Essays & Asides
LB CITY GIRL: PRESIDENT OBAMA, YOU’VE GOTTA BE OFF YOUR NOODLE!
Mr. President, as a devout Pastafarian I'm angry you require the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster to provide medical coverage to employees who refuse to eat pasta! This disregards our religious tenets and contributes to sinful eating habits that create a need for medical coverage.
LB CITY GIRL: IF THEY’RE SERIOUS ABOUT REVISING SEADIP, THEN LET’S PLAY BALL
With the Second+PCH development in a coma, and everybody suddenly chomping at the bit to amend SEADIP, Long Beach City Girl is proposing the construction of a Major League Baseball park at the corner of PCH and 2nd Street.:
We said we wanted a gateway toLong Beach and what could be a finer gateway than an awesome looking ballpark?
AS ELON MUSK UNVEILS TESLA MODEL X, WE BURN FOR THE LOVE THAT BURNED US
If Elon Musk’s just-this-side-of-disturbingly elfin head had not been turned on that fateful May 20 of 2010---when he seemed ready to propose putting a Tesla plant in Downey after snubbing $28.3 million in incentives from Long Beach---then maybe we'd be at the big party for the Model X.
LB CITY GIRL: CAN I SAY I DON’T LIKE O’DONNELL’S SNOW DAY? OR IS THAT CATTY?
What's got this feline feeling so feral and so like hell that absolutely nothing sounds better than a session of taming at the hands of cat-whisperer Jackson Galaxy? It might just be 4th district city councilmember Patrick O'Donnell and his annual Snow Day.
‘HEY PUNK, I’M NOT GOING TO GET THREATENED ON A TRIP TO MAKE SOME COPIES!’
I didn't mean to see you tag that sign in the parking lot---so why did you ask me what I was looking at? I probably wouldn't have called the cops on you if you had let me go on my way. I don't live in Downey, but I'm not going to get threatened on a trip to make copies.
LB CITY GIRL: ONLY BUSINESS FRIENDLINESS WILL SOOTHE MY RAGING GRANNY
Although the Raging Grannies protested in 2010, they stayed far away from the site where Tesla Motors considered building a production line to replace Downey Studios, where workers reported illnesses they suspected were caused by contamination from the former NASA plant--the future home of Tierra Luna Marketplace.
LB CITY GIRL: POLITICIANS AND FRITTATAS AND WHAT THEY’RE MADE OF
Seeing my chance, I cornered Dan Pressburg in the kitchen and started talking frittata. He tried to change the subject to redevelopment, until I finally had to insist: I wanted that recipe!
MARTIN LUTHER KING’S DREAM DID NOT INCLUDE CHILDREN IMPRISONED FOR LIFE
As we reflect on the values of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., these photos of children who are sentenced to life in prison without parole illustrate how far we still have to go to realize Kings observation that "whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."
LAST LOOK: THE GUY WHO TOOK MY INTRAMURAL SOCCER GAME TOO SERIOUSLY
I saw you taking practice shots, kicking the ball really hard but missing every time, even though there was no goalie. You were trying to impress the women, even though there’s never been a single recorded instance of a woman getting turned on by a man in a neon headband, tank top, blue short shorts and the orange shoes kicking a soccer ball really hard.
FIRST LOOK: RIDING THE LB MONORAIL TO ALL-PROBLEMS-SOLVED-VILLE
If 60 miles of monorail track looks to you like the solution to Long Beach's transportation and employment problems, then you are apparently looking at it the right way ... according to a group called Island of Long Beach, anyway. It claims its project would move 460,000 people an hour and create 300,000 jobs. That's enough for us! All abooooaaarrrd!!!
HORATIO & NEWT: HEAPING THE BLAME FOR POVERTY ON CHILDREN
Newt Gingrich took a page out of Horatio Alger's books when he called for rolling back child labor laws. Newt wants poor kids as young as nine to replace their school janitors, so they can learn the work ethic, as opposed to well-off kids, who are evidently born with a work ethic.
REMEMBERING DOUG ZERBY: NO WORDS TO WARN HIM, BUT PLENTY TO BLAME HIM
Tonight's candlelight vigil at the Long Beach Police Department marks one year since Doug Zerby---drunk and playing with a water nozzle at his Belmont Shore apartment complex---was gunned down without warning by officers Victor Ortiz and Jeffrey Shurtleff, who say they thought the nozzle was a pistol.
