Whatever you celebrate, however you celebrate, and especially for those of you who don’t celebrate, I’m going to be a sap for a moment and send out a big fat I LOVE YOU GUYS and I hope you spend the next few days having fun.

Be safe & be healthy and have a happy holiday.

Don’t drink & drive, call a cab. Or hail a cab.

Photo by the one & only Pickles.

CBS2.com has posted the merriest of Merry Christmas poems, complete with hookers, johns, and the police! It’s not just a holiday greeting, but a news story, as well! Credit goes to Alan Carter for whipping up this soon-to-be holiday classic:

Twas the night before Christmas,
the Pasadena Police were all rested,
cause a sting Tuesday afternoon
saw one hooker and 15 johns arrested.

Undercover cops did their duty with charm
to make sure the ladies got off the streets without harm!

To lessen the number of streetside, uh, flings,
the cops worked the streets from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. for the sting.
Imagine those big burly guys out in a dress!
Oh, but they did it dear people to keep the streets from being a mess!

Police Chief Bernard Melekian said that neighbors were upset,
to see their beloved East Colorado Boulevard get –
kinda seedy with men who were, uh, uhm, needy and
that’s why the cops took the hookers off the street,
On Dancer, on Prancer — you two will have to find some other place to meet!

Those cops were quite efficient to hear it told,
they dressed like ladies of the night and even Johns who were bold,
but if the Pasadena cops have their say,
no more flesh will be sold…

Ah, to those who were busted, this is no time to whine,
but you’re facing six months in jail and a $500 fine!

Original story: http://cbs2.com/local/Prostitution.Sting.Arrested.2.894687.html

I was downtown a couple of nights ago and came across this beautiful display o’ lights strung up on 4th and Main.  Quite stunning.  Apparently they came all the way from Paris… and they look it.  If you like Christmas displays, downtown seems to be rockin’ this year.  And I found some cool stores and restaurants on 4th… Check it out, that little section of LA seems to be really lighting up!

Tonight was our annual Christmas Dinner with our neighbors, actually close enough to be family, Bill and Stacey.  After dinner we cruise on up to Upper Hasting Ranch of Pasadena, along with several hundred other carloads of families to check out the holiday lights.   Each street is themed, snowmen, santa, elves etc.,.

This year we broke up into 2 cars.  A “girls” car and a “boys” car.  I had the latter.  It was 3 boys 11, 13 and 15 who still revel in potty humor.  As we rounded the corner up on one of the streets the theme was “Rudolf”, you know the red nosed reindeer kind.  All of a sudden there was this rising staccato of giggles and guffaws. Given the potty humor coming out of the back seat I kept quiet, my wife however had to ask what was so funny this time.

“Rudolf is taking a dump” was the chorus from the back.  I had to laugh, my wife was not as amused.

Happy Holidays all.  The fraz and fam got last minute scheduling done and are off to LV for the Holiday with relatives.  Should be fun.  Should be very cold…and my kids will get skiing lessons if I am lucky and the roads to the local slopes are open.

Pic by me with the trusty phonecam.

Wow.

A press release just came across my desk notifying me that “A benefactor, wishing to remain anonymous, pledged to pay all adoption fees for 300 pets adopted between now and Christmas at any LA Animal Services Center.”

The anonymous donor stated, “I hope this offer will help empty the kennels and cages and gives these pets a real home for Christmas.”

The donor also had one request of those adopting a pet; that they write a letter to LA Animal Services explaining how adopting the pet changed their lives. I think that’s a small price to pay–and another gift, if you think about how meaningful it can often be to write letters enumerating the things for which you are grateful–for saving the life of an animal who will enrich your own life for years to come.

Full info & adoption locations from the Department of Animal Services is behind the jump. At a time when the government of the state is considering cutting costs in animal services, this is a priceless gift.

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For the five years I’ve lived in Los Angeles, I’ve been driving, biking and walking past El Cid, the 47 year-old restaurant on Sunset in Silver Lake. That all finally changed on Saturday night when a group of friends gathered there to celebrate a birthday.

