With all this LA bashing out in the common sense world, I wanted to turn things on its head a bit and actually chime the merits of the City of Angels and its surrounding area. Granted, major world cities such as New York are exempt from certain aspects of this list. But on an ESPN special yesterday, sportswriter Bill Plaschke noted that Los Angeles was America's greatest city. Most people would scoff at this, and although I'm not exactly defending that argument, I will fight for my current residence...well, I really don't live in LA, I actually live in South Bay, etc, etc
Why other cities suck #1:
Public transportation - have you ever taken the morning train, air conditioning not working, next to the smelly guy? And how do you exactly enjoy that music in your ears?
Why LA doesn't suck #1:
How great is driving? On your own, in control and you can blare and sing along to music all you want. Not that I sing, just sayin.
Why other cities suck #2:
Weather - in most places in the world, when you make plans, you always have to either plan something around the possibility of bad weather or hope it doesn't come about
Why LA doesn't suck #2:
Weather - in LA, you only have to worry about when the sun will come out and how much sunblock you need
Why other cities suck #3:
Corporate or hick - most other cities either are way too corporate or too hick. If you dress down too much in midtown Manhattan, you'll get laughed at. If you dress up too much in Seattle, you get laughed at.
Why LA doesn't suck #3:
Casual - whether you're some tattoed action sports athlete or Hollywood producer, you're probably hanging out at the same place, dressed all kinds of casual. The nicest restaurant will likely accept you wearing a form of jeans.
Why other cities suck #4:
Diversity - some cities, like Boston, are wholeheartedly white. Like, white white.
Why LA doesn't suck #4:
Diversity - if you're at a bar in LA, you'll easily see a white guy, black guy, Mexican, Asian, on and on. Even in NY, people are somewhat segregated. Plus, in LA, people are from everywhere, which naturally creates interesting conversation. Plus plus, have you seen the mixes of girls around here? I'm a taken man, but the diversity makes for attractive set of females.
Why other cities suck #5:
Sports - you have one set of teams, maybe in all four sports, and usually everyone follows the same teams
Why LA doesn't suck #5:
Diversity of sports - everyone is from everywhere, so you get a huge diversity of sports fans, both in types of sports and their teams. This makes for more interesting conversation.
Why other cities suck #6:
See what you get - with many cities, you know the cool places and can figure out the vibe of the city in one night out. There's nowhere to dig.
Why LA doesn't suck #6:
Underground scene - like from that scene in Swingers, all the cool places in LA aren't labeled and tend to stay that way for years. For instance, places like Silverlake and Echo Park were edgy popular four years ago and still are. And their cool is legit cool.
Why other cities suck #7:
Occupations - I don't know the exact statistics, but most cities probably hire a good deal of people in sales, real estate, accounting. "Hey Bill, nice to meet you. What do you do for a living? Oh, sales. Ahem."
Why LA doesn't suck #7:
Jobs - how many interesting people have you met in LA? My buddy's ex was the young girl at the beginning of Adams Family Values. My two friends were extras in Wedding Crashers. Hell, my job the past two weeks has been the X Games and U.S. Open of Surfing. How's sales in Louisville going?
Why other cities suck #8:
Parkways - one or two major parkways/highways to get you to where you're going. And when there's an accident or cop pulling somewhere over, there seems to be traffic, yes?
Why LA doesn't suck #8:
Freeways - there are like, four freeways that just go to Long Beach. Sure, the freeways are crowded and sort of a roll of the dice on safety, but they have up to six lanes, carpool ones at that and tons of entrances/exits. Plus, the side of the road is usually interesting or scenic.
Why other cities suck #9:
One dimensional - in Detroit or Minneapolis, you can only do so much. What are the other options, and again with the weather, how often an you do this? In the midwest, you can go to another city pretty much like it.
Why LA doesn't suck #9:
Options - living in LA, you can do the following without too much ahead planning: surf in the morning, ski in the afternoon, hike, bike, skydive, go to San Diego, go to Orange County, go to Mexico, go to San Francisco, go to Vegas (!). And that's a few things when one of the six major pro sports teams, concerts or events aren't going on.
Why other cities suck #10:
Airports, lack of - Even the biggest cities usually have a major airport and one less major. This makes for inconvenient drives and higher prices.
Why LA doesn't suck #10:
Airports, many - In the LA area, you have LAX, Orange County, Burbank, Long Beach (fantastic, btw), Ontario, Van Nuys. And these are probably only the ones Jet Blue goes to.
Why other cities suck #11:
Food - other areas have fantastic food, but it's usually a product of that part of the country or just plain reproduction of popular style. I'm talking about you, Applebees and Olive Garden.
Why LA doesn't suck #11:
Food, lots of it - I recently had many varieties of great Mexican food, one from a truck at night next to a strip mall. You can find good pizza if you look for it. There's great sushi if that's your thing, Thai, Vietnamese. And the burgers! Pink's hot dogs is overrated, but they still have a hot dog place called Pink's. Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles (which I've yet to try). And have I mentioned the Mexican? Oh yes, In n Out and Fatburger are wonderful, too.
Why other cities suck #12:
They have football - on a Sunday afternoon, there are two factions of people: one who goes to the game and the other who doesn't. They're segregated that way. Plus, the focus on one favorite detracts from the fun of watching everyone.
Why LA doesn't suck #12:
There's no football team - Sundays here, everyone is outside ether barbequeing or throwing the football around. Gives new meaning to the term Sunday Funday, especially if a big game is playing at a bar. And everyone's content enough with watching the big game of the week, not the one local team everyone lives and dies by.
Why other cities suck #13:
3 hours later - Baseball starts at 8, ends Lord knows when. Live events and shows start at 8, hopefully end at 11 for the news. New Years happens at midnight.
Why LA doesn't suck #13:
3 hours earler - Sunday Night Baseball ends at 8, allowing you to have a full Sunday night of TV. Those events and award shows are pre-taped, so you can guarantee they'll end at 11. New Years happens twice, one on east coast time and another on LA time. OK, this could be a coup for the entire west coast, which leads me to the last point of the night...
Why other cities suck #14:
Proximity to paradise - flying anywhere in South Pacific usually requires a stopover in LA. If you reside in Chicago, you'll have a nice three hour flight to LA, theeen a five-hour flight to Hawaii.
Why LA doesn't suck #14:
At paradise's door - you don't need that layover, you're already in LA! And this usually only applies to LA, since it's the central hub for South Pacific flights. From my own experience, even a flight to Australia is a tolerable 14-hour direct flight from LA.
That is all I have. Not meaning to disparage other cities, because I love aspects of most other bigger cities I've been to (except maybe Miami). I'm just making the case for LA, a place where it really doesn't get nice-nice until October. The summer is just nice. Go, Randy, go:
(Randy Newman's I Love LA video link should be here, but for some reason, YouTube is not working at this exact moment I'm trying to put a link to a video. But I'll put it here anyway, hoping it works for you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le5aIqn_MfE)
