I have a friend coming into town this weekend. Nice enough guy; we worked at the college newspaper together, then again at The Sporting News. Depending on who you talk to, he either a) made me aware of the job, or b) was the reason I got hired (a: me, b: everybody else). He’s now a big-shot columnist at USA Today, though I’ve always felt his mug shot looked kinda doofy (no, he’s not Larry King, dammit).

Save for one guy who happened to be out here for something else and my friend Chris, who visited on a weekend when she was desperately needed, and my pals Mike and Joan, also from the college newspaper, he’s the first person to come out since I moved to New York. (OK, so maybe he’s the fourth person, but I needed an easy segue into the column). And, as one might expect, he’s out here not to visit me, really, but to visit the city.

It’s somewhat surprising to me, actually. Being from the Midwest, a vast flat land full of nothing particularly significant, save for a couple of places Abe Lincoln once used the crapper, I’m aware that people there are looking to escape at any opportunity. And nothing’s a better sell than New York, save for maybe Los Angeles.

When I lived in L.A., I had, let’s see, seven visitors. Some were welcome: My sister trotted out there to get a tattoo on her 18th birthday - a huge-ass butterfly across her stomach, an adornment my parents for some reason blame me for - cousin Denny visited twice and my friends Andy and Kyla came out to celebrate their recent engagement. But there was one guy ...

His name was John Lalande. (If you happen to know John, whom I haven’t talked to in almost two years, make sure to forward this column to him, so the little shit knows I haven’t forgotten.) I’d gone to college with John, and we had a few mutual friends, but I never particularly cared much for the guy. He was spineless and had a tendency to trash you behind your back (I, of course, do the same thing, but I’m better at not being caught). Upon graduation, I figured I’d never run into the guy again, and I felt none the worse for it.

About 10 months into my one-year stay in L.A., I received an e-mail from Mr. Lalande. He mentioned that he would be out my way in a month or so, and he thought we should hang out. I could swing that, I told him, just let me know, we’ll grab a drink or something. He ended up calling about a week later, and his “out my way” had suddenly morphed into, hey, would it be OK if I stayed with you while I’m out there? Another week, and it had degraded further, into, hey, let’s just hang out that week - you can show me around.

In other words, I had to play the cordial host to a guy I didn’t even like doing things I didn’t want to do, for a week. He postponed the trip for one more week, a pivotal move; in that week, I learned I’d notched the job at The Sporting News and had just nine more days to stay in Los Angeles, to say goodbye to the old gang. And seven of those freaking days would be with John Lalande.

People often ask me, now that I’ve professed an immediate deep and lasting love to New York City, what I thought of Los Angeles. My social group in Los Angeles consisted of my roommates and co-workers Marisa and Lynda, and the Film Nerds, a bunch of people who had gone to USC film school with Tim, my best friend from Mattoon. They were wonderful human beings, just crazy smart, and when I found out I was leaving, I knew I’d miss them all terribly. They were my favorite part of Los Angeles, the people who were my crutches when the ex-fiancée left, lifelong compadres. Leaving them saddened me greatly.

My least favorite part of Los Angeles: Fucking Hollywood Walk of Fame. My God, I bet I saw that stupid thing 30 times. Every single person who came into town ... let’s see the Hollywood Walk of Fame, oooh, it’s George Burns, oooh, it’s Alec Baldwin, oooh, look how small Lillian Gish’s hands were, hey Will, do you know who Lillian Gish is?

Every damned person who visited wanted to see the blasted Hollywood Walk of Fame and Mann’s Chinese Theatre. Now, if you haven’t been to Los Angeles, you might not know that the area surrounding the Walk of Fame is the dirtiest, nastiest, cheesiest, most tourist-infested place on the planet, and I’d be surprised if Neptune has much that can compare, too. It’s a bunch of morons with Hawaiian shirts, mullets and excessive chest hair, putzing around with cameras and snickering about that Rock Hudson exhibit. Best way to describe the Walk of Fame: Right next door, there is a wax museum. If you ever meet anyone who willingly wants to visit a wax museum, neuter them immediately as a civic duty.

Well, guess what John wanted to see. Like every other first-time-to-L.A. visitor, he wanted to see the Walk of Fame, and the place that was in Swingers, and the planetarium, and the part of the beach with the most people and syringes. I spent my last week in Los Angeles showing some idiot around town, and thanks to an upcoming

“cross your fingers drink this stuff you’ll be clean” drug test, I couldn’t even drink away the pain. I vowed never to be sucked in by tourist friends again.

Nobody ever wants to visit St. Louis, so I didn’t have this problem when I lived there. In fact, I temporarily forgot my own rule and visited my old gang in L.A., staying a ridiculous 10 days (funny, nobody ever invites me to come back there anymore).

And now I’m here, and now everybody I know that’s ever wanted to visit New York has an excuse to. This weekend’s visitor is the first in a string of people: My uncles and grandmother will be out here at the beginning of July, and then the big one, the one you’ve all been waiting for: The Leitch family, Bryan and Sally and Jill, will be making its first ever trip to New York City at the end of July, the Clampetts take Manhattan, a very special episode (Quoth the Mom: “Make sure you can get us some Montel tickets.”).

Now, I’m excited to see my old TSN buddy this weekend, and he’s staying for four days, a perfectly reasonable time, enough for us to appropriately hang out but short enough so that we don’t become sick of one another (a friend here at work has someone staying with her “until he finds a job and a place to live,” which, if any of you people ever do to me, I’ll choke you).

But I’m just trying to think of what people want to do when they visit New York. There are a few givens: Statue of Liberty, Times Square, Central Park, Chinatown. We’ll go see a baseball game (actually, my first trip to Yankee Stadium is this weekend), and we’ll probably scope out the Village a bit.

That’s not my life in New York, though; people often forget when they visit that while this is just some fun vacation for them, you live here. If I were to give him the true New York experience, the way that I live it, we’d sit inside writing all day, then we’d go out and drink all night, whine about women, drink some more, then stumble home, either write some more, play some video games or go to pass out. It’s a vacation to me, but probably not to him.

I’m just afraid I’ll be a terrible host, which is pretty much assured, since I’ve always tried to avoid hosting anyway. I just hope he doesn’t mind when I point out everything he wants to see as “Well, that’s a tourist trap, only dorks would want to go there, and you’re not a dork, so we won’t go.”

At least I like the guy. Actually, if anybody does happen to know where John Lalande is living these days, lemme know ... I could use a vacation.

*BT*

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