Eight of us wound down the labyrinthine stairs from Sunset into the seemingly subterranean theater restaurant. Although there is a same-level entrance from Myra St., the sense that your burrowing into times past matches well with El Cid because the building itself has a story to tell:

Built as a movie theater around 1900 by early movie director D. W. Griffith, it was where his notoriously racist silent film, Birth of a Nation, first played in 1915.

Converted into a cabaret theater in 1950, it became known as a hangout for actors of the day. In 1961, the building was converted into a 16th century Spanish-style tavern and the El Cid restaurant was born.

A few nights per week or month are given over to comedy, burlesque and country music, but El Cid’s mainstay is the Flamenco Dinner Theater that has been running for the past 40 years. And whether you pay $34.95 at the restaurant or $25 in advance through Goldstar Events, it’s a bargain that includes a three-course dinner along with the dance performance. Drinks and tip are extra; but still, dinner and a movie comes in at around the same price. (New Year’s Eve suggestion after the jump.) Read the rest of this entry →

Just look at all those horrified exclamation points there in the subject line! Yes, it breaks my heart to say that Regeneration is being forced into closing its brick-and-mortar shop, by these foul economic times that have befallen us all. [shakes fist impotently at sky.] I doubt there’s much we can do to keep ‘em open (and its Etsy site will remain open), but we sure as hell can send ‘em out with a bang. Regeneration, I’m broke, and I swore all anyone was getting from me this year were cards, but you’ve made me recant. I’ll be there. With the paltry sum I have left before payday, I shall arrive, and buy as much as possible, and then in the grand tradition of any quality holiday shopping spree, I shall keep it all for myself, and everyone will still be getting just cards.

I saw Cracker open for the New York Dolls tonight, and their lyric here properly sums up my holiday shopping behavior:

” Well I was gonna bring you flowers, but I didn’t.
It’s the thought that counts and I think I’m a bit too broke.”

It’s that time of the year again! Time to drag out the classics. From the Echo Park Film Center, whose last date of operation before it closes for the holidays is this Satruday (they won’t re-open until January):

What a wacky and wonderful year it’s been! Join us for EPFC’s last event of 2009… our annual screening of that ol’ holiday classic, It’s A Wonderful Life. Sentimental sobbing encouraged.

Also on the bill, a very rare and special treat: incredible Super 8 footage of the 1967 Echo Park Christmas Parade shot by the one and only Mr. Al Kasselman! Neighborhood history at its finest!

And for those who have been both naughty and nice, a very special presentation of Doug Harvey’s Moldy Slide Show.

The event is free, with eggnog, cookies & reindeer treats in attendance, as well as your lovely visage.

I went to Bed Bath and Beyond Budget in Culver City today to play the 20% coupon game (where you’re supposed to feel like you got a deal by using their 20% off coupons to offset their marked-up prices), and found the place surprisingly empty.  Was this a sign of the Next Great Depression?

Granted, it was mid-afternoon, likely an off hour between lunch time and after work.  And perhaps BBBB is not a Christmas shopping destination, except for practical people like me.

vacuum cleaner bags?  you shouldn’t have!  really, you shouldn’t have.

Indeed, the parking lot was pretty full, so maybe hordes of Christmas shoppers were next door at Target, where you can buy toys and iPods with your household cleaning fluids.

I did my part, picking up a fancy photo album covered in nice dead cow for one of “my people.”  But I have to wonder what Christmas is going to be like this year, in Culver City and elsewhere.

Either way… I’m lovin’ the festive spirit of the neighbors on my street.  Imagine all the characters moving… which is a little weird… (hence the blurry photo).

Every year there are more and more lights adorning everyone’s houses on my street, leading me to believe that there is a heated competition I’m not privy to.  It’s even inspired me to put up a paltry string of blue lights, which I’m quite proud of!  I’m usually pretty pathetic around Christmas festivities… but all the Sturm and Drang of this year is getting me in an especially perky holiday mood.

I’m up at 5am with another of my intermittent early-morning allergy attacks, which has afforded me the extreme pleasure of some spare time in which I can communicate with you, dear reader. I figured while I was waiting for the benadryl, xyzal and vitamin-B-complex (which actually helps the most) cocktail to kick in and make my sinuses stop feeling like they’re about to peel themselves off my skull, I might as well transmit a bit of vital information.

