Photo Essay: Dinny & Mr. Rex Are a Pair of Halloween Treats in Cabazon

I'd seen the Cabazon Dinosaurs dressed up for lots of other holidays, like Christmas, Valentine's Day, and Easter....

...but I hadn't yet seen them in costume for the ultimate dress-up holiday, Halloween. 

Photo Essay: Exploring the Navy's Explosive Island Across the Santa Barbara Channel

I'm a completionist. So of course I've been tracking how many of California's Channel Islands I've been to—and how many I can eventually get to. 

I've already been to Catalina, Santa Rosa, Anacapa, Santa Cruz, and San Nicolas. (Santa Barbara is closed until they can fix the anchorage, and San Clemente is off-limits as a Navy station.)

And as of last weekend, I've crossed yet another off my list: San Miguel. 

Photo Essay: Woolsey Fire Recovery Still Continues With the Reopening of Peter Strauss Ranch (Without Its Ranch House)

The last time I tried to check on Peter Strauss Ranch—one of my favorite places in LA—I couldn't get anywhere near it because the November 2018 Woolsey Fire had destroyed the Mulholland Highway bridge you'd normally have to walk across to get to it from the parking area.

 

That was January 2019. 

But the National Park Service had announced that the ranch—part of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area—had finally reopened in June 2022, so I went back a couple of weeks ago. (They still haven't replaced the park sign, which was burned to a crisp.)

Photo Essay: Monte Carlo Deli & Pinocchio Restaurant, A Red-Sauce Reverie Inspired By A Fairy-Tale Boy Puppet

Walt Disney once considered building Disneyland in Burbank, California instead of Anaheim—on the lot that now houses Walt Disney Animation Studios and ABC, across from Walt Disney Studios. 

But today, the only place in Burbank where the public can get a taste of Disney—since there's no studio tour offered—is at the Monte Carlo Deli and Pinocchio Restaurant on Magnolia Boulevard, in Magnolia Park. 

Glendale's Moonlight Rollerway Once Again Lights Up Tuesday Nights With Live Organ Concerts [Updated for 2024]

[Last updated 8/27/24 9:43 PM PT—Organ nights have ceased.]

I recently included Moonlight Rollerway in Glendale, California as one of the top places to "feel like a kid again" in LA, in an article published on KCET.org. But that's not exactly accurate for me—because I didn't grow up getting invited to rollerskating birthday parties.

Or, if I had been invited, I wouldn't have been allowed to go. 

So although I had a pair of those metal strap-on skates that I'd wear over my sneakers as I plunked down the sidewalk in front of my childhood home, I never really learned how to rollerskate.

I tried once in college with some high school friends, but I fell so many times—and so spectacularly—that I got ejected from the floor.

 

Still, I can't shake my fascination with rollerskating—probably because of my lifelong love of Xanadu—so this year I've made not one but two pilgrimages to Glendale's oldest roller rink, which has operated as Moonlight Rollerway since 1968.

An Alien-Assisted Recharge of My World-Weary Battery At the Integratron

I'd hoped to complete my extraterrestrial experience after helping to clean up Giant Rock last weekend by following it up with the alien-architect-designed Integratron, also in the California High Desert town of Landers.  

 

Photo Essay: Giant Rock, (Maybe) The World's Largest Freestanding Boulder & Mysterious Alien Beacon

Once thought to be the world's largest freestanding boulder, Giant Rock in the High Desert town of Landers, California has somewhat mystified me over the years...

 

 

...not only as the former site of UFO conventions...

A Dream Encounter With the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile (Or, the Day We Had Hot Dogs For Breakfast)

The first time I ever got to see the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile up close, it was in Palm Springs in April 2021. (I might've seen one in the wild on the freeway or from a distance before that, but I can't quite remember.)

 

circa 2021

Photo Essay: St. Vincent Court, The Historic Los Angeles Alley Where Coffee and Kebabs Converge

Between the St. Vincent Jewelry Center on the corner of 7th and Hill and the Burlington (Coat Factory) department store at 7th and Broadway, there's a breezeway that leads to an alley, traversed by two multistory air bridges.

 Photo: Google Streetview circa February 2022 

This is St. Vincent Court. 

 

 

Taking My Punishment

Image by Edward Lich from Pixabay 

As a child who was wrongfully accused and convicted of a number of household crimes—from scratching my mother's wooden rocking chair and new bathroom wallpaper to pitting the cover of a borrowed paperback book on the kitchen counter—I learned early on how to shut up and take my punishments.