Wackarons

When out-of-town bloggers visit--especially Francophile bloggers--the search is on for macarons. (You know better than to ask me about macaroons, right?) This time we tried Lette on Fair Oaks. Pretty! And lots of flavors. I figure you're supposed to eat them.

Apparently no, not if you're a photo-blogger.

(Pictured: Virginia of Birmingham, Alabama Daily Photo and Paris Through My Lens, and Kathy, aka "the Chieftess," of Mammoth Lakes Daily Photo. Here's Kathy's take on the event.)

The Best Laid Pipes

Boz and I had planned to hike yesterday. We were going to head to Johnson Field, where this pipe stands. Or stood. We're not sure. A lot's been going on at Johnson Field lately, and for all we know this above-ground access to water has been buried under the mounds of silt being moved from behind Devil's Gate Dam to what we hope is temporary storage in Johnson Field.

But we didn't find out for sure last night, as we had to postpone our hike. We'll find out later today, though, and bring you a report.

Fun news for the meantime: the September issue of Pasadena Magazine features the Dena's daily photo bloggers. For her article, "Daily Affirmations," Kelly Shimabukuro interviewed me, Laurie Allee (Glimpses of South Pasadena), Kat Likkel (Pasadena, 91105 and Beyond) and our already sorely missed Ben Wideman (The Sky is Big in Pasadena and wherever else he goes). Thank you, Kelly!

It was Ben who turned me on to our newest daily photo blogger. She's a bit anonymous, but she's got style. Check out All Over Pasadena.

An August Personage

I liked to read books as a kid, but I didn't like school. I was dutiful, I studied, I did what I was supposed to do and got the grades. But I preferred horseback riding, building forts and wading barefoot in the river--things there wasn't time or weather for during the Illinois school year.

Even now, years out of school, for me, August signals the end of fun, the beginning of work.

This year August also signals the end of The Sky is Big in Pasadena. Ben Wideman began his blog in September of 2007 and "Can8ian Ben" has been chronicling Pasadena life ever since. He's a long distance cyclist, a lover of food, baseball and beer, a husband and father, a seminary student and soon-to-be-pastor, and that rare man who can hear all ideas with an open mind.

This month Ben says goodbye to his adopted home with daily tributes to Pasadena in the form of two lists: the things he'll miss (a long list) and the things he won't (shorter). The list of Pasadenans who will miss Ben is longer than a baseball field, longer than Ben can ride a bike in a whole day, longer than the distance between here and Harleysville, Pennsylvania--and I'm on it.

Unruly Posse

Sunday my friends and I traipsed about Pasadena and Altadena for the annual Theodore Payne Foundation Native Plant Garden Tour. I loved poking around the exquisite, private, drought-tolerant gardens.

It was educational. It was gorgeous. It was inspiring. And it was frustrating, because I can't show you any of it. At every garden we visited, photos were either not allowed or allowed for personal use only. I of course took photos for my personal use, but I'm much to chicken scrupulous to post them.

On the way back to our cars we stopped to peer at one last garden, which wasn't on the tour. Is that a great gate or what? It reminded me how glad I am not to live in a gated community tyrannized by muted colors or a homeowners association. The San Gabriel Valley is full of undiscovered Edens, tour or no tour. I hope the owner didn't mind us peeking in because we'd been nosy all day and we just weren't ready to stop.

*

By the way, thanks to the Restless Chef for alerting me to the fact that my posts and those of other bloggers are being stolen by http://www.justpocketcamera.com. I'm trying to have a good attitude about it. justpocketcamera is one of those blogs where they steal content to try to get you to click on ads. I hold the copyright to my posts, which are published at http://pasadenadailyphoto.blogspot.com before http://www.justpocketcamera.com steals them. That's against the law, but try getting a sheriff and a posse on this here wild, wild internet.

If you'd like to be my posse, c'mon and join up. I'm not sure how to get them to stop, but maybe I'll see if I can come up with more bizarre word combinations than theirs. Your suggestions for messing with them are welcome. In the meantime, it's worth a look just to see their weird translations of the copy.

