Rosh Hashonah

Sundown Wednesday is the beginning of the Jewish High Holidays. Wednesday night and alll day Thursday we celebrate Rosh Hashanah which is the Jewish New Year. The following is from the Judaism 101 site. 

In Hebrew, Rosh Hashanah means, literally, "head of the year" or "first of the year." Rosh Hashanah is commonly known as the Jewish New Year. There is one important similarity between the Jewish New Year and the American one: Many Americans use the New Year as a time to plan a better life, making "resolutions." Likewise, the Jewish New Year is a time to begin introspection, looking back at the mistakes of the past year and planning the changes to make in the new year. 

It is customary during Rosh Hashonah, the Jewish New Year, to start fresh and cast your sins into the water.  This is called the tradition of Tashlikh. This Wednesday, Larry and I will travel to the closest body of water to our house, the Ballona Creek flood channel, and cast our sins off!

Click to make larger.  So, THIS is how gefilte fish is made!

One of the many traditions during this holiday is to eat something sweet to make sure that you will have a sweet and happy New Year.  We dip apples in honey or eat some delicious honey cake. Sometimes, I will cook a simple dinner of roast chicken, noodle kugel (with raisins for sweetness) and carrots cooked in butter, brown sugar and a bissel orange marmalade.  The carrots are cut into little circles to represent coins to symbolize wealth in the New Year.

It's always good to review your life for the past year and think ahead to what you'd like to accomplish in the coming year. We all make mistakes throughout the year. The difficult thing is to try and correct those mistakes or to not repeat them. I'll give it my best shot! This year, my Cousin Lauren is having a Rosh Hashonah dinner at her home.  I look forward to having challah and honey with my cousins and her besties.  

Hometown History

 

Photo, courtesy of Los Angeles Public Library Archives

The caption for the photo above that appeared in the L.A. Herald Examiner in 1960 reads, "Commemorating the work of eight film pioneers who led the fight against Beverly Hills' annexation by Los Angeles in 1922, a 30-foot marble monument was dedicated at Beverly Dr. and Olympic Blvd. on March 9, 1960. A spiraling bronze replica of a strip of motion picture film is topped by a 14-karat gold star. Among filmland personalities taking part in the fete are, left to right, Conrad Nagel, Corinne Griffith, Mary Pickford and Harold Lloyd."

I was at this dedication. Sooky Goldman, photographer and reporter for the Beverly Hills Courier, recruited our Brownie Troop from Beverly Vista Elementary School to participate in the dedication ceremony for the statue. There was a photo of our troop, saluting in front of the statue in the BH Courier. My copy of the photo is long gone, but I still remember the day.

Beverly Vista Brown Troop, 1960 - L-R: Jeri, Denise, Allison, Erica, Jody, Ellen, Nancy, Leslie, Sharon, Eva, Ria, Mandy, Dana, Sandy, Karin, Gayle - Back row: Troop Leaders, Mrs. Milner, Mrs. Martin

Our neighbor, Sooky Goldman, later became active in the preservation of Franklin Canyon Park. 

The statue is still on Olympic Blvd. at Beverly Drive, right near Von's Pavillions Market. It's in the middle of this traffic triangle. I must go over there again and photograph the statue! I feel proud to have participated in this small piece of Beverly Hills history.

Memorial Day Weekend

Memorial Day Weekend is the kick-off for summer!  It is also a day to remember all the people who have served, and are serving, in the armed forces; our surviving veterans; and to honor those who have died in past wars.  Thanks, guys! Wikipedia's description of this day, Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May (May 28th in 2018). Formerly known as Decoration Day, it commemorates U.S. women and men who died while in the military service. First enacted to honor Union soldiers of the American Civil War (it is celebrated near the day of reunification after the Civil War), it was expanded after World War I.

Summer also means backyard barbecues, parties, the beach and vacations! We are experiencing some cloudy and cool weather here in Los Angeles right now.  We call it "May Gray," which leads to "June Gloom."  Eventually, we'll have plenty of sunshine.  Savor the coolness while it's here!

Photo by Nicole Houff

My local ukulele group, The CC Strummers are having their annual Memorial Day Potluck on Sunday.  It's always fun, full of great food selections and excellent conversation!  We are also holding an Open Mic with about 10 participants. Ukulele has changed my life!  I hope you also have a fun weekend planned. Try to stay out of traffic and just enjoy your current surroundings. There's a lot to be said for a home-grown holiday!