MY SISTER, THE FLOWER GIRL AT MY WEDDING, IS A SAILOR GOING OFF TO WAR
What will I say to Anna on the drive down to the Naval Base in San Diego? I will be the last of her family to say goodbye. I don't want to cry. I want to give her a gift. But where she is headed, Anna has neither room nor need for anything I could give her.
SAVE THE (REST OF THE) PLANET! COSTA RICA IS SAVING ITSELF
There really is a place on Earth where people do more for the environment than replace their detergent with baking soda, and where that ethos is fully supported by the government. Costa Rica is a botanical wonderland with plentiful (and colorful) animals, birds and fish, great surfing, frijoles y maduras---oh, and very cute sloths.
COMMIE GIRL: EMMA WOULD HAVE DANCED AT OCCUPY, BUT NOT WITH ME
When I was a girl, and my mother got arrested at places like Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant, the name she gave was "Emma Goldman". Only now, after reading Vivian Gornick's biography of Emma Goldman, do I realize how little I have in common with my heroine. I don’t want to remake society from the ground up. I just want to re-elect a goddamn Democrat
SECOND BIXBY PARK HALLOWEEN CARNIVAL SHOWED PROMISE AND PRACTICE
The arrival of the second annual Bixby Park Halloween Carnival shows promise, not only for the event, but for efforts to revitalize the historic park. It's good practice, too, getting people back in the habit of coming to Bixby Park as it recovers from some difficult times.
ZOMBIE SURVIVAL GUIDE: ONE QUESTION … FOR COUNCILMAN ROBERT GARCIA
We ask comic-book-geek and Superman fan Robert Garcia (that's him on the right) who would win if Superman and Zombie Superman (that's not him on the left ... is it?) cross paths during Zombie Walk/Comic-Con weekend and get in a fight. Of course, the Long Beach City Council member has an answer. A couple of 'em.
ONE QUESTION … FOR EX-REPORTER/FUNNYMAN THEO DOUGLAS
[Another in a trying-our-best-to-make-this-a-weekly series] The back story: In the good, old days when he was a member of The District Weekly staff—actually, even in the not-quite-as-good but even-older days, when he was a member of the OC Weekly staff … or way the hell back in the bad, as in going-Medieval on your ass, days [...]
EAST VILLAGE ARTS DISTRICT: IS ITS STAR BEING STRANGLED BY BANNERS
By hanging banners that draw distinctions among the streets in a neighborhood as small as the East Village, city officials and promoters generate a separatist mentality that risks undermining the sense of unity crucial to the area's success. Better to hang an all-encompassing “East Village” banner that leaves the street names to the street signs.
LOWENTHAL’S SPEECH LIFTED BIXBY PARK BEYOND REHAB … TO RELEVANCE
By delivering her State of the Second District address from the historic band shell at Bixby Park, Council member Suja Lowenthal gave the park's restoration movement the best kind of validation---re-establishing it as a center stage for Long Beach's most-important events.
SHOULD NAPLES RESIDENTS PAY FOR SEAWALLS THAT SUPPORT THEIR LIFESTYLE?
The Naples seawalls keep private mansions and their manicured gardens from tumbling onto adjacent boat docks---with mooring fees that the city deeply discounts for residents---then crashing into the canals. Is fair---or even legal---to repair them by using Tidelands Funds intended for the widest public benefit?
SAN PEDRO DOESN’T PLAN TO END UP IN THE SAME BOAT AS LONG BEACH
The historic battleship USS Iowa is coming to live the rest of its days in San Pedro, and the not-for-profit operators have plans to make the ship a major cultural and educational resources---without draining City of Los Angeleles funds. Let's hope the Long Beach City Council pays very close attention.
GOP REPS PAID ANTI-GAY-MARRIAGE GROUP TO TRAIN THEIR STAFFERS
Using Congressional office accounts to send staff to a conservative Christian group's training seminar is perfectly legal, but underscores the relationships that members of Congress can build with favored causes without violating rules against using taxpayer money to fund political activity.
