Betwixting My USA INTERIM part 2: L.A. can be dangerous!

SO I’m Back in the USA, as somebody once nearly sang. Los Angeles is magnificent in oh so many ways, but can be perilous to ones emotional and physical health. Read on I say and THEN we’ll talk Turkey (though I won’t be going there this trip)…..

FIRSTLY. Let’s talk toilets again Dear Reader.
Water levels way too high leading to, well you can imagine! Why? No idea. Neither do they! Greyhound bus toilets? Some of the worst on Earth and I’ve BEEN to India now and they’re occasionally worse than there. Occasionally. Usually much cleaner though…..

SECONDLY Let’s talk Comedy Sandwiches.
A club sandwich in LA came with three layers of ham, two of chicken, Swiss cheese, American cheese, beef tomatoes, lettuce, mayo, ketchup and five pieces of crispy bacon on the top. And let’s not even get into burgers but just say they’re measured in feet. Heart bypasses? Make it a triple please, and hold the mayo.

THIRDLY. Thoughts of Los Angeles. Winter 31 degrees glorious blue skies. Muscly boys in tight short shorts walking dogs picking up poo in regularly located dog poo bags. Topless boys on free scooters. Heaps of older and not so old vagrants on buses and subways carrying their home with them in huge bags bin liners and trolleys, like tortoises carting around their abodes. Cheerful largely Hispanic waiters/waitresses topping up your water and coffee regularly. Subzero temperatures in cinemas during movies. Happy Hours everywhere despite the fact people genuinely seem happy all the time kinda like a lot of Australia….

SUNDAY NIGHT ON WeHo (West Hollywood Santa Monica Boulevard) LGBTQ+ strip. Or most nights. Drag shows which are frankly hilarious and superb, the waft of cannabis legal of course and smiley people willing to chat. Oh and apparently all beautiful according to my pix! Brilliant bar staff everywhere and a plethora of high quality enormous video screens showing “sports” and Music Videos….often there are also a few rather fit gogo dancers encouraging dollar bills to be handed over….

Only here for two weeks, so what else This Trip? Went to three gigs by my pals, plus Eddie Izzard doing solo Hamlet….all stunning. Jake’s gigs are a residency lasting 15 years (I think Jake) and Charlie’s was in Heaven Knows Where a one horse village where the horse has done a runner…somewhere up past the hills and then keep going….

Hollywood happily touristy, lovely jubbly warm winter weather…. Food? Lots of (close to Mexico) Mexican plus lots of the usual… the beaches nearby still uniformly gorgeous…. and truly, still folks keen on a Hollywood career waiting tables…..

Then there’s driverless cars everywhere with weird round things on the top rotating….there’s little delivery bots on every street with cute names….there’s security guards letting in us older folk without ID (unlike other places in the US)….oh and then there’s ROMANCE….

Romance???? Ok well here we go….here WeHo.. fell in love proper with hugs cuddles kisses angst tears laughter and lots of texts…maybe the 45 years age difference was a wee bit too much, took me so by surprise it was genuine but of course ridiculous….unless er….….also kinda fell briefly (only one day) in lurve in Sydney with a guy with wife and kid, in an Irish bar …Gawd think about him every day though still, Hot Dang! This 69 year old is STILL a romantique….

The former am still in touch with but but…..

But realising that I’m too old to move here, and the house I fancy is $19 million…it’s very very sadly time to make a move, neatly having my visit topped and tailed (started and finished) by my most dear buddy and collaborator Richard plus new wife Alex, thence to my Chicago changeover, via a tortuous 2 day train journey and thence thither and therewith an horrific 10 hour bus trip to the latest bucket list location: NASHVILLE!

Amtrak train was fun, got some sleep in my sleeper and met the fabulous ex Vietnam (“I got shot”!) ex lawyer Hunter who really REALLY told me what he thought about the incumbent (Great GREAT Incumbent) President.. also had a gorgeous gentle couple of chats with the gentle Mark from Dublin who gave me useful tips about the forthcoming Nashville….. the horrible Greyhound Bus journey was vile though with a 25 stoner pushing me constantly outta my seat, and was overnight with at least one Hitleresque Driver: “I’m not TELLING YOU AGAIN, PASSENGERS”….but despite having a massive Rail Network thru to there, tis only fraught with freight…no rail is bad trail IMHO.

NASHVILLE. Nashville though, well the music in the literally 50 bars along the Broadway Music strip all is provided by the greatest live performances you’ll ever see…The Grand Ole Opry theatre was also extra special with THEIR 100th anniversary Country show….and honestly it’s not really touristy at all either….pure utter joy. Then it was the turn of someone else to apparently fall in love (well, fall in like more like) with me! In the wonderful Tribe Bar, Steven and I had a great great time followed by a few nights later watching a hilarious drag show accompanied by a fabulous young lady called Mallory! Simply hilarious and lovely…..the drag was mad too!

Studio Tours (Elvis and Dolly recorded tons here) and Country Music museums accompany the fiddles banjos pedal steel laptops and croony dreamy vocals with appropriate aplomb. (What is a plomb by the way, non-Existent Ed.)

Great barboy T-Shirt “Still can’t find her G-Chord”.

Now this is all sounding extra smug and not too funny.. well, I’ve been away nearly five months so why not???

USA is all it purports to be. I’m glad I’m a slightly hippy capitalist cos America wouldn’t be as great as it really is if the West Wasn’t. Plus I’m bored with Owen Jones rhetoric no matter how correct he is. Obviously IT IS GOING THROUGH ISSUES. But the best bits are Simply the best (thank you Tina) I think. Many of you Dear Reader and Co may prefer other places like European Cities with vast amounts of history and culture, or Far Eastern countries with temples galore and traditions. Me? Nah. I’m all about Hollywood and Stonewall, of cute sweet chatty blonde eyes blue haired boys with extra white toothy smiles, of the Grand Ole Opry and Canyon, of landscapes beyond yer M25s and yer Champs Élyssés, though I’ll always whack a vast swathe of British Music atop that….and ok I miss UK sarcasm, but just not much TBH. Had enough trubble at t’Mill methinks….

Do I miss a quiet English pub? If I had a partner or was in England with the besties, maybe yes maybe. To be sure to be sure though, I probably prefer the Irish ones in Australia, another place I have fallen in love in and with. Not that a nice few pints with my beloved Denise in Skipton won’t be most welcome soon nor bubbles either with the gang….

Having said ALL THAT….Toilets? Sort out yer water levels Auntie Samantha! America will have to do better…

I leave Los Angeles and Nashville with a heart heavy and a whining pedal steel guitar constantly breaking it, plus a hope that the final month of my trip warms up from currently -4 deg C in Chicago and —8 deg C in New York, and that story will be the final Betwixt in this almost never ending sago. With way too much sugar. Phews Galore eh???? Windy City, here we come….BRING ON THE GREYHOUND.

Love Christoph, February 2026, Nashville, Tennessee

PS Greyhound Coach back in daylight much better despite DRIVER WITH ATTITUDE… I ask a question, get a mumbled “hag dunno catfish ramma lamma coz” back, sometimes twice…