Wish Upon a Star

This weekend, you have an extra-special opportunity to wish upon a star at the Huntington Library and Gardens.

Tanabata
July 6 (Sunday) 1:30 – 3 p.m.
Celebrate Tanabata, the Japanese Star Festival, with children from the Kodomo No Ie preschool in San Gabriel. According to ancient legend, Tanabata tells the tale of two stars, Orihime (Vega) and Hikoboshi (Altair), who are separated by the Milky Way and can only meet once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh month. To mark the happy event, children are invited to write their wishes on strips of colored paper and tie them to bamboo where the wind can carry them to the sky. Origami crafts will also be offered. General admission (children under 5 enter free). Japanese Garden

Iris and I have already picked our wishes.

See the Huntington calendar for address and contact info.

Sky Writing

Like Eric and My Buddy Mimi, I have more respect for sky writing than Banner Towing Aircraft. My Buddy Mimi says that she saw "Tori & Dean" in the sky. I captured the "To" on my way to work last Friday. I wish I had stuck around for the ampersand. That takes some skill. Another reason that sky-writing doesn't bother me as much is that the aircraft fly higher. Consequently, they appear less noisy to the spectator on the ground.

Where did I last see sky-writing? In Silverlake, through the Golden Vortex.

A few more pictures of the Golden Vortex.



While sifting through the August 2005 pictures, I came across the Crystal Cove Pullover, blogged about when I was writing for my sister's blog. See the entry here. Its curves remind me of the Golden Vortex.

Jacaranda Season 2008

My favorite neighborhood jacaranda tree.

See also the view from my window and Jacaranda Season to view this tree in 2006 and 2007. If only the one in my front yard looked this good. (The reader that says Jacaranda trees bloom only every other year should be particularly interested in the spectacular blooms of this tree three years in a row.)

If you are in the south bay, drop by Isis between Rosecrans and 135th Street. Just spectacular.

I feel like I cheated because I crossed latitudes and caught the tail end of jacaranda season in New Zealand and then again in Hawaii. Three jacaranda seasons in one calendar year. I am rich.

Guerrilla Gardening

The LA Times ran a delightful story today, Guerrilla gardener movement takes root in L.A. area. Also read MamaGenerica's A guerrilla gardening primer. I have been planning a series of posts about how PR has destroyed civic discourse. But, I want to say in advance, I don't mean MamaGenerica. She practices PR for the forces of good. She is a good fairy. ;-)

2008 El Segundo Bike To Work Challenge Results

The results are in and here's an excerpt from the press release.

The final total cycle commuters this year were: 416. The total includes Los Angeles World Airport's Westside Welcome Station/Pitstop at World Way West, Equity Office's Welcome Station/Pitstop at the Howard Hughes Center, and Playa Vista & Electronic Art's Welcome Station/Pitstop at Playa Vista. The breakdown was as follows:

1. Los Angeles Air Force Base (Military/Civilian) 81
2. The Aerospace Corporation 78
3. Raytheon 63
4. Boeing 55
5. Northrop-Grumman 38
6. Equity Office / Howard Hughes Center 31
7. Los Angeles World Airports 25
8. Electronic Arts 20
9. DirecTV 14
10. Playa Vista 5
11. Federal Express 2
12. ESMS 1
13. Linquest - TSAT 1
14. Mitre 1
15. Scitor 1

Last year's total cycle commuters were: 309. The breakdown was as follows:
1. The Aerospace Corporation 68
2. Los Angeles Air Force Base (Military/Civilian) 56
3. Raytheon 48
4. Boeing 39
5. Northrop-Grumman 25
6. Los Angeles World Airports 24
7. Electronic Arts 20
8. Carr America / Howard Hughes Center 19
9. DirecTV 7
10. Federal Express 1
11. Mitre 1
12. Scitor 1

A big THANKS to Aerospace, Boeing, Electronic Arts, Equity Office / Howard Hughes Center, DirecTV, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Los Angeles World Airports, Northrop-Grumman, Playa Vista, and Raytheon for donating the awesome giveaways!!!