A LIBERTARIAN REFLECTS UPON LIBERAL BIAS IN THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA
Conservatives are often right, but they have become so instinctive in their media-bias charges that they fail to recognize the degree to which the mainstream media has improved. And anyone who doesn’t like the mainstream media certainly isn’t dependent on it anymore, which is reason enough to chill out about media bias.
26 MILES ACROSS THE SEA … NOT MUCH WATER, TOO MUCH AUTO-TUNE
With water sources on Catalina Island being more finite than the mainland’s, you see more conservation: water-saving toilets; more scrubbing than hosing; people drinking their own urine. I also saw a teenaged acoustic duo using “auto-tune” pitch correction technology---giving them pitch-perfect, tight harmony, as sung by inhuman Cylon warriors.
THE KELLY THOMAS CASE: INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER OR FELONY MURDER?
An involuntary manslaughter charge depends on the assertion that the police were lawfully arresting someone. But if they beat Thomas after he lost consciousness, it was no longer a lawful arrest. Felony murder---death arising from a felony---could be based on Thomas' death arising from battery with serious bodily injury, mayhem or torture, as examples.There does not have to be any intent to kill.
JACK GRISHAM’S “AMERICAN DEMON:” FROM A NOT-QUITE GOD’S LIPS, TO OUR EARS
“I wasn’t really talking to God,” prodigal punk Jack Grisham says of his memoir, "An American Demon." But the literary device is convincing: Grisham as a demon taking his cues from the “Not-Quite,” a lesser God, “an inch shorter, a pound heavier, two degrees less intelligent and nowhere near as loving and kind.”
FIRST PERSON: BEARING WITNESS TO LIFE IN BIXBY PARK IS NEARLY UNBEARABLE
I live very close to Bixby Park, and I witness illegal behaviors there on a daily basis. I do not use the park, although I would like to. I have seen drug deals, bloody fights, public drinking and drunkeness, public urination (indecent exposure), public sex acts, littering, loitering, sleeping in vehicles, sleeping in the band shell and more. I awakened one morning to find a man asleep on MY FRONT PORCH!
TO STOP POLICE VIOLENCE, THE PERPETRATORS MUST BE PUNISHED
Punishing perpetrators of police violence does not mean buying off survivors with piles of taxpayer money. It means vigorous criminal prosecution of whatever crime fits the facts, not administrative reprimand or paid leave. If there are convictions, it means prosecuting anyone in the police department who may have lied on their behalf as accessories after the fact.
LET’S CALL AFTERMATH OF KILLING BY FULLERTON COPS WHAT IT IS: CORRUPTION
Whenever the lack of accountability for abusive police officers is pointed out, their union reps insist that police have to endure an enormous amount of scrutiny. But although there are many levels of internal oversight, every level is dominated by law enforcement. Police often brag about the way they “protect their own,” and what happened in Fullerton exemplifies that.
THREE REASONS THE QUEEN MARY ISN’T GETTING ALL THE LOVE IN LONG BEACH
Put simply, the people of Long Beach do not feel the Queen Mary is theirs. Ticket prices not only keep out the poor completely, but also a large percentage of everyone else. The Queen is regarded as part of the landscape, but in many ways, as alien as a flying saucer.
PORT OF LB AT 100: A COMPARISON OF ITS COFFERS AND OUR COUGHERS
Part of the reason the Port of Long Beach/Los Angeles are here is you subsidize them. They are tremendous polluters and the region has about $2.5 billion annually in externalized health care costs---about $7,000 per job. That kind of subsidy is enough to attract nearly any industry.
WELL, I’LL BE DAMNED … THEY WERE RIGHT!
The world really ended Saturday, just as a small segment of Christians predicted. The lack of preparedness left lots of issues unresolved---the outcome of the NBA playoffs, the success of Oprah's cable channel and whether Long Beach would ever really be America's most bike-friendly city.
BOOK OF REVELATIONS: HOW LINDSAY LOHAN MIGHT LEAD ME TO A LIFE OF CRIME
After reading how Lindsay Lohan's 120-day jail sentence will likely be reduced to 16 or 17 days, and how the typical woman serves only about 20 percent of her sentence, Steve Lowery is suddenly thinking of recruiting a crime harem---preferrably consisting of married women with kids.
