[1] Rodolfo Cano is a hot-tempered slacker living in Echo Park with his free-spirited girlfriend, Diaz, with whom he has a tumultuous relationship.
On the morning of his birthday, they have a fight, and Rodolfo impulsively enlists in the army to escape his sense of ennui.
However, his call-for-service letter erroneously ends up getting mailed to another man with the same name ("Rodolfo II"), a quiet and stoic loner living nearby in a boat.
Diaz destroys the cake meant for her boyfriend, cathartically assaults the fridge, and then, noticing Rodolfo II's downbeat attitude, performs an old-timey dance for him.
As guests for the party begin to arrive, Diaz receives a phone call from a city bar, where Rodolfo I is drunkenly provoking fights with patrons.
Diaz wakes some time later to see the woman from the bar departing, and she enters the ruined house, putting the record on again before sitting across from Rodolfo I in quiet contemplation.