improv | Zach Selwyn

Lakers are For Fakers * 2015 By Zach Selwyn

The following is an email chain I exchanged with my Hollywood agent, who I have paid 10 percent of my income to these past ten years. In that past decade, he’s brokered a deal or two for me and has also bought me lunch three times. His agency is a big one, but I am a lowly peon in the cable TV hosting game, dwindling way beneath the Seacrests and Trebeks of the world. However, I am undoubtedly the biggest sports fan on the roster. Which is why, as a die hard NBA fan, I began asking him for tickets to the agency “luxury suite” four months ago to watch the Los Angeles Clippers play the Cleveland Cavaliers at the Staples Center on January 16, 2015…

Oct. 12, 2014.

From ME: Yo – Looking for Clippers – Cavs tickets on Jan 16 2015. I think the Cavs are gonna be great this year – and their new coach is a mastermind. Clips look strong too. Both teams will be in top playoff mode around January. If possible, might I be able to get into the agency box seats that night? Asking early to make sure… Thx – Z

From AGENT: Z! Of course buddy. Emailing tickets guy. You need two, right?

From Me: Yes Thank you so much.

Nov. 8, 2014.

From ME: Checking in on Clippers – Cavs tix for January. Has anyone asked about them? Thx – Z.

From AGENT: You’re #1 on the list. I got you covered big Z.

From Me: U Rule. Thx.

Dec. 9, 2014.

From ME: Hey brother – any news on those tickets? It’s getting close and I want to make sure I get in here before the office shuts down for holiday season.

From AGENT: Thank you for your email. Our offices have closed until January 7, 2015.

Jan 7. 2015.

From ME: My dude. Zach here – Hope your holidays were awesome… I was in Seattle with the fam. Checking in on Clippers – Cavs game for January 16. Wanted to see if you could email the tickets to me? Or maybe messenger them? Very excited – thank you sooo much.

From AGENT: Hey Z. Checking in with tickets guy again today.

When the Lakers lose, this is often what the Staples Center looks like…

Jan 8. 2015.

From ME: Any news?

From AGENT: Hang tight.

Jan. 12, 2015.

From ME: Hey man, sorry to bother you – but game is in 4 days – trying to figure out babysitter and all that stuff… Looking forward to seeing LeBron.

From AGENT: (No reply).

Jan 16, 2015.

From AGENT: Hey Z, so sorry bud but we had an overflow of ticket requests for this game… Apparently both teams are playing really well. Matthew Perry snapped up a pair this morning and Giuliana Rancic is top of the list for the other pair. Sorry bud. We’ll get you into a game. I know we have seats for the Lakers – Nuggets on February 10… Chace Crawford just turned them down.

In the world of celebrity, free stuff is king. Matthew Perry and his 500 million dollars does not need free basketball tickets… Plus, he’s sober, so all the free booze in the luxury box was going to be ignored anyway. Giuliana Rancic? Or DiPandi or whatever her name is? Are you kidding me? She makes fun of celebrity dresses for a living. She probably heard the word “Cavs” and thought it was a leg workout. And Lakers – Nuggets tickets? The Lakers are led by a guy who is famous for being Iggy Azaleia’s boyfriend. Kobe is out for the year. They’re not exactly a hot ticket. The point was, I was not considered successful enough to snag the Clippers tickets. I was looking at some washed up pretty boy from Gossip Girl named Chace Crawford’s rejects… Perry and Rancic were gonna be on their iphones in the suite the entire time and most of the so-called Hollywood celebrities who were going to the game probably think “Chris Paul” is a type of champagne.

Although Im a huge Matthew Perry fan, he doesnt party and look like this anymore…

WTF is this? Maybe a few hot dogs is exactly what she needs…

When I first moved to Los Angeles, the Lakers were all that mattered. They had Del Harris, a young Kobe, Van Exel was being name-checked in Jay-Z songs, Eddie Jones and huge NBA stoner Sam Perkins. (Who looked blazed in 99% of his games). My friends and I would drop $25.00 to sit in the nosebleed section of the Forum just to catch a fading glimpse of what the legendary teams of the 80’s left behind. They were likeable underdogs who fought hard and always battled. Then came Shaq. And Phil Jackson and Kobe became Kobe. Those were the last years I liked the Lakers. Kobe lost his appeal when he shaved his mini afro and faced his legal troubles. Still, going to games was fun because, hey – going to the games are always fun. Still, these last ten years I stopped rooting for them and began just appreciating all professional basketball in general.