Even though we lost, it was great to see a 25% year to year increase in bicycle commuters. Note also that LAAFB has 7000 employees and we have about a third as many. They beat us in raw numbers, but we have a higher percentage of bicycle commuters. We were saddened to see that ES major employer, Mattel, chose again not to participate.

See you at the bike fair tomorrow and at the MTA Green Line Nash Station on Thursday morning!

El Segundo Bike to Work Week Events

Media coverage of Bike-To-Work Week events in the South Bay has been sketchy again. Last year, I posted a schedule of Bike-To-Work Week events for 2007. Here's some info for Bike-To-Work Week 2008 in the El Segundo Employment Center area.

The 8th Annual El Segundo Bike-To-Work Challenge will be held from 6 to 10 a.m. on Tuesday, May 13, in The Aerospace Corporation's Visitor Lot/Gate C located on Douglas Street, just south of El Segundo Boulevard. Many of El Segundo's employers will be competing for bragging rights (and a trophy) to see who can bring in the most bicycle commuters. Free continental breakfast, t-shirts and goodie bags^* will be provided.

There will be a bicycle and commuting expo outside the cafeteria at The Aerospace Corporation at lunchtime on Wednesday, May 14. MTA, AAA, commuter services and bike club members will be on hand to help you find a commute route using public transit, carpool/vanpool or bicycle. Several area bicycle shops will also be present with special deals for Bike to Work Week.

MTA is sponsoring a Bike to Work Day on Thursday, May 15, 2008. Check their website for more details. South Bay Pit Stops at:

1. Aviation Station Metro Green Line
2. El Segundo Station Metro Green Line
3. Torrance City Hall 3031 Torrance Bl, Torrance

* I have written before about how much I hate goodie bags, but this one actually contains good stuff. Last year, they gave out LED lights for commuting after dark!

Bicycle commuting in the news links:

• Riding a bike to work is more than a healthy commute: It's a sign of adulthood via the LA Times
• Bike to work next week and win a folding bike via Emerald City Blog
• Catching Up results from the 2007 El Segundo Bike-To-Work Challenge

Maybe you are looking for a good used bike to use for bicycle commuting? You are in luck. As part of my stuff diet, I am selling two (out of 3.5) of my bicycles. Email me through my profile page for more info.

Not so relaxing mommy and me day

Iris says that weekends are for relaxing. So getting her out of the house in time for a 11:30 tour of the Art of Motion Picture Costume Design Exhibition at FIDM (the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising) was not easy. In fact, we were a bit late and missed ~10% of the tour. Museum entrance is free, but we took a tour as guests of Quick Culture.

Our guide, Ellen Greenberg, really did her homework and provided Iris with many movie tidbits that engaged her interest. I doubt that I could have kept Iris entertained for that long without her help. I enjoyed peering intently at the costumes for an hour without having Iris hanging on me and begging to go home. Photography is not allowed inside the exhibit, so I offer a picture of Iris in the park outside FIDM.

Afterwards, we drove north from the fashion district to Chinatown for dim sum at Empress Pavilion in Bamboo Plaza.


Then we drove a bit farther north to the Los Angeles Downtown Arts District for the Brewery artists' colony annual artwalk/studio tour. I was surprised by the crowds. This town cares about the arts.

I put Iris in charge of the camera for the day. Each live/work loft has a little patio area. Iris enjoyed the view from one of them.

One of the artists put out a cardboard playhouse which was enjoyed by many.


Iris wanted to see this video installation, which drew crowds. We both liked it, but they cranked up the sound so loud, that my ears hurt and we had to leave without viewing the entire thing.

With the crowds, we were unable to park on the complex itself so we parked 3 blocks away in the neighborhood. We enjoyed looking at the many well-kept gardens and modest historical bungalows. I was pleasantly surprised by this little neighborhood, tucked between the I-5 freeway and the railroad.

