Everything Glendale

Filed Under: Celebrities, City Politics, News, Paul Krekorian, The Americana

We haven't done a news roundup for a couple of weeks now, so there's a lot to catch up on. Here's some noteworthy items that you may have missed:

• That roar you may have been hearing at night isn't in your dreams. The Glendale Police Department has issued a warning to residents to be on the lookout for a mountain lion that's been roaming the Verdugo Mountains.

• While Westfield is cutting the hours of its shopping centers across the country, The Americana at Brand will defy economic forecasts by keeping its normal hours.

• Our friendly neighborhood Assemblymember Paul Krekorian authored tax-credit legislation that aims to lure production on films and TV shows back to California.

• Time published a cool obituary of Glendale resident and punk rocker, Lux Interior, frontman of the Cramps.


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Filed Under: Airports, Celebrities, Glendale News-Press, Motley Crue, News, Tommy Lee

• A near-miss with a police helicopter in Glendale got Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee and his chopper pilot busted.

• The neighborhoods around the Bob Hope Airport may get a whole lot quieter because the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority is seeking to ban cargo carriers, airlines, and private planes between 10:00 p.m. and 6:59 a.m.

• The editor of the Glendale News-Press is packing it up and moving to Boston.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, Education, Miley Cyrus, News, Nicollette Sheridan, Shia LaBeouf, The Americana

• Did you know there's a firearms dealer in Glendale that converts old weapons into props for major motion pictures? Cinema Weaponry just made a deal to take the Santa Barbara SWAT team's old firearms in exchange for new ones.

• If the economic stimulus package that just passed the House of Representatives last week is finalized, the Burbank and Glendale unified school districts will receive a combined boost of $33 million over two years.

• Okay, so the reason why Shia LaBeouf seems to be always be "news" in Glendale is because almost every day he walks to his neighborhood liquor store to pick up an Arizona Iced Tea, like last Monday and last Tuesday. But let's give Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday a Shia LaBeouf break and point out that...

• Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana) was mobbed by screaming fans at The Americana at Brand and...

• Nicollette Sheridan was photographed on the set of Desperate Housewives in Glendale.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, Forest Lawn Cemetery, News, Shia LaBeouf, Tacori Enterprises

Here's a round-up of intriguing Glendale news stories from this past week:

• What a difference a day makes! Immigration officials who denied a Glendale-based Armenian man an application for political asylum—because he was supposedly a day late in filing—have been forced to recount.

• Glendale-based jewelers, Tacori Enterprises, won a $650,000 copyright infringement suit against an Ohio jewelry manufacturer.

• Unemployment continues to hit the San Gabriel Valley, including Forest Lawn in Glendale.

• Parents are rescued in Glendale after their kid threw a teddy bear down a hillside.

• And, finally, what Glendale news round-up would be complete without a few items about Shia LaBeouf? (Look, if more celebrities lived here, we wouldn't be so limited in our celebrity reporting.) On Wednesday, he was caught looking a bit sad on a friend's porch in Glendale. Later that day, he was seen dashing home and petting a dog. And on Thursday, he walked around with a bag over his head. Seriously.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, Joel Madden, News, Nicole Richie

Joel Madden, lead singer of Good Charlotte, has been a longtime resident of Glendale, but the blogosphere reports that his girlfriend, Nicole Richie, has convinced him to pack up and move to a Spanish Villa in the Hollywood Hills (with baby in tow).

C'mon, Joel, surely you're getting a better deal here in Glendale than the reported $6,500 per month you're forking over to lease your new home at Outpost Estates. And won't you miss The Americana?! Wont' you?!


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Filed Under: City Politics, News

Glendale is number one! According to the Daily News:

The American Lung Association of California on Tuesday graded 297 cities on their success at creating outdoor smoke-free environments and smoke-free housing and reducing sales of tobacco products. The report provided an overall grade for the average of those categories in its first State of Tobacco Control report.

Locally, Glendale topped the list with an A—the only A in Los Angeles County....

Glendale's high mark had city officials beaming Tuesday after imposing a strict anti-smoking ordinance Nov. 6 that limits exposure to unwanted secondhand smoke across the city, including parks, parking lots, enclosed public areas and common areas in apartment buildings.

Now the city plans to hire a fresh-air ambassador to visit apartments, restaurants and bars and engage the public about the ordinance, said Steven Koszis, Glendale administrative analyst.

