That's what I meant.

The last time I was in the US I had to go out to LAX. I had to get a cab from the airport to get to the next place I had to go.

The white woman standing ahead of me in line turned around and started panhandling me. She was attractive, well-dressed, and was nowhere near being “in need.” I pointedly turned away, so she stopped and got in the next cab.

No shame at all. The niggerification of america.

Are you saying that you don't like those hard working gutterscumbags rubbing a greasy snotrag on your windshield at every corner for a small "donation" while their compatriots scan your vehicle to see if there is anything to smash and grab? Good god, man, where is your charity!?

Such PROGRESS!

MANY PROGRESSIVE!

That may well be. A GOOD businessman would have greased the appropriate palms in city hall, I guess.

I dare you do do better in downtown los angeles. I DOUBLE DOG DARE YOU!

Yes, ALL of downtown la is pretty much skid row now. We left when it was merely encroaching on all the streets beneath our [rather nice] loft. Lofts became so "hipster" by that point that we knew we had to leave anyway... but it was SO NICE! You should have seen the view we had. We could see city hall... but then it was just like a couple of blocks away, but then we could also see a huger panorama to the south as well, and on a clear day [which is super rare in LA, as everyone knows], we could see Catalina, glimmering jut above the sea!

We had lived there years prior, back in the early to mid 90s, and it was completely different. We were absolute monarchs, living high above the riffraff then, surveying all the dead city that was ours. We could have parties on the roof, and I could still play my trumpet without worrying about bothering the neighbors, because after all if they're bothered by such a thing, they belonged elsewhere, and the majority agreed, because we were all weirdoes! Also, we didn't lock our door and had a fridge perpetually filled with beers... which we didn't really need, since I got to drink my fill downstairs where my wife was the bartender at one of the most epic bars ever...

Sure, there was always scary criminals, but I was always confident that all I ever had to do was be scarier than them, and also SUPER willing to fight, and that always did the trick.

We ended up moving to chinatown. Another friend had gotten mugged there and they were moving out, so we scored their weird house... and I was just looking for any excuse, and all the chinatown scumbags I guess could tell and just somehow kind of accepted us as, well not one of their own, but they left us mostly alone [aside from that time the missus' car got broken into for a can of oil].

Man. Downtown Los Angeles was kind of really cool in the late 80s and early 90s. It was like a weird post-apocalyptic beautiful no-man's land. Especially along the river. And that's where we were. Real artists doing real art, real punk rock doing... drugs mostly. And us, making money off of both. And now and then hollywood shits would film in the vicinity and pay us $100 just to exist in our natural habitat for a day. And we'd raid the living fuck out of craft services.

We have stories. I should tell some someday.

I don't want to imagine how expensive meat is in CA.

How much is a pound of Chicken breast there?

How much is a pound of 93:7 ground beef there?