danny De La Cruz
www.restless-souls.com
Original music by Danny De La Cruz
Photo by Danny De La Cruz
www.restless-souls.com
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Sunday, December 25, 2011
All them birds on the wire, Gonna say I'm a liar...
All them birds on the wire, Gonna say I'm a liar...
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Friday, December 16, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Newest Additions to the Music Library
This is what I got from eMusic this past week:
The Black Keys - El Camino
The Clash - The Singles
Hall & Oats - a couple tunes including Kiss on My List & Maneater
Emmanuel - a few tunes includeing Toda la Vida y Quiero Dormir Cansado
Le Butcherettes - Kiss & Kill
Ray Charles - Modern Sounds in Country & Western Music vols 1 & 2
The Rolling Stones - Out of Our Heads
And a few artists doing Buddy Holly covers including:
Paul McCartney, The Black Keys, My Morning Jacket and Modest Mouse from the album Rave on Buddy Holly
Oh yeah and Pearl Jam - Backspacer
Feeling good :)
Enjoy Your Youth
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Friday, December 2, 2011
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Monday, November 14, 2011
The Paperplanes!
Ashley's
Long Beach, CA
11.4.2011
I love the Paperplanes. Everyone needs to check them out and get some of that honky tonk stank on ya.
I always have a great time in Long Beach with Micah and Pete. We usually go into the wee hours of the morn and I wake hung over but happy around noon.
©Danny De La Cruz
Friday, November 11, 2011
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Monday, October 31, 2011
Love
Model: Caryln Marie
©Danny De La Cruz
This was such an amazing shoot.
We just decided to try a bunch of different things and most of them seemed to work.
More pics to come. :)
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Funny crimes from last night
These are true.
COMMENTS: The victim arrived home to discover the suspect inside his residence. The suspect covered his face with a T-shirt and punched the victim several times. The suspect then left location taking two i-phones and a Blackberry phone. Although the victim did not see the suspect’s face, he believed the suspect was his cousin.
COMMENTS: Victim stated that she met suspect 1 while drinking in a club in Hollywood. Suspect-1 took her to his apartment. Victim was going to have consensual sex with suspect 1 when several males walked into the bedroom and had sex with her. Victim fell asleep with suspect 1 and had consensual sex with him in the morning before leaving. Victim talked to her roommate about the incident and made a rape report.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Part 2
So checked into the Liquid Kitty.
Nice place and definitely a big contrast to the bowling alley, complete with free spirited young ladies.
Ordered up a Pabst. Yes I did.
The older gentleman at the end of the bar caught me looking in his general direction and raised his limed Corona at me and cheersed.
I think I made up a couple of words there.
I was completely shit faced the last time I was in here. It's super dark and the conversations here are at full volume...on 11.
Turns out the guy who cheersed is Mexican. He totally looks like an old Irish man.
Their thing here is martinis. The place is named after the specialty.
I can see how this place may get me in trouble some night.
Friday Night
I'm at the Mar Vista bowling alley.
This bar is always clean but tonight it's fucking freezing.
The man two red bar stools down from me put his napkin over his drink and started playing pool by himself. He has been sketching Mexican skulls on a few napkins.
I ordered a Pabst from the bartender. They always dress in black and white stripped referee's jerseys.
The three Indian fellas next to me are really deep into a fantasy football conversation and nursing their Bud Lights.
The occasional bowler comes in for a drink but besides that it's a slow night.
I'll probably have another and bail.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)