Wait, wait, wait. Did he say "fresh-air ambassador?" Although it sounds like an intriguing job, I know that I certainly don't want someone coming to my apartment to school me about city laws.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, News, Shia LaBeouf

As long as Shia LaBeouf keeps living in Glendale, this blog will always have fodder. A couple weeks ago, the paparazzi snapped shots of the actor ambling home from a liquor store. This week—are you ready for this?!—Shia LaBeouf...gets into his car!

Yes, dear readers, it's a slow news day.

More Shia LaBeouf-in-Glendale pics here.


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Filed Under: Barnes and Noble, Blockbuster, Borders Books, CVS, Downtown Glendale, Glendale Exchange, Glendale Fashion Center, Ice Cream, Longs Drugs, Mervyn's, News, Shopping, The Americana, Thrifty Ice Cream

The closing of all Circuit City stores across the nation, including the one on Maryland and Broadway, is the latest big news of the worsening economy. (I'm generally an optimist, but 34,000 lost jobs can't be good.) This leaves downtown Glendale looking a bit bleaker—witness the gutted space where the Mervyn's used to be, and the Exchange shopping area is becoming a dead zone. Now, Glendale Avenue is going to take a couple of hits.

The Longs Drugs on the lower level of the Glendale Fashion Center across from Ralphs will be permanently closing its doors on Tuesday, January 20, 2009. CVS bought Longs last year, but decided to shut down this location rather than changing the name. This sucks for me because Longs is within walking distance of my house, and the Rite Aid up the street is not (though the siren song sung by Thrifty Ice Cream may be enough to entice me to walk the few extra blocks).

As if that weren't enough to dampen my neighborhood spirit, the Blockbuster on Glendale and California is closing on February 15, 2009. (Last day to rent is February 8; last day to return is February 19.) Which means I have to drive to the Pacific location or Colorado location for DVDs or stay home and read—I don't like any of those choices.

What will become of you, Glendale Avenue? As much as I love The Americana, I thought it was a pretty crappy move to close the Barnes & Noble in the Glendale Fashion Center and move it to The Americana, especially since there's a Borders just a block away. It's good planning for The Americana, but bad planning for the structure of a city. I live between downtown Glendale and Glendale Avenue, and things seem a bit off-balance. I don't like that feeling.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, News, Shia LaBeouf

Since Shia LaBeouf lives in Glendale (do any of you celebrity stalkers know where?), I'm actually surprised we don't see more paparazzi pictures of him at Zankou Chicken or Michael's or anywhere else, really, around town.

Well, alas, the star of Transformers, Eagle Eye, and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (say that five times fast) was spotted on Wednesday, according to Gossip Girls, walking home from an unnamed liquor store and drinking Arizona Iced Tea.

I would stop posting about these celebrity sightings, but I know how much you love them.

More Shia LaBeouf-in-Glendale pics here.


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Filed Under: Cell Tower, City Politics, News, T-Mobile

We attempt to limit the number of "newsy" items here on this blog because we've never aimed to be a source of breaking stories (think of us more like the Parade section of the Sunday paper or your old neighbor who is filled with timeless wisdom but never watches TV), but the ongoing saga of the impending T-Mobile cell tower on Cumberland Road just keeps getting more and more interesting.

Sunroom Desk has been keeping track of the drama, and Northwest Glendale Real Estate and Kendyl's Open House has reported that the City Council has ruled in favor of a 45-day moratorium on the tower. (Kendyl has pics from last night's City Council meeting.)

Some local residents also got to have their say on a news segment on NBC prior to the City Council meeting. Watch:




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Filed Under: Cool Websites, Farmers' Market, Food, Green Living, Montrose, News

A few years ago, my best friend moved into a swanky apartment in West Hollywood, right across the street from the Wattles community garden. On the way up to our hike at Runyon Canyon, we snuck a tour of the garden's periphery and saw, beyond the wire fence, an abundant beauty that reminded me of one of my favorite childhood novels, The Secret Garden. There seemed to be a hundred or more small vegetable and herb gardens, separated by a simple mulched pathway. Bordering each farmed plot were creeping vines and blooming flowers. We spotted busy gardeners, working the weeds, schmoozing under lemon trees.

