Notes from The Assistant Job from Hell
Toting my boss’s kidney stones in a Ziploc bag to the lab, my degree in lit/creative writing was really paying off
When I first moved to L.A., I waitressed at two different restaurants. One was A Votre Santé in Hollywood, where customers obsessed over chapatis with no oil, dressing on the side, and dairy-free pies made out of tempeh. (Yeah, they tasted like an old shoe.)
But Flea and Anthony Keidis of The Red Hot Chili Peppers came in every day to order one blue corn banana pancake and one yellow corn blueberry pancake. Read all about Anthony propositioning me over coffee here:
Reflections on 30 years in La-La Land, and why I staymedium.com
The other waitressing gig was at Gaucho Grill in Brentwood, where every night was a decadent Bacchanalian feast. Customers drank Argentinian malbec and ate blood sausage and sizzling provoleta, which is like the calories of three extra-large pizza pies in one tiny little cast-iron pan.
I also had a third job scheduling patients at a physical therapy clinic in Santa Monica. None of these jobs was going anywhere — they were definitely not helping me pursue a career in screenwriting.
So, when my office manager, Mona, mentioned that one of our patients, a writer, and producer, was complaining about his assistant, she asked me if I was interested in working for him. I saw it as my entry into the entertainment business.
Mona got me an interview with George and his partner Peter, (not their real names) and I guess it went well because they hired me to be their assistant.
And speaking of educations, as I walked those five blocks to the lab carrying parts of Peter I would have rather never known existed, I thought, is this really what a degree in lit/creative writing from SUNY Binghamton…