Now, Los Angeles is all about the Clippers. A recent text from a buddy read: Lakers are for Fakers… I’m going to the Clips game. The abundance of Lakers flags that people used to display from outside of their car’s windows are long gone. The sea of purple and gold has been replaced by red, white and blue. And let me tell you, I have never seen anyone play pick-up basketball while wearing a Carlos Boozer jersey.

Still, the luxury box is indeed, luxurious. I emailed my agent back a few days later and accepted the Lakers – Nuggets tickets. At least I could see Arizona Wildcat-alum Jordan Hill and possibly watch a few Jeremy Lin up–and-unders. Plus, my brother is a huge hoops fan as well and neither of us are Matthew Perry – sober. Watching two out-of-the-playoff race teams loaf up and down the court over free hot dogs and Stella Artois isn’t a bad way to spend a Tuesday night.

I emailed my agent a week before the game to make sure he could send the tickets over.

Feb. 3, 2015

From ME: Hey man – excited for Lakers – Nugs game on Tuesday… Can you messenger the tickets or email them? Thx brother – Z

From AGENT: Yo, Z – Hey man… looking into this. Looks like Chace Crawford might want the tickets after all… but it depends on if we can get him seats on the floor or not.

From ME: You’re fired.

When it was all said and done, Chace Crawford ended up not going, so I snagged the tickets. The game was poorly attended and didn’t even get exciting until the 4^th quarter. Jack Nicholson wasn’t there. Neither was Leo. Or any other familiar celebrity face that we have all come to associate with the Lakers. Instead, it was my brother and myself, sitting amongst a bunch of 22-year-old agent assistants in the luxury suite, sipping Stella Artois and filling up the stat sheet with junk food.

Bieber texting and missing Kawhi Leonard dominating the 2014 NBA Finals last year.

I looked long and hard down at the floor as the game wound down. I was having the time of my life. I guess watching LeBron James would have been a lot more entertaining, but this was still a pretty awesome way to see a basketball game. As a sports lover, sometimes it doesn’t even matter who is playing. And after Swaggy P made a three-pointer and did the eye goggles gesture with his hands, I suddenly became a Lakers fan again for the first time in ten years.

And as I squinted hard at the row of folks seated on the floor, I believe I recognized a celebrity typing away into his iphone three seats down from the Lakers bench.

It was Chase Crawford.

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This morning I drove past two skinny homeless men with multiple missing teeth who were smoking cigarettes before nearly running over a mangy stray dog panting in the street. I made a left turn at the Hustler Hollywood store, narrowly averting a woman who was squatting and urinating into a discarded water bottle. I eventually parked and walked around my car, side-stepping two discarded needles some dog crap and a used condom. I dodged a speeding Hyundai that was being driven by a dude vaping and texting at the same time before opening the passenger door… and helping my kid get out of the car.

“Ready for school?” I asked.

Welcome to Hollywood.

A scene from our nice little walk to school

I was raised in a peaceful, quiet corner of the desert where coyotes and jumping cholla cacti were my biggest fears while walking to school. I didn’t see a homeless man until I was about 13. Hustler was a magazine that only prisoners and truckers read and needles were something only a doctor could get a hold of. Yesterday, my son asked me why the guy who lives in the dumpster across the street from his carpool pick-up lane is always shouting, “Ho ass bitch” while shuffling down Selma Avenue.

I am raising my children in Gomorrah and it’s starting to freak me the fuck out.

Nice little bottle of urine found by the carpool pick up

This school year, my son’s entire fifth grade class was moved to a new school campus – about 10 blocks north of the previous campus where they had been since kindergarten. The new campus is on Selma Avenue and is a stone’s throw from the Hollywood YMCA. It’s also a block south of Hollywood Boulevard, nearly 10 medical marijuana dispensaries, six seedy bars, smoke shops, two run-down hotels, a vintage street clock that has been permanently set to 4:20 and about nine tattoo parlors.

