Last year we did a lot of Best Of lists, and this year we are on a roll to eclipse the quantity and quality of last year. One thing I have noticed is there seems to be two ways to do a Best Of list. You can do a politically correct one for the hipsters and cynics - which is boring and a lie. Or you can keep it real and talk about how... [continue]

Ever try to get in the left-hand lane hoping you'll get that green arrow, but only end up waiting thru one series of lights after another? Imagine you drive a truck for UPS and you find yourself in that situation day after day, year after year. Then multiply those trucks by the tens of thousands. Think about how much gas is being wasted and how much CO2 is being released due to idling. The... [continue]

Kudos to LA Indymedia for pointing out this amazing fantasy that the LA County AFL-CIO is living in. According to the LA Union website (who are trying to fight for higher wages in LA), they believe that a single adult needs to only make $13.52 an hour ($28k a year) to "support a modest standard of living in LA". The AFL-CIO has broken it down to explain to live modestly, one would be able... [continue]

Approximately 5,000 people came to the Gibson in Universal City and paid between $25-$250 to hear presidential hopeful (and TRAILS the California frontrunner, if you believe recent polls) Barack Obama explain why he's in the race. His speech brought tears from women, commanded several standing ovations, and even made this little kid near us shut his trap for 45 minutes. Bon Jovi wannabe's The Goo Goo Dolls played, James Brown wannabe Ne-Yo performed, and...... [continue]

As soon as we arrived at the Obey sale on Saturday in Santa Ana I told my friend, "fuck this, I'm out." The line was longer than anything I'd seen outside Magic Mountain. All you could see were high school and college-aged kids in hoodies and tapered jeans messaging their friends and they were probably saying the same thing I was saying, "fuck this." But my friend was determined. She had Christmas shopping to...... [continue]

The Coen Brothers have made a very very good movie with No Country For Old Men. Josh Brolin is the tough guy that all men would want to be and women would love to come home to. Frenchy Javier Bardem plays one of the creepiest and vicious bad guys to grace the screen in a long time. Hell, even Woody Harrelson adds some comic relief for pretty much no good reason, but it adds... [continue]

People have been asking me what's up with the Weekly lately and hell if I know. They do their thing and maybe new management has made them lose their edge, but maybe they're just getting olde. Seems to me that once upon a time if someone like Juliette Lewis was in town to play a Saturday night show at the Roxy with a decent bill like Scissors for Lefty and Suffrajett, the Weekly would...... [continue]

The white smoke flowed from the chimney, doves were released, and virgins scattered to deliver the Good News that the newest Editor of LAist is Zach Behrens. Valley boy Zach has been a contributer to this fine blog since 2005, he's an outdoorsman, he sits on the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council, he's a vegetarian, he volunteers selflessly, and yes ladies, he's single. Softspoken, strong-willed, and determined to get you to ride public transportation, Zach...... [continue]

The Hollow Trees are the best folk band "for families" that you have never heard. By "for families" we mean little kids would love it as much as their parents. Mixing Americana, folk, and pop, The Hollow Trees keep it simple enough for children with the G-rated lyrics. The music, however, is authentic, pure, and as good as anything you'd hear from your grandpa's best bluegrass records. This year the Hollow Trees have gone... [continue]

Due to "human error" in tallying the votes, the crown that was placed on the head of Koreatown's Christina Silva, aka Miss Los Angeles, was placed on the head of Miss Barstow Raquel Beezley yesterday in Beverly Hills, and Breezley is now the winner in the all-important Miss California pageant. - AP Guess who's getting naked for Peta now? Film star Eva Mendez. And if her poster is any indication, she's really behind this...... [continue]

He's 30, he spells his name funny, when he's not injured he's tearing the cover off the ball, and he's got a gun for an arm. If he passes his physical Andruw Jones will be on the happy end of a $36.2 million, two-year contract to play for the Dodgers. But should Dodger fans be happy about another outfielder, especially one who had such a miserable season last year (.222 batting average, .311 on-base...... [continue]

Hi Most Deceptive Sign in LA, what are you still doing there? Oh, hello, LAist, but do excuse me while I go back to ignoring you. Well why on Earth would you do that? O I don't know, maybe because you left me off your little list of 25 posts that got you the most hits this year? Wait, you're not on the list? Why, no. No I most certainly am not! A thousand... [continue]

How much money would it take for you to go on tv night after night and be wrong about things? Millions? Tens of millions? Even if they gave you $10 million a year could you really enjoy the caviar, Hummers, and grillz if you knew that you were rollin in your 6-4 due to bullshitting America? Especially about war? Well every night Bill O'rly says something stupid or lame or embarrassing and the next... [continue]

"You see this watch? You see this watch? That watch cost more than your car. I made $970,000 last year. How much you make? You see, pal, that's who I am. And you're nothing. Nice guy? I don't give a shit. Good father? Fuck you -- go home and play with your kids! You wanna work here? Close! You think this is abuse? You think this is abuse, you cocksucker? You can't take this...... [continue]

Frommer's website for the Budget Travel magazine has an interesting, on-going feature where they ask "experts" from around the country to answer questions sent in from their readers in a chat. The experts have one hour to answer as many questions as they can. Afterwards the site adds links, corrects spelling (omg thank you!), adds a pretty picture, and puts it on their site. This morning yours truly was the special guest and the...... [continue]

Before the questions are asked, please let me state for the record that I graduated from UC Santa Barbara, a college sports powerhouse that hasn't lost a football game since 1990, so I don't have a dog in this fight. Having said that, I was a little surprised at how sensitive it appeared Bruin fans are about the firing of their head coach this afternoon. Again, I am out of the loop, but when...... [continue]

Some people hate the truth. They look at the scoreboard and they hate what they see. They look at themselves and they hate what they see. They look at others having success and they hate that too. Last night blogging.la did the right thing and they linked to our post about my resignation from LAist due to my new gig at the LA Times. Because the blogosphere is what it is, a small group...... [continue]

Reporting is tough. Transcribing is tough. Transcribing live on tee vee is totally tough especially if there's a damn fire raging. Recently a captioner working for KABC made a mistake that Snopes confirmed to be true. Live broadcasts can present captioners with additional problems: Multiple speakers may talk at the same time, external noise may render some speech inaudible or otherwise difficult to understand, and some words and phrases used by speakers may be... [continue]

Sea Wolf - "You're a Wolf", UCLA, 11/29/07 Sea Wolf @ Rhythm Lounge The Lemonheads, Racoon, The New Rivals @ The Troubadour Adolescents, Agent Orange @ Galaxy Theater Slightly Stoopid, Fishbone @ Wiltern Youssou N'Dour @ Royce Hall Too $hort @ House of Blues Jewmongous @ Tangier Steve Forbert @ McCabe's Ojos Rojos, Chuck Dukowski Sextet, The Sundowners @ Knitting Factory Big City Rock, Everybody Else, The Hanks, Girl in a Coma @ Roxy...... [continue]

Ghostland Observatory @ Henry Fonda Jimmy Scott, Hello Stranger @ The Echo Carole King, James Taylor @ The Troubadour The Raspberries @ House of Blues Cake @ Orpheum Aimee Mann, Paul F. Tompkins, Grant-Lee Phillips, Morgan Murphy, Ben Gibbard @ El Rey Chimaira, Kataklysm, Terror, Divine Heresy @ Key Club Under the Influence of Giants, Maxine @ Malibu Inn Bullets & Octane, The Ringers @ The Roxy...... [continue]