So, if you live in a major metropolitan area like LA, how do you go about having adventure? Where are the untrodden corners that a person can explore? How does a person go about living an authentic life?  In such places, a person is absolutely surropunded by structure- streets, neighborhoods, commerical districts, underground infrastructure, zoning, civil law, criminal law, home owners associations, etc. You can’t dig a hole without doing a utility check. The airspace overhead is a codified layercake governed by the Federal Aviation Regulations.  Every aspect of life is structured. 

Even recreation is highly engineered in every way. I’m presently at DisneyLand. Every sound, texture, taste, smell, and view has been thoughtfully engineered for some specified effect. DisneyLand is a confederation of attractions held together by the glue of merchandising. In fact, virtually every form of recreation in SoCal (except the beach) has been contrived to give some kind of virtual experience. 

The effect of show business can be seen and heard in many ways here.  You can hear it in the way people speak, the cadences and the mannerisms are part of the Hollywood schtick.  It has permeated all of the surrounding space.  Show business remains what it was a hundred years ago, but with the raster scan of electronic immediacy.  It is still the rattling of a stick in a bucket of swill. The promise of titillating wonders and thrills. I’m hooked.