The LA Years: I’d like my Old Fashioneds to cost $6, please

I think a lot of people justify living in LA, despite its issues, because they think it’s fun. They find it a busy place with lots of fun things to do. You’re never bored, the city is alive, there’s always something going on, blah blah blah. I could not have found this further from the truth.

I’m not sure where these fun things were supposedly happening. I suppose they’re happening underneath where the blimps are circling… but that’s probably an hour’s drive away. and I’m probably too poor to get in to it. And every time there was a fun thing, it was a logistical nightmare. An hour of driving. $60 parking (not an exaggeration). 50% too many people in the vicinity.

I won’t recount the story of the time my sister and I went to John Mulaney at the Forum and sat for 45 minutes in the parking line just to get to the front and be told it cost $60. Because that’s the whole story.

There was one time where I did get invited out with some friends from work. We went to the Magic Castle, which is an invite-only (you have to know somebody!) place that was only 2 minutes from my apartment, where you can get food and drinks from a couple different bars, and you walk around and see magic shows all night. Sounds like a very exclusive and ~cool~ place to spend an evening in ~Hollywood~, right?? And overall, I had a fun time! It was a reason to dress up, I carpooled with my friend and it was only a 2 minute drive. The magic was fun to see!

The craziest part of the evening, however, was when we stopped at the basement bar for a show. I was told that the magician making the drinks made a great Old Fashioned, so I ordered one. I thought he might do a magic trick while he made it or something, but instead he just made a regular, very standard Old Fashioned. Then he slid it across the bar to me, with the receipt that said it was twenty four dollars. Twenty four dollars. For a single Old Fashioned. Sorry… I’m from the Midwest, where you can find an Old Fashioned for $6, and max $14 if you’re at a nice place in the city. When I visited home and told people about this, the literal punchline of the story was “the old fashioned was $24,” and people laughed.

*It’s worth noting that this has nothing to do with cost of living. I make more now than I did then, living in the Midwest, and the drinks are all still a reasonable price. That drink cost $24 because I was probably supposed to feel honored I was even given the chance to pay for it.

I cannot think of a drink worth $24. But it was too late, I had to pay. I tried to savor it while he performed his show, but all I was thinking was how the greatest magic trick he performed was the robbery that took place before everyone’s eyes.

I switched to gin and tonics for the rest of the evening, in the hopes of saving money. The gin and tonics were $16. That may have been even worse, because it was a shot of gin, tonic water, and lime. We were there for about 4 hours, so I had probably 4 drinks. So that was $72 on drinks. $86 including tips. In one evening. And I didn’t even have to pay for parking, or an entry fee. Seventy-two dollars!!! Just to have an evening out and have a few very standard drinks!! I truly don’t know how anyone can financially have a social life in LA. I’m sure it would have cost me $8 per drink just to have Diet Coke all evening. I know some bars/clubs charge entry fees too, so I really don’t know how anyone ever goes out.

Needless to say… I didn’t go out much. When everything cost too much to do, I became good at coming up with things that cost little-to-no money. (That meant a lot of walking trails.) But I also got an AMC A-List membership so that I could go see as many movies as I wanted, and I scoped out the AMCs that had the best free parking. So that became about the only thing I did. I would frequently go out to movies just so I could sit in a dark, air-conditioned room and then have something to talk to my coworkers about. I made it my mission (that continues to this day) to see as many movies in theaters as possible, to justify the membership. And to get out of the house!

And I enjoyed that! Really! But when you are paying the money and suffering the other difficulties of LA, it feels as though you should get some benefits to make it all worth it. I know for a lot of people, they say those benefits are in the nightlife and everyday happenings of the city. The opportunities for exciting things. Frankly… Most events that went on were overcrowded, involved a line, or were a weird letdown because everyone there was just there to say they went and take a photo. Lots of bizarre influencer events that were just photo-op backdrops that people waited in line for. And usually, events just caused traffic nightmares for your daily life. Really just a lose-lose-lose.

I enjoyed the concerts, and I enjoyed the movie theaters. I enjoyed hanging out with my friends on the few occasions we were able to. But the cost and hassle of most things never matched up to the level of enjoyment I got. It’s just amazing to me that I could live in a city where supposedly everything was happening and still feel as if my only options to leave the house were a hike or the movie theater!

But I’ll stop complaining now. Today’s recipe is a $6 Old Fashioned. It really only cost $3 to make at home, but a bar might charge $6. I’m really thinking of one specific bar in Wisconsin that makes an Old Fashioned just like this – even here in Minneapolis you probably would get charges $12-$14 for an Old Fashioned. But not TWENTY FOUR DOLLARS. So here’s the recipe for the cheapest classic Old Fashioned:

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