Comments

1
That's too hot.
2
I am so happy to think of you there. Good for LA, good for you!
3
Welcome back, Ms. West!

Is it seriously 127 degrees in your car? Even for LA that seems improbable...
4
driving? for shame.
5
Nice Volvo
6
You need to learn how to park on the shady side.
7
Life during the Santa Ana winds.
8
We miss you, too.
9
Yay Lindy!
10
You lie. If you missed us YOU'D BE POSTING EVERY DAY instead of hanging around on the beach or going shopping on Melrose or whatever it is you do down there, Ms. Fancypants.
11
How's the traffic? And the smog? And all the assholes?
12
Yeah, what @11 said: how do the traffic, smog and assholes in that legendary city offering you new horizons compare to the traffic, smog and assholes you left behind here in smugville?
13
Hahaha @5 beat me to it. But the windshield still leaks, right? Just reminding you because nothing else will, now.
14
rob!, we mustn't belittle the windshield-leakening possibilities of a good old L.A. car wash, where it's always 1976, Franklin Ajaye's natural is perfect and Antonio Vargas is "more man than you'll ever be and more woman than you'll ever get", and where I Wanna Get Next To You plays at just the right moment.
15
It's a good thing you dropped so many breadcrumbs, gus, because I'm culturally deprived that way. Thanks for the diversion. But maybe you're mixing up Antonio Fargas with Antonio Villaraigosa?
16
@11, traffic's worse in Seattle than it is in LA. So's the smog, at least a few days a year. They have more assholes, sure, but they have more everything, including more nice people. If you can't get it in LA, it doesn't exist; if you can't get it in Seattle, that's because you're in Seattle.
17
Oh, rob! I am awash in envy at the thought you have ahead of you the sheer joy of seeing "Car Wash" for the first time ever. Sigh. Lucky you.
18
@16: Traffic is not worse in Seattle than LA. No street in Seattle compares to the clusterfucks that Wilshire and Santa Monica Blvds are. LA's 10, 101 and 405 are a mess for twice as long each day as I-5 through Seattle is.

Saying our smog is worse than LA's "a few days a year" is like saying it's hotter in Seattle for a few days a year. So what? How about the other 360 days?

LA is teeming with industry assholes. The grade we have in Seattle does not compare.

What can I get in Seattle that I can't get in LA? Oh, how about a dip in a lake? Or a bike ride to the baseball stadium? Or a pro football game?
19
Lindy, I love you, but please, please, please don't post a bunch of smug comments about the sun this winter. I get enough of that from my California relatives.

California sun-smugness is like having a booger hanging out of your nose. Not attractive.
20
@16 No way is traffic here worse. I lived there and that place is traffic hell. Plus you have never, I mean never, seen freeways like they have there. So many fucking lanes!
21
Oh, and HI LINDY!
22
I don't know about Seattle's traffic, but I have lived most of my life in LA and the traffic is time consuming. It took 30+ minutes to go 5 miles, Los Feliz Blvd/ Griffith Park Drive to Mission Road, and that was my shortest commute, I had a 90+ minute one prior to that. Maybe it seemed unbearably long because I was 8 months pregnant at the time and still experiencing morning sickness. I hope Seattle's traffic is better.
23
Lindy!!

You are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO missed!!!

Glad you're happy about the sun and stuff down there in CA - but don't forget: sunscreen!
24
Keep cool, Lindy.

My family in San Pedro (LA Harbor) said it is 97. My cousin in San Diego says it is 103. So don't forget the sunblock. Take care.
25
@18, @20, there are plenty of streets in Seattle that are in the Santa Monica Blvd. category at certain times, and unlike that street unsuspecting motorists who don't know the rules are not going to suddenly find themselves in a special lane that veers off to the right and across some goddamn bridge from which there is no way to return, as almost all Seattle arterials do at some point.

And in LA the solution to traffic on Santa Monica or Hollywood Boulevard is to take a different street a few over. "Take Fountain", like the lady says. Here there are no other streets; this is the only one that goes this way. And the potential overflow down residential streets is blocked by traffic circles in every block here.

