High Class Cultural Activity

This weekend was spent with wife and in-laws partaking in some wonderfully enriching activities. My dear wife has never been to an Alabama football game, nor even Tuscaloosa on Game Day. So by cashing in all of my brownie points, I was able to coax her into joining me at Sonny McLean's Pub via Randy's Donuts to watch Coach Saban's Crimson Tide whoop up on Ole Miss. As a complete non-seqitur: we traversed the entire length of Inglewood on Manchester  Avenue, passing Soul Food Kitchen, The Forum, and seven different places selling fried chicken. I must say that a drive from Lincoln Blvd to the 110 Fwy is a lot like driving through Memphis. Anyway, I digress.

After getting a pre-game donut at the much hyped Randy's Donuts, we took a short rest back in Santa Monica before heading over to Sonny McLean's Irish Pub on Wilshire. Those readers familiar with West L.A. will know that there is absolutely no soul food anywhere near this part of the city. Fortunately though, Sonny's makes fabulous guacamole and perfect shepherd's pie with ground lamb and savory sauce. If you wanted to replicate a Tuscaloosa or Birmingham sports pub, Sonny's would be a close to perfect match. There are plenty of TVs; enough to watch the opening part of my Alabama vs. Ole Miss game, and simultaneously revel in Oklahoma thrashing Notre Dame, and Georgia beating LSU. We found out about this "meet up" of Bama fans online. Apparently there is no connection to LA's chapter of UA Alumni Association, but that doesn't stop 10-20 Southerners from gathering to watch the Tide Roll.

The wife had never seen anyone besides me sing "Yeah Alabama" or shout "Rammer Jammer", so allowing her to witness these firsthand was a real treat. I really enjoyed explaining the bad calls and how the system of "downs" works (why the goal is to keep getting 1st Down) en route to the end zone. Both of us were impressed by the safety for 2 points toward the end of the game. After the win, we both had a little bit of ringing in our ears from the crowd noise inside Sonny McLean's. There is nothing quite so sweet as driving home after an Alabama SEC victory. Roll Tide Roll.

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On Sunday afternoon, we partook in a similarly exciting event: Georges Bizet's "Carmen" performed by the LA Opera in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, conducted by the legendary Placido Domingo.  Carmen is one of the three most famous operas of all time; sandwiched between Puccini's "La Boheme" and Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro", it was amazing to see for the very first time (with my wife/ in LA). We saw "La Boheme" last year, which was my first live opera experience. Everyone should see a few famous operas in their life to get a sense of refinement, and see and hear Western Civilization's classiest form of entertainment. Filled with very memorable songs, "Carmen" is the story of a gypsy lady who runs off with Don Jose, corporal of Dragoons and later dumps him for Escamillo, the grand bullfighter baritone who sings "Toreador."

At half an hour into the first act, we are treated to the "Habanera" which is the trademark song of this opera. It contains this line: L'amour est l'enfant de Boheme... or in English: Love is a gypsy's child. While I don't proffer this as a rational worldview, it does contain poetic charm. My main grievance on the performance was that my opera-mates told me the ending. Spoiler alert! When taking your son-in-law or your husband out to see a show that he's never seen, don't ruin the suspense by telling him that the title character gets stabbed. If I wanted to know who dies at the end, I'd have read up on it! As my wife says, "don't get attached to any of the characters because they'll probably die." Wow! How's that for comfort? Anyway, aside from Don Jose stabbing Carmen in a fit of desperate rage, it has a cute ending. I hope you like the songs as much as I do --> really catchy tunes.


vivid costumes, gallant dancing, lustrous voices, fun people watching

The Southerner’s view of Southern California

 I am from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It is a medium-sized college town with fairly homogeneous culture. There are white and black people, a few Hispanics, and negligible number of Asians. My wife’s hometown, Santa Monica, California hosts a more colorful palette of people.  Here you will see folks going about their life in every imaginable conveyance and raiment.  Just today I have seen skateboards, bikes, tandem bikes, motorcycles, wheelchairs, Range Rovers, classic Broncos, sports cars, German sedans, American cars and pick-up trucks, and the ubiquitous Japanese hybrids. Los Angeles probably has the same concentration of Toyota Prius as Hong Kong does of Ferrari… flocks of them!

