Sweet

Cricket returned to DC last night after being away on business.   Combined with my business travel and a tacked-on week's vacation, I hadn't seen her in three weeks.   It's good to have company again.    

I'm manically working to prepare for more business travel, but article like this one are just sapping my energy.    I suppose it's typical at this point in my career to have doubts about what I want to do with my life.   I really don't mind, except when I hang out with the one or two people my age I know who have an order of magnitude on me in disposable income, or those who are smarter than me and who I admire but do things I consider useless.   It also makes me sad when I learn of people from college who were smart and intellectually curious, iconoclastic even, but have largely decided to serve Mammon.    For that matter, I know people in the scholarly pursuits who have become provincial and hidebound.   If I have a career goal right now, I suppose it is to be able to (honestly) think of myself as a scholar but not live like a churchmouse.     I'm almost dead set on refusing to take a pay cut from my current job, which since I have a pretty good gig, will limit my possibilities somewhat.

I miss Los Angeles.   Seeing the mountains behind my old San Gabriel Valley home was a sight I'd been so used to that it took being away for six months to really appreciate.   Other institutions I miss: the Rancho, up on Lake Avenue, where it's quiet and divey, and the barflies are artsy, dumb, or both.    The Colorado, down on Colorado, which is a meaner and squarer dive, and one marinated in memories.    And, of course, Amigo's, where I learned last week that the margaritas classico are the way to go, which would have saved me gallons of tarwater gasoline margitas regularito that I've pumped into my body over the years had I been told right away.   

DC is a much better town for me, though, the evidence being that I have a steady girlfriend of many months, which is something I never found in Los Angeles.    To all my friends complaining about the single life in LA: move here.   Move here now.   

I'm taking Cricket to see Once tonight.  I'm a sucker for sappy indie stuff like this.   I'm also a sucker for movies like Waitress .    She'll probably be annoyed at me for both, but then again, the last two movies we saw together were the ghastly and intolerable Volver and For Your Consideration.   

And, as a final note, I bought my first bottle of whiskey in DC a couple weeks ago, at the place next to the carpet joint and shitty cheesesteak house near Woodley Park Metro.   I've avoided the water of life so far, as it's a drain on my already empty pocketbook, but I've found that nothing helps me transition from working a twelve-hour day to blissful slumber better than a wee dram and some celebrity gossip.     For this first bottle I selected the solid Irish bestseller, Powers.    Heartily recommended.