Thank You

As Bellis said, it was "like Christmas."

Thank you, Barbara Ellis (aka Bellis), Karin Bugge (aka Altadena Hiker) and Michael Coppess (aka East of Allen) for helping create a terrific groundswell yesterday, a blogging extravaganza to express our communal desire to keep soccer fields out of Hahamongna Watershed Park.

And thank you, Pasadena/Altadena blogging community, for teaming up to make a powerful statement.

When I spoke with Janette Williams of the Pasadena Star-News for her story about our efforts she asked me, in so many words, how one rallies a bunch of disparate bloggers in this world of online snark. I told her I've heard of snarky blogging but that's not my community. San Gabriel Valley Bloggers like each other. We tend not to go that route.

We bloggers don't always agree, we don't vote the same way, we don't care about the same stuff. But we're nice to each other.

Not everyone we invited to participate in yesterday's event responded to the call. Chances are those people want soccer fields at Hahamongna and it's their right to feel that way. But they didn't sabotage, send nasty messages or shout us down. (And blogs we didn't even think of added great posts to the mix.)

So thank you. We were heard on many levels. We made a statement about Hahamongna, and about community. People can work together. People can be nice to each other. At a time when hatespeak has become the vernacular of politics and TV news, I'm proud to say I hang with a crowd that doesn't speak that language.

Hahamongna Blog Day

Counselors from Tom Sawyer Camp set up a learning center on the shore of a natural lake at Hahamongna Watershed Park (click to enlarge).

This Monday, July 12th, Pasadena's City Council will discuss and probably decide once and for all whether or not to build soccer fields in Hahamongna Watershed Park.

One field is planned for the location pictured above. This natural lake fills with the spring floods, then slowly dries out in summer. It provides habitat for coyotes, bobcats, ducks, swallows, rabbits, ground squirrels, toads, egrets and herons. These are the animals I've observed there.

Soccer is more popular than ever before. Yet the City Council recently voted millions in budget cuts, affecting salaries and city services. Caught between this rock and that hard place, what's the City Council to do?

We have alternatives. Vacant lots and little-used playing fields all over town lie waiting to be repurposed. There's no need to spend millions during a recession to fill in a lake and build unsustainable soccer fields in a flood plain when we have access to other, more appropriate land.

In almost every issue of Pasadena In Focus, the city's useful and effective newsletter to citizens, we're urged to reuse and recycle. Repurposing unused lots is recycling on a grand scale. Let's use land that's already flat, already outside the flood plain and all ready to be played on, to make financially and environmentally sustainable soccer fields for Pasadena.

If you'd like to email your council member, you can do so here. And thank you.

Today several bloggers have teamed up to talk about why we think Hahamongna Watershed Park isn't the place for athletic fields. Please visit all the blogs (and one website!) participating in Hahamongna Blog Day:
Altadena Above It All
Altadena Hiker
Arroyo Lover
A Thinking Stomach
Avenue to the Sky
East of Allen
Finnegan Begin Again
Go Deep...Find Truth
Greensward Civitas
LA Creek Freak
Mendolonium
Mister Earl's Musings
My Life With Tommy
Pasadena 91105 and Beyond
Pasadena Adjacent
Pasadena Latina
SaveHahamongna.org
Selvage
Temple City Daily Photo
The Sky Is Big In Pasadena
Webster's Fine Stationers Web Log
West Coast Grrlie Blather

My thanks to Barbara Ellis and Karin Bugge for helping put Hahamongna Blog Day together.

Primavera II

Apparently it's my tradition to post a photo of Timothy Rutt for the annual Primavera celebration. Tim is the brains behind Altadena's powerhouse Altadenablog, and Primavera is the San Gabriel Valley Blogger potluck Tim hosts along with Altadena Hiker Karin Bugge, Susan Carrier of Open Mouth Insert Fork and Cancer Banter, and Debbie Swanson Patrick of Altadena Above It All and Altadena Daily Photo. Thanks, you guys! We had a wonderful time.

