Last night TLC's "I Can Make You Thin" had some good ideas in it but it felt and looked like a frickin' Ronco infomercial. Did anyone watch "John Adams" on HBO? How about Parker Posey in "The Return of Jezebel James" on Friday night? For a St. Paddy's Day themed show tonight, check out the "Ghost Hunters" repeat on SciFi at 9:00pm. 8:00pm Dancing With the Stars ABC - Season Premiere. Here we are with......

This morning at the Marriott Downtown, Los Angles Development and Economic Corporation (LADEC) financial uber-guru Jack Kyser will be presenting the 2008-09 LAEDC Forecast Results, a 71-page document entailing the region's financial future. Highlighting a recession watch, the crumbling housing market, and growth opportunities such as tourism, one loosely dubbed as "Its NOT business as usual!" talks strike and its ill-economic impacts upon the city. From the Hollywood Reporter: The figure includes lost wages from......

Killing on the big screen at the New Beverly tonight, courtesy of Eli Roth. / Photo by hemmob via flickr. TALK Author Katha Pollitt discusses her new book On Learning to Drive: And Other Life Stories with UC Irvine Professor Jon Wiener as part of the ALOUD at the Central Library series. Pollitt is a poet and columnist for The Nation who’ll discuss her latest essays that deal with sex, death, ex-lovers, politics, motherhood,......

As Carol Channing, clad in a Bob Mackie sleeveless pantsuit, chinchilla (?) wrap, bright red lipstick, and a 77-karat diamond said last night: "Musical theater is a strictly American art form." The ladies who helped forge that - along with movies and television - were being feted by The Smithsonian, who were specifically honoring women who have woven their way into the American cultural fabric, welcoming their treasured memorabilia into the Smithsonian's permanent collection. There......

Monday No bookish events on Mr. King's Day. Tuesday John Densmore of The Doors, Jim Henke and John McDermott present The Jim Morrison Scrapbook and Jimi Hendrix: An Illustrated Experience 7pm @ Book Soup Wednesday Sudhir Venkatesh presents Gang Leader for a Day 7pm @ Vroman's E. Duke Vincent presents Black Widow 7pm @ Book Soup Robert Novak presentsThe Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington 7pm @ Glendale Public Library Thursday Steve......

If you're looking for something free and chill, then catch old school acoustic jazz at Crane's Hollywood Tavern or ride the tram uphill for reggae at The Getty. For jazz of a crazier brand (yet still classic), try the Art Ensemble of Chicago at REDCAT. Speaking of Chitown, three hip-hop artist from there will be at Echoplex. Hip-hop of a different brand can be found at the weirdest space in LA, pehrspace. And for some......

Our friends over at Austinist asked us to pass along this casting call for Lucky magazine--one of their writers, Breanna, made the cut and will be striking a pose in the mag's glossy pages come March '08--and now they're looking for some lovely Angeleno ladies for a local shoot. Could you be one of them? The shoot is going to take place here in Los Angeles on Friday, January 4th. According to their press info,......

Close, but not close enough: a 3.9 earthquake hit Baja California today at 1:50 p.m. Now that we think of it, getting yourself prepared for a major earthquake is a great New Year's resolution! Those rodes are slick, stay safe! This morning's crash on the 5 near the 170 left one dead and three others injured. Who loves the politics of hair? Pam Spaulding at Pandagon writes that Essense Magazine's Top Ten Celeb Hair......

Clippers 91, Nets 82 - Nothing like a trip to New Jersey to make you feel better about yourself. Los Angeles came into East Rutherford having lost 8-of-9. By the end of the night, it was the Nets who had lost 8-of-9. The struggling Clippers were able to pull off the W even without Elton Brand and Sam Cassell. Chris Kaman continued to impress with a team-high 18 points, 14 rebounds, and 2 blocks. USC......

