Well, we saw the Rocky Horror Show in New York. It was a gigantic kick. It was raucous and a lot of fun. I think the whole energy of the audience and the cast worked back and forth to make it an almost shared experience.
Luke Evans was a giant bundle of puppy-dog-in-a-corset-and-cock-ring energy as Frank n Furter. Rachel Dratch, as the narrator, did a fine job, but I think she really is there to make sure the audience doesn't go too overboard.
It was very fun.
There was a very odd but cool show at the Park Ave Armory. It featured meditation music made by bowls and water. Sounds dumb, but look at pictures.
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| The 3 pools were located in a riser at the Park Ave Armory Drill Hall. |
Humm.. This reminds me of the Madeline Kahn line in Clue (below).
And from Clue
This is something Ed and I just discussed as we drove to Arizona and saw open canals in the desert. Why not cover the canals with solar panels?
Well, they are trying it in the Central Valley right now. The image below shows a football field-sized set of panels. Apparently, they reduce evaporation by about 70%, help to slow or stop algae build-up, and generate a lot of energy. Why don't they put they everywhere now?
Well, right now, they only make sense where there is infrastructure to use that energy. So you put it where electricity hookups already are, like pumping stations along the route. They are also looking at installing charging stations near them and bringing infrastructure closer as it is updated.
Generates electricity, saves water. Win win.
But in many poorer areas, they are simply left as trash plots and urban blight. Well, while I have been away, there has been work to use some of these as lower-income housing infill. Here are some very cool images of the "Isla Intersections" housing. I will include the write-up below, but the key takeaway from me is the unique and innovative use of land and low-cost building supplies to create affordable housing.
This remnant of the street was left during the construction of the 105 and the 110 interchange. (For those with a more verbal memory, the Harbor and Century freeways). It is cool. And designed to buffer noise - which is why the Imperial Ave side is kind of boring.
Interestingly, I was born at a hospital about 1/4 mile away.
4 more pics
I wrote this and had Shelly and Barbara read it. I think it is 99 cents of fun. But that is me.
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| LINK |
Here is my blurb.
Constance Orvan, a skilled thief, steps into the opulent world of the English Upper Classes circa 1911. Hired by the charming rake Connor Moss, she’s tasked with stealing a priceless Caravaggio painting from the enigmatic Hamish Tanner’s estate. Masquerading as the refined Constance Borsale, she navigates the treacherous social waters of Wellspring House. Constance grapples with her growing attraction to another guest and the moral dilemmas of her double life. With every stolen glance and whispered secret, she inches closer to a choice that could redefine her future. Can she maintain her facade while staying true to herself?
Constance and the Caravaggio is a fun romp reminiscent of the joys of P G Woodhouse and E F Benson.
I read it with trepidation. Knowing that if these things really worked, what my different dogs would have texted.
Their favorite texts:
Trevor
Ashford
Hastings
I was looking at the week in nature photography on The Guardian. They had captured a picture of a "ringtail" on an animal camera in Oregon. I didn't know what they were.
This is a Ringtail, also called a Ringtail Cat, although it is most closely related to a raccoon.
Apparently, they live all over the western US, but I was unaware of them. They are nocturnal and rarely seen.
You learn something new every day.
It looks a lot like a Ring-tailed Lemur, but it is not.
Again, like the post below, I must post and then comment on an advice letter.
In this case, I used to be the "handful" before bed. Before the divorce, I was way too hyper. Read the letter, and then read how my family dealt with me.
Dear Care and Feeding,
My husband and have a 7-year-old son, “Orlando,” who is a high-energy handful. Two weeks ago, we were due to go out of town to meet with a client (we run our own business together). Orlando’s regular sitter had to cancel at the last minute, so my sister-in-law, “Evie,” who lives in town, and came over to watch Orlando for us.
We returned home late that night expecting to find the house wrecked and Evie exhausted. Instead, she was sitting on the couch watching TV, and Orlando was in bed asleep. When I asked her how on earth she had gotten him to go to bed before 11 p.m., she told me had given him an edible and it “really mellowed him out”! I was furious, but it’s my husband’s reaction that has me seeing red. He actually wants to start giving Orlando small doses of edibles to “even out his mood” since the one his sister gave him worked so well! His excuse it that people use medical marijuana all the time, and it would be no different. Our son is 7! Now I’m concerned he may resort to Evie’s home remedy when he wants some peace and quiet behind my back. How can I convince him this is not an appropriate treatment?
