Something extraordinary just happened in Malibu on Carbon Beach. Amidst the traditional preparations for summer--the sign-posting, the guard-hiring, and the state-suing--a homeowner has voluntarily opened a public accessway next to his house. Yes, voluntarily.

Are we about to hear the sound of gates unlocking across Malibu? That remains slightly more likely than, say, global re-cooling. To begin with, the homeowner actually lives in Connecticut (though the public need not be any less thankful). Still, now is an excellent time to celebrate the very real progress toward establishing public access to these beaches. Not all homeowners may be ready to fling open their gates. But hasn't the time come to stop fighting so hard not to?

In California, all beaches are public below the mean high tide line (working definition: the wet sand), and state laws clearly require beachfront communities to maximize public access. The treatment of the 20 developed miles of beaches in Malibu as a private riviera--a full quarter of the L.A. County coastline--has long constituted one of the most egregious violations of public space in the Los Angeles area.

However, in the last five years, state agencies have settled every single major legal battle over Malibu beach access in the public's favor. In the last three years, the state and the nonprofit Access For All have opened four new accessways. They've opened dozens more public easements on the dry sand. And exactly two years ago--in a highly publicized victory that even everyone in Bhutan seems to have heard about--entertainment-industry mogul David Geffen gave up his 22-year battle and agreed to open both the accessway next to his Carbon Beach compound and the dry-sand easements on the beach in front of it.

So isn't it time to stop fighting, perhaps? Surely, the loss at the Geffen estate argues that no amount of money or influence--or laudable civic-mindedness where one does not live in the L.A. area--will prevent the public access guaranteed by the state constitution and the California Coastal Act. Why then, just two days after Geffen opened his gate, did homeowners on Broad Beach bulldoze tons of sand out of the tidelands, and build an 8-foot-high dune that cut off public access at high tide?--and then post bright new "Please Respect Private Property" signs atop the land they pilfered from the public beach?

The battle on Broad Beach? Lost: the Coastal Commission ordered the homeowners to de-reengineer the coastline. The several ongoing lawsuits to stop new accessways? Dim prospects.

So why fight access that is becoming increasingly inevitable? As if to emphasize the point, the newly minted Carbon Beach accessway happens to run right next to Eli Broad's beachfront pad. In 2000, über-civic-leader Broad (truly--I'm not being sarcastic) and two fellow Carbon Beach-ers bought and donated a $1-million parcel on La Costa Beach--a different Malibu beach--for public use. Which was a good deed, but also, the donation won them exemptions from the state requirement that they make 20-percent of the ocean visible from the street when they enlarged their beach houses. In other words, since the time that these three homeowners paid handsomely to block the view of the beach, two new accessways have opened on Carbon Beach--aka Billionaires Beach--and a third is in litigation.

Meanwhile, just upcoast on the same beach, Geffen has turned out to be an excellent neighbor. And the public beachgoers--as the great majority of us do on all these beaches--have basically been treating both public and private lands with appropriate respect. No one has stormed the decks. The beach looks clean, and the birds and dolphins still like the place fine. The sky hasn't fallen. People are just walking and sitting on the beach. Sharing adjacent public lands with the rest of the public may be inevitable. However, it's also really not that bad.

Creating one's own public accessway is just one option, of course. But yes, definitely, the time has come at least to stop blocking public access so actively--and to stop waging battles that have become more and more pointless. So please no more signs that say "Private Beach"--or "Right to Pass by Permission" or "No Stopping." No fake but official-looking "No Parking" signs on the PCH near accessways, and no orange cones in public parking spots. Likewise, no mailboxes, trees, and lawns in the shoulder for public parking. Also, no "Private Street" signs on public roads, and no private locks on public gates. No special tags on dog collars so that all the neighbors will know which illegal dogs belong to the beachfront homeowners. No private security guards at public entrances to tell the rest of the public what they can and cannot do on public land. And no investing inordinate sums of money in lawsuits to keep people from using the public beach, which is one of the few truly great public spaces in Los Angeles.