Back in my 20’s, when I was stumbling out of the bar Boardner’s (a block away from the school on Cherokee), I could never imagine that someday my son would be taking “Beginner Spanish” 50 yards from where I once puked after a night of Vodka – Red Bulls. I never thought I’d be raising my kids anywhere but some pristine little tucked away school with manicured lawns and open fields and morning sing-a-longs. Little did I know that barbed wire fences, metal detectors and cement soccer fields were going to be the norm for my children…

At a back-to-school meet and greet two weeks after the first day, some other parents expressed their concerns as well.

“We just don’t like the way the school feels,” an angry parent offered.

“We are striving to make everybody comfortable,” the principal, a 40-something man named Reggie replied.

“It’s hard to be comfortable when I smell marijuana every day when I drop my kid off,” another mom piped up.

This nearby billboard has all the kids very excited for Christmas

Hollywood has changed immensely since the rundown 1990’s. Tourism is up, souvenir stores are making great money and people from all over the world are still traveling here to take photos of the sidewalk where an actor’s name is etched into a star. Of course, when the tourists come, so do the hustlers. You’ve seen them selling rap CD’s, trying to get you to take the TMZ Tour and drunkenly swaying into your photos while dressed up in a piss-stained Spider-Man costume demanding five dollars.

This guy smells like beef and wants $5 a picture.

Look, my high school was no picnic. I witnessed a shooting, a lot of fights and certainly saw my share of LSD and dirt weed from Mexico, but I was in high school… Not fifth grade. Being raised in the desert certainly shaded me from the inner city realities of gang-ridden America, but I was also lucky enough to travel to places like New York and LA to see how other kids were growing up. Ultimately, their fast-paced lives had a strong effect on me because I headed for college in Los Angeles the minute I turned 18. Thinking back about my childhood dreams, I turned my son one day after school.

“Hey dude, where do you want to live when you grow up?” I asked him.

“Probably the beach… or New York I guess.”

Obviously he hadn’t thought this one out. Not me. By the time I was ten, I had it narrowed down to Los Angeles and Los Angeles.

My son is also already planning out his first tattoo, based on a conversation we had last week. After pouring over NBA star Brandon Ingram’s arms as we were watching a basketball game, he asked me a question.

“Dad, if you could get a tattoo, what would you get?”

“Oh wow, I dunno – probably your name and your sister’s name,” I said. “Something small and hidden and meaningful.”

“I’d probably get Savage in cursive across my eyebrow,” he said.

“You’re not getting a tattoo,” I told him.

“Why not? All the sickest rappers have face tattoos now…”

Oh boy.

The late rapper Lil Peep had the type of facial tattoos my son is craving.

As we listened to my kid’s Spotify playlist, I heard no less than ten “N-Bombs”, three songs about abusing Xanax, Percocet and Molly and over ten about Gucci, 80,000 dollar watches and ‘Lambos. Every song featured sound effects like “Skrrr” for a cool car or “Skrrrrratatatatata” to mimic an assault rifle peppering an enemy with bullets… Look, I love rap music. I chased a rap career myself at one point… but no 5th grader should be asking his dad what Codeine, Mountain Dew and Jolly Ranchers taste like together.

Alas, the reality of this situation is that I can’t afford to shell out 35,000 dollars to private academies like Campbell Hall or Oakwood… Although from what I remember from college – most of the heaviest partiers came out of these schools. Which gives me some hope… And truthfully, other than the dead guy who was wheeled away from the apartment down the block last week, the school is fun, diverse and growing and I’m actually proud to be a part of the community.

So, as the years roll along, I’ll just have to deal with the syringes, homeless guys and Hustler Hollywood foot traffic for a few more years until junior high. Luckily, that campus is located downtown in a much more secure location…

It’s across the street from an outpatient clinic for opioid addicts…

GOT ZACH’S BOOK YET?

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By Zach Selwyn

THE CONCEPT:

Recently, as a creative experiment, I decided to commit myself to sitting in the Hollywood YMCA sauna for 20 minutes every morning for ten straight days in a row.

