Leave the gun, take the cannoli.

Saturday night after having some land speeder trouble I made my way down to the Italian Feast of San Gennaro in Hollywood with good friend the Silent Android on the Metro. After making a small pit stop at the Hollywood and Western stop we ran into old friend and champion of biker speeder rights Jedi Master Box of all people. We informed him of our destination and proceeded to make our way towards the festival.

Once we arrived there we encountered a maze of smells leading us in many different directions. We had to chose what kind of Italian food we wanted to stand in line for. Pizza, cannoli's, espressos, calzones, gelato, sausage and meatballs, Italian ice, mozzarella cheese etc etc etc seemed to be everywhere. The lines seemed to be everywhere too. The shortest lines were for some cannolis made by Storm Troopers and Rocos Pizza. You know... the guys that set up shop in Vitos old place in East Hollywood.... yeah those guys. Vito's line was twice as long if not more. You rock Vito!

Anywho, I digress. We had those cannolis which weren't great but weren't bad they just were. The Italian Ice was awesome. The gelato was not chalky like it is at some gelato shop in Silver Lake, in fact it was pretty good.

We listened to Italian music, ate some Italian food, learned some Italian history in LA and we ran into a Roller Derby Skater Fighter acquaintance of mine. Los Angeles truly is an amazing city.

Cannoli Place

Cheesy decorations look like X-mas

They were selling lightsabers to non Force Sensitive people! I stopped them.

May the Force be with most of you.
"Don't forget the cannoli."

I have succumbed...

to the Dark Side. I bought Crocs. This doesn't make me a total hipster does it? I was just getting tired of those damn jedi boots.
Feet are happy now.

Storm Troopers are at it again

I ask you. What is wrong with this picture?

This time they were not serving a search warrant, they were hand cuffing Jedi Master Box and his wife.(wife? thats not the Jedi way!) Anyways, Jedi Master Box was attacked by a local bus driver the other night and Storm Troopers (as usual) got a contorted view of the events and hand cuffed the innocent victim then proceeded to hand cuff his wife for telling them they were cuffing the wrong person.

*note to self. Never tell Storm Troopers how to do their job.

I'm beginning to get the feeling that Storm Troopers are just another street gang only they have badges that give them the authority to be assholes and shoot people.

Apparently cyclist's are road hazards now.

*not to self. Find that bus driver and ask her is she enjoys running over cyclists.

We still have a long way to go to make the streets of Hollywood and Los Angeles safe for everybody.

May the force be with most of you.
except stupid bus drivers.

wait... Dick is Lukes father now?

In a funny story that I could hardly stop laughing at, Presidential hopeful Hilary Rodham Clinton called Vice President Dick Cheney, Darth Vader.

Now, by no stretch of the imagination would it be difficult to assume that Senator Clinton believes that Tricky Dick is skilled in the Dark Side of the Force to which I assume she considers herself on the Light Side of the Force. I can assure you my young padawans, she is no Jedi.

Truth is Darth Vader really wasn't as strong with the Force as everybody thought.

May the Force be with most of you.

George! You are my father!

On October 3rd at the Arclight Cinema on Sunset, George Lucas will be presenting his space opera to a few lucky people as part of AFI's 40th Anniversary.

AFI will be presenting 11 classic movies each introduced by a member of the cast or its director. Needless to say The Hollywood Jedi will be there to meet his maker and watch the Death Star get blown up by a bunch of fuckin' teenagers.

May the Force be with most of you.

Swashbuckling Jedi Day!

Its that time of year again when people start acting like pirates again. Yes folks, swashbucklers converge on Studio City Tattoo celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day. Buccaneers, pirates and swashbucklers from all over Southern California, San Francisco and even Oregon will gather in Studio City Wednesday, Sept. 19, to celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

They'll convene from noon to midnight at Studio City Tattoo “Ye Olde Tattoo Shoppe," 11032 Ventura Blvd. The event is free and open to the public.

Talk Like a Pirate Day is celebrated by millions of people throughout the United States and around the world on all seven continents – even at the South Pole! It's a day when – just like the name says – people are encouraged to swash their buckles and talk like a pirate.