Then, maybe next Memorial Day, we can talk about unlocking the gates in unison. As the Carbon Beach homeowner has said, "All I did is open a door." It's easy.

Or not. But in the meantime, as we all start to enjoy the new summer beach season--"Please Respect Public Property."

(Update: The accessway closed 3 weeks later. See post on 6/15.)

(Malibu Beaches Owners Manual--Click for parts 1, 2, and 3).

The brand-new accessway on Carbon Beach is at 21950 PCH, on the west edge of the property. Look for the "Coastal Access" sign on the highway.

For now, it is open Thursday-Sunday ONLY, from sunrise to sunset.

How to operate: If the blue-grey wooden gate is closed (and it's Thursday-Sunday), just push on it--It should be unlocked.

You are welcome on the dry sand in front of the property (the blue house). Most, though not all, of the nearby properties also have public easements on the dry sand:

Public easements--Upcoast:
1st house (massive white)--to bldg
2nd house (white balconies)--to bldg
5th house (tile roof)--25 ft from daily high water line (DHWL)--to 10 ft. from bldg
6th house (white w/blue roof)--25 ft from mean high tide line (MHTL)--to 5 ft from bldg
7th house (1-story)--25 ft from MHTL--to 5 ft from bldg
8th house (grey modern)--25 ft from MHTL--to 5 ft from bldg
9th house (grey w/brick seawall)--to 10 ft from bldg

Public easements--Downcoast:
1st house (blue w/accessway)--to 5 ft from bldg
5th house (grey/white 2-story, L-side stairs)--to 10 ft from bldg
6th house (grey/brn 2-story, R-side stairs)--to 10 ft from bldg
7th house (brn A-frame)--25 ft from DHWL--to 10 ft from bldg
8th house (white modern)--25 ft from DHWL--to 10 ft from bldg
10th house (big white w/dark roofs)--to bldg
12th house (long brn 1-story)--25 ft from DHWL--to 10 ft from bldg
13th house (white 1-story)--25 ft from MHTL--to 5 ft from bldg
14th house (tan 2-story)--25 ft from MHTL--to 5 ft from bldg
15th house (white 2-story)--25 ft from MHTL--to 5 ft from bldg
16th house (brn w/white windows)--25 ft from DHWL--to 10 ft from bldg

Future operation: The homeowner has opened this accessway voluntarily, and on a trial basis. So no guarantees--though he does say it may become permanent and/or may open daily in the future.

And--Ideally, he'd like to make the bathroom in the house available to public visitors in the future.

Yes, you just read that sentence.

Enjoy your accessway.

Sure, there are splashier streets with rows and rows of these lovely purple trees, but the quiet lines and soothing asymmetry of this house in Rancho Park just begged for a photograph.

The morning after the elusive Lake Machado alligator Reggie was captured and taken to his new home at the L.A. Zoo, I visited with the man who knew him best. Fred Dowell is his name, and he's been on the case since Reggie first appeared nearly two years ago. Dowell told me he doesn't buy the reports that there's another gator lurking beneath the surface of Lake Machado. Watch the video for our full conversation.

Video edited by Alex Gans.

Driving down San Vicente in Brentwood yesterday, lodged in the usual backwash of traffic. Saw this guy standing in the street, waving at the cars, a cardboard sign held aloft. No one looked, no one stopped. Nothing new. Except there was: "POETRY TO GO" the sign said. And the guy, tall and bearded, in his 60s, was smiling, gleeful, even. I went around the block, wound through some magnificent streets with magnificent houses - no one hungry behind those walls - and back toward the poet. Still there. Pulled over in a red zone, cars honking, pedestrians grinning. Gave the poet a dollar and he gave me a poem. "Ballad of a Bushman," by Wendell Brown. Copyrighted.

