Deer Neighbor,
The scariest part of Halloween season in the Santa Monica Mountains is the threat of Santa Ana winds and the high fire risk they bring. We’ve been spared so far this autumn, but they are coming. This is the...
Orb Weavers: Artists & Architects of the Insect World
“What’s miraculous about a spider’s web?” said Mrs. Arable. “I don’t see why you say a web is a miracle—it’s just a web.” “Ever try to spin one?” asked Dr. Dorian. ― E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web The webs appear...
Topanga Film Festival 2022
Fall officially arrives on September 22, when the autumnal equinox occurs. The days are already growing shorter, and the temperature at night has dipped into the 50s for the first time in months. Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year,...
Sara Wan: Saving the Coast
Former Coastal Commissioner and lifelong conservation activist Sara Wan has died. She was 83. Whenever and wherever there was a conservation or environmental issue on the California coast, Sara Wan was there. She fought to protect beaches and mountains,...
Humor is a Funny Thing
Blistering heat baked much of the West over Labor Day weekend. Temperatures at the beach reached an almost unprecedented 102 on Sunday morning at 11 a.m. Beach parking lots at Zuma and Westward filled to capacity by early afternoon...
Homeworld: A Conversation with Singer Songwriter Tai Woodville
I still recall before the fall, when we were stars, expanding and changing. I still miss home, a home I’ve never known. —Tai Woodville, “Homeworld” Imagine a place of perfect peace and tranquility, full of light and crystalline beauty....
Wish You Were Here: A Short History of the Postcard
The postcard: inexpensive to buy and send, requiring only a sentence or two and a stamp—it’s the perfect combination of economy, brevity, and sentiment. This fragile bit of paper has carried more than just messages from far off places,...
George Bernard Shaw’s Day at the Beach
Irish playwright and critic George Bernard Shaw dropped out of the sky in Malibu on March 28, 1933. It was an unusual beach trip. The celebrated Nobel Laureate had expressed absolutely no desire to visit Los Angeles, but there...
Wish You Were Here
Nature’s Grand Hotel has its Season, like the others. As the guests one by one pack, pay, and depart, and the seats at the table-d’hotel shrink pitifully at each succeeding meal; as suites of rooms are closed, carpets taken...
Local Sting Operations in Progress
What is that feeling when you’re driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? It’s the too-huge world vaulting us, and it’s good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy...
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