STRAIGHT FROM THE BRAINS OF SUJA AND ROBERT, VIA LBREPORT.COM
Vice Mayor Suja Lowenthal of the 2nd district and Council member Robert Garcia of the 1st district sit side-by-side behind the rail at Council meetings and often seem like mirror images---especially their blank poker faces. Fortunately, LBReport.com has secured a hard line to their brains and today begins a series of transcriptions
AMID CELEBRATION OF BID LADEN’S DEATH, INT’L HUMAN DIGNITY GROUP SUGGESTS PRAYERS FOR HIS SOUL
At 4:11 this morning, amid the reflexive celebration that has dominated the early aftermath of Osama Bin Laden’s death, GreaterLongBeach.com received this e-mail from a Rome-based organization that calls itself the Institute for Human Dignity. This is what it said: PRAYERS, NOT REJOICING, NEEDED OVER BIN LADEN’S DEATH Following reports of the killing of Osama [...]
WONDERS OF THE WATER-SAVING WORLD ARE RIGHT OUT MY FRONT DOOR
Besides the birds, butterflies and bees, our new drought-tolerant yard has attracted lots of human attention, too---especially from the neighborhood’s young children. Last Saturday I was delighted to overhear a young boy exclaim, “Look at all the pretty flowers!” to his grandfather as they walked by.
LA TIMES OP/ED: PUBLIC HAS RIGHT TO KNOW NAMES OF COPS IN SHOOTINGS
A police officer on duty performs a consummately public responsibility. Officers wear their names on their uniforms because it's crucial that people in the community know their identities. Police are armed and allowed to use force, but they must do so in the service of the public, and under its scrutiny.
PROSTITUTION ABATEMENT: LONG BEACH POLICE TIME AND MONEY WELL SPENT?
Greggory Moore asks: If you could eradicate either prostitution or littering, prostitution or graffiti, prostitution or texting while driving---wouldn't you do a greater service by in each case leaving prostitution alone and getting rid of the other?
BLIGHT MAKES RIGHT: HOW-LOW-CAN-YOU-GO TIPS FOR GETTING WHAT YOU WANT
Make your place look like you’re chasing nickels to support a meth habit. Erect a plywood berry stand on your front lawn and use smelly, unshaven men to sell Christmas trees when it gets dark early---but only after pulling out the grass and throwing down gravel. Make it look like you have no self respect as a business owner.
THE TSUNAMI’S RIPPLES: AN EVENING OF SHARED HUMANITY AT JAPANESE GARDENS
No one knows why we must suffer, yet no one can deny that the ripples of our suffering often awaken revitalizing forces in our lives. So it was at Sunday's vigil at Long Beach State's Japanese Gardens for victims of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. [ A photo essay by Jeanine Birong. ]
PETA GIRLS: TOO MUCH TITILLATION AND NOT ENOUGH … WELL, YOU KNOW
When I heard a couple of PETA girls were going to shower together Wednesday in observation of Water Awareness Day … well, let’s just say it came to me as a call to action. I strapped on my vegan high heels and headed on down to Belmont Shore.
KEEP LONG BEACH WEIRD? ALL YOU GOTTA DO IS ACT NATURALLY
I’m sick of cities that take the phrase “Keep [insert city name] Weird” and blast it on shot glasses, playing cards, pins and tshirts. No truly weird place would try that hard. Long Beach is where the real weirdos are, and we don’t need to ask them to keep the city weird---it just sort of does it itself.
THE DAY LONG BEACH BEAT WESTBORO BAPTISTS AT THEIR OWN FREE SPEECH
On the day the Supreme Court upheld the First Amendment rights of the despicable Westboro Baptist Church, it's worth remembering the way the people of Long Beach greeted the wacky Kansas hatemongers last year with more than a little free speech of our own.
THE ROAD TO BIKE-FRIENDLINESS IS A FRUSTRATING CONSTRUCTION ZONE
I love the idea of a bike-friendly city but wonder whether the transition is making people friendlier toward cyclists. Lots of folks seem angry. They talk about “bike Nazis,” and rail against spending taxpayer dollars on something only a small segment of the population will use.
TO HELL WITH THE CHIEF: ON PRESIDENTS DAY, HERE’S A LIST OF THE 10 WORST
This is Presidents Day, and in recognition of the 44 men who have been President of the United States during the nearly 235-year history of the country, Greater Long Beach refers you to this list of the 10 worst to occupy the office, as compiled by U.S. News and World Report. 10. ZACHARY TAYLOR: A political novice, [...]