In my case, my family took different routes. The most normal one was that I was allowed to stay up later, if I was quiet. Or I could lie in my bed, and watch TV through the bedroom door into the living room until I fall asleep.
Now this didn't always work, and occasionally my parents would give me a small glass of red wine. You can say this was bad, but this was nothing. When my maternal grandparents put me to bed, I was occasionally given a nice shot of whiskey. When my paternal grandmother (Zela) had a horrible day, with her elderly, cranky father, her daughter with Down syndrome, and me - her hyperactive grandson all having been too much, I was given valium. I assume it was a small dose, because it was white, not the 5 or 10 mg blue. But it worked.
My father also sometimes gave me things to help me sleep every now and then. In fact, I slept through the big San Fernando Valley earthquake because I had a cold and couldn't sleep so dad slipped me a secondal.
And I turned out dreamy!
I am smiling here. I read advice columns because they often make me laugh. And they often make me feel better about myself.
I particularly like the advice ones about children, because nothing - affairs included - riles up couples like children. I saw this today, and I loved it. The answer is boring, but the question shows a family having issues talking.
Dear Care and Feeding,
My wife “Nikki” and I have a daughter, “Amber,” 9, and a son, “Adam,” 4. We relocated to our current city in March for my work. Amber is rather shy and has trouble making friends as a result, so we were very pleased when she hit it off with a classmate, “Serenity.” The issue I’m dealing with is that my wife has a hair up her ass about the fact that Serenity’s parents just had a pool installed and didn’t tell us. Nikki thinks that their failure to inform us of “the hazard” is a major violation of trust and doesn’t want Amber to be friends with Serenity anymore. Amber is in zero danger of drowning. She’s not a toddler and was on the swim team for our community pool back in our old city. My wife is insane for wanting to cost our daughter a good friend over nothing, right?
—Pool Problem
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| No, not that kind of hare up her ass |
Sometimes Palm Springs is too gay, and sometimes it is just wildly gay enough. Last night was the second kind.
In a beautiful step away from the daily throb of news and news spin, last night we stumbled upon a group of gay men (Facebook "Among Friends") who have a monthly old-movie screening with mildly interactive moments. Mildly interactive, meaning that a few times the audience repeats what is being repeated on the stage, or they throw out bags of peanuts when an actor on screen calls bullshit by saying "nuts!", or they wander across the stage during the big fashion show number.
Well, we went to see The Women (the 1939 version) last night, and it was a hoot. Hoot is the right word. It was old-fashioned, PG-rated, good times. It wasn't all dirty, or draggy, or disingenuous, just a bunch of old guys (my 67 years was about average - on the other hand, Ed, not yet 60, was in the "chicken" camp) laughing at an old black and white movie together. And doing that stuff together is soooooo much more fun than doing it at home in front of your screen.
I don't know if anyone remembers, but there was a great Seinfeld Episode where George's dad (a frantic Jerry Stiller) translates beauty-shop Korean for Elaine.
Well, I just read a story, which might or might not be true - but it should be, that the new translation AirPods allow people to pretend to listen to music, but they can hear a full translation of what is being said. Their stories - as long as they are about someone else - are supposed to be extremely dirty and funny.
Having sat at a Raman place with Chinese cooks and a Chinese speaker, I can say I totally believe it.
Apple (TM) Bringing the Future to You
Yes, it was silly. Yes, it was fun.
I remember the original of these stupid ass movies. Kentucky Fried Movie. It was a skit movie that de-butted in 1977. It was just as SNL debuted, and the movie was a series of unrelated gags. Since then, gag movies have had to have a theme - and Stop That Train had a silly one.
It was a runaway train movie with a bomb on board. Kind of "The Bug Bus," only this time on a train where drag queens were the hostesses. Again stupid fun.
