Deconstruction

Perhaps it's a positive sign for the local (L.A.) economy, but I seem to be surrounded by construction, and have been for the last few years. The Santa Monica Freeway (a state highway) has been torn up near my office for the last few years, as part of a massive construction project that promises to help traffic flow (and which is disturbing traffic flow in the process). The building I work in in Century City has been undergoing renovation since the summer of 2004 -- and the end probably won't come until this summer. My office's window is right at the level of the parking garage of the old Fox Sports building on SM Boulevard; and for the last several months, a crew has been slowly taking that building and parking structure apart, by jack-hammering sections (yes, right outside my window) and pulling up sections by pickaxe and shovel. (I've taken to plugging headphones into the computer's earplug jack and switching Itunes to a jazz radio station when the jackhammers are slamming.)

And since January of this year, the entire western portion of the local mall, the Westside Pavillion, has been vacated and torn up; the sidewalk in front of it on Pico has been closed off, and a gigantic green tarp thrown over it, as it's turned into an arthouse multiplex theatre. (I didn't think enough arthouse movies were produced a year to support a multiplex.)

I feel like I live in a world of change -- and bad traffic.