I went for a walk in my neighborhood last night, the moon, waning just past full, threw quite a bit of light pert near about everywhere I could see. Overall, a really nice stroll around 11:00 p.m. here in PDST. I eyed our Jacaranda out front: I could make out every purple flower on its yawning limbs. Every last one of them. We notice our Jacarandas out here in May and June: they practically scream "Hey, look at all this purple! Did you every see so much purple in all your life? Didja?" Jacarandas: pretty trees, smart trees, talking trees. Some even pull up their roots when the sun goes down: they head to Pasadena and scare the shit out of the late night latte crowd. I've seen it happen, so there. The Jacarandas head up the 2 north to the 134 east and then on to Tournament of Roses town. Don't ask me why they do it. I don't know why they do it, and frankly, I don't want to know.
I live very close to the Los Angeles River, which was cemented over many years ago by the Army Corps of Engineers. They had a different approach to nature back then, with various Public Works Projects in motion during the 1930s, like The Coast Guard putting tile on the ocean floor beneath Los Angeles Harbor, the DWP's yearly applying of a coat of shellac to homeless people, and the Forest Mowers annual assault on the Verdugos. Different times produce different approaches.
I love visiting the river at night, when hardly anyone except those kids with guns hang out. I thought to myself: what the heck, there's alot of moonlight and if I have to I can take a few bullets, so why not go down to the river? So, there I went, walking down to the river when just up ahead I saw a three hundred pound skunk waddling up the dirt path to the rise next to the waterway, and I thought "Big skunk." Wouldn't you? Wouldn't anybody? I followed at a safe distance (distance in Los Angeles is measured in time, not in feet, yards or what-have-you. If you ask an Angeleno how far Venice Beach is he or she will ask you what day and time were you thinking of going--"it's 38 minutes on Saturday at 9:00 a.m., but that shoots up proportionally as the minutes click by.") A safe distance in following the skunk, I determined, was two minutes and 23 seconds. I ascended the small slope and peered down below: What I saw at river's edge blew my mind but did not blow me.
The legendary Order of the Odor of Skunks was having its rut-fest right here in my hood--giant motherfucking skunks organizing just down the road, up a path, and down the bank of the cemented river from yours truly. The largest ones were upwards of five hundred pounds, great bellowing Musk Fucks who gyrated their torsos back and forth, manipulating the group down closer to the water. I contemplated gaining a safer distance (I would move to Paris) but froze in my spot when a young monster, maybe the size of a fat Rottweiler, began to head right towards me. I knew I was faster than these behemoths, but I decided to play dead and hope for the best. Not a good move, considering the nipper clipped my sweatshirt in his chompers and dragged me down to the center of the great gathering. I was surrounded by more than five hundred bizarrely large, rather aroused and distinctly putrid carnivores. They smelled like shit, except that shit smells better. These mammals have no known counterpart in the human world, except for the Press Secretary to the President of the United States, Scott McClellan, who oddly enough, has two glands on either side of his anus, just the same as skunks. Do not ask me how I know because I am not going to tell you.
Where was I? Oh yes, the great herd glared at me--actually, even with the moonlight they squinted, their eyesight being a bit on the weak side. They can't see anything clearly past three feet, which is why they have a problem with cars. Cars often start out more than than three feet away, traveling at speeds quite past the reach of the average skunk, then the car will be less than three feet away, still moving rapidly, until the skunk is no more. I thought about this as the Stink of Skunks began to squeal and blather and otherwise freakify me to the beyond. But their eyes caught me as well: dark, very dark. Pretty eyes. I made a mental note that if I should survive this encounter I would paint those eyes, over and over, everywhere I went. The Eyes From the Night of Five Hundred Really Big Skunks would become my calling card on bus benches, on buses, on the Metrolink, stop signs, optometrist offices, taco stands, that restaraunt that keeps asking me stay away...but I digress.
COME BACK TOMORROW FOR PART TWO OF THE GIANT MOTHERFUCKING SKUNKS ORGANIZING STORY!
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I live very close to the Los Angeles River, which was cemented over many years ago by the Army Corps of Engineers. They had a different approach to nature back then, with various Public Works Projects in motion during the 1930s, like The Coast Guard putting tile on the ocean floor beneath Los Angeles Harbor, the DWP's yearly applying of a coat of shellac to homeless people, and the Forest Mowers annual assault on the Verdugos. Different times produce different approaches.
I love visiting the river at night, when hardly anyone except those kids with guns hang out. I thought to myself: what the heck, there's alot of moonlight and if I have to I can take a few bullets, so why not go down to the river? So, there I went, walking down to the river when just up ahead I saw a three hundred pound skunk waddling up the dirt path to the rise next to the waterway, and I thought "Big skunk." Wouldn't you? Wouldn't anybody? I followed at a safe distance (distance in Los Angeles is measured in time, not in feet, yards or what-have-you. If you ask an Angeleno how far Venice Beach is he or she will ask you what day and time were you thinking of going--"it's 38 minutes on Saturday at 9:00 a.m., but that shoots up proportionally as the minutes click by.") A safe distance in following the skunk, I determined, was two minutes and 23 seconds. I ascended the small slope and peered down below: What I saw at river's edge blew my mind but did not blow me.
The legendary Order of the Odor of Skunks was having its rut-fest right here in my hood--giant motherfucking skunks organizing just down the road, up a path, and down the bank of the cemented river from yours truly. The largest ones were upwards of five hundred pounds, great bellowing Musk Fucks who gyrated their torsos back and forth, manipulating the group down closer to the water. I contemplated gaining a safer distance (I would move to Paris) but froze in my spot when a young monster, maybe the size of a fat Rottweiler, began to head right towards me. I knew I was faster than these behemoths, but I decided to play dead and hope for the best. Not a good move, considering the nipper clipped my sweatshirt in his chompers and dragged me down to the center of the great gathering. I was surrounded by more than five hundred bizarrely large, rather aroused and distinctly putrid carnivores. They smelled like shit, except that shit smells better. These mammals have no known counterpart in the human world, except for the Press Secretary to the President of the United States, Scott McClellan, who oddly enough, has two glands on either side of his anus, just the same as skunks. Do not ask me how I know because I am not going to tell you.
Where was I? Oh yes, the great herd glared at me--actually, even with the moonlight they squinted, their eyesight being a bit on the weak side. They can't see anything clearly past three feet, which is why they have a problem with cars. Cars often start out more than than three feet away, traveling at speeds quite past the reach of the average skunk, then the car will be less than three feet away, still moving rapidly, until the skunk is no more. I thought about this as the Stink of Skunks began to squeal and blather and otherwise freakify me to the beyond. But their eyes caught me as well: dark, very dark. Pretty eyes. I made a mental note that if I should survive this encounter I would paint those eyes, over and over, everywhere I went. The Eyes From the Night of Five Hundred Really Big Skunks would become my calling card on bus benches, on buses, on the Metrolink, stop signs, optometrist offices, taco stands, that restaraunt that keeps asking me stay away...but I digress.
COME BACK TOMORROW FOR PART TWO OF THE GIANT MOTHERFUCKING SKUNKS ORGANIZING STORY!
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