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Hollywood Park

December 23, 2013

After we had lunch on Sunday, we decided to take a ride up to Inglewood to visit Hollywood Park on its last day of operation. Hollywood Park closed after about 75 years of operation, a victim of way too many opportunities to gamble.
 


So, I asked Paula, expert on all things California, she being a native Californian, “why is it called Hollywood Park, not Inglewood Park?” Her answer was that the park was built by Tom Warner of Warner Bros Studio along with investments by many Hollywood Movie stars of the late 1930’s. So it was named “Hollywood Park”
 
 So we headed up the 110 to Inglewood on a beautiful December day. We arrived late enough so that the ticket takers at the gate weren’t interested in my $20, Woo-Hoo! We arrived in time to watch the 4th race.
 

 We watched the 4th race from down by the winner’s circle where we could see the horses coming onto the track. Picture taking was a challenge. The finish area was in shadow, while most of the track was in bright sun. Then we went up into the grand stands for a better view of the goings on.
 
 It was interesting to watch the many people studying their racing forms trying to intuit who the next winner would be. One man we talked to asked if we were betting? I said, “No, I’d rather throw a $20 bill over the railing.”
 


So it was 30 minutes of boredom followed by 90 seconds of action. No wonder all the action has moved to the sports book operations at casinos. You don’t even have to go all the way to Las Vegas anymore. So we stayed for about three more races and then headed for the gates. We didn’t want to be stuck in the traffic getting out of there.
 


So for the price of gas, we had a fun afternoon. No parking fee, no admission fee, no gambling. Done!
 
 – Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Inglewood, CA

Categories: California, Los Angeles
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Dodson House – San Pedro

December 20, 2013

Last week we had the opportunity to tour the Dodson house on 13th Street in San Pedro. Here is the entry from sanpedro.com

Built in 1888 by the Sepulveda family as a wedding present for their daughter Rudecinda and her husband, James Dodson, a merchant and one-time postmaster. Rudecinda Dodson dwelled in the home for the duration of her long life, becoming a notable local figure. Dodson House, one of San Pedro’s best examples of Victorian architecture, was originally located at the corner of 7th and Beacon Streets. Since then, it has been moved twice and has undergone restoration. Private residence, not open to the public.

Here’s an article written by The Daily Breeze writer Donna Littlejohn.

The two-story, gingerbread Victorian house — built in the 1880s by one of the port town’s early families — is getting some lively interest from potential buyers since it was put on the market and open for public viewing a couple of weeks ago.

Normally, the house has not been open to the public, but for weekends during the month of December it has been open for viewing. The reason it has been open is that the house is up for sale for a tidy sum of $800K. Such a bargain.

Here are some pictures.

The house has been beautifully restored. Someone probably put a lot of money into it. Here are some interior shots. Note the stain glass windows. Most of the plumbing has been updated except for the claw foot bathtubs. I can’t for the life of me figure out why one would replace all of the sink fixtures with ultra modern ones and leave the antique bath tubs.

So, who would pay $800K for this gem of a Victorian house? Not me certainly. The house is on the historic register, so you can’t change almost anything. The location stinks. It is right across from the San Pedro HS athletic field. Not exactly a tony upscale neighborhood.

Bed & Breakfast perhaps? Maybe, but there is no parking to speak of.

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Location:San Pedro, CA

Categories: California, San Pedro
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About me

November 22, 2013

There has been a FB meme going around lately where one is given a number and the receiver of said number is instructed to write n things about themselves. No one has bothered to send me a number, but I have decided to write about myself anyhow. I’ll let you know the number that I have given myself when I am done.