As such, it is the conduit for a ton of trash swept away during rainstorms. It is a big contributing entrance to ocean garbage. So the fact that they have been using a boat designed to stop garbage from entering the sea. And this is no pie-in-the-sky idea. To quote:
In this creek, the end of a 130 sq mile urban drainage network in LA County, the boat stopped 143,710lbs of rubbish from entering the ocean in 2025.
That's a lot. And there are others now around the world.
This particular barge is a model for others being deployed around the world. Ocean Cleanup operates in 10 places, with 21 Interceptor systems – in countries including Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Guatemala, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic. It aims to clean up the 30 most-polluted cities by 2030
Rivers are key. Research by Ocean Cleanup has shown that just 1,000 of the world’s rivers are responsible for nearly 80% of plastic emissions into the ocean, and 90% of all pollution in the ocean comes from rivers. “We have to turn the faucet off before we can scoop the ocean, or else all we’re doing is taking out legacy trash to replace it with new trash,” Patterson says. “Before you can clean out the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, you really need to turn off the source.”
Work on designing the autonomous boat started in 2017, and this pilot project in LA began in 2022. It cost about $1.3m to design and permit, and another $1.5m to secure the boat and booms in place. Maintenance each year costs $650,000 – and the Interceptor is being provided to LA County free from Ocean Cleanup.
On the other hand, David Hockney is an artist I don't mind praising, because no one cares.
David Hockney has held my imagination for many years. He is a British Pop Art painter who spent the 70s - 90s primarily in Los Angeles. His work is deceptively child-like. He works with big colors and ideas, with the subtext of place never far from his work.
His painting of Mulholland Drive (at the top) is the perfect example for me. If you don't know, Mulholland Drive runs along the ridge of the Hollywood/Santa Monica Hills between the LA Basin and the San Fernando Valley. Both sides of the hill are various levels of urban city - typified by the street layouts on the top of the page. Below the ribbon of the roadway are the faux natural habitats along the street. But if you look a little, the colorful "nature" is that of Beverly Hills pools and Bel Air Canyon tennis courts, manicured lawns and gardens. The colors are vibrant and not very natural. It encapsulates the beauty of the city, all the while acknowledging the beauty of this "nature' is almost completely artificial. And yet, that doesn't detract from it.
He brings an outsider's viewpoint of Los Angeles (he was British) and succeeds because almost everyone is an outsider to Los Angeles.
Anyway, here are some of his pictures, the highlights of various decades as called out by his website (link).
Ed's mother Jo passed this morning. She was beloved by her family. Ed's stepfather, Donald, passed away about 2 1/2 years ago.
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| Front row: Donald and Jo with their boys |
Every now and then, as I am writing, I investigate an era. Sometimes I am very surprised what I find out about different eras and what was popular.
In looking at the time period around 1910 in England (I wrote a really fun book, but did not use this fact), I found this tidbit.
For about 5 - 8 years around 1910, London and the surrounding areas in England became enamored with Roller Rinks.
In 1910, England was in the peak of a massive roller-skating craze known as "rinking". Over 526 indoor rinks existed nationwide, featuring polished wooden floors, live orchestras, and upscale cafes. This short-lived but intense boom faded by 1912 as the fad died out. [1, 2, 3]
It turns out that the reason for the boom had to do with sex and dating. There were very few places where men and women could interact with a chaperone, and Roller Rinks were among the most popular. Kind of cool.
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| Olympia Rink (South Shields): Opened in 1910 by the sea, this prominent skating palace was a fixture of coastal entertainment until a fire destroyed it in 1932. |
I know, roll your eyes, but this will not be a normal - "I Love UCLA" post. It is a lot different.
College Football has a place in many students' hearts because of this:
That is a football stadium with almost 100,000 fans. Many, maybe most, either went to or still attend the universities where these happen. These football games and teams transform a college, students, alumni, and locals into a group of friends into a community, at least for home games, often for longer. For many colleges, it transfers dissaperate people into a community with a shared language (Go Bruins!) and hopes (Beat SC). For some, it is the modern equivalent of nationalism, complete with good guys, bad guys (I am looking at you, Michigan and USC), redemption arcs, and shared pain.
