The Wanderers.

View-to-the-North-from-HAC, originally uploaded by Here in Van Nuys.

I have a favorite person whom I have known for 15 years, since he came to Los Angeles, fresh-faced and smiling, out of Arkansas and onto Zelzah Avenue in Encino where he tried his hand at acting and improving at the Groundlings.

Sadly, he left here and went to graduate school at NYU, got married, got children and got divorced.

His name and accomplishments have danced across my computer screen as his Facebook friends have grown to over 1200 people and at various times he has credits as a writer, screenwriter, producer and columnist.

And last night I saw him for about 1.5 hours, for the first time in seven years, and we met in a crowded bar on Santa Monica Boulevard where you can only valet park, and he was with a friend, a friend with an iphone who was texting continually and the three of us went to another bar on Fairfax where more people joined us and I was the only one who was born north of the Mason-Dixon line and the conversation revolved around projects in development and people who were waiting to hear some confirmation of some impending entertainment job that was supposed to happen but had not. Y’all know the story…..it’s called Hollywood.

Narcissist that I am, I stared into mirrors of the bar, and compared and contrasted myself to last night’s companions.

I know I haven’t reached any level of professional accomplishment in my own life, and that screenplay I should have sold has never sold, and that book I should have completed has not been written, and those titles and jobs I might have climbed into and those incomes I might have earned have not been earned, but somehow, against those obstacles of my own making, I have become happier in the past few years.

And I think I know why.

I don’t work in entertainment. I really don’t. I write a blog. I take photos.

And it is refreshing. I see myself and I see Los Angeles as entities with possibility and hope whose fulfillment does not depend on someone working at MGM, Sony, Sundance, AMC or E!

People who live in Los Angeles but do not work in entertainment, these people are generally better off financially, ethically and psychologically.

On Mullholland, driving west, they can see the hills and the orange sun setting without the big lips and huge face of Angelina Jolie darkening the dusk. The earth is older than Hollywood and will be here years after man has vanished.

But for today, if only Hollywood and its poisons could be taken out of the bloodstream of Los Angeles, the city could be experienced for what it is, honestly, fervently, innocently.

To just live here without an entertainment agenda or ulterior motives is liberating.

I drove yesterday, in the bright sun, with the dry winds blowing, and had lunch with friends, and I stopped into my favorite clothing store, General Quarters, and chatted with Blair Lucio.

Blair envisioned, imagined, created, and opened a perfect little traditional men’s store. He doesn’t hop and jump and whore himself for publicity. He was not keen on me asking him if I could borrow some of his clothes for shoot. He doesn’t want to loan anything out because he has a few pieces and he intends to sell them.

He may succeed and he may not. I certainly hope he does. But his methods have garnered my admiration because they are true. Unlike the Hollywood wanderers…

And tomorrow and the day after I will talk and text with Hollywood people, the people who think they will become the next big thing and make love to Andy Cohen or get backslapped on-stage by Simon Cowell, or work in a bright writer’s room on a dark show about zombies, vampires or detectives. Some will pick up the microphone and lay down tracks, and others will Twitter incessantly, hoping that fate will bend to ego and self-promotion. They will be enacting and working on the self-destructive and futile passion of pursuing a career in Holllywood.

We Must Never Allow America to Become European.

“Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who served as a missionary in France and recently toured Europe, said Obama is determined to impose a Euro-style welfare state on the U.S. at the expense of free enterprise.”-Washington Post, Jan. 11, 2012

And here are some ominous photos, taken from Google Street Maps, which show the dangers that await America should it adopt a more European system of government, taxation and environmental policy.

Scania County, Sweden

Zurich

Strasbourg

Bergen, Norway

Alscace, France

Netherlands

Bergen, Norway 2

Demolition Days.

Across Van Nuys this winter, they are demolishing some large buildings.

Prominent among the big, ugly ones now being hacked away and dumped into large containers, is the former Wickes Warehouse Furniture Store on Sepulveda Blvd. north of Oxnard.

The white, windowless, concrete structure, which housed perhaps the world’s ugliest collection of overstuffed and ungainly furniture, was “going out of business” for many years now. Down to only a few 15-foot leather sectionals, Wickes was doomed. Death came quickly. And the little old lady in Burbank cried for days in her beloved Barcalounger.

Located next to the Busway, on land where Metro once promised to develop housing near the bus, it is near many acres of unused Metro parking, within sight of Wendy’s, Costco, Fatburger and the Chevron oil storage yards. The enormous parcel could be the future sight of a walkable, green, agricultural and urban mass transit project.

But this is not Japan or Switzerland, Dubai or Chile, Italy or France, Canada or Australia, Malaysia or Singapore, India or China.

This is the United States of America. There is nothing we can accomplish if we keep talking and keep electing Congress. We talk big and build small.

To refute other’s grand visions and my own authorial imagination, this promising parcel will face insurmountable hurdles. Those obstacles will include tens of millions of dollars in legal, environmental and political challenges. Surely, it will one day emerge resplendent…..as an asphalt parking lot, perhaps to be rented by Costco for the convenience of its customers.

Chevrolet R.I.P.

On Van Nuys Boulevard at Burbank, near where they have just planted eternally green Astro-Turf, the old Chevrolet dealer building is a carcass of bent metal, piles of stucco, and spongy insulation hanging on steel rafters like just killed sharks on dockside hooks.

