The five-ton Mercedes Unimog U1300 isn't usually street legal in California, says Yahoo Autos. But Arnold Schwarzenegger has the money to customize and as the ex-governor he may know how to get his way with the regulations.

Brown skips Charlotte, Los Angeles River gets reclassified as a river, new taxes proposed for SM Mountains, Live Nation gives to Trutanich, steal a police car lose your legs, social media engagement bv the City Council and the Dodgers fall further behind. Plus more of course.

Alesia Thomas was described as large and not cooperative with police who came to talk to her after she left her two children at the LAPD’s Southeast Area station. Some of what happened next was caught on a patrol car's video camera, the LA Times says.

Today's usual afternoon thundershowers over the San Gabriels and the high desert smushed down into the basin this time, drenching places like Altadena and Studio City in some pretty heavy rain. Then it lifted and many rainbows were had, including one over Dodger Stadium. Fun diversion for many, judging by social media, unless you were caught in the places where summer t-storms turn into flash floods.

With Ayn Rand in the media conversation around Paul Ryan and the Republican convention, here's a look at the home that Rand used to occupy in Northridge. And what a house it was — if it still existed, the Richard Neutra design might conceivably be the most architecturally renowned home in the San Fernando Valley.

The LA Times says that Solomon Mathenge, who is 74 and lives in Lawndale, had his drivers license suspended for not showing up in court on a traffic ticket. His DMV record includes citations for speeding and talking on a cellphone. The mother and daughters who died have been identified.

Lawsuit against Farmers Field, Steve Wynn vs Joe Francis hits court, rise and fall of Mr. Cudahy, big waves this weekend, Rec and Parks' expensive closed camps, medical pot signatures and a save Patt Morrison Facebook page, plus more.

Author Michael Connelly is known for his LA mystery novels, but he lives in Florida these days and sat down in Tampa with Warren Olney on KCRW to talk about the sides of town the Republicans may not be seeing.

The Heidi Duckler Dance Theatre's latest work, "Kiss n' Ride," will be performed inside the city's Van Nuys FlyAway Bus Terminal on Woodley Avenue.

Whoa, this was decisive: LAPD Chief Charlie Beck announced tonight that he has relieved Foothill division commander Capt. Joseph Hiltner for his "severely deficient" response to the appearance of excessive force used against a handcuffed woman in Pacoima. "Proper steps were not taken," Beck said.

Instead of a Thursday press conference to appeal to the public for help, Councilman Paul Krekorian might shame his fellow council members into taking care of it like they do so many, many lesser things — or just absorb the bills in his office slush fund.

Preston Carter's car backed into a crowd near Main Street Elementary, hitting at least nine children and two adults. He has a clean DMV record — but has to wear glasses while driving.

Cool local Altadena story. An old stone grave marker for Owen Brown, the son of Civil War abolitionist John Brown, had been missing from its old spot in the Altadena hills for a decade or so, under mysterious circumstances involving a development dispute. It was found recently by artist Ian White, who got in touch with the Paul Ayers of Save the Altadena Trails to help relocate the marker.

The Glendale black bear incurred his third strike and has already been taken to an animal sanctuary in San Diego County. Plus: nice video of a young white shark and a humpback whale in the Pacific off Orange County.

Gerber, 41, had left a suicide note. His crashed car was found this morning off Angeles Crest Highway.

LAPD chief Charlie Beck, on the Patt Morrison show on KPCC just now, said he's very concerned by a video showing officers throw a handcuffed woman to the ground during a traffic stop. He said there are criminal and internal investigations going on and the main officer has been assigned to home duty. Watch the video.

I can just imagine the tragic news rippling through the day across several communities. Awful.

David Chalian is the Washington bureau chief for Yahoo who last month floated that weak and mysterious story asking if Antonio Villaraigosa was poised to become the first Latino president. Today he was fired over something he said during a webcast at the Republican convention.

LAPD stop in Pacoima under investigation, Sacramento interest groups pile on the money, Antonovich in North Korea, free masseuses, more naming abuse and more.