I was insanely jealous. Here was a communal sanctuary, right along Hollywood Boulevard and yet too far from home. When I got back to this side of town, I rushed online and Googled "COMMUNITY GARDEN GLENDALE CALIFORNIA." Sadly, the search proved unfruitful (pardon the pun), as such a garden did not exist.

About a month ago, I became aware of the new Coalition for a Green Glendale, an organization working with the Los Angeles Community Garden Council in building a new community garden at 870 Monterey Road. The Coalition was founded by recent college graduates who have joined with landscape designer Guillame Lemoine (and who I recently had the pleasure of meeting) to "protect, preserve, restore, and enhance the ecological environment of the City of Glendale through conservation, research, education, and activism." Their website also shows that they've been working to make Glendale a more environmentally respectful city by taking even simple steps like handing out reusable bags at the Montrose Harvest Market.

Those who are interested in participating in the new Monterey Eco-Community Garden can go to the Coalition's website for the interest form. According to the Glendale News-Press,
the proposed plan includes communal fruit trees along the edge of the garden (which means anyone could pick 'em!), the possibility of 45 plots of land, and it would serve as a model for future community gardens. Under the current plan, "gardeners would put down a $20 deposit and pay $80 annually for a full plot, $45 for a half plot." Not bad for a year's worth of food and a small slice of Eden.

Visit the Coalition for a Green Glendale website.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, News, Shopping, Vanessa Anne Hudgens

Even though High School Musical's Vanessa Anne Hudgens looked all shopped out last week, she returned to Glendale on Monday to go mattress shopping. Zac Efron was once again nowhere to be seen. Doesn't he get a say as to the firmness and bounce factor of her new bed?

All the reports I checked about this celebrity sighting (which did not indicate whether or not she jumped up and down on beds like I would) did not identify the mattress store. Click the picture to enlarge, and see if you can identify the shop. I don't know. Is it one of those mattress stores on Central? Does anybody have the slightest clue?

For more Vanessa Anne Hudgens mattress-shopping pics, go here.


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Filed Under: Celebrities, Downtown Glendale, Kitson, News, Shopping, The Americana, Vanessa Anne Hudgens

What the hell is going on this month at The Americana that's drawing the Hollywood elite? Not allowing Britney Spears to hog up the Celebrities-Shopping-in-Glendale spotlight, High School Musical's Vanessa Anne Hudgens was also spotted at Kitson yesterday, looking, shall we say, a little underwhelmed. Maybe she didn't stay around for the fabulous fountain show? That would've put a smile on her face! (Or is she already jaded at 19?)

I have never been in Kitson. I don't know what it is. I don't even know where at The Americana it's located. But if Hollywood keeps this up (and perhaps sends a smiling Zac Efron to shop and pose), I might have to investigate further.

The Americana at Brand
889 Americana Way
Glendale, CA 91210
818.637.8982
www.americanaatbrand.com

[Source: Just Jared Jr.]


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Filed Under: Britney Spears, Celebrities, Downtown Glendale, Food, Kitson, News, Shopping, The Americana

We don't typically get many celebrity sightings this far east of Hollywood, but The Americana at Brand is enough of a glittery paradise to draw the likes of Britney Spears, perhaps the mother of paparazzi bait. She was seen buying some toys and pajamas for her boys and jeans for herself at Kitson last week. Earlier that day, surrounded by security, she ate at Katsuya, a Japanese restaurant. No news on her chopstick-wielding abilities. (Why don't journalists observe the things I want to know?)

And that's about as Hollywood as this blog is going to get. Unless Britney Spears returns to Glendale. And shops at Ross. And eats at Panda Express. Now that I'd like to see—her digging into a big plate of orange chicken. While admiring her marked-down skirt.

The Americana at Brand
889 Americana Way
Glendale, CA 91210
818.637.8982
www.americanaatbrand.com

[Sources: E! Online and People.]


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Filed Under: City Services, News, Parking and Traffic, Video Clips

Did you know that Glendale used to be considered the most dangerous city in California for pedestrians over 50? I don't think they give awards for that. But anybody who's lived here long enough knows that some of the drivers in this town are freaking crazy.

According to a CBS 2 report that just aired, Glendale is now 30% less dangerous than it previously was because of a new traffic program that has 17 cameras trained on 160 intersections around the city. Live video of these intersections are transmitted into Glendale's Traffic Operation Center at City Hall, where traffic engineers are watching closely and even controlling the frequency of red and green lights.

