A Year in the Province, buddy

No, I'm not Peter Mayle and this is not, thankfully, the Dordogne (when WILL they learn to speak English over there?!), but as Mayle described in his books - and probably in common with just about every other emigrant - my first year in the LA area has been full of ups and downs - mainly ups, more than enough to confirm that Lynne and I made the right decision to decamp from London, England.
First the downs.
1. It has been far harder getting work over here than expected, either from local employers or British companies wanting someone they could turn to in California.
2. Health insurance has been a hassle, as expected and now as fully explored in Sicko (although Moore did not spend a lot of time on migrants, probably reckoning that we can take care of ourselves). Our company, Pasadena Media, qualifies as an employer able to offer a group health scheme. PM has begun to take on a life of its own, forcing us to account for income and expenses differently. It seems wierd filing an expenses claim to yourself, mulling it over for all of two seconds and then deciding, yes, this claim is fully justified. I have also had a call from Dun & Bradstreet, no less, to get information so they can rate PM's credit - and, I suspect, to try and sell a copy of their directory. PM may also count as an employer for the purposes of getting more Brits over here on employment visas. So who knows where it will lead - Rupert Murdoch watch out!
3. Taxes have been higher than expected. Not sales tax, which runs out at a tolerable 8.25% compared with 17.5% UK VAT. Income tax is not much different from the UK, with more offsets allowed: the sheer joy of being able to claim for drinks, meals and entertaining (banned these 36 years in Britain). So what, then? The main surprise has been property tax, which is tied to the price you pay for your house. The good news is that it is then fixed for as long as you stay at that address, but then you are piling up a capital gain which - unlike UK - can be taxable. I expect it will settle down, and I'll get used to it, but forget the idea that the US is a low-tax country.
4. Utilities are about as poor as in Britain. Special venom reserved for Charter, a virtual monopoly supplier of phone, cable TV and internet. Call center rubbish, service times awful. Plumbers, electricians, locksmiths etc very hit and miss, some great, some terrible, some disappear and never come back.
And that's about it for the downs, not too many really.
The ups.
1. The weather. Another myth is that southern California is a land of eternal sunshine. Not so. Plenty of wind and rain through the winter, and in high summer (like now) it can get a little too hot for comfort. In between, though, pretty good, especially compared with the floods and gales Britain has been having to put up with.
2. Lifestyle. Very relaxed, with a low cost and high standard of living. You can live very cheaply here without cutting corners. Of course, you can splash out on $100-a-head restaurant meals, but there are plenty of good places at half that or less, and the supermarkets offer a good variety - even before Tesco opens up this autumn.
3. Good social life. We have been very lucky to be introduced to some lovely people, mainly through our great friend Libby. It could have so easily worked out differently, but there are plenty of bars and restaurants in Pasadena where we have bumped into people and made friends - and our estate agent, Mark Ogden, has been a good pal too, so even without our huge slice of luck the local people are generally open to newcomers. English accent doesn't hurt in that respect, along with tales of the Old Country, who is this Gordon Brown, why does David Beckham have such a squeaky voice, etc.
4. Plenty to see and do. I slightly take this for granted, having been over here on holiday for so many years and done most of the trips and sights, but it's a great part of the country for days out, exploring and just getting around - freeways are much underestimated, anti-social as they are. And it will be even better when LA gets a decent transport system. Almost worth a separate point on its own, but a special category of 'see and do' is the whole Hollywood thing. Hollywood Boulevard is on the up and up (frenetic club scene there at night) and the Egyptian is always hosting seasons of specialist films such as noir and horror. The studios seem to be very co-operative with providing excellent prints of old films, and actors from these movies often turn up to do Q and As about what it was like to work with the stars.
5. Stimulating creative environment. They may come to nothing, but I've been writing song lyrics and working on a novel based in Pasadena. There's just a lot to work with here, and I believe that if people aren't handing out work you just have to get up and get on with something yourself.
So that's a narrow-looking 5-4 win, but in my opinion the ups heavily outweigh the downs, most of which are temporary while the ups will endure. I still like visiting London, but two weeks is quite enough and so far I've been relieved to watch London vanishing in the jumbo jet's slipstream. I'll be interested to see how much that has changed a year from now.