Birthday Week 2023

B-Day carnations (my faves) from Mr. Larry

I've been on a birthday roller-coaster since last week!  My actual birthday was on Thursday, July 20th.  We had lunch with Mollie and Jeffrey on Monday (Miolie's b-day is 7/23) at Bodhi Thai on Olympic Blvd. in BH.  Delicious! Tuesday, I finally passed my obligatory written CA-DMV test.  When you reach a certain age (ahem!) you are required to re-take this tricky test!  On Wednesday, some of the Ladies of the Uke took me to lunch at our fave place, Jackson Cafe.  

On Thursday, the big day, I was greeted with flowers and gifts from my Sweetie! After my online ZOOM ukulele class with Cali Rose (where the group sang "Happy Birthday" to me), Larry and I embarked on our b-day field trip.

6th Street Bridge View from the Street Below

First stop, the Sixth Street Viaduct Bridge. The original bridge built in 1932 was torn down in 2016 and replaced by 2022.  This is the longest bridge in L.A. spanning the L.A. River, The 101 Freeway and the I-5 Freeway. This bridge looks totally different from the original and the other bridges cross the L.A. River, which are Art Deco in design. It's a modern miracle.  The bridge was so popular and unique when it opened, that people were performing all kinds of stunts on it, driving too fast, getting into accidents, jumping off, etc.  It had to be closed numerous times for these knuckleheads!  It's been a year since the bridge opened, so we figured we'd be able to drive across without closures.  No such luck.  We got there and police activity had closed the bridge.  So, we drove around underneath and took a few pictures.

We head over to Al & Bea's  Mexican food stand on East 1st Street in Boyle Heights for lunch.  They make the BEST bean and cheese burritos!  I haven't eaten anything else there because the beans in those burritos are so flavorable, but I'm sure everything is good!  There's always a guy playing popular tunes on his guitar out front.  It's a pleasant and delicious time at Al & Bea's.

The famous bean and cheese burrito at Al & Bea's doesn't look like much, but it's divine!

On our way back home to Mid-City, we drove down to Whittier Boulevard (which transitions into 6th Street on the other side of the L.A. River).  The 6th Street Bridge was open!  We finally got to drive across.  A park environment will be built beneath and surrounding the base of the bridge in the near future!

Driving across the 6th Street Bridge, east to west

We stopped at home to rest up a bit before the next leg of our birthday field trip. Later in the afternoon we headed over to the newly refurbished Hammer Museum in Westwood. The lobby has been remodeled with some added gallery space.  We toured the galleries and generally enjoyed the atmosphere.

Yarn installation, "Uncertain Journey," by Chiharu Shiota in the Lobby of the Hammer

A crocheted man met us in the first gallery

Selections from the Hammer's contemporary collection

An entire room made out of particle board by artist, Roland Reiss

Mixed media piece by Noah Purifoy

For dinner, we tried out the Santa Monica branch of Bludso's Barbecue on S.M. Boulevard at 14th Street.  The BBQ was delicious!  The restaurant operations and staff could use a bit more time to get up to speed, but all-in-all it was a great experience.

I have a few more lunch dates this week and next!  Thanks for all of the cards, gifts and greetings!

The Weather Outside is Frightful!

Winter 2022.  It's very cold across the world.  It's cold in Los Angeles, but warm compared to other parts of North America.  For me, I'm cold when the thermometer drops to below 65 degrees. Time to get out the bulky yarn and knit and/or crochet a BULKY KNIT item!  I have tons of vintage knit patterns lining my bookshelves.  I've been collecting these old pattern books since I started knitting as a little girl, way back in the 1960's.  I've been rummaging through my books and have come up with some fabulous chunky knits to whip up for this cold snap.  Behold:

Fat yarn, large needles...these sweaters are quick and jiffy to work up!  The only problem with these chunky and bulky knits is that I'm rather chunky and bulky myself.  These types of sweaters just add to that bulky Babushka-lady look of my ancestors.  Oh well...who am I to go against my Ukrainian roots! 

These MEGA knits are coming around again in fashion circles.  Take a look at some recent runway favorites:

Please note that these high-fashion MEGA knits are shown on clothes-hanger skinny models.  

Eh!  Who cares!  I'm freezing.  I'm gonna whip out my size 13 needles and double up some yarn and knit a SUPER-CARDI this weekend!

Happy New Year, my friends.  I'll be here at Chez Bloom Underhill under a pile o' yarn!

