March 13, 2009

• When You’re a Jet…

  At 4 AM in the morning I was awoken by a car alarm.  Usually something like that never wakes me up in the middle of a sound sleep, but this alarm was loud and seemed quite close.  (People have become quite nonchalant about alarms these days, have you noticed?  Even sometimes when I see people walk out of a store where the alarm goes off, the cashiers and sometimes even the “security” guards, just wave people through, or worse yet, don’t even notice!)

  So as I lay in bed waiting for whoever the idiot owner was to figure it out and turn off the damn alarm before waking up the whole neighborhood, a thought came into my mind…What if it was my alarm?  Surely it couldn’t be?  My car was safely parked in my garage.  No, wait, when I came home from the grocery store earlier that evening I parked on the street because it was easier and closer to carry the groceries into the house.  But how could my alarm be going off?  Did I somehow hit my keychain on the nightstand next to me while dreaming?  At any rate, this had been going on for at least 5 minutes, and by now I was wide awake. So I grabbed my keys, and ran out to my patio.  Sure enough it was MY car alarm, and my trunk was open!

  I was able to stop the alarm from my patio, and then I put on some shoes and ran outside.  I expected half of my neighbors to be looking out their windows and cursing me.  When I got to my car, I found the passenger side window was down (?), the trunk was open, as was the center arm rest in the car.  I quickly started the car and moved it into the garage, where I began to take inventory.  Strangely, nothing seemed to be missing.  Apparently alarms really do work.  Mine must have scared this would be thief away.  But how then did he have time to rifle through the center arm rest?  Very odd indeed.

  Then I noticed my neighbor from across the street, movie and TV personality, David DeLuise was outside.  He’s the son of Dom DeLuise (of Cannonball Run fame) and brother of Peter and Michael DeLuise.  In fact, here’s a bit of Hollywood trivia, they all (even Dom) appeared in 21 Jump Street, the television show that rocketed Johnny Depp to fame in 1987.  Turns out that David thought it was his car alarm going off, and by some weird coincidence, we both clicked the buttons to turn off the car alarm(s) at the same exact time.

  As we stood on the street and pondered the 4 AM coincidence, we noticed a band of punks (think West Side Story…when you’re a Jet, you’re a Jet all the way, from your first cigarette, to your last dyin’ day…) loitering up by Sunset Blvd.  Suddenly we were back in 1987 as undercover cops, posing as high school students a la 21 Jump Street.  I was the Johnny Depp character (or course) and David was, well, whoever he played in 21 Jump Street.  I asked him if he thought we should call 911, and (in character) he pondered the question, analyzing the danger, and responded “Let me get my dog”.  At which point he went into his 1.2 million dollar house and brought out what can only be described as a teacup!  This dog made Paris Hilton’s dog look mean!  (OK, maybe I’m exaggerating, but the point is, it wasn’t a Rottweiler or a German Shepherd!)

  We started walking up the street with the “attack dog” and we both had our keys in our hands, in case we needed to gouge one of the Shark’s eyes out.  As we got closer to Sunset Blvd. we found, quite anticlimactically, that this band of ruffians had escaped.  (And not a minute too soon, lest they face the wrath of our keys and our faithful sidekick, who for the purpose of this story, I’ll call “Killer”).

  By now it was after 4:30 AM, and it was time for Johnny Depp to get his beauty sleep.  I went in and phoned the West Hollywood Sheriffs office with an “anonymous tip” (very 21 Jump Street), and they said they’d send out a patrol car.  My job was done.  Just another night in Hollywood.

  Speaking of ferocious dogs, I’m Chazz-sitting this weekend, while Claudio & Ryan are in San Diego.  Chazz is 5 months old now, and he finally learned to bark.  And what a manly bark he has!  He would have scared away the robbers for sure!  It’s only been 2 weeks since I last saw him and he’s taller.  Isn’t he handsome?

  

  

  • 11:59 pm
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