Bookmarks

The Battery Books and Music, South Pasadena

Today I begin a regular Saturday feature on writing, reading, and books. Not just my books, but also guest authors, libraries, book shops, ideas, writing tips, and fun stuff. I'm just busting to talk about this stuff. I'm calling it "Bookmarks," and I welcome your suggestions.

I won't limit it to Pasadena, though of course I'll include a local photo. (That's the rule, and I obey the rules, most of the time. It's easier to get away with being bad when no one expects it.)

And what better way to kick off this feature than with footwear? Chain mail--or maille--running shoes for the knights of Camelot & Vine. Or maybe not. So much for literature.

Actually, literature is doing fine. The publishing industry is changing, but reading isn't going away. Just like we changed the way we listen to music (I wish I'd kept those LP's), and the way we watch movies (have you seen a VHS tape lately? I don't miss those), we're reading in new ways. TV wasn't the end of the movie business, and ebooks aren't the end of publishing. They're just another way of reading.

I'm keeping my books, though.

For now, enjoy the documentary Bad Writing, streaming free for the month of January only. I owe thanks for the link to Karin Bugge, the excellent writer known as the Altadena Hiker.

Echo Means Comeback

Yesterday was a spectacular day, so John and I went hiking. John's been up the Sam Merrill trail several times in past months, but I haven't hiked it in almost a year. It's such a beautiful trail that I don't go on weekends because every cute family and dating couple and gaggle of teenagers in the San Gabriel Valley agrees with me.

Mid-week, though, it's dreamy. Karin, the Altadena Hiker, calls it "my mountain." She shares the mountain with me and the gaggles, of course, but she's not really kidding and I know how she feels. You climb switchbacks, steep scree and stretches of relentless sun, up, up, always up. In rest stop shade you can feel the faeries watching you (except on weekends, when they fly to higher ground). And all the time you revel in the smells, the light, the sound of your breathing and the beating of your heart.

Some of you may remember I decided to take up running last spring, which was fun until I injured my hip. After the MRI, months of physical therapy, several setbacks, miles of walking, endless podcasts, boring stationary biking and colorless cussing, it was time to take my mountain back.

Atop Echo Mountain after a 2.7 mile climb, which I used to do in just over an hour, you'll find traces of the Mount Lowe Railway and ruins of a hotel that burned down in the early 20th century. You'll also find views of the San Gabriel Valley, with Los Angeles beyond. On a spectacular day like yesterday was, you can glimpse the Pacific Ocean and Santa Catalina Island.

I didn't get that far yesterday. John could have made it, but he was nice enough to stick with me. I got about a mile and a quarter and decided it was enough for my first trip back up the hill. I won't be having more setbacks. I'm going forward from now on. Make that upward. A mile and a half next time. A mile and three quarters the time after that. And so on, until I can do 2.7 miles in just over an hour, just to glimpse the ocean on a spectacular day.

Boz (Not Boz)

Oooh, the face.

How many times have you said, "I wish I could have a dog like Boz, but there's only one Boz in the whole, wide world!"? I know! You're like a broken record! How many times have you wished you, too, could have a mild-mannered, easy-to-handle, calm-as-can-be Boxer like Boz?

Well, now you can! Yes, you, too, can meet Vinnie the Boxer at Boxer Rescue! He's available for adoption today!

Here's what Karin the Altadenahiker had to say when she walked Vinnie: "He was happy to mosey on the leash, but every so often would break into a sweet but tame happy dance. He wouldn’t lunge at other dogs who said rude things behind fences, but he wasn’t afraid of them, either. Was curious about everything, but not insistent about it."

Wow. "...all a boxer has to offer without the exuberance," as Karin says. Sounds like Boz to me. And Vinnie comes with a bonus even Boz can't match: he's an actual Boxer (Boz is actually a Mixer).
Here's another shot Karin took of our guy:**

I love that far-away look in his eyes, don't you? Soulful. So Clark Gable.

Vinnie (you can name him Boz once you take him home) is 7 or 8 years old. I highly recommend a mature dog, especially if you yourself are not a spring chicken. Puppies are great if you have furniture to spare and if you are free 24/7 to train your young piddler and walk him/her several times a day so he/she will please god sleep for chrissakes. But Karin and I picture Vinnie with someone who appreciates the finer things in life--at a slower pace.

"In all the [dog] walks I’ve taken," says Karin, "I've never met a dog so well behaved and affectionate." And Ms. Hiker has walked more than her fair share of dogs as a volunteer at Boxer Rescue.

