<p>You scared me. Why would you need to buy a house when you spent so much of your time away from home checking out restaurants, looking for grafitti, visiting open houses and model homes. If you have your lap top set up in your vehicle like Troop then you could live in your car and save rent and mortgage. </p>
<p>I'll need to find a model with a shower and enough juice to power an 1800 watt hair dryer. </p>
<p>The graffitti I drove by on my way to work. When my old job was going to transfer me to LA, I (briefly) considered the Lennar project next to the train station. While it's nice to be close to the train station, that location is a POS for any other purpose (except, perhaps for supplying drugs to the surrounding neighbors). Now I drive by it and count my lucky stars.</p>
<p>Between my husband and me, we have worked near Rancho D for many, many years now, although I only found it about five years ago. I liked Pollo d'Oro, too, but my husband said it wasn't as good as it used to be.</p>
<p>Next up: IHB meeting at Rancho De Mendoza so Effen can do his Mexican Food review. </p>
<p>"Most decaying cities promote live/work lofts to drive out the hood rats socially and economically."</p>
<p>In the old days, I believe the mafia used to serve this function. They would buy up the depressed/decayed areas for real cheap, chase out the hoodlums (or make them "disappear") and then gentrify.</p>
<p>I imagine it was a very efficient way to clean up a part of the city. However, then you would be paying higher grocery bills as the mafia would force protection services on the merchants. A "clean-up" tax on local citizens, if you will, and done for a lot less than it would have taken the government to do it, so the mafia would argue.</p>