  1. I play the piano. It seems that I have always played the piano. I first started when I was about 7 years old. I took lessons until I was about 18. I am certainly no Artur Rubinstein, but I can read music and belt out a tune. One of the first things that we bought when we moved to Cal last year was a Piano. When one of our lodge members found out that I played the piano, he asked me how long I had played. I told him that I had picked up a book at Barnes & Noble titled “Piano playing for dummies”. He believed me. There is no such book. Musical instruments are best learned as children. My two brothers and I all took piano lessons as children. I am the only one who still owns a piano and plays.
  2.  Seeing that today is the 50th anniversary of John F Kennedy’s assassination. I was 15 at the time and I learned of the event while I was in religion class at BC High. I remember seeing the afternoon newspapers on the newsstands on the way home from school. Back in the day there were such things as afternoon newspapers.
  3.  And while we are talking about 50 year anniversaries, next year will be my 50th reunion for BC High (Boston College High School). I have no use for high school reunions and have no intention of attending. I have little or no use for the Roman Catholic church, though I like the new Pope. I’ve told a few of my RC friends that I would return to the RC Church when the Pope ordains women and allows priests to marry. Oh yeah, add LGBT weddings too. I doubt that I will see that in my lifetime.
  4. I am active in Masons. I am a member of LA Harbor Lodge F&AM #332 in San Pedro and Thomas Talbot Lodge AF&AM in Billerica, MA. So I am a bi-coastal Mason.
  5.  My wife and I are members of OES (Order of Eastern Star) which is a fraternal organization for men and women. I play the piano for both Lodge and OES.
  6.  I was born in Brighton, MA at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital and spent my early years living in Brighton and West Roxbury (parts of Greater Boston).
  7. I taught math for a couple of years at the Junior and Senior high school level in the early 70’sin Boston. I wasn’t very good at it. I have great respect for good teachers, especially good math & science teachers. I was good at math, just not good at teaching it.
  8. I worked for Digital Equipment Corp (DEC), Compaq, and HP before getting laid off in 2008. To this day, the layoff still bugs me. People were being discarded like used junk. Ken Olsen would never have done that. When people asked me what I did at DEC, I tell them that I fixed stuff. The “stuff” that I fixed were complex computer systems.I also worked as a contractor for IBM for a couple of years, once again fixing stuff. I left in 2012 to retire and moved west.
  9. I live in San Pedro with my wife of 35 years along with my mother-in-law. We moved out here to take care of her mother who is 89. I have found that I can make one woman happy. Making two women happy is an extraordinary challenge. So I try to bite my tongue and STFU. Lodge (for a couple of nights a month) gives me a chance to get out without the ladies in my life. I truly don’t understand how the Mormons (and other polygamous cultures) could possibly live with more than one wife. The same goes for a wife and a mistress.
  10. I attend the Ocean View Baptist Church in San Pedro. I would prefer going to a UCC (Congregational) church, but this is the church that our extended family goes to. So I am okay with that. I have started to push back a little bit on LGBT issues. The pastor is good guy and listens to my point of view.
  11. My wife and I are registered Democrats. My Mother-in-law is a Republican. We rarely discuss politics. Explaining why Obamacare is a good thing to my mother-in-law is like explaining algebra to Boomba (Boomba is a chocolate lab retriever). Also, for the same reason we don’t watch Fox News (or MSNBC or CNN) EVER. I would sooner have root canal surgery without anesthesia.
  12. People often ask my wife and I whether or not we met on the San Pedro or Boston. Here’s the story that has been told and retold. We met in Boston at a MIT folk dance. One of Paula’s roommates was dating one of my roommates. That was November of 1976. We were married in October 1978. We lived in Billerica for the next thirty odd years. Paula can embellish the story a bit. She would be happy to do that.
  13. I keep in touch with all of our east and west coast friends by way of Facebook. The move would have been a lot more painful to me without it.

There, that’s enough. 13 it is. That’s a good number.

Location:San Pedro, California

Categories: Boston, Family, Freemasonry, Piano, San Pedro
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Ranch House Restaurant, Gorman CA

October 23, 2013

I’m a little bit late in getting this written. Last week we traveled up to Fresno to attend Cal Grand Chapter of OES. By the way, California OES has a great new website that went online recently. Take a look at oescal.org for more info on the Order of Eastern Star.

