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2010 NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing season kicks off this weekend, February 11-14, with the 50th running of the Kragen O’Reilly NHRA Winternationals.   If you love loud and fast cars this is the weekend made for you.  I’m not kidding, invest in good ear protection for this as after the Pomona Finals in November my ears were ringing for a good hour after the event and I had good plugs with me.

To mark the milestone 50th running of the Winternationals, NHRA has scheduled a series of events to transform the Auto Club Raceway at Pomona into a virtual hot-rodding amusement park for the weekend:

• The Golden 50 Corral Car Show, effectively a museum displaying the cars including Roland Leong’s Hawaiian and Don “The Snake” Prudhomme’s Hot Wheels Funny Car that laid the foundation for today’s 7,000-horsepower, 300-mph dragsters.
• Daily cacklefests, featuring top cars from the last 50 years in one of the oldest traditions in drag racing
• Autograph sessions with NHRA legends, including Shirley Muldowney, “Big Daddy” Don Garlits, Bob Glidden, Kenny Bernstein to drop a few names.
• Exhibition runs by legendary tribute cars on the Auto Club Raceway track.
• The unveiling of the Greatest Moment in Winternationals history (the complete list of moments can be found on NHRA.com).

All the details can be found at the Fairplex web HERE.

Pic by me from the 11/15 NHRA Pomona Finals.

It’s not easy to live in LA.  You’ve got to have a certain toughness.  Especially if you are struggling to make ends meet… and who isn’t these days?

Certainly our fair city is having a hard time.  And it seems that one of the answers the people who run this place have is raising the fine on just about everything having to do with driving.  Forget about the impact on the populace.  There’s a new attitude and it seems to be…  let’s make new laws to take as much money as we can from the people of this city.

Now I’m not an advocate of scofflaws who drive like maniacs and endanger peoples lives by their bad driving.  Those losers should be off the road… but I can’t help but wonder what kind of message politicians are sending to us folks when they raise the parking rates to outrageous sums, slap $50 parking fines on expired meters, boot and tow cars after three unpaid parking tickets … it used to be 5 (lots of money in getting a car out of hock) and now are suggesting that putting more cameras at intersections can raise millions for the city.

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Gentlemen! Are you looking for a fab Valentine Day gift for that special zaftig someone in your life? Always wanted to buy her sexy lingerie that you know SHE (and you) would like? Ever feel kinda creepy walking into Victoria’s Secret – alone?

Jenette Bras is here for you.

This Thursday, Friday and Saturday Jenette Bras is hosting Men-Only evening events from 6pm to 8pm. From their invite:

We’ll pour you a drink, then get to work helping you select the perfect gift: beautiful brassiere and pantie sets, slips, corsets and gift certificates for a custom bra fitting. And if your honey is already a Jennette Bras gal, then we’ve got her stats and you’ve got it made. Painless.

If your special someone a gorgeous, curvy gal, this is the shop for her. And you.

At Jenette Bras, the Alphabet Starts at D — ask your woman, she’ll know what that means.

(Full disclosure, I’m a very satisfied customer of Jenette Bras so I know what I’m talking about.)

Jenette Bras
4308 Melrose Ave.
323-665-7490
Right around the corner from Scoops!

A remarkable coincidence has been pointed out to me by my friends Kay and Joni who are planning on attending my somewhat-anticipated 8 Presidents Ride this Presidents Day weekend. It seems through no fault or planning of my own, the ride is taking place this Saturday –  the very same day as the highly anticipated first-annual L.A. Street Food Fest. Not only that, but check it: the end of the bike ride puts us almost in veritable bacon-wrapped hotdog-throwing distance of all that centralized mobile deliciousnessesness. Whoa.

So without busting out the slide rule and coming at it from an intensely scientific and/or parlimentary perspective, suffice it to say that upon the conclusion of the 8 Presidents Ride (estimated to be around 2 – 2:30 p.m.), some of us cyclist types will then be pedaling down 7th Street to Bixel to end up where the food peddlers (and free bike valet!) are. Join us, won’t you? Or see you there!

PS. Our own Queequeg had the fest’s details here first.

Classic Eats #9 is scheduled for Saturday, February 27. Where shall it be?