MUSIC: The Los Angeles Master Chorale performs Handel's Messiah tonight at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. But the audience has a part in this fun sing-along. So get your "hallelujah" ready. 7:30 pm // Walt Disney Concert Hall // 111 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles // $16-$69 (Cheaper tickets are getting scarce). OUTDOORS: Santa Monica pretends its Pershing Square with an ice rink of its own. It’s a stone’s throw away from the Third Street......

People have been asking me what's up with the Weekly lately and hell if I know. They do their thing and maybe new management has made them lose their edge, but maybe they're just getting olde. Seems to me that once upon a time if someone like Juliette Lewis was in town to play a Saturday night show at the Roxy with a decent bill like Scissors for Lefty and Suffrajett, the Weekly would......

photo by gotomattex via flickr Uh Oh, not sure what to get for that sullen-eyed teen or Vampira look-a-like on your list this year? Is shopping for your little darkling turning into a real nightmare before Christmas? Fear not! We live in L.A.: one of the best places to be dark and spooky or at least look the part. Not only do we have a thriving Goth scene, but tons of local vendors that......

a writer's perspective After giving the 5AM shift a shot yesterday, I decide to actually get some sleep and “work” the 8-11 shift today. I feel rejuvenated and energized when I show up to relieve the exhausted morning crew. Not a lot happens today. People seem in extra-good spirits, but I’m not sure why. The latest “off the record” word is that negotiations didn’t go great yesterday. There is talk that the AMPTP is......

A couple of weekends ago, my friend and I went bar hopping in LA. On our last stop, we headed into, in my opinion, the shittiest dive bar off of Sunset Blvd. Needless to say, I wasn’t looking forward to it, yet my friend convinced me that I should turn the frown upside down and make the most out of the evening. Once inside, we realized it was cash only, and neither of us......

The WGA and the producers are back at the negotiating table, hopefully they will catch the breaks that they need so that the collapse of Western civilization is averted. In a desperate attempt to avoid family time over the holiday, I managed to watch season one of Showtime's Dexter and my optimism for the future of mankind was restored. I missed Dexter when it premiered last year but was happy to cover the zany stunts......

In the 80s, I kind of felt like I was living in the Twilight Zone. Particularly the episode where everyone thinks people with pig faces are beautiful. Back then, people were wearing asymmetrical everything, giant hair, giant shoulderpads, giant polkadots, and dayglo colors to complement the ultrathick, bushy eyebrows. My mother would try to force these horrible clothes on me in the dressing room, and it was as if they were burning my skin.......

Did you know there's a medical/psychological condition called trichophagia -- where someone is compelled to eat his or her own hair. Could this the next big celeb dysfunction? Move over meth and anorexia. Here comes hair eating to help with your weight gain... An 18-year-old Chicago girl found out the hard way why eating your hair is bad for you. She was suffering from stomach pain, vomiting and losing 40 lbs. over a five-month......

As I prepared to move here from New Jersey in 1988, I kept hearing the same thing: “It’s all plastic Hollywood showbiz hair-metal people trying to make it big. You will not succeed and you will hate it.” Yet I instinctively knew not to listen. SST Records was here, along with most of my favorite bands. The one person I knew who’d made the journey, my friend Ben Chatrer, told me that while it......

"Welcome to My Home." Written, directed, produced, and starring Brenda Dickson. Part I... ...and Part II. Last Autumn I ate so much Halloween candy, Thanksgiving Tofurkey, and Happy Birthday Jesus grocery store sheet cake that I gained five pounds in two months. This year I'm determined not to let that happen again, so I have decided to start a preemptive diet and exercise plan right now before the holiday fattening season is in full......

Back in 2002 or so, a guy friend of mine introduced me to a band he had discovered, whose lyrics were all about two fictional characters in a sci-fi world, and whose artwork had no band photos, only a drawing of the fictional guy and girl. The music was like a cross between pop/rock, metal, and prog-rock, with high-pitched vocals that immediately called to mind the band Rush. There were some amazing melodies in......