This post is more about the journey than the destination. It’s about 250 miles from San Pedro to Fresno. I am sort of getting used to traveling up and down the state of California. On this trip, we got off to a somewhat late start. We got on the road at about 11AM. The hope is that the traffic will have eased a bit either on the 405 or the 110 through downtown LA. It seems that there is always traffic in LA.

So after about 2 hours of driving we were ready for a stop for lunch. 2 hours into our drive gets us to somewhere on the Grapevine. If you recall from some of my previous posts the Grapevine is a stretch of road between the San Fernando Valley ( aka “The Valley”) and the San Joaquin Valley (aka, Central Valley).

So how did the Grapevine get its name? Common thought is that the name was related to the many switchbacks one had to traverse on early versions of the road. In fact, it was named for the grape vines growing along the canyon. Here is an excerpt from an article about building the roads through the area.

The first white man through this area was a Spanish officer and acting governor of Alta California in 1772, Don Pedro Fages. He noticed an abundance of Cimarron grapes growing wild in the area north of what is now Gorman. He named the place Canada de Las Uvas, or Grapevine Canyon. Grapevines were so prevalent the wagoneers and soldiers had to hack their way through. Wild grapes still grow on the sides of I-5 in the pass. 

Another association of the name Grapevine was established during early highway construction. The engineers had to abandon the original wagon road up the canyon from the valley floor when Grapevine Creek overflowed during a torrential cloudburst in 1914. The highway alignment was rebuilt on the east side of the hill with a series of switchback loops to gain elevation. Thus the appearance of a grapevine.

Here is the pointer to the entire article.

As you can see from the map, the Grapevine is pretty much straightened out on the current I5.

grapevine

So we decide to stop at a restaurant in Gorman CA named the Ranch House Restaurant. The restaurant is a bit unusual in that it is not a big franchise restaurant like Denny’s, McDonalds, etc. Here’s a picture of the exterior.

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The menu is somewhat similar to what one would see at Denny’s, Typical breakfast menu, lunch menu is burgers, sandwiches. The food that we had was excellent. Service was excellent. Not too crowded. Here’s the review on Yelp.Com

One of the reasons that we stopped here is that Paula remember stopping here back in the fifties. Her father was a part time ranger at Lassen National Park. As soon as school ended for the year. The family would drive from San Pedro up to Lassen. As Paula tells the story, they would get to Gorman in the evening and she had to be wakened so they could get a piece of pie and some coffee. Then they would continue their journey and stop overnight in Bakersfield. Remember this was pre-interstate. Getting to Lassen was a two day trip. Some times they were pulling a small travel trailer. Pulling a trailer over the Grapevine was (and still is) a stressful activity for a passenger car.

Now here is where it gets interesting. We were talking with the waitress. I think that she had been working at the restaurant for many years. She seemed to think that this building was at least the third incarnation of the Ranch House. Earlier versions had to either be moved or demolished to accommodate road construction. According to Paula, the interior of the restaurant is much like how she remembers it from her days as a child going to Lassen with her mother and father.

Until next time,

Joe

Categories: California, Reviews, Travel
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Octoberfest – Los Angeles Style

October 14, 2013

We meant to do this last year but never got around to it. So yesterday afternoon we went to the Octoberfest at Alpine Village in Torrance. This has been an annual affair for the last forty some years in Torrance. During the months of September and October, Alpine Village puts on Octoberfest on Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons.

The Sunday afternoon affair is a little bit more family friendly. People bring their entire family from infants to grand parents. The rest of the year Alpine Village runs a restaurant and gift shop. But on the weekends they move to the huge tent. My guess would be that it is the size of a couple football fields.

Get your tickets on line. This will save you waiting in the long line to get in. They encourage appointing someone the designated driver. I was selected for the job yesterday. They put a green wrist strap on you. This gets you all the soda and spring water you can drink for free. People are encouraged to come wearing lederhosen or Bavarian Dirndl dresses.