GO SEE CAL … Y’KNOW, WHILE YOU STILL CAN … THAT IS, BEFORE HE DIES
My familiarity with Cal's visage from the TV spots of my childhood set me up for shock when I recently started seeing him again in Worthington Ford commercials. The gauntness, the obviously skeletal frame beneath his suit jacket, the dragging of his palate as he enunciated his sales pitch. There was no denying it: Cal Worthington is dying ... as are we all.
HOW MANY CONDOMS PER SECOND ARE USED ON VALENTINE’S DAY?
LifeStyles Condoms estimates that 87 condoms are used each second in the U.S. on Valentine’s Day, which is lesser known as National Condom Day. Organic Bouquet (www.OrganicBouquet.com) estimates that over 200 million roses were produced for Valentine’s Day 2011. The US Census Bureau reports that only 11 percent of households celebrate by gifting each other jewelry on [...]
WHAT A DIFFERENCE SOME MULCH MAKES—TO OUR GARDEN … AND MARRIAGE?
Putting in this garden has brought out our crazymaking characteristics. Mark is a perfectionist while I’d rather just get her done. When he made a planter in a perfect circle without measuring it, I told him I’d read that only crazy people can do that. What saved us? The arrival of the mulch!
LONG-AWAITED REVELATION: THIS IS GONNA LOOK GREAT WHEN WE ARE DONE!
Removing the black plastic to discover completely bare dirt—not a single weed---and the “tabula risa” of our new front yard is somehow very satisfying. The goal is to get our new ground cover to grow in before any weeds take hold. We charge out to buy plants and shortly after our return ... our yard looks like a yard again!
ON THE CUSP OF 2011, LET’S PAUSE TO SIP AGAIN FROM CUPS OF KINDNESS PAST
Here’s a personal (and mostly steady) walk down New Year’s Memory Lane---as well as a party game everyone can play Friday night. Ask people to relive some of their most-memorable New Year's Eves. Consider it a kick start, something to do before Kathy Griffin gets bleeped or, worse yet, poor Dick Clark is wheeled out.
ACADEMIA NUTS: MY BORING PLASTIC YARD FASCINATES A USC GRAD STUDENT!
In the third installment of her Lawn to Garden diary, Jeanine Birong reveals how boring it is to watch grass die---especially when you can't see a thing---until a USC journalism student shows an interest and asks for an interview. Suddenly, she can't stop raving about it!
ONE QUESTION … FOR RESTAURATEUR KAMRAN ASSADI: ARE THESE HOLIDAYS MAKING MERCHANTS HAPPY?
The question: From where you stand—on the downtown corner of First Street and Linden Avenue, where you and Amir Zee have co-owned Utopia Restaurant for 11 years—do these look like Happy Holidays for East Village businesses? Kamran Assadi’s answer: Compared to last year, it’s much, much better. It’s been a very good holiday season for [...]
BEYOND GREATER: MUST-READ STORY WE DIDN’T WRITE—IS JAMIE LEE CURTIS FULL OF … CRAP?
Jamie Lee Curtis simply gushed about the performance of her colon in ads for Dannon's probiotic-laced yogurt. Like, she loved going to the crapper! But Dannon's $21 million fine for false advertising makes you wonder what---if anything---was really going on behind Curtis' bathroom doors.
ONE QUESTION … FOR MICHAEL CLEMENTS: WHAT HAPPENED TO BEER & POLITICS?
[ Another in a weekly series. ] The question: What happened to Beer & Politics, the thirst-quenching public-issues forum that you’d been moderating in taverns around town for the past few years on the last Tuesday of every month? Mike Clements’ answer: Beer and Politics was a casualty of real life. By end of 2009, [...]
ONE QUESTION (ABOUT PUNCTUATION) … FOR RYAN ZUMMALLEN
[ Another in a series. ] The question: What’s the deal with the spelling of your last name—ZumMallen—that is, a double-M with the second one capitalized? Ryan ZumMallen’s answer: ”That’s just the way the name has always been. I don’t know much about its history—my dad tried to trace it for awhile, but he hit a dead end. [...]