[Wikipedia says that we were in Lincoln Heights.]

There were so many galleries that I longed to see, over 100. Yet, I saw about 5 of them because Iris was melting down. Reluctantly, I left.

But, I promised Mark I would stop by the Music Center to exchange our tickets for My Fair Lady. We scored some good seats for a Saturday matinee later this month. What are the chances that we would be invited to a baby shower and Iris would be invited to a birthday party on the exact same afternoon? These friends are near and dear to our hearts and we reluctantly exchanged our tickets for another day.

Iris was so upset about not going directly home, I had to let her play in the dancing fountain at the Music Center a little while. She fell asleep on the way home. She was plum tuckered out and over stimulated.

Aside:
When Mark and I first moved to Los Angeles, we were surprised by the number of residents of the South Bay who don't go downtown--who are afraid of it. We live within 20 miles of one of the major cultural centers of the world. What is the point of living with the density and exorbitant cost of living if one doesn't also partake of the upside of living in this metropolis?

Links:

• Iris and I enjoyed some works so much, we considered buying a painting or two. You can view some of the artist's work here. We saw two in the carp series, which have a Manga and traditional woodcut feel at the same time. The fishes' bug eyes remind me of Ukiyo-e Kabuki posters.
  
• I learned about the Artwalk through an article in the LA Times about the gardens at the Brewery. Alas, Iris melted down shortly after we got there so we didn't get far enough into the complex to glimpse the garden.
• You can get half-price tickets for Quick Culture tours through Gold Star Events. We use Gold Star frequently for tickets. They offer an interesting and affordable selection of things to do in Los Angeles.
• The April/May 2008 issue of American Craft magazine contains an article about craft in Los Angeles, with a slide show of local artisans' work. Do look at it; wonderful stuff is made right here.

Saturday

Kathleen had a few hours to kill before catching a flight at LAX and I offered to help her kill them. At first, I thought a walk and brunch at the beach would be nice. Uncle Bill's Pancake House is a good, unpretentious place with views of the ocean. We made plans and she put out a call on her blog that any of her friends in the area were welcome to join us. I forgot that she has a HUGE fan base and UBPH is not a good place to take a large crowd on a weekend.

I picked her up at her hotel, which is conveniently across the street from the European bakery/deli where I buy Burda WOF and Mark buys his German groceries. It was only that morning, as I was leaving my home (with Mark's shopping list) to go pick her up, that I realized that she would probably want to visit Sanseido, the Japanese bookstore where I bought my copies of Pattern Magic and Pattern Magic 2.

Silly me. Southbound traffic on the 405 cost me some time. Then, hoards of people descended upon the deli just as I got there. The wait for the loaves of rye and salami was interminable. I had to fight jostle past two older German ladies for the last loaf of farmer's rye. Then rubberneckers created another traffic jam on the trip northbound on the 405, making a pre-brunch visit to the bookstore impossible.

Brunch, and waiting for the only table in the place large enough to accommodate us, cost us more valuable time. Afterwards, the group reconvened at the sewing books section of Sanseido. We should have changed our plans and just eaten at the excellent food court in Mitsuwa marketplace.

Here's Kathleen and Birgitte, before we cleaned out the bookstore.

Actually, I was rather embarrassed and disappointed. I had talked up their selection, but they had only half as many pattern books in stock as the last time I visited back in November. I wanted to buy the patten book of fashions inspired by classic movies. (They even recreated shots from the movies!) Alas, I didn't find it. However, I couldn't resist this book.

I know that my sister and I have a gift moratorium, but she NEEDS this book. I mean, she loves fleece. She loves her dog. This book was written for her. They also have directions for making fleece dogs without dog hair. Their needle-felting cushion is shaped like a bone. Gotta love that.

Does this not look like Iris' cousin, Waldo?