For historians of Los Angeles, and librarians such as LAPL maps Glen Creason, old reference tools called the Sanborn Fire Insurance atlases are invaluable. They can show a researcher what was on the ground in a specific place in, say, 1901. Here are MGM studios in 1929 and the city's former amusement park Chutes Park in 1906.

The county's Hall of Records might be the least appreciated of the government office buildings strewn around what used to be called downtown's Civic Center. I would bet that many visitors to Grand Park, which will open a new section on its back side in September, have no idea of the building's name or function. Its name is actually a misnomer these days — the county Registrar-Recorder took most of the eponymous records to Norwalk more than a decade ago. But the hall has sterling LA architectural roots.

British readers of The Guardian got a glimpse the other day of a Los Angeles they may not have known about. West Coast correspondent Rory Carroll became the latest journalist to take one of activist George Wolfe's kayak tours on the short stretch of unpaved Los Angeles River in the Sepulveda Dam Basin. Carroll makes some cogent observations, but first he has to find the place.

Out are short ribs, canned salmon, a triple-decker sandwich with tongue, macaroni salad and peppered beef. In are panini wraps, more salads, more breakfast choices and a cocktail menu.

CCNMA-Latino Journalists of California has picked up a competitor in an LA chapter of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.

Russ Stanton, the former Los Angeles Times editor in chief who is "Vice President, Content" for KPCC these days, has taken to the comments section of the station's website to further explain this morning's announcement that KPCC would drop the Patt Morrison show. She will keep doing the Comedy Congress segment and be involved with the station's other shows.

Sheriff's at the La Crescenta station say a resident in the Briggs Terrace area this morning reported the bear with the orange ear tag, presumably the one spotted earlier this year in the Glendale area. The Glendale bear could be getting closer to exile to Colorado.

One of Rep. Brad Sherman's new videos focuses on what he's done for the San Fernando Valley. The second, titled "Courage," is built around William Isaac, a former chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. who gives Sherman kudos for his opposition to the TARP bank bailout. View them here.

These internal moves at the Los Angeles Times aren't nearly as newsy as they used to be, either in LA or around the media biz. But still worth noting: Scott Kraft, the LA Times' former national editor and current page one editor, will now take a spin as the deputy managing editor for the front page, Column One and projects. In that role he succeeds Marc Duvoisin, who recently was named managing editor.

The Rafu Shimpo is running an open letter to the Little Tokyo community about last week's embarrassment at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center, whose new CEO vanished after his checkered legal and professional past was revealed by activists.

It has been two decades since artist Robert Mapplethorpe's exhibit of sexually graphic photographs of black men were denounced by Jesse Helms and put on trial for obscenity in Cincinnati. (The jury acquitted the museum director.) Now Mapplethorpe’s rarely shown "X Portfolio" will go on display this fall at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, "in a space beyond immediate sightlines."

Gene Warnick, the sports editor at the Daily News, will expand his duties to oversee sports across the Los Angeles News Group papers. His appointment follows the promotion of Daily News opinion editor Mariel Garza to a similar LANG-wide role. Also announced by Michael Anastasi, the group's new vice president and executive editor, is that LANG will fill four reporters jobs in sports, including Lakers beat writer. Read the memo.

Unclean jail informant, sports fans' conduct, Oliver Sacks drug-taking, a California magazine issue and more.

The other shoes have fallen at KPCC from the addition of A Martinez as co-host with Madeleine Brand in the morning. Larry Mantle's time slow move, and Patt Morrison's show ends.

Theater critic Don Shirley likes to peruse the new CTG seasons when they are announced and gauge how well the material fits the company's pledge to tell stories "inspired on our own streets” and through “collaboration with other Los Angeles theatres and ensembles.” Only this time, Shirley says that principle has gone missing from the CTG website.

Zocalo Public Square likes to tape featured speakers answering a few personal questions in the green room before events. Carla Hall talks about her best friend, her dancing style, her last voicemail, the time she spent the night with a newborn elephant, and the TV show that got her to LA.

