One of the things about working downtown LA is rats. Big, fat, sassy rats who aren't afraid of you, chump.
Tonight, I left my light* for a few minutes to pee and make a sandwich (not simultaneously). When I came back, I saw a really big rat.
A really big rat perched on the arm of my camp chair (with nifty built-in cupholder), daintily sipping my coffee (I still can't figure out how he got the plastic lid off the cup).
In case you were wondering, flapping your hands and yelling "Shoo!" does not frighten rats in downtown Los Angeles - in fact, it barely makes them look up from their coffee.
I had to lure him off my chair with part of my sandwich.
We're in the same set-up tomorrow night. I'm going to load up a cup with sugar and milk, hunker down and wait - hopefully I can get a picture of the Really Big Coffee Sipping Rat.
Hey, it beats reading a hand-me-down issue of InStyle over and over. Once I learn which color is the new black, I kind of lose interest.
*When a gaffer places lights on top of buildings or in other hard to reach places, he (or she) usually wants to keep a guy next to the lamp all night - just in case. While this may seem excessive, it's better than telling him (or her) that it will take 20 minutes to get someone across the street and up onto the roof to move said light 12 inches to the left.
10 comments:
it barely makes them look up from their coffee
That made me spill my own coffee :)
Wait, where's the part of the post that goes: So this being downtown LA, I wasn't going to let some nasty rat get between me and my $4 half-caf, soy latte from the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. I pulled out my gatt (nothing special, just standard issue for all Angelenos) and popped a cap in the rat's ass. The AD was not happy as they were right in the middle of a rehearsal.
I'm hoping to see a picture of the rat. Go rat!
Tomorrow you should be prepared with your sandwich ahead of time in order to lure him into your fashion shot.
Alas - the rat stood me up last night.
Perhaps he just didn't want another case of the coffee jitters.
I once asm'ed on a show that was very cue heavy at the begining, but every show I had nothing do to for 45 mins.
I started entertaing myself first by making snowflakes (I was working a season in FLA) out of the white sheets of paper that had to be replaced from the pervious shows.
After covering the walls and ceiling of my office and the ajoining laundry room with snow flakes, I went on to coloring books given to me by the cabaret's sm... she had a preference for power puff girls.
When I filled that book I took up yoga. After one of the shows, one of the actors came to me and asked what I was doing in the wings cause occasionally he'd catch a glimps between the blacks of legs swinging up over my head.
As someone who works downtown: the only thing bigger than the rats are the cockroaches. And yes, they fly.
Hey - your story made it to LA Observed:
http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2005/11/first_thing_friday_11405.html
AJ Gentile said...
I thought rats in LA prefered chai soy lattes.
Nah, those are Westside rats. Downtown, it's all about 40s of malt liquor.
I live around the corner from where the streets were blocked off for the spidey 3 shoot (that's the only recent big one i remember, so i'm guessin here) - and I often wonder, as I look down side streets of Skid Row, if the creepy backlit silhouettes are transients, zombies, or just caffeinated rats. If you go a bit farther east, say 5th and San Pedro, you'll meet some hard, pipe-hittin rats that'll mess you up good.
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