On living in Los Angeles

T and I have lived in Los Angeles for a year now, and have both been asking ourselves if this is where we want to be long term. Following is my formal analysis of our Los Angeles experience.

CULTURE:
pro; LA has options. There are a variety of concerts, museum exhibits, and old movie screenings available weekly. Since most of the show business population has immigrated here to from the Midwest and East, people tend to be open to meeting new friends. Everyone has spent a year or two as a broke and lonely production assistant, so they tend to be nice to the chick who's paying her dues.

con; Since most people have moved from elsewhere, the city lacks a sense of ownership or a unified identity. Everyone is here to fulfill their personal goals, so there is not a lot of community involvement or even awareness. While on an interpersonal level people are awesome, they also seem to have a sense of anonymity and entitlement which allow them to drive like jerks and not clean up their dog's poop.


CAREER:
pro; This is where T and I have been extremely lucky and thus pretty successful. Although starting at the bottom rung of any career ladder sucks, it's been well worth it to have the chance to work with a great team in a dynamic environment. And it's fun to see a project you've contributed to on TV.

con; If we decided to do leave TV, the economy sucks. Sucks. Sucks.

STATE OF CALIFORNIA
pro; The ocean is nice. The weather is nice. We see celebrities at the gym.

con; After more than a year of legislative gridlock, California has no state budget, and no funds available for any hypothetical budget. As a temporary solution, the state is issuing IOU checks as payment. Supposedly, the IOUs will be fully paid plus interest come October, but Banks have already started to refuse the IOUs. This not only makes it difficult for people to get the money they've earned (money which is critical in keeping the already sluggish economy moving), but the denials continue California's already bruised credit rating will crash. With no credit, everything stops. Good times.

QUALITY OF LIFE
pro; We've got restaurants, we've got ocean, we've got shopping, we've got great produce markets, we've got sunshine, we've got great people.

con; We've got traffic. We've got crowds. These alone negate many of the pros listed under Quality of Life and Culture.


CONCLUSION: Although life here isn't perfect, I don't think we'll be moving any time soon. We like the work, and having so many fun things to do and eat available within walking distance is pretty nice. However, the density of the population is tiring, and I'm not looking forward to watching the state infrastructure fall apart. We'll see what how things stand in four years.

In the meantime....come visit. It's pretty nice.