So we loaded Mary K and Paula into the Jeep and picked up Mike up in RPV. And off we went. We had some sausage and bratwurst for lunch along with the usual sides like sauerkraut and potato salad. Tables are rugged picnic tables capable of supporting a tuba player in addition to the food and beer. So Mike lines up for the beer while Paula, Mary K and I line up for food. Lots of fun;

Here are some pictures:

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Categories: California, Food, Los Angeles
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Peppermill Resort & Casino

October 3, 2013

In my last post, I talked about the routes from So Cal to the north. It was pointed out by my wife (a native Californian) that there is a fourth route that exists. That would be the inestimable Rt 101. Rte 101 follows the coast from LA to San Francisco. This is the ultimate in scenic routes. You go through Santa Barbara, Big Sur, Carmel and a host of other photo ops along the way. One of these days we will do the 101,

So we arrived at the Peppermill last Saturday for the Nevada Grand Chapter of OES. OES is the Order of Eastern Star which is a fraternal organization for men and women. More about Grand Chapter later.

The Peppermill is a huge facility. Large Casino operation plus meeting and banquet facilities, Checkin went pretty smoothly. There was a short line, but it went pretty quick. The parking was valet parking though you could self park if you insisted. The bellman unloaded all of our stuff and got it up to room real quick.

So far so good. The room was good size. It had king size bed, couch, desk and chairs. Included coffee pot, wifi and all of the normal amenities. Wifi was fast when you could get a signal. It was intermittent at best. One strike for crappy wifi.

The decor was a sort a Queen Anne motif along with paintings of Tuscan motif. Even a painting in the bath room. It seemed a bit odd to me.


We attend four banquet meals during our stay. All of the meals were absolutely fantastic. Feeding a large crowd all at the same time can be a real challenge. The Peppermill wait staff were absolutely fantastic. I can’t say enough good things about them.

Okay now lets talk about the casino. Nevada is the only state in the USA that stills allows cigarette smoking in public spaces. I don’t really blame the Peppermill for this but the place stunk of cigarette smoke. They did have a small non-smoking gaming area. This was the first time in over 25 years that I saw a cigarette machine. $9 for a pack of cigarettes.

Casinos are designed to be a disorienting space and the Peppermill is no different. It takes a good long while to figure out your way around. I don’t gamble so I just had to make my way through the casino section. The noise is deafening.

We are looking forward to a trip in November to Las Vegas to a non-smoking, non-casino resort. Betcha didn’t know that such an thing existed in Vegas.

Overall, it was a decent experience. All of the events were in one place. We didn’t have to go anywhere else during our stay. If you don’t care about OES, then stop here.

Nevada OES is certainly much smaller then either CA OES or MA OES. About 20 chapters spread out around the state. Several chapters around Reno and the same around Las Vegas. Getting from the chapters in the north to the ones in Vegas is not so easy. There is I80 running from Reno to Wendover in the East for about 400 miles. There is no interstate between Reno and Las Vegas. So going from Reno to Vegas is a challenge.

That’s pretty much it for the hotel part of this post. The rest is about OES in general and Nevada OES in specific.

The folks that we met at NV GC were very friendly. They made our stay very enjoyable.

The registration process was oh so very easy. They had a single spreadsheet on their web site where you could select our hotel accommodations and the banquets that you planned to attend. Fill out the spread sheet and send it in with one check for the banquets. One stop shopping, so to speak. In CA and MA, one has to download flyers for each banquet. Write a check for each banquet and send it to the chairperson.

Elections were an interesting process. There were five women running for the office of Assoc Grand Conductress. None of the candidates were allowed to give a campaign speech or to campaign during the months leading up to Grand Chapter. The process took four votes before one candidate finally got a majority.
Candidates were asked if they wanted to withdraw, but were not required to do so. In MA the bottom vote getters would be required to withdraw.