This is the third year Ye Olde Tattoo Shoppe has hosted a Talk Like a Pirate Day celebration, and each year the event gets bigger. This year's event includes live music by Captain Kula’s Pirate Band, pirate lightsaber fights, fire breathing, and an appearance by the founders of the holiday themselves – John "Chumbucket" Baur and Mark "Cap’n Slappy" Summers, from Albany,OR.

Baur and Summers are two friends who started Talk Like as Pirate Day as a joke, then, as they say, "took the idea way too far." Since their idea first came to the world's attention in 2002 they've had a book published, have performed in Las Vegas, San Francisco, Seattle and New Orleans, their Web site – www.talklikeapirate.com – has taken tens of millions of hits, and they've appeared (with Baur's wife, Mad Sally) on ABC's "Wife Swap." They will be signing copies of their book, "Pirattitude!" during the event.

yaarggghh May the Force be with most of ye. Yarrghh!

New park then the ball park

On Saturday I felt good enough to venture out in my land speeder for some business and pleasure. First off I was informed by the Militant Padawan about the grand opening of a new park in Historic Filipinotown. Seeing as I am clearly not interested at all in park space I couldn't miss the opportunity to mingle with city officials to bring more parks to Hollywood.

After speaking with Los Angeles Jedi Council President, Jedi Master Garcetti and a couple of his padawans about a proposed project to bring a Recreation Center to East Hollywood, I approached Tsilah Burman who is the Executive Director of the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust about bringing about working together to bring a park to this part of town too . Just the people who can help me and my personal Jedi agenda. Seeing as I am in good standing with all these people and they seem to have a soft spot for Hollywood they agreed to help in any way they could and even mentioned my dedication to the cause as an inspiration. Yay for me.

This new park is nestled in one of the richest cultural areas in the city and in front of the largest Filipino Mural in the country. The ceremony was short and sweet by the above mentioned city officials including Mark Mariscal, the Superintendent of the Dept. of Recreation and Parks and a friend of the Hollywood Jedi, in order to get the children out of the hot sun and into the brand spankin new jungle gym where the kids could sweat some more and dehydrate themselves into a heat stroke. No worries, water was available.


Here is a video of the ribbon cutting.


Soon after the ribbon cutting I jumped back in my land speeder and headed back to my Jedi Temple and to eat some ethnic food and rehydrate before heading out to the Ravine with some non Force Sensitive friends to catch the boys in blue put a wookiee sized ass whoopin on the Snakes from Arizona.

Larry Lucy Live

The Los Angeles Jedi Council voted to rename the block around the CNN building in Hollywood, "Larry King Square".

Also, the Los Angeles Jedi Council voted that the the corner of Plymouth and Melrose in Hollywood would be renamed "I love Lucy Square".

I wonder when will we get Tie Fighter square in Thai Town?

I think its time for dinner at Lucys El Adobe Cafe.

May the Force be with most of you.

OMG Explosion!

The Hollywood Jedi has been painfully sick all week and has rarely left the Jedi Temple aside from a side trip with the Militant Padawan to Vitos and to meet up with Jedi Master Box for some Jedi Council bussiness. At the conclusion of all these minor events I would return to the Jedi Temple and try and regain my strength. So as to not keep you all out of the loop as to what has been going on in Hollywood I read up on other bloggers info and came up with this piece you should all read.

Hope everybody is doing well and wish me a speedy recovery. If you are wondering whats wrong with me, I seem to be having problems with those pictured right.

May the Force be with most of you.

You don't need to see my search warrant,

In an ongoing story, Jedi Master Box who has brought us the story of the Beverly Hills Storm Trooper incident has taken a turn for the..... distasteful.

Friday afternoon the Beverly Hills Storm Troopers served LAist with a search warrant after last weeks article.

quote from LAist:
"The warrant states that the police are to search the author's information and any relevant IP associations (even though the author was with the police on Thursday morning) and all IP addresses with date/time stamps for all comments posted before and after the the warrant was served. The police suspect there may be a correlation in IP addresses from LAist's comments and the e-mail address the threat was made with."

The Hollywood Jedi will not stand for this injustice and will forever give them and the city of Beverly Hills as much shit as I can possibly give them whether its with my keyboard, my bike, my car, my light saber. (fyi that cannot be constituted as a terrorist threat you fucking pigs so don't come serve my ass with a warrant either). And no pulling me over cos I'm brown again either!