MURDER OR MERCY: WHAT DO WE REALLY MEAN BY THE SANCTITY OF LIFE?
A couple weeks ago, 88-year-old Roy Laird went to County Villa Healthcare Center in Seal Beach to see 86-year-old Clara, his wife of nearly 70 years---like he did three times every day because Clara could no longer walk, sit up, feed herself or recognize visitors. This time, Roy shot her in the head with a .38 caliber revolver.
ONE QUESTION … FOR DIANE RIPLEY
Why haven't you registered as a lobbyist with the City of Long Beach, which last February instituted a Lobbyist Registration Ordinance by a unanimous vote of the City Council?
WOULD YOU BELIEVE SENIOR GRAD NIGHT IN THE SCHOOL GYMNASIUM?
Because their graduation ceremonies will be held later in June than most Southern California high schools---a full week after Disneyland's annual Grad Night promotion ends on June 16---seniors at Warren and Downey highs don't know where they will be celebrating their commencement.
BIKING THROUGH PUVUGNA TURNS SAD ANNIVERSARY INTO SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE
I rode my bike to places Cindy would have enjoyed. When I reached ceremonial Puvugna at Long Beach State and saw the dedication to the Tongva ancestors---portraits with black, yellow and red flags---I realized they looked just like Cindy’s pictures of laundry!
THE FIRST THING WE DO, LET’S KILL ALL THE LAWNS—AS IF THAT’S SO EASY
Cutting off the lawn with the sod cutter took four short hours. But pulling up the sod and getting it into the dumpster took an entire week. Rain, work, school and sports schedules made us scrounge for a couple of hours for our project every day. Fittingly, the dumpster full of the hideous dead lawn finally pulled away from the curb on Dia de Los Muertos.
WILL CALIFORNIA’S PUBLIC PENSIONERS CASH IN AND CHECK OUT?
Given the one-sided election results in California, a trend of “red flight”---that is, an out-migration of people from cities and counties made insolvent by public employee pension costs---may soon appear. And those pensioners may lead the way, taking their lucrative checks with them.
IT STINKS, AND SOMEHOW I BEAR SOME SCENTS OF RESPONSIBILITY
The latest sewage spill will close Long Beach's open coastal beaches for a few days while scientists monitor the water's bacterial levels. The good thing is, somebody warned the sea lions, birds and fish. And?When the percentages of poison drop to acceptable levels, everybody’s going to be invited back into the water!
IT’S A DYNAMIC TIME FOR DOWNEY—BUT SADLY, NOT FOR ITS CANDIDATES
What the city needs right now is a vision. Boosterism, photo ops, discussion of variances and the water table--though important--aren’t enough. But at last week’s candidates forum, all you got was a steady gaseous release of punishing clichés and useless generalities.
AS GOVERNOR, JERRY THE JABBERJAW WOULD BE A REPORTER’S DREAM
Brown does love law enforcement, and he does hate capital punishment. He does think government sometimes hurts more than it helps, and he does feel that government is sometimes the solution to life’s difficulties. If elected, he is quite capable of anything. And that will be a hell of a story
LAWN DAYS JOURNEY INTO DROUGHT TOLERANCE: A DIARY BY JEANINE BIRONG
Greater Long Beach photographer Jeanine Birong and family---husband Mark, children Anthony and Sarah---are replacing their water-guzzling front lawn with a garden of California native and drought-tolerant plants as part of the Long Beach Water Department's Lawn-to-Garden program. This is the first installment of her diary.
BEYOND GREATER: TODAY’S MUST-READ STORY THAT WE DIDN’T WRITE—MEG WHITMAN’S BARGAIN
MEG WHITMAN'S BARGAIN: Writing in the Sacramento News & Review, Rich Williams considers what California might look like if gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman actually applied a real-world business model to state government.
PASSAGE OF PROP. 14 MEANS THE (THIRD) PARTY MAY BE OVER IN CALIFORNIA
Proposition 14, which passed in June, bans all but the top two finishers in the primary election from appearing on the November general election ballot---basically, eliminating Greens, Libertarians, Peace & Freedoms and American Independents. The ostensible goal was to get more moderates elected, but a very real consequence will be giving voters even less choice.