Everyone got down safely, but there was a scary moment over Hollywood Monday afternoon. Helicopters for Channel 5 and Channel 2 were covering the report of a gunman in Hollywood when Stu Mundel, the pilot for KCBS' SKY2, noticed smoke spewing from the engine of KTLA's Sky5.

Married political analysts Sherry Bebitch Jeffe and Doug Jeffe don't pundit-ize in print together very often, I don't believe. But they forecast the November election's "defining moments" in a piece at Fox and Hounds Daily.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa isn't doing much for the people who elected him this week — and he'll likely do even less next week when the Democrats meet. He's in Tampa now doing CNN every morning with Soledad O'Brien, filling the role of Democratic counterpoint to the Republican convention. He also sat down Monday with KPCC's Larry Mantle and mingled with the gathered journalists on the convention's Radio Row.

The Lakers will erect a statue honoring NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar outside Staples Center this season, the LA Times reports. This is newsworthy because Abdul-Jabbar last year said in a huff that he was through with the Lakers in part because they had no plans to honor him with a statue — but had honored Magic Johnson, Jerry West and Chick Hearn. Kareem is the NBA's all-time leading scorer.

So far on Monday there have been just four earthquakes measuring magnitude 3 or higher in the Imperial Valley, and none larger than 3.8. That's a lot easier for residents to take than Sunday's swarm, which included two quakes over 5.0 and another late last night that came in at a 4.9.

KTLA sportscaster Rebecca Hall's weekend oops — in which she jokes during an on-air tribute to Vin Scully that he "should get his shit together" — has been pulled down from Big Lead Sports. Copyright claim by Tribune, which owns Channel 5, is the explanation. Well, the Tribune suits haven't made it to Deadspin yet, apparently.

Steve Lopez has a heart scare, Al Martinez told to write less about death, today's LA Times just 40 pages. Greuel and Garcetti pick up names, Valley Good Samaritans won't get a paramedic bill, and a KTLA sportscaster tells Vin Scully to "get his shit together." Plus more for a Monday.

Bill Davis, the station's president and CEO, tells a complainer via email that the Madeleine Brand and A Martinez pairing on KPCC checked out in focus groups and audience testing, is here to stay and will be expanding to two hours day: "I know a thing or two about public radio programming --and I like what I hear with these two." He recounts and pooh-poohs the complaints that came in from previous program changes, including the addition of Brand in the first place.

A brown bear that was reported hit by a car Sunday morning on Foothill Boulevard in La Cañada-Flintridge was located later in the afternoon behind a Starbucks. Fish and Game officials tranquilized the bear after it climbed a tree, but they said later that its injuries called for euthanasia.

Scot Graham, the LA Unified leasing chief who has sued ex-superintendent Ramon Cortines for sexual harassment and filed a $10 million claim with the district, says he first met Cortines in San Francisco's gay community in the 1980s. Now married to a man, Graham details in the Daily News numerous unwanted sexual advances allegedly made by Cortines, who is now 80.

LAT columnist Michael Hiltzik argues that the anti-doping system "is the most thoroughly one-sided and dishonest legal regime anywhere in the world this side of Beijing," a position directly opposed to the case made here last week.

Another in the periodic earthquake swarms that visit California's lowest-lying populated area has been bothering the Brawley area all day. With two more over 4.0 in the past hour, there have now been 11 quakes of magnitude 4 or more on Sunday and dozens of lesser strength. The two biggest measured 5.5 and 5.3, enough to cause scattered damage.
 
Sunday night: 7.4 quake off El Salvador with tsumani warning

The headline of the piece is "Venus and Serena against the World." It's thrust is that the tennis stars have come a long way from Compton to dominate the sport, with a close look at mom and dad. May be some new stuff in there even for those familiar with the Williams' story.

The trompe l'oeil bookshelves were commissioned by Lee Dembart, a former Los Angeles Times editor and writer, and painted in 2005 by artist Don Gray. Author Robert Crais posted about the garage door recently on Facebook.

Dodgers fans can breathe easy for another year. Check out our new story on Scully's five most memorable calls, by guest author Paul Haddad.