Creepy? Or cool? And what am I to make of the ridiculously ominous tone of the news report, in which they throw around words and phrases like "deadly" and "life-and-death" when referring to pedestrians and traffic? Ah, local news—gotta love it. Watch:




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Filed Under: Green Living, News, Parking and Traffic

Between Mister B's declaration that "Living in Glendale Will Save the Earth" and all these posts on Green Living lately, I've been thinking that this blog has become prone to gross exaggeration, particularly when it comes to Glendale and the eco-friendly movement.

But did you see the following announcement on the Los Angeles Times site?:

Clean Energy Fuels Corp. said today it plans to open a compressed natural gas station at the Glendale train station off San Fernando Road by summer 2009. The station will be open to the public and also service the city of Glendale’s CNG-powered Beeline buses and its growing fleet of CNG-fueled trash trucks....

Seal Beach-based Clean Energy, co-founded by Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens, is a major local operator of CNG stations open to the public, with about 20 in the Los Angeles area and north Orange County....

Natural gas costs the equivalent of about $1.65 a gallon at Clean Energy stations. That's cheaper than the $1.95-a-gallon statewide average for regular gasoline, although CNG's price advantage has narrowed considerably as gasoline prices have plummeted.

I don't know what "natural gas" is exactly, and I'm too busy this morning to look it up (maybe I'll go to the Wikipedia page later?), but this sounds good for the environment, doesn't it? And the fact that Glendale has been chosen as one of the cities to be at the forefront of the movement is pretty damn cool.

(On a side note: There's a train station in Glendale?!)


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Filed Under: Downtown Glendale, News, Shopping, The Americana

I'm going to kick off another week with yet another post about The Americana at Brand (I know, I know!) because I just read an article on a U.K. news site that covers the rise and fall of "lifestyle centers" and focuses on Glendale's $400 million complex. It amuses me to no end that U.K. readers would be interested in my little corner of the globe, but I suppose The Americana is such a lavish display of American consumerist showboating that everyone's probably heard about it by now.

Anyway, the article gives a short history of The Americana, criticizes developments such as this, and gets into the recent fireworks controversy. The most interesting stuff, though, is a side story that has to do with a man who lived in the Providence Place Mall in Rhode Island for four years!:

There are cheaper ways to live in a mall than spending $2 million on a condominium at The Americana. Take Michael Townsend, 37, an artist from Providence, Rhode Island. He used breeze blocks to build a fully furnished 750 sq. ft. apartment in the parking garage of the Providence Place Mall - using the public lavatories to get running water. He managed to live in the place rent-free for four years before the security guards noticed. “I was surprised at what he was able to accomplish,” admitted the local police chief, referring to Townsend's sofa, TV and PlayStation. “But what he did was clearly criminal. The mall is private property.”

To me, this sounds like an invitation by the Times Online for people to squat at The Americana. If I were younger and less paranoid, this is something that I would definitely do because how fun would it be to shower in that fountain?

Read the entire article here.



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Filed Under: Bamboo Panda, City Politics, City Services, Community Happenings, Events, News, The Americana

I was having dinner at Bamboo Panda (an okay Chinese restaurant run by, I believe, Koreans on Brand Boulevard) a couple Saturdays ago when the sky started exploding. When I got up and peeked outside, I saw that it wasn't some apocalyptic byproduct of the then-raging wildfires, but an elaborate fireworks display at The Americana that was set off to celebrate the shopping complex's tree-lighting. (The event, by the way, really cheesed off City Council members, who said going ahead with the proceedings in a time of emergency was "dumb-headed" and "ill-advised.")

There will be less controversy, I'm sure, at the Holiday Tree Lighting Ceremony at City Hall on Wednesday—unless, of course, I decide to streak around the tree. Here are the details:

Holiday Tree Lighting Ceremony

Wednesday, December 3, 2008
7:00 p.m.

Glendale City Hall
Perkins Plaza
613 E. Broadway
Glendale, CA 91206

This holiday celebration features choral music, lighting of the City Hall tree, and a special visit from Santa Claus! Free parking is available in the Civic Center Parking Structure (enter off of Wilson). Hot chocolate and candy canes will be served. In case of rain, the event will be cancelled.

Or maybe I'll try to pants Santa. Dare me to?


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