Stranded Ducks

Rain. We are having rain. The much needed rain has finally arrived and we are loving it. The hills are slowly putting on their green winter coats, lawns sparkle emerald green, and it is time to check on the river and the waterfowl.

The river carries a lot of water. It has changed from a comparatively gentle waterway to a rushing torrent, complete with the appropriate noise. The Los Angeles River roars.

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One should assume that the mallards and all the other birds are loving it. But actually – they don’t. They are hanging out up and down the banks of the river, looking slightly puzzled.

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Their islands are flooded, the current is too swift to keep up with. Any bird brave enough to hop into the water gets carried away at an unprecedented pace.

The only ones to get their feet wet are the black-necked stilts.

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I swear, they are looking quite smug. Right, they seem to be saying, you lot are always snickering at us because we prefer wading to swimming. With our long legs we can still wade. Can you swim?

LAX

Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate.

( Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.)

Dante / “Divine Comedy” 1308 – 1321

LAX has made it. It pushed Heathrow off the top position on my personal list of airports to be avoided at all times and under any circumstances.

Congratulations – not.

Huzita-Hatori Axioms

“The axioms assume that the operations are completed on a plane (i.e. a perfect piece of paper), and that all folds are linear.”

That is one way to describe origami. I like the hands on approach better:

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This beautiful collection (only parts of it are shown) came from Boston via Burbank to L.A. Thank you, what a wonderful gift.

Lotus, fish, turtles, cranes… such delicate examples of an old art still very much alive today. So very much alive that even the mathematicians could not keep away from it. Although I must say – any origami master would probably tell me that the secret is indeed a linear fold without having to throw out some complicated formulas of the axioms.

Don't Mess With Nature

We finally had the long desired rains. Lots of it. Good. We are at 97 % of normal rain levels in downtown Los Angeles after two years of drought conditions. The last year was the most severe.

The dreaded mud slides in the burn areas (from the fires last October) did not happen. Good.

But even in the city, far away from burn zones and hills prone to mud slides one can see examples of what happens when man messes with Nature.

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This is a California Pepper tree (Schinus molle). Despite the name it is not a native tree, its natural habitat are the Peruvian Andes. It became very popular in California because it is a fast growing tree and drought resistant. Perfect for SoCal, one might think – hey, let’s plant them everywhere. Which is exactly what happened. Hence the name California Pepper tree.

However, dear Schinus molle is not quite as perfect as one might think. Even though the foliage stays lushly green even with very little to no water, spending lovely shade, the branches and the trunk react in a different way – they hollow out and become brittle. The root system of the tree is another weak point, it is rather shallow and does not work itself very deeply into the ground. Why should it? Coming from the Andes, you don’t dig deep for water through rocks and stuff, you spread out to get whatever water you can gain from the surface seeping down.

So there you have it: A rather large tree, the perfect picture of health with full foliage, but with brittle, hollow branches and trunk and a root system only about a foot deep. Along come heavy rains with quite strong winds and… well, see photo above.

In the end Nature always has the upper hand.

Delayed By Parcel In Burbank

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Sometimes a trip to the airport can be an interesting experience, provided one does not need to catch a plane. Today was one such example, attempting to drop off friends who had to fly home. As they did have to catch a plane, they could have done with a lot less of “interesting.”

Apparently a suspicious parcel had been found in the terminal. That resulted in an evacuation of the building and the surrounding area. A bomb squad moved in and took care of the parcel, which was found to contain a small TV set. (This information is unconfirmed, but was given by an airline employee.) Suspicious parcel-scare over, business returned to normal and the whole incident didn’t last too long anyway.

The interesting fact however was this: The day before an anime convention had begun at a hotel near the airport. So amongst the many passengers milling around outside the airport waiting for some kind of information about their flights were quite a few convention goers who for some reason or other had to leave earlier. They were easy to spot, they wore full anime regalia.

Which leads to the question: What rattles a check-in employee more – a bomb scare or Mituki Shinomiya and Itachi Uchiha turning up at the counter?

On A Clear Day You Can See…

…the ocean.

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Winter solstice. The shortest day of the year was also sunny and warm, perfect weather for a hike in the park. The added bonus was the cleanly washed air after the recent rain, providing the happy hiker with a view of the ocean about 20 miles away.

That’s a sight one does not get to see too often from this particular spot. Whatever nice one can say about Los Angeles, “pure, clean air” is not among the attributes of the city.

Well, one can’t have everything.

Isn't It Romantic?

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Candles glowing in the dark always conjure up such romantic images. These candles were lit to greet the first power outage of the rainy season. They were first and foremost an emergency measure, not so much lit to cast a warm glow on a dreamy winter evening.

Yes, even though it is hard to believe, all it takes is a little rain (oops, a rain storm) and whole areas lose their power. The electric power, I mean. No true Angeleno loses inner power over such a trifle as a few hours without electricity. They improvise. They love the challenge. They cherish this sense of adventure. They are cool.

I, not being a true Angeleno, rely on my big bad Back-UPS. Once the computers are all safely shut down without loss of any data (the mother of all nightmares) I reach inside me and out come: improvisation skills, love of challenge, sense of adventure. I am not so sure about cool. After all, I am still an Angeleno in training.

And then, then it is time for a lovely glass of wine, sipped in the warm glow of candles. It is also a very interesting occasion to contemplate how people read before the introduction of electricity or even gas or oil lamps and such.

Lesson learned: Reading by candlelight is not something one wants to do every evening.