After Kathleen left for the airport with her ride, Birgitte and I headed back into the store to special order copies of Pattern Magic 1 and 2 for her. When she heard that I bought Iris Hello Kitty jello molds at Mitsuwa, she had to get some for her six year old daughter. We struck out again. I couldn't find them either.

At least we found the table of bargain-priced past issues of Japanese fashion magazines.

The Enchanted Camellia Forest

I didn't think we had a shot of getting Iris out of the house to go to Descanso Gardens today. So I asked her if she would like to visit the enchanted camellia forest. It worked.

This winter was kinder to the camellias than last year.


The cherry trees were also in bloom.

As were the magnolias.





Interpretive dance for the horticultural set.

Like our trip last year, we stopped at downtown Montrose's Honolulu avenue for lunch first at Pho 21. (We were sorely tempted by the BBQ at Zeke's Smokehouse.) We tried a tart frozen yogurt at Yolicious yogurt and then I bought a couple of skeins of Alpaca Silk at Needle in a Haystack.

We were saddened to see that Once Upon a Time Bookstore, one of the finest children's bookstores around, had to move to much smaller quarters. Color me mine, a chain where you can paint your own ceramics, will soon open at their old location.

There was some sort of street fair in addition to the regular farmer's market. It is hard to believe that Montrose is 13 miles from downtown Los Angeles. It's picture perfect today.

February 2008 Rainfall

I haven't been keeping careful track of the running rainfall total at my house like Breathing Treatment. I often forget to check and empty it out for weeks at a time. Mine is on a stake and sometimes blows over, making the readings lower than the actual rainfall. It is probably not very accurate. However, I emptied 0.5 inches from the rain gauge yesterday morning.

I listed a bunch of useful Los Angeles rainfall statistics links in When is a moderate drought good news? The good news is that the the US Drought Monitor shows our area has been downgraded from moderate drought to abnormally dry. (The map is clickable if you want to see a regional map.)

More thoughts about BCAM

We hired a babysitter so we could go to the reception on Friday night. We dithered about taking Iris, but ultimately decided against it. I had heard that there would be a healthy dose of Jeff Koons and some of his stuff is not appropriate for Iris' developmental age. Or rather, I didn't want to answer some questions that might arise. (Little did I know that some of Cindy Sherman's work might elicit questions that I also don't want to answer.)

When we worked our way down to the bottom floor where the Richard Serra works reside, I sorta did wish we brought Iris. You should have seen the joy on this kid's face as he raced round and round the Torqued Ellipses. Even with the crowds, it was incredibly moving to walk between the massive steel walls. I liked the newer work, "Band", quite a bit. Mark felt quite meh about it. But you have to look up close at the surface of Band. Serra refined his rust technique so that the sculpture resembled a monochrome abstract expressionist painting that just went on and on. The surface of Torqued Ellipses was never as interesting.

Mark and I saw Torqued Ellipses (I don't know which version; there are several) eons ago at the Temporary Contemporary, now the Geffen Contemporary. The TC/GC has a platform from which you can view the rest of the cavernous gallery. It was a wonderful way to view the Torqued Ellipses because you could experience it from ground level, and then step back to take the whole thing in.

At BCAM, the first floor gallery seemed only slightly higher than the monumental sculptures. Additionally, they were on either side of the central hall (and glass elevator) so that one cannot step back and view the sculptures in their entirety. It is a lost opportunity.

Aside:
Remember how Iris caught me completely unprepared for the birds and the bees discussion in MPAA Rating and Parental Complacency? How do you explain the coupling of Jeff Koons and Cicciolina? Or Cindy Sherman's rubber ahem? On second thought, the sitter was a good idea.
For the record, I thought Cindy Sherman was making a valid point and I would call that art.

Links:
Richard Serra's Outsized Vision
Tyler Green over at Modern Art Notes has been following Eli Broad's ego for some time. Read his recap and analysis of the brouhaha.
He pointed out this unintentionally hilarious interview with Broad.
The NY Times is similarly puzzled about the non-gift.
I wish they had built the Rem Koolhaas design below (picture from the NYT).

