BLIMEY IT'S COLD

The two most amusing things to which I was exposed this past week were five very tall German tourists spending ten minutes not buying a damned thing at a Chinese bakery loaded with yummy expertly-made pastries and snackipoos, and someone speculating that if Seattle were facing a natural disaster, there would long lines of people in gluten-free bread lines.
As well as the looting of compost.

That should tell you approximately where I live.
A) Somewhere that isn't Seattle.
B) A place worth visiting.

There's only one city on the coast that combines both of those features.


呢度唔係羅省

A fellow Dutch American suggested recently that if I did not like the weather and objected to drug-addicts shooting up in public, or trash overflowing on the streets, I had best move to Los Angeles. He liked it there.
An idea which is patently absurd.

My dad grew up in the Los Angeles area, my mom lived a few years in Santa Barbara as a child, and my grandmother was still living in Beverly Hills till decades after the war. Kin on both sides have been in that part of the world.
I myself spent some time in the Alhambra - Monterrey Park area.
What I remember clearest is food-poisoning.
And not seeing the mountains.
Because of smog.


I can put up with the weather here at present, because it will improve over the next few months. As for the addicts and their needles, eventually they'll chase the yuppies and e-commerce techies out, as well as other recent arrivals from the Rest Of the Country.


Large tourist bodies cluttering the space in front of the counter at a Chinese bakery are no problem. Especially when I've already got my hot milk tea and flaky egg-tart (or any one of several other delicious things they make), and can observe them from a distance as they gradually realize that they don't know what any of that stuff is.


As a pipe smoker, if I have to go outside, I prefer this place.
Plus these pedestrians and the street-scape they provide.
There is scant street theatre down in Los Angeles.
And more consumerist assholery.




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