October 2003 Archives

Jim Washburn has an eye opening, if a bit inflammatory, opinion editorial in this week's OC Weekly:

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: it is flat-out insane for a nation to spend billions on a missile defense shield while leaving itself defenseless against the damage that any nitwit, domestic or foreign, can do to us with a single match. A great many experts will tell you a missile defense shield simply won’t work and that, moreover, none of the terrorists we regard as a threat have a missile that could pester us. Meanwhile, the threat of arson is so palpable that I could instead be writing this article in big letters in the layer of ash blanketing my neighborhood.

Why even mention the missile defense shield at this charred moment? Because we have only so much money and resources. We have only so many scientific minds. We have only so much civic will. And we are frittering it all away on a bunch of fearmongers’ hardware instead of on programs that might ever conceivably do us some good, particularly in weeks such as this.

Do you know how many nuclear warheads the U.S. has? As of February, we had 10,729 operational nukes, and Bush wants to build a pricey new generation of treaty-busting ones.

Do you know how many firefighting tanker planes we have? Thirty.

For a nation that has spent the last two years venerating Firefighters, why don't we allocate them the resources and staff to do their jobs?

San Diego, with a high proportion of tax-cut fervored Republicans, got caught with their pants down. Right or Left or Center, we Americans need to rethink our approach to essential services and infrastructure and tax accordingly.

I don't know about you, but I think I would like a well-staffed and equipped fire department, clean water & air, good roads, and effecient sewage treatement over more warheads.

After dinner last night and dropping off CDs to Lucky, I went over to Alex's Bar to buy pre-sale tickets for Wanda and David for tonight's Halloween Ball with Throwrag. This would be my 2nd attempt to buy tix for Wanda and David, and I was successful.

I was also successful at getting recruited by Mr. Alex to be the MC for tonight's Halloween Costume Contest. I will be the MC and final Judge. (*snort*)

Just call me MC BlaPho. (*ha*)

Happy Halloween!

Ok, all the nice lovely folks out there in blog-reader-land, I need your semantic help. Last night, Erika and I went to dinner at Alegria in Long Beach and we tried to determine what is the step between Smitten and Whupped.

Erika has decided that I have graduated into this step of my admiration for my Favorite Cute Man. Please help us find a name.

It was in the late 40s last night and I got to put on my thrid blanket! Wahoooo! Happy Sleeping weather here I come!

Both Lisa Johnson and my roommate, Lauren, informed me around around 6pm tonight that we had a beautiful orange sliver moon peeping through the ash cover.

Other parts of the Northern Hemisphere get October harvest moons, we get LA Fire moons.

The above satellite photo was taken on Sun. 10/26/03 by the US Forest Service / NASA Satellite. We have been downwind of the big plume for over 4 days now. Today is back to falling ashes and heat.

The above photo is from the LA Times coverage.

Nasa has a more comprehensive satellite image showing the smoke plumes going hundreds of miles out in to the Pacific and an article explaining the sat photos. The high res NASA photo shows fires also burning down the Baja California coast and more than half of the Salton Sea in algae bloom.

CNN.com and the LA Times report this evening on the Southern California Wildfires.

LA Times map

Bascially there is a wall of fire burning up the mountains and hills from San Diego to Ventura. I am somewhat overstating the case, but as you can see from this map of the Old Fire the whole front range of the San Bernardino Mountains in on fire or burned to a crisp. The Old Fire has now merged with the Grand Prix Fire on the east end of the San Gabriel Mountains.

On one hand, we are very glad when we get a decent to good year of rain, like this past winter, but when combined with an extremely hot summer it makes for a horrible fire season. I have been praying that the high pressure system will lift off the Northwest and send our first storm of the season to douse us with moisture. The last good October rain we had was in 2000 over Halloween weekend.

My Grandma Grace and step-Grandpa Bill live in North Escondido on a ridge that over looks a very dry arroyo and in the distance one can see Valley Center and Mt. Palomar. My aunt Anne and cousin Brian drove down tonight to evacuate Grandma and Bill out as the Julian Fire, which is the largest of the fires burning right now, has now reached Escondido. Please pray that they do not lose their house, as they have had a very tough year with Bill's broken vertabrae and Parkinson's diagnosis.

Here in Orange, the Santa Ana winds and the accompanying rain of ash ceased around noon today leaving a strange, murky, dusky stillness in its wake. Just after 6pm, a lovely, cool offshore breeze started up and brought temperatures down into the late 60s. What a relief.

Lest I seem whiney, I must note after my other two posts about how bizarre the weather has been in the LA basin in the last 24 hours, I would like to state that it is currently warmer right now than it was at noon.