I took this photo early, before things got crowded. Later on we had about 45 people, says Tim. Maybe we'll see more pictures of the picnic on their blogs. The food was great and the people were even better.

If you weren't there we missed you.

High Chaparral

It's funny how a girl from Illinois corn country becomes a woman of the San Gabriel chaparral.

I want to get up into the hills right now but for reasons of my own I can't go. I'm afraid the trails don't look like this anymore but that's okay. I still love them. I still want to be there. I still want to photograph them, and I will.

Until then, others are photographing the trails and the hills. Larry Wilson. Altadena Hiker. Keith Durflinger, for Pasadena Star News. Gem City Images. Mount Wilson Tower Cam. Rose Magazine. And oh, man, LA Daily News. Many more. I'll add today as I find them, or I encourage you to link to more in the comments.
The Truant Muse

Take time, if you will, to read Nancy Steele's post, How do we do nothing after the fire?
I think it'll help you begin to come to terms.

Tinder

I was offline most of the day yesterday. Karin, Tim, Deb and Greg will be good blogger sources for what yesterday felt like in Altadena. It sounds to me like it was tense and scary. But people supported each other and helped each other face the tasks they had to face.

We were kind of doing the same thing here in the old 'hood, except it didn't require aircraft. We had a bon voyage party for our friends who are leaving Pasadena.

Yesterday in the comments here on PDP, USElaine said, "When we love nature, we have to accept all of it as a package." Yes, I think so. I think we have to accept it all in order to love it.

Life has such sadness sometimes, such hardship. If we embrace the hardship, might that enable us to find life's goodness? Is that how we locate happiness, by slogging through pain with our eyes and ears and hearts wide open?

"Accept all of it as a package"?

Yes, I think so.

They say some of that brush up in the hills hasn't burned for 60 years. Well, it's a process of nature. That brush has got to burn.

(Update: Thanks to Bellis for reminding me to check LA Creek Freak. Always excellent information there from Jessica and Joe.)

Theme Day: Night

Night in the city is often bright. Here's what night looks like when you look up from South Lake Avenue in Pasadena.

The City Daily Photo family is now 1019 strong. I've met people in Iran, Brisbane, Paris, Rotterdam and now a new blog in Herat, Afghanistan. This remarkable community of communicators joins together on the first of every month to share a theme. This month's theme is "night."

To see how other CDP bloggers have interpreted this month's theme, click here to view thumbnails for all the participants.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

I've been taking a vicarious vacation on Turquoise Diaries lately because Aysegul's visiting the most glorious places. Yesterday she said she loves Ghost Whisperer, which was shooting at the Pasadena Public Library last Friday (see yesterday's post). So for Aysegul, here's a shot of the library's main hall, in case it shows up on Ghost Whisperer.

Something I recently discovered about the main hall: you can drink your coffee in there! I KNOW! (Oops. Shh. I mean, I know! I was shocked!) I've visited the library's coffee shop many times. Central Grounds is outdoors on the front patio. It was the first stop in my quest for the perfect coffee shop in which to write (a quest I promise I'll take up again.) But it wasn't until last Friday, when it was nine million degrees out, that I discovered I could buy my coffee at Central Grounds and take it inside to the air-conditioned comfort of the main hall. (I'd make the main hall #10 in The Quest if I didn't think it was cheating.)

You may not drink your coffee in the stacks. You may not have it in the computer room or the study rooms or beyond the reference desk. Only in the main hall. But click on that picture and enlarge it. Isn't that a nice place to plug in your laptop, drink your coffee and write?

Lovely as it is, I don't suppose Aysegul would trade places with me. Not even for a glimpse of the Ghost Whisperer.

Free to Believe in Green

I have always had the freedom to think what I please and say what I think. Sure, we have conventions. If I'm rude I may be chastised or lose a few friends. But the law protects my freedom of speech.

For those like me who love to share opinions and feelings, the internet is a boon. The City Daily Photo blog community is all about worldwide understanding and friendship; through it I've made friends all across the planet.