My plan was to arrive at the same time every day… roughly 9:45 a.m. and see what different characters I would meet from all walks of life. After all, as a longtime YMCA member, the sauna has always offered up a diverse cast of dreamers, stars, trust fund kids, drunks and Hollywood failures and I was hoping that maybe this little adventure would lead to a fairly decent piece for Los Angeles Magazine. So, I re-upped my monthly membership and sauntered down through Hollywood at the beginning of May for my first documented YMCA sauna adventure.

DAY 1:

A toothless man wearing jeans and a hoodie with a bandage around his head just told me that he was currently recovering from a Samurai sword attack…

As he began unwrapping his head bandage, I quickly noticed a large raised scar that slightly resembled the laces on a football running across the crest of his cranium.

“Holy shit,” I said. “Is it – SAFE for you to be in a sauna?”

“I dunno,” he chucked. “After the attack, the YMCA let me join for free for a month so I figured I’d try it out.”

I soon came to find out that this man’s name was Ray and he had moved to Los Angeles in the 1980s to make it in “fuckin metal, man!” He claimed that he had some minor success but got derailed by the drugs and now he was pushing 65, missing a few teeth and living just outside of the park next to my kids’ old middle school.

I asked Ray if the jeans and hoodie thing was some sort of extreme weight loss plan – like when wrestlers jog with garbage bags on to cut weight.

“No – I just don’t get naked around other men since I was released from prison,” he said.

“Oh,” I eeked out. “I’m gonna go.”

Before I could go, he wanted to explain the scar on his head.

“Some guy was swinging a Samurai sword over by the Pla-Boy Liquor Store,” he explained. “I tried to stop him – but that was a bad move. Luckily the clerk called the hospital and I got stitched up. This town has changed since I opened for Faster Pussycat, man.”

That was day one.

DAY 2:

In the 30 years I have been going to gyms, I have never walked into a sauna and found a guy playing with himself while sporting two nipple clamps on his chest… However, on only my second day in my sauna quest, I was met with a dude who looked like that Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuerrmann proudly fondling himself.

“Uhmmmm,” I said as I walked in.

“Sorry, saunas make me horny,“ he said. “What about you?”

I have been hit on by men before. Christ, I was a 22-year-old actor in Hollywood back in the day… But this was excessive. I was staring at a grown man’s penis, and was solicited with the fact that saunas ‘turn him on’ within 30 seconds. I crouched in the corner for a few beats, praying that somebody I knew came in, but I told myself that I would commit to a full sauna session – especially since my day one experience had ended so abruptly.

He then asked me if I wanted to retreat to the steam room because, “The smoke provides better cover for hand jobs and stuff…”

“What?” I said, horrified.

“I feel like a zoo animal here because everybody can walk by and look at us inside.”

Jesus Christ. I proceeded to tell him that there were other dudes at the Hollywood Y who would fuck him up for even suggesting a sexual favor in the sauna, but he just scoffed. He did not seem at all intimidated by my threat in the slightest… He then followed up with another line that made me laugh.

“Have you ever had an orgasm in 180 degree heat? It’s fucking mind blowing”

“Well… I did grow up in Arizona,” I said.

He laughed. Shit… Why did I make him laugh?

I finally told Rex that I had to go pick up my kids. I had lasted four minutes and 30 seconds… So far my 20 minutes a day goal has been limited to nine minutes in total.

DAY 3:

I have never taken my cell phone into a sauna, but for some reason a lot of people do. And today, a younger guy was in the sauna taking selfies of himself while wrapped in a beige towel.

“Do iPhones even work in this heat?” I asked him, just happy that he wasn’t playing with himself or showing me a scar on his head caused by a katana that was once used in feudal Japan.

“The new ones do,” he said. “It’s great for Influencer stuff.”

So are you a ‘Sauna Influencer?’” I asked, hoping that he was so that this sauna piece would really have some legs…

“No – I’m a Sober Influencer. Follow me @soberguy1989 on Insta.”

Ugh. Sober influencers. Due to my regular IG posts about bars and drinking, I get a ton of suggested sober influencers placed into my algorithm… and most of them tell me that I definitely have cirrhosis and that I have been dead since I was 32. No shade, but I hate sober influencers… I do love sober people, and I have hundreds of good friends who are clean and sober – but just don’t try to preach your way of life to everybody who might still be able to handle a few cocktails every once in a while.

