Yup, it was such a success last time around at Santa Anita Park they are returning this summer.  If you made it to the Pasadena locations last year you were probably put off by the density of the crowds and difficulties with parking and stuff.  The move to Santa Anita Park alleviated those obstacles and made the event really fun.  Of course, if you made the ones after the move to Santa Anita you are well aware of how much fun the place was.

The folks at 626 Night Market are so happy with the change of venue they are looking to increase their crowds.  They are having a contest on facebook and are giving away 5 passes to each of the 10 winners.  To enter all you gotta do is like their page and share it with your friends.

626 Night Market is also looking for artists, food trucks and other vendors to pack the place with and add to the fun and enjoyment.  If you are interested visit their web page HERE.  Yes, the prices seem steep, but it includes your canopy, lights, outlets and most importantly your permits.

I’ll post more on the dates as we get closer to the event.  If you want more deets visit the main 626 Night Market site when you have time.

Congratulations go out to Kristina Reed, also known as wife of long-time blogging.LA’s Mack Reed not (just) for producing the Academy Award-winning Animated Short Paperman, but for getting kicked out of (and getting let back into) the 2013 Oscars.

According to The Hollywood Reporter:

After Disney’s Paperman won the Academy Award for best animated short Sunday, producer Kristina Reed began throwing paper airplanes, about three or four — with kisses on them, like the ones seen in the film — from her seat in the mezzanine.

The paper planes were nowhere near the stage, instead shooting straight down from the balcony. It went largely unnoticed by the crowd, but security didn’t think the act was very sweet, kicking her out of the Dolby Theatre auditorium.

It would turn out to be temporary. After a short protest, security brought her back to her seat about five to 10 minutes later.

The story has been picked up by Gawker, HuffPo, ABC, MSN, and more.

(Photo lifted from Mack’s Facebook feed… thanks, Mack!)

Having survived one teen driver I’m getting ready to add another soon. The biggest fear for a parent is what if the kid makes a critical mistake driving that hurts themselves or someone else. Only so much a parent can do alone.  There are a lot of resources a parent can access to help them keep their kids out of harms way and DSFL-Driving Skills For Life is one such resource.

The program will be in L.A next weekend, March 2nd and 3rd at the Hollywood Park race track.  All the details you could want are HERE on the DSFL web site.  You can register your 15-19 year old HERE.

As if the links don’t answer all of your questions you can read the press release after the jump. Read the rest of this entry →

I can’t take credit for finding this, spotted on facebook on a friend of a friends liking it chain of posts.  None the less it is a great view of Burbank to Toluca Lake in 1958.  Isn’t that sound track something else?  The turds at the Getty images won’t allow embedding, but you can view it HERE.

Just got the press release.  Congrats to the 4 local marching bands that made it into the 2014 Tournament of Roses Parade.

They are:
Glendora Tartan Band and Pageantry, Glendora
Los Angeles Unified School District All District High School Honor Band, Los Angeles
Pasadena City College Tournament of Roses Honor Band & Herald Trumpets, Pasadena
The Salvation Army Tournament of Roses Band

Print and bring this voucher to CPK 2/25-28

Hat tip to my friends at Arcadia PD  for this tip regarding a fund raiser for the fallen officers due to shoot outs or outright assassination by Chris Dorner last week.   (You remember Chris Dorner, the ex-LAPD officer on a bizarre vendetta to prove he was wrongfully terminated by LAPD )

20% of your total bill will be donated to the respective police associations for Officer Crain and Detective McKay who wound up dying as a result of shooting by McKay.

To participate all you need to do is print out the flyer to the right of this post and present it to your server at the time you order at California Pizza Kitchen February 25-28 2013.

The quarter seen next to the plate is for scale. The Hollenbeck Burrito is the creation of a singular master by the name of Manuel Rojas who owned the famed Manuel’s Original El Tepeyac Cafe in Boyle Heights. But the Hollenbeck is hardly the largest burrito he makes — or I should say made, since sad news came yesterday that Señor Rojas has died at the age of 79 after a half-century of  serving them up.