The new Renzo Piano design does a poor job of linking to the street. They took out the street light in front of the new entrance! You have to walk one block away, to the old entrance, to cross Wilshire. But, you won't be able to enter there because they closed that gate. You have to walk all the way back to the new entrance. Crazy urban design, no?

Christopher Hawthorne takes LACMA to task:

Last April, the Los Angeles Planning Commission endorsed a list of 14 aggressive principles to help make the city more livable. The first sentence of the plan was blunt: "Demand a walkable city."

But demanding and creating are two very different things. Too often in Los Angeles, city officials still give cars and the free flow of traffic almost automatic planning priority over pedestrians.

A recent case in point involves a stretch of Wilshire Boulevard near the Los Angeles County Museum of Art...

The short version goes like this: The DOT refused to approve the new lane unless the museum also was willing to remove the stoplight and crosswalks at the intersection and extend the median strip running down the center of Wilshire.

The sum effect of the changes to the intersection, carried out last fall, has been to seal the south side of the boulevard off from the north right where the LACMA campus has established its new center of gravity.

See the previous post, BCAM Opening.

BCAM Opening

Mark and I were invited to a reception and BCAM preview at LACMA tonight. BCAM will be open to the public starting tomorrow. Click here to obtain free tickets.

The Broad collection was hit and miss. We saw some great stuff, and some not so great stuff. Frankly, I am relieved that Eli Broad reneged on his promise to donate his collection to LACMA. That way, the museum doesn't have to be obligated to display some of the lesser works.

I love this piece, though. It reminds me of being a child and playing under the table while the grownups sat at the table, chatting and drinking tea.

We explored the new walkway between BCAM and the Ahmanson building. What did I see at the top of the stairs between street and plaza level? I could hardly contain my excitement. Unfortunately, this example of El Anatsui's Gawa series is on loan from an anonymous patron. Maybe they will donate it to the museum. It looks great in that space.

They served a very nice dinner with wine and dessert. We met many interesting people, including International Chanteuse Morganne. She had the most incredible feathered headdress. Go to her official site to see the headdress in better light.


See also More thoughts about BCAM.

Marie Antoinette Costumes and More at FIDM

In case you missed the exhibit of Marie Antoinette movie costumes in Hollywood last year, they will be on display at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (FIDM) Museum in downtown Los Angeles.

With great pleasure and excitement, FIDM has announced that the "16th Annual Art of Motion Picture Costume Design Exhibition" will adorn FIDM's Museum & Galleries at the Los Angeles Campus from January 28 through April 12.
(The exhibition will be closed March 21-23.)

Costumes from some of the top films of 2007 will be on display, along with costumes from the film that won the Academy Award™ for Best Costume in 2007, Marie Antoinette. Here's just a taste of the variety of films whose costumes you'll see in the Museum & Galleries during this history-making exhibition: Atonement, The Golden Compass, Enchanted, Hairspray, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Beowulf, 300, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, and Nancy Drew.

The exhibition is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and is free to the public.

Learn more here. (Click on the address and directions link.) If you can't make it in person, go see the online exhibit.

Los Angeles Rainfall: Dec 2007

Brent has been sharing his rain gauge readings. Our house got 1.4" this week through Friday evening when the rain slowed to a drizzle and I emptied the gauge. Then Mark went to the grocery store without a jacket and walked home in a miserable downpour. The gauge showed another 0.2 inches from that brief rain band. Add the inch we got the previous week and the early storm in October, and LAX rainfall is at 106% of normal for this time of year. Still not enough to make up for the severe drought last year.

For the latest rain year data, see the California Nevada River Forecast Center page for data for the most recent two years. Or data for the past 6-24 hours.

Some thoughts on water policy.
[LA] Mayor Villarairgosa called for voluntary water conservation, but only if it does not involve sacrifice or inconvenience for anyone. I suggested to Mark that we let our small patch of lawn in the front yard go brown in anticipation of replacing it with EasyTurf like in the backyard. Mark was adamant that we will not do any more conservation of any sort because we will be punished again.

