The New York Times is reporting that Lance Armstrong "has told associates and antidoping officials that he is considering publicly admitting that he used banned performance-enhancing drugs and blood transfusions during his cycling career."

The first of our regular updates looks at the Temple Beth Jacob debate, a Friday zing war between Garcetti and Greuel, who's covering the campaign for the LA Times and more.

Times columnist Bill Plaschke made a guest appearance yesterday on "Petros and Money," the talk show on Fox Sports Radio. His opening four-minute admiration of naked actresses, hotel room porn and especially the nudity of Helen Hunt in "The Sessions" has got the sports media chattering. Deadspin files the story under its "Gross" category and includes the audio.

Julio Morales cannot be convicted of raping a sleeping woman unless she is married, due to California state law, or unless it's proved that Morales knew she was asleep when he forced himself on her.

Female half of suspected child porn couple arrested, LAT says the answer to aggressive paparazzi is just to enforce the laws against jaywalking and reckless driving, Big Thunder to close for renovations at Disneyland and more.

The recycling of Christmas trees in Los Angeles County is actually kind of complicated. Some will be buried in landfills, but still be considered recycled. And it makes sense.

On a trendifying block of Ocean Park Boulevard in Santa Monica, between Bob's Market and Thyme Cafe, is a relic of another time. Owner Colby Evett, 93, goes to work every day, and is kind of famous in the world of models and radio-controlled airplanes.

A race in the streets, downtown, at night, in the middle of winter. It's a concept.

Tony Peyser saw our item this week on the potential closing of Cliff's Books in Pasadena and remembered a poem he wrote after visiting the store a few years ago.

Two Hollywood area narcotics officers have reportedly been implicated by four women. The accusations go back several years. The LAPD moved against the two officers on Thursday after one of the women filed a lawsuit.

Police in the Rampart division laid out for the media today all the stolen loot they say was retrieved from the car of Frank Chibbaro, a 38-year-old ex-con arrested hiding in a downtown garage on New Year's Day. It's a lot of stuff. Video inside.

Tonight's mayoral candidate forum from Beth Jacob synagogue will be live streamed on the website of the Jewish Journal. Good choice, since the forum moderator is Jewish Journal president David Suissa.

Child porn couple sought, Macy's to close in Pasadena, LA pot initiatives have the signatures, updates on the mayoral race, Greuel on guns, personnel moves at NPR and much more.

What is it about non-Angelenos becoming so obsessed with old filming locations that they spend years tracking down obscure shots and facts — then write books about their discoveries that become chronicles of LA history? When you grow up in Los Angeles, you get used to seeing familiar sights in the background of movies and TV shows. You just stop thinking about it.

Al Jazeera on Wednesday completed a deal to take over Al Gore's seven-year-old Current TV, which is based in San Francisco. A new channel, Al Jazeera America, will be based in New York, the NYT says. "Current will provide the pan-Arab news giant with something it has sought for years: a pathway into American living rooms."

On Tuesday afternoon, volunteers at the ACS/LA Gray Whale Census and Behavior Project at the Point Vicente Interpretive Center spotted a mother and three orca calves patrolling off the PV peninsula. Nice underwater video.

Page was to receive a lifetime achievement Grammy Award next month. The top selling female recording artist of the 1950s died in a nursing home in Encinitas.

For 25 years, Cliff's Books has survived just a half-block from Vroman's on Colorado Boulevard. Now everything in Cliff's large inventory is on sale for 50% off and they are hoping for a buyer to show up — and soon.

First morning roundup of the new year, after a bit of a break: politics, media, top filming locations of 2012 and the name of the paparazzo who died while shooting Justin Bieber's car in Sepulveda Pass.

A celebrity photographer said to be working "exclusively on Justin Bieber" had finished taking pictures of a CHP stop involving Bieber's car when he was struck Tuesday evening while crossing Sepulveda Boulevard near Getty Center Drive. The driver stopped to help and no arrest is foreseen. More inside.

These are stories, news or other items that I mentally noted and should have posted about during the last two weeks. Or I overlooked them completely until now. I was trying to spend a little less time tapping on keys.

Which all proves that popularity on Instagram does not reflect the actual world, or Internet culture. And that San Francisco baseball fans post more than Los Angeles baseball fans — and more than all the football and soccer fans in the world.

Westside playwright and screenwriter Gideon Brower has found community in the small crowd that gathers to watch the death counter on Santa Monica Boulevard reset to zero at midnight. "People cheer and drink champagne," he says. There's a twist.

The shutdown of the Barnes & Noble store in the Westfield Promenade shopping center leaves just two of the book chain outlets in the Valley, none of them within the city of Los Angeles portion (population about 1.5 million people.) The company had no comment.

Rep. Janice Hahn has been profligate with the press releases recently — but this one is actually worth mentioning.

I'm catching up on some locally prominent deaths I've missed during the holiday slowdown. Video inside: 17 minutes of "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida."

Junior's Deli in Rancho Park closes today at 5 p.m., and there are other longtime LA restaurants shutting down or already gone.

With a new board of mostly entertainment industry types, and a CEO on the way who has been at Fox and Discovery, it seems clearer that Tribune will look to sell the newspapers. Whether that's good or bad for the LA Times, it's too soon to tell.