Home » southern california (Page 54)

Category Archives: southern california

Petting a Lizard

Posted on by | 1 Comment
Pepperdine College Main Campus in Malibu

Pepperdine University Main Campus in Malibu

The Pepperdine University campus in Malibu is, to my mind, one of the prettiest in Southern California. It is scattered across several foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains and boasts a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean.

It was a warm Sunday in August, so Martine and I decided to take a walk across the up-and-down campus. A ring road surrounds it, and it takes about an hour and a half to navigate it.

During our walk, Martine managed a feat that astonished me. She snuck up on one of the little lizards that are scattered through the area and actually managed to pet it for a second or two before it realized what was happening, whereupon it fled into the underbrush in abject terror. Having gotten away with this feat once, Martine tried it on all the other lizards we encountered, but to no avail. The word must have traveled fast.

deeratpepperdine

Deer on the Pepperdine Campus

Then, as we left, we drove around the ring road looking for deer, which we can usually see in abundance around sunset. Of course, it was hours to go until sunset, so we saw nothing.

But we had a  nice walk and an interesting talk about old time TV.. Martine is a bit of an expert on television series in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. She has a collection of autographed 8 x 10 photographs of many of the stars which she got from attending the old Hollywood Collectors’ Show in the San Fernando Valley, mostly in the 1990s and through the late 2000s, when many of the celebs were still alive.

“6-2-6, You’re Wild and Free!”

Posted on by
The SGV’s Fung Brothers

The SGV’s Fung Brothers

I must be going out of my mind: I am about to recommend for your consideration an Asian-American rap duo which calls itself the Fung Brothers from the SGV—that’s San Gabriel Valley to you libtards. The SGV is where L.A.’s Chinese-American community is centered, in communities like Monterey Park, San Gabriel, San Marino, Rowland Heights, Rosemead, Temple City, and a dozen other places.

Where does 6-2-6 come from? That’s the Area Code of much of the SGV, and is used much like Beverly Hills 90210 for that hoity-toity place west of West Hollywood.

I recommend you visit YouTube first of all, to see their song and dance video about their neighborhood, and then their website, which you can find here. (Beware, however, their website reset my cursor to chains, but restored it when I restarted the system.)

This is a part of Los Angeles I love visiting when I want authentic Chinese food, such as when I wrote this blog earlier in the week.

The Greatest Show on Earth

Posted on by
Ringmaster Andre McClain of the Ringling Bros Barnum & Bailey Circus

Ringmaster Andre McClain of the Ringling Brothers Circus

When I returned from Iceland, I noticed that Martine had printed out a couple of sheets about the latest show of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Since she had been waiting patiently for my return, suffering from an obscure nerve disorder (apparently still not officially diagnosed as fibromyalgia) that has robbed her of sleep and caused a steady level of back pain, I thought it would be a good idea to take her out on Saturday afternoon to see the show.

It was playing at the Staples Center downtown, which Martine had never seen; so I reserved a couple of VIP seats and hopped on the bus to go downtown. (A Santa Monica #10 freeway flyer bus straight downtown picks up only a block from our apartment, and it is far more convenient than hassling the downtown parking scene.)

I had seen several circuses in Cleveland while I was growing up, both the Ringling Brothers and the Grotto Circuses. In Los Angeles, I had seen Circus Vargas twice. Even in Mexico, I had seen small local circuses in Zacatecas and San Cristobal de las Casas. The latter was a family affair which I saw with my brother Dan in 1979. The 15-year-old aerialist also sold popcorn. Having taken a shine to Dan, she sat several rows behind him and tried to get his attention by tossing popcorn at him.

Ringling Brothers is several thousand times bigger then the Circulo del Sureste in San Cristobal, but it was all the same sort of fun. Instead of an adolescent boy rolling around in broken glass and Mamacita balancing furniture on her chest, we had a tiger tamer from Chile that had me on the edge of my seat. There was also an all-African-American unicycle team that played basketball, a young lady shot out of a cannon, a parade of elephants, various high wire acts, and a husband/wife pair of clowns from Russia who were outstandingly funny.

Outside the Staples Center were scores of protestors claiming that the animals in the show were being tortured to perform. Yes, true to some extent, but so were the humans; and no one was protesting about that.

