No, I have not wrapped the Brougham around a tree. The drive simply became so intense that I’ve not had a moment to update the blog. My apologies. 

Felt right at home tooling around the Hills.

While waiting on media interviews in Hollywood, I decided to knock out some of the more pedestrian aspects of traveling across country. On the first leg of this journey, I packed many fantastic clothing combinations–totally prepared for whatever climate, calamity, or critic I encountered along the way. This made for a monstrous bag, one that proved unwieldy getting in and out of the trunk.

Glamour in Hollywood

So on this leg, you may note that I always seem to wearing the same things in photos. Thus I’ve only packed jeans, white shirts, lots of underwear, a blue blazer and a few rep ties. Today called for laundry.

The Andaz did not strike me as the sort of hotel with laundry facilities, so I asked the bellhop where I could find the nearest laundromat. He pointed me towards a facility about three blocks away, and I made my way there. Laundromats remind me of my days as a very broke writer in New York. Wet clothes smell awful, no matter what you’ve put in the machine to clean them. And laundromats always smell like wet clothes–somebody else’s wet clothes. One of life’s greatest luxuries is owning my own machines, counters and hampers.

Budding thespians in Hollywood.

I parked the Brougham outside the laundromat and immediately noticed a lot of 20-something, good-looking people milling around. They weren’t the least bit interested in the car, which is unusual. Driving an old Cadillac like the Brougham makes you feel like a celebrity. People point. Children smile. Adults come up and introduce themselves. Other drivers wave and let you in traffic. The downside of this automotive celebrity, of course, is that everywhere you go in the car, you are “on.”

At gas stations, grocery stores, and other routine stops, old-car drivers are accosted by “What year is that?” “My grandmother had one just like it!” “What kind of mileage do you get? Ha, ha, ha!”

Unlike a celebrity, I can switch cars and suddenly become invisible again. I’m sure many a Hollywood leading man and lady wish they could switch faces sometimes.

The good-looking people outside the laundromat were all holding sides from “Boston Legal.” Ohhh, I thought, a Boston Legal audition. Actors were busy rehearsing lines. This is great! I’ve come to Hollywood to do laundry and bumped into budding stars of the tiny screen. So as to not make them nervous, I snapped their pictures from across the street, paparazzi-style, a la Perez Hilton.

Later, I found out the storefront was an acting studio, so I dropped in to see if I could take a class or two. There was no lobby, so I lingered to see if I could meet one of the instructors. They were in the middle of a class. I listened. “The biggest problem in LA is that everyone here has taken another acting class,” intoned one of the instructors whom I could not see. This seemed like a reasonable complaint. “You go to a studio. You’re given a scene to work on. You rehearse that scene for, like, two months and get really good at that one scene. Then you get great feedback. And then you think, I’ve done this one scene great. I can do any scene great!” The instructor went on to use a sports analogy, which I found pretty apt, “It’s like a guy who takes up golf, learns how to hit a 9 iron, then thinks he can play the whole course with that one club.”

I began feeling guilty for eavesdropping, so enriched with some free acting advice, I went back to the laundromat to get started on my pile of whites and darks. The smallest bill I had was a $20, and I naively assumed the the change machine might give me $5 in coins and $15 in bills. Nope. It gave me 80 quarters, the volume of which caused the metal flap on the dispensing tray to lodge firmly shut. After struggling for a few minutes, I got my quarters out and began shoving them into various washing machines, dryers, and soap dispensers. That cost $7. I still had 52 quarters left.

The dullest "star shine" ever.

So I went next door to the “Star Shoe Repair” store. An elderly man came out to greet me and I inquired if he shined shoes. “Eight dollars,” he said. Damnation! Eight bucks was a lot of money for some shoe polish, but I hadn’t brought my shoe-shine kit and the kicks were looking dull. Maybe this was some sort of celebrity shine? Maybe Brad gets his mules polished here before the Oscars? Perhaps Angelina does her hair in the shimmer of his brogues? So I gave the man $8 in quarters. Maybe I’d get the Hollywood special.

That was wishful thinking. It was, undoubtedly, the worst shoe shine I’ve ever received. Truly awful. Did this guy have cataracts? Did he just fog my shoes with a little polish mist? He didn’t even blacken the soles. But instead of making a fuss, I simply said, “Thank you” and stepped, lackluster, back into the laundromat. 

With 20 in quarters still jingling in my pocket, I approached a guy who was about to make change in the machine and made a trade for his $4 in bills. We struck up a happy conversation, which made cleaning, drying, and folding my pantaloons go faster. His name was Mark Bringelson, a writer, director, and actor. I should preface that with the note that he is a working writer, director, and actor. You can read his blog here.

My laundry mission complete, I tooled through Beverly Hills. It’s not as pretty as the Tiny Kingdom but it has it’s finer points.

My friend Tad Weyland, master chef.

