Life in California is full of vexing questions. How are you feeling? You OK? Why are you weeping? Oh, right, sorry.
Alta Journal has enlisted two experts to answer all of your questions: Stacey Grenrock Woods and Gustavo Arellano, both of whom bring decades of hard-won knowledge and laser-sharp insights into the Golden State.
Have a question of your own? Ask a Californian!
I’m not sure if this is the right kind of advice column to send this to, but I’ve got a problem with my partner. They’re really into doing this weird thing that I can’t stand. It’s called hiking. Am I obligated to participate in their filthy hobby because it gives them pleasure, or should I encourage them to find someone outside of our relationship who’s more open to it?
—(Won’t) Take a Hike
Stacey: This is exactly the right kind of advice column. While Gustavo and I are primarily California experts who give California counsel, we are also highly skilled, board-certified analysts of reality television (I with a minor in true crime) who will happily, eagerly inject ourselves into your innermost personal problems to provide you the kind of lasting relief you need.
Persuading people to have hobbies is a hobby I wish no one had—if you told me to get into bowling or meditating, I’d punch you square in the face—but should you decide to, say, put down the vape and pick up something new, you could do a lot worse than hiking. I’m about as rugged as Private Benjamin, and even I love it. The air is crisp, the smells are intoxicating, the views are sweeping, and the rock formations bear a loftier caliber of graffiti than you find in the city. On my recent hike up Mount Baden Powell (elevation 9,400-ish feet), I even came across a hidden natural spring whose miraculous water I was able to steal quite a bit of with the water bottles I had on hand. There are no special skills or equipment required to hike (though you can outfit yourself like a beekeeper should you care to), and you’re not locked into a whole day unless you want it that way or something goes terribly wrong. What I mean is that hiking is not camping: before it gets cold and dark, you’ll be safely back home, eating, drinking, lounging, and watching bears and serial killers from the other side of a sturdy OLED—rather than a flimsy mesh—screen.
So, before you encourage your partner to find someone else who’s also out in the woods, looking for some trailhead, you might want to take a fresh look at hiking. (I’m not saying you two are doomed. I’m just saying that the phrase outside of our relationship, followed closely by the phrase more open to it, is the sort of thing you hear on Dateline right before the hikers vanish.) If you still really hate it, just make sure your partner’s new hiking buddy is someone you, Gustavo, and I have fully vetted.
Gustavo: Sorry, Stacey, but hiking is a bachelor’s in cannabis studies from Cal Poly Humbolt: Why bother? Leave the flora and fauna alone, get your steps on city streets so you can meet neighbors instead of fight off bears and mountain lions and ticks, and revel in what your ancestors could only dream of, like flushing toilets and air-conditioning and Vanderpump Rules. Besides, my dad got enough hiking as a teen to make sure I never needed to do it—he called it “living in poverty in the mountains of the Mexican state of Zacatecas and having to chase down stray cows as a teen while sleeping under a cactus during thunderstorms and wiping his butt with rocks.” (It sounds better in Spanish.)
On the other hand, what’s that saying? Happy partner, happy partner? A healthy relationship is one where we indulge the other person in things they love but we loathe as long as they indulge our proclivities. So accompany them once in a while—but make sure you get a California treasure out of it in return, like a Sonoma wine tour or a round of golf at Pebble Beach or a dab of the pomade U.S. senator Alex Padilla uses to make his hair shine as bright as his political career.
Should adults without kids go to Disneyland?
—It’s a Small World After All
Stacey: What an interesting question, Small World. Or should I call you Disneyland Karen?
Nice try. I’m sure you thought you could casually drop that insidious notion here, hoping it would catch on and people at cocktail parties would start saying things like, “Oh no, haven’t you heard? Disneyland’s only for nuclear families now.” And then your terrible dream of a park free of childless mouse ladies would become reality.
Let me quote to you from Disneyland’s dedication plaque: “To all who come to this happy place: Welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past…and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future.” I don’t know exactly what that means, but I know it doesn’t say anything about being fruitful and multiplying. You have to be this tall to ride the Matterhorn, but you don’t have to be a mom.
So, Karen, don’t get it Mr. Toad-ed: the Happiest Place on Earth is the happiest place on earth for everyone—young, old, straight, gay, parents, and freedom-loving people with disposable income and no spit-up on their clothes alike. I’m just glad Walt’s head is too frozen to hear this. If he were here, he’d lock you up and give a dog standing a little too far away the key.