“So you get paid to talk about how great it is to be sober?” I asked him.

“Sometimes… I mean, I used to drink a lot – like 4-5 beers a night!” He explained. “But then, when I hit 30 I couldn’t do it anymore.”

I’d chuckled knowing that I was currently sweating out two bottles of Trader Joe’s Campo Viejo Rioja onto the floor at that same moment. Which is when he began spreading his gospel.

“Have you ever asked yourself the addiction questions? Like… Are you employed? Are you happy? Are you single or broke? Are you in massive debt?”

“Yes,” I said. “Well, in reality – I’m happily married and fairly happy overall – but I am definitely unemployed and in massive debt – but I guarantee you that I would be the same way even if I was sober.

And that was that. He took some more photos of himself. I did my 20 minutes and went on with my day.

DAY 4:

The Hollywood YMCA sauna used to be a creative cocoon for industry veterans, actors and mainly…screenwriters. I knew dozens of guys with past TV deals and feature films who often discussed how they were optioning some comedy series to NBC. Of course, this was back when Hollywood was still functioning.

I met writers, directors and first AD’s from all walks of life in that sauna – and heard fantastic stories. One I recall in particular was from Randy Carter, who was Francis Ford Coppola’s Assistant Director for decades, who would spin Apocoalypse Now Martin Sheen stories that would make any film junkie feel like they were losing their minds in the jungles of 1969 Cambodia.

Today, however, I sat in the sauna with two young kids who called themselves screenwriters. They ran off a string of complaints about how selling your original script would never happen and I laughed under my breath at their naivete. Still, they kept on about “established IP” and began complaining about the fact that they were writing scripts for a vertical platform called ReelScreen – and how they should both be the next Tarantino.

“Wait… So you guys are actually currently employed as writers?” I inquired.

“Yeah, but it’s like, bullshit vertical soap opera stuff,” one kid said. “It like… barely covers my rent.”

What? I thought to myself… Rent? Writing? A possibility?

“So – Sorry to pry,” I said. “But – are they accepting writing samples – or looking for writers?”

The kid studied me for a few seconds. I was the epitome of middle age… Dad bod. Beer belly. Thinning hair…

“Uhm… It’s a pretty young platform,” he said. “So probably not.”

I decided not to pitch them my sequel to Splash and I finished my 20 minutes in silence.

DAY 5:

Today was one of those rare days where I found myself alone in the sauna. It was beautiful… and the wood was dry and it just felt safe and peaceful. I let the sweat drip down my body and fall onto the surface where I made a little Rorschach Tests for what shapes I found. It was a parade of dragons, butterflies and weird silhouettes of men scooping ice cream… It felt like I was on mushrooms… More days like this please.

DAY 6:

Reid, an old pal of mine from the basketball courts, was in the sauna today and asked me if I heard about the old guy who got kicked out for regularly soliciting hand jobs in the steam room.

“Holy shit, that dude hit on me!” I said. “Did he look like that Gilgo Beach Long Island serial killer Rex Heuermann?”

“Yes! He tried to lick my nipples last time I was in here – turns out he was 64!”

Suddenly, I didn’t feel as special, knowing that this dude was basically chasing every dick around the sauna. I took some pride in the fact that I was 15 years younger than him, so for a second I considered myself a “twink.”

Wait. What?

DAY 7:

Big delay upcoming. The sauna was closed because somebody had defecated on the rocks. I think I may be done with this experiment. I also wouldn’t be surprised if it was the Samurai Sword guy…

DAY 8:

It’s been two weeks since the sauna reopened after being scrubbed and sanitized. I have certainly missed my daily trips but was looking forward to getting back to a nice schvitz following a quick jaunt to New York where I slept for a total of nine hours in three days.

So, imagine my surprise when three fully naked old Korean guys and a moss of white pubic hair greeted me on a random Thursday. The three guys were laughing about something I was not privy to, but there were no towels or clothing ANYWHERE. I mentioned that this YMCA demands that you wear some sort of covering, but they didn’t understand me. All I heard was that the Koreatown YMCA was temporarily closed, so a bunch of members were coming here now…

I walked out early, but was pleasantly amused when fifteen minutes later I saw the same three naked men try to walk into the co-ed jacuzzi area buck fucking naked.