Our three options:

Hot Hollywood Night: Roscoe’s Chicken and Waffles and Boardner’s

Burbank Bonanza: The Smokehouse

Westside Alka-Seltzer Fest: Tito’s Tacos and Johnnie’s Pastrami

As ever, we’ll start around 5pm so you can stop in then move on to the rest of your Saturday evening events. Or stay all night!

Click here to vote!

Looking forward to seeing you all soon!

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City Councilman Tom LaBonge participating in cover up. Literally.

An LAPD “community alert” sent to me moments ago reads:

On February 11, 2010 the Hollywood sign will be covered up for an international campaign. The sign will be covered until further notice.

Do not be alarmed, the sign will remain in place and there will be no changes done to the sign. This is just an informational e-mail so we do not receive phone calls from worried citizens.

Carolyn Ramsay with Councilman Tom LaBonge’s office would provide me with no additional information besides that they were participating in the secretive event. “You’ll have to wait til Thursday,” Carolyn repeated to me when I pressed for information.

*UPDATE 4:59pm: The media point person with the Hollywood sign itself, Betsy Isroelit, told me that the sign cover up would have nothing to do with an Amnesty International announced day of support for human rights Iran also scheduled for the 11th, or the Winter Olympics, beginning the following day. Zach at LAist is also digging into this.

**UPDATE 7:54p: The LA Weekly reveals that the alteration is planned to coincide with an announcement by the non-profit “Trust for Public Land,” which, based on the group’s purpose, could theoretically be purchasing the land around the Hollywood sign, which has been at risk of being used for private development over the past few years. Details will be announced at a Thursday 10am press conference at the Hollywood W Hotel.

Worth nothing: Carolyn insisted this has nothing to do with the fake Hollywood sign vandalism that pop star Ke$ha hoaxed her fans with a few days ago. Viral video after the jump.

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Everytime I drive past this little house in Duarte I have to double take the 6 foot tall headless angel.  Next to the flag pole, framed by a partial fence.

Pic by me and does get bigger with a click.  I love these home-owners that decorate with a zeal an HOA would never approve of.

Living in the center of the film and television industry, there are some fun games we get to play, like the “That Guy” game, where you run into a random actor out and about who you can’t quite place, and whichever of your friends figures it out first without resorting to IMDB wins. Another great game is “Name That Location”, wherein you can recognize the exact location a show is using for those remote scenes, not only showing off your photographic memory, but also destroying the fictional world the show has created and disrupting its narrative. It’s fun!

Now, it’s one thing to recognize local landmarks being used in a film, but I find it especially fun seeing my own neighborhood represented on the big screen (or TV. or laptop screen.). Eagle Rock is used all the time for exteriors, as many blocks are easily disguised as Small Town, Anywhere, USA. But interiors are harder to spot on TV – I knew it was Cindy’s Diner (which quite possibly gets more business as a shooting location than a restaurant) in those AT&T ads with Luke Wilson, but only because I saw Wilson standing outside in the parking lot while the commercial was being shot.

But this weekend while catching up on The Office, I spotted another local business (Can you guess it? Identity revealed after the jump):

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click to embiggen, image courtesy of Stephen Coleman.

Photographer Stephen Coleman got up into the neighborhoods below the Mullaly Flood Basin that over flowed in the early morning hours on Saturday.  His images of the devastation is pretty amazing.  I feel for those home owners and their recovery that lies ahead.  I hope that the storms set for this week aren’t as strong and don’t add to their misery.

Photographs can be seen in two sets Mudflow A and Mudflow B.

Photograph “Paradise Valley” used with permission of Stephen Coleman.

I can’t find verification but either I heard it through the blogvine or simply have imagined that Councilman Eric Garcetti is looking into a beautification project for East Hollywood’s untility boxes, similar to the one done a couple years ago around Silver Lake and Historic Filipinotown.

If indeed I’m not making that up, in the interim we have some artists from the Positive Message Division of the Department of DIY who have undertaken the charming decoration of the box pictured at right (click to enlargify) found on the southeast corner of Virgil and Lexington (pinpoint map).

I finally stopped my dawdling and immortalized it while biking home Thursday night because even though it’s been there for more than a month, there’s just no telling when it might become the target of taggers or seen by some assbackward county supervisor who would no doubt place a rush order for the federal stimulus funds needed to paint it out.

The backside of the box reads: “December 28, 2009,  Love N Respect,” and it’s signed by Michael, Emilio and Diana. Bravo to them. More please.

