Aimster Spends an Evening with Scientologists

For those of you who don’t know, I work in the entertainment industry, and here in Los Angeles there are a lot of Scientologists in entertainment. Furthermore, many of these Scientologists are powerful folk, so it’s not really a good idea to get on their bad sides when you’re an up-and-comer like me.

Fortunately for you, this grain of knowledge has not deterred me from writing a story about the time I spent with Scientologists last Saturday. Allow me to start at the start.

I have a friend, who for the sake of anonymity I am going to call Xenu. Xenu is not a Scientologist, but some members of his family and some of his friends are. A few weeks ago he was invited to participate in a play. As a good friend, I promised I would attend, and I kept that promise upon learning that the play was put on by Scientologists, being performed at one of the many Scientology centers in Hollywood, and was an adaptation of an L. Ron Hubbard story. So there I was on Saturday, with my brothers Chris and David and my friend Nate.

Some people assume that all L. Ron Hubbard did was write stories about aliens that hold some secret texts upon which the religion is based. Well, I am here to tell you that this is false. Maybe.

Mr. Hubbard wrote tons of pulp novels set in the wild west, the high seas, the air, and of course, space. I myself have never read one of his books so I can’t attest to their literary merit, but you have to give the guy some credit for naming them things like Black Towers to Danger and All Frontiers are Jealous. I mean, that’s personification at its highest.

The program for the evening was a western called Hoss Tamer. Upon arriving at the theater, I was surprised to discover something about Scientologists which I have a huge amount of respect for: they were wearing costumes. When I say this, I am not talking about the cast of the show. I am talking about the people in the audience. I think this should become a universal practice, probably because it reminded me of the days that I used to go see the Harry Potter movies dressed as Harry Potter, and not just on opening night. How awesome would it be if when you went to see Footloose, everyone dressed in terrifically flashy 80s clothing with crazy hair? Or if we all wore loincloths to see Tarzan? Actually, nevermind. That last one just made me turn against my own idea.

In the back of the program I found a glossary of terms that were a part of the dialect in the 1930s and 40s. If in real life I ever call you a “furrin’ lineback with false-fronted pants”, I am really telling you that you are foreign, have a stripe down your back that is a different color than the rest of your body, and have created a façade with your pants to make your penis look bigger than it really is.

After assigning Nate to take care of me in case the lemonade I was given for free was spiked with some sort of drug that would disable my senses and cause me to give the Scientologists money and a pledge of lifelong membership, I sat down to enjoy the show. It was done like an old radio show, where the actors read the parts and there were sound effects and music. Xenu did a wonderful job playing a hammer-headed sidekick to the bad guy (according to my glossary, “hammer-headed” means mean-spirited and is supposed to refer to a horse, but I thought it wouldn’t hurt to expand the context). Afterwards everyone was invited upstairs for a reception.

I however, had a goal to accomplish before going upstairs. I wanted to find a souvenir to take home with me, which is a nice way of saying that I wanted to steal something. There were many collections of L. Ron Hubbard books on display in the theater which were sold in a separate section of the building for $10.00. I decided this was perfect. Nate had brought his bag to the show so I figured I’d just swipe one off the shelf and put it in his backpack. We went over to the display and picked a few of them up to see what the options were. After serious contemplation, I decided to go with Man-Killers of the Air. I grabbed a copy and sneakily placed my program over it. I was ready for the next step of transferring the book to Nate’s backpack when he started walking away. Apparently I did not communicate my plan very well. I need to work on that in the future.

Luckily we went outside and I was able to get the novel concealed without arousing suspicion. We then went back inside so we could congratulate Xenu at the reception. Going up the elevator, we noticed that there were keyholes next to the floor buttons. We discussed where you might be able to go with key access, and were highly satisfied with Nate’s conclusion that L. Ron was probably frozen somewhere in the building.

At the reception, we were immediately targeted as people who had obviously never been there before and were offered beverages and a tour. Let it never be said that the Scientologists are inhospitable. They had a superb cappuccino and hot chocolate maker and there were people in costume to whip up and serve the drinks. I hadn’t yet noticed any adverse effects from the lemonade so I decided to have some more. Next there was a costume contest for all the people who’d dressed up. We were instructed to cheer for our favorites and the winner got some sort of box set of L. Ron Hubbard audiobooks. I am thinking that if Xenu is ever in another one of these shows I am going to go dressed up and try to win the prize, just so I can beat the Scientologists at their own game.

Nate and I were separated from Chris and David when we avoided getting roped into the tour by heading to the food table and loading our plates with goodies. As we sat and ate, a woman wearing a giant diamond tiara and a sash that read “Ms. Multicultural” walked in. Being me and not sensing that Nate was uncomfortable and didn’t want to interact with anybody, I decided to engage her in a conversation and asked about her get-up. She explained to me that she received this designation from the United Nations for the work she has done between the U.S. and Mexico. We talked a little bit more and she told us that we must return often. [Note: In writing this entry, I Googled “Ms. Multicultural United Nations” and found nothing. It seems like a crazy title for a person to make up but maybe I just misunderstood what she was telling me. After all, she was “furrin’” and her English was not perfect.]

At this point Chris and David were still off on the tour and Nate and I were too hungry to continue to have sustenance from the snacks, so we opted to leave and go to In-n-Out. After snapping a quick photo of me posing with the Battlefield Earth display, we left. At the restaurant we gobbled some tasty burgers and got free In-n-Out hats which we wore for the rest of the night. We looked grand.

Back at the apartment Chris and David informed me that they were given L. Ron books after their tour, so it really wasn’t impressive at all that I stole one because had I been caught in the act the Scientologists probably would have given it to me anyway. I still prefer to think that I am as quick with my hands as a pickpocket at the Taj Mahal (and yes, I did choose that comparison because it happened in Slumdog Millionaire).

I suppose it’s possible that any Scientologist reading this might hate me now. But you know what, I don’t hate them. And if they try to sabotage my career, I can always try to get a job with the people at South Park.