Fire Meanie Strikes Back!

Saturday morning I was doing a bit of work over by Plummer Park In West Hollywood when I noticed a plume of smoke. Naturally I headed over to see what the situation was. Not a second after I began walking there I heard sirens and then more sirens and then even more sirens. Geez, this must be a big one I said. Let me see if I can offer some jedi assistance.

As soon as I arrived I saw smoke and flames coming from a two story apartment building. I noticed an elderly couple who were in need of some medical assistance and flagged a fireman over who helped the elderly gentleman who seemed to have been passed out. After the fire department put out the fire the elderly gentleman seemed to loose control and began fighting with local Storm Troopers.

Five storm troopers and the elderly violentman were taken to a hospital for smoke inhalation.

Cyclists vs BHPD & Motorists

In a story first brought to us by Jedi Master Box in LAist.com where a motorist attacked a bicyclist in Beverly Hills with his SUV, it appears that Jedi Master Box and his army of speeder bikers once again helped make a difference it making our streets safer for cyclists and pedestrians (pedestrian?) alike. In a planned protest against the Beverly Hills Storm Troopers who cited the cyclist and not the motorist in a ludacris act of ignorance and plain stupidity, the Midnight Ridazz stormed the commission demanding equal rights for peds and cyclist alike.

After all was said and done justice is on its way with the commission declaring it will make an effort to fix such problems that they being a small city with big city problems have. Of course it wouldn't be a trip into the 90210 which oh by the way is the most dangerous city to be a pedestrian in and judging by some of the women I see driving their SUV's on Santa Monica Blvd I can totally see why, without another attack on a cyclist only this time "Road Rage Guy" was apprehended.

Score one for the good guys!

Jena Six

I received a distress call from a colleague of mine down in Louisiana who asked me to look into this case and give him my thoughts on how to approach the situation and what he could do to mediate the problem and and help ease the racial tension. Seeing as I currently live in the most diversely populated city on the planet, I gave him my thoughts which will remain private due to the delicate content involved. I also agreed to help spread the awareness of the situation whether it was pro or con to the Jena Six. So I ask you to do a bit of research yourselves and if you find it a worthy cause help spread the word and the awareness. I will not try to sway you in either direction but this situation deserves more attention nation and world wide.

Since I know none of you will do any research on it I will provide you with a list of links.

Democracy Now
Petition Online
Jena Six.org
You Tube
Truth Out.org
Wiki
I am not ashamed
Color of Change

X-Wing Flying

I've been wasting my day away flying paper X-Wings.

Jedi Training Grounds

So in my previous post I mentioned the lack of park space in Hollywood not to mention the lack of parking space.

Well a few devoted people will make parking a bit more difficult in LA for a day in order to help the higher cause. What is the higher cause you ask? Parks of course, you silly nerf-herders! On September 21st devoted Angelenos will take over metered parking spaces in Los Angeles and create mini parks on them (while feeding the meter naturally) in order to open a dialogue with City officials about the lack of green space in the city. This is an amazing idea and The Hollywood Jedi will not try to influence you with his Jedi mind trick but as many of you out there as possible should do the same. If you need more information check out Park(ing) Day LA.

While I'm on the topic of lack of park space, I should mention that the city has been making an effort of late remedy this problem. For example, in January of this year the Los Angeles City Council approved $100,000 in funding for a park feasibility study to create an unprecedented 24 acres of new green space all in one location. Where you ask? Good question. I have answers. The project is called the "Hollywood Freeway Central Park" which will build a deck on top of the 101 Freeway from Bronson Avenue to Wilton Place in Hollywood. Yes folks you read right.... a deck... on top. This is a great idea that will use those much discussed Quimby funds and will give Hollywood its very own lung giving its residents and business owners fresh air as opposed to the poison our padawans are currently breathing. They might as well suck the tail pipe of my land speeder.

Another project currently in the works and many of you will probably say "huh? what?" The LA River Project. This is a non profit group dedicated to the conservation of the river and making its a fun place to visit and enjoy a day at rather than that cement canyon snaking its way through LA County. Check it out its good stuff.

All these new projects should receive extra funding from huge companies in Los Angeles like The CIM Group who likes to create more density and traffic and not give these people they will eventually house a decent park to take a walk in. Think about that wealthy contractors of LA!