That distinction belongs to any variety of Manuel’s Special burritos, each of which roughly calculates out to being about 250 cubic inches of gut-busting deliciousness (here’s an example with the unknown patron exhibiting the appropriate level of shock and awe). Simply laying my eyes on such massiveness the one and only time I ordered a Manuel’s Special was almost enough to stave off my worst hunger pangs. Since then, it’s been Hollenbecks for me and they’re pleeeeeenty! But if the previously mentioned dimensional quantification is hard to wrap your head around, try this alternative: it weighs in at five pounds.

I’m having trouble wrapping my head around Rojas no longer overseeing the construction of his classics, but I take solace that they live on, and I will most certainly be paying a visit in the near future to honor him by digging into one — and taking the inevitable leftovers home.

This article was originally published at 8Asians.com and has been reposted here with permission.

While smog is yet one of the many problems afflicting Los Angeles, this blog entry points out that some of LA’s famous air pollution comes all the way from China.   According to this report, some days have a third of the air over San Francisco and Los Angeles coming from Asia, and along with it, up to three fourths of black carbon particulate air pollution, among other pollutants.  Just how does Chinese pollution get to the US?  Is it just the fault of the Chinese?

Some of this pollution begins as naturally occurring dust plumes from the Gobi desert, whipped up by storms every spring and summer.  As the dust travels west, it picks ups pollutants as it travels through heavily industrialized parts of China.  Those pollutants include the end products of coal burning, a common source of power in China.

While the US may complain about the pollution, it does contribute to the problem.  Various loopholes and subsidies are driving up the export of coal from the US and Canada to China, which gets burned and exported back through the atmosphere.   The US demand also drives production in some of those Chinese factories.

To me this shows how much the world is shrinking – what happens in one part of the world can unintentionally affect other parts.  Our atmosphere is something we all share.  While Beijing’s “airpocalypse” may seem far away, it really isn’t.  Not only can that pollution reach my family and me here in the Bay Area, but conditions were not much different here some 50 to 60 years ago.

(Photo Credit: Norman Kuring, SeaWiFS Project, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

This article was originally published at 8Asians.com and has been reposted here with permission.

Terminator Salvation. Sherlock Holmes 1,2, and 3. Lego: The Piece of Resistance. Godzilla. Stephen King’s It. Death Note. Justice League. What do all these disparate movies past, present, and future have in common? One amazing Taiwanese American producer, Dan Lin.

And you might have heard of his latest film Gangster Squad, an LAPD period movie about a battle to take back LA from the mafia. Named back in 2008 by Variety as one of top 10 producers to watch, Lin has definitely lived up to the title, and with all the classic blockbusters being tacked to his name, he and everything he does will be worth watching for long after Gangster Squad hits the streets this Friday.

Here are 8Questions with Dan Lin about his new film and more from a roundtable press interview:

Read the rest of this entry →

I spotted this on the Smoking Tire’s channel this morning.  Pretty awesome downhill boarding just outside the city limits.  Interesting to note that these guys had helmets on, much better than the yahoos I was behind recently on Laurel Canyon doing this WITHOUT helmets.

Smoking Tire for those of you who don’t know is owned by Matt Farah who runs Smoking Tire.com and was interviewed by me a couple of years ago.  Good guy, great cars and car reviews all taking place in and around Los Angeles.

Its been going on for as long as my kids were little and I have lived in Monrovia.  Its a great little tradition where MPD and MFD escort Santa and his carolers through the streets of town hitting EVERY neighborhood during the course of 4 nights the week before Christmas.  The Holidays wouldn’t be the same without this wonderful tradition, especially for those with little ones afoot still.

What sort of traditions exist in your pocket of L.A?  Share them in the comments with links to any video or pics you have.

