Heirloom Bakery

It spent a particularly lovely morning at Heirloom Bakery on Wednesday. The air was calm and cool, the coffee was strong and hot, and the food -- the food!!! The food was so fresh and yummy I wanted to order seconds.

When you're gluten-intolerant like I am, you don't usually gravitate to anything with the word bakery in it. Lucky for me, Heirloom also makes simply delicious eggs served with thick slices of bacon and to-die-for roasted potatoes. (And I am pretty sure the sliced tomatoes on the side of my plate were from the Farmers Market.)

For those of you who don't have to avoid bread and pastry, Heirloom sure offers a tempting array of baked goodies. Plus, the cafe is now open for dinner, too.

In case you guys haven't figured it out yet, I'm a big cheerleader when it comes to South Pasadena's small business owners. Locally owned restaurants like Heirloom literally give South Pas its flavor. Get our there and indulge! (Just don't try to steal any potatoes off my plate. Seriously, get your own.)

Encore, Rialto

Rialto fans, join me in the South Pasadena Library Community Room this Sunday, October 2 at 3:00PM for Encore, Rialto, A Revitalization Symposium on The Rialto Theatre. Wonder how other old movie palaces have successfully reopened and found new life? Come hear an enlightening panel discussion with expert speakers from The Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles, The Alex in Glendale and the Pomona Fox: The program also includes music and a short student film about the history of the Rialto by high schooler Miranda Gontz. Speaking of film, I'll be there with my video camera recording your Rialto memories to include in my column for South Pasadena Patch. How do you think the Rialto can be brought back to her former glory? Join other friends of the Rialto Sunday and join the discussion. (Admission is free!) For my Patch column and historical video about the history of the Rialto, click here. For my Patch column highlighting how other theaters have been restored, as well as Part 1 of my video interview compilation The Rialto: Remembered and Imagined, click here. Update: check out today's post from the fabulous Pasadena Adjacent. It's all about another successful movie palace revitalization: Albuquerque's own KiMo Theater. Be sure to check out the documentary.

South Pas: Observed

Attention coffee and photography lovers...

This Saturday, October 1, from 4-6PM, the uber-cool Charlie's Coffee House is hosting a reception for my photo exhibit, South Pas: Observed. (Long-time Glimpses readers will recognize many of the photos.)

I must say, it's pretty cool to have so many of my shots hanging in my favorite coffee house. I credit Charlie's fabulous proprietress Kelly with making me a hopeless addict introducing me to Jameson Brown coffee. I've met many a deadline with the help of a large size brew with half and half. (Just don't drink more than one a day. True, you might feel inspired to learn Japanese in a single afternoon but, then again, your head might explode.)

It was hard to choose the shots to include, but I think I've managed to come up with photographs that represent many of the aspects we all love about South Pasadena. Stop by the reception to see them, and to say hi!

Update 9/29/11: See what Patch has to say about it here!

Look Up

I'm stepping into Shanna's territory with this one, but I can't resist sharing. The humidity of late has cooked up some interesting sunset skies.

Twilight: El Centro and Fremont

It's been a while since I prowled around at night with my camera. (Note to self: Prowl around more at night with your camera!)

Historic Mission Street

South Pasadena's business district boomed between 1906 and 1908. At the time, the South Pasadena Record reported, "Rapidly and surely the march of progress is wending its way from Fair Oaks west and from Meridian east."

The first man to build on Mission Street was Alexander R. Graham, who razed a grove of eucalyptus trees at Mission and Meridian and built this concrete building. (Graham named the building the Alexander Building. Lest we forget who he was, two years later he erected another building right next door and called it the A. R. Graham Building. Now, what was his name again?)

I've raved about it before, and I'll rave again: for the ultimate South Pasadena history, you can't beat Jane Apostol's comprehensive South Pasadena, 1888-1988, A Centennial History, Second Edition with Chronology, 1988-2008. Check it out at the South Pas Public Library. Or better yet, purchase your own copy at the library bookstore.

You can read my former interview with Jane right here.

Caption This Photo (#75)

I really need help with this one...

Coffee Talk

There are a lot of ways to satisfy your coffee jones in South Pasadena. Kaldi is a great option, especially if you have your java outside under the trees on one of these warm autumn days. (Just pop a Benadryl first if you're allergic to fall elm. They're pollinating like crazy right now.)

Speaking of coffee, I was listening to the XM Public Radio station yesterday and I caught the last part of a piece about how new words get into the Oxford English Dictionary. Apparently, one of the program hosts was trying to see if she could get the word "flatte" to catch on. That's flatte, pronounced "flah-tay" as in a shortened version of "decaf latte." A local coffee shop even joined in the fun and featured Flatte as their Drink of the Day.

Is it any surprise that not one person ordered a flatte for the entire day? Anyone at Kaldi -- or Charlie's or Busters or Starbucks -- could tell you why. Who in the world wants a DECAF latte?!

Still Life With Dirty Hands

I hadn't noticed Little Bit's fingerprints on the window when I took this photo. Now that I see them, I like the picture even more...

Scooping out oblong vaults

Guns,
Long, steel guns,
Pointed from the war ships
In the name of the war god.
Straight, shining, polished guns,
Clambered over with jackies in white blouses,
Glory of tan faces, tousled hair, white teeth,
Laughing lithe jackies in white blouses,
Sitting on the guns singing war songs, war chanties.

Shovels,
Broad, iron shovels,
Scooping out oblong vaults,
Loosening turf and leveling sod.

I ask you
To witness-
The shovel is brother to the gun.

--Carl Sandburg

Under a Bridge

Did you know these whimsical river rock benches are part of the base of the Oaklawn bridge? Now you do. They aren't the most scenic benches in town (that honor goes to the ones here) but they are wonderful in their blend-right-in Craftsman design. I haven't been able to find out if they are part of the original Greene & Greene bridge plans, or a later addition. At any rate, they're great, aren't they?

Teenage Wasteland

Decorating the inside of your locker was the thing when I was in junior high. There were no computers with graphic design programs and no high speed printers when I started 7th grade in 1977, so my girlfriends and I had to rely on back issues of Tiger Beat, leftover Christmas wrapping paper, brown grocery bags and magic markers we used to doodle our names in the same plump, psychedelic fonts we'd seen on record albums. There was a recurring theme in the decorating style of my fellow pubescent girls: lots of swirly flowers, a few carefully concealed 4-letter words, budding fashionista collages of Cheryl Tiegs and Christie Brinkley, the ever-classic "Hang in there Baby" kitten, some Charlie's Angels poster shots, more than an occasional bible quote. (This was, after all, predominantly Southern Baptist Texas.) And then, there were the photos of boys. Most of us were too young for boyfriends. While a few cheerleaders were already going steady with the jocks they'd break up/make up with all the way through high school, the rest of us made due with altars to those famous boys who paved the way for this generation's Justin Beiber. Shawn Cassidy was well-represented, along with his Hardy Boys co-star Parker Stevenson. All of the popular girls had pictures of Leif Garrett and the Bay City Rollers. The cooler girls featured Peter Frampton and Roger Daltrey. The really bad-ass girls had splashy shots of KISS and Tim Curry. As far as I know, I was the only one with a picture of Che Guevara. In this age of Facebook and smart phones, I'm sure locker decorations have fallen out of style, but the same archetypes are still part of middle school: the popular girls, the cool kids, the misfits. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't at least one offbeat girl at South Pas middle school with Che Guevara's picture as wallpaper on her laptop.