Los Angeles Thread #11: Let's Save Vincente Minnelli's House

Karen Bass slightly ahead now. Villanueva is OUT

this fuckin guy

rest easy, P-22

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-12-17/p22-obituary-celebrity-mountain-lion-cougar-puma-griffith-park-california

BrokenBookSellers on IG names Vroman's/Booksoup as #1 of the 10 worst bookstores of 2022.

Congrats to Dolores Bauer for all her hard work making Vroman's our other #1. Dolores, you win nothing.

We received more stories from Vroman's former and current employees than from any other store, some we could not publish for fear of retaliation. Almost all whistleblowers told us some of the worst bookstore stories in this page's history, many inventive in their cruelty and heartlessness. Bauer hunts her employees like sport. TW: A few of these stories in the panels to come discuss sexual harassment.

Where do we start? Where do we end? We spent half the day sorting through the stories to make these graphics and it broke our hearts all over again to read.

Well, damn. Everybody on the Pasadena fb group I'm in loves Vroman's.

I stopped going to Vroman's when they put the wine bar in, devoted more square footage to selling things that aren't books, and then whined loudly about how they were about to go out of business because it was everyone's fault for shopping elsewhere.

Book Alley just down Colorado Blvd. is where it's at anyway.

I still haven't stopped in at Book Alley's "new" location, but used to love the old one. Also RIP Cliff's Books.

every time I’ve gone to Vroman’s it’s packed like any Barnes and Noble. Didn’t know about its rep, I’d dealt with them previously on a couple different things though likely dealt with folks who could very well be sources for the stories. My preferred book spot is Iliad, which is not the type of spot that exudes any bad vibes. I’m conversely not surprised to see them talk about The Last Bookstore.

RIP Cliff's Books

Yup. While we're at it - pour one out for Either/Or Books and Acres Of Books too.

Alias Books in Atwater is worth stopping in if you haven't yet. Iliad, Arcana, and the CLUI are my faves right now.

sorry to keep adding grim notes about bookstores to this thread but Alex Maslansky, the co-owner of Stories in Echo Park passed away suddenly this week. don’t think i ever encountered him there beyond maybe a standard book-buying transaction but he was clearly hugely respected and loved, very sad news

https://www.instagram.com/p/CnxTuXcy_tf/?igshid=ZDFmNTE4Nzc=

RIP Mission Tiki Drive-In in Montclair

Big Bridget Riley exhibition just opened up at the Hammer. Everyone here should go (also it's free!)

https://hammer.ucla.edu/exhibitions/2023/bridget-riley-drawings-artists-studio
http://lacmaonfire.blogspot.com/2023/02/bridget-riley-drawings-at-hammer.html

very keen to see that one!

on that note, this show of lithographs by women artists at the norton simon closes this weekend and is really good:

https://www.nortonsimon.org/exhibitions/2020-2029/ink-paper-stone-six-women-artists-and-the-language-of-lithography/

also enjoyed the henry taylor and simone forti shows at moca grand, the latter has live performances happening for the duration of the exhibition

Some assholes stole https://www.pasadenanow.com/main/octavias-bookstore-burglarized00 from Octavia's bookstore.

https://www.pasadenanow.com/main/octavias-bookstore-burglarized

Had an event at Redcat on Saturday so I officially tried out one of the new metro stations: Grand Avenue/Bunker Hill. The station is just *right there* across Hope St. The new alignment for the Gold A Line makes it a one-line shot. It's eerie when big public infrastructure just works.

FWIW, there weren't any spontaneous games of Thunderdome on the A line. I haven't ridden frequently enough to notice trends, but things seem ... less intense? My home station is still weird at night though.

haven’t gotten the chance to explore all the new stops yet, except for the new little tokyo station which looks great.

the weekend the regional connector opened i took the former gold line train, which stops near my place in highland park, all the way down to long beach without having to transfer trains - on the way down it took less than 75 minutes, no interruptions. could not say the same about the way back, unfortunately - there was an electrical issue at one of the north LB stops which added almost an extra hour (!) to the trip.

also i take the former gold line to the former red line to get to work and i much prefer transferring at 7th over union station for my commute - just having to go up/down one flight of stairs to transfer at the former beats that 5-minute schlep between trains at the latter.

haven’t ridden the blue train enough to comment but the red line has been pretty grim post-2020. more than once have had to switch train cars because of meth smokers, and the train cars in general are pretty filthy in a way that used to not be the case.