Yesterday marked my one year anniversary in Los Angeles and when I thought about how I spent it, I realized I spent the majority of my spare time in restaurants. I think a great way to get to know a city as large as Los Angeles is to seek out great food and boy did I do that!

I’m vegetarian and my dude Sean is vegan so we probably do a lot more scouring than omnivores do. Vegan does not equal rabbit food as so many like to joke, in fact, I believe that vegans have a much more refined palate than non-vegans. And when vegans get together, 99.9% of the time they will talk about food and where to get the good stuff.

Here is a list of my favorite restaurants that we frequent and that serve vegan food (in alphabetical order):

BabyCakes: Desserts: Downtown: Cupcakes Cupcakes Cupcakes. Oh they also serve donuts and cookies and brownies. Vegan and gluten free options. The gals who work there are adorable.

Bawarchi Indian Kitchen: Indian: Culver City: I recommend getting the $8 dinner. Your taste buds, stomach, and wallet will thank you.

Bulan Thai Vegetarian Kitchen: Thai: West Hollywood and Silver Lake: I could eat their chicken satay all the day long. Mmm, I want some just thinking about it.

M Cafe: Macrobiotics: Culver City and West Hollywood: The Tofu Benedict and French Toast are a great way to start the day. Their tempeh bacon is my favorite. I took a class on how to make it but haven’t actually attempted it yet…

The Meet Market... Read more

Hello from the beautiful West Valley, where we have everything we need to weather the storm.

Feel free to share links to your rainy-day photos in the comments, below.

The LA Weekly is tackling one of my old favorite topics: carrying a gun in Los Angeles. They are specifically talking about carrying one in Starbucks but it’s worth taking the opportunity to discuss the larger issue. Yes, carrying a gun in Los Angeles is legal in a variety of different situations. For anyone who can legally own a gun, carrying the gun exposed and unloaded (though you can also carry the ammo separately) is completely legal assuming you aren’t near a handful of places like a school or bank where it suddenly becomes very illegal. This is a right granted by not just the US constitution but also the CA constitution which you can read more about on CaliforniaOpenCarry.org.

There are many arguments for and against carrying a gun openly. The immediate reaction I hear most often is that it’s a great way to get shot by a police officer. That’s actually not really something to worry about as no officer in his or her right might is going to risk their job by shooting someone for legally carrying a holstered weapon. Now pulling the thing out and waving it around is another story all together. In fact here is a Los Angeles District Attorney memo and a Los Angeles Sheriff Dept memo about open carry explaining it is legal and explaining to officers what actions they can and can’t take. Read more

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Overnight in my corner of LA  some 3 7/8″ of rain fell.  The National Weather Service via The Weather Channel calls for more storms through this evening.  Thunderstorms, water spouts (potentially), urban and burn zone flooding are all in store.  I plan on staying in with the Tivo and video games until I absolutely have to go out this afternoon.  Be safe.  Stay dry(ish).

It tastes a lot better than it looks.

Here’s how you can tell I’m not originally from California: I don’t like avocado on my burgers.

Really. I enjoy avocado in general. It’s nature’s answer to butter. And I’m the guy at the party who sits down on the couch and makes sweet love to a bowl of chips and guacamole until everyone in the room is staring. But I just don’t think avocado and burgers mix. Something about the cool smoothness of the avocado manages to distract my mouth from the burger and the remaining toppings, and then my mouth gets confused and angry and resolves to keep saying stupid things, like that maybe a flat tax wouldn’t be such a bad idea, or that those jeans aren’t doing my girlfriend’s hips any favors.

So I avoid avocado when I’m ordering burgers. I also avoid iceberg lettuce, but for entirely different reasons I’ll get into another time.

Fortunately, I don’t have to worry about avocado when I go to Five Guys Burgers & Fries, one of the most recent east coast transplants. A smallish, DC-based burger chain best described as In-n-Out East, Five Guys was voted “best burger in Baltimore,” which is a great endorsement, if only because it allows me to imagine that I’m eating burgers and fries with Omar Little or Bunk and McNulty.

Five guys (fairly) recently opened up a restaurant in Carson, so I decided to give it a try after spending my Sunday morning with a crowd of kindergartners and their parents for reasons I’ll get into another time. The verdict? While In-n-Out probably won’t be losing market share anytime soon, Five Guys is goooooooood.

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