Thanksgiving at the Office

Kevin's Perky Turkey Sugar Cookies

Happy pre-Thanksgiving to all! I hope you have a marvelous, stress-free day. Next Thursday. About 18 of our family will be convening at my cousin Carolyn's home in Valencia. We're all helping with the dinner.
If you want to contribute to your family's Thanksgiving feast, you can bake Kevin's easy Perky Turkey Sugar Cookies, pictured above. We used to have a progressive Thanksgiving lunch at my office. Everyone brought a dish.

Here's my interpretation of Kevin's recipe:
Get some of that Pillsbury Sugar Cookie dough in the deli aisle of your supermarket...you know, the kind you slice down. In the cake section, pick up some squeezable cake frosting in white, orange and black. You'll find candy corn in the candy aisle. Bake the cookies according to package directions. Smoosh a bit of white frosting on the top curve of the cookie, smash in the candy corns. Draw in the eyes, beak and turkey gobbler neck with the proper color of frosting! Done! Proudly serve your Perky Turkey Sugar Cookies!

Another marvy recipe gleaned from a co-worker is Jelled Cranberry Mold. Rochelle brought this divine dish. As you can see by the photo below, I liked it alot.

Office Progressive T-Giving Luncheon

Rochelle's Jelled Cranberry Mold
1 large box cherry Jello™
1 can whole cranberry sauce
1 can crushed pineapple (blue can with syrup)
1 cup chopped walnuts
Dissolve the Jello™ in 2 cups boiling (or very hot) water. Add all the other ingredients, mix well and chill...that's it!
Rochelle's tip: She usually switches bowls after dissolving the Jello™ since it leaves a grainy coating on the bowl. Next, she adds the cranberry sauce and uses a fork or spoon to really mash it up well (so you don't get chunks of cranberry sauce)...then the crushed pineapple and lastly the nuts.

The only bad thing about eating out for Thanksgiving is that there are no leftovers! I love these recipes so much, that I'll probably whip them up after the big day, along with a turkey breast, some yams, stuffing and creamed spinach for my sweetie pie! Barbie has the right idea.  Serve plastic food. No muss, no fuss!

Fall Back

The saying goes, "Spring Forward, Fall Back."  It's all about that one hour!  The practice began as a way to extend daytime working hours and conserve energy during the World Wars. The time change became a national standard in the U.S. in 1966 with the passage of the Uniform Time Act. It requires states to either change clocks at a specified time or remain with standard time throughout the year. Arizona and Hawaii are the only states to not observe daylight saving time. But in recent years, multiple states have shown interest in having daylight saving time last year-round, citing reasons such as more daylight after school and a decrease in robberies. Eighteen states have passed laws or resolutions to this end.  

I do like Daylight Saving Time, when it doesn't get dark until later in the day. It's good for driving at rush hour.  Whatever.  I just know that this Sunday, we'll get one extra hour of sleep!

BHHS Class of 1970 - WELCOME!

We are ready! The Reunion Committee for the Beverly Hills High School Class of 1970 has been planning our 50th reunion for 3 years! We started planning in 2019, one year before the supposed event. Well, you know what happened in 2020 and in 2021...the PLAGUE! We could not hold our reunion! FINALLY, in 2022, we are ready to par-tay! We're holding the reunion this weekend at The Skirball Cultural Center in their OUTSIDE Taper Courtyard. The name-badges are printed. The centerpieces are ready. The dinner choices have been selected. Now, all we have to do is gussy ourselves up and get over to the event! On Sunday, August 7th we've invited the Classes of 1969 and 1971 to join us in a BYO-Picnic at our beloved Roxbury Park in Beverly Hills. We will be showing our school movies, The Norman Newsreel and have a few other fun displays.

SEE YOU THIS WEEKEND!

Beverly Hills Monument

Photo Courtesy of Los Angeles Public Library Archives

The caption for the photo above that appeared in the L.A. Herald Examiner in 1960 reads, "Commemorating the work of eight film pioneers who led the fight against Beverly Hills' annexation by Los Angeles in 1922, a 30-foot marble monument was dedicated at Beverly Dr. and Olympic Blvd. on March 9, 1960. A spiraling bronze replica of a strip of motion picture film is topped by a 14-karat gold star. Among filmland personalities taking part in the fete are, left to right, Conrad Nagel, Corinne Griffith, Mary Pickford and Harold Lloyd."