This Thursday and Friday, Los Angeles will see the first return in 30 years of one of its more singular musical forces: Ya Ho Wa 13. Active from 1969-77, the band produced nine LPs – and recorded enough for fifty-six more - of stunningly original psychedelic rock. Hardly anyone ever got to hear them, however, since they were entirely self-released and only available at the Source Restaurant on Sunset and Sweetzer during the last......

My asshole has been clenched in anticipation since October 18, 2006 for the fourth season of the Bravo hit show Project Runway. On that Wednesday evening, I was at a Project Runway finale viewing party my friend threw at her apartment in West LA watching local designer and Cosa Nostra founder Jeffrey Sebelia win the whole kit and caboodle. Starting tomorrow there will be 15 brand new contestants vying for: An editorial feature in......

Monday Dave Isay, from StoryCorps, presents Listening Is an Act of Love 7pm @ Vroman's Johan Lehrer presents Proust Was a Neuroscientist 7pm @ Dutton's Nigella Lawson presents The Domestic Goddess 7pm Borders, Torrance Tom Brokaw presents Boom! Voices of the Sixties 7:30pm @ Temple Emanuel Tuesday Clive Barker presents Mister B. Gone 7pm @ Vroman's Gregory Rodriguez presents Mongrels, Bastards, Orphans & Vagabonds 7pm @ Central Library Susanne Daniels presents Season Finale 7pm @......

Heavy Trash - "Dark Hair'd Rider" Heavy Trash @ The Echo The Octopus Project, Pedestrian, 8MM @ The Roxy Culver City Symphony Orchestra @ Veterans Auditorium Evanescence @ The Greek Theatre Henry Franklin Quartet @ Senor Fish (The Plan to End Homelessness benefit at 4 p.m.) She Wants Revenge @ The Henry Fonda Theater Nathan Hubbard's Everything After @ Cafe Metropol Very Be Careful @ The Regent Theatre......

Attempting to pull sticky, er, bubble gum out of your hair was as vain as trying to banish Hanson's "MmmBop" from your brain ten years ago. A decade ago, that was your little sister's Hanson. Fast forward to 2007 and you've got three grown men who have purposely done nothing to shed their image of the past but have somehow emerged as a band for today. Unlike comparable, so-called boy bands, the Tulsa, Oklahoma-based......

The Red Sox has permeated nearly every facet of Bostonist's lives. When they're not live-blogging the games, waxing poetic about the games, thanking Curt Schilling for his splendid work, or telling Dane Cook to watch his hair, they're watching certain presidential candidates hop on the Red Sox bandwagon (sorry, Gothamist). The Sox are so branded on the local brain that people are using the Series to spice up their sex lives. Speaking of spice, Bostonist......

October is a remarkable time of year. It's around this time that I always get an unbelievable urge to see the seasons change. I long for the dramatic oranges, reds, purples and yellow that signal the end of summer and the beginning of a long, hard winter (well...not exactly, but you get the point). As a kid growing up on the prairies, when fall rolled around it always looked as if someone had dipped......

Unintentional cacophony at it's finest. The pre-taped keyboards kick in a hair faster than they're supposed to, throwing the entire song into a beautifully out of tune dissonant noisefest. What does the band do? Finish the song, of course. All 6 and a half horrible minutes of it. If this was Ashlee Simpson, you would have heard about it by now. But this is Van Fuckin' Halen!......

Ray Charles - "Ring of Fire" on the Johnny Cash Show, 9/23/70 One of the things the recent release of the Johnny Cash tv show on dvd reminds us is that the days of the tv variety shows and the real music shows are over. The closest thing going these days is the Henry Rollins thing on Bravo and all due respect to Henry but when you have a man with the stature of......

Doomed to repeat - if not exceed - the failures of their previous generations, the youth of today are spreading sexually transmitted diseases at an alarming rate, the LA Times reported yesterday. In fact the next time a college girl giggles when, in the heat of the moment, you pull her hair and call her a dirty dirty girl - the joke might be on you, holmes. About 1 million Californians between the ages......