"You're pretty," he said. "So are you," I told him, and he was, this genuine joy coming off him.

The poem's about his service in Viet Nam, being homeless, living in the bushes, being lonely. ("But wait, I say, don't pity me/I have the mountains and the sea./I've watched the cities sprawl and grow,/With 'people boxes' row on row ...")

I'm told Mr. Wendell has been plying his trade there in Brentwood for the last 15 years. And I can't help wonder what he can buy with that measly dollar.

Kayakers Marcus Eriksen, George Wolfe, and Jody Lemmon found this black-necked stilt nest in the middle of the L.A. River last week--on a small piece of board lying in the concrete channel at the grim site where the Arroyo Seco meets the river.

They tell me that a stilt nest graces every piece of debris, every manhole cover, etc. that they saw. If you can't find a sandbar, I guess, then a piece of trash or infrastructure will do just fine.

The stilts in Los Angeles, apparently, treat and understand the L.A. River as a river. The humans are just catching up.

(photos courtesy of www.amphibiousproductions.com)

It was cute, at first, when the hostess introduced him as "Harry Gore."

It was Tuesday evening, May 22, and Al Gore was in Beverly Hills at an event described by its host organization, Writers Bloc, as "Al Gore in conversation with Harry Shearer." However, as I soon discovered, this was actually the first stop on a tour to promote Gore's new book, "The Assault on Reason," which was released Tuesday, May 22 (as of Thursday the hardcover was priced at $15.57 on Amazon.com).

I intend no disrespect, nor criticism, of Al Gore, or of what he had to say Tuesday. He represented himself well, defended his points of view, and made me feel better about my failure to "get" some of Harry Shearer's jokes (Gore also had the guts to wear cowboy boots with a conservative blue suit and tie, another point scored). I still marvel at the rock-star treatment Los Angeles gives Gore despite his complete lack of the kind of glitz usually required to achieve such status.

My disappointment is with those who organized and promoted the event.

As I write this two days later, I feel as though I was cheaply duped into my purchase of a ticket to attend what amounted to a campaign rally and book signing, neither of which were hinted at by Writers Bloc. This is how the event was promoted:

Former Vice President and Academy Award winner Al Gore takes on the current administration's preoccupation with eroding reason and obfuscating the truth about critical issues we as Americans face. Gore's manifesto, a new book called "The Assault on Reason," states clearly that truth has taken a backseat to governing by fear. There is little time left to repair our standing in the world, and if we want to rescue the environment, national security, the economy, and social welfare, we had better move fast. Harry Shearer is the creator and host of the weekly radio show, LeShow on KCRW. His recent novel, "Not Enough Indians," is one of the funniest books of the year. He can be heard on "The Simpsons," and has had featured roles in such terrific movies as "This is Spinal Tap," "Best in Show," "The Mighty Wind," and "For Your Consideration."

The hostess representing Writers Bloc was to say the least effusive in her introduction of Gore, referring to him several times as "our favorite vice president." Though some might consider this description dubious, many of those in attendance applauded each time she said it and waved signs that proclaimed "Gore 2008," and "Reelect Gore." Although Writers Bloc may have had nothing to do with these sign-wielding boosters, the would-be campaigners succeeded in making it look otherwise. Several signature gatherers had even stalked the will-call line outside with (worthless?) petitions that sought to persuade Gore to run for president in '08.

The hostess, who seemed a bit nervous, spliced Gore and Shearer together during her introduction and presented the night's main attraction as "Harry Gore," which, as I said, was sweetly amusing, at first. However, it later proved to be the start of what became a disappointing mess.

