Rule #1: Do not point at the turtles.

For one reason or another, my friend Jeannette and I had not seen each other in many months. But after a few phone calls and emails, we set out last Thursday night to enjoy one of the fine cultural offerings available here in L.A. - turtle racing. Unsuprisingly, this was NOT one of the events you read about in O.K. or People, attended by celebutantes and A-listers (or even B or C listers, to be perfectly honest). But hey, it's culture.

Brennan's is a little hole in the wall pub on Lincoln Boulevard in Marina del Rey, populated mostly by buzzed 23-year-olds. It is not a place where you see people drinking Cosmos, or whatever the hell the drink du jour is. There's beer, and french fries, and on Thursday nights at 10, there's turtles.



I've never asked if you can bring your own turtle to race; this is a town populated by yapping little rat-on-a-leash dogs, so I'd be surprised to see anyone pull a red-eared slider out of their handbag. No, these would-be champions are brought out to their racing grounds (the patio adjacent to the bar) in the humble transport of an Igloo cooler. Attendees go up and sponsor a turtle for a small fee, and, three at a time, they are placed inside of a small plastic holding pen. The pen is lifted out of the way at the end of the (somewhat inebriated) countdown, and the turtles race their way to the outside rim of the large circle that serves as their racetrack; the first to hit the painted line is declared the winner. At the end of these races, the various winners are penned together and released for the dramatic conclusion to the evening, in which one lucky turtle becomes the evening's champion. Alas, the glory does not last long, as the champion and the defeated alike are once again returned to their Igloo and ferried away (where to, I have no earthly idea).

(Yes, I know that this is a crappy picture and that I need to spring for Photoshop. But look, people: has Annie Leibovitz ever captured a turtle at the moment of victory? Didn't think so.)

Before the races, however, the evening's emcee reads the rules, the first of which is: do not point at the turtles. Despite the fact that this rule is repeated, at full volume and with an admirable level of audience participation, at the beginning of each and every race, it is frequently ignored. What's more interesting is that the turtles actually appear disturbed by these pointing behaviors; more than once, I have seen the leading runner millimeters away from his goal rendered motionless, paralyzed by the power of a single digit pointing in his or her direction. These races are, in the interest of fairness, disqualified, and the offenders are fined anywhere from $10-50, depending on the number of offenses thus far that evening. I don't know if these fees are actually collected, but they are posted. Rules 2-4 escape me now, but, as the emcee says, they can all be summed up by rule #5: don't be a douche bag. If only more people followed rule #5.