Later that afternoon, I ventured to Santa Monica to visit my friend Tad Weyland, who is the chef at a hot new restaurant called Huckleberry. Huckleberry is clean, spare, and very fresh. Allow me to put on my former food-critic hat for a moment: the baked goods absolutely blew me away. 

Huckleberry at 1014 Santa Monica Boulevard.

The breads were crusty and perfect–especially the tangy sourdough. The pastries made me glad I didn’t live within 3,000 miles of the place. 

Little bits of chocolate heaven.

The fresh breads were some of the best I've ever tasted.

Now this is genius! Biscuits with the bacon built right in.

And Tad, who took a barbecue pilgrimage across America, of course made a killer BBQ sandwich. That’s a pretty amazing feat in California, where you can’t exercise your God-given right to smoke barbecue as the Lord intended it. Tad has to make his ‘que in the oven. But it’s still great.

Tad's version of a BBQ sandwich.

I ate the whole thing.

Now that's sassy: a shirt that says "MEATBALLS!"

The waitresses were very sweet to me and made a to-go box as a housewarming gift for my longtime friend, Elizabeth.

Esza Kaye, musician, mom, star.

Elizabeth and I worked together at Vanity Fair in the 1990s as assistants. We fetched a lot of coffee, dry cleaning, and every now and then worked on a story. Both of us dreamed of bigger things, and Elizabeth has certainly achieved that. To listen to her music and songwriting, visit her website here. She has an amazing voice and gift of entertaining. She also has become a super-mom, which (for good reason) she ranks as her greatest accomplishment. Her son has his mother’s astute powers of observation: he took one look at the front of the Cadillac and immediately cried, “Boobies!”

A young man destined to love 1950s Cadillacs.

An astute child.

A glam evening in the Pacific Palisades.

Elizabeth and her husband Darell kindly put me up for the evening in their gorgeous Norma-Desmond-styled palatza in the Pacific Palisades. We stayed up late chatting with Elizabeth’s cousin, Fin-Olaf Jones, a contributing editor with my old employer, Forbes. 

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The drive to Wildomar, California was totally uneventful, which pleased me to no end. Crossing through Death Valley made me nervous, as I figured they don’t call it “Death Valley” for nothing. Maybe the memories of aptly named spots in the midwest such as “River Bend” and “Old Stump” were still swirling in my head.

Cruising through the desert

The Mohave Desert shimmered in the afternoon sun and loomed with things that sting, stink, or stick. I definitely did not want to break down or overheat out here, and happily the old Brougham didn’t let me down. 

The old girl didn't let me down here.

Stopping at a roadside diner for lunch, my favorite Walt Whitman quote greeted me above the door: “Afoot and lighthearted, I take to the open road healthy, free, the world before me.”

Walt Whitman in a truck-stop diner.

My destination was Mastermind, Inc. If you own a 1957-1960 Cadillac, you probably know Mastermind and its owner, Mike Rizzuto. Mike is a font of all things Brougham, air ride, and original equipment on vintage Cadillacs. His shop is neat, tidy, and the sort of organized place that you’d expect from a fastidious person attuned to how to keep a 51-year-old piece of Detroit iron roaming the roads.

Greeting Mike for the first time, after many a phone call.

He and his lovely wife kindly made a fabulous Italian dinner (my first home-cooked meal since I left Dallas) and we had a evening of telling lies and stories about old cars by the pool beneath their lush palm-tree garden. Both Mike and I believe the Brougham is America’s postwar Duesenburg, and he’s seeing prices for the cars that reflect that trend. 

The next morning, the Rizzutos again fed me, this time with a whopper of a breakfast. Mike helped me adjust the leveling valves on the Brougham so it isn’t as high in the front and I bought a few parts as well. He checked over the carbs and even grabbed a bucket and washed my car. What a guy. I asked Mike to drive “Heavy,” and aside from a hard brake pedal, his diagnosis was that she is a fine running machine.

Mike takes Heavy on a test drive.

After leaving Mike’s, I had some repairs to make. My stop light switch went out–and having brake lights in Los Angeles seemed like a wise idea. So I stopped at a NAPA and spent 40 minutes talking to the staff. Every part I requested was, “at the warehouse,” so finally I left and headed to Pep Boys. Within a few moments, I had my brake light switch installed and working beautifully.

Of course, fixing one problem on the car brings up the cosmic old car problem that something else has to break. That would be the air conditioning fan-switch knob, which snapped as I was turning it on. Great. They’re made out of pot metal, difficult to find, and expensive to replace. But I need air conditioning, so I had no intention of driving the car without it. After all, Mrs. Murphy is joining me in New Orleans (not known for its temperate climate) and she, I’m sure, wouldn’t take too kindly to a lack of refrigerated air. A little history: she refused to so much as visit my apartment in Birmingham until I bought an air conditioner (eager to lure her to my bachelor pad, I bought an AC that weighed more than my Cadillac). I got on the horn and called a few shops. Craig at McVey’s came through for me with a new switch in good condition. In the meantime, a screwdriver and pair of pliers would have to suffice to make the cables move so I wouldn’t fry behind the wheel. 

