About EL CHAVO!

I like poetry, romantic candlelit dinners, and quiet walks on the beach.

CicLAvia: Some Photos

I wasn’t really planning to go, but my friend thought it was a good idea. I just didn’t want to hang around with that whole Bike Kulture set that make my skin crawl. The bike people think they have found the answer to all of life’s problems (aka, the bike) just like the Hemp Hippies thought they had also found the solution to everything in this one plant, which just also happened to get them high. People with simplistic solutions to everything are annoying and usually preachy. I gave up church for a reason.

Oh, pedestrians are invited too? I am a paid member of The Walking Class after all. Well then, lets take a looksey!

Click ahead para ver un chingo de photos.

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State of the Torta 2

I’ve been waiting to submit this update on the current state of tortas, but I was missing a 4th addition to the collection. Oh well, I’m gonna wing it. It’s not like it really matters, right? Just some arbitrary number I gave myself, which I can also ungive (?) at a moments notice. ‘Ta bien?  Sopa! Let’s take a look at the various ways in which we find this homely sandwich.

We start off this update with a look at the torta from a usually exemplary eatery, El Huarache Azteca on York. I’ve had their torta vegetariana many times and it’s always a fine specimen, but this day I had it “to go” and it was a bit lacking.

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Not a Sausage

I was flipping thru the latest issue of the LA Weekly, when I came upon this sad article in which some newbie Canadian gives us his North of that other Border take on LA. Do these people that keep moving to Los Angeles not have any knowledgeable friends here to give them an introduction to the city? Cuz the poor sap wrote his lil’ article with some abysmal word choices.

“South-of-the-border folks, Guatemalan or Mexican perhaps, see the sidewalk vending as a livelihood, cooking sausages and onions on a cold Echo Park night…The sausages steamed; the Echo Park clubgoers, unstoppable with their appetite for music (and sausages), were beautiful.”

Uh, sir, those be hot dogs. Bacon wrapped to be precise.

You can consider me a friend now, guiding you along as you make your way in and out of LA. And another thing…

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River Filters


Click on pic for larger version

Some people complain about the shopping carts that get thrown into the LA River, maybe for good reason. But check out this innovative use somebody came up with, using them carts as a sort of filter to help keep the waterway clean.

Ingenious! Now if we can only devise a way to string these along the banks, have some way to easily clean said filters, then the river will be clean in no time! Get on it.

Click ahead for a few more pics.

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LA to Host Lamest Grito Ever

A reventar!

So you thought you were going to check out the Grito downtown tonight, like you do every couple of years in front of city hall, eh? I sure did. But you forgot that this is the city that thrives on terrible ideas, replacing simple traditions with stupid media events that nobody can enjoy. That’s what’s happening today, the lil’ celebration to mark Mexico’s Independence has been moved to something called the “Nokia Plaza” in the totalitarian wet dream of developers known ridiculously as “LA Live”. A public event moved to private property.

Oh, and you thought you could just show up asi nomas? Ja ja, pero que menso eres! Nope, you have to buy tickets for a show of Los Temerarios, or you can go today to the Mexican Consul to get some wristbands. Because, you know, you don’t have to work or anything.

I’m not at all surprised by this selling out of our Grito tradition, but is anyone else as pissed as I am?

Screw that business, I suggest you go to Huntington Park instead.

Annoying Gifts Depot!

Say its Administrative Professionals Day and you need to get something for that annoying and loud receptionist at the front desk. You know, just so she doesn’t keep reminding you about forgetting for the remainder of the year. Or more practically, so that she might overlook your habitual tardiness. But where does one find the crap paraphernalia by which to appease the West Covina set? I’m always amazed at the mounds of trash people describe as ‘cute’ and even more incredulous that said items were available at an actual store. In the modern era. Plus I can barely believe they chose to look at these items, out of their own volition, all day long, at the place at which they toil, the 40hr cemetery, the drudgeria, all day long, can’t-wait-for-the-clock-to-tick, temple to mediocrity, the workplace,  anything but here, yes sir, no sir, thank you for calling, please hold, staff meeting at noon, a dozen donuts in the break room, performance evaluation, consider your IRA, no personal calls please, submit to your KRONOS master, donation envelope for ultra-sugary B-day cake of person down the hall, sign up for reduced price tickets to shitty local outing by noon, waiting to go home, the CFO wants to treat your dept to a “friendly” get-to-know-me-but-mandatory fast food lunch, the workload and stress piles on, yet the obnoxious receptionist expects you to join in with chatter about their stupid offspring and its impending move to some lousy college.

But yeah, so back on topic, you need to buy some junk? Let me show you where!

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2 Random Minutes on Brooklyn and Soto

And the accolades just keep pouring in! The 2 random minutes of action on some LA street corner is making a lasting impression on people. Oh, what an impression.

Today we bring you a corner I know very well, having spent many hours waiting for the 251 to take me back home. On this Saturday morning the traffic and peds were light, not the usual crush of humanity that it once was. There used to be much more street vending which made the place lively and interesting, but the bad planning dept has made sure they get their way. With the bad planning.

On this corner I’ve seen many, many checkpoints, where cars get impounded in the middle of the night and a family of 6 has to figure out how to get home to Huntington Park, I’ve had cholos tell me that they used to kill people and take lots of drugs but cuz of Jesus they don’t do that anymore, I’ve battled for sitting space on the window ledge with the nopal vendor, I’ve seen the buses pass us up cuz they don’t want to bother with the large crowd, I’ve seen murals tagged up and sometimes restored, and I’ve heard my fair share of annoying evangelists with a bullhorn.

Since they moved the bus stop to the Payless, its no longer as busy. But still, its a nice corner.