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Fun Stuff

Pop Quiz: SoCal’s Most Notable Flora

Thanks to the region’s famous mediterranean climate, Southern California boasts one of the richest mixes of native and exotic plant life found anywhere in the world. But here’s a thorny pop-cultural question for you…
What does the Bird of Paradise pictured here have in common with the rose, camellia and California Golden Poppy?
One little hint: We’re [...]

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Spirited Getups for the Easter Season

Life in Angel City

I like Halloween as much as the next person, probably more. But when it’s over, it’s over — right?
Not for the good people at the Spirit Halloween Co., who’ve become incredibly innovative in their attempts to keep the seasonal marketing going, and going, and going.
Back in October I purchased a hanging skeleton at their Silver [...]

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For Auld Lang Syne, My Dear, Remember the Lyrics!

Tonight, at thousands of New Year’s Eve parties across America, a cultural tragedy will strike along with the midnight hour.
Countdowns will end, horns and shouts of Happy New Year will ring out, and drunken revelers will launch into a rousing chorus of Auld Lang Syne, only to realize within a few bars that no one [...]

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Photo Op: Seeing the Lights in Altadena

Angeleno Sights

Still in a holiday mood? That’s OK, because technically the Christmas season runs the next twelve days until January 6, when the Christian world celebrates Epiphany, or the Feast of the Magi. So, if you’re looking for something to do this second night of Christmas (or the third or fourth, for that matter), why not [...]

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Friday Flix: A City of Angels Holiday Double Feature!

Life in Angel City

Search on keywords “Los Angeles + Christmas” in the vast video wasteland that is YouTube, and this is the campy sort of thing that pops up…

For the more nostalgically minded, there’s also the following vintage three-clip Dragnet episode in which Sgt. Friday and fellow gumshoe Frank Smith perform the Christmas miracle of tracking down and [...]

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BlogoBuzz: The Halloween Edition

Dateline>City of Angels would like to take this opportunity to wish readers a Happy Halloween and announce a special treat: Before dusk descends and the little costumed urchins hit the streets, I’ll be posting this site’s very first Podcast Report. (Be sure to check back here shortly!)
Technologically challenged as I am, this podcast was a [...]

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Return of the Autumnal Witching Season

Life in Angel City

Who doesn’t enjoy those first telltale signs of autumn returning to Southern California? Shorter days… Cool and breezy evenings… The appearance of neighborhood Halloween superstores like this one in Silver Lake.
Yes, it seems the Witching Season is upon us again, earlier than ever.
Remember when Halloween was a minor holiday, with its merchandising confined to the [...]

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Friday Flick: Pacific Ocean Park, Circa 1959

Angeleno Sights

A few decades ago, a SoCal day at the beach often meant a trip to Santa Monica’s Pacific Ocean Park (POP), a 28-acre seaside amusement extravaganza designed to rival Disneyland. Featuring a Sea Circus, pier, funhouses, thrill rides, and even a few outer-space themed exhibits, the park opened in 1958, attracting more than a million [...]

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Pop Quiz: Where Was L.A.’s First Chinatown?

Angeleno Sights

As the world celebrates the Beijing Olympic Games, it seems only fitting to serve up a pop quiz paying tribute to the City of Angels’ Chinese community, which has overcome tremendous adversity over the last 156 years…
The Question: Centered around North Broadway, New Chinatown is among L.A.’s most popular tourist attractions. However, as the name [...]

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Friday Flix: Anticipating “The Big One”

If this past week’s 5.4 Chino Hills quake rattled your nerves, you’d best brace yourself for The Big One that experts say has a better than 99 percent chance of striking California by 2038. To help prepare you, here’s an 8-minute excerpt from a PBS documentary focusing on the San Andreas Fault and highlighting a [...]

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Friday Flix: Just What the Doctor Ordered

This week’s pick for most interesting, offbeat and/or entertaining web video sharing themes with this blog…
Searching: Daily Motion
Keywords: “Los Angeles + History”

PSA For Tequilla, The Wonder Drug…
by SaveManny

The Result: Daily Motion’s search engine must be broken. As noted above, I entered “Los Angeles + History” and this is what popped up. Do they mean [...]

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Pop Quiz: Hooray for That Famous Hollywood Name!

Names and Faces

Famous as the film capital of the world and home to L.A.’s mythic “Boulevard of Dreams,” Hollywood has come a long way since its founding in 1886. Carved from lands that once belonged to Ranchos La Brea and Los Feliz, the area was known to the region’s Californios as “La Nopalera” because of the huge [...]

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Summer Reruns: Raiding the Archives to Bring You the Classics

Don’t call ‘em a rehash. Think of ‘em as Summer Reruns — or better yet, “encore presentations.”
One of the downsides of blogging is posting an item you’re really proud of, only to watch it slowly creep down your homepage and eventually disappear into the Twilight Zone of your site’s archives, never to be seen again.
So [...]

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Friday Flix: L.A.’s Mean Streets, Circa 1898

Life in Angel City

This week’s pick for most interesting, offbeat and/or entertaining web video sharing themes with this blog…
Searching: YouTube!
Keywords: “Los Angeles + Landmarks”

The Result: How times have changed! Modern downtowners fret about hailing a cab to get from place to place. Nineteenth century Angelenos had to hoof it in every sense of the phrase, as evidenced in [...]

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Pop Quiz: Ready For Your Sunset Blvd. Close-Up Challenge?

Angeleno Sights

The Film: Sunset Blvd., the 1950 film noir classic co-written/directed by Billy Wilder and starring Gloria Swanson, William Holden, Erich von Stroheim and Nancy Olson.
The Scene: After leading two repo men on a high-speed car chase along a winding stretch of Sunset Blvd., down-on-his-luck screenwriter Joe Gillis (Holden) ditches them with a quick turn into [...]

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Pop Trivia Quiz: Grind Your Gears on These Streets

Question: Ask someone where you’ll find California’s steepest streets and they’ll likely guess San Francisco, where roadways like Filbert and 22nd sport a 31.5-percent grade. Hilly as the City by the Bay may be, however, it’s got nothing on the City of Angels, which actually lays claim to not one, but five of the state’s [...]

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No Bull: The Ring Was Here!

Angeleno Sights

Next time you visit L.A.’s Chinatown, stroll to the northwest corner of College and Hill, close your eyes, open your mind, and listen ever so carefully. If you’re psychic enough, you just might hear shouts of “Ole!” echoing from the past.
That’s because within a few yards of here, on the grounds of the Pacific Alliance [...]

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