Thirteen US Dollars and Some Change
A fiscal quarter in Los Angeles, California
"Some nights you can see more planes in the sky than stars."
"That sucks."
"Well, yeah...but there's something about it."
It seems to me that the economy is one great, big game of follow the leader. The trouble is nobody can see the front of the conga line. This is all well and good for a while. Dancing with the people around you is one of the finest joys the human experience has to offer. But, again, the trouble: before you know it, your invisible leader has led you to the edge of the cliff. Now what? It's scary to set off on your own path. There's some cold comfort in mutually assured destruction, I suppose.
Or, said another way, things in Los Angeles, California are much too expensive. When I drive back on Sunday, I’ll have lived there for exactly three months. It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long but I am trying to recalibrate my perception of the passing of time. Between getting older, the contourless haze of lockdown, and unemployment’s dilation and contraction of days, weeks, months, it’s hard to tell what three months should feel like. Not to worry about that last part—I start my big boy job on Monday.
I’m excited about it. Excited to get out of the apartment, excited to collect paychecks, excited to feel normal. Not that I haven’t been getting out of the apartment. In fact, one of the best things about being unemployed is all the time you have to get out of the apartment. Getting out of the apartment rocks. Walking around? That rocks as well. Los Angeles public transit? It does not rock quite as much but I enjoy taking it nonetheless and at times it is even quite convenient. The only way to truly learn a new city is to put yourself in the city. From inside the car, the avenues and boulevards all blend together. You cannot get a feel for a neighborhood while mindlessly scrolling in the backseat of an Uber. But walking around, you'll stumble upon all sorts of things. A sushi spot with a concerningly cheap happy hour, a little free library that actually has a book worth grabbing, a quiet park with some comfortable benches, a house with very confident decorative choices. These are the things you miss while double checking you didn't miss your turn onto Highland Ave or while squirreled away in some weirdo's Infiniti QX60.
Plus the price tag. It's so expensive to do much of anything here so you gotta use your walking legs when you can. Beers at the bars here are $8. They're just allowed to do that kind of thing. There are exceptions of course (shoutout to the $4 Budweiser drafts at Crawford's) but for the most part there are not. Cocktails are $16 minimum and many of them require an Andrew Jackson plus tax. Stupid.
The saving grace is the street tacos. Sidewalk tacos are cheaper than every taco I ever had in Portland and are immeasurably better. $2.50 for an al pastor taco that will actually, in a material way, change your waking life. The tacos make up for the dearth of edible, let alone exceptional pizza in town. Where on earth are the Italians? But no matter, basically any sidewalk spot you see with a huge slab of pork roasting in a fireball is going to be fantastic and you can have a full ass meal for less than you could at Taco Bell.
I had Taco Bell for the first time since I moved here over the weekend. I was driving home from a 9:50pm screening of Saltburn (shoutout AMC A-List, the only consumer cult in Los Angeles that I am fully on board with. So far.) and my brain got infected by the craving for Garbage so I went to Taco Bell and got the Ryan Moloney Meal: chicken quesadilla combo (water for the drink) and an additional two crunchy tacos. That ran me thirteen US dollars and some change. I did however have the pleasure watching the person in front of me order a large Baja Blast and nothing else. Going to Taco Bell at damn near one in the morning on what has just become Monday to get a single Baja Blast is deranged and you cannot convince me otherwise.
The city warps your brain quickly. Just a couple weeks after moving to LA, I drove past the ARCO near my apartment which was selling gas for $5.39 per gallon. I audibly said, "Oh, let's go." And I actually meant it. Starting Monday, I will spend at least an hour in the car every weekday for the foreseeable future. It has rained exactly once since I moved here and there is no telling when it will rain again. I may never find a single-digitally priced sandwich in Los Angeles.
But there's something about it.