Though I live in a metropolitan sprawl, the effect is much the same. Everything is farther away, in both distance and time, than you'd think. What with traffic and distance, it takes 20 minutes to get to anything "close", 45 minutes or more to get to "in the area" stuff, and an hour or more to get to everywhere else, that's if traffic is good(it never is).

Anyway, congratulations on your 40th, you must be very special people--most of us couldn't figure out how to keep it together at all;-)