I’m Plagiarizing This Because I Agree With It

This originally appeared on lemondrop.com on September 25th, 2009 and was titled “10 Things I Won’t Miss About L.A.”It was authored by a young woman from New York.

Let me preface this with the following statement: I despise Los Angeles. All I like about LA are the Lakers, The Rose Bowl, The Galaxy (soccer club), Griffith Park Observatory, The Miracle Mile, Certain parts of Long Beach, and on rare occasions (and in very small doses): Hollywood and Silverlake/Echo Park.

Let’s begin.

1. Vapid, self-promoting actors. This is an actual conversation I overheard last night at Aroma Cafe in Studio City: “Are you going to come see my one-woman show next week?” “I can’t, I have a relationship workshop in Malibu.” “Bummer.” “How was your audition?” “Oh I don’t know, I’m too young to be playing a mom.” Uh, no you’re not. You’re actually the exact right age to be playing a mom. You could be MY mom for God’s sake. Shake the Botox out of your brain and wake the eff up, ladies

Well, that’s not exactly the angle I’d take to express my disgust with the thousands upon thousands of no-name wannabee actors and actresses in Los Angeles, but I suppose it will suffice. What I would have said is: Go back to Ohio, you fucking kook. We don’t need you, nor do we want you here. You pretentious piece of shit and your clown friends make this city unbearable for the people who grew up here. I wish nothing upon you but bad luck and misfortune. Actors bring out my misanthropic side. Oh, how I hate them.

2. Drunk driving. It seems like drunk driving is totally acceptable in Los Angeles. I can’t tell you how many times a friend has told me “I don’t even know how I got home last night.” Or, “Oh my God, I got home and the left rear-view mirror of my car is gone! I don’t remember hitting anything!” People in Los Angeles don’t believe in public transportation (this includes taxis), and on any given night the roads are peppered with wasted people driving cars home from bars, or to bars, or wherever drunk drivers go when they’re not getting arrested or killing people.

Can’t argue with facts. I completely agree.

3. Sober driving. There’s no two ways about it. Driving in Los Angeles sucks ass. It’s ALWAYS rush hour. You think getting up at 6 a.m. will help you beat the rush? Wrong. Think it’ll only take you a second to jump over the hill to Santa Monica on a Sunday afternoon? Wrong! More like a two-hour drive through fire-scorched mountainsides in 108-degree temperatures without air conditioning because your car might overheat from going up the big hill.

I’ll second that. What you forgot to mention, however, is the harrowing trek across the 91 East for those of us who live in Orange County and wish to a.) gamble at Indian Casinos, or b.) gamble in Las Vegas. Yep, a 3-lane highway is all that separates the 3.1 million inhabitants of Orange County from the 4 million inhabitants of the Inland Empire. Oh yeah, and there’s a train that runs M-F between 9 and 5. Makes perfect sense, right?

4. Earthquakes! All right, I may miss the small ones (they’re actually kinda fun), but I will not miss the big ones. I was very close to the epicenter of the Northridge quake and it was frigging horrifying. I’m not going to miss sitting around wondering when I’m going to need to bust into my earthquake kit. Oh yes, I have one: backup dog food, water, human food, flashlights, batteries … If you live in California, you have a disaster kit because, there’s always some kind of disaster coming your way.

Going to have to disagree here. The last major earthquake in LA (The Northridge Quake) occurred in 1994. Fifteen years ago. Get over it. It’s not like it’s an annual occurrence like hurricanes in Florida.

5. Raging fires. The Station Fire (as it is now called) that started this summer has been burning for weeks. Last night I was driving around and the ash was raining down like snow. All I can think about is all the poor little animals that can’t escape, and the fires are always started by humans. Natural fires are extremely rare. Arsonists suck.

Well, your facts were wrong here. Forest fires are a natural annual occurrence in areas with hot, arid climates and tons of dry brush (like Southern California.) But hey, arsonists don’t help matters.

6. Rage, period. Sorry, dude in the “Bad Boyz” gas guzzler with the “piss on Ford” decal in your window who won’t let me get over even though I’m driving a safe speed, leaving a proper following distance between me and the cars around me, and have been signaling for seven minutes. That’s cool. Don’t let me and my hybrid get over into your lane. I respect your totally unexplainable territorial dominance of the left lane. You go Alpha Male!

From what I understand, driving is just as bad in New York. Plus I hear cabbies are fucking insane and drive worse than Indiana Jones on his Disney Adventure. I will, however, agree on your assessment that bros fucking suck.

7. Hortense Alley. Hortense Alley is my own personal L.A. nemesis. It’s an alley behind my apartment complex. Sometimes I brave the dark alley at night when walking my dog and have come across two guys giving each other blowjobs, old used panties, condoms, empty bags of drugs, stolen cars, and the like. They even found a dead body in the trunk of a car back there. I will not miss your charms, Hortense Alley.

I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about. I do, however, know about “Crack Alley.” Yes, Crack Alley was a neighborhood in South San Clemente (near Trestles) that I once I lived in that was notable for its dive bars, drug dealing (see: crack), underage whores, liquor stores and great surf. All in all, I liked it. We would snort speedballs (oxycontin and cocaine) and drink Latin American lager whilst listening to gangster rap with the local sluts, and then stay up til 5am and surf a dawn patrol at Lowers until our bodies could no longer function. It was tits, brah.

8. Valet parking. I will not tip valets who get in my car, steal the change from my change holder, mess with my radio, readjust the seats and make me wait 20 minutes while they try to figure out where they parked my car, usually in a space that I could have parked it in myself.

I hate valets. But again, like a lot of your complaints, they’re not exclusive to Los Angeles. Let’s complain about something that is: $100 parking to sporting events. What the fuck!? Lakers games? $50-$150. Ducks playoffs? $25 for the cheap parking. USC games $100. Fuck that noise.

9. Pee-covered street sofas. I don’t know if it’s just here, but Los Angeles is littered with old sofas that people have thrown out onto the sidewalk that smell like pee. I’m not sure if the sofa has been thrown out because it smells like pee, or if someone or something pees on it the minute it hits the street, but it seems to be a requirement that if you are throwing out a sofa or chair it must get covered in pee immediately. And no one ever calls the city (a free service) to come pick the sofa up so it sits there for weeks and weeks and weeks while more and more and more people pee on it.

Yawn.

10. The Lakers. I hate the Lakers. I hate people who love the Lakers and have Laker flags on their cars and worst of all when they have multiple Laker flags flying high on their cars. I wish the Lakers would lose every game. The only thing more annoying than the Lakers is a Lakers fan. I have news for you Laker fans: Kobe doesn’t give a sh-t about you.

Ok. Cool? No need to argue about nonsense. The Lakers are a great franchise. They’ve won more championships than 26 other NBA teams combined. They’re competitive every season, and Dr. Jerry Buss makes sure that the product on the floor always includes superstars and marquee names. Gotta love ownership who is committed to winning and keeping the fans satisfied decade after decade. But I can understand why a Knicks fan would say that. As for Kobe, I guarantee that the “haters” would jizz in their pants were he to sign with your team, so stfu.

She finishes with:

But seriously — suck it, Lakers.

Lmao. You should have been telling Mike Dolan to suck it.