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Wednesday, January 15, 2003 |
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An Evening in the City Wandered through Hollywood tonight. Took the 101 North out of the city, away from the tall buildings and bright lights. Went along side the city, slipping away from it slowly in the midst of the other travelers, on their way home from another day in the urbans. The radio loud, the sound of the rushing air matching its crescendo, I make my way along the 101 toward the Fairfax. Got off on Santa Monica Boulevard and headed West. The Santa Monica starts at Little Armenia and proceeds straight through the night toward South Hollywood. With the top down, I swear I could smell the jasmine and orange wafting through the warm night air. The path the Santa Monica takes is not a pristine one, we wander past a strip club, past a sex toy store, but then past an audio store and a Whole Foods market. Turning down Fairfax, the smell of food drifts across the road. Garlic. Cilantro. Beef. Ham. Beans. All of these, taking their toll on my ever-growing apetite. The corner of Santa Monica and Highland, just off the road, there stands a tall building, all alone amongst two story storefronts. It stands ten stories, and all along the Northern face is an Apple billboard. The new 17" iMac stands larger than life, pronouncing itself to the dingy dark neighborhood. Not a bad metaphor for the current market, now, is it? Canter's Fairfax, where I was headed for dinner tonight, is a Deli from a Los Angeles that died in the 1970s. The waitresses are curt, and all uniformed in the standard cursive-script Canter's t-shirt. The menus are large, and densely packed. Robert and I each have the pastrami. 3 halves each. All with the spicy hot russian mustard on the lightly toasted rye bread. The mustard is so hot that when you whiff it in, your nose is suddenly clear, your eyes just tear a bit. I annihilated that sandwich with extreme prejudice. It did not stand a chance. War was declared, and it just didn't know what hit it. Candice arrived about 7:40, having braved her way up from San Pedro and the hideous traffic on the 10. It was good to see her again. Robert's friend Alex was not far behind and the four of us near-strangers talked about our Christmases, how they didn't feel right this year, about school, about cheap 40s and cigars, about LA neighborhoods and strange things about this oddly quirky, oddly sane oasis in the midst of such insanity. We talked about the nature of California, how you're an hour's drive away from something completely different than where you are now. City, Sand, Desert, Snow. All an hour away. Diversity of terrain, but also of culture. Driving back down the 101 into the city, I must say, LA is pretty at night. The sprawl of the suburbs instantly stops as the giant skyscrapers appear.
But the Traffic is Hell. |
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Things that Irk me about Radio. Radio's starting to irk me for a few reasons...
But there are things I *do* like about Radio. The MyPictures tool is slick. I can carry my server with me, no need to worry about it going down. I can control a lot of the stuff from within my own browser through the Prefs function. Blogging via email. Blogging via web browser from home.
The pros outweigh the cons. For now. |
Last update: 6/28/03; 9:48:08 PM .
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