When I was in Cornwall, visiting what I like to call my cousins once removed by friendship (my best friend’s cousins), I missed my plane to London. The plane hadn’t taken off but they had given away my seat. Their marketing slogan should be “Ryan Air: Dirt Cheap and It Shows.”
I had tickets to see a big musical on the West End that night. It was the most money I had ever paid to see a show. The cousin’s best friends (I love every single one of these humans) were in charge of getting me to the airport and when we figured out they would have to drive me about an hour to the train station. The look of woe on their faces said it all. Unless you’re transporting livestock with four legs instead of two, the Englanders don’t drive much. They looked at me the way the way most people do when I eat chicken feet at Dim Sum.
The entire country of England is only 848 miles long and the state of California is 800 miles long. Some people in the countryside of England have never been to London. When you compare that to the fact that in college my friends in San Diego would make a Los Angeles Tommy’s run (chili burgers, six hour round trip) you begin to understand the cultural difference…oh yeah, and petrol in England costs around $6 a gallon.
I know I don’t speak for all Californians or even all Angelenos, but Los Angeles is definitely a car-centric place. People are in th