First there was the annoyance of press photographers who were permitted to stand beside audience members and click away throughout the entire event (where these images appeared is beyond me, and Google images). As a member of the press for nearly 20 years, I would expect to see this at a campaign event, but not an evening "in conversation" with a former vice president. Then there was the behavior of security (presumably Gore's Secret Service detail), one member of whom communicated several times to his counterparts across the theatre by waving his arms. The evening was a frustrating loss 45 minutes into the conversation when the hostess began to pace from one side of the theatre to the other, looking increasingly frantic. Eventually she approached the foot of the stage where she waved and waved again, failing in her intent to distract Shearer from his conversation with Gore, but managing to distract many in the audience. When she eventually resorted to holding a sheet of paper up with a message written on it, someone (I assume it was an audience member) shouted to get Harry Shearer's attention. Shearer, who acknowledged the sign with something like "yes, I've seen it," continued his talk. The hostess finally got on stage to urge the conclusion of the hour-long conversation because Gore's "people" were upset about the time.

No one seemed to care that most audience members paid $20 to hear Gore in "conversation," there were books to sell and sign. The longer this "conversation" went on, the less time there would be to sell books to those who had already invested four hours or more traveling, waiting on line, and (oddly) dining on salad, Fritos and whatever in their seats beforehand. (Did I forget to mention there was a full bar in the lobby?)

The San Francisco Examiner described the evening as "more like a campaign stop than a book signing," which was accurate enough, except this was not billed as either.

Who would pay $20 to attend a book signing?

"La di da di, we like to party!"

The Anaheim Grove was booming Friday night with sweaty, jiggly, old-school hip hop fans, gathered for Doug E Fresh, "The Human Beatboxer" as he was known in his heyday, circa 1985. Doug E was supposed to appear with his longtime cohort Slick Rick, but Slick Rick was sick. Disappointing, to be sure, but that didn't slow down the party. Doug E took the stage and led an ecstatic throng through a retrospective mashup of the best of 80's hip hop and rap - everything from Afrika Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash to the theme song from The Jeffersons. We were all shaking our money-makers and waving our hands in the air like we just didn't care.

Doug E is not only the acknowledged inventor and chief innovator of beatboxing, but he's also the embodiment of a Master MC. He held the audience in a thrall, singing half a line of a song and letting the crowd fill in the blanks. It was call-and-response euphoria, taking this transplanted New Yorker back to those heady days of the 1980's when hip-hop was fresh and positive and full of surprises, where every street corner featured a kid break dancing on a square of linoleum, and the subways blazed with wild style graffiti and Keith Haring chalk drawings.

The only low point in the evening came when the show ended - Doug E had to catch a flight to Miami. Another MC took the stage and in an audience-appeasing, time-killing maneuver, asked us if anyone had a rap to contribute. A skinny, white kid in a polo shirt mouthed a few beats into the proffered mic, and he was pulled up on the stage to do his thing. The kid gave a spontaneous show of inspired, masterful beatboxing, and the crowd went wild. He had us tangled up in his funky web for many minutes, all around me sisters were shrieking and laughing, nobody could believe this white boy could be so good, mixing beats with melody, spinning out his own medley of hip-hop highlights. Finally, a stage bouncer tossed him - you just can't have unbilled talent walking away with the show, can you? I found the kid after the show chillaxin' on a bench outside the club. He told me he's been beatboxing for ten years, which would be half his life. I figured he'd be flying high from his breakthrough moment, but mostly young J.P. looked sanguine, "It was cool," he said. Yeah, well, true dat.

White boy beatboxers are all the news -- unless you've been detained in a Gitmo holding cell you probably know that beatboxer Blake Lewis is poised to win American Idol tonight. In that spirit Idol has flown Doug E Fresh back to L.A. to appear on the show for a duet with Blake. At a small dinner party held Tuesday night in his honor, Doug E passionately avowed that Blake "is the real deal." Of course, both Doug E. and Blake are showmen, their gift is in getting an audience going, whether through beats or rap or personal magnetism -- the singing is almost secondary. There are some fusty muthas who would vote them off the island for that, but no one who loves a groove will contest hip-hop's infectious, delicious and lasting appeal.

