Pretend I'm Carting You Around On A Rickshaw

My room... she is complete!

Yesterday I found a place for all my personal belongings in the new pad. You should be, like, so impressed. My old apartment was a two-story shit-hole apartment-mansion (hyphens-rule) and my flatmates and I had an entire year to accumulate enough crap to fill that giant, vacuous space. I was concerned that I wouldn't be able to scale things back... as the popular saying goes, you can't re-condense the soup once you've added one can of water.

Soup has so much to teach us about ourselves and the world around us.

The concern was legitimate since I'm working with a lot less. For one thing, the kitchen, dining room and living room are all one entity... and it only counts as a living room because I had nowhere else to put my books and printer. It would be more fitting to call it a kitchen and dining room with books and a printer. Because while you're waiting for that spaghetti vermicelli bean thread from the Ai Hoa Market to boil, you might want to brush up on your Jorge Luis Borges, or else peruse the Final Cut Pro 7 guidebook for quick tips on how to create that gnarly skater video you and your friend with the dislocated shoulder and the Rock Star™ tattoo have been talking about. This could be his big break, man!

Other than the three fractures in his tibiaAMIRIGHTYOUGUYZ?

But, surprisingly, everything in the apartment has a proper place and it feels very comfortable without being cluttered. My room is like a jigsaw puzzle of shelves, decorative boxes and dual-purpose furniture. It took the place of the half-finished Sudoku puzzle I tore out of the Pennysaver, except it didn't end in frustration and the private shame that I was outwitted by a picture of a square.

I am quite happy here, in case that hasn't been made explicit. Especially now that the whole kit n' caboodle is put together and I'm not tripping over cardboard boxes filled with office supplies from the Dollar Tree, I feel very zen about this whole situation.

Hey, 'zen'. That's a Chinese word, and therefore the opportunity to flawlessly segue into my musings about Chinatown.

Here's the thing.

Chinatown.
Effing.
RULES.

How can I put this. If the main street of Chinatown is a strand of DNA, it's built of endless combinations of the following nucleobases: curio shops, cheap Asian markets, Chinese/Pho restaurants, bakeries, boba shops, and places that sell mysterious medicinal herbs out of large wooden barrels. And then every now and then some sort of institutional building like a bank, temple or "brotherhood association" whose function I still probably wouldn't understand even if I could read Chinese characters.

The main strip-- that's Broadway-- is the hub designed for tourists, but the "authentic" aspect definitely seeps through as well. On the one hand, you've got the bedazzling central plaza which is decked out with really cool Chinese-architecture-looking buildings, hanging lanterns, and a sick wishing well that actually labels what you can wish for.

Toto, I don't think we're on Broadway anymore.

I'm not seeing the "self-automated laser fingernails" sign anywhere...

But then you walk past places like Superior Poultry, which has a heavily gated area beside it that I can only assume is full of live (but not for long) chickens.

Cock of the walk --> cock on the block.

The side streets are oodles more restaurants, markets and shops that are a little more low-key. Having been here less than a week I'm not going to pretend I fully understand what goes on in like half of these buildings-- especially once you get off the main strip the stores stop providing the convenience of English characters, or they will but they'll be selling a gold-foiled tin labeled "Pearl dragon powder" or something.

Chinatown is also awesome not only because of what it is but where it's located. My apartment is like a 15-20 minute walk from Olvera St., and you know what that means...

LUCHAAAAAAAAAAAA

Also tacos.

I haven't hit up Little Tokyo since I've been here, but that's also extremely close, about a half hour walk I believe. I've been there a couple times with a friend and it's pretty great. Like Chinatown plopped inside of downtown LA with sushi instead of roasted duck corpses.

If I wasn't vegetarian I'd say these guys look DUCK-LICIOUS AHAHAHAHAHAQUACKQUACKQUACKQUACK

Downtown LA is also about a 10-minute bus ride away, for anyone looking to drink and possibly throw up on the amenities of the DTLA Public Parklets.

Exercise bikes installed on the sidewalk = fodder for SO many bad ideas after 3am.

Chinatown doesn't have very many bars, but I went with a friend to my first Chinatown bar the other night called the Melody Lounge. It was a delightful little dive bar with ambiance out the wazoo and around 30 beers on tap.

Caution: hanging lanterns are even MORE bad ass than they appear.

Apparently they do karaoke there, too, so... all I'm saying is, they'd better have "Angel is a Centerfold" or else I'm going to attempt rap songs drunk again.

Why did nobody tell me "Jump Around" by House of Pain was a poor back-up?!