Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Tales from the Rue de la Noir

I spent most of the weekend shooting meaningless and mostly unusable video. One of the places I went, for no particular reason, was Lockwood, up the canyon east of town. They're building a park there called Lockwood Trailhead. It looks like it will be pretty nice, once the landscapers are finished. I also saw another set of goslings, but the parents were nervous so I couldn't get a good shot of them.

As I was leaving, I drove into the town of Lockwood, which isn't really a town but a trailer park. It's not half bad, as trailer parks go, but I had to laugh at the street names. They're all in French. There's names like Avenue de Colours and Ave de la Argent. I believe that should be Ave de L'Argent, but what do I know. My knowledge of the French language is roughly equivalent to that of your average Trailer Park Planning Commissioner. Apparently, whoever names these things believes that fancy French names add glamour and status. They don't. They do however, force you to explain why you live on a street with an idiotic name. The conversation might go something like this:

Person 1: So, where you livin' now?
Person 2: I'm over on the Avenue Da Champs Da Leezay.
Person 1: (pause) What?
Person 2: I say I'm over on the Avenue Da Champs Da Leezay.
Person 1: (pause) Where the hell is that?
Person 2: It's the trailer park.
Person 1: Oh.
Person 2: Yeah, when you get there, just keep goin' straight and it's just past Rudy Culldisack Street.
Person 1: OK.

My personal favorite in Lockwood is the Rue de la Noir. I could imagine drunken dance hall girls careening down the dark, foggy street, and being a trailer park, may not be too far off the mark. Could a modern day Toulouse Lautrec be sitting in his driveway, painting portraits of lawn gnomes while discussing the philosophy of country music with his neighbors? Would the spectre of Edgar Allen Poe appear through the early morning mist? I don't know, but it's a great name for a video series. The challenge will be, to find something the least bit entertaining in Lockwood.

1 comment:

Tom said...

I wonder how someone would give directions to a taxi driver if they were a couple of sheets to the wind...