Couldn't help noticing the L.A. Weekly's Best of L.A. listing for Hope Gallery that referred to Chicken Corner as "Echo Park's historic Chicken Corner." I guess it depends on your definition of history, considering that the name "Chicken Corner" in ref to the intersection of Delta and Echo Park Ave. is less than ten years old. But I'm intrigued by the idea of declaring history in real time (more or less).

And now, your moment of zen. Gelson's 6:30-ish p.m., Wednesday -- it's late, off-hour in grocery shopping. A young pop soul woman sings brightly over the P.A. Baby bok choy, white onion, red chard. I am trying to recreate a vegetable dish a friend served recently (the result comes close but not close enough.) Bananas. P.A. stops abruptly. Half-aware, I wait to hear about a clean-up needed in aisle 91, or somewhere. A man's voice, mumbling a bit: "House passes bailout for 800 [sic] billion dollars." Different kind of clean up. Over and out. The singer comes back. Yogurt. Milk. Special fancy lightbulb.