Fugitives And Scandinavian Furniture

Did you read the story about Christopher Dorner, the man who had a beef with LAPD so he wrote a manifesto and then ultimately killed his lawyer’s daughter, her fiance and two sheriffs who had nothing at all to do with his problem, because he was trying to prove that he wasn’t a liar by becoming a killer, as if he was in some sort of Quentin Tarantino movie?  Djorner Unchained (the J is silent.)

"Do you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in Paris?"

“Do you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in Paris?” “No I don’t. McDonalds hasn’t even been invented yet.” “Oops, my bad.”

I’m not going to go into my opinions and feelings about that situation here. I have some strong ones but they aren’t especially funny. However, I will say that it made for some tense times around the Fathead household. It was almost as much fun as the time Hubs was green lit when I was pregnant with my daughter.

greenlight

Hubs’s Green Light announcement. Gangsters don’t use Evite.

Hubs insisted I wear an automatic assault rifle strapped to my thigh under my clothes when I dropped the kids off to school and everything. Let me tell you, those things chafe. And have you ever tried pulling one out of skinny jeans in a timely manner without ripping your fancy underwear and shooting the PTA president? It’s not as sexy as you might think.

Okay the part about the assault rifle wasn’t exactly true, but what I’m about to tell you did actually happen…outside of my mind…in real life.

I’m typically very calm in a crisis. However I do obsessively redecorate and reorganize to manage the stress. For instance in the past few weeks I’ve redone three rooms in our house. Hubs can’t find the remotes, the kids can’t find their toothbrushes, but they know better than to stop me.

So it really comes as no surprise that in the middle of the whole manhunt I ran into Christopher Dorner in the Returns section of my local Ikea while returning a cabinet that I’d been planning on turning into a fantastic faux-denza/media cabinet.

Okay, in retrospect it wasn’t actually Christopher Dorner — just some dude sitting with Tisha Campbell-Martin (the actress from that Damon Wayans show, My Wife and Kids) who really looked like Christopher Dorner, but considering that I had already parked next to a gray Nissan Titan, the exact same truck that Christopher Dorner had been driving, and my head had been on a swivel looking for Dorner because, as I mentioned, it isn’t uncommon for people to want to kill Hubs and I’m just narcissistic enough to think that everything revolves around me, it took me a moment before I realized that it wasn’t him. My first thought was, “Sh!t, he found me,” followed by, “Maybe he just wants to furnish his hide-out with some inexpensive Scandinavian furniture,” and finally, “Is that the chick from Martin and My Wife and Kids??? I love her!”

Doesn't she look like someone who would want to hang out with me?

Doesn’t she look like someone who would want to hang out with me?

It was a tense minute or two. I had to go deep undercover and sit right across from them on one of the pleather couches, casually humming Public Enemy’s Fight the Power as if to say, “Yeah, the Man always brings this sistah down too,” before I figured out that it was just some random dude.

Frankly I was a little disappointed when I figured out that I hadn’t single-handedly located Christopher Dorner, after I’d spent so much time meticulously planning the conversation I would have with him to make him realize the error of his ways and turn himself in. I actually spend a lot of time imagining conversations like that. Almost as much time as I spend mentally choreographing my kick-ass fight moves, which is embarrassing to admit, but I feel like we’re close and I can pretty much tell you anything.

Anyway, the dude was reading Dorner’s manifesto and Tisha leaned over, looked at Dorner’s picture, then looked at her friend and said, “Don’t smile.” See? Because the pictures of Dorner were all photos of him smiling and even a sitcom star could see that the dude was totally Dorner’s doppelgänger.

And you all thought I was overreacting. Tisha totally gets me…or she would if we hung out. Call me, Tisha.

Me and Tisha hunting fugitives and returning furniture. Don't mess with us.

Me and Tisha hunting fugitives and returning furniture. Don’t mess with us.

Then it struck me that the police had already shot two Asian ladies delivering papers (yep, that’s embarrassing), so maybe sitting across from a dude who looked waaaaay more like Christopher Dorner than any Asian lady was actually pretty dangerous. I could get caught in the middle of a messy take down. I wanted to give the dude a respectful fist bump and say, “Hey man, stay safe out there,” but Tisha’s number was called and they went up to return their shelving unit and I chickened out.