I was at this dedication. Sooky Goldman, photographer and reporter for the Beverly Hills Courier, recruited our Brownie Troop from Beverly Vista Elementary School to participate in the dedication ceremony for the statue. There was a photo of our troop, saluting in front of the statue in the BH Courier. My copy of the BH Courier photo is long gone, but I still remember the day.

Beverly Vista Brown Troop, 1960 - L-R: Jeri, Denise, Alison, Erica, Jody, Ellen, Nancy, Leslie, Sharon, Eva, Ria, Mandy, Dana, Sandy, Karin, Gayle - Back row: Troop Leaders, Mrs. Milner, Mrs. Martin

Our neighbor, Sooky Goldman, later became active in the preservation of Franklin Canyon Park. 

The statue is still on Olympic Blvd. at Beverly Drive, right near Von's Pavillions Market. It's in the middle of this traffic triangle. I must go over there again and photograph the statue! I feel proud to have participated in this small piece of Beverly Hills history.

BH Sculpture in 2021. Photo by James Kraus

21 Years Later, Back on the Radio

Mary Katherine Aldin's Master Control

This past Sunday I had the pleasure of being the guest host on KPFK's "Preaching the Blues." Regular host, Mary Katherine Aldin invited me. The show has been on the air for decades. When I was listening a lot in the late 1980s and early 1990s the host was Ed "The Geezer" Archer. He was always full of entertaining stories about blues performers. That's what makes a radio show interesting to me, hearing about the lives of the players and little tid-bits about their performances.  I tried to bring some of that to the show on Sunday night.

For 8 years I co-hosted the "Friday Night Blues Revue" on KPCC-FM with John "Juke" Logan (RIP). Juke was a very well-known harmonica and keyboard player. He knew everybody in the roots and blues music scene. Due to the fact that Juke knew so many musicians, we had great guests on our radio show. This resulted in a CD, produced by Jerry Hall, called "Friday Night Live" compiling so many of the live performances from our 8 years on the air. The CD is documentation of L.A. blues players from 1992-2000.  Sadly, KPCC went to an all-talk format in 2000 and cancelled all music shows, otherwise I'd probably still be there hosting the show! I played many tunes from this CD on Sunday's show.

I learned how to engineer, announce, etc. when I was the board operator for "Billy Vera's Rock 'n Roll Party" on KCRW-FM in the mid-1990s.  I also learned a lot about rhythm and blues, blues, swamp pop, zydeco, Cajun and straight-up jazz when I worked with Billy and Juke. I tried to bring their spirit and knowledge to KPFK on Sunday.

Some of our in-studio guest on the "Friday Night Blues Revue."  Clockwise, from top left, Ladies of the Blues, Billy Boy Arnold, the Blazers with Cesar Rosas of Los Lobos, Ronnie Barron, Billy Vera, Rick Holmstrom & Johnny Dyer, Floyd Dixon

There's a LOT of preparation that goes into hosting a show, especially for two hours. Sometimes at KPCC, when Juke was on the road, I would host the show on my own. Usually, I'd just bring a bunch of blues compilations and decide on the spot which song I would play. On "Preaching the Blues" last Sunday, I was not the engineer. Mary Katherine was handling those duties. So, the CDs weren't in front of me for reference and back-announce. I had to prepare a spread-sheet of the songs and comments I wanted to play and talk about.

Also, when you're on the air live, you have to juggle the songs around to make room for station identification, commercials for other shows, etc. Luckily, Mary Katherine took care of this too. I used to be very nervous when I had to do this on my own. Many times there were equipment failures, the radio signal might get cut off or worse. There were and are so many things that can go wrong. We had a few minor CD player failures on Sunday, but Mary Katherine is a pro and knows how to yell at the machines so they behave!

Turntables are available for vinyl play

I tried to play lots of my Los Angeles musician friends' songs on the air. Naturally, I over-programmed so we ran out of time. It was fun though. If you'd like to hear the show, it's archived at KPFK.org. Just go to the "Archive" section, look for the show, "Preaching the Blues" and click on the July 11, 2021 show. It should be up for a week or two. Thanks to Larry for coming along and photographing this event and organizing the CDs for us. Thanks also to Mary Katherine for her calm engineering and announcing. We would have taken photos with MK, but she is camera-shy.

Leaving KPFK, the back door is filled with bumper stickers. So colorful!

All in all, we had a great time! If you'd like to help keep these shows on the air and make a contribution to KPFK, 90.7 FM, Pacific Radio for Los Angeles, Southern California and the World, click HERE.