A whole bunch of catch up

Thoughts running through my mind while watching the planes overhead in the LAX cell phone lot…

Wow, planes are cool. It’s not often that you get to see them go directly overhead. But somehow the smart people at the LAX airport put their new cell phone lot directly under the flight path of landing planes. I just dropped Kevin off for his flight back to Denver and am now waiting for Liz to land in an hour. A few hours to kill, and with LA traffic, by the time I get anywhere, I’ll just have to turn around and go back. So here I sit. But luckily the jets buzzing overhead make for great entertainment.

Oh, quick update, Kevin blog pages written = 11. Grad paper on Jamaica needed to gradute = 1 hand written + 1 typed page. For those of you keeping track, that means Kevin has actually written 1 page of the paper since leaving Boston. But it also means that the blog has been fantastically updated and people have been entertained from coast to coast.

Haven’t heard “Party Like A Rock Star” in months, but have now heard it twice in 3 minutes (on 2 different stations).

It’s amazing how fast the past 2 weeks have flown by. I can’t believe it was 2 weeks ago that Kevin and I set out on the Mass Pike heading west and didn’t stop till we reached the Pacific Ocean. We were talking about it on the ride to the airport- how insanely fast the time has passed. We did so much, had a great time, and now it’s already time for him to head back home.

It’s hard to put into words how amazing the past 2 weeks have been. You hear about people who have driven cross country, and everyone has their own stories, and I have tons that I’ll try to relay here in the coming weeks as I have time. But the totality of the whole thing is really what’s starting to sink in. Leaving Boston, traveling to new cities, seeing new roads, meeting new people, skiing in Vail in a giant snow storm in April (what are the odds of that?!), the beauty of the Canyonlands in Utah, arriving in LA, apartment hunting- all in 2 weeks.

Man do I have a lot of pictures. Digital cameras are the best because you can just keep snapping. And I’ve tried to toss up a few here and there, and thanks to everyone who has mentioned they’ve seen them (it always helps to know that people are actually reading this!), but we haven’t even gotten to put up a lot from the trip. I’ll do my best to organize and post a few, hopefully they will be interesting to people and they won’t be a whole bunch of “had to be there” pictures.

Apartment hunting stinks! When we arrived on Monday, I was cautiously optimistic that I could find a place within a few days. My office is at the corner of Wilshire & 405, right next to UCLA in an area of LA called Westwood. It’s a nice area, lots of restaurants, shops, etc. But to live, I wanted another unique area. Through e-mails with some friends of friends who already lived in LA, I was told that the best places to look around that area are Brentwood, East Santa Monica & West LA. So I narrowed my search to those areas on Craigslist, Westside Rentals (a local apartment listing service) and good ol’ fashioned driving around.

We seem to have arrived at a good time because there are a TON of places! My criteria started off as $1500-2000 for a 2 bedroom with patio/balcony, central AC, in-unit washer/dryer and ability to install DirecTV (gotta have the NFL Sunday Ticket!).

From driving around the various areas, I quickly grew to like East Santa Monica the best. It’s absolutely gorgeous, close to the beach, lots of restaurants & shops, warm neighborhoods, the type of place you immediately feel comfortable in. But even within that, I was amazed at the difference a few blocks can make. Click the link below to see the 4 “finalists”.

Click here to see the Google Map

Within this area, south of Santa Monica Blvd quickly becomes seedy. Between Santa Monica & Wilshire Blvd is ok and then between Wilshire & Montana Ave is ideal. I learned very fast to look for “north of Wilshire” in apartment listings. Then for east/west, anything closer to the beach than 7th St (it’s sequential from the beach, just goes up as you move inland) is too expensive and parking on the street is tough. Then between 7th and 14th St in beautiful, and 7th to 20th is great too. So I had a mental box created with streets as borders – Montana on the north, Wilshire on the south, 7th on the west and 20th on the east. Once I had that narrowed, it really helped.

And from looking at the $1500-2000 range, you would either get a decent-ish 1-bedroom or a small 2-bedroom with lime green bathrooms from the 1970’s. Not the best. So I started playing around with slightly higher prices in the on-line searches, and it quickly became apparent that an extra $2-300 makes a big difference.

After seeing aprx 40 apartments this week, and snapping only once (sorry Liz!) it’s been narrowed down to 4 finalists. If you care to see the pictures, click below. If not, you’re not missing much. They look like empty apartments.

931 Euclid St, #102

1040 Euclid St, #9

932 10th St, #2

601 California St, #206

I’m amazed at the variety of appliances in these places. The cook top seems to be common place in California with the oven separately in the wall. There are some ancient appliances. Seriously, how these things work is amazing to me. I’ll have to take some pictures just of the appliances. 1970’s at least.

The front runner is 931 Euclid #102. If they come down on price slightly, I’ll definitely get it. If not, we’ll see what happens. One of the others has already come down, it seems to really be a renter’s market. There’s just so much on the market, and all 4 are currently vacant. Owners seem willing to deal, especially if it’s been vacant for a few weeks.

That’s the update for now. It’s been a whirlwind 2 weeks, and I’m only getting started in LA. Hopefully this weekend I can lock into a place and at least have that taken care of. New job begins on Monday, so lots of excitement there!