Then it started to hail as if God was saying, “you blew your chance, Sucka!”

And that is the story of how I almost cornered Christopher Dorner and became Tisha Campbell-Martin’s best friend in Ikea. I swear it is all true, including the biblical hail. In fact, I haven’t been back to Ikea since the incident because I know it will just be a let down.

Me and Tisha with our own Graphic Novel.  The possibilities are endless!

Me and Tisha with our own Graphic Novel. The possibilities are endless!

Post Note: All kidding aside, my most sincere condolences go out to the families of those who lost their lives during this senseless tragedy. You have been in my prayers. And to those police officers who continue to risk their lives to protect and serve, thank you (respectful fist bump).

**********

Photo Credits:

Sony Pictures

Hubs and the Los Angeles Association of Gangs (or LAAG)

Mylifetime.com (and some low tech photo editing)

Porn to Run

I saw it on the internet, which everyone knows is the most reliable source of information (even better than going to a doctor or reading a book.) Evidently the threat of mandatory condom usage is driving the porn industry to abandon California and head to an unprotected state.  Very soon silicone laden hoochies may be donning little Hobo bags filled with crotchless panties and jumping on east-bound trains. This has me worried, as it should worry you (and not just because you are about to read a disturbing amount of porn-related puns.)

Yes I'm once again using my children's toys inappropriately to make a point.

This mass exxxodus is going to have an effect on Southern California’s economy, an economy that is already in need of a fluffer. Porn doesn’t happen in a vacuum. (It happens in a warehouse in Chatsworth, but that’s beside the point.) It is a multi-million dollar industry and it in turn helps support other local industries–tanning booths, Cosmeticians and stores selling super-glossy lip gloss and hair extensions, Estheticians specializing in hair removal and body acne, disreputable plastic surgeons, trashy lingerie shops, drug stores carrying personal hygiene products whose names makes good insults, STD clinics and the makers of batteries, lubricant and costumes that all begin with the word “sexy” to name just a few. This will impact their bottom lines as well. And nobody wants their bottom line impacted. It’s really uncomfortable.

I’m also worried about the social and psychological ramifications of a porn-free California. What will become of our local youths with low self-esteem and no job skills? Hot Topic can’t give all of them jobs. Where are they to look for a legitimate source of income and the validation they didn’t receive from their parents? Are they just supposed to hang out on their friends’ couches and wait for their latest YouTube video to launch them into a short-term pseudo-celebrity status or hope that MTV will make them the next Snooki? Suddenly porn starts to sound more respectable, doesn’t it?  Not to mention, how badly will we, as a state, feel about ourselves when even porn has turned us down? Is there enough cookie dough ice cream in the world to take the sting out of that kind of rejection? I don’t know but I hope Ben and Jerry are ramping up production just in case.

"I'm going to lie in the road until porn comes back or I'm crushed under the wheels of a semi."

But you know the thing that really worries me? The thing that keeps me up at night?

What will become of the city of Chatsworth?

For decades Chatsworth has hung its hat on being the city that produces porn. It put the “strip” in strip mall if you will. Sure that is a somewhat tawdry reputation but cool in its own way–certainly worth a mini-tour from lonely deviants hoping that the girl next to them at Subway Sandwiches would say “I’d like a foot long” with cheesy 70’s funk music playing in the background. What is Chatsworth’s future now that it may be deprived of its skanky reputation? Will we simply call it the town next to the town that had the big earthquake in 1993 where everything burst into flame? Will it become just another semi-respectable Valley community or simply an R rated ghost town?

"Ghost" Town - NARA - 543356

Would you look at that--some poor exotic actress forgot her porn wagon.

These questions haunt me. They persist regardless of how many times I watch Boogie Nights. In my heart of hearts I think the only true way for us to weather this storm is to each do our part. Buy that extra pot of lip gloss. Support your local Hot Topic. Drive through Chatsworth blasting a little 70’s funk and then stop to pee in a cup at the local clinic. Tell the young lady with the slutty outfit and the bad boob job that you think her dad would be proud (if you only knew where he was.) It takes a village, people! A really skanky village. We can get through this.