Cleaning things out today and I found this. I only started using GPS a couple of years ago. Until then I actually referred to this book to find things in So Cal.
In the old days when I was playing a lot of one-nighters I would look up the address in the index, find the page(s) containing my destination, and work back from there to my home. Sometimes the trip would span two or three pages, and the way the book is laid out these pages were not necessarily in consecutive order. When a road went off the edge of a page it would sometimes be picked up 50 pages away.
Once I figured out the route, I’d write down turn-by-turn directions for myself on a white typewriter sheet with a fat marker, so I could easily see it while I was driving. I was always distracted on these drives, which could be anywhere from Ventura to Laguna, thinking about the gig, so I didn’t need to invest any of my limited brain power wondering where the hell I was. I did this because when you are the entertainment, nothing happens until you get there, so I couldn’t be late.
Apparently the Thomas Brothers found (and documented!) 17,400 changes to the streets of LA and OC from 1988 to 1989. If that rate continued, the maps in this book would be a half million changes out of date today. I wonder if I should just keep it in the car anyway? It would work if the Russians shut down the internet.
Or…does anybody want this book?