Boba has taken on this kind of weird proxy status in my food life. Because I just recently realized that when I say I crave "boba," I'm hardly craving the actual gummy, gelatinous globes of tapioca. Those things get really tiring to eat...and digest later on. What I really want is the excuse to drink cold caffeinated anything at 11 pm. In fact, after witnessing a friend request exactly five boba balls with her iced coffee, I adopted the same embarassing display of specificity. 

Of course, I couldn't have been happier when I discovered that my local Tapioca Express is now offering mini boba balls. (Okay, I know I'm late to this party, so please, no comments about "where have I been?" Well, given that the poor food blog has yet to get a single comment, I guess beggars can't be demanding. But still...)

Seriously, these things are tiny, tiny. And they provide the exact opposite experience from traditional boba drinking which requires a magnum straw, the better to see each dark ball amble up methodically to your mouth. These mini little buggers come shooting at you so shockingly quick, straw diameter be damned.

No wonder they felt it wise to stamp a new disclaimer onto the plastic cup.

Did you catch that? What, that was too tiny? "Please drink carefully to avoid choking on the Boba" (emphasis mine).

Consider your gag reflex warned.  

Madonna night at Spaceland was not always like a prayer, with only two bands (Mountain Party and The Chapin Sisters) delivering the True Blue goods.

Many ladies in the audience had dressed up to cause a commotion (will this punning ever cease?) in black and lace and rubber bangles, clearly expecting some kind of Madonna explosion to go off on stage. What they got instead was a massive dose of Eastside psych-folk, and a rather lite dusting of Ciccione.

Most bands played two or three of their own songs before performing their Madonna cover. Some, like Winter Flowers, didn't even get around to playing any Madonna. "We couldn't get it together in time," they told the audience before launching into another Laurel Canyon-invoking melody.

The whole night was to celebrate the Madonna compliation CD Through the Wilderness being put out by freak folk label Manimal vinyl. On it, Silverlake's finest--including Giant Drag, Lavender Diamond, Bat for Lashes, Lion of Panjshir and Winter Flowers--give Madonna the full-on Eastside treatment.

We saw Mountain Party, led by the awesome Erica Garcia, gave Material Girl the dreamy, psychedelic once-over it has always deserved. Erica, who repurposes thrift store clothing better than anyone I know, was rocking the full-on peasant girl look.
 

When I saw her the next night she was wearing an Eddie Vedder woodcutters shirt with a silhouette of Christiane F. (notorious teen drug addict and prostitute from 1980's Berlin) screened on to the shirt pocket.

Erica, a former Latin Grammy-nominated singer from Argentina, now lives in Echo Park and has her own clothing line, La Luz, as well as running the New High gallery in Chinatown. Oh, and she dated my boyfriend for a year, before I met him. Now we're all one big happy family.

Back to Madonna...so, the Chapin Sisters closed the night with a formidable and highly-polished rendition of Borderline. As my friend Steffie Nelson, an L.A. Times writer, commented "they made the whole night worth it".

The blond Chapin was wearing an awesome Grace Jone-esque jumpsuit with pumps. Coincidentally, she used to date one of the members of Mountain Party and things didn't end well, so it was a little tense backstage.

Brunette Chapin, unfortumately, got it all wrong with her uber-folky and somewhat weird sequined mini skirt that reminded me of old Hungarian accordion players. And, as we all know, it is only OK to look like an old Eastern European accordion player if you are actually playing an accordion, preferably with some kind of monkey on your shoulder. Not when you're prenteding to be Madonna at Spaceland.

I know, I know...it seems ages away, but before you know it, August 10th will creep up on you like an evil, razor-toothed gnome in the bushes, and you'll wonder why you didn't already score your tickets for the Nuart's midnight screening of Troll 2, a film about...evil razor-toothed gnomes in the bushes.

The cast will be present to answer questions about why this is the worst (yet most enjoyable) film ever made, but the menacing goblins are still in negotiations with their agents to appear. Divas.

I urge you to view the horrible goodness below, and click here to secure tickets to the screening. Guaranteed the audience will be laughing harder at Troll 2 than that "I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry" hogwash, or whatever is passing for comedy these days. Bring on the goblins.

When a club wants to open with a splash, they invite one of three DJs: DJ AM, Steve Aoki or Caroline D’Amore. Caroline, of course, isn’t much of a DJ, but she’s hot and she’s best friends with Paris Hilton—so, booking Caroline usually guarantees an appearance by the blonde heiress and a subsequent mention of the new venue in Us Weekly. I bring this up because Ms. D'Amore is DJIng the opening of V Lounge in Santa Monica on August 9. Here’s the scoop on the new spot.

V-Lounge brings a sexy dining atmosphere and nightlife experience to the Westside. Reminiscent of a sleek, upscale boutique hotel lounge, the décor features low-backed ottomans, hidden nooks, and streamlined booths arranged in amphitheater style seating that radiates from the perimeter of their signature sunken dance floor, the largest in Santa Monica.

Sounds hot, but will Paris drive out to Santa Monica?

It was during the first of her two-night (and very sold out) stand at the Echoplex. It was during the encore, when she decided to roll out onto the outstretched hands of the rabid crowd in front of her. Only when she rolled over onto her stomach, it was right on top of me (that's what I get for working my way down into the heart of the pit). If I didn’t do something, the star of the show was going to go crashing to the floor. Not sexy. So I put both my hands up to brace her fall. In my right hand I had her arm. Right there in my left hand? Boob city. The inadvertent grab didn’t seem to faze her. She just kind of rolled back towards the stage, where a handler lowered her back down.

The show? Good times. The crowd was well into it. Enough that I watched a couple of heated exchanges almost result in full-on fights down in the pit (one between two girls). DJ Low Budget rocked the crowd with a mix of Baltimore clubbed versions of current hits. But when it was half past M.I.A.’s appointed set time of 10PM, the natives began growing restless. “Bitch, come out now!” wailed a young lady beside me. The same one that kept nailing me with her huge purse, like some prop out of “The Devil Wears Prada.” But down front at an M.I.A. show? Not so much.

When she finally came out to do her thing, all was forgiven. She ran through hits from “Arular” and numbers from the upcoming “Kala,” with “Boyz” and “Bird Flu” getting the biggest response from the partisan crown. I was partial to “Twenty Dollar,” which rides a slowed-down groove lifted from New Order’s “Blue Monday.” But the real winner of the new batch of tunes is “Jimmy,” a Technicolor explosion of Love Unlimited strings and a disco beat that’s on some Donna Summer “I Feel Love” shit. Awesome. Buy the album when it drops 8/21.