The overriding factor that seems to govern the lives of people in all of the Los Angeles area, including far-flung portions like Riverside and San Bernardino, is traffic. On the freeway, timing is everything. If you hit it right you zoom along at 65 MPH or better, and if you venture onto the freeway at the wrong time, heaven help you because you may be like Charlie on the MTA (Cue the Kingston Trio: “He never returned, no, he never returned, and his fate will never be learned …”)With this in mind we have traveled cautiously these past 24 hours. Friends of ours were staying at the downtown Marriott and we tip-toed through the traffic this morning to meet them for a really great brunch. So far, so good.

Then my task was to drive 15 miles down “the 91” (as they say around here) to Corona, to meet up with Andy Rogozinski, the proprietor of Inland RV. He’s the guy who virtually invented the Airstream vintage parts business. He’s been in the Airstream community for over 40 years, starting off as a dealer service tech, moving up to Caravanner Insurance in 1970, and now selling vintage Airstream parts out of his facility in Corona. Almost everyone who has ever done a vintage Airstream restoration has dealt with Andy at some point.

Traffic will be particularly of interest to us on Friday. We’ll have to tow the Airstream back 100 miles to storage, then drive about 30 miles to LAX. I’m crossing my fingers that Friday is a light traffic day all over Los Angeles.

The Santa Ana winds are forecast to being to blow soon. This will have two effects: It will clear the smoggy air and give us a decent view, and it will fan any flames if a new set of wildfires break out. After seeing what happened a few weeks ago, everyone here has gained respect for the power of fire and wind. And of course, it can’t possibly be good for traffic.