Sure, I have almost nothing in common with the Jim Morrison of the Doors, Carol Burnett, Jackie Robinson - the first black major league baseball player, 9 Nobel Prize scientists, Ralph Bunche - the first black Nobel Peace Prize winner, and Azadeh Kian - French / Iranian scholar and member of the EU parliament EXCEPT that we are all Bruins. And football is where we often meet - metaphorically. So college sports are a big deal in the States.
In cities as diverse as Madison, Wisconsin, and Bozeman, Montana, game day is part of the community. Go to breakfast in Columbus, OH, on a football Saturday, and everyone is wearing Ohio State colors, from infants to retirees. This happens if the school is playing in Columbus or away.
Which is why the changes in college football hurt so much.
College football used to pretend to be a part of the University. The teams were made up of student/athletes. Sure, at big schools, many of the players were athletes first and students only as an afterthought, but this wasn't the case for most team members.
The biggest change was made when schools and alumni were allowed to pay athletes. For many of us, it was horrible, but it acknowledged out in the open what was happening illegally. And maybe the players should participate in the billions of dollars being shuffled around.
Then... changes were made that allowed players to transfer and play immediately from team to team. Now players could be bought from other teams, which made them only marginally part of the shared community.
Some great, but not great enough, players changed schools for more money than they would make in the "pros". These student-athletes often do not attend classes on campus or even plan to graduate. Some are graduates who now take online classes at their new destination.
But a recent ruling at a school in Texas has put another arrow into the game. This ruling cleared a college football player from Texas Tech to play, even though he actually bet on a game his team was in. Even the pros don't allow players to stay if they bet on or against their own teams. But this Texas Tech player was ruled eligible anyway. BTW, the 4-judge panel that ruled this way was made up of all Texas Tech alumni.
I suppose it is another scale that has fallen from my eyes. There is no Superman. Not all people are equal under the law. College football and basketball athletes are athletes, not student-athletes, and definitely not students.
I guess part of getting old is hating that you see the world for what it is. I liked being stupid, happy, and believing in the good in people.
Of course, I still root for UCLA and Ed for Wisconsin. But the emotional tether to the schools gets more frayed as the biggest visible ties - the ones that play on TV in the fall and spring - are rooted not in love of the school but in love with the richest of the alumni.
So I read about the demise of soap in bar form the other day (the other day is now a year later, but I was off nincompoopery for a while). One of the major companies was discussing the transition from bar soap to liquid soap. This was in the context of Covid-19, and the reporter was saying that bar soap purchases have fallen due to Covid needs for antiseptics.
The company man was having none of it. In fact, the companies that make bar soap can point to the exact cultural moment when bar soap went out of fashion. Before he even pointed it out, I knew what he would say. And I was correct.
Here is that exact moment in history for all of us.
So I was reading this interesting/gross story about these giant hissing cockroaches they confiscated in Australia. And yet at the end, only one thing stood out. I will let you read - and then the highlighted section.
And as I read, I am processing. For instance, when I read they were worth $142,000 - I think.
Wow, that is only $1.42 per cockroach. I wouldn't raise a cockroach for a buck and a half. I wonder where the break-even is? Would I raise a hundred of them for $142, no? I mean I guess you have to get above 10,000 of them before it starts to feel like real money. So, you don't really scale up this operation from 2 cockroaches. You've got to start with a bunch.
And then they are warning pet owners - I think.
I assume they are talking about pet owners who use these big-ass cockroaches for food. But, let's say you have a snake, do you really think about where the bugs as food come from? Is there some sort of seal of approval for bugs? Can't you probably buy at least 2 domestic roaches for the same price?
And then my mind says...
Speaking of price, I wonder if that is US or Australian dollars. So, I look it up. Suspiciously, $1 US = $1.42 Australian. So was this really $100,000 in the article and someone just converted it. That is lazy
And then I read that all the cockroaches will be euthanized. And I think...
How do you "euthanize" cockroaches? Take them to a child's party and let all the little kiddos crunch them? Then my mind is full of this image (and I can use AI to share it).
Well, we saw The Odyssey yesterday in IMAX. It was fine. Which is sad; it might have been amazballs. Here are my positive criticisms: It wa...