Also Grand Sentinel is an elected office like in MA but not in CA. We think the GS goes up the line as in MA. Grand Sentinel in CA is an appointed office and does not go up the line. We met people from CA, AZ, ID and WA. Our thanks to Linda (Grand Representative to MA in NV) for being very gracious host.

So now we are in Utah to visit Neil. We are going to visit the Utah Museum of Science and Industry to see the Leonardo exhibit.

– Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Reno NV

Categories: California, Freemasonry, OES, Reviews
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Trip to Reno

September 29, 2013

We are on another road trip to attend NV OES Grand Chapter in Reno. We left San Pedro at about 0900 on Saturday. There are three main north south routes from LA to Northern California.

The quickest by far is I5 that starts in San Diego and continues through LA and then up through California’s Central Valley. There are huge farms that produce much of the vegetables that everyone consumes in the USA. Without stopping, we could potentially make it from San Pedro to Reno in a little over 8 hours. However, the ride is oh so very boring.

The second route is up US99 a bit east of I5. A little bit longer and just as boring. One goes through the major farming towns of Bakersfield, Fresno, and Stockton. Eventually you reach Sacramento and then head east on I80 to Reno.

The most visually interesting trip is on US395 that runs between the Sierras on your left and the CAL-NV border on your right. Lots of mountains, lakes and streams.

That was what we had intended to take. Best case should take 9 hours without factoring bathroom stops, gas stops, etc. But i screwed up in loading the GPS and we headed up I5. By the time we figured out my mistake, we were almost to Bakersfield. So we headed east to pick up US395.

Not so simple though. We ended up on SR14 that took us on a twisty windy road through Kern County and the Kern river canyon. We stopped at a place called Walker Pass to stretch and take a couple of pictures. This is some of the most desolate parts of California. It was also super clear on Saturday. The blue sky in those pictures was not photo-shopped.


So we eventually got on to US395 and continued our journey north. We were way behind schedule. Driving this road when dark is very challenging. Paula had me stop for a few seconds so that she could smell the ponderosa pines. She said she could actually see stars. You don’t see many stars (the astronomy kind) in LA. Of course I didn’t see stars, I was trying to see which way the road was going.

We eventually arrived in Reno at about 10PM. We got checked in and luggage up to our room. We had a gin and tonic and went to bed.

Next post will be about our experience at the Peppermill Resort and Casino.

Later…

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Location:S Virginia St,Reno,United States

Categories: California, Travel
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Portuguese Bend Horse Show

September 7, 2013

So yesterday Paula and I were looking for something to do other than grocery shopping or lodge or church. Paula finds an ad for the Portuguese Bend Horse Show up in Rolling Hills Estates. Better yet admission was free on Friday. So after we did the grocery shopping, off we go up the hill.

Now I know practically nothing about horses other than they are big, can run fast and jump. We arrive at about 1pm. Having a HP placard gets us a prime parking spot. The common folk have to park at a remote lot and get bussed to the park.

First things first. Lunch. Paula gets a burger and I get a quesadilla. Weather was warm, but there was plenty of shade and a light breeze. Food was good and reasonably priced. They also had adult beverages for sale, but we stuck to the soda and H2O.

After finishing lunch we headed over to the competition arena. They were just beginning to set up for the next event which was women’s 35+. They had tractors raking and rolling the surface while a tanker sprayed water to keep the dust down.

So I am getting the idea, that this whole thing has to cost a ton of money. This is definitely not a middle class sport. I was adding up the perceived costs in my head. You have the equipment, the real estate, the horses, the barns, the hay, the tack (saddles and such), fancy clothes. Man, it made my head spin. Certainly not for someone living on social security.

There were about 30 or so competitors in the event we were watching. All of the ladies were wearing the khaki form fitting pants (Paula says they are jodhpurs), black jacket and a helmut. My, my all those lovely looking ladies in their tight pants.

Before the start of the event, the contestants walked the course, pacing off distances between the fences. Then the event began. I was pretty clueless as to what makes a difference in the judging. We were sitting next to some folks who knew more than me who helped explain stuff.

