Everything's fine -Doooowntown

I've got an audition downtown in an hour. The sat nav (they call them GPSs) reckons it'll take 25 minutes but what the hell does that mouthy cow know. The other day she gave me three options to get to Long Beach, two of which said it would take me just under an hour. The third option said 4 hours and 48 minutes. Whhhha'?! To be fair, it was the only route that went through Inglewood so she was probably factoring in the inevitable carjacking that my rental number plates and wet behind the ears naivety would attract.

Downtown LA is so different from Hollywood and the like. It actually feels like it was created by a civil engineer who's brief wasn't 'make everything as inconveniently far apart as you can'. 

It feel a bit like New York (minus the subways and the skyscrapers - and the attitude problem... I can see you're walking, buddy)... It feels like you could actually have a wander and stumble upon a nice eatery, a fun bar or a bustling coffee shop. Life is so much more disparate uptown. There are small pockets where you can have a stroll but before you know it, you're once again in the hinterland. 

The film Chinatown had the conspiracy theory around the supply of fresh water to LA as its backdrop. I wonder if anyone would be brave enough to do a film where the automobile industries strangle hold on transportation is the subplot. 

It's tiresome to have to depend on the car to get around. It pains me to think of the pollution emitted and fuel consumed so I can get to an audition. Clearly it hasn't pained me enough to stop doing it though. Seems like there's no escape from LA and it's car-dependent life. In the meantime, we'll always have Downtown.