The city needs more places like this for us to go to.

May the Force be with most of you.

Chinese Theater Sold!

The iconic theater was sold today to the CIM Group of Los Angeles by Damon Runyon Cancer Research Center of New York and Barlow Respiratory Hospital of Los Angeles (who made Darth Vaders iron lung) for an undisclosed and no doubt huge amount of Republic Credits.

The CIM Group, Hollywoods largest commercial land lord, who also owns the Hollywood and Highland (hye-land?) complex located right next door to Graumans, has said they have no plans to change the Chinese Theater, and Mann who holds a long time lease on the theater still plan to use the theater to show movies.

Other properties owned by CIM are the Renaissance Hotel, Mann Chinese 6 Theatre multiplex and the Galaxy building . CIM is planning on converting the Sunset and Vine Tower into 59 Luxury apartments and 7000 sq ft. of retail space (pictured). To which I ask where are the fucking parks!? (Shameless plug) I wonder.... If the city of Los Angeles is allowing all these new apartment structures and condos do go up while obviously taking the Quimby funds and not putting them to any good use, why not have the city propose to some of these major developing firms to purchase a chunk of land in the city and donate it making it a tax deduction so that the city can use those Quimby funds to build a recreation center and not stand around with a thumb up their ass!?

But... I digress... and this will be picked up soon in another blog entry. Back to the Chinese Theater.

No doubt ground zero for Los Angeles' and Hollywoods tourist population the theater has tons of history. Built in 1923 by Sid Grauman it holds over 1100 seats. It is home to the famous hand and foot prints in cement which by the way will always have Darth Vader, C3PO and R2D2 prints in cement.

Lately the Chinese has seen some very interesting random moments, for example Shrek fighting with Busta Rhymes, and some random wookie sexually assaulting Marliyn Monroe! To be honest none of that bantha fodder really surprises me. Except for the wookie thing. They don't ever go for humans, in fact they stick to their own species. Personally I think Marilyn is full of shit.

May the Force be with most of you.

Oh yeah... The LA Ice Cream Party today was pretty cool too.

The New Beverly Cinema

Tonight I was joined again by Darth Dragonfly who suggested we patrol West of La Brea. I knowthat is not Hollywood anymore and is considered Mid City West. Where do they come up with these names? Seeing as I'm (as far as I know) the only Jedi in L.A, I feel it my responsibility to extend my boundaries as I see fit.

Before leaving for Mid City West, were-energized ourselves at a local Mexican eatery. After eating we went for desert at a local gelato shop owned by Viceroy Tai Kim of the Trade Federation. Viceroy Tai Kim had promised to help with a donation to The Great LA Ice Cream Party which I am an official Ice Cream Ambassador to. His donation will serve the Opportunity Drawing which everyone is automatically entered in just for attending. So if you like free Ice Cream and aren't going to Universal Studios this Monday, this is the event to be at.

I saw it fit to work around the New Beverly Cinema for a while. Nothing like keeping Orthodox Jews safe as they walk home from Shabbat. It just so happened that the New Beverly Cinema had a double feature by world renowned Chilean director Alexandro Jodorowsky. We decided to do some patrolling inside while El Topo and The Holy Mountain were shown. Nothing happened during the film aside from a couple kids laughing at blood, guts and gore and an elderly couple walked out after spending 30 minutes inside a really bad acid trip consisting of Jesus, tits and a future war against those vile and evil Peruvians. Peruv(ian)?

Heading back to the Jedi Temple, I noticed my speeder was emitting odd amounts of poison and toxic fumes from the rear end so we stopped to get it checked out at the Smog Cutter.

Upon entering the seediest cantina in the galaxy, which smelled like dry octopus, beer, piss and vomit we ordered our drinks, listened to some bad karaoke, (apparently it was Huey Lewis night) watched some bad pool players, and we were approached by a woman who was very friendly and enjoyed talking to us. We had conversations ranging from Huey Lewis, dry octopus to architecture and her regularity in that cantina which she was sure was in "South Silverlake".

Okay... First of all its spelled Silver Lake, thats two words, second of all, there is no South Silver Lake, and last but not least, Smog Cutter is in East Hollywood! I forgave her since she was an Outer Rim transplant.

May the Force be with most of you.