Brother and Sister Grice Go to L.A., Birthday Week, "To Live and Die in L.A."

Day 6: Depression

Nooooo, not really - but there's something a bit saddening about approaching your birthday (Feb. 14 -- gifts, well-wishes, and handouts are currently being accepted) and your mid-late Twenties without the security of a job you hate. Where do I direct all that negative energy??

So far it's been confined to the sterile streets of Cambridge. This crippled lady has taken to jogging (!!) in this upper-middle class suburbia dreamland; I've cooked more food than I thought possible; I've drawn cartoons, reaching back into my 6th-grade bag of hobbies, which I'm going to hang on my wall with a little placard that reads: "What happens when you try to pass time due to Unemployment."

There's been a couple good developments, however.

Sister and Brother Grice are using Bl'erg severance to go wander around Los Angeles! We're doing it - the tickets have been bought, the e-mails have been sent, the tentative interviews with movie-industry jobs are in the works. It should be grand.

I've also begun planning my usual Morgan's Birthday Week festivities, which begin on Wednesday with another Grice dinner party. On the menu so far are Texas Hold-Ums chipotle hamburgers, chicken rice pots with avocado/sour cream dip, some variety of cookies -- and, as usual, a lot of Grice stress.

Oh, unemployment.

Of course, my Cantabrigian host has been a dear friend and has facilitated much movie-watching to get me through my trying time of sloth and gluttony. My favorite film was the well-timed (considering my very possible Westward move) "To Live and Die in L.A." Man, oh, man -- it features a young Willem Dafoe as a rotten counterfeiter, a cuh-razily young John Turturro, and William Petersen (looks like his only other big thing he's done is CSI, meh) as a Secret Service agent who's going after Dafoe. Wang Chung does the original score for the film ... I mean, you can't get more 80s than this flick. I knew I was going to love it when a money-carrier character goes into a train station, walks up to the Amtrak counter and receives a note that just says "Hello Asshole."

The only thing that comes close was another Friend movie suggestion, "Thief," which I watched a couple months ago. Same synthesizer-loaded music soundtrack, lots of crazy car chases and bad explosions ... It turns out William Petersen was in that oldie as well. Some of these 80s dudes really suited their decade.

The "To Live and Die in L.A." trailer, below.

God, in another life, please make me a cool Secret Service Agent ... or, rather, maybe a cool counterfeiter who is described as Armed and Extremely Dangerous. Don't let me be a laid off movie critic! A second-rate movie critic at that, SIGH!

Shameful Reviews From Last Week, Friend in Town, Movie Marathons

I'd avoided posting my latest reviews from last week. It was so unfair!

At about 6:45pm on Tuesday evening, I received an e-mail from my editor. I often avoid opening messages from my superiors so close to the end of the day (Who said that?), but given this regarded the only part of my job that I like, I clicked to find that they decided to run my reviews early: "Please send them first thing in the morning."

Considering I never turn them in until Thursday, I was hardly prepared (hadn't started researching, let alone writing!). But I was meeting a friend for dinner, who was already on her way, so I couldn't cancel.

This meant I was an antsy dinner partner at a time when she needed my full ears-attention; upon returning home and engaging in requisite roommate banter, I didn't get started until 10pm. Maybe later.

The result was an all-nighter, a half-alive Ms. Grice the next day and my worst-quality reviews to date.

Enough disclaimers? Never.

I usually paste the text here, but I can't bear to re-read. "Yes Man" and "Tale of Despereaux" on the Bl'erg's website. I can't believe "Yes Man" beat out Will Smith's "Seven Pounds" this weekend, by the way.

In other news, the weekend was mostly great. After enduring a full cancellation Friday night and a near all-day delay on Saturday thanks to the relentless snow gods, my Poor Friend finally made it on a flight to Manhattan.

So far, I've made us Mexican omelettes and a taco dinner; in one day, we watched "Goodfellas," "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford," "Thief," "Blood Diamond," "Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson," and "Fried Green Tomatoes." (After a few more movie marathons, I plan to compile some thoughts on the best and worst of them all.) And we've walked around the city for hours -- thanks to the cold, I think my gimp limb is too numb to feel the pain.

Perhaps I can have Happy Holidays with a good friend, without being home.