To learn more about Vinnie, read Karin's piece on Altadena Patch. Then call or visit Boxer Rescue and take Vinnie home with you. Then you, too, can have your very own Boz!**

Boz the Mixer, photographed by John Sandel

I guarantee it--you'll be so glad you did.

**Leash and tags sold separately. Available in colors shown. Boz not included.

Abundancia

photo inspired by John Sandel

There's always something to photograph at the Saturday Farmers' Market at Victory Park. Yesterday everyone was exclaiming over the purple peppers (near the top of the photo) at the Jaime Farms booth.

We shopped all around the market: peppers, zucchini, eggplant, broccoli, arugula, freshly baked bread, peaches, granola and fresh swordfish. You can also buy oils, plants, beef jerky, cheese, olives, and a lot of other things I'm forgetting. The only way to get fresher produce is to grow it yourself (or to have a generous neighbor who gardens).

We ate our peaches for lunch and had the fish and broccoli last night. We're going to make a ratatouille this week; I was inspired by the Altadena Hiker. I probably won't take pictures of mine. I'm not the Julia Child disciple she is.

There's a new Farmers' Market in town called the South Lake Avenue Summer Farmers' Market. It happens every Wednesday from 3:30-7:30 pm until September 29th in Shopper's Lane at Del Mar Blvd. And don't forget the Tuesday market at Villa Parke and the Thursday market at Robinson Park (also 'til September; check out the Pasadena Farmers' Markets here).

Pasadena has so many Farmers' Markets we could buy fresh produce almost every day if we needed to. But we don't. I didn't have to buy tomatoes for the ratatouille yesterday because we have a generous neighbor who gardens.

Busch Gardens Pasadena: Sleuthing

I've enjoyed showing you some of the traces of Pasadena's Busch Gardens we discovered on our tour last weekend. It was a special event to benefit Pasadena Heritage, a worthy organization that works to safeguard traces of Pasadena's history. This fencepost and other traces like it might have remained lost if not for the enthusiastic research of Michael Logan and his colleague Gary Cowles. The fencepost is another one of those items from which they literally pulled away the vines (see Wednesday's comments). It's located at the corner of Madeline and Stoneridge Drives.

Bellis was so enamored of the fencepost that she couldn't resist searching for more. (I wonder what that sign says? Probably "Please don't touch the ivy.")

The garden's terraced hillsides can be seen clearly today, especially on Stoneridge Drive just north of Madeline. Here's the Altadena Hiker reminding Bellis that this terraced hillside is on private property. Oh, that zany Bellis!

We had a wonderful time on our tour. Many thanks to Pasadena Heritage, Logan, Cowles and especially our tour guides in the field: the energetic Pat Lambert and our lifeguard, Michael Grady. These people volunteer their time and expertise to educate and entertain us, and to preserve Pasadena's past.

Parc San Marino

Virginia Jones has two (count 'em, two) daily photo blogs: Birmingham, Alabama Daily Photo, where she posts explorations of her home town, and Paris Through My Lens, where she posts her photographic visions of Paris, a town she and I have both dreamed of living in.

I think Virginia and I both love our home towns or we wouldn't blog about them every day. But we like to dream about Paris. I've never met anyone who's been there who didn't yearn to go back, even if they've been there many times.

Virginia's been there many more times than I have, and she's taken lots of pictures. Her photo of the gate at Paris' Parc Monceau inspired me to post a picture of this often-overlooked gate at the Huntington Library and Gardens in San Marino. Karin Bugge also posted a photo of this gate in one of my favorite Altadena Hiker posts. All three of us managed to photograph our gates under moody skies. Maybe we're all daydreamers.

My vision of living in Paris involves exploring the ancient streets, gardens and history until I've discovered every inch of the city. This fantasy includes having unlimited funds despite not having a job. I imagine one reason Paris seems so dreamy to those of us who've visited as tourists is precisely because we're on vacation and we're allowing ourselves the leisure to explore.

I'm lucky: blogging about Pasadena gives me not only the opportunity but the motivation to explore Pasadena, and to find hidden treasures like this gate. Next time you're at the Huntington, seek it out.

Henry's Back Yard: Part Three

Continued from Tuesday and Wednesday...

Karin the Altadena Hiker is a docent at the Huntington Library and Gardens, which privileges her to explore parts of the grounds that aren't open to the public. Inside Karin beats the heart of an explorer; give her a piece of ground and she will seek out its every corner.