It feels like it is 80-something outside, but according to all the online weather sources it is 71 degrees farenheit. It is 1:25 am.

At 8:24 pm (PST) the Santa Ana Winds started.

I walked out at 8:55pm and the the ashes from the fire were whirling everywhere along with leaves and debris. Yet, the stars were still obscured by clouds and fog.

Now at 9:36pm, there is ashes and dust on every surface in the house and the sky is clear. Mars is shining orange gold half way up the southern sky.

At 8:24 pm (PST) the Santa Ana Winds started. Or at least, after 2 days of claims that they had been blowing through the Inland Empire, they have travelled southwest throught the Santa Ana Canyon to the coastal areas.

I walked out at 8:55pm and the the ashes from the fire were whirling everywhere along with leaves and debris. Yet, the stars were still obscured by clouds and fog.

Now at 9:36pm, there is ashes and dust on every surface in the house and the sky is clear. Mars is shining orange gold half way up the southern sky.

I woke up late this morning to weird diffused brown-yellowish light streaming into my room. It was not the bright yellow of California sun, nor the soft, diffused grey light of fog/inversion clouds, but an odd apocalyptic brown-yellow mist.

After a week of high heat in the 90s, yesterday was cool and misty. Thick fog rolled in by 8pm and blanketed Orange and Anaheim, and most likely the rest of the LA basin but I only ventured as far as the Doll Hut. When I woke up, I half expected the fog to still be lurking about, but the color of the light was so odd, I got up to investigate.

I took my camera and looked out all of the windows of the house into the back and side yards, and found the world to be draped in soft orange-brown-yellow tones. Upon exiting out to the driveway, I found a layer of ash on my car and on every surface. Ash was falling down much like a light snowfall. The sun, which was trying to break through the fog / cloud cover, was a reddish-orange ball.

CNN.com and the LA Times are reporting that the Rancho Cucamonga Grand Prix wildfire has grown to over 16,000 acres and has closed down the 15 fwy. They are both reporting high Santa Ana winds are flaming the blaze. Usually if the SA winds are coming through the Cajon Pass then we here in Orange would not be socked in with fog / inversion clouds, as the SA winds usually roar down the the Cajon pass through the Inland Empire then it speeds up through Santa Ana Canyon to clear out all the air through south LA and north / central OC.

The ashfall seems strangely out of place given the lack of winds here in Orange, the stagnant cloud layer, and we are approximately 50 miles southwest of the Grand Prix Fire. It is now 3pm, and the sun has not burned through the cloud cover. We are in an all day twilight with ash continuing to fall lightly down.

Audobon Warbler in front of Blue's place

Ever have one of those days that by 6:00pm you are so frustrated and tired that you could just cry (or if you are a guy - hit something)? Yesterday was that day for me....but it marvelously turned around after 6:00pm and by the time that I pulled the little honda to park at home after 2:00am, I looked up at the stars and was delighted.

According to Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's Good Omens, the Earth's birthday is Oct. 21st. She is a Libra, and is now 6007 years old, so says the book. Happy Birthday to Mother Earth...

Current theories on the creation of the Universe state, that, if it was created at all and didn't just start, as it were, unofficially, it came into being ten and twenty thousand million years ago. By the same token the earth itself is generally supposed to be about four and a half thousand million years old.

These dates are incorrect.

Medieval Jewish scholars put the date of the Creation at 3760 B.C. Greek Orthodox theologians put Creation as far back as 5508 B.C.

These suggestions are also incorrect.

Archbishop James Usher (1580-1656) published Annales Veteris et Novi Testamenti in 1654, which suggested that the Heaven and the Earth were created in 4004 B.C. One of his aides took the calculation further, and was able to announce triumphantly that the Earth was created on Sunday the 21st of October, 4004 B.C. at exactly 9:00 A.M., because God like to get work done early in the morning while he was feeling fresh.

This too was incorrect. By almost a quarter of an hour.

...the Earth's a Libra.

The astrological prediction for Libra in the "Your Stars Today" column of the Tadfield Advertiser, on the day this history begins, read as follows:

LIBRA 24 September - 23 October

You may be feeling run down and always in the same old daily round. Home and family matters are highlighted and are hanging fire. Avoid unnecessary risks. A friend is important to you. Shelve major decisions until the way ahead seems clear. You may be vulnerable to a stomach upset today, so avoid salads. Help could come from an unexpected quarter.

This was perfectly correct on every count except the bit about the salads.

