In the neighborhood

One of the benefits of unemployment is an overabundance of free time. The problem with all this free time is that most people I know work. Luckily for me my dad arrived in town Saturday night. Like me, he is also unemployed.

Those that I know who work (nearly everyone I know) sometimes look at me with wonder and awe and ask me what I do with all my free time. My guess is they can't imagine what it would be like to not be working. Truthfully, most the time I'm at Daniel's. Looking for a job, writing, blogging, etc. While my dad has been in town, however, I've been enjoying sleeping in my own bed.

My dad and I spend our days riding bikes along the ocean, going to the coffee shop five blocks from my house (he pays), taking walks, reading and lounging.

Today while biking along our usual route we decided to venture to an unfamiliar part of Long Beach: Second Street. I've lived in Long Beach for five months now. Because of my hectic schedule while working at Aerospace Company X, I never had the time or energy to do much exploring around the neighborhood. Second Street is roughly three miles away from where I live. Long enough to make a round-trip walk slightly unrealistic; short enough to feel guilty for driving. (I won't even mention the parking situation in that area.)

My dad wanted to stop at Polly's, a coffee shop on Second famous for roasting a wide variety of coffee beans. For Valentine's Day he wanted to send my sister a pound of locally roasted coffee.

Today was the second time in my life that I've been to Second Street, but I rarely remember the first. It was after a wedding, before I had moved to California. My ex-friend has a friend that bartends at Lucille's. All I remember about that night is driving a long way to get to Long Beach and having to stand in line to go to a bar that seriously had like five people in it. I had not been impressed with Long Beach or Second Street that night.

Second Street looks a lot different during the day than it does at night. For one thing, my first impression was that Second Street is one bar right after the next. I was delighted to learn today that there is so much more. There were tons of restaurants with patrons lounging at sidewalk tables. There were coffee shops and pastry shops and creperies. There were brand name stores like Banana republic and non brand name fashion boutiques. There were nail and hair salons, high end food markets, and music stores. Best of all were the niche stores like the store that sells olive oil and its derivatives and Frosted the knock-off of Sprinkles cupcakes. All this in the first four blocks--the only blocks on Second Street where we wandered.

At Polly's we bought a pound of coffee for my sister, a cup of coffee for my dad and an Cappuccino Royale (espresso with steamed chocolate milk and whipped cream) for me. At the olive oil store my dad bought a bottle of California pressed olive oil. At Frosted we went slightly hog wild buying four cupcakes.

When we finally wheeled the bikes back into my apartment two and a half hours after we had set off on our journey, my dad looked at me and with a huge smile said, Today was fun. I laughed. That's because we spent money, I said.

I probably won't go back to Second Street all that often once my dad leaves town. Second Street is wonderful. Too wonderful in fact. I've never been a good window shopper, and right now window shopping is the only type of shopping I can afford to do. So instead of drooling over Frosted cupcakes from the other side of the window, I'll try to put their close proximity and their decadent, creamy frosting out of my mind. Until I find a job, that is!