Item: 1 pewter book keychain
This keychain, which is shaped like a book, is made by a company called NovelKeys. Get it? The one I have is the Jack Kerouac one, with the line "Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?" This isn't because I'm a huge Jack Kerouac fan - there are plenty of authors I like better - but because I liked the quotation and it seemed apropos for car keys.
I mentioned the 43 Things website awhile ago. They used to have a feature where they listed by city what the most popular goals were. I found it interesting that 1 of the top 10 goals for people in LA was to "get the hell out of Los Angeles." As I've thought about it, almost everybody I know here can tell you exactly where they'd go if they left LA, without having to think about it. Each of us has our personal escape route in our head. I have one myself, though it changes from time to time.
I wonder if it is part of what enables a person to live here: having an alternate life just below the surface. Being able to sit in traffic and execute in your head the plan in which you light out for Chattanooga next week somehow helps make things endurable. The idea of another place saves us. There was a passage in the Edward Abbey book I read last month about wilderness, and how we need the idea of a refuge even if we never actually need to go there. It's pretty much the same thing.
Google-searching returns 1160 results for "get the hell out of LA," as well as 1420 for "get the hell out of Los Angeles." This is compared with other unscientifically-selected random cities, such as:
"get the hell out of Cincinnati" - 14 hits
"get the hell out of Kansas City" - 10 hits
"get the hell out of Denver" - 10 hits
"get the hell out of Chicago" - 53 hits
Of course, more people live in LA than any of those other places, so maybe that also helps the numbers go up. "Get the hell out of New York" gets 2690 results, so maybe they are even more miserable in their own way. Ultimately, the reasons a person gets the hell out of anyplace are probably unique unto themselves.
I mentioned the 43 Things website awhile ago. They used to have a feature where they listed by city what the most popular goals were. I found it interesting that 1 of the top 10 goals for people in LA was to "get the hell out of Los Angeles." As I've thought about it, almost everybody I know here can tell you exactly where they'd go if they left LA, without having to think about it. Each of us has our personal escape route in our head. I have one myself, though it changes from time to time.
I wonder if it is part of what enables a person to live here: having an alternate life just below the surface. Being able to sit in traffic and execute in your head the plan in which you light out for Chattanooga next week somehow helps make things endurable. The idea of another place saves us. There was a passage in the Edward Abbey book I read last month about wilderness, and how we need the idea of a refuge even if we never actually need to go there. It's pretty much the same thing.
Google-searching returns 1160 results for "get the hell out of LA," as well as 1420 for "get the hell out of Los Angeles." This is compared with other unscientifically-selected random cities, such as:
"get the hell out of Cincinnati" - 14 hits
"get the hell out of Kansas City" - 10 hits
"get the hell out of Denver" - 10 hits
"get the hell out of Chicago" - 53 hits
Of course, more people live in LA than any of those other places, so maybe that also helps the numbers go up. "Get the hell out of New York" gets 2690 results, so maybe they are even more miserable in their own way. Ultimately, the reasons a person gets the hell out of anyplace are probably unique unto themselves.
posted by Karen at 7:52 PM
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