The Late Late Show With James Cordon

James Cordon does a great job, I think, and the show is very entertaining.  Having said that, let's now concentrate on the backdrop.

Behind the usual desk and a couch or two is the usual mock up of a city skyline.  L.A. in this case.  One of the buildings depicted is the Roosevelt Hotel.  I have no idea if the Roosevelt Hotel is a famous L.A. landmark of some kind, but it is a famous location for me.

It was the first place that I ever slept in L.A.  I flew out in 1972 to reconnoiter, to see if L.A. was a suitable place for a New Yorker to relocate.  Why the Roosevelt Hotel?  Maybe it was an advertisement in a New York newspaper.  Pre-Internet, you know.

It was where I learned that the water in L.A. was so hard that you could take a shower without getting wet.  The water just beaded up on my shoulder like rain on a well waxed car fender.

It was where I was reassured that there were roaches in Los Angeles.

It was where I learned that when you stepped off the curb to jay-walk in L.A. all of the cars approaching from either direction magically stopped.  "Oooo," I remember thinking as I walked between the now stationary cars, "that's different."

It was also where I learned that one is helpless in L.A. without a car.  I got a free ticket to a TV preview up on Sunset Boulevard, and I went by bus.  I got there okay.  Not quickly, but okay.  Returning to the hotel was another story.  It took several hours.  The buses on Sunset didn't run after a certain hour, so I had to walk south to Hollywood Boulevard.  Then I discovered what happens when you say, "Seventh and South Hill" to an L.A. bus driver in a heavy New York accent.  (He assumes that you are speaking Chinese, turns his head, and ignores you.)

Yeah, the Roosevelt Hotel is part of my thirty-year history in L.A.  (Now fading in memory.)  After a couple of days I caught up with a friend from New York who had moved out a year or two before, and he graciously invited me to sleep on his couch for a week or two.  L.A. seemed like a good bet, and within a few years my wife and I had relocated.  We never regretted it.  Almost never.  After all, you can't beat the weather.