To say nothing of the vast numbers of clueless fatheads in Seattle who have no idea what the fuck they are doing or where the fuck they are going, tootling down arterials at 11 MPH, signaling left but turning right, coming to a dead stop in the middle of the block because they don't know where they are, and gosh, is that Fred Meyer? Let me stop and think about it! Also, LA is generally free of people who never stop at red (unless they're turning left) and never go at green. People in LA KNOW HOW TO DRIVE. People here do not.

Freeways? Hey, if you don't like them, don't drive them. There are other ways to get around. Smart people have a Thomas Guide in the car and use it until it falls apart. And as far as freeways go I drove in LA recently and never experienced anything remotely as challenging as merging onto I-5 at 45th and trying to get over all the lanes to the 520 exit in time. People in LA know how to drive on freeways, too. Eight lanes? Not a problem if everybody's going the same speed. This has never happened in Seattle, EVER. There's always some dingleberry swinging back and forth from 45 to 65 in the fast lane while packs of douchebags are going 90 in the right lane, and everybody else is following their bliss in their own way, dreaming of warm milk and making it impossible to change lanes safely, even though there may only be two or three of them.

The thing about LA driving that freaks Seattle people out is that LA IS BIG AND DENSE, which throws your sense of scale off. Does it take a long time to drive from the beach to downtown via Santa Monica Boulevard at rush hour? Yes; yes it does. Now try a trip from Lake City to White Center and see how long it takes you. Imagine driving that every day. It's a shorter distance.

The only thing wrong with LA driving is their weird high curbs that scrape the bottoms of your car doors off. They build their storm sewers into them, instead of the street, for some reason. Probably because the city's in a flash flood basin.
Teeming with industry assholes? If you go looking for them, I suppose. If you're an industry asshole yourself, they might be hard to avoid. If West Hollywood nightclubs are your bag, you might have a problem. Ordinary Angelinos, of which there are 20-odd million, are perfectly nice.

The list of things LA has that Seattle doesn't is far to long to list here. Let's start with a thousand liquor stores. Open at night.

Seattle's a pleasant smaller city, somewhere on the continuum between Phoenix and Boise, but has always been controlled by bluenoses and City Beautiful types who are horrified by anything that resembles liveliness, movement or pleasure. It's greatest aspiration has always been to the condition of enlightened suburbia, with grassy lawns, gently curving roads, charming vistas, and an absence of signs.
26
Oh Lindy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla…
27
@25 Wow. You've studied L.A. traffic with verve! Was it your dissertation for a city planning degree? And I see your points. WDOT knows how to fuck things up, that's a gimme. When I moved here, I drove in terror for months. You win.
28
@25: In the time it took you to type that, the southbound 405 backed up from LAX to Mulholland Drive.
29
@28, I will grant you one point: LAX is at the bottom of the bottommost pit in the deepest part of hell, and no human being should ever have to suffer there. I'd rather spend a day stuck on the freeway than an hour in LAX (though the reverse is more typical).
30
@ Fnarf, I understand that it's possible to be in the left lane on a California freeway and, without ever changing lanes, end up exiting on the right. A friend who lived in Oakland for years told me about that.

Something really fucked that I experienced first hand was the I-5/CA 99 split north of LA. I-5 goes left, 99 goes right, so you can stay in the left lanes to stay on I-5, right? WRONG. The far right three lanes exit, while staying on the freeway takes you to 99.

Seattle freeways are fucked, no doubt (your 45th to I-5 to 520 is a good example, by Mercer would have been even better), but I can't recall coming across anything as counter-intuitive as that.
31
@16, 25 Fnarf is correct on every single point.

I lived there for ~ 5 years, and now have lived in Seattle ~5 years. Actually paying attention while driving, combined with a Thomas guide and a little creativity, you will be flying all over that town in no time. There are as many different alternate routes as blocks in the city. Here there are only one or two ways to get anywhere.

Another Seattle trait I love is the signage: signs usually come up as a tease once you've already been forced to randomly decide on one lane or another. And if you are taking your best guess, usually you are wrong.

Weirdly I like the weather here but miss the LA driving. Go figure.
32
@25 -

WHY AM I ON 99 AGAIN!??? AUUGHHH!!

or suddenly... You're in West Seattle!

Please wait...

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