Photo by Rebecca Schoekopf “Have a nice Day of Atonement,” the woman was saying, realizing as soon as it fell out from between her thin lips that it sounded rather awkward; it's very like Memorial Day—wishing someone a happy one is gauche, although we blithely do it just the same. And so she tried to save the situation, but as so often happens—just ask Arnold!—the hole she was digging started to look like a mass grave.
“We live next door to a private school,” she rambled to the acquaintance to whom she had just wished a happy Yom Kippur, “and it was closed today! I guess there are Jews who go there. I was very surprised!“
It didn't help that we were at the Phoenix Club at the time—das Weltberuhmte deutsche Klub, am grossten Nordamerika!—trying to find out the hours for its Oktoberfest.
Now, I don't like stereotyping Germans any more than I like stereotyping Southerners as bigots or people who live less-privileged lives as “white trash.” I think it's awful that this pretty bit of classism is perfectly acceptable as long as the beneficiaries of the epithets are poor and ill-educated. But let's face it: Germans and their Teutonic ilk (say, like, Austrians) totally blow.
The amusing part of the story is that the woman was not a first-generation German; her parents might have been, but she was as American as Barbara Coe—the delightful lady who gets all freaky about Mexicans and whom we once saw wearing mismatched shoes—and far more American than, say, Ward Connerly. (As for Connerly and his Proposition 54, how will the Right know how many more blacks are sucking from the public teat and snatching college admission from the mouths of oppressed whites if the state doesn't have the stats?)
No, see, first-generation Germans know to keep their mouths firmly shut on any casual statements about Jews or The Jews or Dirty Jews or Bloodsucking Dirty Christ Killers. And this woman wasn't a raving lunatic at all. She was nice and warm. She was just surprised that there were Jews in the private school next to her house.
That's all.
The other amusing part of the story is that people will read it and think I called Jews Christ Killers and said blacks are sucking from the public teat, when I'm just being outrageous! and saying outrageous! things to promote myself! So that's okay then, right?
And the third amusing part of the story is that to get to the Phoenix Club, my Republican boyfriend and I rode our bikes along the Santa Ana River Trail, a collaboration between three counties to install bike and walking trails along the river basin to the sea, and it was delightful. The trail was started by OC way back in the '70s, when people were busy being all Wiccan and pagan and reading Silent Spring and not wearing bras and starting things like Earth Dayback before it was celebrated by seeing bands and leaving lots of litter in The Hub's parking lot. Then Riverside and San Berdoo hopped on the hippie trail. We saw what looked like storks and lots of algae—apparently, the Riverside stretch is prettier, but ours has some delightful breezy greenbelts and some cool dystopian concrete jungles. And if you go south along the Santa Ana Riverview Golf Courseinstead of north to Anaheim, you can look in people's back yards, which is superfun!
So do you know how the river trail's getting completed? Federal water and transportation funds, state parks and water funds, local county and city funds, and some funds from dirty-hippy environmental groups.
It's amazing what a little government can do. Now give me back my car tax, bloodsuckers!
So I went to this benefit Thursday, Oct. 2 at Club Monacoat South Coast Plaza! And if the government hadn't sucked me dry building its “schools” and “roads” and “sewage processing plants” and the “Santa Ana River Trail,” maybe I could have spent a whole bunch of money on cute clothes for me! Luckily, even though I didn't spend a dime, I still got the free hand facial from the ladies of Georgette Klinger, as well as the fab Cosmopolitans and the best catering I've had in years by some guy named Brian. It was luscious, truly, with caviar and scallop slices piled high on charmingly presented trays, the bottoms piled with edible textures like spinach, chopped cabbage or shredded coconut. And the best thing was we didn't even have to tip! There's nothing worse than poor people with their hands out while I'm trying to shop.
Hey, you know who's charming? Arnold Schwarzenegger! He's so charming! I think it's especially charming how the emcees at his events goad the mobs to “find the guy from the Los Angeles Times and beat him up!” Ha! That is hilarious! It is so very funny—especially when you consider how very easy it is to sway and incite the kinds of folk who would show up for an Arnold rally. By which I mean they are simpleminded and stupid. Thank you.
Hey, here's a funny one the emcees should try: “Find the shops of the Jews and break all the windows, and in the morning, we will round them up and put them on the trains! Ha, ha, just kidding!” Thank you.
You know what's even more charming than that? How Arnold grabs the breasts of the women and says to them, “Have you ever had a man slide his tongue up your ass?” and all of these things.
No, I'm not bothering to put allegedly.
Sue me.
And you know what's awesome? Both Schwarzenegger and Tom “Seor The Devil” McClintock are vowing to get rid of carpool lanes! It's quite amazing how much sway radio hosts John N Ken have. First, they announce their next big putsch is to get rid of carpool lanes, and seconds later, presto! Arnold and McClintock are promising to get rid of carpool lanes! Because nothing says, hey, baby, you're entitled! like a bunch of assholes in Hummers complaining about how unfair it is that only people with two or more people in their car get to carpool. Awesome! I think next we should send some jackhammers to tear up the Santa Ana River Trail. I mean, how is it fair that only people with bikes or horses or feet should get to use it? Am I right, folks? Thank you.
And say! How exciting is it that the woman the nasty British tabs say is the mother of Arnold's love child lives in Brea? It's superexciting! Sadly, we'd need a lot more in the way of corroboration than the word of those nasty British tabs, who, frankly, are preposterous. If only . . .
And if only the alleged love child was black, like Bill Clinton's fake love child. Then maybe the story would have some legs in the right-wing media.
The moral of this little story is that OC chicks are superhot! Even ones from Brea!
Thank you very much!
Go to the Phoenix Club's Oktoberfest at 1340 S. Sanderson Ave., Anaheim, (714) 563-4166. Fri.-Sun. Call for times. Through Oct. 26. $5; kids under 12, free!
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