(Remember Stick that Up Your Light Socket? We conserved electricity in 2000 so we weren't eligible for $ credit in 2001 when people were rewarded based upon how much they reduced their electricity usage between 2000 and 2001.)

If we conserve water now, we will be punished again when water rationing is implemented for real. They are suggesting baseline water allotments based on historical use. If you used more in the past, you will be given a higher allotment. There will likely be an appeal process, which will be as inconvenient as possible to discourage people from using it. Unlike Brent, I object to being put through administrative hoops to get a reasonable water allotment. (I am busy enough.)

It will be galling to watch profligate water wasters be given a higher allotment because they "need" more, based upon prior history. Consumers do learn--the wrong lessons. Perhaps we should fill our jacuzzi tub for nightly bubble baths for everyone to establish that we have a "need" for huge amounts of water. Or maybe I will wash our cars in the driveway twice a week.

Links
Los Angeles Rainfall
California and Nevada Precipitation Data both real-time and archival long-term history

LAX Insomnia

In case you, too, are wide awake, listening to jet aircraft noise, you might find these links useful.

LAX Noise Complaint Form is really hard to find from the airport website.
LAX Airport Monitor lets you view a map of the area with all planes in the vicinity. It is animated so you can see planes appear and disappear as they take off and land. All flights from near real time up the the past 3 months are viewable.

From the airport monitor, I can see that flights went directly overhead at 3000' and 3200' in the past hour. They should be flying at a minimum of 4000'. I reported them.

We normally don't hear jet traffic from LAX because the planes take off to the west, toward the ocean. However, we sometimes here them when they reverse the pattern. The wind is currently coming out of the east so aircraft takes off toward the east. The planes that went overhead then turned clockwise to head out over the ocean.

Why are they running the north LAX runway in the normal (take off toward the west) pattern and the south LAX runway in the reverse (take off toward the east) pattern? Weirdly, they are also allowing planes to land on the south runway in the normal pattern (toward the west). That requires flawless coordination and execution.

There goes another one.

At least it isn't a summer weekend with all those banner towing aircraft, circling the beach. Let's boycott all the businesses that advertise that way.

The ghosts among us, Part II

Speaking of the ghosts among us the recent fires have illuminated some of our dirty laundry. We like to keep our insatiable need for cheap, exploitable labor and throwaway people neatly hidden.

The NY Times wrote about how the Glare of Fires Pulls Migrants From Shadows.

Ms. Trujillo and others who help the immigrants said they saw several out in the fields as the fires approached and ash fell on them. She said many were afraid to lose their (agricultural) jobs.

“There were Mercedeses and Jaguars pulling out, people evacuating, and the migrants were still working,” said Enrique Morones, who takes food and blankets to the immigrants’ camps. “It’s outrageous.”

Some of the illegal workers who sought help from the authorities were arrested and deported. Opponents of illegal immigration, including civilian border watch groups, seized on news that immigrants had been detained at the Qualcomm Stadium evacuation center as evidence of trouble that illegal immigrants cause.

The Border Patrol also arrested scores of illegal immigrants made visible by the fires. Agent Fisher of the Border Patrol said 100 had been arrested since the fires started Sunday.

Migrants hide in the canyons at the urban-wildland interface. It appears that many (perhaps most) of the fatalities last week were migrants burned alive in their hiding places. Their remains are being found as the fires are slowly conquered.

Also don't miss another article, Rethinking Fire Policy in the Tinderbox. Here's a graphic from the story.

People outside this region are often not aware that LA is a broad basin ringed by mountain ranges. The basin is built out. The growth has largely been in canyons or in the mountains, at the urban-wildland interface (shown in yellow). The only reason that LA county's percentage is not as high as those of neighboring counties is because of urban infill developments such as the townhouse I call home.