I can't imagine not having the freedom to speak to them. I can't imagine being afraid that if I shared my opinions of my culture, my spiritual beliefs or my country's politics I might pay for it with my life.

A City Daily Photo blogger is missing in Iran. For him, and for all the bloggers, journalists and Iranian citizens jailed either by their rulers or just by the rules, today is a special blog day to raise awareness. I don't know if the Iranian people would elect a leader I like, but it doesn't matter. I defend their right to elect whomever they choose, and to speak openly about their choices.

Click here to view thumbnails for all today's participants, and you'll see our worldwide family united in this effort. To sign the Avaaz petition to the Organization of Islamic Conference, the Non-Aligned Movement and all UN member states, click here. (Thanks to Hilda of My Manila for the Avaaz link.)

UPDATE, 2:30 PM: AMIR IS HOME SAFE! Reports are confirmed, according to JM at Oeiras and Environs Daily Photo. Thank you!

Green Balloon Friday for Iran

The Iranian protests touch me through blogging. That is, I've become friends with Iranian bloggers who have been threatened and whose blogs have been censored in recent days. This tells me how easily an issue becomes personal if I can only put a face on it--if I meet a person who is part of it.

Pasadena Daily Photo is part of a larger community called the City Daily Photo community. One of our fellow bloggers is missing in Tehran.

Here's a blog that's still going strong. He blogs in both Farsi and English. Yesterday he said:

GREEN BALLOON FRIDAY for IRAN

WE WILL PAINT THE SKY, GREEN. IN IRAN, AND AROUND THE WORLD.
-----------------------------------------------------
Are you mad about what has been happening inside Iran these days? Well then take a deep breath... blow it all into a Green Balloon... and wait until Friday afternoon to send it up to the sky, wherever you are on this planet. Millions of Iranians inside Iran are planning to paint the sky green on Friday exactly at 1pm Tehran time. The non-violent green movement is being cracked down on the ground, so lets take it to the sky.
People are called to send "green" balloons to the sky on Friday in Iran and any where else in the world. Sky is ours if they ban us express ourselves on the ground. They may shoot our balloons but at least we can be happy that no one dies.

Tehran is 10 hours ahead of us, so just go ahead and send 'em up! Here are some places to buy balloons in Pasadena.

I've chosen to use an old photo today, from my 12th day of blogging. I retouched it for the occasion. My balloons are green at heart.

Spread the Word

I haven't seen the White Hut open lately, have you?

Brigham Yen has his finger on the pulse what's going to happen on the southeast corner of Colorado and Madison. I like Brigham's blog. I suspect a lot of people will have mixed feelings about what's planned for that corner, though.

Another subject: are you a blogger? If you're so inclined, join bloggers worldwide this Sunday, June 28th as we post in support of the people of Iran in their struggle for self-determination. Post a video from YouTube or a photo you've found particularly inspiring or even disturbing. Or just post the color green in solidarity with the protesters. Say what you feel about self-determination or free speech. Let me know if you'd like more suggestions and I'll post them here.
The world is watching. Spread the word.

Hometown

It's Jacaranda time in Pasadena.

We've got a lot of blogs here in town. A lot of good ones. For keeping up with what's happening the best one is Hometown Pasadena, managed/operated/lovingly filled to the brim by editor and publisher Colleen Dunn Bates, who seemingly can do no wrong. Right now she's got a couple of pretty shots of the jacaranda trees along Del Mar Blvd. 

Then again, what hasn't she got? It's a mind-bogglingly fabulous website that functions like a blog, or about a hundred blogs. I don't know how she does it, but she does it so well.

Noblesse Oblige

Pasadena's City Hall has no bad angles, even if I can't always flatten myself far enough behind my camera to get them. I've enjoyed our tour this past week.

Now a little order of business, then onto whatever else I can find to take pictures of. Tomorrow is the first of the month, which is City Daily Photo Blog theme day. Here at PDP that means we'll have Zen Monday on Tuesday. There's a thought.

