Scientology Gone Wild

This is the Scientology Celebrity Centre that sits across the street on Franklin Avenue from one of my favorite places to meet my friends for dinner, La Poubelle. I have sat at the tables outside on the sidewalk on countless nights, watching Scientology buses (big buses) full of people, drive in and out of the "Celebrity Centre". This can be at midnight. I'm always wondering what in the world they're doing, driving around in buses late at night?

I also wonder why a "religion" has a building dedicated to celebrities in the first place? What other religious group or spiritual group has a building dedicated to celebrities?

Scientology owns SO many HUGE buildings around LA that it's scary. I'm talking about hospital sized HUGE (they own a building that actually used to be a hospital) buildings. What are they doing in there that they need so much space? And why have I never seen one of their buildings in a poor neighborhood?

I just noticed a few days ago that they are setting up camp in Malibu now. The building that they have in Malibu is not a huge building, it's kinda small, but they don't have any huge buildings in Malibu aside from Pepperdine University.

A few years back, I was approached by a Scientologist dude in a suit. I decided to play along with him. He asked me to fill out a "personality profile". He told me that there was no obligation at all, and that they would mail me back the results. I asked him to clarify what "no obligations" meant several times. He said that I would not have to go into any of their facilities or meet with anyone at all to get my "personality profile" results. Someone would just mail me my results. That's all.

I knew there was a hook but I couldn't see it because I had asked him to clarify so many times. So, I filled out the profile. He said that he would give me some time to fill it out and he would come back to pick it up from me in a bit.

This profile asked questions like "Have you ever felt sad", "Have you ever felt angry", "Have you ever had a twitch in your eye", "Have you ever had a stomach ache", "Have you ever felt like crying" or "Have you ever felt pain in your knee". I ask you, who in the hell would not answer YES to all of these questions?

The Scientologist dude in a suit came back and picked up my profile. And I asked him AGAIN to clarify how I would be receiving my results. He told me that they would be mailed to me.

About a week went by and I get this phone call. It was somebody calling me from one of those HUGE buildings. The man on the phone told me that he indeed had my results from my "personality profile". He said how unfortunate it was that they couldn't mail the results back to me because they had "lost" my address and could I come in to get my results in person? I told him how very odd that was because the same form that I had used to write my phone number on was the same exact form that I wrote my address on.

He didn't budge and there was the hook that I had been looking for all along.

Lies. Lies. Lies.

P.S. I wonder if Will & Jada had to take the test?