Category: Uncategorized

Green Arrow Nursery is an extremely well run and somewhat retro garden store that also stocks hardware, Christmas decorations, garden books and many (discounted) fountains. It has a personal and idiosyncratic style with big green signs that point customers to aisles: “FERTILIZER” and “BIRD FOOD” are but two of many. Staff is friendly, bi-lingual and courteous.

There are red wagons for shoppers to haul their plants around, and there is an attractive and logical way that the merchandise is arranged. Shade plants are under the shaded areas, Mexican pots are in another area, the perennials are all together, as are vegetables, roses, bulbs, herbs and indoor plants.

It is one of the joys of living in Southern California that the planting season here begins just when the rest of our nation enters winter.

Green Arrow Nursery
8845 Sepulveda Blvd.
North Hills, CA 91343
t. (818) 894-8301

I am astounded that the LA Ciy Health Department has not cited all these restaurants who place plastic utensils with the eating ends pointed up. Plastic utensils should be stored with the handles pointed down, so that self-serve restaurants will not be spreading germs. Instead, so many establishments (especially mideastern ones) keep the forks, spoons and knives with the eating end pointing up.

Can you imagine (or do you care to?) the nose picking kid, the crotch scratching truck driver, the snot laden hands which are reaching into the utensils cup to grab a fork or spoon? How much disease is going around town because these establishments do not follow common sense sanitary rules?

It’s so easy. Eating utensils should be handled by the handles. Any other method of distribution is dirty and should be against the law.

PHOTO: http://www.animalfriendsrescue.org

Sometimes a trend can be happening for a few years or decades before I notice it. The tattoo –just above the crack on the ass of the fat girl with the lo-rise denim jeans–is something I only noticed last summer. Now the “newest” LA fad is the small dog usually owned by the hipster.

I wonder what the point of these yapping small animals is? They can’t be vicious watchdogs, they don’t catch frisbees in mid-air, they just yap and annoy and leave little poops around the house and yard.

Or maybe……. they really are lovable creatures. If a cat can be loved, so can one of these little dogs.

Parked along this street in Studio City is a Hummer with the license plate “7 MPG”. Maybe his other car reads, “I LUV AL QUIDA” or “SAUDI BOY”?

I guess when you drive a Hummer you have already shamed yourself and nothing on your license plate can bring you down any lower.

The LA Times reports today that producer Mark Burnett is unhappy with NBC for rescheduling “The Apprentice:Martha Stewart” on Wednesday night at 9pm rather than the previous 8pm. There is panic at NBC as this reality show has performed poorly in the ratings against what had been high expectations. It might be cancelled, a huge ego blow to the bloated ego of Mr. Burnett.

Martha’s strength has always been as a teacher and marketing person, and a TV personality secondly. Before she went to prison, her on camera manner was stiff, proper and strictly stuck to the facts. In a now infamous appearance on the CBS morning show after her indictment, Stewart refused to budge from her assignment in the kitchen to answer a host’s question about the stock fraud charges.

Now in the post-prison era, Martha Stewart Omnimedia with the help of Burnett ,is trying to sell her as a sweet, caring, smiling wonderful businesswoman who always points out mistakes and does not humiliate or bully her employees. When the losing team enters the boardroom for their inevitable lecture and firing, Martha sweetly tells the dismissed team member, “You just don’t fit in here!” Then she politely writes a thank you note filled with some clever and helpful suggestions about how they might succeed in the future.

In seeking to make Stewart just as kind as Mom, the producers have failed in keeping the drama and conflict in. Martha is just too sweet, and her daughter (sans personality) is a self-effacing and bland judge who could never hold a candle against Trump’s Carolyn whose cold eyes and biting criticisms are wonderfully cruel. It would make the show much more fun to watch.if Martha had a temper, got into arguments with the team, and if her judges projected power, intelligence and authority,

The team is full of prickly, pretentious and faggy people who tackle such blue state tasks as setting up a flower store and designing and selling a wedding cake. The men have more emotional meltdowns and episodes of self-pity than an entire season of “Desperate Housewives”. There is absolutely no chemistry between the men and the women, or any hint of sexual tension, and this further makes the show a bore. Some of the women are well into their forties (or look it) and the guys are low on testosterone.

Perhaps this show was set up as a way to rehabilitate Martha. But in censoring her most odious personality traits, the humor and hubris that made her such a pleasure to watch is gone. What is left is a Botoxed show, without wrinkles or character.

Photo courtesy of: San Fernando Valley Issues Digital Library
Publisher: California State University, Northridge. University Library.

In 1955, civic leaders and the Reseda Chamber of Commerce embarked on what seemed at the time quite progressive: an enormous road widening. Yet 50 years later Reseda Boulevard is still a shabby, ugly, broken down street. The good thing is that cheap restaurants, bicycle stores, taco stands, vacuum repair outlets and pawn shops are also useful to earning a living.

Reseda once was the gateway for middle class families to buy a starter home and eventually move upwards and onwards. Now the starter home is half a million dollars. But Reseda Bouleveard looks like the main drag of a depressed area. Where are the leaders, the homeowners, the architects, the dreamers, the Mayor and the City Council who could turn this underutilized and wretched boulevard into a beautiful and aesthetic urban experience?

What will Reseda Boulevard look like in 2055?