This is another prominent corner, where Van Nuys Boulevard becomes Van Nuys, and where the street is eight-lanes wide, full of cars and trucks who out-speed each other. No pedestrian enjoys walking here. The sad people on plastic benches, who wait so many hours a day for the bus, they are watched with pity by those sitting inside their car.

The Piano Store Reborn

And on the NE corner of Van Nuys Boulevard and Burbank, the former piano store, where no shopper shopped and no pianist played, has been emptied and is now under construction to become something that is only one story tall, on a street whose width is five times the height of any building on it.

Retail watchers are anticipating the opening of something small and forgettable!
The excitement of waiting for monotony has whetted the appetite of many a passerby.

What will open here? A yogurt store! A nail salon! Or maybe another uniform store! Nothing with any imagination or ambition would dare show up here or it might suffer the fate of the ¾ empty Smoke City Market down the street.

It is like 1939 again in Van Nuys. The Depression is ending and the ones with money are tearing down, speculating, building and buying at depressed prices, banking on a recovery that will once again make Van Nuys safe for bad cooking and fast cars.

Hamlin St.

Hamlin St., originally uploaded by Here in Van Nuys.

“Illegal Immigration is Immoral”

Victor Davis Hanson lays out a compelling and logical argument why illegal immigration is immoral in the National Review.

Casing the Hood.

Back a few months ago, I reported that I was home, about Noon, on a Thursday, working in my kitchen, when there was a frantic knocking at my front door.

When I went to answer, a young Latino in a knit cap asked, “Hey is Ray home?” I told him nobody by that name lived here.

I went out onto the driveway, and saw that a pickup truck had been backed up, as if ready to unload or load up, and as the truck pulled away, I noted the license plate and called the cops.

Four hours later, the LAPD called and said they had just driven down my street and saw nothing matching that description.  

I found out the next day, that this method of knocking on a door, and asking for a name is the new modus operandi of the burglar. If nobody answers, they go around back, and smash a window or kick down a door. It takes only minutes and they come in and destroy and steal and invade our homes……

Everyone should be alert, all the time, because we have almost minimal police protection in Van Nuys.  It is not safe to walk around at night, and it is practically unsafe to be inside your home during the day….

Today, my neighbors down the street reported again, that they had answered the door from people claiming to look for somebody who didn’t live there.

Merry Christmas.

Burglaries in Sherman Oaks.

From LAPD’s Ron Carter: 

 

“Those of you who receive “Nixle” messages have already received this update. For those who have not gone onto the LAPD Web at www.lapdonline.org and registered to receive “Nixle”messages and alerts, please consider checking it out. I receive Nixle at my home with current update information.

 

On November 30th (Thursday) between the hours of 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. there were three (3) additional residential burglaries at the 3400, 3600 blocks of Longridge Drive and at the 3600 block of Cody Drive. 

 

At one of these residences, the alarm frightened off the burglars, who left taking only a wallet and a lap-top. At the second location, the alarm was not turned on and the suspects left with assorted jewelry, shoes, I-Pads, Computers, Television, Game Consoles and multiple credit cards. This burglar smashed a rear window using a concrete table in the yard. Please remember to always activate your alarms, even when you are home.

 

Many of your neighbors are not active in a Neighborhood Watch, and may not attend their  local Government meetings , so it is important that we all share this information. This will help us all to get through the Holidays with less chance of becoming the victim of a crime. It is the “Fear of Crime” which we must also work hard to remove from the neighborhoods.

 

Thank you for being vigilant in your efforts to look for suspicious activities and persons who you do not recognize from the neighborhood.

Remember, for non-emergency, please call (818) 734-2223 and of course, if you see a crime  “in progress” then it may be a “911″ call. Let our Officers verify if that person does have legitimate business in your neighborhood.

 

I am sending this e-mail to all of my Group Contacts, because this can happen anywhere and anytime. Being aware, alert and knowing “Who to call, When to call and What to say“makes a difference. Please read the attachment.

 

Sincerely,

 

S.L.O. Ron Carter”

Highland Park Bike Advocate Talks Life After Cars

1871 S. Aquanetta Drive.

1871 S. Aquanetta Drive., originally uploaded by Here in Van Nuys.

A photo I took, along with others, from a Thanksgiving weekend spent in the Palm Springs area.

Some people hate Palm Springs, saying it is too hot, too sterile, too artificial.

Perhaps it is, but at twilight, when the sun is setting behind the mountains, there is nowhere I’ve been that feels so calming, so warm, so otherworldly.

There is something special about the desert, even the irrigated desert, and along with the green golf courses and the stucco clone houses, there are also special and completely original neighborhoods, dating from the 1950s, where the fine art of strange architecture and sculpted plants transports one into a reverie of light and form, which I have tried to capture photographically.

The Almighty was merciful in creating only one place like Southern California. For better or worse….

And we who inhabit this imperfect, flawed and destructive region, we occasionally are seduced and awed by a light and a moment to realize that we are also blessed to live here amongst human creativity, human imagination and nature’s nature.

This was Palm Springs yesterday and this is the way it was and will always be.

Superba Avenue/Alley

Superba Avenue/Alley, originally uploaded by Here in Van Nuys.