In the
Pasadena Sheraton last Sunday, my phone rang for a visit in Irvine. Pasadena
is twenty miles from home, Irvine
fifty miles. I would miss supper by several hours, but the month before
Christmas is slow, so I was pleased at another visit.
I often drive
to Irvine but not from Pasadena, so I consulted
Siri from my I-Phone. She directed me toward the nearest freeway but told me to
turn off as I reached it. That didn’t seem right, but disobeying Siri is
usually a bad idea. A drive through city streets to the Long Beach Freeway
saved several miles but probably not much time.
I settled down
for the trip before realizing with a shock that she was directing me toward
the Santa Ana
freeway. No one takes the Santa Ana
freeway. It’s always jammed. Sure enough, as soon as I drove on, traffic slowed
to a crawl.
I arrived
after 1½ hours to face another irritation. The address, 2120 Waterbury, wasn’t a street address but suite 2120 at the
Waterbury Apartments. Siri found the complex
but getting to 2120 among the buildings was my job.
It was night.
The guest was a traveler and unfamiliar with the area. There was no parking
except in locked underground garages, so I couldn’t wander far from my car. Also
(and I’m not making this up) it was raining. In the end, she came out and
searched the streets until we encountered each other. The visit, as usual, was
the easy part.
Leaving, I
drove to the San Diego freeway, the sensible, if
not the shortest, route from my house to Irvine.
To my dismay, traffic was crawling. Weekends are usually OK, but I should have
remembered that this was the Sunday before Christmas.
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