Not the one at your house, but the one in your neighborhood, down on the corner. The one that looks like the picture here. 

We used to have two within six blocks of our house and both are gone. Vanished in the night. I saw our mailman yesterday and asked where the box went and he did a double take at the empty spot where the box used to be. (Seriously, he did a double take) and said “Yeah, I guess it’s gone.” (Thanks.) He then said, “I’ll collect your mail from now on.” 

Well that’s a problem for me as I stopped putting my mail on outside our door about ten years ago when it was stolen, checks were washed and I *almost* had $4000 taken. Luckily for me I caught it within a day and the bank made it right. 

I’m not quite ranting as there is a post office nearby, but it’s kinda sad. Are you mailboxes disappearing? How do you feel about that?

(Clarification after I hit “post” — the post office took them away, they were not stolen.)

Yes, LA video blogger Pete Handelman is at it again.  This time its Manny Ramirez’s unemployment woes (and doesn’t more than a few of us have that now) that are the subject of a video dart  blog entry on Sports Shorts.

Pete’s thoughts on the topic and his inspiration after the jump. Read the rest of this entry →

Pictured here is a Fiat X1/9 well worn and quite a few bits and baubles missing. Hell its a Fiat and the car in particular that helped earn the company the jokesters renaming to “Fix it again Tony”.  Sure they were temperamental to keep in tune, prone to break down if you ran them the way you would any other sports car.  But, and this is a huge BUT, when that car was in perfect tune it was a thrilling little car, especially the earlier versions before they were bloated with a lot of power equipment and A/C.  More details and pics after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry →

Towards the end of last year, LA’s infamous Wolfpack Hustle staged their second All City Race. The rules were simple, 5 member teams with at least one rider on a fixed gear. Starting at Tang’s Donuts in Silver Lake at Docweiller Beach. First full team to cross the finish line wins, any route they choose is fair game. There was blood, broken bones, freeways and bike paths. And much rejoicing. In case you missed it, here’s the video which was just released:

'splains the ice on the car lucy...

Who else had to scrape ice from their windshields this morning?  Better, how many of you in LA moved here with the expectation to never ever have to scrape ice in the morning again?

Pic by me with the trusty phone cam…before I left the driveway.

I’m a regular visitor to the LA Times’ excellent Culture Monster blog, so I was taken aback when I completely missed a major piece of news they reported last week. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the eagle eye of Taras “20 Minutes into the Future” Matla, I might still be in the complete dark about what will undoubtedly be the cultural event of 2009.

What am I carrying on about? At the end of a recent post about an exodus of board members from the Museum of Contemporary Art, LA Times staff writer Mike Boehm dropped this bombshell:

[T]he museum’s Geffen Contemporary building, closed until at least July as a cost-saving measure, is scheduled to be abuzz on the evening of Feb. 12 — not for art lovers, but for video game enthusiasts who’ll man more than 100 gaming stations during the launch party for Street Fighter IV. The game’s creator, Capcom, is renting the venue for the event.

Wow, talk about burying the lead! Capcom’s party will not only celebrate the launch of their latest entry in their mega-popular Street Fighter series, but will also mark 20 years of the button-mashing franchise’s history. Imagine that! And all without the help of $50 million from the NEA.

The festivities take place from 8 pm to 12 am and is free; you just need to RSVP.

At this late stage of the game, I can only hope that this post gets the word out to Capcom’s considerable fanbase. And no, I don’t mean this guy.

See updates below…

Neither DJ Khaled nor Chris Brown. Image via @BreakingNewsOn

As I type this, a white Bentley with Illinois plates is in the midst of a police pursuit being that has been carried live by KCAL9 for two hours. They’re mentioning that this is likely a high profile suspect, described as an African-American male, and that it may be someone who was associated with an awards show this weekend. They also mentioned the suspect is suicidal and was in communication with the victim of an assault.

The chase began in the 4000 block of Lankershim in North Hollywood, and is currently in Manhattan Beach.

More at KCAL9… updates below. Feel free to pipe in below in the comments. Read the rest of this entry →

I apologize in advance for any deception the thumbnail might present. Click it for its maximum size and you’ll quickly see this isn’t any masterpiece. It’s a digitally zoomed image from a point-n-shooter sitting on the corner of my desk and pointing through a dirty Westchester window at Mt. San Antonio (aka Mt. Baldy) and the San Bernadino range some 48-miles away. Improper equipment aside, when I looked up from my desk and saw the storm had cleared out and left me with this breathtaking scene just shortly before sunset, I just had to capture and share it.

One of the silver linings of a poor economy are the deals that inevitably evidence.  I have been seeing them all over the place, even in very high end areas.  Fine dining is starting to feel the pinch all across Los Angeles and the deals are becoming plentiful in an effort to entice diners out for a meal.  These are a couple of the latest special menus I’ve come across.

Taste on Melrose is extending its DineLA menu through the entire month of February (something many participating restaurants are also doing).  You can enjoy a three course lunch for $22 per person or a three course dinner for $34 per person.  If you haven’t been to Taste, now is the time to try it out.  It will be impossible not to fall in deep taste bud lust.

This weekend the Innovative Dining Group announced Appetite Stimulus Menus at several of their popular restaurants ranging from $25 per person to $40 per person Sunday through Thursday beginning yesterday at BOA Steakhouse (West LA and Santa Monica locations), Sushi Roku (West Hollywood and Santa Monica locations), and Katana.  It appears to be a similar extension of the DineLA concept.

So, if you are dire need of an exquisite little venture to remind yourself that life can be completely hedonistic even in the darkest of hours, take advantage of these sumptuous menus and spoil yourself or do it in tandem with your favorite partner in crime.