Today will surely be a busy day for many people beginning their holiday preparations. Therefore it is with great joy then that I inform you of today’s Santacon, quite possibly our city’s biggest to date, and a spirited event GUARANTEED to get you in the mood for the holidays to be over already. I know nothing of its location or appointed rounds (as the Red Tide does often span the city) because the event is shrouded in secrecy, but for those who’d like to follow along in spirit, I highly suggest you look to…no, not the skies! to Twitter!…where I have it on good authority that many well-known LA twitfolks will be broadcasting their experiences. You can also check my photostream on flickr, where I will be posting horrendously lousy cameraphone photos all day long.

Ho ho ho!

Pic by The Opus from flickr under a creative commons license.

Oh, and to those elves who’ve been fomenting discontent and grumbling about a strike, GIVE IT UP! You strike  EVERY YEAR!!! And you know what happens EVERY YEAR?! Santa smacks you DOWN, bitches! You know why?! Because you’re FOUR FEET TALL!!! Ohhhhhhh DAAAAM! Boo yah!!!

Leaked photo of local weatherman, post Botox. Or something.

Any guess WHO it could be? (answer, involving the Grinch and Universal Studios here).

The Mar Vista Farmers’ Market is gearing up for the Holidays with their Winter Festival for the next three Sundays. Along with the freshest veggies and fruits, there will be craft booths from the Mar Vista Arts and Crafts Collective, cooking demos with Amanda Cushman and music by Klezmer Juice to get you juiced up to shop. There are plenty of food booths to keep you going too, crepes, omeletes, BBQ, Peruvian delights, pastries, and much more.

Have you been naughty or nice? Rumor has it that Santa Claus will make an appearance.

Mar Vista Farmers’ Market
Grand View Blvd at Venice Blvd.
Sundays from 9am to 2pm

(click on image to make it larger.)

It’s the most wonderful time of the year, or so they say. Its that season when we all try a little harder to be patient, being more passive and less aggressive, perhaps with the help of some spiked nog. But let’s face it, as we make our lists and check it twice, there’s got to be something to give to those that have been naughty. And that’s why for the third year LA Metblogs is asking readers to nominate individuals for the Grinch of the Year Award.

Last year Pasadena’s Mayor Bogaard was the winner, for allowing China, a country with a poor record of human rights, into the Rose Bowl Parade, as well as his kicking a grandma out of a city council meeting for protesting the action. And in our first year Zuma Dogg earned the title for being a thorn in the side of LA City Council (now he’s running for mayor, btw).

This year, who could it be? Sam Zell for continuing to run the LA Times into the ground? Alejandro Moreno and Juan Meza of Palm Desert for shooting each other dead at a Toy R Us on Black Friday? Pasadena Now’s James MacPherson for outsourcing writers to India for $7.50 per 1000 words? Or maybe El Coyote owner Marjorie Christoffersen for donating $100 to the Yes On Prop 8 campaign?

Nominees can be anyone who has been a Scrooge to Los Angeles residents, or a fellow Angeleno who gives the rest of us a bad name. Of course, the nominating process is entirely subjective, but feel free to name names and plead your case in the comments below. We’ll filter through suggestions over the next week or so, and then put final nominations up for vote.

A Christmas tree light show at LA Live, the Grammy museum opening, and the return of Cole’s highlight the busy commencement of the holiday season in Los Angeles. And guess what? It’s all happening Downtown. Just in time to abuse Metro’s late night Red Line and DASH hours. Fill your Calendar app accordingly.

Ongoing

• Ice Skating in Pershing Square with daily concerts. What, no outdoor movies this year? At least you have an excuse to wear that Old Navy scarf of yours in 80-degree weather without looking like a total Hollywood jackass.

Today

• ESPN Zone opens at LA Live. There is no local NFL team to cheer on to the playoffs, and the BCS Champion, the Super Bowl Champion, and the Gold Medal Curling Team of the 2010 Winter Olympics have already been decided by HAL 9000. But you can still watch the events as they happen on a bunch of big TV screens.

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