The only sour note was that my cell phone holster fell apart, and I lost my cheap cell phone. I’ll make a few calls to lost and found today, but I’m not exactly disconsolate about the whole thing. I never answered my cell phone anyhow unless I was expecting a particular call.

The Japanese Garden

Posted on by | 1 Comment
The Japanese Garden at Huntington Library and Gardens

The Japanese Garden at Huntington Library and Gardens

Closed for over a year for a $6.8 million overhaul, the Japanese Garden at the Huntington Library and Gardens in San Marino, California, has recently marked its centenary. It had reopened in April looking as stunning as ever, with its koi ponds, ornamental trees, its moon bridge, traditional Japanese house, and scattered strategically-placed temple-like structures.

Now with the addition of the equally spectacular Chinese Garden, the Huntington remains one of the primo tourist attractions in Southern California. Sometimes, I wonder why people visiting here make the needless trek to Hollywood with its crumbling Walk of Fame and decaying footprints at Grauman’s Chinese Theater. My vote for the best tourist attractions in the Southland are, along with the Huntington, Descanso Gardens in La Cañada-Flintridge and the Los Angeles Arboretum in Arcadia.

Sometimes I think that people from out of town who dislike Southern California do so mainly because they have been badly informed.

 

By the Lily Ponds

Posted on by
Watchful Heron

Watchful Heron

While we were spending some four hours at the Huntington Gardens on Saturday, we spent an inordinate amount of time at the two large lily ponds. Not only did we see a heron (above), but also Canada geese with two ungainly, very adolescent-looking goslings, and a mother duck with seven little ducklings. Then, too, there was a supersized turtle and a whole lot of koi.

Below are the goslings, both of which have their heads tucked away in “You can’t see us” mode:

Two Goslings

Two Goslings

For the better part of an hour, the goslings sat at our feet while we occupied front-row seats at a strategically located bench. Sure, Martine tired herself out; but we both had a good time.

If you’re interested in seeing all the pictures I uploaded to Yahoo! Flickr, click here and scroll about 80% of the way down to photo DSCN3853, where Saturday’s pictures begin. As yet, there are no captions.

The Luminescent World of Cacti

Posted on by
The Cactus Garden at the Huntington Library and Gardens

The Cactus Garden at the Huntington Library and Gardens

Although she is still struggling to get a good night’s sleep, Martine wanted us to go yesterday to the Huntington Library and Gardens in San Marino. So off we went. We usually take the same route through the gardens, ending up in the large and rather spectacular cactus garden on the eastern edge of the park. It is Martine’s favorite, and for me shares top billing with the lily ponds (about which more in a future posting).

There is something otherworldly about cacti. They catch the light in a certain way and play with it. The result, as with the cholla cacti above, is eerily luminescent. One feels a desire to hug the thorny plants as if they were overstuffed teddy bears. Ah, but the thorns of the cholla are barbed like tiny fishhooks and are difficult to remove. Beautiful, but deadly.

Part of the fascination that Martine and I feel wth the cactus garden is that in the slanting light of late afternoon—and it is always the last stop of our round tour of the gardens—the cacti have an almost supernatural look to them. One result is that my photos of the cacti are usually the best pictures of the lot.

 

“The Earth Laughs in Flowers”

Posted on by | 1 Comment
Flower from the Tropical Greenhouse at the L.A. Arboretum

Flower from the Tropical Greenhouse at the L.A. Arboretum

The sentiment is from Ralph Waldo Emerson, as is the following: “Flowers … are a proud assertion that a ray of beauty overvalues all the utilities of the world.”

When I was a child, I was always surprised that my parents expended so much effort surrounding their house with elegant (and hard to care for) tree roses and other flowers. Perhaps I was slightly jaundiced in my opinion because my brother and I had to keep the blossoms and leaves free of voracious Japanese Beetles.

Now that my parents are gone, I begin to appreciate how they felt. One of the things that I noticed was that they could always tell if a Hungarian family lived in a particular house based on the flowers they planted. I guess it’s partially a genetic thing. Although Martine and I do not raise flowers—after all, we live in an apartment—we go out of our way to visit Huntington Gardens, Descanso Gardens, the Los Angeles Arboretum, and other places where one could walk in floral beauty.