Karin's favorite part of the Huntington Gardens is the Desert Garden, and this part of the Desert Garden is closed to the public. The stairs above and this walkway, both made with river rocks, are in the oldest part of the garden and were probably installed before 1910. Many specimens in the Desert Garden are over 100 years old.

I'm grateful to Henry and Arabella Huntington for having the foresight and generosity to leave their home and collections as a legacy to us. I'm grateful to those who work and volunteer at the Huntington for making it such a magnificent place to visit. I'm grateful to those who contribute financially--donations large and small--so this unique institution can thrive. And I'm especially grateful to Karin, the decent docent, for the unique tour she gave me of the quiet, private places in the gardens.

There's more to see, so much more. I've got to think of a way to return the favor to Karin so I won't feel guilty begging her for a chance to see it again.

Henry's Back Yard: Part Two

Continued from yesterday...

Backroads wander through hidden parts of the Huntington property, unfolding the story of those who lived there a hundred years ago and of those who live there now.

This old, stone culvert begins at the northern end of the unused acres. Huntington decent docent Karin and I passed it early in our ramble. Next came expensive private homes, lining the fence just outside the property. Through thick foliage we glimpsed tennis courts, gazebos and private gardens. It would be abusing my privilege to show them to you. People pay a lot of money to live exclusively, and I'm not that kind of blogger. (But I enjoyed my glimpses.)

I thought you'd like another flower shot. The place is rife with wildflowers.

At the southern end of the property we found the other end of the culvert. At least I think it was the same one. It appeared outside the most exclusive home of all. There's a grounds-keeper's cottage--not really a cottage, but a lovely home, very private. Can you imagine?--being able to wander the grounds alone in the midst of all this glory?

Henry's Back Yard: Part One

Down a secret road, where the public isn't allowed...

...a grove of orange trees grows. The trees are about a hundred years old, I figure. Big, fluffy trees with branches that droop to the ground, where little purple wildflowers reach up to kiss the oranges.

The trees are precious and well cared for. They grow in the part of the Huntington Library and Gardens that most people don't see. The Huntington property is about 250 acres but 100 or so of those acres are closed to visitors.

Last week, on a cool, overcast day, I got to wander those quiet acres because I know a person in high places: a docent we'll call the Altadena Hiker.

More to come.

Debris at the PWP Corral

In yesterday's comments the Altadena Hiker reminded us of the high waters behind the Devil's Gate Dam after a storm in spring of 2005. Greg Sweet wrote of the debris that builds up behind our local dams after big storms. That gave me the idea to post these pictures from spring of 2008 to show what Pasadena Water and Power does with storm debris behind Devil's Gate Dam.

In the first two photos you can see JPL in the background. I didn't know what the line of connected logs was for at first.

But as the water recedes it becomes clear that the logs are in place to corral the debris that has gathered in the flood.

A lot of the debris is twigs and logs. But if you enlarge this photo you can also see plastic bags, styrofoam cups, a flashlight and a lot of unidentifiable stuff. If the water gets high enough, plastic bags and all sorts of weird junk hangs in the trees.

Sprocket and Boz find it absolutely delightful.

I'd say the PWP does a fine job. But I have no idea where they put it all.

Blog Action Day 2009

NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab hunkers down in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. Enlarge the photo (or, as the Altadena Hiker says, "enbiggen" it) and you can see patchy scrub growing on the low hill behind the campus. The higher mountains beyond are barren. Every bit of vegetation that once grew on them burned in the Station Fire, which began on August 26th. Amazingly, the Station Fire continues to burn in small "nuisance smokes" today. The fire's been at 98% containment for a couple of weeks now.

These empty, gray mountains go on for miles in either direction. As you drive through the towns below them it shocks you how far the fire went. And you see what the firefighters had to do: they beat the flames back and protected towns and structures. Beyond that, they had no choice but to let the fire go. 250 square miles of it. They saved the people. They couldn't save the forest.

In time, the forest will renew itself.

What if there had been no water available to fight that fire?

As of last count, 9975 blogs in 151 countries (and counting) are participating in today's Blog Action Day, expecting to reach over 13 million readers in a global discussion of climate change.

At the Copenhagen Climate Summit in December it will finally be time for America to step up. From Here to a Global Climate Treaty, a recent blog post at Avaaz.org, gives an idea of where the United States stands. There's a link to the Senate Finance Committee so you can see just which individuals it comes down to, besides you and me. We are a top emitter of greenhouse gases. We can urge our senators to help us take responsibility for our emissions. We can do something.