Gustavo: I wish I could say adults who go to the Happiest Place on Earth are full-stop losers, but then I’d be a hypocrite. Although my wife is not a full-on Disnerd, she LOVES the Disneyland Resort for its appeal to nostalgia, its attention to detail, and the boozefest that is Trader Sam’s Enchanted Tiki Bar at the Disneyland Hotel, where the tropical-themed cocktails are potent enough to take out Bob Iger once and for all. My siblings used to go to Dapper Days, when everyone dresses up as though they lived in the 1920s, sans the legal segregation and Teapot Dome scandal.
So remember what I said in my hiking answer about indulging your beloved? I personally find it absolutely ludicrous for adults to walk around with pins on their shirts, or wear vests with patches as though they’re members of a motorcycle gang (I wish I was making up that latter point, but it’s sadly, pathetically a thing). But I see this spectacle every once in a while, and I dare say I enjoy it. Like Pope Francis famously said, Who am I to judge? Everyone deserves their stupid escapism. For some, it’s walking around with Mickey hats, Grogu backpacks, and Iron Man T-shirts. For others, it’s hiking.
For years I’ve told myself I’d finally put together a go bag in case of the Big One, but I have no idea what to put in it besides the basics. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
—Half in the Bag
Stacey: The basics? You mean Pellegrino and Frizz Ease? Because that’s all I’ve got, and I’m pretty low on both.
Part of my contract with the universe is to never be prepared for anything. It’s worked so well that I’m now realizing it must be my very lack of preparedness that’s been keeping the Big One at bay all these years. That’s right: you have me to thank for all this glorious stillness, so I hope you’ll repay the debt by sharing your water, generators, hand-crank radios, blankets, batteries, Pop-Tarts, etc., with me should I ever need them.
Bag, I suspect the reason you’ve gone without an earthquake-preparedness kit is that you share this spooky brand of knowledge of mine, and you know that nothing disturbs fault lines like people driving to and from big-box stores to assemble their emergency supplies. Luckily, there are companies that do all that for you. There are kits you can get on Amazon for under $200, but I advise you to get the biggest, best one you can for when I come by. I’ll probably be cold and hungry.
Aside from a full charge on your cordless flat iron (you just don’t know what kind of humidity you’ll be up against), probably the most important thing to have is a power bank so that you can keep all your devices charged. Otherwise, you might have to resort to reading actual books until help arrives. If you’ve got room, Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time will keep you busy for a while. You might not make it through all 12 volumes, but they’re there if you need them, and you could burn what you don’t read for warmth. Another great choice that isn’t as long but might feel that way is My Name Is Barbra, Barbra Streisand’s new-ish, 1,000-ish-page memoir. Society should be back up and running by the time she starts dating Elliott Gould, and if it’s not, you’ll hardly notice. Beyond that, I’d throw in any kind of small, analog entertainment you can think of: a deck of cards, some jacks, dominoes, backgammon, a book of crossword puzzles, your old knitting, a Rubik’s Cube, a Slinky, needlepoint, woodworking, etc. Basically, any abandoned hobby you still have around will find new life here. And if you can locate your old Easy-Bake Oven, definitely include it. You’ll be a big hit around the trash fire when you bust out some tiny red velvet cake. Just make sure the light bulb works.
Gustavo: The cool thing about having a copy of My Name Is Barbra handy after the Big One is that it can double as currency—I’ll trade you tales from the set of Yentl for a charcoal filter, please! The universe doesn’t like me, alas, so the kit that I currently have holds gauze, Band-Aids, scissors, a flashlight, gauze, aspirin, batteries that are probably defunct, and more gauze. That doesn’t include a pantry full of canned and jarred food, the massive machete under my bed, a magnum of Evan Williams, and a copy of Candide, by Voltaire, because I’ll need a reminder that we live in the best of all possible worlds as I have to channel my inner hiker to survive.
Gustavo Arellano is the author of Orange County: A Personal History and Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America. In 2025, Arellano was named a Pulitzer Prize finalist for his work as a columnist for the Los Angeles Times. He was formerly editor of OC Weekly, an alternative newspaper in Orange County, California, and penned the award-winning ¡Ask a Mexican!, a nationally syndicated column in which he answered any and all questions about America’s spiciest and largest minority. Arellano is the recipient of awards ranging from the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies Best Columnist to the Los Angeles Press Club President’s Award to an Impact Award from the National Hispanic Media Coalition, and he was recognized by the California Latino Legislative Caucus with a 2008 Spirit Award for his “exceptional vision, creativity, and work ethic.” Arellano is a lifelong resident of Orange County and is the proud son of two Mexican immigrants, one of whom came to this country in the trunk of a Chevy.
Stacey Grenrock Woods is a regular contributor to Esquire and a former correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. She writes and consults on various TV shows, and has a recurring role as Tricia Thoon on Fox’s Arrested Development. Her first book is I, California.