Went from unseasonably cold to hit pretty fast. I hope it's not a miserable summer, it was a fun ride from the fall til a couple weeks back. The hills are so lush. I also hope we're not in for an active fire season. Still not quite used to now living in what is the hottest *and* coldest part of L.A. -- frost on the windshield thru March, and I assume I'll be boiling my eggs on the surface of the patio starting next week.

Heads up...

https://www.cinema.ucla.edu/events/2023/07/30/crossroads-exploding-digital-inevitable

Crossroads / The Exploding Digital Inevitable
July 30, 2023 - 7:00 pm
Billy Wilder Theater

Admission is free. No advance reservations. Your seat will be assigned to you when you pick up your ticket at the box office. Seats are assigned on a first come, first served basis. The box office opens one hour before the event.

In 1976, groundbreaking collagist, sculptor and filmmaker Bruce Conner released his magnum opus, a 36-minute assemblage of U.S. government footage of the iconic Bikini Atoll atomic bomb test. If Conner invented the modern found footage film with A Movie in 1958, he re-invented it with Crossroads. His editing of the film's brilliant "dual" score — by seminal minimalist composer Terry Riley and synthesizer pioneer Patrick Gleeson — evokes a surreal beauty latent in the devastating images that comprises one of the most profound meditations on the nuclear era extant.

The Exploding Digital Inevitable is a live documentary essay by Ross Lipman, who oversaw the restoration of Crossroads in 2012. Integrating an array of movie and audio clips, still photographs and rare archival documents, Lipman tells the story of Crossroads' unique production, as well as the massive cultural spectacle of the original Bikini Atoll tests themselves. It also chronicles the extraordinary collaboration of Conner with Riley and Gleeson, including original interviews with both composers. As part of this program, The Exploding Digital Inevitable will be presented jointly with Crossroads for a total run time of 90 minutes.

(Crossroads is considered to be a a big obvious influence on Episode 8 of Twin Peaks - The Return. never seen it before!)

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/weather/tropical-storm-hilary-expected-deluge-southern-california-heavy-rains-rcna100302

The first tropical threat to the U.S. this season isn’t on the East Coast or in the Gulf of Mexico — it’s in Southern California.

Tropical Storm Hilary formed Wednesday morning along Mexico’s western coast and is forecast to bring intense rain to Southern California early next week. If it makes landfall, it would become only the fourth storm of at least tropical storm strength to hit the area.

i have read some articles speculating this system would bring 2-3 years worth of precipitation to some areas. i take that kind of speculation with a big grain of salt, but after the shockingly intense deluges we had earlier this year, i'm also not necessarily dismissing it out of hand.

will the rain potentially help with low water levels?
(I know nothing about LA but remember the recent drought being in the news)

The lakes will benefit, but so much precipitation just runs off into the ocean.

The reservoirs are largely full now, so no help on that front. Tulare Lake may get even bigger, which is good for the aquifers but bad for farmers.

apparently the rotation means east of the mountains is going to get it much worse.

Regardless of intensity, the most dangerous aspect of #Hilary will be the rainfall, and that will be most severe in the deserts east of the Peninsular Ranges. Many areas there will see 4-8 inches of rain, with local amounts of a foot or more. That's 2-3 years worth of rain! #CAwx pic.twitter.com/DuuG4MWxb1

— Craig Ceecee, Ph.D. (@CC_StormWatch) August 18, 2023

Model average + NWS forecast has 4" of rain in Imperial, CA over the next 3-4 days.

That'd be more rain than Imperial's seen in the last 4 years combined (3.59"). #CAwx #Hilary pic.twitter.com/Q6Kb5kVKG8

— Chris Bianchi (@BianchiWeather) August 18, 2023

Some good analysis as of right now: https://weatherwest.com/archives/29462

Basically, anywhere along route 86 along the west side of the Salton Sea seems like a very bad place to be. There's cool places in Imperial County, though I grimly think of that water tank in El Centro that has "Sea Level" like 80 feet over your head. Fingers crossed for the folks out in Slab City.

I keep thinking of that chapter in Kim Stanley Robinson's The Ministry Of The Future, where a megastorm washes all of Sierra Madre over the 210 and into the LA basin. OTOH, we got 7" of rain here in the heaviest of the January storms. Our prep = charging everything up, putting whatever cardboard boxes we have on the garage floor either on a table or stacked in a plastic bin to keep the moisture out, and getting an extra bag of charcoal for the grill.

