$3 million doesn't buy what it used to - from today's LA Times, Steve Lopez column

Days like this I want to move to Podunk, IA, where presumably folks have wits.

http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-me-lopez7nov07,1,6223859.column?coll=la-news-columns&ctrack=1&cset=true
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"I spent $3 million to live in Beverly Hills 90210. To be the creme de la creme of society. I am supposed to be at the pinnacle here," she wrote to me.

snip

In April, wildfires came too close for comfort. In July, she read about the burglary ring hitting the homes of the rich and famous in Beverly Hills and surroundings.

But the toughest blow of all came last month, when coyotes ate her miniature beagle, Lucy.

snip

I quickly assessed the situation and observed that Gordon-Gilardian's property line abuts a wilderness canyon where, it can be assumed, some wild animals might be living.

Did that possibility ever cross her mind?

Sure, she said. She'd have no problem seeing the occasional deer.

"But we didn't know coyotes lived here."

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Mods, I know this is technically more than 4 paragraphs, but newspapers tend to make each sentence a paragraph.........

And I have no idea how Steve kept a straight face while he was interviewing this lady!

My sympathies are distinctly with her poor little dog, and the coyotes!

They were here first, after all!

:P

wasting oxygen and space. What a ninny.

I am embarrassed to be a fellow Valleyite........

I mean the dog.