Just For Fancy Musings of a self-proclaimed Fancy-Pants.

I’ve only got four weeks left here in the City of Angels, so in honor of my impending departure, I’ve decided that for the next month, I’m going to indulge as much as possible in those things that are peculiarly Angeleno — things you can only get here, or that you can only get that way here: Oki-Dogs. Sunset from a patio at the Getty Center. The acrid smell of burning “sage” on Venice Beach…

Last night I treated myself to a showing of UP at the El Capitan theatre — an extravagantly refurbished classic movie-house across the street from Mann’s Chinese Theater and the Hollywood & Highland complex on Hollywood Blvd (in Hollywood!) where Disney premiers its new films. As a theatre, it’s over-the-top nostaligia as only Disney knows how to do it: everything inside is gilded mouldings and velvet curtains, there’s a hokey live stage-show before the main feature, and — my favorite detail — an organist on a genuine Wurlitzer organ (one of only a small handful left in the world, apparently) who rises out of the stage to play Disney favorite’s between showings. Last night the organist gave us some selections from Snow White and Pinocchio, but spiced it up with some patriotic Sousa marches in honor of the holiday.

The movie — shown in 3D — was excellent. I went into it with very little expectation (aside from having heard a few vague but entirely positive reviews); last year, I saw WALL-E fully fully prepared for brilliance, and I was not disappointed. This time, not knowing what to expect, I was just as blown away. I’m not sure what makes me doubt Pixar every time; I may not have LOVED loved every one of their films, but I’ve never seen one that wasn’t worth the price of admission. But for some reason I tend to approach their movies with skepticism (WALL-E last year was a big exception); maybe it’s their marketing? Maybe there’s a little pessimist in me that figures they’ll have to flop sometime.

Well, not this time. UP is great. It’s not as stunningly gorgeous as WALL-E, but it’s (duh) much more human. There is a rich sadness woven through the details of Karl and Russell — details like Karl’s minute twitch of the hand when Russell tells him that the woman who told him he bugs his father is not his mother — that previous Pixar films have only scratched at, and that undercurrent of melancholy heightens the humor and makes a boxy old man and a silly-putty boy real. All fictional characters are reductions, but in UP, they’re reductions in the culinary sense: concentrated to its most essential, flavorful parts.

So yeah. It hit all the right spots, and I enjoyed it very much. Afterwards, feeling momentarily at peace with humanity and wanting to make the most of being up on the Blvd, I wandered across the street to the Chinese Theater (another quintessentially LA place) to stand on the famous footprints with the tourists and freaks. I hadn’t realized it before, but Michael Jackson’s walk-of-fame star is just in front of the theater — of course there was a crowd taking pictures and leaving flowers, and a sad pile of candles and bouquets and cards and junk left by mourning fans. There were people selling t-shirts and sequined gloves. The MJ impersonator I’ve seen out in front of the theater had (probably wisely) decided not to come back out yet, but Cat Woman was there, so were Chewbacca, Princess Jasmin, Bart Simpson and Jesus Guy.

Ah, Hollywood. I wonder if I’ll miss that.

Setting up the new blog has been a bit like moving into a new house, sight-unseen: I keep finding new rooms I didn’t know existed, all in varying states of readiness. Some are completely unfurnished; some seem to have some random scattered detritus lying about… I’m doing my best to tidy-up as I find it.

In the meantime, try to enjoy the content, and don’t be alarmed if things look different each time you land on a page. The work in progress continues to — you know, progress…

I gave up on the last design, and the idea of the thematic child-theme. A few weeks ago I came across the Carrington family of themes, most notably Carrington JAM (Just Add Markup), which is pretty much exactly what I’ve been looking for in terms of a truly blank slate on which to hang my own html and style.

So you’re looking at the first fruits of my labors. It’s not entirely finished yet, and it’s not been tested across platforms or browsers. I think I’ll be able to live with this a bit longer than the last few attempts.

The truly observant among you will see that I’ve broken this blog away from my portfolio site, and given it a home of its very own. I’ll be back later to document the last few weeks a bit more completely!

So, a few months ago I went on a little rant about how there is not one single solitary Dunkin Donuts shop in all of the greater-Los Angeles area, despite several false leads on Google Maps, and in defiance of what would seem to be a wide open market for the chain here in LA. At the time, there was a rumor that D+D was hiring for a new shop to open on Hawthorne Blvd in Torrance, CA. I had my doubts; — these Phantom DD’s usually turn out to be Baskin Robbins and/or Togo’s Sandwich shops (two Dunkin-owned chains that you can find in any strip mall down here), and at this point, it seems unlikely that a real DD could open anywhere in Southern California without some degree of attendant fanfare. But, since my own precious supply of DD Hazelnut is dwindling (despite my having hoarded it like a miser, doling out three or four tablespoons of the precious stuff per week since Christmas), and since I was going to be in the South Bay today on errands anyway, it seemed like a worthwhile detour.

And I suppose it was, because at least now we all know the truth:
there is NO Dunkin Donuts at 20022 Hawthorne Blvd, or anywhere else in Torrance, CA.

UPDATE: Since my trip down to Torrance, and the above post, a friend of mine was intrigued enough to go straight to the source to find out what, exactly, is going on with the So-Cal Dunkin shortage. This is what he got back:

So there we have it, straight from the horse’s mouth. Not only is there no Dunkin Donuts in Torrance, there are no Dunkin Donuts shops anywhere in the state of California.

Added some color, played a bit with borders & margins, &c… it’s not my favorite thing in the world yet, but I don’t hate hate it anymore. I’m messing about with the comments at the moment, but that won’t go live until I’ve found a reliable 2.7 update to the Sandbox comments template. Anyone know of any?