RACHEL POWERS: HOW I OUT-RAGED THE TEA PARTY IN A WAL-MART PARKING LOT
As I came out of the WalMart I walked up to a man sitting behind a table festooned with a huge "Repeal Obamacare" sign, nodded toward his array of clipboards and asked, "Could you please tell me where I can sign to repeal Medicare?"
UNDER THE SUN OR IN TANNING BED, SKIN CANCER ALWAYS A DEADLY POSSIBILITY
“No mother should have to visit her daughter in a cemetery,” says a heartbroken woman as she recalls her daughter’s ritual of going to the tanning salon on her lunch hours. The girl started as a teenager and died of melanoma three weeks before her 30th birthday.
WHY THINGS ARE HILLS: WONDERING IN THE SIERRA WITH A GEOLOGIST AND A DOG
“Usually there's a reason why things are hills,” he began, while the dog peed on some buckwheat and stuck its nose in the wind. I had never questioned a hill's grounds for existence---just its choice in placing itself at the end of a long hike when I am already tuckered out.
THAT WASN’T THE BIG ONE THIS MORNING—IN FACT, IT WASN’T ONE AT ALL
In between shakes, I daringly left my room and headed outside. As I opened the front door, a flyer that had been slipped into the jam fell and hit me on the foot. When I read it, I didn’t know if I should be relieved or irritated.
A HOUSE-TO-HOUSE SEARCH PARTY FOR SCOFFLAW CATS? GET MEOWTTA HERE!
While I try to give the slip to the Cat License Gestapo---buying cat food and litter at a store in another county, avoiding neighbors with allergies who might put the clues together---I have visions of Kitty at the computer furtively searching out countries without cat extradition laws … Cat-mandoo, Purrsia, Cat-alina.
AT FRANKLIN SCHOOL IN THE MID ’80S, WE LEARNED OF HORROR AND EMPATHY
When principal Wayne E. Piercy learned that the Cambodian students were being bullied, he dealt with it in the most extraordinary way---he asked some Cambodian students to write down their life stories. They did. Then every student at Franklin Middle School was herded into the auditorium, where they listened.
F-BOMBS: SUCH A KINDLY WAY TO SAY THE ONCE-VERY-WORST CURSE
The years pass. I'm working at a children's agency. From across the hall, the director sometimes reminds me, “We don’t say damn, Louise.” I’ve adopted an alternative set of curses, though “shazbot” doesn’t really feel as satisfying.
THE ANNUAL ASSAULT ON SIGNAL HILL: A GUIDE FOR WATCHING FIREWORKS
Every year thousands of people assault the summit of Signal Hill, seeking the best place in all the land to see Independence Day fireworks. If you intend to be among them this year, here are a few tips---from a Signal Hillian to all you flatlanders.
ON FATHER’S DAY, SHE FEELS MORE LUCKY THAN GOOD
This is for everyone whose father wasn’t Robert Young—you know, the 1950s TV dad on “Father Knows Best,” the dad everyone wished they had. Instead, we got … well, I got an alcoholic mess of a smart, well-read, first-to-wear-Bermuda shorts (with black socks and shoes) in 1959 dad, who died young. I got lucky. He [...]
BACK AT MY ROOTS, NO HAIR MEANS NO BAD HAIR DAYS
I’ve returned to my roots, literally: I’ve just had my hair shaved off---gone, no más. As a result, I am happy, nappy and finally free from the drama that I’ve allowed to big-foot its way back into my life for the past several years. I’m back where I belong after trying it all, again.
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TWEET THIS! SOMEDAY THE DOGS OF SIGNAL HILL WILL HOWL MY NAME!
Up on Signal Hill, the wind is whipping the trees around like Tina Turner’s hair, and making sound effects from a very scary movie—wooooing as it swirls through my front porch, setting the windows to creaking. The flatlanders of Long Beach don’t know this thrill. Fourteen years ago, when I spotted this condo in a [...]
AS A MATTER OF FACT, TIME IS ON YOUR SIDE—TWEET THAT!
“Man walks into a bar with an octopus…” And so began the long tradition of Tim Grobaty telling me a joke—line-by-line, one trip past my desk at a time. That could take awhile, even though he walked past my desk a lot. It was situated at the entry to the newsroom of the Press-Telegram, where [...]
