On Sunday when we went to the Pantages to see “Waitress” we started out at the Universal City station. Directly across the street from the Pantages is the Hollywood & Vine station. Naturally, it has a distinctly Hollywood theme to its decor.
LA Metro – Universal City
Yes, Los Angeles does have a mass transit system, including subways!
When travelling to downtown or Hollywood it’s actually quite easy to get to one of the stations on the subway, particularly on the weekend or in the evening. We don’t have a subway line terribly close to us (although there’s a dedicated bus line only a couple miles away that goes to the station at the end of the subway line) but it boils down to parking for $3 at the subway station that we’re driving past and $2.75 to get to Hollywood, or driving to Hollywood and paying $25 (or more) to park and having to deal with a ton of nasty traffic.
The LA Metro system, when you’re in that envelope where it’s going where you’re going, can be quite useful.
And a lot of it is gorgeous as well. The stations are all relatively new (the entire system only started twenty-five years ago) and there’s a lot of interesting designs and artwork involved.
When we went to the Pantages to see “Waitress” yesterday, we started out at the Universal City station.
Filed under Art, Los Angeles, Photography
Pantages
Tonight we returned to the room where it happened – to see a different play.
The Pantages Theater in Los Angeles was, as always, spectacular.
It’s a 1920’s design so the bathrooms sort of suck, but you learn to live with that.
Can you say, “Ro – co – co?”
Sure. I knew you could.
The play, “Waitress,” had a cast with great voices, some great staging and choreography, and one part in particular that was way, Way, WAYYY over the top and hilarious.
Hollywood Boulevard on a Sunday afternoon with all of the tourists and buskers and hustlers and people in costume – it’s our little version of Times Square. Complete with that certain smell (stale urine) which out here is cut with that other (now legal) certain smell (pot).
I love LA!
Filed under Entertainment, Los Angeles, Music, Photography
Clarity Eludes Me
Clarity eludes me…
…but Beauty and Wonder are still found.
Filed under Photography
Best Comment From The Airshow
(Oops, looks like I forgot to post yesterday! I remember researching something, apparently never wrote or pushed the “publish” button. That’s what? Four times? Five times? In over five years? “That will do, pig. That will do.”)
An ongoing repair in one of the CAF SoCal hangars led to the best line of the weekend.
Imagine the following, in an incredibly thick Scottish brogue which I won’t even attempt to reproduce in writing:
“Jesus Christ, you’ve got to have the fucking stupidest pilots in the world here! How many of them actually tried to piss in the thing before someone put up the sign??!!”
Filed under CAF, Farce, Photography
TOTALITY!! One Year Later
Yeah, it’s been a year. Damn.
We were right…THERE!
(Map courtesy of Xavier M. Jubier at xjubier.free.fr/en/site_pages/solar_eclipses)
(Map courtesy of Xavier M. Jubier at xjubier.free.fr/en/site_pages/solar_eclipses)
We had clouds and didn’t get a perfect view, but did we ever get a spectacular one, with storms all around us.
(Click for full-sized image – it’s worth it!!)
The two minutes and 38.4 seconds of totality were one of the most amazing experiences of my life.
Even through the clouds.
The next total solar eclipse in the United States is on April 8, 2024. (Really, check out Xavier Jubier’s website and maps, they’re spectacular!!) I’m looking at southern Texas for the best chance of clear skies and the maximum totality in the US (over 4:20), eastern Indiana or western Ohio to be with the most fannish friends (3:57 north of Dayton) – but there’s a good chunk of northern Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine that’s in the path of totality where I’ll tons of family and friends from high school (but only 3:33 of totality north of Burlington).
Decisions, decisions!
Filed under Astronomy, Panorama, Photography, Travel
No Context For You – August 20th
I don’t think the cavalry is coming.
Busy Monday. New crises to deal with and I’m still ass deep in the previous crises.
Busy weekend, not getting much sleep, still currently suffering from some BAD leg cramps at night.
Busy August, watching others have fun and vacationing.
Busy 2018. Watching the world shuffle insanely toward spontaneous combustion.
But into all of that, a few rainbow sticky notes must fall.
And power squids. As bad as things get, just imagine how screwed up we would be without power squids!!
See, things aren’t that bad.
Filed under Paul, Photography
Like Pearls On A String
Today was Day Two of the Wings Over Camarillo airshow – I was really busy and it’s been a really long weekend.
I’m not going to post pictures of the airplanes today. (I shot mostly video today when I was able to get out at all.)
But when I was leaving there was the most wonderful spectacle across the southern sky. I wish I could have gotten some really excellent pictures of it – but I couldn’t, I had only my cell phone and it doesn’t do particularly well in low light.
But I’ll give you what I got.
Almost due south, the first quarter moon was high. To the east, Mars was bright and red, with Saturn shining between the two.
To the right of that, Jupiter was high bright with Venus setting toward the horizon.
Like pearls on a string, follow the line from Venus to Jupiter to the moon to Saturn to Mars. There’s your ecliptic, the plane in which the planets all revolve around the sun.
Beautiful.
Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Space
Wings Over Camarillo Saturday 2018
It’s been a long, long day. A pretty good day, a good airshow – but a long day, with another to start early tomorrow.
Here are a few quick pictures from today.
(click to get the full sized image that you can scan through in detail to your heart’s content)
Right outside my “office” there was a Warthog and a Hornet – and a bunch of our planes – and a P-38 Lightning and a P-40 and a Corsair (yes, it was in “Black Sheep Squadron”) and…
When I’m busy doing the work, it’s important to stop for a minute every now and then and remember, ‘WOW!!“
Filed under CAF, Flying, Panorama, Photography
Wings Over Camarillo Preview
The air show is tomorrow and Sunday. I was out at the hangar tonight getting my financial ducks in a row (I am the Finance Officer for the CAF SoCal Wing, need to get cash boxes and paperwork ready for our various revenue points such as our PX booth [T-shirts, hats, toys, etc], our Beer Garden [margaritas, sodas, water, and snacks as well], our membership booth, and our ride sales) and took the time (I could I not!) to watch a few of the planes coming in and doing their practice routines.
Allow me to share!
(Click on image to enlarge to full size)
Our ramp has some sweet aircraft on it! Not only are our warbirds there, but there’s a P-38 Lightning, a Corsair, and a Warthog!!
Then the F-18’s started coming in and practicing. (Having two F-18s taking off in formation on full afterburners is an ASTONISHING thing to experience, even if it does leave you saying “What??!!” a lot for the next couple of hours!)
That sunset!! And then our Zero taxied in.
It would have been sweet to have the good camera (I didn’t, I went to the hangar straight from work) but this doesn’t suck!
I hope to see some of you this weekend out in Camarillo. For the rest of you, watch for pictures here and on my other social media.
For the really, really good photos (to be taken by pros who aren’t simultaneously running around like lunatics trying to be the finance guy) you can follow the CAF SoCal feeds on FaceBook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Filed under CAF, Flying, Panorama, Photography, Video
We Love The Stars Too Fondly 