They were politely asked to leave… I waved at them before going to do 40 crunches.

DAY 9:

Look, I never liked the guys who use the sauna as their “gym.” They use it to do crunches and squats and shadowbox and shit. Today – some dude was getting after it. HARD. I am pretty sure that there is an unspoken rule that you are not allowed to exercise in the sauna, but I’ll be damned if this guy, who was wearing a pointy felt hobbit hat, wasn’t taking up the entire room with jabs and push-ups…

“Dude, what does that elf hat do?” I asked him.

He threw a few crosses before alerting me that it keeps the heat closer to the head and therefore you can stay in the sauna longer.

“Yeah, but you look like Frodo Baggins.”

He stopped and looked at me. He was larger and had some bad tattoos and I immediately regretted commenting on his Lord of the Rings hat. He didn’t even respond. He just took the towel from around his neck and wrung it out over the electric sauna… right in front of the sign that clearly states “Do not put liquid on the electric sauna – it will short fuse.”

Frodo then walked out and left the door open… About two minutes later he came back, soaking wet from what I assumed was a trip to the shower. His hat was gone – and he started doing push-ups on the floor. I walked out a few seconds later, 11 minutes short of my goal.

DAY 10:

My final day of this experiment was somewhat heartbreaking… especially because Reid was back – and he informed me that his mother was recently conned out of her life savings by a
“man” she met online who claimed to be Van Halen lead singer Sammy Hagar.

Now, apparently Sammy himself had reached out online and told his mom that he was in debt and needed some money for surgery… He also tossed in that he thought she was very attractive. (For the record, she is currently 82-years-old).

Well, the next thing Reid knew, his mom was on her way to Los Angeles to meet the famed Red Rocker at the Sunset Marquis Hotel… Of course when she got there, Sammy Hagar was nowhere to be found and her $450,000 dollar nest egg was gone.

“Jesus, that’s heartbreaking,” I said, flabbergasted. “That’s like that one girl who thought she was married to Brad Pitt.”

“Exactly,” he said. ”Apparently this fake celebrity thing online is a new scam on the elderly… It’s happening everywhere – My cousin’s dad just sent 200 grand to Chilli From TLC.”

“What the FUCK!,” I said. “Who could be that stupid?”

“Dunno. The world is full of online scammers. By the way, are you hooping today?” He asked.

“No, I’m writing a story about the sauna.”

“Ew.”

Reid high-fived me and mentioned a future beer together and I nodded and smiled knowing that my ten day experiment had finally come to a close.

I also made a mental note to not return the email I recently got from Stevie Nicks…

So there ya go. 10 days. One sauna. Many stories. I’m sure there have been more lascivious tales, steamy stories and 180 degree orgasms in the days of sauna past but these were my encounters over the past month… But do me a favor and check back next week…

I’m thinking of doing 15 days in the steam room…

Read “Blood on the Floor” – Zach’s Latest Short Story for Hiii Magazine

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When I came down with the rebound and heard my right knee explode and pop, I knew something was horribly wrong… I looked up at the faces of my basketball teammates looking down at me lying on the court writhing in agonizing pain. I somehow managed to verbalize what was going through my mind…

“That’s it, amputate my leg… just cut the fucker off.”

Turns out my injury wasn’t bad enough to turn me into an amputee, but it was bad. Torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL). Partially torn medical meniscus. Partially torn medial collateral ligament (MCL). If you’re not familiar with this medical terminology, in layman’s terms… I blew out my whole fucking knee.

Before I was given the official medical report by my doctor, I had four days to figure out what the hell I had done to myself. Why? Well, in America, with health care as bad as it is, getting in to see an Orthopedic surgeon for an official diagnosis takes time… Like, a lot of time. Which means, after Googling “knee injuries” over 3000 times, I had to make my own medical diagnosis on myself until a doctor appointment could be set up.

Based on my online research, I had concluded that one of three things had happened to me:

1. I tore my ACL.
2. I tore some other knee ligament.
3. My bones were deteriorating from early onset kidney disease and I would be dead by August.

