#9 Body Factory

#30 Hollywood Walk of Fame
#29 Yamashiro
#28 Hollywood Billiards
#27 Genghis Cohen
#26 Piano Bar
#25 Shmutzville
# 24 Loteria
# 23 The Griddle
# 22 Proximity
# 21 Hollywood Freeway
#20 Kitchen 24
# 19 The People
# 18 Sushi Eyaki
#17 Raymond Chandler
# 16 Jumbo's Clown Room
#15 Skooby's
#14 The Arclight
# 13 The Well
#12 Runyon Canyon
# 11 Canter's
#10 Hotel Café

#9 Body Factory

Ok, I have a feeling very few people are familiar with Body Factory, so let me do my best to describe it. Body Factory is a riddle to me. It is a store that sells candles and soaps and kama sutra bullshit, but also makes smoothies and wraps. They are constantly blaring the most annoying and strangest playlists that seem to be pulled from late-eighties work out videos; they have two plasmas inside that show—at least what appears to be—workout stock footage with crazy Japanese-style cuts and non-sequitur messages being given off. It makes absolutely no sense. Furthermore, it is nestled behind the Arclight, directly beneath the Hollywood 24 Hour Fitness, where, as a former member, I can assure you that only Hollywood's best and brightest work out. Quite simply, Body Factory is a vortex within the space-time continuum that should not exist outside of near-future science fiction popcorn movies (think Judge Dredd of Demolition Man). Everything about the place, from the meathead clientele, the obnoxious and offensive music, and the illogical inventory tells me to stay away from this place, but holy mother fucking shit are their smoothies good.

So you know when you go to a regular smoothie place—think Jamba Juice or Juice It Up—they use weird frozen fruits that look like something that came from the spaceship candy aisle? Body Factory skips the pretense and just throws weird ass powders in the smoothies. Yeah, there are some frozen pineapples or bananas or berries, but the key to Body Factory is the space-agey weird ass powders and what have you that give the smoothies a rougher texture and supposedly make them the healthiest things you can possibly put in your body. There's a decent chance that one Body Factory smoothie contains more carcinogens than eating lead paint, but according to their nutritional information, each smoothie contains thirty-five grams of protein. That's fucking insane. So I have been devouring these things like they're the antidote for a year and a half. I can't get enough. I usually stick to the "Body Fuel" which is described on the board as being they're house special and don't ask the ingredients. Ok, I won't. It's the tastiest fucking smoothie ever created. I think there's pineapple, maybe? Maybe coconut? But let's just think about how weird this is: a store, selling soaps and candles and bullshit, playing stranger than strange work-out music, showing non-sequitur bullshit on their two plasmas, selling me a smoothie that may or may not contain gasoline because not only do they not tell you what's in it, but they throw weird powders and things in it and then it tastes better than Filet Mignon and is supposedly the healthiest thing on Earth. To quote Lance's wife in Pulp Fiction "That's fuckin' trippy."

I'm not exaggerating when I say I devour these things. Rough estimate says that in eighteen months, I've had close to one hundred of these things, and I've never bought anything else at Body Factory. Oh, so there's another weird thing about Body Factory. Every time you go in, they ask you if you're a member. Apparently there's some membership that costs money to get, and you get nothing other than discounted smoothies. Like the membership costs twenty, and the discount is one dollar, so you have to think, "Will I have twenty smoothies from this place" before you sign up. I assure you, I never paid a dime, but for some reason they think I'm a member. But why the membership?!?! It doesn't afford you a newsletter, or special access to things not on the menu—it's just a fucking discount. You have to pay for a discount. Everyone breaks even! What the fuck is going on here?

As you can tell, Body Factory makes no sense at all to me. If you want to pay by credit card you have to pay fifteen dollar minimum for a five dollar smoothie, so they have a thing where if you pay fifteen bucks for a smoothie, your next two are already paid for, so sometimes I roll in, several weeks after my last smoothie, with a five dollar bill in my hand and they refuse it because I've already paid. So strange.

However, they are the best smoothies on the planet, they are supposedly healthy, and they are five dollars after the membership I never paid for. I could walk to Body Factory and did quite often, and now the pain-in-the-ass parking situation could mean no mas Body Factory para mi. This is mildly depressing but could be a good thing if they are putting fucking benzine in my smoothie. Anyways, Body Factory, I will miss the fuck out of you.