Doug E spent the day Tuesday in Beverly Hills, shopping for something shiny to wear on the show. He came back from Gucci with a shirt and jacket, but no trousers. "Gucci is not designing for the black man's body," he said with a remorseful tongue clck before tucking into some red snapper. It's a tense situation certainly, and I'll be tuning in if only to see whether he's wearing pants. But have no fear, Doug E is permanently on record for getting nattily dressed:

"Clean, dry was my body and hair,
I threw on my brand new Gucci underwear
For all the girls I might take home
I got the Johnson's Baby Powder and the Polo cologne
Fresh dressed like a million bucks
Threw on the Bally shoes and the fly green socks
Stepped out my house stopped short, oh no
I went back in, I forgot my Kangol."

That's it for me. Harper's Bazaar lost me for good with this month's cover. Can't say I didn't warn them.

It was serious before he grabbed the oversized bottle of Tabasco by the neck and yelled "Gimme my food or I'm gonna F@#$ing beat you."

He's new to Westwood Village, as are many of the homeless people who've begun to linger there in the past couple months. Every day it seems there are new faces begging in Westwood and on the Westside along Pico Blvd. It's not just the numbers that have increased, but the aggressiveness. Although most still hold signs, or ask for change, others make requests that border on ultimatums. A polite "I'm sorry" isn't enough. They yell at people, follow people, and even challenge vehicles in intersections.

The incident with the oversized bottle of Tabasco at a Westwood diner wasn't a case of a hungry man desperate for a meal. Food had been offered. A generous individual purchased the homeless man breakfast. This wasn't a doggie bag of leftovers, or an extra burger on the way out the door, but the specific food the homeless man chose. He stepped up and ordered it, but he didn't want it. When the food was served, he said he wanted the money instead. A choice between food and nothing resulted in a threat and a demand for food that was never denied. A glass bottle went up. A voice was raised. The server was about to be bashed upside the head.

"Gimme my food or I'm gonna F@#$ing beat you."

This sort of thing happens every day throughout LA. However, I've encountered it in Westwood and on the Westside much more in the past month than in any other during the past seven years. A Los Angeles Police Department statistic hints at a possible reason. It appeared in a Los Angeles Times story on April 25:

The crackdown [in downtown LA] has corresponded with a drop in downtown's street dwellers, from 1,800 last September to fewer than 750 last week, LAPD statistics show.

The increase in aggressiveness I've witnessed is unfortunate, yet, I can't wag a finger at anyone to assign blame. Although I'm not happy about the Pied-Piperesque approach that seems to have driven them to my neighborhood, they came here of their own volition. It's hardly comparable to the inhuman practice of dumping indigents downtown, even if the results are similar. The problem wasn't solved. It was moved.

Fortunately, no one will read about the homeless man with the oversized Tabasco bottle in the newspaper tomorrow, or see a report of the incident on the evening news. Nothing happened. He threw his food and the bottle in the trash and stomped out of the diner.

And while it's entirely possible he wanted the $5 and was foolish enough to think that this complicated scheme was the only way to get it, I've decided it wasn't about money, or food. It was about a man who felt pushed around and needed to push back, if only to remind himself what that felt like. He should have been grateful, and that's why he wasn't.

* RELATED: 60 Minutes aired a segment Sunday, May 20, 2007, on hospital dumping in Los Angeles, by Anderson Cooper.

* SIMILARLY NOTED: Curbed LA's Josh Williams makes a similar observation. And David Markland at Metroblogging Los Angeles points to a blog post by Don Garza about "why the $250,000 toilets in downtown LA are important."

I have always enjoyed driving East on Pico at night and encountering the Horizon Furniture sign on the south side of the street, one block shy of La Cienega. Painted in a mossy green and beige, a single incandescent bulb flashes on and off, illuminating "Horizon" then "Furniture." It' is so old-school and Luddite-ish, I always linger on it. For a second it feels like Pico circa 1937. The other day I drove past and saw big signs taped to Horizon's windows advertising their going-out-of-business sale. I stopped in hoping to get a deal on an armchair. What I got was a small encounter with history.