My father and sister are both doctors, so their advice to use the RICE method, (Rest, Ice, Compress, Elevate), helped a lot. They recommended getting crutches to get around, so, I quickly called my friend Scott, another basketball friend who had suffered numerous leg injuries over the years. Sure he had a pair… he said. But they were for people 5’10” and under.

After searching for cheap crutches online, I called the Hollywood Goodwill and was told by an employee that they had a set that they would hold for me. As I limped through the parking lot of the store, praying that they would fit my 6’2” frame, I went over certain decisions in my life that had lead me to this point… Why had I turned down the professional path to pursue this artist life? If I hadn’t, would I be staggering through a Goodwill parking lot in Hollywood on a Thursday afternoon in my pajamas trying to save $15 on crutches if I only had I taken that job at FOX SPORTS all those years ago? What had I done to my life? The last couple months had been tough… Air BNB disavowed my house from renting it out, so my income had been roughly slashed in half. My latest voiceover residual check I had received in the mail was for .08 cents… My only solace of late had been in playing basketball… and now that dream, like my right knee, was CRUSHED.

I felt like I was on the verge of being homeless.

Of course the girl at Goodwill had made a mistake. They had a WALKER, not crutches. It also happened to have a blood stain on it, which is why it was SLASHED to $2.00. I passed.

Finding crutches in this town is nearly impossible.

I went to Walgreens next, where the crutches were at the back of the store. I hobbled all the way in only to find that they were “on sale” for $59.99. Excuse me? 60 bucks? FUCK OFF. I was about to go fasten myself a crutch out of an old tree branch and a bicycle seat when I looked on my phone and noticed that Home Depot sold them… I called, but got no answer. When I showed up, I was told that their crutches were not available in-store. They were online deals only.

“Go to Urgent Care,” my friend Alex told me. “They’ll be able to tell in five seconds if you tore something… and they’ll give you crutches for free.”

Urgent Care it was. I found one with a five star rating on Yelp and went down. I paid my $25 co-pay and was treated by a 20-something female who claimed to be a doctor, although I noticed that her name tag did not say “M.D.” It had a bunch of other letters that I’m sure were placed there to confuse naive patients… Hers said A.P.R.N. C.N.M.

I texted my sister – a doctor down in Newport Beach – to see if this lady was, in fact, a doctor.

ZACH: Hey – What do these abbreviations mean and is she a legit doctor? A.P.R.N. C.N.M.

She wrote back immediately.

AMANDA: NO! That stands for Advanced Practice Registered Nurse – Certified Nursing Midwife – What are you, fucking pregnant? get the hell out of there and see a real doctor!!!

Since I had already paid the $25.00, I stayed. The young “doctor” felt my knee. She moved it around. She stretched it. It actually felt pretty good… And then, she gave me her official diagnosis:

“You did NOT tear anything,” she said. “This is a bad sprain at worst.”

“Really!” I exclaimed. “A bad sprain? Thank you sooo much! If I ever need a midwife, I’m calling YOU!”

She took some X-Rays of my knee, (which I later learned were completely unnecessary for a ligament injury and cost me $125) and I asked them to provide my free crutches. When they explained that they did have crutches – but that they cost $39.99, I bit the bullet and bought them. Finally, upon checkout, the manager told me that I could earn a $5.00 gift card to a Starbucks if I simply gave them a 5-Star Review on YELP.

“Hell yeah!” I said. “You guys made my day.”

I put in the 5-Star review, snagged my gift card and Uber-ed home to elevate my “bad sprain.” Wow, no tear, no surgery, no problem. I was elated and texted everybody I knew that I’d be back on the basketball court within weeks.

Better days…

And then I got an appointment with a real doctor.

Dr. Weiss was recommended to me by my primary care physician. I had my leg up on his exam table the very next day, confident that he would walk in, slip me an ACE Bandage and wish me happy holidays… Instead, within 30 seconds of looking at my knee, he casually offered the following.

“Wow, you tore the shit out of your ACL… Hopefully you didn’t do too much damage to the other ligamants,” he said.

“Wait, what?!” I reacted. “Tore my ACL? But the Urgent Care said it was a bad sprain…?”

“Well, if by ‘bad sprain’ they mean a ’completely annihilated anterior cruciate ligament,’ then… yes.”

