While it’s true that whenever possible I avoid leaving the house, I’m still very acclimated to the world at large. I am NOT a shut in. I can use the excuse that I’ve got a baby, but let’s be honest: that’s just recently good press tossed on a scenario that is far, far older. Still, it’s amazing that even short journeys can be fraught with peril.

(Deathville, USA.)

My mission was to go to the bank and deposit a check. Nice and Easy. On a Monday morning, it appeared to be the simplest of tasks and a lovely little drive in the warm California Sun. It missed being a bloodbath by inches as every other driver was either blind or oblivious to me and the world at large. As is par for the course in Los Angeles, they all thought it was my fault.

Okay, it was really only 3 times, but still.

The first time my life was threatened today was when I pulled out of my driveway. A car was parked in front of my building, just to the left. The driver was bent down, digging through something in the passenger seat. As the light turned red at the corner, I began my right turn into the right lane. That’s when the parked car bolted. He honked, then braked. It was more important for him to complain rather than prevent an accident. I stopped. He yelled something indiscernible at his rolled up windows and proceeded past me, nearly weaving into oncoming traffic. As I pulled out behind him the true nature of his jackassery became clear. He drove 5 miles an hour, and pulled over into a different parking space 100 feet down. As a Los Angeles driver, he needed to be in front of me because he thinks he’s awesome. It didn’t matter that he was only going a few feet for some stupid reason. All others must be required to wait. This will be a theme throughout the rest of the 3 mile round trip that nearly killed me.

(They will be measured via vicious dogs.)

The second time occurred when I crossed Beverly on to Larchmont. A girl with Olsen Twin sunglasses on and talking on her phone (a violation of California V C Section 23123 prohibiting hand held cellular phone use while driving, I might add) in a black Escalade completely blew through her red light and turned right, right in front of me. We missed each other by inches. Of course upon seeing me, she gave me the finger and shouted “Right turn on red! Watch out Asshole!” Yes, silly me. I should have ignored my green light (and the pedestrians on her cross walk) and allowed her the God Given Right to turning right through a red light with absolutely zero caution or pause. She wasn’t older than 16 or 17, so clearly she has been privy to new driving laws in the 16 years I myself have been a licensed driver. Now I was behind her, which I thought was ultimately safer, until she got a look at Larchmont Blvd. Not liking the possibility of having to wait for a car backing out of an angled spot, she immediately threw her car in reverse, again almost hitting me. I reversed too, just in time. She pulled a U turn and whipped around to go back the way she came, stopping only to again berate me for apparently not reversing fast enough. “What the fuck is your problem?! Why didn’t you back up?!” she screamed as she veered around another car pulling out of a spot. She never once lowered the phone, leaving me to wonder if the person on the other end agreed that I had a problem or was making a mental note to never get into a car she was driving. Luckily, I was at the bank and almost finished.

As I pulled out of the bank (and after the guy taking my space inched up so close on me I couldn’t back out), I cancelled all other errands and bee lined for headquarters. This place was crazy, and I was too underslept, underfed, and underpaid to deal with it. As I crossed one of the last stretches, an oldie but a goldie when it comes to LA traffic nearly cost me my front bumper. It was the old, “He thinks I have a stop sign like him but I don’t oh God he’s just going HOLY SHIT!” This time it was a pick up truck. It had truck balls. Obviously from Orange County, or possibly Canoga Park, this guy was unfamiliar with the area. Luckily, he spoke the local dialect. 

“Stop sign, Asshole!” I agreed. Stop sign, Asshole. Even from the way he rolled through his stop sign, if this were a 4 way intersection he would have gone first. Guys with truck balls believe the roadways are ruled by the bold and the mighty, with Limp Bizkit as the soundtrack. Their life is a 24 kegger and tattoo shop, why should anybody who thinks differently even be allowed to exist, let alone operate a non-tricked out Nissan? 

(Truck balls mean no real balls.)

I had a conversation a while back with parties who shall remain nameless, and we concluded that the best way to look at Los Angeles is to pretend that 75% of the drivers are stoned. If they aren’t actually high at that moment, they’re extra angry because the traffic is stopping them from getting to their dealer. It’s really the only way to explain the unpredictable nature of the LA roads. Hey, I’m from Chicago, but at least there people all knew the same rule: faster, or get the fuck out of the way. In Los Angeles, it’s fast, slow, medium, stop altogether, or drag race, and often on the same block. Sometimes not even on the right side of the street. When you take drivers from large urban areas across the world and add people from vast rural areas across the Great Plains States, you get a volatile bouillabaisse of shitheads, assholes and morons. And they’re all high.

I won’t be leaving the house for awhile unless I have to. Even then, maybe I’ll go on bike. If every car driver in LA is stoned, then every cyclist is on meth. At least they get the hell out of the way.