Horizon furniture opened in 1924, as The Southern California Furniture Company at Pico and Vermont, then the epicenter of Los Angeles. The store's name was spelled out in black and white mosaic in the sidewalk where it remained until just a few years ago. Film stars like John Barrymore shopped there, browsing the Chippendale, Sheridan, Tudor, French, Italian and Spanish pieces that were must-have styles of the day.

In 1937 as the country was recovering from the Great Depression and giddy with the New Deal, Sam's son Alan had a hunch that the city was going to grow westward. At that time the west side of Los Angeles was all mustard grass and farm land, but already new duplexes, homes and apartments were cropping up. Alan moved the store to "the suburbs" at 8600 Pico Blvd. He filled the spacious, new showroom with art deco sofas, glass and Lucite tables, bleached oak and silver fox finishes - pieces that Lana Turner and Bette Davis might have lounged upon.

By the 1940's most of Beverlywood and the surrounding area was built. Alan's son Don Behrstock was five years old and he remembers the Big Town Market that stood where 20/20 Video is now on the North East corner of the intersection. Across the street Lester Young and Nat King Cole were headlining at the Capri Club (where the Bank of America sits today on the NW corner). The Behrstock's first house was across from Canfield Elementary (where I am currently a parent) and a bean field. His family moved a couple of years later to Stearns Drive (where I now live). They bought their house for $7,000 (we paid just a bit more for ours). "I've never lived more than three miles away from Pico and LaCienega," 71 year-old Don told me. "Pico is the center of the universe for me."

In 1957 Sputnik was in orbit and twenty-one year-old Don launched his career at the family store. They were doing solid business in Mediterranean and Italian Provincial styles, but Don, having inherited the Behrstock gift for anticipating furniture trends, saw something new on the Horizon: Danish Modern. The store did brisk business specializing in the sleek, modernist pieces for many years.

In the 1980's Don renamed the store Horizon commissioning a commemorative poster by LA's iconic rock poster designer John van Hamersveld. Horizon has done brisk business in Stickley, Greene & Greene-inspired designs over the past twenty years.

Don is the third and last generation of Behrstocks to operate the store. His two children are not following him in the family business and he's ready to close up shop. A spry and forceful presence, he claims he could go a few more years if his longtime business partner weren't ready to call it a day. "It's tough to justify keeping an independent furniture store open," Don says without a hint of sadness, but it makes me sad to see another family business close its doors. It's one less special place in the world. It's a prime location, so I'm sure some franchised operation will jump right in.

Horizon still has a lot of inventory, so they'll stay open until the last of it has been sold. Then, after 83 years of furnishing the homes of mid-west Los Angeles, Don will switch off the lights and the flashing sign and that will be that. Fade to black.

When I arrived at the command center this morning at 6:00 am, 600 acres of Griffith Park had burned. The Times and the LAFD now say it's over 800. For a look at what it's like below a fire department chopper dumping tons of water, watch the video. Also featured: Griffith Park-area City Councilman Tom LaBonge, LAPD Chief Bill Bratton, and LAFD Captain Carlos Calvillo.

My cameraman Tommy Macker also shot some stills today. The first picture is me after being soaked by a water drop. More on Tommy's Flickr page.

LAO video edited by Alex Gans and photographed by Thomas Macker.

Nearly four years ago this month, I started work on my current book, “All for a Few Perfect Waves: The Audacious Life and Legend of Rebel Surfer Miki Dora.” It’s an oral biography of the once and forever king of Malibu, and HarperEntertainment will publish it in April 2008, just in the nick of time for the Los Angeles Times Book Fair – in case they’re interested in having me back, this time to talk about a unique and iconic Southern California anti-hero. (Just a word to the wise.)

While I’m in plugging mode ...