Last night, Tues. Oct. 21, 2003, I hosted the postponed Book Club at my place, and we discussed life, the world, supermarket strikes, grading papers, food, the amazing (or horrifying) nursing & poo antics of babies & toddlers, and a little bit of the book. I read above exerpt that talked about the Earth's creation date and her horoscope for the day and then Heather pointed out that today was the Earth's birthday. We all got a good laugh that Good Omens Book Club was on a date that featured prominently in the book.

A 100% Pure Product of American Protestantism - in this blog post Mark Shea tells it straight and links to an article that spells out the extreme results of American Evangelical culture.

"Same with American Protestantism: at it's best you get saints like Billy Graham or Jim Eliot. At its worst, Brother Bubba's Informercial Gospel Hour."

Mr. Shea forgot to mention that American Protestantism at its worst also gives us George W. Bush and his cronies.

As a nice Californian Christian person from a family that is a mix of Catholic and Protestants and Agnostics, as well as someone who attended a conservative Protestant Evangelical college, this post reminded me why it is very important to be flexible, be open to the tenets and emphases of the other major branches of Christianity, and why not to take oneself and one's beliefs so darned seriously.

Christians of all the branches of the faith should read Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman's "Good Omens" to loosen up and have many great laughs.

Big thanks to Dan Callis, the painter of Crown, for coming over to find the wall studs and hang the painting up with earthquake proof hooks. The living room actually feels like home now.

The Tampon Angel (via Teresa Nielsen Hayden).

The big question that the website doesn't answer is which brand of tampons to use? Tampax for a tall angel or OB for a short angel?

If you are crafty, then I double dog dare one of you to make one and display it on your tree this year...

[Side note: it is really frightening that tampon manufacturers have very peppy promotional websites in pink and blue.]

Today, I went over to Blue's to help her out with her computer. As I was walking up to her place, the olive trees were full of flitting, chirping birds. At first I thought they were the usual SoCal crew of twittering bushtits, but I kept seeing flashes of blue.

As I walked up the sidewalk, the birds would flush out of the nearest tree to the tree just in front of me. It was enough movement and flight for me to realize that I had walked into a large migrating flock of western bluebirds, orange-crowned warblers, and yellow rumped warbers. There were at least 40 plus birds.

Truly wonderful and extraordinary.

Get out in the next week to areas of trees and calm, and you may find yourself delighted to be in the midst of a flock of northern birds on the way to their winter holidays in Latin America.

Sugar Plum, my lovely - albeit a wee cosmetically battered - 1993 Honda Civic, is now at 198,541 miles. Given that I drive approximately 30,000 miles a year, Sugar Plum ought to turn over 200,000 before the end of October.

I plan on carrying my camera with me close to the due date to make sure I get a picture of all of those zeros.

As mentioned in my posts of the last hour, Erika and I went on a circumnavigation of the Bolsa Chica Wetlands. Usually we walk on the path that is a couple of hundred yards east of Pacific Coast Highway. Today we started at the parking lot just off PCH and walked around and ended up walking down PCH. Bad idea. Halfway through the walking south on PCH in the bike lane, I was lightheaded by the car fumes. Luckily there is a culvert between the two lagoons that allowed us to walk back on the good path.

Here are my pictures of the various photogenic and attention hound birds that we came across in our 1.5 hour jaunt at sunset /dusk. There were several snowy egrets, 3 great egrets, and one kingfisher in the photos. We also saw, but I did not capture with the Mavica, brown pelicans in flight, a lot of ruddy ducks, a few surf scoters, various terns & gulls, and pied-billed grebes.

Whilst walking along the path at Bolsa Chica today, as I was babbling along about my "Favorite Cute Man", Erika pointed out to me that I have passed beyond "Crush" to "Smitten." She's right. Just thought I ought to let y'all know.

This late-afternoon / early-evening, Erika and I went for a walk at Bolsa Chica Wetlands and then to dinner at Kung-Pao in Huntington. At dinner, Erika asked me what was happening with the spider family that was homesteading on the trash bin. She reminded me that I had not blogged about it in weeks and that I had a duty to my readers to update.

Here's the update: Two Tuesdays of Trash Days after the last update, the trash bin went out to the curb with Ms. Spider and her two egg sacs attached on Monday evening and came back on Tuesday afternoon sans Ms. Spider and her two egg sacs. I did not bring the trash cans back, as the front house neighbor got to them before I could, so I don't know if the spider family took off on their own out at the curb, was shaken off into the trash truck, or if the front neighbor sprayed them with Raid. I am sorry to report that there is only a remnant of her web left dangling on the trash bin.

Last week, I left a message on Wanda's machine to the effect of, "My family is in the middle of a huge conuberation. Argh!" Wanda left me a message later that said, "I looked up conuberation and it is not in any dictionary. What did you mean by that word?" Blessings upon my English Masters / journalist/ editor friends for keeping me honest.

