This morning a friend who lives in West Los Angeles (north of Barrington/Wilshire) begged off attending a screening later this week at the Writers Guild theatre (100 yards south of Wilshire/Doheny) because “it’s not in my neighborhood.” What? “From your house to the WGA is a hop, skip and a jump,” I replied. “20 or 25 minutes. Okay, a half-hour.” Nope. After 5 pm and until 7:30 or 8 pm that drive takes an hour, he said. “I know that traffic has probably gotten worse since I left in ’08,” I admitted, “but I can’t believe it takes that long…c’mon.” It really does, he claimed. Especially with everyone texting in their cars all the time. They take that much longer to respond to traffic surges, and if you multiply each distracted texter by 1000 or 3000 or 5000 in a given mile-stretch, it really slows things down.