Oh fuck.

Dr. Weiss scheduled an MRI for that afternoon and told me I had wasted my money on X-rays and my entire Urgent Care appointment.

“Lemme guess,” he said. “They offered you a Starbucks gift card?”

Following the MRI, which is when you go inside one of those huge claustrophobic X-Ray machines to examine all of your inner workings, I was back in Dr. Weiss’ office for my evaluation two days later.

He broke down my injury and began planning out my recovery. Since I was set to travel with my family for the holidays, I was concerned I’d be missing out on my trip… He assured me that since my swelling was so immense, I would have to wait at least four weeks for surgery. He then explained how it would work.

“Based on the fact that you’re 44-years-old, I’m gonna replace your ACL with a cadaver ligament.”

“I’m sorry, what? A CADAVER LIGAMENT?”

Doctor Weiss smiled. He went on to explain that younger “athletes” can replace their torn ACL’s with their own ligaments, but for older guys like me, the best option is to take an anterior cruciate ligament from a DEAD BODY and put it into my destroyed knee.

“Can you make the ligament from like some Kenyan distance runner or something?” I joked.

“Haha,” He said. “It’ll most likely be from a car crash victim.”

Wonderful.

Dr. Weiss also told me that 20 years ago, patients my age wouldn’t even be ELIGIBLE for ACL replacement. As if men over 40 were considered beyond repair or something… Luckily, the outlook on knees had changed since the late 90’s.

My torn ACL

Eager to get to my rehabilitation, I bought a $300 knee brace from the doctor (Of course, not covered by insurance) and got instructions on how to put it on. After it was affixed, I had the look of a hydraulic half-man/half-Cyborg. I felt like Darth Vader.

“Will I be ever able to play basketball at the level I was playing again?” I asked.

“Maybe,” he said. “But you might want to join an elderly league.”

Limping out of Dr. Weiss’ office on my crutches, the first glimpse of my mortality had hit me. Knees crumble, ankles snap… ligaments are torn. Age is forever out there hunting us down. Luckily, with this type of injury, full recoveries are entirely expected and at worst, I would lose 4-6 months of my life to inactivity.

On the way home, I stopped at Starbucks to spend my $5.00 gift card on a cup of coffee. When I presented it to the cashier, he told me news that at this point, I was not surprised to hear.

“Sorry, sir,” she said. “This card only works at certain Starbucks… Not this one.”

I logged onto Yelp and changed my review…

*Ed Note: Zach is set for ACL replacement surgery in Mid January. Stay tuned!

CHECK OUT/BUY ZACH’S DEBUT NOVEL NOW!

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see below! Zach brings his worldwide knowledge of slang words to Sirius XM/ Shade 45’s hip-hop radio show “THE ALL OUT SHOW” once a month. Make sure to listen in and hear Zach and Jude play origin games and chop up the English language… on SHADE45 Sirius/XM

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“LA DISPENSARY” LAUNCHES AS A GROUNDBREAKING VERTICAL INSTAGRAM SERIES EXPLORING LOS ANGELES’ CANNABIS CULTURE

Los Angeles, CA – The cultural capital of cannabis finally has its own story told on screen. “LA Dispensary”, a new vertical comedy series that premiered on Instagram and YouTube Shorts takes viewers inside the quirky world of a fictional Los Angeles dispensary.

TRAILER HERE

Shot entirely in vertical format to match the way audiences consume content on their phones, “LA Dispensary” blends sketch comedy and observational humor from the perspective of two budtenders, played by Megahn Perry and writer/director Zach Selwyn. New guest stars enter the dispo every episode.

“Cannabis is not just a product —it’s a lifestyle, a culture, and a community,” said Selwyn. “With ‘LA Dispensary’, I wanted to create something that was funny and original – as far as I can tell, this is one of the first vertical comedies out there which I think will be the future of Hollywood now that the studios have all moved to Ireland.”

The series is designed for quick, binge-worthy viewing on Instagram, making it accessible to a global audience. The first two episodes have been released through Hiii Media’s Instagram @hiiimag – as well as @LADispensaryshow

For Press Inquiries reach out to Zach@hiiimag.com

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