I looked in my dictionary. There is a conurbation (a continuous network of urban communities; example: Los Angeles). But no conuberation. I was surprised, as I have been using the word for years, mostly with Erika and my brother Joe. Upon reflection, I realized that Erika, Joe, and I all make up new words all the time, and as a result have no problem with using made up words in context. Some of the words get used frequently, and then become a "word" in our vocabulary.

I called Erika and asked if I made up conuberation or if it is a real word, because I know that she and I use it all the time. She told me that I made it up years ago to describe how crazy my family is and that we both now use it regularly in conversation. She said it is spreading to other people.

Here is the official definition that Erika and I have decided upon:

Conuberation: \kän-(y)u-ber-'a-zhen\ modern Califorian, n: a fit or enactment of crazy, mixed up, hysterical, out of control place, situation or family.

The conuberation is a hybrid of conniption and conurbation.

After months of taking bad self-portraits in hopes of finding something to submit to the Mirror Project, I finally took a photo worth sending in on Sunday night at the Grisham for Governor Rally at the Henry Fonda Theatre in Hollywood.

I was downstairs when Gina Martinez introduced me to Stuart from the English Dogs. Gina wanted a picture of her and Stuart together, and I took one. The next day I was looking through my photos of the event and found that I was in the mirror behind Gina and Stuart. I submitted it to the Mirror Project.

Unfortunately, I did not get to see the English Dogs while they were in LA this last weekend even though I heard great reports of their shows at the Knitting Factory and Alex's Bar, but I do hope that Stuart and Jock had a lovely time at Disneyland on Monday.

Much to my horror last night, I discovered that Movable Type will automatically send a track back ping to a blog post that I linked in one of my posts. Yes, my post-election rant and rave that included insults, swear words, and bad logic that was therapeutic for me but got track backed to JD's New Media Musings post about the election when I linked his post to a part of mine. I apologized in JD's comment section, cleaned up my original post, and spent most of this morning searching on the MT support forum on how to not have automatic track backs.

What I discovered is that in the "Weblog Config" section of the MT interface has a section on Track Backs, and that in that configuration section is a box that I can check to allow for "Auto-Discovery" to be on. What this means, as I found out today, is that if the box is checked (which it was), MT will take any link you put in your blog and ping the site to see if it will recognize you. All MT and TypePad Blogs that are Track Back enabled will put an exerpt of your post on the other blog automatically without you (me) realizing that has happened until it is too late to change it. That is what happened to me last night. "Heil Arh-nold. Fucker." And all.

I must admit to being confused about Track Backing for some time. I have several times now followed the directions on how to do a Track Back to let folks at other blogs know when I have referred to their posts. But to find out that MT automatically put a track back on JD's blog when I linked his post distressed me, mostly because I respect JD's writing and I used the "f" and "c" words about our new Esteemed F-ing Guv'ner* in my original post.

I turned Auto-Discovery off tonight. I would rather take the 3 or so steps to manually Track Back a post rather than make an automatic ass out of my self. JD Lasica is a true gentleman and a great thinker on media old and new.

* All due respects to Skippy...

Notes from the 10:00 pm (PDT) hour on the day of the Recall Election:

1) I must quote Jello, the punk prophet, who called it in 1980, "California Uber Alles". Heil Arh-nold. Arnold + Arrogance + Big Money GOP Backing = Arnold - you are now what you fear most - a whore. Go shoot more steroids, then you will be a real man...

2) (Arrogance + Actor who reads scripts for a living + cult of celebrity) + Calif's career politician legistature = hell hath no fury like a woman scorned + one interesting Circus to come.

Hope Arnold has been coated in teflon, the Terminator may not last through the first one hundred days or so predicts conservative George Neumayr.

3) Can we Recall Dick Cheney? Please?

4) Art and Punk Rock is always best under oppresion and facism. Look at what the Reagan 80's produced.... Bush Jr + Actor Governor = Bye Bye Blink 182, Good Charlotte and the like. Hello Anti-Flag!

5) At the Grisham for Govenor Rally on Sunday night, one of the security guys said to one of the bands, "I like your music, but I hate your politics." Hello! Wake up! Real Punk = Radical Politics. If you don't want radical left politics with your music, go listen to Korn or Brittney Spears or Celine Dion.

Let the Games begin! Shall we all go to the Colesium for bread and circus?

(note to the faint of heart or the moderate: this post was purposefully inflammatory)

In many parts of the country, this is the time of year when the leaves are falling and folks are tucking their gardens in for the winter. Here in Zone 23 of the Sunset Garden Guide, we are losing leaves and many of the garden plants are thinking about tucking in for a short nap.

