A study in contrasts.

On Saturday night, I was standing out on what I still refer to as "my" balcony in SanMon, although, it really is no longer "mine," with Ritu. She shivered and noted how cold out it was. Meanwhile I was still marveling over the fact that it was nighttime, and I was outside in a sundress and sandals, and was not cold in the least. I kind of wanted to punch her at that point, knowing that back in SF it was likely 45 degrees out and I would've been wearing jeans likely paired with my puffy black North Face parka despite the fact that it's Aug, b/c it's just that cold here.
LA v. SF: a study in contrasts. Whereas the individuals populating Cobras and Mats on Friday night were trendily dressed, and good-looking (including Kristin Cavallari who I'm mostly sure was sitting at the table behind us), an SF restaurant would've been filled with kind of ill-dressed people, and umm, not attractive, people. But granted, they would've had actually functioning brains in their heads and real, paying, steady jobs. So, it's a trade-off.
LA: sunny. SF: foggy. LA: warm. SF: f'in cold. LA: flaky. SF: sensible. LA homeless: sleep drowsily under the palm trees along Ocean blvd. SF homeless: rant noisily until they disturb the bus driver enough to put the 71 out of service. LA restaurants: generally over-hyped and over-priced. SF restaurants: ridiculously good and nearly under-priced. My old LA neighborhood: lovely and suburban, preppy and sleepy. My new SF neighborhood: eclectic and colorful, and umm, kind of scary to walk by yourself in after dark. I know it's wrong, but over-piecing and under-grooming kind of set off my alarms.
I alternated my state of mind throughout the weekend. On Friday night when I skipped out of the airport and into the balmy air, I totally missed LA. Then on Saturday, when it took us 45 min to get to the Rosecrantz exit and we actually had to turn back around without ever making it to the beach, and I kind of wanted to kill myself, I sighed relief that I don't live their anymore. When I was strolling down Montana past all the sane, safe people on my way to Khiel's, I missed LA. When I was sitting at NailSpaLane watching all the men that came in to get waxed or pedi'ed, I chuckled and was happy I'd left it behind. When I first got to Les Deux and surveyed the outrageousness of everyone around me, I was like, "wow, this is so entertaining. I miss these weirdos." After a couple hours of watching countless bleach blonds wearing bandaids gyrate drunkenly and drape themselves over the bouncers to gain VIP access, I was happy to be gone.
So it was like that. It reminds me that there really is no perfect place to live. I've had this chat w/ Aly many times. You can live in SF or LA West coast where everything seems more interesting and fabulous, and a "cold" day in the winter (even in the North) is 45 degrees...and maybe when you're 43 you can afford a one bedroom house for $1.5M. Or you can you can be 26 and living in a 5 bedroom custom-built home on a 1 acre that cost <$5K, and be surrounded by Olive Gardens, bad shopping, and Christian Values.
Conundrum, right? I'll close by saying this, and it's completely unrelated to anything. Don't fly Virgin America yet. The planes kick ass, but they clearly don't know how to operate domestically yet. Oh, and if you were curious, no, no hand-holding for me on my most recent voyage. So that's good. Okie dokie, the end.