I was in Baja California (~750 miles south of San Diego) for Hurricane Odile and that sucked. Similar energy as this one. 4-6" of rain and 100+mph winds.

5 deaths, total damage amounted to MXN$16.6 billion (US$1.25 billion)

The house we were staying at (and evacuated from) was heavily damaged, as was the airport which made getting home a bit of a challenge. The Red Cross helped us with evacuations as roads were flooded/washed out, <3 to those folks.

In typical modern myopia, it was less than 9 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Odile

It's been raining steadily here in the canyons since before 8:00 am. Not particularly heavy, but steady.

5.0 near Ojai...

Is that why we got an alert here in L.A.?

No noticeable tremors here.

we felt it in Westwood. just a short sharp shock. I thought my daughter had jumped on to the sofa where I was lying.

I'm in Benedict Canyon, I thought the alert was a prank.

Didn't feel a thing in the SGV

our apartment wobbled a bit, it threw me for a loop

Earthquake after a long rain was the scenario for a landslide in the Canary (or Azore) Islands that would cause a huge tsunami to hit the Southeast US. Nova TV show, I believe.

Raining harder here now. Can confirm that it's miserable pissy rain

It's not raining in BH/Century City.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-09-30/la-golondrina-cafe-historic-olvera-street-mexican-restaurant-back-rent?

sad to hear about this

Damn...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMsz03YCtZc

yeah i had seen that story. it's absolutely crazy out there with some of the smash and grab robberies, following the recent follow-home robbery trend, and this seems to be a really extreme case of both.

my understanding is they were chasing this guy on the freeway and if anyone is familiar w/that stretch, it's extremely busy at that time.

kudos to that dude who was filming them doing that, totally without fear (i don't know that i would have done that.) i hope that car wasn't stolen, those plates are very clear.

Storybook GTA mission

opening scene of heat, except that spot is no good. 405 is 7 minutes, and the 110 is a parking lot and 4 minutes away.

here come those santa ana winds again

And again!

Found out today that the house insurance has been cancelled. We're a mile away from the state defined Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone border (hell, we're closer to the 210 freeway than we are to the hillside) but nevertheless...

i didnt know that that could happen? jeez

Background to all this from Sept. 2021: https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2021-09-26/california-fire-insurance-moratorium-expire

A California moratorium guaranteeing insurance in wildfire-threatened areas lapsed Saturday, putting 347,000 homes in Pasadena and other Los Angeles foothills communities at the mercy of the market.

As many as 2.4 million homes are at risk of losing protection in 2021 as yearlong grace periods expire — though new disasters may extend their shields. In all, 18% of the state’s households could effectively lose protection, the largest single group since the moratorium law took effect three years ago.

“We’re going to pay the bill for climate change one way or the other, and it’s just a question of how we divvy up that cost,” said David Russell, co-director of the Center for Risk Management and Insurance at Cal State Northridge. “What California politicians are trying to do is tinker with how we do that. They’re buying time, hoping they get a break.”

Climate change has been rough on the world’s fifth-biggest economy: Wildfires torched nearly 4 million acres last year and more than 2 million so far this year; the Dixie and Caldor fires, two of the biggest, still aren’t entirely contained.

Fires in 2017 and 2018 alone wiped out more than a quarter-century of underwriting profits for the California insurance market, according to Milliman Inc., a risk assessment company. As insurers rushed to recalibrate risks, consumers were shocked by canceled policies and soaring rates.

In 2018, after the Camp fire destroyed more than 18,000 buildings, lawmakers in Sacramento prevented insurance companies from canceling homeowner policies in or adjacent to wildfire areas for 12 months after the day of an emergency declaration. The idea was to protect consumers after traumatic episodes and to give them time to make their homes more fire resistant. That, ideally, would prevent higher rates or cancellations.

“Even when these moratoriums end, they have given people time to make their homes safer,” California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara, said in a statement to Bloomberg, an argument he has made on numerous occasions. “I expect insurance companies to take that into account.”

It’s hard to tell whether this is wishful thinking or effective policy. Even before the law was enacted, California’s highly regulated market was seeing insurers quit the state or refuse to write new policies. In 2019, the last period for which information was available, the state saw a 31% uptick in non-renewals. Over the same period there was a 36% increase in homeowners using the California FAIR Plan, the state’s bare-bones alternative for those who can’t get insurance in the traditional market.