Last time we looked at signatures, this time we're looking for significance.
A friend of the blog e-mails, wondering what to make of the fact that "the jury forewoman in the Pellicano case is named Winbush, as in a win for (Anita) Busch, who had the rose and dead fish placed on her car."
And please add us to the growing list of admirers of Carla Hall's great line: "This all started with a dead fish on a car."
Purple prose from Los Angeles City Council President Eric Garcetti at this morning's news conference on the eco-friendly building plans for Dodger Stadium:
"When you have the yellow of the sunlight and the blue of the Dodgers, what do you get? You get a green project."
-- Jesus Sanchez (with thanks to Times Staff Writer Dylan Hernandez)
"However, there will continue to be energy consumers who wish to consume a significantly greater amount of energy than that consumed by the average consumer in the average home."
More jail problems for the O.C.: A brawl in the Men's Central Jail leads to a lockdown. LAT
Church in Panorama City damaged by Molotov cocktail. LADN
Santa Monica Ferris Wheel: one bid ($50K) and two retractions. Four days left. EBay
The blog of unnecessary quotation marks. Because it's funny and "quirky" and there's "something for everyone." And that's enough unnecessary quotation marks for "one post." (OK, now I'm done.)
State flower growers wilt under competitive pressure from imports. Ventura County Star
From a UC Berkeley memo touting the accomplishments of its incoming freshman class:
It includes a world champion in youth division sailing, a student who wrote a symphony during high school, a backup dancer for a pop star on a U.S. concert tour, a national chess tournament champion, an international Irish dance competition winner, several Olympic and Junior Olympic medalists and a set of quadruplets.
How crazy did things get during the U.S. leg of the anti-China protests Olympic torch relay in San Francisco today? Crazy enough that at about a zillion police were at the scene, CNN covered it like a sporting event and, at one point, the runner disappeared. Full story here. And pix, of course.
Man dies in a wood-chipper accident in Inglewood. LAT
Two landscapers in Cerritos found $140,000 in cash last month. You're reading about it, so yes, they turned it in. And got a $2,000 reward from the bank whose ATM machines the money was meant for. Daily Breeze
Think the Pellicano trial is dull? Try Nikki Finke's Technicolor take on things. Deadline Hollywood
Voters in more than a dozen cities from Long Beach to Lancaster cast ballots on everything from phone utility taxes to mayor. Robert Greene has a rundown and results. Opinion LA-LAT
One of my all-time favorite signs warned "Beware of mentally ill cat." This missive, sent in by a reader, makes a pretty good runner-up. Love the energy of it, and the fearlessness. Neither spelling nor grammar get in the way of the message. Authority with evidence - great name for a band.
*Animal Assist* N Bel Air Rd; TG 592-A4; FS 71, Dog in ravine; LAFD copter will likely hoist rescue; NFD (No Further Details); Ch:7,12 @7:32 AM -Brian Humphrey###
*UPDATE: N Bel Air Rd* Injured dog (@ 100lbs?) as much as 200' stranded in ravine; NFD - Brian Humphrey###
*UPDATE: 1951 N Bel Air Rd* Dog's owner is on scene and will take care of animal once rescued; NFD - Brian Humphrey###
*UPDATE: 1951 N Bel Air Rd* Rescue complete; The dog's owner will take care of animal; NFD - Brian Humphrey###
Yeah, it's April first, and pranksters everywhere are having a little laugh. The foolish season got an early start with Gustavo Arellano's "I quit" missive in the OC Weekly last week.
"And with this, the Mexican formally bids adios, effective the feast day of St. Melito. It’s been a great run ... but all the hateful e-mail, the attacks ... and the fact that few of you have bothered to submit video questions to my YouTube channel wear on a guy, you know?
Ummm, St. Melito's feast day? April 1.
Google (which didn't buy Malibu, btw) raises the bar with Virgle, a plan to colonize Mars (apply here!), Scratch 'n' Sniff Google Books, and Custom Time, which lets you send emails from the past. Australian Google comes through with Google G'Day, which lets you surf tomorrow's web today.