They said it was more a test of the rider’s ability rather than the horse. On occasion the rider would miss a jump. There was one rider who fell. Neither horse nor rider were injured.

All in all, it was a fun afternoon. All the folks who were running the show were super friendly and helpful. Here’s a link to the horse show program.

Here are a few pictures.


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Location:Rolling Hills Estates, CA

Categories: California
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Labor Day 2013

August 30, 2013

Well, Labor Day weekend is almost upon us once again. Somehow, it doesn’t feel like Labor Day. So I was thinking, why not?

First thing different is that Paula and I are retired. Have been now for a little over a year. So holidays don’t matter so much. I don’t have to go back to work on Tuesday. We have been out here in the LA area now for a little bit over a year. For Paula, this was coming home sort of. She still runs into people around Pedro that she went to high school with me, the only people I know out here are the folks at blue lodge and OES. Even when we were living in Billerica, there was no chance that I would ever run into high school or even college friends. The community is way too diverse.

Another difference is that back east I would be putting the boat away for the season. Summer’s over. It starts getting chilly fast. Certainly too chilly for being out on the boat. I no longer have a boat. I didn’t have the urge to get a new boat either. No place nearby to use it. Besides, the kids are all grown up and don’t have the time.

Now, let me tell you about the weather here in LA. September is hot. Heat will continue probably through mid October. Even here close to the ocean, the daily high temp is in low 90’s. Monsoon season is also starting. It doesn’t rain much, but when it does, it comes down in buckets. Riverside (East of LA) had major flooding yesterday. Click here for a local story on the flooding. Of course with the flooding comes mud. Lots of it. Sometimes the thunder storms don’t bring much rain. They bring forest fires. Luckily for us, we are not anywhere near the big fires this year.

So Paula was looking for something to do over the holiday weekend. One thing she found that looked interesting was a bus tour of Art Deco architecture around Long Beach done by the Long Beach Historical Society and the Queen Mary. Here’s a link to the Art Deco Society of LA.  Lots of interesting examples of Art Deco around LA. Unfortunately, the tour was sold out. I put a reminder in my calendar to check next year. There is also a big affair going on at the Battleship USS Iowa. I suggested that we wait and go on Tuesday or Wednesday when all the kids have gone back to school.

I received a flyer from the Long Beach Symphony Orchestra. Someone figured out that I like classical  music. I told Paula that a concert would be a good birthday present next March. There will be an all Brahms program with Piano Concerto No 2 in B Flat and Symphony No 1.  in C minor. I will be getting tickets ASAP.

That’s it for now. Have a great Labor Day weekend.

Joe

Categories: California, Retirement
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And the Adventure Continues…

July 29, 2013

Much to tell. Yesterday started with OES Reception for the Grand Organist. That was in Rancho Cordova (East of Sacramento), That lasted until 4pm. Then off to Chico for reception for Grand Ruth. Ninety miles up and ninety miles back, We got back to our hotel at 12:30am.

So up today at 7:00 am and off at 10am. Heading east on I80 towards NV. First stop was at Donner Pass. Elev 7056′

The Donner pass is named for the Donner Party who perished in November 1846 after getting snow bound by early winter storm. Read the Wiki entry for more detail than you ever needed. See link above.


West side of the Sierras are verdant and the east side is arid. All of the moisture from the Pacific stays to the west of the Sierras. We stopped for lunch and then stopped at a rest area at Button Point in NV.

Bathrooms were the worst we’ve seen in all of our travels. Took a a few pictures. Notice all of the green is gone. All you see is sand, salt flats, and sage brush.


Button Point is part of the Humboldt River basin. Here’s the Wikipedia entry.

Finally after driving 435 miles today we arrived at our hotel in Elko, NV.

By the way, Mary safely made it to LAX to fly to SLC. Mike took her to LAX and Neil picked her up. We will be in SLC tomorrow to visit with Neil and his family.

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Location:Elko, NV

Categories: California, Travel
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