Work it, Girl!

Damn RDJ! Lookin' saucy! You think the trucker behind him was honking at him?

Temescal Canyon Photo Essay

Lately I have been exploring Topanga State Park, the largest wilderness park contained inside any major city in America.

Temescal Gateway Park is one of the ways to access Topanga and its myriad hiking trails and fire roads. The entrance to Temescal is right off of Sunset, which is probably one of the reasons why the place was so damned crowded.

The entrance to Temescal Gateway Park. Be warned, there is a parking fee.

The park has several trail heads. The ridge/canyon loop is very popular. If you start on the ridge trail all of the elevation is at the beginning of the hike. We took the canyon trail first, past the waterfall and then back on the ridge.

Wildflowers were in abundance this weekend. Just a week ago in the Pacific Palisades we saw almost none.

Temescal park has several outbuildings, including a general store, a conference center, and some seemingly abandoned buildings along the canyon trail.

Lots of lovely conglomerate rocks to gaze at along the way.

The waterfall is about a mile up the canyon trail. Right after the waterfall the hike gets HARD. Switchback after switchback, up up up! Thought I was gonna die, but I made it.


This is the payoff. Check out that view.


And this one. Amazing.

Thank god for trail markers.

A bevy of yellow beauty.

This was one of the easier parts of the downhill hike. My toes were totally shoved into the toes of my boots the last half hour.

And purple flowers too!


This one was my favorite flower. She was all by herself on the side of the trail. Big and bright!

Overall great hike if you can stand to be hiking with plenty of other people. Short but plenty of different things to see and if you choose not to do the loop you can keep heading out the canyon trail to a place called "Skull Rock," which I most certainly plan on checking out next time.

Go Girl Scouts Go!

This story was in the L.A. Times today about a girl scout that warned both a local city and the state transportation authority about a dangerous intersection where train accidents were likely.

She did a powerpoint presentation for the City of La Canada just last month which was forwarded to CalTrans, but no one actually listened to her. Then, earlier this week another accident happened in the same place--a fatal accident that could have been prevented had the City and CalTrans heeded the girl scout's warning.

Girl Scouts is important y'all. Seriously. I learned stuff like what bark I could use to light a fire even when it was raining, that rose petals are edible, and how to rappel. Not to mention how to make and market majorly kick-ass meatball sandwiches.

I'm so proud of Ms. Malia Mailes, even though the asshats at Caltrans and the City of La Canada totally ignored her warnings. Maybe next time they'll take a 16-year-old with a powerpoint presentation a little more seriously.

The True Age Test

I realized over the weekend that I am O.L.D. No, it wasn't the muscle aches after hiking (although that did confirm it for me). It was the TV that did it.

Back in the day, when I got my hands on the channel box (as I like to call it, much to T-man's dismay) I went straight to MTV. Of course, we only had one MTV, rather than many there are now. And it played at least some music videos. And maybe the Real World. But I digress.

I don't think I've watched MTV for about five years. I found the channel this weekend for about three seconds and I couldn't get away from it fast enough. What is this crap? At that moment, when I was choosing to watch CNN prime news rather than MTV, it struck me that the transformation is complete.

I am getting gray hair (thanks Mom!).

I am getting achy old-lady hips (thanks Grandma!).

I can't stand loud commercials (thanks Dad!).

And I can't watch MTV anymore to save my life. But I still like by circa 1982 MTV t-shirt that my Dad snagged for me back when I was a little kid. It looks just like the logo above, same colors and everything, and it's awesome.

Damn That's A Big Gun

Seriously, I think it's gotta be a .50 caliber, dontcha think? All I know is Ms. Twin Bullet better use two hand to shoot that puppy.

Move over Stan Lee. I just created a super hero. This website lets you create your own customized hero. Soooooo much more fun that writing serious legal things.

My favorite is her mask. Wouldn't it be nice to have one of those bad boys to put on sometimes?

Pink guns were not my first choice, but hey, pink gun, black gun, silver gun, all of them are gonna kill bad guys, right?

Its as if someone got into my head and asked what the most fabulous Easter gift could possibly be.........

And then gave the idea to McDonald's.

You know how we have the Shamrock Shake? In Britain they got the Cadbury Creme Egg McFlurry. My head just exploded.

I absolutely love Cadbury Creme Eggs. On Easter day I will go to the local market and buy out their display (which goes on sale on Easter day) and enjoy Creme Eggs for weeks afterward. Okay, the part about weeks was a lie, I can't let Creme Eggs sit in my house without eating them. For days afterward. Days. I swear I won't eat ALL of them on Easter day.

Once I found out about this, I learned a little more about Cadbury.

And dammit, I found out I was right that they reduced the size of Cadbury Creme Eggs! But only in America! Damn Brits!!!!

Yum. Chocolate. Only 35 days to go.

Bad News and More Bad News

A man whose voice I heard almost every day as a high schooler has died. Probably most of us have heard Paul Harvey on the radio. At WFRM we played his vignettes every day. They were short and usually inspirational stories with a somewhat surprise ending. He did his own commercials. Very old school. Very cool. Never again will we hear The Rest of the Story.

The Other bad news is that I will continue making less than my male counterparts no matter how dumb and lazy they are. And not just a little less, I'm talking 22% less. My dot on the graph is the highest brown one. While women ALWAYS make less than men, the do the best comparatively in service jobs.

Wait! I am SO mistaken. There are TWO whole jobs in which women make more than men: postal clerks and special education teachers. Of course, it's only 4% more, which is nothing compared to how I'm getting shafted by the legal system. Gee, guess I aimed too high. Should have aspired to be a postal clerk. I could do that, I'm good at losing the mail.