Hydra’s on a lemonade kick. Dodger is ready to help.
I’m not sure sticking his beak in the sugar is really helpful, but it pleases him. He gets a little dish of lemonade.
Me, I’ve been making Arnold Palmers with the lemonade. That’s half lemonade/half iced tea. YUM!
p.s. For those of you who eat at our house from time to time, I assure you that no beaks, feet or feathers are allowed in anything I offer to my friends.
Really? You don’t want me to attempt to use this device?
I’m offended! Offended, I tell you, that you tell me that I can’t use the payphone when I know I am perfectly capable of operating one!
Wow, we really felt this morning’s 5.8 earthquake in Burbank this morning, even though we’re about 45 miles from the epicenter.
The building shook and then it rolled. It went on long enough that I bent over and considered whether it would be better to duck under my desk or my computer table.
We’re on the second floor of a two-story building. The window blinds swayed for a while after the movement had probably stopped, but it’s disorienting. I felt like I might still be moving!
I have already gone to the USGS site and entered my experience in their database. I think it’s cool that they gather anecdotal information. If you felt it, you can report too! (Click on USGS and then when on the site, click on Report an Earthquake.)
You can also just use it to look at the activity that’s going on right now. They’ve had two aftershocks already!
P.S. My all-time favorite earthquake video. I was working in a restaurant in Century City during this one, and the TVs started bouncing on their chains. The cooks ran out of the kitchen because the grease in the big deep fryers started sloshing out!
I really like this graphic on the cards they put out on the tables at Andrew’s.
I actually drink the water, so I still get it!
Technically, this is Dodger’s playset.
But sometimes Nick likes to pretend he’s the big cheese.
It took a considerable force of will–or no, maybe that was just a sense of impending guilt–for me to get up Saturday morning and get these bags loaded up with clothing and linens and put them on the curb.
I wasn’t thinking when I received a call on Thursday saying the Salvation Army would be picking up in our neighborhood and would I like to contribute. They were driving all the way from Bakersfield, so I said yes. They were looking mostly for clothes.
Of course, they said they’d arrive between 8am and 4pm and they showed around 2:45 pm.
In the meantime, we put together a bunch of other stuff to give to our favorite local charity, Valley Oasis Thrift Shop in Palmdale. They provide safe haven for battered women and children.
I looove the Internet. I do, I do!
Needed to meet Braveheart in Hollywood. I got off work at 3:30 and didn’t need to meet her till 7-ish. So I Googled the area where she was doing some counseling (she’s going to be an amazing therapist, without a doubt) and searched for coffee in the area, and found Caffe, etc.
Quiet and unassuming coffee house with a big rack of magazines and newspapers to peruse. I read from Details and Esquire, a couple of mags I don’t usually spend time with. Wrote about all the people I saw heading home or meeting people after work. Sipped an iced coffee. Aaah.
I parked my car a few blocks away and left it there when Braveheart picked me up and whisked me off to…
…the Hollywood Bowl!
You have to relax at The Bowl. People meet to picnic ahead of time at the tables or, like us, bring sandwiches and wine to their seats. You get to sit and watch the sun go down and feel the air cool, and check out people scaling the concrete steps.
And then, if you’re lucky, you get to see Diana Ross! Great concert, really. She had us all singing along (as if you could have stopped some of us) and at a couple of points, she shielded her eyes and said, “I can’t see you!”
So they upped the house lights and we all waved, and stood, and swayed. She did lots of Supremes hits, and a little something from Majogany and from The Wiz and from Lady Sings the Blues.
Fun night.
And if you live in Los Angeles, it includes using your own reusable shopping bags by summer 2010!
Yes!
This week the Los Angeles City Council passed a ban on plastic bags (if the state doesn’t make good on its threat to require a 25 cent charge for each plastic bag.) This is really great news.
Those flimsy plastic bags are a nightmare. They’re manufactured using petroleum products, they don’t decompose, they get caught in fences and on bushes. They pile up in my pantry because I feel guilty about just throwing them away.
Today I sent emails to each of the 15 L.A. City Council members thanking them for passing the ban. It’s wonderful that they are taking the lead in changing the way we do things, and it’l hopefully support the state in passing its own legislation.
All those tote bags you’ve gotten as gifts or as rewards for joining book clubs? Dig ’em out and use ’em!
Here’s the L.A. City Council’s homepage, in case you want to write and thank them too. I just wrote up a little form letter and cut and pasted it, changing the name of the councilmember.
The automatic replies I received from each were really interesting too. A different tone and a different amount of information in each.
I just went and read a few of the bills regarding plastic bags and recycling of various plastic products that are in the California Senate and Assembly right now. What’s disturbing about the one that I think the Los Angeles ban would defer to(AB 2058) is that it bans only non-reusable bags. It actually says that heavier plastic bags are okay to provide because they’re meant to be reused. Aren’t those also harder to break down in landfills!?
If you want to see the various bills in play right now, click here and do a keyword search on plastic and/or recycling.
To find your California State Assembly and Senate representatives by zip code, click here.
To find your state legislature in whatever state you’re in, go to the National Conference of State Legislatures, highlight your state in one box and legislature in the other, and click on Get Legislature Links.
You can contact your U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives, too.
Because our little town goes through growth spurts every so often, you see a lot of these group mailboxes around. It saves the post office sending someone around to each and every house in our 154-house complex.
People post notices on the mailboxes. Usually advertisements for the Homeowners’ Association meetings or for Bingo night at the club house. (Yes, I’m serious.)
The middle one, hoping for the return of a darling lost cat has been there the longest. I hope they find her. Odds are not good out here in coyote country.
The top one gave me a laugh because I misread it as “Lost Bed” when I first saw it. I’m thinking how the heck do you lose a bed!?
Ah…loft bed. I see!
This one showed up yesterday. It made me smile for so many reasons.
Stone steps outside Braveheart’s house.
There is so much unexpected beauty in the world.
Sometimes it just stops me in my tracks.
The stone dove checks me out.
Any Given Sundry 