I think we can all agree climate change is happening. I'll leave it to the scientists to figure out how and why. Other crucial issues exist, but if there's not enough food because the earth can no longer grow it--if there's not enough water left on the planet to drink, let alone protect us from the inevitable fires brought on by global drought--then nothing else matters, does it?

Lost Garden: In Memory

In comments on my first post about Earthside Nature Center, Karin the Altadena Hiker said some put their heart and soul in to the place. It's true. If you keep your eyes open you can see the evidence in small monuments on the property. This one says, "In memory of 'Pop Pop,' Shirley W. Owen, Pasadena, 1895-1983." At least I think it says 1983, it's kind of hard to tell.


The small plaque on this stone says "in memory of Marilyn Close Davis, 1989."


The kiosk (scroll down here for a look at it) is still in decent shape. A plaque lists names, presumably of donors. Marilyn Close Davis, 1989, appears here as well. There's also a Hazel M. Close, 1988. And look, Elna S. Bakker, the founder, 1995. And Virginia M. Connelly, 1995. I wonder if she was (is?) related to Kevin Connelly, the native plant advocate (see yesterday's post) who helped run Earthside. And lo and behold, there's Grace Gertmenian, 1985. I recognize her name. The Gertmenian family is one of the featured families in the fantastic Pasadena Museum of History Family Stories Exhibit that's running until January of 2010.

I'm a little amazed to find this connection. I shouldn't be. The Gertmenian family began arriving in Pasadena from Armenia in the 1920s. They're familiar to me because I'm curious about Pasadena history and they're part of the fabric of that history. The more I learn the more connected it all becomes for me.

I like my history like that--not that I don't like reading it in a book, but living with it is so much more rewarding. This is why preservation is so powerful. A book is history removed. Living with history is letting it touch you and affect you. Seeing Grace's name on the plaque is like finding a message she wrote in the past and left for me to read in the future.

Lost Garden: Found

A couple of quick facts about Earthside Nature Center: it was founded in 1971 by the Pasadena Girls Club and naturalist and author Elna S. Bakker. Kevin Connelly, a horticulturalist and native plant advocate, took over the day-to-day operations in 1975. Volunteers and contributions helped Bakker and Connelly keep the place running for twenty years or so. But both of them happened to die in the mid-1990s and no one took up the cause. Earthside has been returning to nature ever since.

Earthside Nature Center appeared to be an abandoned idyll until recently. Arroyo Lover told us in yesterday's comments that plans are in the works, and I found a .pdf about it on the City's website. Since I don't know how to link you to a .pdf, I'll tell you simply to go to this page and click on the GREENVISION link. It takes you to a .pdf of a study that was done this year by four grad students in Urban and Regional Planning at Cal Poly Pomona. Among other things, the study offers suggestions and potential uses for Earthside (the uses they suggest are all parks).

One of the people the Cal Poly students met with was the guy who got the Altadena Hiker and me interested in Earthside in the first place, open space advocate Michael Coppess of East of Allen. His was the last comment on yesterday's post before I had to sign off. He said, "Most recently, the parcel was slated for a fire and police training area. Thus far, there is no official city action preserving the site for open space, park or garden use."

So though Earthside will no longer be abandoned, perhaps it will also no longer be an idyll. I'm glad I got to snoop around and take pictures. More tomorrow.

Lost Garden: Paths

I might not have known about the abandoned Earthside Nature Center if the Altadena Hiker hadn't posted about it. She might not have known about it if Michael hadn't posted about it over at East of Allen. He's posted about it three times: first here, then here and a third post here.

One day, while the Station Fire kept our trails closed in the mountains, Karin (the Hiker) took me on a tour of the nature center. I love hidden spots like this. Nature has overgrown the edges that humans once put there to define it, making it perhaps even more beautiful in disorder. It's over at 3168 E. Del Mar Blvd., behind an abandoned learning center. You can cut through the empty parking lot and take a look for yourself.

Karin, Phoebe the Boxer, Boz the Mixer and I did some snooping. I'll show you what we found over the next couple of days, and I'll do some research. You can also click on Michael's East of Allen posts for more information.

This is the first series I've taken with my new Canon 20D that I feel are good enough to post. I still keep the Olympus SP350 in my purse. It's a good little stealth camera.