I have mixed feelings about urban infill. I am collecting photos and other supporting documentation for a long post later.

You may want to visit Volker Radeloff's website. He collected the land category data for the map above. His website has a link to the paper, The Wildland Urban Interface in the United States.

Coincidentally (or maybe not), Radeloff and Yi-Fu Tuan are both at University of Wisconsin, Madison. Tuan writes short essays in "Dear Colleague" format. I don't always agree with him, but I enjoy reading him from time to time. When I reread him, I discover thoughts and ideas that I didn't see upon earlier reading. I highly recommend his website! I found this in his archives about the difference between science and magic.

Magic is knowledge and knowledge is power. Magic is full of esoteric knowledge, backed by test tubes, burners, and bubbling liquids, the end of which is power—that is, the ability to change the world or navigate effectively in it. In the sixteenth century came science, toted with great vigor by Francis Bacon. To him, science and not magic is knowledge and power. In the end, as we all know, science displaced magic, not because its knowledge is more esoteric or because it has fancier test tubes or because it is backed by a more prestigious social network, but because it has triumphed in the one area that truly matters to people—power.

At the end of this particular essay, he cautions against studying systems just so we can mess with change them.

Magic predates science. But so did something else—wisdom. Wisdom strove for knowledge about reality, but not so much to gain mastery over it as to enable humans to adapt. Ecological science is thus more like ancient wisdom than it is like modern, technology-driven science. The word "community," which frequently crops up in ecology, suggests that one studies it not to control or change it to something better, but rather the opposite, to preserve or restore it. When "human" is added to ecology, as in human ecology, the word "community" is retained, and with such retention, the implied conservative posture of wisdom. Political ecology, on the other hand, is more dynamic. Implied is a need to alter the socio-political structure of a community. Alter to what? Do ecologists say that a mangrove swamp or a tropical rainforest ought to be something ecologically better? No. But political ecologists do say of any existent human community that, yes, it can and ought to be better. Ecology is like old-fashioned wisdom in that it studies what exists and how creatures ought to adjust and adapt. By comparison, political ecology is more power driven, and is in this regard like modern science. On the other hand, the power it interests itself in is not physical power, like the ability to throw things, but rather socio-political power. So what is political ecology? A science, a wisdom, an ideology? All of the above, none of the above?

Surf

The surf was up last Friday. Remember how placid it looked in the photo in Pleasure?

Sure looks different in the video I took Friday, 5 October at lunch. Listen to the roar of the wind and watch the flapping of the palm fronds in the video.



Look at the jet stream analysis (courtesy of the California Regional Weather Server). Ripping winds aloft usually mean big winds below. Big winds bring big waves.



By the next morning, the water was considerably less choppy.

Birthday Dinner

Warning, this post is heavily image and calorie intensive.

Mark and Iris took me to Yuzu in Old Town Torrance for my birthday.

The charming menu doesn't translate well.

The view from my seat. I love the willow and miniature rope light arrangement.

I ordered the "Japanese Salad" because I saw one delivered to a neighboring table.

Mark says that the pickles taste like kosher garlic pickles-only made with Japanese eggplant and other vegetables you don't find in a kosher deli.

We had to have the phat oysters again.

We also ordered the pork again. Iris loved this.

Iris was lured to Yuzu by the promise of gourmet rice balls.

She seems to be enjoying the food and her book.

For my birthday, they sent us all green tea ice cream. It was fabulous, but I missed the sesame ice cream we had on our first visit to Yuzu.

The floors looked familiar and not familiar at the same time. Closer examination showed they are made of giant bamboo. I have never seen bamboo planks like these before.

These are the bamboo planks you most commonly see. When we put bamboo in our bedroom 10 years ago, it was considered exotic. Now, every remodel you see in the LA Times requires bamboo. How quickly we went from green trendsetters to bourgeois bohemians.

Old Town Torrance has an edgy feel that outsiders know nothing about. We like to keep it secret from the trendoids.

