and something like no puck like boy girl boy but about the lack of hockey season based on shakes rather than a precient baseball poem w/ both the red sox and cardinals in it
I am posting now about NOTHING TO DO with poetry and poetrics because I have been completely distractd at work YET AGAIN but THE FREAKING SEARCH FOR A FREAKING HOUSE
If you know my husband and I personally, you know that for the past several years he has been searching for a house; you also know that we both work hard, but want a lot of space for our home (writing) offices, and are not willing to sacrifice on location. There's really no need to, as he makes a good salary and it looks like I won't be teaching anytime soon, so I am temping around until I can find something meaningful to do making at least 100K a year. At least if I can't teach, I can make the same amount of money as one would in a tenured position at a top tier school.
We like areas where we can walk around the block at night and can walk to a restaurant, a bar with bands -- just a little something to do. And we actually do this from time to time. Ron has a fear of neighborhoods of tiny ranches all lined up except if they're in Glendale, and I have a fear of suburban areas -- distant from museums and libraries and such -- even if they meet my "walking around" criteria. Neither one of us wants to be next to a freeway, an apartment building, or any commercial property (or church!) -- just near it. And this is not a plea for help. We are looking for something with spirit that has at least 2000 sq ft, 3 bedrooms + den, 2 full baths, and a guest house. We have tried Eagle Rock and I like Martha Ronk's neighborhood near OXY, but that's about it. We have no desire to live in a townhouse again, after living in Park La Brea (as Diane Ward did) for seven years and my husband being partially raised in a townhouse. The valley is too hot. Palms is yucky; Westchester's under the LAX flight path. Downtown is still in transition. C'mon. We are former New Yorkers -- you can't fool us, those are open air drug deals.
There is a neighborhood in Los Angeles that was destroyed by the 10 freeway. It is a story like the Robert Caro Robert Moses story that hasn't been told in book form about Los Angeles except partialy by Mike Davis and partially in WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT. It is a story that my freeway manuscripts don't even begin to touch -- a story of oil and self-interest and real estate -- a story DAY OF THE LOCUST and all the film noirs don't tell, except perhaps the one that has the last shots of Bunker Hill when is was old Victorian mansions carved into rooming houses. That neighborhood is called WEST ADAMS. It is officially South Central. The riots were there; it is north of Watts but was on the same streetcar route; it is not on the same (or any) metro route. It is gentrifying because of the pressure on housing prices in LA. My husband's writing partner lives there. We have put in offers on two houses there (well, one was in USC, which -- has not taken care of their neighborhood at at -- USC neighborhood the houses are orgiinally nicer (and older) than those in West Adams, but the crime is terrible and the people are very very poor or often very drunk students).
There is not a house available in West Adams under a million dollars (oh yes, many of the houses are a million dollars there -- especially those in Lafayette Square where uh - blanking -- the woman made famous by the civil rights movement because she wouldn't go to the back of the bus?) which is not near an apartment building, car repair garage, package store, or the freeway itself, it seems.
I am posting now about NOTHING TO DO with poetry and poetrics because I have been completely distractd at work YET AGAIN but THE FREAKING SEARCH FOR A FREAKING HOUSE
If you know my husband and I personally, you know that for the past several years he has been searching for a house; you also know that we both work hard, but want a lot of space for our home (writing) offices, and are not willing to sacrifice on location. There's really no need to, as he makes a good salary and it looks like I won't be teaching anytime soon, so I am temping around until I can find something meaningful to do making at least 100K a year. At least if I can't teach, I can make the same amount of money as one would in a tenured position at a top tier school.
We like areas where we can walk around the block at night and can walk to a restaurant, a bar with bands -- just a little something to do. And we actually do this from time to time. Ron has a fear of neighborhoods of tiny ranches all lined up except if they're in Glendale, and I have a fear of suburban areas -- distant from museums and libraries and such -- even if they meet my "walking around" criteria. Neither one of us wants to be next to a freeway, an apartment building, or any commercial property (or church!) -- just near it. And this is not a plea for help. We are looking for something with spirit that has at least 2000 sq ft, 3 bedrooms + den, 2 full baths, and a guest house. We have tried Eagle Rock and I like Martha Ronk's neighborhood near OXY, but that's about it. We have no desire to live in a townhouse again, after living in Park La Brea (as Diane Ward did) for seven years and my husband being partially raised in a townhouse. The valley is too hot. Palms is yucky; Westchester's under the LAX flight path. Downtown is still in transition. C'mon. We are former New Yorkers -- you can't fool us, those are open air drug deals.
There is a neighborhood in Los Angeles that was destroyed by the 10 freeway. It is a story like the Robert Caro Robert Moses story that hasn't been told in book form about Los Angeles except partialy by Mike Davis and partially in WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT. It is a story that my freeway manuscripts don't even begin to touch -- a story of oil and self-interest and real estate -- a story DAY OF THE LOCUST and all the film noirs don't tell, except perhaps the one that has the last shots of Bunker Hill when is was old Victorian mansions carved into rooming houses. That neighborhood is called WEST ADAMS. It is officially South Central. The riots were there; it is north of Watts but was on the same streetcar route; it is not on the same (or any) metro route. It is gentrifying because of the pressure on housing prices in LA. My husband's writing partner lives there. We have put in offers on two houses there (well, one was in USC, which -- has not taken care of their neighborhood at at -- USC neighborhood the houses are orgiinally nicer (and older) than those in West Adams, but the crime is terrible and the people are very very poor or often very drunk students).
There is not a house available in West Adams under a million dollars (oh yes, many of the houses are a million dollars there -- especially those in Lafayette Square where uh - blanking -- the woman made famous by the civil rights movement because she wouldn't go to the back of the bus?) which is not near an apartment building, car repair garage, package store, or the freeway itself, it seems.
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