Adam takes his free throw afer a Spartan foul.

WCS Spartans, and I mean coach, players and parents deserve a round of applause.  I actually gave the coach and one parent a hand shake.  In all sincerity I was impressed by how they played and acted.  Yes, there were parents coaching from the sidelines, but it wasn’t mean and with malice towards our kids.  We’re all in competitive kid sports (basketball) but not everyone keeps sportsmanship in the equation like the WCS Spartans. 

This weekend my sons Santa Anita Mountaineers (SGV based) played the WCS Spartans (Carson based) in a very tough basketball game. What stopped me in my tracks is that one of the parents of a WCS Spartan player actually coached his son on how to make sure someone is OK when you accidentally foul and knock them to the ground.  How absolutely refreshing to see and hear that instead of the usual congratulatory praise when a strong player is taken out. (I’ve ranted about this and it happens more often than I care to see and tossing a dart…happens most often in the Orange County tournaments).

As a Mountaineer parent to the parents of the WCS Spartans, thanks for being such good sports and great competitors.

Pic by me with a point and squirt casio exlim.  Its the free throw after a foul by a WCS Spartan in the 12U (6th grade and younger) tournament this weekend.  It does get bigger with a click.

Fetish Film Fridays, Rick Castro’s monthly film series at the Egyptian Theater, continues this Friday with a screening of The Baby– a 1973 movie about a grown man raised as an infant.

Castro, who owns Antebellum Gallery, says it’s one of the few films to present the fetish of ABs (adult babies) on the big screen. He promises it’s “original and odd.” To me, it sounds like the perfect Valentine’s eve date movie.

The Wadsworths are a typical ordinary family: a strong-willed matriarchal mother, two lust-fueled daughters and a bouncing baby boy. Except the baby is going on 30 years old, sits in a crib, wears diapers and sucks a bottle.

Really, does it sound any different than a Farrelly Bros. movie? Go.

The Baby, Friday, Feb. 13th, 7:30 PM; Egyptian Theater 6712 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles 90028.

Shepard Fairey, accused last week by the Associated Press of infringing on its supposedly copyrighted photo of Obama, has fought back the only way successful street taggers can: with a lawsuit. Specifically, Fairey is asking a New York federal district judge to find that his HOPE poster does not infringe on the AP’s copyright and that his use of the photo was protected by the Fair Use Doctrine. Looks like there’s going to be a lot of welcome billable attorney hours on this one.

Just in case anybody could forget that the struggle for gay civil rights has been ongoing for decades, I had it brought to my attention that this Wednesday is the 42nd Anniversary event of the Black Cat Bar Protest for Gay Rights. For those who don’t know where the Black Cat is, it is now a gay Latin bar, and you’ve all seen it–it’s on Sunset right in the middle of Sunset Junction. While it’s now called Le Barcito, it’s an official Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument and still sports its original sign with a black’n'white pussy cat.

In 1966, New Year’s Eve, the Black Cat was ground central for horrific police brutality as plainclothes officers viciously beat revelers for…kissing at midnight. About a month later a protest vigil of about 200 people gathered at Sunset & Sanborn to stand in opposition to the brutality and discrimination. In 1966, that was a hell of a vigil–when just being openly gay could be grounds for arrest as a sex offender. This brave protest occurred two years before New York’s groundbreaking Stonewall Riots.

Here’s all the info on the event. Today, when we’re all still fighting for everyone to stand on equal ground, I think it’s also important to remember from whence we’ve come.

The Wrecking Crew will be screening at the Grammy Museum this Thursday, February 12 at 7:30. Music and LA history buffs will especially love this documentary about the most famous musicians you might not have heard of.

From the Grammy Museum Website:

The GRAMMY Museum presents a special screening of “The Wrecking Crew,” an intimate, insightful and often humorous documentary about the legendary group of session musicians in 1960s Los Angeles who earned wide acclaim by backing dozens of popular singers including The Beach Boys, Frank & Nancy Sinatra, Cher and Sam Cooke. A panel discussion with filmmaker Denny Tedesco [son of legendary guitarist Tommy Tedesco], drummer Hal Blaine and pianist Don Randi, moderated by GRAMMY Museum Chief Curator Ken Luftig Viste will follow the film.

Elvis Costello said of the film, “A wonderful, touching and hilarious film about the unsung stars of so many records that you carry in your heart.” 

Tickets are $10 ($5 for museum members) and are on sale now. This will sell out! Doors open at 7pm.

Tickets can be purchased at the box office, at ticketmaster or by calling 213.480.3232.

The Grammy Museum is located on the campus of LA Live.
800 W. Olympic Blvd., Ste. A245
Los Angeles, CA 90015 USA

For more details about the film, visit The Wrecking Crew website.

Go see how the music of the 60′s was really made.

I ran across this oddity parked next to me Saturday afternoon in Arcadia.  I was gob smacked.  The keys were in the ignition, the car running.  No driver in sight.  I scanned all over and couldn’t see anyone else in the lot.  As I loaded my car with groceries a hundred options of what I could do or should do ran through my head.  My wife was with me and wouldn’t let me check to see if the doors were open and was irritated that I even took a pic with the trusty phone cam. (it does get bigger with a click).

Of course I wouldn’t act on it, but the impulse to move into the cart return corral entered my mind.  So did calling the police, but what would they do?  The former didn’t happen as I think it might have been considered “grand theft auto” and the latter…I just ran out of time and the car had no plates.  

I can’t call it a parking tard as they were completely in the lines.  I can truthfully say the last time I saw that was when a friend of mine and I tried to get  rid of his gremlin by leaving the keys in, windows down and a “for steal” sign on the dash.  (True story and it was a fail).

What would you have done?