Wired collects some great gags from Aprils gone by:
1997 - Between March 31 and April 2, the World Wide Web will be closed for cleaning. Five Japanese-built, multilingual Internet-crawling robots will remove "electronic flotsam and jetsam."
1976 - At precisely 9:47 am on April 1, Pluto will pass behind Jupiter, causing a brief reduction in Earth's gravitational pull. Astronomer Patrick Moore urges his BBC Radio audience to jump into the air at that exact moment to experience a floating sensation. At 9:48, dozens of light-headed listeners begin calling the station to report their success.
Further afield, the BBC caught footage of flying penguins, while Hilary Clinton challenged Barack Obama to a bowl-off. In Berkeley, a rumor that a controversial Marine recruiting center had been closed turned out to be false. Not a hoax, said Code Pink, the anti-war group who admitted to to spreading fake news, but "a hope."
Oh, and full disclosure - that Malibu blog just might belong to me. No fooling.
What did a local (radio) reporter ask Atty. Gen. Michael Mukasey during the drug indictment press conference today? Whether he brought any of those "enhanced interrogation techniques" with him for local law enforcement agencies to use, our own Andrew Blankstein reports.
"I'm not here to talk about interrogation techniques," the AG said testily, then added that the LAPD is doing "just fine."
A chair dumped on the curb is just another piece of urban blight. But a purple couch sitting on the street? Well, that's funny. At least for Hollywood resident Peggy Archer. For nearly two years now, Archer has captured images of everything from sleek leather sofas to chintz patterned love seats on her Abandoned Couches photo blog.
"I got interested because it's just a strange thing to see sitting out by the roadside. I'd never noticed them before, but now I realize they were there all along," writes Archer. "I can certainly understand why they upset some folks. It's not like it's hard to call the city and have it picked up. I just think they're funny."
Most of the photos come from bicycle rides the lighting technician takes near her home in Hollywood, an area where couches (and the occasional recliner) seem to sprout up overnight like mushrooms after a rain. But you can go on a sofa photo safari anywhere in the region, from Pasadena to Beverly Hills. There is even the occasional bean bag and a lonely wing back chair.
City of Los Angeles residents can always get sidewalk sofas picked up. Archer herself is not about to get involved in finding new homes for old couches.
"Stuffed furniture that's been sitting out on the curb isn't something I'm tempted to bring into my house."
For a quick laugh as the day winds down, check out Jay Leno riffing on Carla Rivera's story about the lengths LAUSD teachers will go (lighted candles!) to make sure parent-teacher conferences go well.
Click on the March 12 episode (you can f.f. to the 8:40 mark to find the bit, though there's a pretty good doughnut joke at 7:17).
Top news right now -- Gov. Eliot Spitzer of New York has been linked to a prostitution ring. So far, the NYC tabs, the Post and the Daily News, are playing it straight.
How long until the newspapers that brought us headlines like "Ike Beats Tina to Grave" and "Headless Body in Topless Bar" sink their teeth into this one?
We're taking suggestions (Hunk of Burning Gov?) here at L.A. Now. Remember the rules: short and pithy. And if you want to get published, keep it clean.
Your neighborhood mini-mall is no longer just a convenient spot to have your nails done or pick up a donut (a glazed cruller, please). These often parking-challenged retail centers are now home to chic wine bars, art galleries and trendy boutiques, says Lea Lion at the Guide.
So, who do you have to thank for all these homely havens of hipness? Most likely the men of La Mancha ... La Mancha Development, that is. While the earliest forms of Southern California strip malls date back to the 1920s, it was the founders of La Mancha Development, Sam Bachner and Alan Riseman, who most likely built more mini-malls than anyone else.
After building their first mini-mall in Panorama City in 1973 (is this a historic landmark yet?), the development duo went on to build more than 600 of these stucco centers across the region. At its height, La Mancha was building five malls a month. By the mid-1980s, La Mancha and its competitors had built an estimated 3,000 mini-malls, many of them on the sites of former gas stations, across the Los Angeles area. Click on the link below for Mini-Mall Milestones.