Lynn of Cheltenham Daily Photo has honored me with an award. Did you know there are two Cheltenham Daily Photos? Say hi to Marley.

Anyway, the award is called the Noblesse Oblige Award. It looks like this:
Dictionary.com defines noblesse oblige as "the moral obligation of those of high birth, powerful social position, etc., to act with honor, kindliness, generosity, etc."

It means those of the nobility are obligated to be kind to others, including and especially "the little people." It's why the royals are always going to charity functions.

Thank you, Lynn! I'm crazy about Lynn. She was one of the first people to welcome me to blogland when I began commenting on Paris Daily Photo. She's almost of the nobility, living so close to the Royals and all. But there are a couple of things I haven't told Lynn about me: one is that I'm not always a rule-follower, and the other is that I'm not of the nobility.

Here are the qualifications to win the Noblesse Oblige Award:

1) The Blogger manifests exemplary attitude, respecting the nuances that pervade amongst different cultures and beliefs.
2) The Blog contents inspire; strives to encourage and offers solutions.
3) There is a clear purpose at the Blog; one that fosters a better understanding on Social, Political, Economic, the Arts, Culture and Sciences and Beliefs.
4) The Blog is refreshing and creative.
5) The Blogger promotes friendship and positive thinking.

Hmm. I try to be respectful, encouraging, creative and positive. But I wouldn't recommend any blogger split focus as described in #3.

The Blogger who receives this award will need to perform the following steps:

1) Create a post with a mention and link to the person who presented the Noblesse Oblige Award.
2) The Award Conditions must be displayed at the post.
3) Write a short article about what the Blog has thus far achieved – preferably citing one or more older posts to support.
4) The Blogger must present the Noblesse Oblige Award in concurrence with the Award conditions.
5) Blogger must display the Award at any location at the Blog.

Jeez Louise, it's a tall order, innit?

#1, check. #2, check. #3... well I don't think I have any posts to support this. I don't wish to seem ungrateful. I'm very grateful to be acknowledged by my fellow blogger, Lynn. But see now, I'm not sure PDP qualifies for this award. My purpose here is for us to discover things about Pasadena and have a good time doing it. My intent is not to "foster a better understanding on Social, Political, Economic, the Arts, Culture and Sciences and Beliefs," though if that happens, okay. But I'm lucky if I foster understanding of my captions and map directions.

I'm hesitant to pass on blog awards because I've come across bloggers who don't want the obligation. So what I'd like to do here is acknowledge some blogs that, in my opinion, "foster a better understanding on Social, Political, Economic, the Arts, Culture and Sciences and Beliefs," or at least come close. Then if they want to post the award and pass it on, they may do so.

The winners, should they decide to accept the award, are these:

1. Jerusalem Hills Daily Photo: Dina has a big following and has probably already won this award several times. Dina is one open-minded, fair, generous, warm-hearted, funny, smart, terrrific--uh, have I given you a noun yet?--blogger.
2. Portland (OR) Daily Photo: Dina and her (our) friend Meead are exemplary of my theory that when we talk to each other, we prove our governments don't represent us as well as we represent ourselves. Meead is an exchange student from Mashaad, Iran. He left Mashhad (IRAN) Daily Photo in the capable hands of Sara, a student of architecture. Sara's taking a blogging break right now (presumably for exams), but keep checking. It's worth it just to see how much the same we all are.
3. Finnegan Begin Again: I don't know if Margaret's blog qualifies and I don't care. Everyone needs a fiesty goddess to watch their back. (Mine is Bast.) Everyone needs bacon. Wait. No one needs bacon. Bacon is for fun.
4. Izmir: Selim's is perhaps one of the most beautiful photo blogs you'll ever see. Another is Diederick's Arona Every Day. These photographer/bloggers foster international understanding through the art of of visual communication. Their styles are very different. Through their blogs, the Turk and the Italian have become friends.
5. Altadena Hiker: Karin's banana plant post alone meets all the requirements of the award.

