LOS FELIZ CA

Los Feliz,

I got the job of loving you like a wild fella, drunk nights, slow walks, long dinners and jungle strolls. Poet Laureate. I gotta try the rest of the world while I can still walk around. As I pack this apartment into boxes and disappear toward somewhere tropical for a while, I want to leave you a map. Not the touristy one. The one built from years of actually living and loving here, eating here, drinking here, writing here, workshopping here, and falling in love with a neighborhood that has the goods.

So here is where to go if you want to feel what I felt.

Fave stroll: Walk the Fern Dell jungle hike up into the canyon until it spits you out at Trails Cafe. Get there hungry. Then, if your legs ain't jello, head to Vermont Canyon Tennis, right under the Greek Theatre, and smash it up with a pal for ten bucks. reserve it. Nobody in LA is getting sweaty in such a cool ass canyon.

Breakfast funz: Cafe Los Feliz makes a soujuk breakfast burrito that is honestly two meals disguised as one. Eat half, save half, thank yourself later. For my bakery jam, go to Friends and Family and get the olive oil eggs, an apple hand pie, or the heart-shaped Pop-Tart if it is in stock. Yummy wines too for a picnic. That place has a lot of writers tweaking screenplays. Hollywood! Come tweak!

Coffee Bosses. Maru is first, no contest. Second is Obet and Del's. Third is Go Get Em Tiger. Fourth is Handles, which used to be Camel?, right across from the Vista. Get the Silver Lake latte there. And for the full sensory experience, go to All Time, sit at the outdoor bar, order the butter mochi scone and the big ass salad, and watch the neighborhood feeling fancy.

Lunch shiz. El Ruso, parked on Hillhurst near the Coffee Bean. Sonoran style, handmade tortillas, the kind of food that makes you late for whatever you had planned next. Sogo aint bad either for handrolls.

Movies belong at the Vista. Best theater in all of Los Angeles. Not close.

Margarita that messed me up good: Mírate. Get the green one, and the chips and salsa, and let the giant lit up tree in the courtyard do the rest of the work.

Writing happens on Wednesday nights at the Alcove. Bring a notebook, take a table outside, let the evening slow down around you. Bring headphones.

Dive bar, no debate, is The Drawing Room. For wings and dive energy together, it's Ye Rustic Inn. Customize those wings!

For a date, take them to Kismet first, then walk it off. Or go straight for the real thing at Vandell, the best new bar in the neighborhood right now, and order the Pandan and the Smoked Tomato mezcal back to back. For wine, it's a toss up between Tabula Rasa and Covell, and honestly you should just do both in one night.

Ice cream is Jeni's. Youre done.

Dinner date, the real one, is Wildes. Get the skate and cabbage, or the crab and snap peas, or the cured trout. Any of the three will make you fall a little more in love with whoever you're sitting across from, even if they hate your guts.

For pure unfiltered fun, Jumbo's Clown Room. More gymnastics than strip nasty.

Best place to sit and let the evening open up: Barnsdall Art Park at sunset, a blanket, a bottle of... yum. Or the back patio at Tabula Rasa, especially once it gets loud after 7pm and the whole street feels like it's in on the same secret.

Late night, when the hunger hits weird hours, Fred 62 and the meatloaf.

To sit alone with a book and a slice of pie, House of Pies, any hour, any mood.

If your friends are visiting and need a place to stay, send them to Cara Hotel or Hotel Covell. Both feel like a friend's house dressed up for company.

For books, Skylight. For a skateboard, or just to remember that Walt Disney's first studio sat on that same stretch of Kingswell, go to Kingswell. I get my decks there.

That's the neighborhood, as I lived it. Thank you for letting a gondolier turned publisher turned wandering poet carry your title for a while. I'll be back. Save me a seat at the bar.