Right about now is when the basil and tarragon decide that it is time to die. If I clip them down and continue to water them, they will rise again in March or thereabouts. The basil in the driveway side garden is now over 4 feet tall and just starting to yellow a bit. I suppose I ought to harvest it now before it dies off on me. Although, I am still getting new shoots and side branches. Desicions, decisions, decisions.

Many SoCal gardeners will plant a whole new season of vegetables and flowers in Sept. and Oct. for the fall and winter. I have pansy and winter sweet pea seeds waiting to go in as soon as the summer garden is over.

Many of my friends and family are highly political creatures and have already planned their day on Tuesday to fit in voting on the California Recall. Last night at the Adolescents' show at the HOB Anaheim, a bunch of us at the Rose Terrace Bar got into a good discussion on the Recall and why Arnold S. cannot be our next Governor.

If you are on the fence, you are indifferent or otherwise don't think your vote counts, please resist your inertia and go and vote on Tuesday. For or against the recall, and whoever you believe to be most fit to govern our state, just go and vote.

Mi Teaghlach Mithear
o
Mi Familia Loca

Whether I say it in Irish Gaelic or Spanish or Californian, my mother's family is crazy. No doubts about it. My great aunt Shirley truly was out to lunch and lived the second half of her life at the Norwalk State Mental Institution. She would send letters to my mother asking how little 5-year old Jenny was, even when I was 30. I rather liked great aunt Shirley, at least she came by her nuttiness due to natural brain chemicals or lack thereof.

Now the rest of them who are not locked up are still not so sane even with supposedly normal seritonin and dopamine levels. There is the overwhelming family obsession with always doing and competing and excercising. And then there is the family "bad picker". Yep, with the exception of my cousin Brian, everyone of them has been married between 2-4 times.

And the family wonders why my brother, sister, and I are still single. We like stability, we like being laid back (even if a wee bit bouncy), we like no drama (ok as long as it is humorous and makes for a good story later), we like no divorces... it must be the Hanen and Hahn influence on the Mithear Kilroy blood.

Why this post? My mom is currently camping in Mammoth with her new beau... Kevin the local bum. Yep, the semi-homeless guy from the park. My sister has lost her composure, my brother is laughing, and I am shaking my head wondering when I should change my phone number.

I have been threatening to divorce the whole lot of my mother's family for years. I may just do it this year. Or maybe I should write a movie screenplay on a large crazy Irish family from LA...

Supposedly the National Do No Call List was to be set into action today on Oct. 1, 2003. There have been two court cases that have held up the proceedings, all the while Congress and the President moved quickly to give the FCC power to inact the National Do No Call List. Federal Courts defending the telemarketer scum vs. Congress defending 50 million Americans who are sick of bullshit phone calls.

My advice to the 50 million harassed humans: If the Federal courts will not uphold our stated desire to not be invaded by marketing folk, then go down to your favorite purveyor of electronic goods and buy an answering machine. Yep. Screen your phone calls, baby. Then call up your phone company and get the feature where the phone co. sends you a little box that tells you who is calling. Between the old school answering machine with the sound on and the little box with a screen that gives me a number, I am a member of the Screening Nation.

Luckily my friends, family, and business clients are used to my boundaries with the marketing scum, and yell useful things into the answering machine like, "Jen, pick up your phone, this is ...." or "Hey! It's me! Pick up your phone... Hello, Hello... Pick up your phone..."

When I return from a good long bout of being away from my non-slavemaster the phone it is entertaining to see how many messages I have of friends/family/clients doing the above routine, as they think I am screening rather than actually being away from the slavemaster the phone, versus how many calls the little AT&T box tells me called in. Usually I have a large ratio of hang ups & unavailable numbers (telemarketer scum) to actual messages from real live people who I actually want to talk to; somewhere around 20 irritations to 4 real calls.

Today was different. Today was the day we were supposed to have freedom from telemarketers. Today my ratio of evil vs. good was way down. Today, Oct. 1, 2003 - I had 4 real calls - my sister, Erika, Hector, CSLF, and my sister again to only 3 evil telemarketers. What happened to the other 17+ evil people? Did they actually decided to pay attention to the National Do No Call List even though the courts have sided with them?

The irony of it all is that I got my first spam phone call on my cell today. Yes, the cell number that no one has, well, maybe 5 people. The cell that I have off all the time, the cell that I don't take messages for, the cell I only use on business trips. Yes, that cell had a telemarketer call on it. Guess, I better go register my cell number on the National Do No Call List....