The book is based on over 300 interviews with Dora’s friends, enemies, intimates, peers, and family. I also combed through piles of research; traveled the length of California, then to France and the tip of South Africa; phoned/emailed everywhere else there are rideable waves.

Known as “Da Cat,” Dora dominated surfing style and soul during his heyday, and Malibu’s, in the ‘50s and ‘60s, before and after the movie “Gidget” brought the crowds and changed (most say ruined) everything. Although many of his contemporaries were break-the-mold wave-masters in their own right, Dora’s God-given gifts in the water coupled with the living theater of his charismatic, complicated, comic, and non-conformist personality, made him what they could never be: a legend in his own time.

Then, in the early ‘70s, Dora disappeared from Malibu to roam the world on a endless summer sojourn searching for empty, perfect waves – and peace of mind. Yesterday’s rebels had moved on and become the ME Generation. He hated what he saw as First World social and moral corruption – not that he wasn’t infected with a touch of both himself – and he’d had enough of what he considered being trapped in a black hole of celebrity between the soul-sucking consequences of his talent, charm, and mystique, and his belief that nothing in life was more valuable than total personal freedom – no matter what the cost to himself, and often others.

When he died, in early 2002, the London Times eulogized him as “A surfing hedonist who became a hero to a generation of beach bums ... (He) was everything that a surfer ought to be: he was tanned, he was good-looking, and he was trouble. West Coast archetype and antihero, he became the incarnation of surfing for the postwar generation . . . Dora was a Kerouac in board shorts, the soulmate of Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest: A subversive, restless wild man.”

The Surfer’s Journal co-publisher/founder Steve Pezman told the Los Angeles Times, “If you had to pick one surfer that epitomized California surfing in the 20th century, it would be Miki Dora ... Everything that’s wrong with it and everything that’s right with it.”

There’s much more to this great story that's both local and international. (About 500 pages more.) But this much is clear: There will never be another character in surfing like Miki Dora. No one. Not even close.

This kind of story – finally getting to my point – makes finding a follow-up project very anxiety-producing. Time off by the poolside bar is fine, but I hate drinking alone. To paraphrase Joni Mitchell: “The filing cabinet’s too big, the desk too wide.” Book projects are just like serial relationships. All the components are there: romance, sex, friendship, arguments, the break up ... and if you're lucky you've saved something for retirement. The Dora book was great while it lasted; we'll always be friends, but it's time to move on and I haven’t yet found someone new. After such a long relationship, I feel awkard in public. I'm not used to dining at a table for one. I haven’t, well . . . dated in a long time -- but I can still mix metaphors with the best of them.

This is not to say that I haven’t had some good ideas; I just haven't met the right one yet. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a zillion ideas, from the sublime to the ridiculous. One example: "Rocket Juice for the Alien Abductee's Soul." I bet I could find 50 motivational stories about abduction, orifice invasion, and partying with the Grays or the little green men. "My advice," one guy told me, "is to just relax." You get the picture: I have lists and more lists. But just because you recognize a slam-dunk book idea when you get it, doesn’t mean it's actually right for you. No, it means you should have your own publishing imprint and throw the dice with someone else’s money.

My latest inspirations include something with the LAPD, the story of a certain building on the Sunset Strip, something about Malibu. (If I were more specific, you’d end up doing these books!) I got all excited and told my agent.

“Too local,” he said.

“Too local for what?”

“Too local to have national appeal, to make publishers think everyone’s going to want to spend $27.95 on a copy.”

“LAPD, Malibu, Sunset Strip . . . these are names known nationwide.”

“Publishing is in New York.”

So I told him a book idea centered in New York. It’s a quiet little story – very relevant today – about a guy who terrorized the city once upon a time.”

“Love it.”

“But it was years ago.”

“New York is the media center of the world, hence what happens here has broader appeal.”

