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SoCal Focus

SoCal Focus is a blog about the people, places, and issues in and around Southern California.

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Dr. Jane Pisano, who has led the the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County for the past dozen years, asked me to say a few words at the start of the museum's anniversary day events on Wednesday.
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Hollywood's latest critical hit is hitting a snag with audiences who are leery of its subject matter. But if history is any guide, this is not at all surprising.
Detail of Bottle Village in Simi Valley, CA.
Bottle Village is a fascinating place with an equally fascinating history. Although unknown in Kansas, it is well known in the 4500 block of Cochran Street in Simi Valley. Bottle Village is testimony to ingenuity, and the stamina and attention to detai...
Declining eyesight (but slowly, thankfully) and a distracted habit of mind have made the sounds of my pedestrian life more present than they might be for someone else.
Susan Straight and her dog walks among tumbleweeds along the Santa Ana River in Riverside, CA. | Photo: Douglas McCulloh
The tumbleweed. Even the name is round and rolling off the tongue. We are not meant to think they are beautiful. But right now, they are unique explosions of hidden beauty, growing lush and abundant in the vacant lots and roadside acreage and not-ye...
Consequences
Are these bills the politics of unintended consequences or examples of legislation intended just to dazzle and distract?
My cronut from Normandie Bakery. | Photo: Erin Aubry Kaplan
Discovering the gastronomical delights of a cronut on a day of treats is pretty timely.
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Odds are, you'll bring the things that matter to you when you travel. But perhaps at some point those things will falter, or maybe, for a moment, you will put them away. And then you will sit quietly, absorbing a world not remote at all.
Browning
The pause between the start of October and end of December (in a good year) or February (in a dry one) is a season of browns, despite the everlasting green that annoys New Yorkers.
Hizzoner
Problem: Homelessness, pot holes, earthquake threatened buildings, uncertain water supplies, and runaway film production. Solution: They mayor is working on it.
A concert inside The Forum, which reopens in January.
If the new Forum is successful, it won't be because of Inglewood but in spite of it. That's what some people think, anyway.
An oarfish on display in Japan
It makes me happy to know that there are still things beyond our reach or ken. Life on Earth is still full of mystery.
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