»It's just down the freeway.

"Every place in L.A. is twenty minutes!", or, as Duane Delacourt (once Carter's Secretary of Symbolism) put it, "It's just down the freeway." This is California: beautiful, but congested with cars.

While driving (!!) through a pleasant suburban town's main street, I saw plenty of attractive sidewalk cafés, broad pedestrian passages, but all faced with cars, parked and moving. The café tables looked at parking meters and busy streets; pedestrians must needs wait upon cars.

Although the Doonesbury archive no longer provides a free search, alas, I can recount the strip following Duane's relocation to La-la-land. He and his wife are sitting on the deck, about to dip into the ubiquitous Jacuzzi, when he says, "I'm going to the store for some chips and guacamole." "O.k." "I should be back in 3 days." "What?" "It's just down the freeway." This coloured my initial impressions of California; this strip, and the early memories of watching a dragon dance in Chinatown, of riding a cable car (must have been the Hyde St. line, as I remember one particular broad curve).

Cultural differences: ask a Catalonian how the distance from Reus to Barcelona, he'll say "80 km"; ask a San Franciscan the distance from the Mission to the airport, and he'll answer "25 minutes ... depending on traffic conditions."