Maybe he’s right – though as a New Yorker he will cheerfully admit to being a bit biased – because he’s the one who has to deal with the editors with the big dollars at hand, to whom he’d like to sell my books. If they have the sensibility of the late Saul Steinberg’s New Yorker cover illustration of the view of the world from 9th Avenue, what can I do about it?

I’m not saying everyone in publishing is like that. After all, thanks to my very perceptive editor I just spent four years writing about a surfer. But this notion of a story being too local when it emanates from Los Angeles really bothers me. Last I looked we were right up there in the biggest city list. What happens here influences what happens there. We've got more sun-time, but that means more beach-time to relax and read. And there seems to be no lack of interest, at least among big magazines, to read about us. How else do you explain why magazine editors regularly send East Coast reporters out here to decipher our cultural customs for their more civilized readers? If this place is so local, why did everyone move here (and I'm not talking about migration from south of the border.) More than “too local,” I think hereabouts is where much of what’s interesting resides. Maybe we ought to turn the tables and send a reporter back into the snow and humidity to explain to us why they’re so interested in explaining – or mocking – us. I think they're just jealous. Despite the damned traffic, Southern California is an incredible place, with a rich history. So what if we never wore Colonial hats? I've been here 44 years. I still feel like I'm on vacation. (Except for the damned traffic!) There are many great stories here.

At this point I should probably offer a list of great “locally-based” books to prove my point, but I won’t because, as a self-centered writer, all I really care about these days is finding another subject to write about that gives me goose bumps. And why not? When you spend two or more years with the character or topic living in your house, eating at your dinner table, trying to crawl into bed and squeeze between you and your significant other and grab all the passion, it’s no crime think carefully about with you whom you really want to spend your creative time.

So how do you find the next big idea, the next terrific story, the next irresistible character? You’ve got to read, go out, stay open to possibility, check in with your friends back East, examine your long-time personal interests . . . and ask around.

Ok. I'm asking. If anyone knows a great overlooked or undervalued California tale and/or character that begs to be a book, well: the idea mailbox is open and taking all submissions at: themailroom @ tellmeeverything.com. (Remove the spaces before using the email address.)

Please, help me fight for the honor of "local" topics – oh, and keep me out of the pool and off anti-anxiety medication.

The sign pictured at right showed up this weekend in the ticket window of the shuttered Mann National in Westwood Village, calling into question reports of the big-screen movie house's reported "date with the wrecking ball."

As previously mentioned on LAO, the Mann National is one of a dwindling number of big-screen theaters still standing in LA. It's a place where "The Exorcist opened to huge lines and ran what seemed like forever, and same for The Godfather."

Perhaps this means it has achieved a stay of execution, as some had hoped would happen.

For now, all I know is that the sign says "Theatre opening Friday May 11th."

*UPDATED: Mann Theatres no longer leases the theater building and referred questions about its operation to Tom Daugherty, who said during a brief telephone interview that he and a partner now hold the lease. Daugherty said the ticket window sign is correct, that the theatre will reopen this Friday (May 11) with The Ex, starring Zach Braff and Amanda Peet.

Daugherty said movie goers can expect the theatre to continue to show first-run features, just as it did under Mann.

*UPDATED UPDATE: Curbed LA gets some bad news from an unnamed source, who sounds kinda wonkish, so I'm going to guess she's/he's a city planner. Short version: This could be but a brief reprieve for the National.

Conservatively dressed in a British jockey suit, with gray jacket and black pants, the hotel heiress appeared as stone-faced as during her modeling days in New York City during fashion week. But instead of gliding down the red carpet, Hilton made her way up the courthouse steps, roped off from throngs of reporters and photographers by yellow police tape.

* The Mint Julep is the traditional beverage of Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby.
Photo: AFP/Gabriel Bouys via Yahoo

What's it like to try and take the pulse of tens of thousands of activists in downtown L.A.? Check it out.

LAO video edited by Alex Gans and photographed by Thomas Macker.