Life in California is full of vexing questions. When’s the last time you updated your earthquake go bag? Why on earth would we turn Alcatraz into a prison again? And why is it still so embarrassing to order a sandwich from Egg Slut?
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!
Can you settle an argument between my friend and me about the Beach Boys song “California Girls”? My friend thinks the singer’s wish that “they all could be California girls” refers to the girls’ physically being in California, not from California. I say he wishes that all girls could be as perfect as girls from California. I’ve since discussed this with many people, and there are definitely two camps.
—California Woman
Stacey: You and I know that the aim of the Beach Boys song “California Girls” is to extol the superiority of girls from (or naturalized in) the state of California, but in an effort to find out how anyone could develop some other crazy idea (and to weed out the psychos from my own life), I put the question to a group of friends. The results shocked me. After googling the lyrics, over half of my “friends” cited what they consider serious irregularities. One spouse of mine expressed concern that the singer “doesn’t ever say that California girls are preferable to the girls of other regions—only to girls outside ‘the States’—so a wish that they all could be California girls seems to illustrate a desire for the girls to simply be in California.” (Yes, it was nice knowing him.) To that I say this: Anyone currently thinking too hard about the song’s lyrics would do well to remember that they were written very quickly and, according to some accounts, on acid by two young people, one of whom was Mike Love, whose mind is an abyss that one must never gaze into, lest it gaze back into them. That was exactly what Nietzsche was talking about.
The message of “California Girls” is just this: “I like the girls from California the most because they are tan and wear bikinis.” And if you’re still not convinced, I refer you to noted scholar D.L. Roth’s celebrated 1985 interpretation, which remains the definitive word on the subject.
Gustavo: Arguing about what classic lyrics mean is always a fun game. Who’s the jester in Don McLean’s “American Pie”? Is Carly Simon crooning “You’re So Vain” about James Taylor? Did the recipe for the cake in “MacArthur Park” include LSD, or just stale frosting (which gives people far worse trips)? The only controversy I’ve heard about “California Girls” is whether it’s better than Katy Perry’s “California Gurls” (hint: It’s not, even though Katy is kanceled nowadays).
But to address your question, Cali Mujer: To paraphrase the little girl in the Old El Paso commercial, Why not both meanings? The song is obviously about longing to return to the Golden State, but it’s also about the protagonist desiring that all the gals he hooks up with across the world be like Cal gals—and, man, does the guy hook up! “California Girls” makes Dion’s “The Wanderer” seem as chaste as Paul Anka’s “Puppy Love.”
I’ve noticed a lot of young women in Los Angeles dressing in what I can only describe as David Foster Wallace fashion: bandanna around the head, glasses, jorts, and occasionally cowboy boots. Are they actually fans of difficult books, or is there something else at play?
—The Devil Wears Mom Jeans
Gustavo: I’m going to cede any authority on this one to Stacey, because she’s a young woman who’s a fan of difficult books and cowboy boots but not jorts or bandannas.
Stacey: It’s true, I love a difficult book—the more difficult the better, and my readers know that if I take too long to answer their questions, it’s only because I’m flipping around in Pale Fire, looking for coded messages about California’s best brunch. And I actually live in jorts.
I’m acutely aware of the fashion trend you’ve mentioned. I’ve been tracking it for some time, and I have some theories that I’ll touch on, but for my full take, you’ll have to wait for my upcoming collection, Brief Interviews with Headbanded Women. Those with the current Foster Wallace look are not playing some kind of Infinite Jort on society. I think if you showed them a picture of the man, they’d scowl and wonder what any of this has to do with that singer guy their grandma likes. To understand, we must Consider the Hipster: For something to resonate with them, it has to have occurred on TikTok in the past four minutes (formerly five). So rather than nodding to its rightful inventor, a Ms. Rhoda Morgenstern of the Bronx, New York, this sartorial choice will, at least for the next three minutes, reflect an admiration for one B. Eilish of Eagle Rock, California. And eventually, it will become just another page in the look book of youth, the one called A Supposedly Cool Thing I’ll Never Wear Again.
Why are so many Californians obsessed with New York City? It seems like Golden Staters are always comparing their food, their art, and their coolness with the Big Apple’s. We, for the record, are not obsessed with you.
—New York State of Mind
Gustavo: I love New York City, so I say this with peace and love: Actual Californians only care about Gotham when it comes to beating y’alls mediocre sports teams and Rockefeller Plaza. Fake Californians are the ones obsessed with NYC—and by “fake Californians,” I mean all the New Yorkers who have moved out here over the decades and have vainly tried to make “bodega” mean “corner store” in California Spanish even though “bodega” here means “warehouse.” New Yorkers not obsessed with Californians? Then why does the New York Times write about L.A. with the same derision it throws at Staten Island and at the same rate it covers the Yankees? The last time I wrote about the Big Apple for the L.A. Times, it was about how the city has been trying to replicate burritos from San Diego, San Francisco, and L.A. for decades, and guess what, New Yorkers? Your burritos suck.
Stacey: To paraphrase my co-columnist’s paraphrase of the little girl in the Old El Paso commercial, Why not both places? And to yes-and his other assertion: The only Californians who bring up New York at every turn are fake Californians. True Californians understand that New York has good pizza, and we have good pizza and good burritos, and all can be part of a balanced diet, if you want to die young. My only problem with New York is that they put it way too far away from us.
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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.
