Hey, Jack Kerouac

Oh, yeah - one of those blog posts? Which I was going to write about? Yeah, I just remembered, and all this went down right around the holidays, so in the madness, I never got around to writing about it.

Sometime in December, Sweet Dub called me up at work and totally out of the blue, said, "So, how do you feel about Vancouver?"

"It's supposed to be beautiful," I said. "I've been wanting to visit. So what, to live there?"

"Yeah, it looks like I might get a job offer," he said. "But I told them I'd have to talk to you first."

"Yeah," I said. "Okay, why not. Vancouver."

"Are you serious?" he said. "You would actually just pick up and move?"

"Why not?" I said.

"Wow," he said. "Okay, I'll talk to you later."

As it turns out, we are not moving to Vancouver, because for one thing, as his trusted boss says, "Nobody moves from Hollywood to Vancouver." Sweet Dub is in the movie bidness, and while Vancouver has been nicknamed Hollywood North* due to all the production and post-production there, it is still not as happening as Hollywood itself. It seems he would be less busy than he is here and probably not the best move. Also, since who knows if I would be able to work there, they'd have to offer him quite a stack of cheese in order to make it viable for us. And furthermore, after researching Vancouver in an admittedly cursory way, it appears that there are maybe two black people in the entire city. Perhaps that is a lowball estimate, but even given that Canada does not have the same complicated history with black people that the U.S. does, I don't know that I'd feel comfortable there. And if Viva and Sweet Dub and I get stares and invasive questions in greater Los Angeles, I can only imagine what it would be like there. This is not to say that Vancouver is not diverse; it has a sizeable Chinese population (29%), with some South Asians and Filipinos thrown in there for good measure. Its black population is 0.9%. Yeah, you read that right.

I'd still like to visit, but for now, I guess we're staying put. I was kind of excited to have an adventure -- whee, new things, new places, new people, free health insurance! -- but maybe something else will turn up. If nothing else, this lets us know that options are out there and that Sweet Dub is a valuable commodity** -- this was not an opportunity he sought out, they came to him. Yeah, that's right. Sweet Dub is the shizzle!

* Not North Hollywood. Completely different.

** I mean, we knew that already, but I think this whole escapade at least reinforced that with the upper management of his company. Maybe they will find or create another internal opportunity for him.