Read about our first and second visits to Yuzu in The past, deliciously present and Tofu and Toto.

Buying Time

I attended a national science meeting all this week (not the one pictured to the left) while sleeping in my own bed. The downside was, I had to drive to the Pasadena Convention Center each day. It is only 29 miles each way, but the route takes me through downtown Los Angeles and several of the busiest freeway interchanges in the US.

Luckily, I have a Prius with a special sticker that lets me drive in the carpool lane even when driving solo. It made the drive a bearable 40-50 minutes each way. Without it, it would have taken 2 1/2 hours by public transit or 40-80 minutes driving solo each way. (It is so totally not fair, but more about that later.) I now know why Angelenos are so obsessed with traffic.

Guess which meeting I attended? We joked about the scarcity of funds to study earth science and how we could probably learn something by going across the courtyard.











Along the drive, I got to enjoy views of blooming Chorisia (aka Silk Floss) trees. I downloaded this picture from the Huntington Gardens "What's Blooming" web page. Click the photo to view it full res on their site. The Wikipedia entry about Chorisia speciosa says this tree blooms in February to May. This is definitely NOT Feb-May. What gives? It is a South American tree. In the northern hemisphere, the bloom season will be shifted about 6 months. I found a motherlode of spectacular pictures of Chorisia speciosa at Dave's Garden website.

Our garden also shows signs of fall. The Japanese anemones are abloom. Look at the homely brown-tinged leaves near the ground. Who would have guessed that they would send up 4 foot tall spikes holding half a dozen flowers apiece?

It grows in deep shade which creates a surprising contrast of drifts of white petals in the darkest corners of the garden.

I just want to stare into their eyes and save the memory until the next time. Individual flowers do not last long, but the bloom season can last a few weeks.


Back to the traffic war stories. If you live in Los Angeles long enough, you know about Sigalerts. You can see a map of real-time traffic speeds in the whole region. Put your mouse on a dot and a window pops up with information about that locale.

This morning, there was a big fat red diamond next to my route. I moved my mouse over and learned that there had been a fatality on a neighboring freeway that had backed up onto my route. Fortunately, I had a hunch it wouldn't spill over into the carpool lane and I was right.

The other lanes were another story. They were backed up for miles. Suddenly, a small American car crossed the double double yellow lines to enter the carpool lane right in front of me. That is strictly verboten. There are stiff fines for jumping into the carpool lane outside of designated merge areas and she was also driving solo.

Did I get mad? No, I saw her in time and braked for her. I could sense her urgency and desperation. I intuitively knew that she HAD to get to work on time and she NEEDED to keep her job. No one drives a small American car in LA unless they are poor.

Seriously, with all the gigantic SUVs and trucks on LA roads, you risk life and limb driving a small car. People who drive fuel efficient cars out of principle tend to buy imported cars with all the latest safety equipment that Detroit does NOT put in their small cars.

Driving LA freeways during rush hour is a novel and eye-opening experience for me (because I live so close to work and both are near the beach). Usually, I am not in contact with people who drive small American cars out of economic necessity. This week, I saw plenty of them. I could see their tension and anxiety. Sometimes, I worried that parts of their car would fall off right there on the freeway. Imagine how they felt as all the SUVs and luxury European and Japanese sedans rolled past them.

Back to the woman who cut me off. I passed her later when we were close to downtown. As I expected, she was a black woman--not young, not old--just a ball of tension, leaning into the steering wheel which she held in a death grip. Who am I to question her need to get somewhere fast? Isn't that why I bought a Prius with the carpool OK sticker? I bought my way out of traffic hassles legally because legislators pandered for my vote. They, and Detroit automakers, don't give a rat's ass about her.

Aside:
A lawyer attorney friend told me that one of the other attorneys at her firm always drove his European sedan in the carpool lane solo. He figures that it is a cost-effective time saver because he gets fined only about once a year so. After all, the fine is only about $300 and he charges $500 per hour for his time.