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• Best Free Comedy, Beer Included

  Comedy Meltdown

  Comic book geek or hip alt-comedy scenesters? The line is pretty blurred on the fourth Friday of the month at Meltdown Comics. That's when the back room stays open after hours for a nonglamorous, harshly lit evening of standup comedy. The show is free, as is the plentiful Asahi beer, which is notable not only because the talent lineup is… More >>

• Best L.A. Record Label

  Stones Throw Records

  It buggers the imagination that any sane person would consider running a record label in this chaotic environment. Why not play it safe and open a sub-prime brokerage, instead? In this landscape, a hearty huzzah to those who channel their musical passion into pumping the sounds of others. Labelwise, Los Angeles 2008 is a hearty place: Everloving Records outta Los… More >>

• Best Master of Puppets

  Steve Meltzer

  It's not hard to picture what Steve Meltzer must have been like as a little boy. The puppeteer, who mans the box office before jumping onstage to work the puppets for Puppetolio! every weekend, has a big, goofy grin and exudes the energy of an 8-year-old inviting you to play in his room. Puppetolio! is delightfully old-fashioned, a low-tech puppet… More >>

• Best B-Star Fest

  Hollywood Collectors & Celebrities Show

  "You are the entertainment capital of the world," says Ray Courts with a slow and polite Southern drawl from his home in Spring Hill, Florida. "We thought there were other people besides us who come to Hollywood and would like to meet some of your favorite celebrity guests. OK, I grant you that we don't have your Tom Cruises or… More >>

• Best Beanery

  UpHigh/DownLow Dodgeball

  Like a little razzle-dazzle when you're getting smashed in the face? At UpHigh/DownLow, the Silver Lake chapter of LADS (Los Angeles Dodgeball Society), you're sure to get a glimpse of sparkly purple tights, perhaps under a gorilla suit, right before a big red ball knocks you into next Tuesday. Although, says UH/DL founder Matty Pipes, those moon boots are just… More >>

• Best Red Rubber Balls

  Dodge Ball at Crunch

  Gyms in L.A. are always coming up with one new class or another — cardio boot camp, supercharged spinning, power yoga — so it was only a matter of time before the dodge-ball craze found its way to Crunch on Sunset Boulevard, which has been hosting exciting dodge-ball games (or classes) for the past year. Started last summer as a… More >>

• Best Small-Fry Fishing

  Cabrillo Marine Aquarium

  Sometimes overshadowed by its gigantic cousin in Long Beach, the Cabrillo Aquarium in San Pedro is a fantastic alternative for visitors who want to spend the majority of their day at an actual beach. Full of hand-painted displays and small-town charm, the Cabrillo Aquarium has a wide variety of marine species, some of which can be experienced firsthand in a… More >>

• Best Moonlight Stroll

  Sierra Club's Griffith Park Hike

  Hiking the hills of Griffith Park alone after dark is, unfortunately, ill-advised. Happily, Sierra Club's Angeles Chapter has your back, offering group hikes of varying difficulty during the week and on weekends — and, once a month, a special moonlight hike. These treks are no secret: Between 150 and 250 trailblazers usually show up for each excursion during the warmer… More >>

• Best Communal Tennis Courts

  Echo Park Tennis Courts

  You might not find the next Venus or Serena Williams giving the Echo Park tennis courts a good spanking, but you will find a lively, thriving tennis community there beneath Highway 101. Unlike the nearby Griffith Park courts, which charge a small fee, the well-maintained Echo Park courts are free to the public. What's more, the hobos sunning on the lawn… More >>

• Best Compassionate Yogi

  Julian Walker

  In a town lousy with yoga (and so much of it lousy yoga), how does one pinpoint The Best? What does "Best Yoga" even mean? The whole idea of "best" is anathema to yoga, which means "union," which obliterates reductive, dualistic differentiations like "best" and "worst." Aargh! I'll give it my best. ... Noah Williams, seemingly sweet and sparkly, will sadistically whip… More >>

• Best Yogi Rock

  Vinnie Marino

  We've all heard the story before: Drug-addicted East Coast guido flower child gets clean, migrates to Los Angeles and emerges as Venice Beach superstar yogi. It's as obvious as a Jerome Robbins musical. Back in the early '90s, Marino substituted for a vacationing yoga-teacher friend, brought his Rolling Stones CDs to class and blasted the jams as the students pretzeled themselves… More >>

• Best Yogi for all

  Bryan Kest's Santa Monica Power Yoga

  As the world spins off its axis and bounces recklessly beyond the confines of the Milky Way, Bryan Kest leads his packed-to-the-gills Santa Monica power yoga classes with an endless stream of lyrical, Seussian rhymes loaded with humor and self-effacing sarcasm. Breathe with me best as can be through your nostrils if that's a pos-si-bi-li-ty. It helps that Kest has soulful eyes and sensual Scorpio… More >>

• Best Fitness Guru

  Harley Pasternak

  Isn't it time you finally took on the bloat that's been dogging you since you turned 25? The one that's been keeping you out of the water at pool parties for countless summers? The one that makes you wanna move to Portland? Sure, Portland's an option. It'll be great. You're going to love Portland! All that Gore-Tex and rain ...… More >>

• Best Body Trend

  Flesh

  Nope, it's not those mangled earlobes that have migrated from Black Rock City's beloved Playa to the (almost) mainstream streets of Venice Beach. It's ... FLESH!!! Round arms, full faces, radiant complexions, happy, glowing, plump feminine figures that celebrate all that is woman and abundance and yes, please; more, please; gimme all you got, universe! Gone are crimped, contracted waists… More >>

• Best Poker Room

  Hustler Casino

  A few months back, I went to play some low-stakes poker over at Larry Flynt's Hustler Casino, and who did I bump into, right next to me at a corner table in the back of the room? Not only Flynt himself, in his gold-plated wheelchair, but sitting around him were none other than Ted Forrest, Barry Greenstein, Phil Ivey and… More >>

• Best Place to Express Yourself and Your Biceps

  Kinetic Theory Theatre

  Karyne Steben, the lead aerial instructor at Kinetic Theory Theatre in Culver City, won't hound you about your unpointed toes. She won't correct the posture in your tango turn around the trapeze ropes, nor will she insist that you keep your legs straight when you straddle up on the aerial tissu for a double-star drop. She will only insist that… More >>