Five Months and a few days

Head west young man...I did and just in the nick of time. Five months and about a week ago, two days before the birthday that would require me to check a new box, I woke up for the last time in the apartment that I had known as home since nearly the day I graduated college.

As much as I love New york and where so many amazing experiences and people came into my life, it just wasn't feeling right anymore. About 4 years ago I started doing the bi-coastal thing and whenever I would come home, I just wasn't as happy as I should have been. Despite all the friends I had and all things to do in the city, I just wasn't into it.

Using what I commonly refer to as "Carrie Bradshaw logic," I had cheated on my city and it was over. Now we just had to figure out if we could remain friends. That question is still to be answered. But I'm thinking we can co-exist. Stay tuned.

So after 10 years of riding in the back of taxis, being crammed like a sardine on the subway, having regular meltdowns at Duane Reade, and more or less spending the first half of 2009 being holed up on West 73rd street, it was time for head to Hollywood for good, or at least the summer.

Thanks to the recession and few other elements out of my control, business was in the gutter and I had no clue what the immediate future would bring. I did know that if I was going to be broke and trying to figure out what was next, I'd rather be doing in it LA than spending the summer sitting in my apartment feeling sorry for myself.

So with nothing more than my computer, blackberry, ipod, and some summer clothes, that didn't even fit since I all had done for the past few months was watch TV and order in from seamless web (I was fat), I got on a Virgin America flight at 730am on May 23rd said what up to Peter Davis and the rest is history.

Now just a few short months later life is more than back on track. I'm living in LA full time business is booming and most importantly I'm happy. Tan and Happy.

I sleep (ok,maybe not enough) but better than I ever did in NY. I don't remember the last time i tossed and turned or had to hop on the ambien express, which for someone who just a few months ago could tell you verbatim the entire line up of Time Warner's late night/early am programming, it's mind blowing. I go to the gym daily (some times more than once) and in NY I didn't even have to go outside to go and I never went. I always have something to do and I can take $100 bucks out of the atm on Tuesday and still have 40 left in my wallet by Saturday.

On a recent trip back to NY I realized that the little life I've created in LA works for me and I don't see myself ever going back.

I don't want to fight all the time; for a cab, for a seat on the subway, for table, with the co-op board for leaving an umbrella outside my apartment, it's not just a good way to live. Everyone is so angry and stressed.

One of the great things about LA is that everyone is doing their own thing and for the most part people seem happy, even if they aren't they pretend they are. So when I am walking to get my starbucks at 6am before heading to the gym dressed in what looks like a summer camp uniform (navy shorts and white t-shirt) singing along to my ipod, nobody seems to care. They either aren't paying in attention or they flash a smile. That doesn't happen in NY, I'd get the same kind of stares that the crackhead sifting through the trash get.

I was in Times Square about two weeks ago around 8:30 in the morning running around getting ready for this editor event and everyone looked so sad. Getting out of the packed subway car to go sit in their cube to work like a dog for the next 8 hours to go back to the little box they live in.

It's just not living, people need to have space and feel like they can breathe. I have an outdoor space bigger than the apartment I lived in. I have a desk outside where I can sit and work wearing just a bathing swim suit (if i want to, and I do) and can get more done by noon in LA than an entire day in NY.

I don't mean to sound like I hate New York cause I don't, I really don't. In New York it's just that you're at the mercy of everyone and have to rely on people for everything. People who aren't the people you need to be interacting with, cab drivers, store clerks, baristas, delivery people. And everyone wants a tip. For 10 years I tipped the porter at Christmas along with the other 15 people on my building's list I still after all these years I don't know what a porter does, other than that I must have given him about 1000 bucks over the years.

Now if I could only figure out a way to to have Pat Kiernan fill me in on what's "In the papers," when I wake up every morning now that would be amazing, almost as amazing as having a deck bigger than your old apartment where you can work and get tan at the same time.

Some statistics:
Square Footage in NY 355
Square Footage in LA 12,050

Clients May 2009 1.5
Clients Nov 2009 12 + 2 projects

Weight
05.23.09 187lbs
11.01.09 162lbs

Excuse me, I gotta run to target real quick, I need to get some more suntan lotion, between my hike and going to the pool, I think I'll run out before tomorrow and I am playing tennis tomorrow afternoon and won't have time to go tonight since I've got that premiere and then tomorrow is just crazy with work, taping a segment, meetings, and that lunch in Burbank.




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