This weekend, the LA 3-D Club is hosting the 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival at the Downtown Independent Theater. The festival opens Friday, December 14th at 8pm with Robin Hood: Ghosts of Sherwood 3D, a 2012 feature from Germany, directed by Oliver Krekel and starring Martin Thon, Tom Savini, and Kane Hodder.

Short films in competition will screen at 1pm and 3pm on Saturday, December 15th, followed at 5pm by a special presentation of 20th Century Fox’s Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare,  a 2012 3-D animated short film starring the youngest family member of  The Simpsons. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with members of the creative team behind the film, including director David Silverman.

The festival’s Closing Night will showcase the feature U2 3D, the 2008 concert film that was shot in South America during the band’s Vertigo tour.  U2 3D will screen for FREE at 8pm on Saturday,  December 15th and will be introduced by 3D Producer and 3ality Technica CEO Steve Schklair.

Sunday, December 16th will be dedicated to remembering and celebrating the life of Ray Zone, LA 3-D Club Vice President and 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival C0-Chair in a free public memorial at the theater. Ray was an author, 3-D film producer, speaker, and award-winning 3-D artist who passed away on November 13, 2012. A reception, hosted by the International 3D Society, begins at 5pm, followed by family and friends speaking in memorial to Ray in the theater. The evening will include displays of Ray’s art, writing, and film work.

If you buy a pass to the festival, you could be the lucky winner of a FujiFilm FinePix REAL 3D W3 digital camera. A Festival Pass is $30 and gets you into all screenings and events during the weekend  and enters you into a drawing to be held at the awards ceremony on Saturday evening at 7pm.

Come out and support a great local organization, a fantastic independent theater and see some amazing indie 3-D films and music videos from all over the world.

The 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival
December 14th through 16th, 2012
Downtown Independent Theater
251 S. Main Street, Los Angeles 90012

Ford World 2012 LA Auto Show, click to embiggen

So much to talk about so will try to bring it down to a Reader’s Digest condensed version.  I will also try to bring you up to date as well as what you missed during Press Days which were this Wednesday and Thursday.

First of all, if you are looking for exotics fuhgetaboutit, there are none.  The entire class is represented by Galpin’s stock of Aston Martins.  Very nice cars, but not the boat load of Ferraris, Lambos and Rolls of years past.  That’s what happens when the L.A. show grows so big with a focus on green cars it alienated that fun bunch of fantasy cars. Read the rest of this entry →

It is one of my most favorite times of the year, but then again I’m a car guy so it may not rank as high for you.  Since the L.A. Auto Show moved out from under the shadows of the Detroit show a few years back to right around Thanksgiving the show has taken off in terms of international importance.  Even Detroit has begrudgingly noted our importance as an international show.  Actually our show kicks Detroit’s butt, been to Detroit and they have nothing on us, especially when you roll in all the tuners, customizers and other goodies found in Kenetia Hall.  That is something that Detroit completely lacks.

It starts Friday November 30 and runs through December 9 in the entire Convention Center in DTLA.  All the information you could want about the L.A. Auto Show can be found on their web site HERE.  That includes the ability to order tickets online and save yourself some line time waiting to get into the show.

I’ll be there for Press Days as well as a regular paying member with the fam this weekend.  Yes, for me its that big of a deal.

PS as of 8:30AM yet another article out of Detroit goes live about how important the L.A. Auto Show is and sets the bar for others in the US Auto Show circuit.

france and italy car show poster, click to embiggen

If you have a soft spot for those quirky French and Italian cars this may well be the perfect show for you.  The France and Italy Car Show will take place this Sunday in Woodley Avenue Park.  It will feature a lot of vintage French and Italian cars.

It will be located on Woodley Ave south of Victory.  Its official time is 9Am to 2PM, I’d strongly urge folks interested to be there early as a lot of people start leaving well before the 2PM close time.  If they can start their cars that is…sorry for the snark but a lot of these cars will live up to their stereotypes.  They even have a Facebook page with more details.

Details: Sunday November 4, 2012, Woodley Avenue Park MAP HERE, Van Nuys, CA