Everything as Fuck

SO YOU’RE NEW to Portland. Congratulations! In six months you get to start complaining about how the city has changed—AND NOT FOR THE BETTER. In a year you can sneer at people who just moved here from Ohio. In fact, the VERY MOMENT you move to Portland you can start acting like you’re better than people who have spent their whole lives in Beaverton/Gresham/Tigard. You’re basically a born-and-bred Oregonian now. You’re Portland’s finest. So that means there’s only one thing left to do: Move to Los Angeles.

Yeah! That’s right. You’ve put in your time in Portland, and now it’s time to move on. This town is getting stale, right? It’s small potatoes, honestly. It’s fucking small, locally grown, GMO-free fingerling potatoes. You deserve big fucking gnarly potatoes. You deserve Los Angeles potatoes.

All of the best things to come out of Portland have moved to Los Angeles. Bill Walton won a championship with the Trail Blazers, and then it was off to the Clippers—and yeah, they played in San Diego at the time, but the dude went south and so must you. Everclear wanted to buy you a big house way up in the West Hills (the West Hills are those hills to the west, you know? They’re the only thing protecting you from the suburbs. They’re like the wall in Game of Thrones. I bet you fucking love Game of Thrones. Move to fucking LA.), but Everclear also wants to swim out past the breakers in Santa Monica. You should do that, Brandon (probably)! It’s time! Salt & Straw expanded to LA; Stumptown has a shop down there; and Pok Pok too.

Ron Funches moved to LA, so did I, and we work in television now. Don’t you want to work in television? You’ve lived in Portland for like three months, so by now I’m sure you’re complaining about Portlandia, and why shouldn’t you? That’s not the Portland you grew up in! How dare comedians reduce something to a joke? Instead of complaining about a show on IFC, why not take a meeting with IFC? I’ve had several meetings with IFC, Funches too—so get down here, because they’ll DEFINITELY give you one. You could pitch a show about Portland! Just sit across from the executive and say, “It’s like Parks and Rec in a food cart,” over and over again until the skies darken and the air grows thick with the pungent stench of sulfur and the waves crash blood red against the ground-bone beaches.

Holy shit, where are you going to keep your Peabody Award? Probably somewhere in LA, where you now live. Look, the truth is, you’ll always look fondly back on your time in Portland, but it was time to move on, onto something bigger and better, onto a city that’s more diverse and less obsessed with bikes, and not full of so many hipsters, and just… just a fucking city, not a big small town, you know? So you’re new to Portland. Congratulations! Now get the fuck out. 
@IanKarmel