On clothing, one senses the immediate casualness of Santa Monica.  In fact, I have yet to see anyone other than my bank teller wear a necktie.  There is a profound lack of respect as far as removing hats indoors, wearing a belt to keep pants at the waist, and so forth for anyone under the age of fifty-five. Some men dress up in surfer clothes with baggy shorts, hooded sweatshirts, frayed caps, Vans shoes, et cetera well past fatherhood and into their forties. In Alabama, most guys trade that in for khakis and Polo shirts around twenty-two.

I can’t imagine what it must have been like as a resident in the 1940s or 1950s seeing it change so much. From my observations, most of the neighborhoods were constructed as postwar “spec houses” to meet the need of America’s baby boom.  Many homes still bear the “spec” image of a small cottage, whilst next door sits a very modern behemoth mansion.  My cousins in Coronado complain that this phenomenon of literally razing an old structure, then building from edge to edge of the property blocks out the sunlight for the smaller neighbor. It is a pity but the reality of the situation.

Another thing that amuses me about these coastal Californians is how they take great strides to ‘conserve energy.’ We live in America, the land of Ben Franklin, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Samuel Colt and other brilliant inventors whom I shall leave out for brevity. These men did not put so much effort into making our nation the best in the world to have a society that refuses to produce more energy to match growth. Do you think the Chevy Volt or the Nissan Leaf would be the car of choice for Franklin? NO! He would enjoy only the best… Mercedes, Lexus, or maybe Cadillac, but would scratch his head in confusion over why we don’t drill for oil where we know we have it (ANWR, Pacific Coast) or build more refineries and nuclear reactors to accommodate our growing population’s thirst for energy (LED bulbs alone won’t get us there). I digress.

One most amusing display of ‘conserving energy’ was the Venice Community Garden’s “Solar Cooking Day.” The idea was to harness energy from the sun to cook some organically grown veggies in a foil covered box. While the idea is more than plausible (I’ve seen it done at a Boy Scout Jamboree), the community gardeners failed to reduce their carbon footprint as a charcoal grill was substituted for the foil box. So not only was energy wasted, but also time. The moral of the story is that while solar cookers work great in the summer sun of a place like Phoenix, charcoal or propane is a much more efficient and reliable heat source in breezy cool Venice and Santa Monica.

One must never mistake reducing one’s quality of life automatically equals environmental stewardship. Humans were given skill to convert raw materials and natural resources into modern conveniences. Stewardship is having the wisdom to cleanly extract and ethically utilize these gifts. My Dad always told me "lack of preparation on your part doesn't constitute crisis on my part." Having regular gasoline at $4.99 per gallon would be an epic lack of preparation. While searching for an answer to this problem on energy.gov, one senses a huge disconnect from those of us who feel the pinch at the pump for our daily commute and those who make policy decisions for our nation. Nowhere on the main page is there mention of petroleum products. Wind farms in the Great Lakes and solar panels in Nevada seem more important to our president than issuing drilling permits. So we'll see how $4.50 gas affects poll numbers in November.

Let me sum up. Many folks here in California make complaints similar to the above paragraph about the high cost of living, overcrowded freeways, lack of freedom for gun owners, overprotected condors & cougars, and so on. This was my attitude for about a month. Then I realized what an amazing place California is. If it were so terrible why do people continue to move here? Pleasant weather. That is reason number one. Other reasons are 'people watching' in THE melting pot of America, catching glimpses of movie stars, and shopping at the most exclusive boutiques on earth. Southern California has towns that boast 325 days of sunshine. There are some really beautiful towns. San Diego and Santa Monica come to mind. Who wouldn't want to spend a week, month, few years in an ocean side paradise?  

Loma Linda and Redlands are two of my favorite towns in California. Located 50 miles from Big Bear and 50 miles from L.A. they are close to mountain snow or sunny beaches. Oh yeah, Joshua Tree is less than two hours away as well.  These are the reasons people love California: pleasant weather, and abundant outdoor activities. Hike, surf, ski and eat fish tacos all in the same weekend. I will delve deeper into the tasty foods in a later post. 

God Bless.