I never seem to pay for any drinks, and I never need a ride home. Thank God for LJ.

The fireworks from Dodgers Stadium are loud, but the choir of agitated neighbourhood dogs is louder. I remember years ago running out in to the street to stand gleefully watching the fireworks after a game, but now I just think about how dreadful the traffic must be and how they can be sure nothing’s going to catch alight, as Griffith Park still smoulders.

I do have a cutesy little “back when I was a new girl in Los Angeles” story involving Dodgers Stadium, but everyone who needs to know it has heard it already.

Tiger and Saxon rocked Tommy’s birthday party at the weekend. It was nice to see a well-lit drummer for once.

When one’s friend announces a psychadelic Art Deco wedding, it’s worth investing in 70-year-old evening gowns. [This one’s on etsy at the moment.]

Sally and I were watching the fire for hours last night. The flames came up over a ridge on both sides a house perched at the top with all its lights blaring, but never reached the building itself. A little patch to the right kept catching alight but then going out — the New York Times published a photograph of an apparently similar house in an apparently similar location, with firemen stationed on the roof shooting water at the approaching flames.

After two hours, the wind changed direction and sent the fire racing along the entire ridge towards the observatory. This morning I could just see smoke — yesterday we could see the flames from my office when it started.

The oddest moment was when a huge bird glided silently right over our heads. I’d never seen one like it before, but maybe it was an owl. Perhaps it was a refugee from Griffith Park.

The Olšanské hřbitovy is enormous and entirely photogenic. It’s a good thing I wasn’t left to my own devices, cuz I’d probably still be there now, a month later.

There was a cross-dressing party at the Purple Cake House. Some people were quite thorough in their styling.

(The part where Viggo Mortensen turns into Jack Kerouac is so great that we laughed all the way through Johnny Cash.)

Amelia, Able Tasmans
Ando Meio Desligado , Os Mutantes
Autumn Sweater, Yo La Tengo
Ave Lucifer, Os Mutantes
Avenue B, Gogol Bordello
Babe, You Turn Me On, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Baby (1968), Os Mutantes
Baby (1971), Os Mutantes
Baby Boom, The Crimea
The Ballad Of Queen Bee And Baby Duck, Eagles Of Death Metal
Ban Marriage, Hidden Cameras
Bar Italia, Pulp
Baro Foro, Gogol Bordello
Bat Macumba, Os Mutantes
Battleflag, Lo Fidelity Allstars
Beautiful Feeling, PJ Harvey
Beautiful Girls Haiku, Jack Kerouac
Bedazzled, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Bedtime Story for Henry, Viggo Mortensen
Bee Haiku, Jack Kerouac
Big River, Johnny Cash
Billy Chic, Dream City Film Club
Billy Jack, Relaxed Muscle

Read more bazima.com.

Last night’s dinner at The Stinking Rose in Beverly Hills was over-the-top delicious. I ate so much food I fell asleep immediately on arriving home, and so much garlic I had utterly bizarre and alarmingly violent dreams. Is this adverse effect common, or am I just genetically wired to react oddly to garlic? My great-great grandparents were vampires, perhaps, and the “illiterate Polish emigre” story was just a ruse to disguise my family’s Transylvanian origins? No wonder my grandad changed the family name.

I’m not the only one with the garlic-induced violent dreams, though. Irina has them too! Perhaps it only works on Europeans in America.