Warren's Words

Monday, June 19, 2006

I don't think of LA as an honest geographical space, a place where people stay, a place where traditional cities happen. As a native said to me on the first day I ever spent there, LA isn't a city -- it's a handful of towns strung together by a thousand miles of freeway. The biggest constructions in the area are not designed to be lived in, but to be traversed. It's a place that became designed for machines, not humans, at some point.

I hate the place. Which I'm sure comes as no surprise. I hate cities I can't walk around. When I try walking in West Hollywood people in their cars slow down and stare at me. I don't think this is entirely down to my shocking personal beauty. Have you ever tried walking in Burbank? Have you ever tried finding somewhere in Burbank to walk to? Walking down Sunset is an exercise in existential horror. Santa Monica's only walkable if death is no hurdle. The air's the wrong colour. People put sunglasses on their dogs. It's a hideous place where humans are not welcome and those who stay suffer eight kinds of brain damage.

I saw it. A dog with pink-framed sunglasses.

- Warren Ellis