Of course, there was a backlash. Cities responded by imposing regulations to limit their development. In 1989, 10% of respondents to a quality of life poll identified mini-malls as their biggest pet peeve.
Is there a difference between a mini-mall and a strip mall? Who cares, responded Bachner in a 1998 interview:
"Mini-malls? Strip malls? We built convenience centers, to give easy access to go in a store and come out."
What is it with the New York Times and its L.A. problem? The paper sends a writer to Big Bear, a good two hours away, and the very first words out of the guy's mouth are a cheap shot at L.A. "Smog and gridlock and vanity," he sniffs, before turning his attention to the lovely lake. (And btw, that's New York on the right.)
It's not that he's wrong -- our smog has made us, if not famous, then infamous. It's been making headlines lately, too, but not the way NYT guy implies. California's trying to put a cap on emissions and the Feds want to stop us.
Traffic? Yep, we've got it. And if there's anyone out there who's happy with the pace at which L.A.'s gridlock is being handled, from the city to the state levels, by all means, speak up. I'd love to hear from you.
What really irked me (and this is a newspaper blog so please note the polite "irked" in place of language that would make my very proper French mother blush and my bosses turn a deeper shade of red for another reason entirely) was the bit about vanity.
If you don't get out enough, if you read too many tabloids or watch too much TV, you might think Los Angeles equals Hollywood. But if you know the city at all, you know it's made up of regular people doing their best to make a life. Neighborhoods and schools and rec centers, small businesses and artists and activists, food lovers, nature lovers, gardeners. Imperfect? You bet. But vain? I argue no. Most of the people who live here don't deserve that kind of lazy slap in the face.
In the world of Rose Parade floats, it's never too early to start planning. So it should come as no surprise that the eager beavers at the Sierra Madre Rose Float Assn. have not only submitted an entry for the 2009 parade, but that it has already received a tentative OK, according to Sierra Madre News Net. The "Bollywood Dreams" design by Charles Meier was selected after the San Gabriel Valley community's float pickers started accepting ideas last October, said association VP Don Mills.
But Sierra Madre is not alone. The Pasadena Tournament of Roses has received more than 30 submissions so far from would-be participants seeking a spot among an estimated 45 floats, said Bob Miller, chairman of the tournament's float entries committee. It's actually more competitive than it sounds, because most of last year's float entries, including Sierra Madre's, were invited back. That would leave only five to eight spots for new entries.
Not only are applications for 2009 rolling in, but Miller said submissions are pending for 2010, even though a theme has not been decided. In fact, Miller has spoken to groups interested in sending floats down Colorado Boulevard in 2016. With that in mind, you may want to download and submit your one-page float application now. It's free to apply and you might even beat Sierra Madre to the punch...for 2010.
--Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Courtesy of the Sierra Madre Rose Float Assn.
A Hollywood Park racehorse threw his rider and headed onto Manchester Avenue in Inglewood this afternoon, our columnist, Sandy Banks reports. The sight snarled traffic and caused switchboards at the police department and city hall to light up as drivers phoned in the news.
City inspector Chris Marsiglia heard the oddball radio call and, being an experienced horseman, rode rolled to the rescue. He found the errant steed, exhausted and confused, and quickly captured him.
"Code Six on a horse," he said, and just like that, another Hollywood Park race was over.
--Veronique de Turenne
Photo of Monte Rose and Chris Marsiglia (he's the one in the hat) courtesy of the city of Inglewood.
Sketch artist Mona Edwards has been sitting in courtrooms for 30 years, drawing perps and politicos, judges and lawyers, exactly as she sees them. Not everyone's happy.
This week, while sketching Britney Spears' ongoing conservatorship hearings, Mona told Andrew Blankstein about an officer of the court who had complained about how she was portrayed. The first day of hearings, the woman wore glasses and no makeup. After seeing herself in Mona's drawings, she wore lipstick, eye shadow and contact lenses.
Nothing new -- no one's happy with how they look, Mona said. Men want more hair. Women want to be Angelina Jolie prettier.
"You're dealing with vanity on both sides," she said.