Have fun exploring.

-K-

A lot of terrific photographers are out there blogging. Today I'd like to turn you on to -K-, aka Kevin McCollister, of The Jimson Weed Gazette.

Check out the Gazette and browse K's brooding, beautiful pictures. I'll link you to one, my favorite for reasons I'll attempt to articulate. See, I'm trying to learn to do more than just take a picture of a thing. I'm trying to learn how to evoke a feeling, to tell a story in a photo. Kevin is a master storyteller. Here's my favorite of his stories: it's called Old Man, Abandoned Building.

I recommend you tour Kevin's blog as well as his website and enjoy his stories.

The reason I'm thinking of Kevin today is because I'm a little jealous. It's not his talent I covet. Talent is individual. He has his, I have mine. I'm a beginner and I'll develop in my own way as I practice and learn. No, no, no, I'm jealous because I'm too chicken to take my camera and tripod into dark alleys and scary neighborhoods at night and photograph abandoned buildings and sad old men.

Which brings me to today's photograph. A dark alley in daylight doesn't scare me. Ha! (Good thing there was no one there.)

Bloggers Rock

Yesterday's San Gabriel Valley Blogger potluck was a success! Not that I'm the least bit surprised, considering the people involved.

Organized by Timothy Rutt of Altadenablog, Karin Bugge the Altadenahiker, Susan C. of Open Mouth, Insert Fork and Cancer Banter, and Debi of Altadena Daily Photo and Altadena Above It All, the potluck attracted many interesting dishes, including this giant cookie contributed by Michelle Mills, a.k.a. Mickie, who blogs at Diary of a Doo Dah Queen and Mickie's Zoo. Here, Mickie and her cookie pose with Timothy.

Mickie said she had to spell the word "blogger" for the cookie decorator, who had never heard of a blogger.

Kelly of West Coast Grrlie Blather wondered aloud if any of us had encountered, uh, disrespectful reactions when people found out we were bloggers. If I've gotten those reactions I was ignorant of them (blissfully so). And speaking of ignorance, someone who disdains people because they blog surely doesn't understand what blogging is in the first place.

I've found the San Gabriel Valley blogging community to be fascinating, diverse and welcoming. I've found the global blogging community to be all of the above as well. Blogging has opened up my world in ways I never knew possible. What are your thoughts about blogging?

Here's Kathy's post about the potluck at the KCHblog. I'll add more links as I find them.
Tim posted a video, apparently shot while I was in the bathroom.
A lot of fun shots at Cafe Pasadena, including Boz's glamor pic.
Altadena Hiker has added another photo.
This just in: Pasadena PIO's post.

Superfluous Detail: Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf

I love superfluous architectural details (you know I do) - those flourishes that seem to have no structural significance, but are there simply for the sake of entertaining the eye. This one's above the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf at 18 S. Fair Oaks in Old Town Pasadena.

I've searched the whole web over for more information on this building, but haven't found it. If you know anything, please share.

I noticed during my research that there's an OldTownPasadena.com and an OldTownPasadena.org. Surely they're not competitors? I'm so confused. Hey, but the org folks are going to have a blog. I look forward to that. And they put me on their blogroll! I am their fan.

You're Invited

Save the date! It's the San Gabriel Valley Blogger's potluck picnic, coming up on March 28th (that's March! I'm giving you lots of notice) from 12-4PM at Farnsworth Park in Altadena. Everyone's invited and that means you! You don't have to be a blogger to come. Fans, friends, commenters and lurkers are welcome. Bring a dish to share. See you there!

That's not the only invitation today. You'll remember our friend Dianne Emley and the recent contest here at Pasadena Daily Photo to win her book Cut to the Quick. Dianne will discuss and sign The Deepest Cut, the third book in her Nan Vining thrillogy, this Wednesday at Vroman's at 7PM. I'll be there and I hope you will, too. Be sure and say hello!

Speaking of friends, I'd like to say a word to blog followers, official and un: thank you! (okay, two words.) Your visits, comments and emails are much appreciated.