The swaying palms of Southern California.

I made my way towards Hollywood and stayed at the very trendy Andaz in West Hollywood. Traffic was worse than the Long Island Expressway, but the car behaved admirably, even in the dense traffic.

My trendy hotel for the evening in West Hollywood.

My hotel for the evening, the Andaz, sits on 8401 West Sunset Boulevard, in fashionable West Hollywood. It’s very chic, crammed with beautiful people, and has just enough eccentricities to make you feel like the Beverly Hillbillies on your first visit. For example, there is no check-in desk. So you go into the hotel, look around fruitlessly for a desk, and are greeted by a pretty girl holding a laptop. I was greeted by Elisa, from Moldova (she’s been here just four years and loves America). She checked me in digitally and  then walked me to my room where I was informed that everything in the minibar, except alcohol, was complementary. Finally, a hotel that doesn’t charge you $4 for a bottle of water! Even better, Eisa offered me a huge glass of wine and invited me to come down to the lobby to chat. My modern room even had a quote by Dolly Parton on the window, “It takes a lot of money to look this cheap.”

Yep, that's check-in desk. Good luck finding the desk part.

Now that’s quality.

Finally, a hotel that doesn't charged for bottled water.

For dinner, I walked across Sunset Boulevard to Asia de Cuba, which is in the Mondrian Hotel. It’s very modern. So modern, in fact, that the bar has no bar stools. I said to the waiter, “Hey man, who stole your stools?”

A bar with no bar stools.

“It’s the design. Our interior was originally designed by Philippe Starck, and he didn’t want barstools at the bar,” the bartender intoned.

Vegas evidently robbed me of my patience and verbal governor, so I blurted, “Well that’s stupid. This place needs some stools.”

The bartender, Vincent Debbey, looked at me a moment and then burst into laughter. “Yeah, I guess they didn’t want anyone talking to me.” So I talked to Vincent. He grew up in Arizona where his dad owns a bunch of Burger Kings. All of the children work for Pop. All except for Vincent. He took another path (good for him) and started his career as a gossip columnist. Some juicy tidbits:

1. Mike Tyson and his entourage were staying upstairs. I reflexively grabbed my earlobe upon hearing this.
2. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie had the hotel build them adjoining rooms during the filming of Mr. & Mrs. Smith. They had breakfast delivered to just one of the rooms, however. Guess who brought it?
3. Britney Spears tried to shave her legs in the hotel pool. When the staff objected, she tried to rent a room but had no photo ID. After shaving her legs in another guest’s room, Britney went out and had her head shaved.
4. I told Vincent I thought Britney, even bald, was hot. Vincent assured me that Britney Spears looks awful in person. “If she was sitting right there, you’d say, ‘Who’s that? It’s the makeup.’”
5. Some people try to fornicate in the bar. This ticks Vincent off.
6. Security is called on bar fornicators, and they’re thrown out of the hotel (unless they have a room, and then, presumably, they’re told to go there to frolic).

The most popular drink at Asia de Cuba is a mojito, which I nearly blurted was “so yesterday,” but thankfully my verbal governor returned and instead I said, “Really?” Vincent made me a double mojito, graced with a giant stick of sugar cane and a straw. I don’t drink with straws, a.k.a., “sissy sticks.” So I removed the offending plastic from my drink.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Vincent said, “you’ll stick that stick right in your eye.” He was right. So I drank my mojito with a straw, which made me feel like a 4-year-old. 

I nearly ordered the tuna sliders, but Vincent warned they were tiny and steered me instead towards the snapper sushi, an absolutely fabulous smidgen of food. As I ate dinner, Vincent and I chatted about politics. He asked me what I thought of Nancy Pelosi, and I believe the mojito was talking when I blurted, “I’d like to stub out my cigar on her forehead.” 

That probably wasn’t too diplomatic, I thought to myself, considering I’m a white-bread Republican from Alabama and Vincent is a black gay man living in Southern California. 

Fortunately, he had an acute sense of humor and agreed that the bailouts, TARP money, and stimulus packages were getting ridiculous, “I mean, I’m not a rich guy. I’m a bartender. But I don’t need another $600. What I’m I supposed to stimulate with that?”

“Yeah, that’s about three drinks at this bar,” I blurted. What kind of truth serum was in that drink?

“You know, man,” Vincent said conspiratorially, “You need to run for politics. You make sense. I’d be your campaign manager.” 

Now I began to wonder if Vincent was drinking his own juice back there. I laughed, left Vincent an good tip for making my evening, and ventured back to the Andaz for the night.

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