It seems that the Japanese Beetles never made it out to California. Perhaps the intervening deserts and mountains deterred them. One result is that the flower gardens out here in Southern California are particularly beautiful.

The orchid illustrated above is from the L.A. Arboretum’s tropical greenhouse, which contains a treasure of such exotic blossoms.

 

Architecture and Personal Power

Posted on by
Proposed Peter Zumthor Design of New L.A. County Museum of Art

Proposed Peter Zumthor Design of New L.A. County Museum of Art

Has that museum building been hanging around too long? You know the one I mean: The one with the central court that goes up four floors. Rather nice for a building designed in the 1960s. Well, it’s gotta go! It will be razed in favor of Swiss architect Peter Zumthor’s space station illustrated above in a photo from the Los Angeles Times.

In Europe, people are not quite so quick to go to the wrecking ball. And it’s not just because of earthquakes: We see new architecture as an attribute of personal power. Basically, the executives of LACMA are just flexing their muscles. They’ll have to close down most of the museum’s collections for several years while the new monstrosity is being constructed.

By the time the new wing opens, I will probably have just written LACMA off as a place I’m interested in seeing. The works I like the most (click here) will probably be crated up and stored in some sub-basement until the Zumthorian space station emerges out of the dark matter by the La Brea Tar Pits. Of course, all the 20th century stuff I hate will continue to be on view in an adjacent building.

This Is the Rather Handsome Museum Building Doomed to Be Torn Down

This Is the Rather Handsome Museum Building Doomed to Be Torn Down

I really feel for those people in Istanbul who are rioting because the Turkish government wants to turn an old Ottoman-era barracks, sitting on one of the few parks in the city, into a shopping mall. Even Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Prime Minister, has gotten into the act—presumably because he has been paid off by the developers.

Why don’t the people of Los Angeles rise up against the morons who run LACMA and toss them into the adjoining Tar Pits. It would be no more than they deserve!

The Dance Goes On

Posted on by | 2 Comments
Dancing Aphrodite

Dancing Aphrodite

Today was the Valley Greek Festival in Northridge. Martine and I went to St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church at Balboa & Plummer and sampled some of the Greek cuisine (very limited in my case, but still most excellent). Also, I watched some of the folk dancing to the live band—I think its name was Olympia.

The young lady in the photograph above seems to be at all the local Greek festivals. It is a joy to watch her dance: Her moves are incredible. Over the years I have been attending these festivals, perhaps as many as eight or ten years, I have nicknamed her Aphrodite. Never having spoken to her, I do not know her real name; but she is poetry in motion, a regular Terpsichore.

We also took the tour of the church for the umpteenth time. There is something about the Orthodox church that appeals to me. If I were to become an active Christian, I might well switch my allegiance from the Church of Rome to the Church of Hellas. (For one thing, the whole child molestation epidemic among the Catholic clergy has repulsed me, even though I know that only a minority of the priests are guilty.)

The next big Greek festival in the area is in Torrance the weekend after I get back from Iceland in July., followed by the L.A. Greek Fest at Saint Sophia Cathedral in downtown Los Angeles early in September. The dance goes on …

 

 

 

Southern California in Bloom

Posted on by | 2 Comments
Star Jasmine on a Chain Link Fence

Star Jasmine on a Chain Link Fence

The nicest thing about Southern California in the springtime is the proliferation of blossoms. Most prevalent is the Star Jasmine as shown above, scientific name Trachelospermum jasminoides. When I walked into Santa Monica yesterday morning, I saw jasmine bushes everywhere. The flowers emit a delightful scent that hits one in waves as one walks past a plant.

Even more spectacular is the flowering jacaranda tree, Family Bignoniaceae. Beginning in May and lasting through most of the summer, the trees, which seem to be everywhere, are full of purple blossoms. While they have no particular scent, the dropped blossoms do play havoc with the paint jobs of parked cars.

Both plants are “invaders” (albeit welcome ones) from other parts of the globe. (Of course, most of the human inhabitants are invaders, too, in their own right.) The star jasmine hails from Malaya, and the jacaranda from South America. Shown below are jacarandas in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires:

PICT2674

Jacarandas in Buenos Aires

Other than the fact that it marks the end of tax season, these two plants make Southern California a beauty spot every May and June. Now if only the marine layer would go away!