Across the Pond

Purple canopy: Jacarandas on Del Mar Blvd. in Pasadena Trees. Again.  May in L.A. was cooler than usual and June is no different. Anything that flowers is doing so long and abundantly this year, including the Jacaranda trees with their purple canopies. Jacarandas have become popular in the California Southland but they originally came from Central and South America and from the West Indies. The Wikipedia entry on Jacarandas mentions (but does not cite) a legend from Pretoria, South Africa, which is known as Jacaranda City: the time of year the tree blooms coincides with the year-end exams at the University of Pretoria. Should a flower from the Jacaranda tree drop on your head, you will pass all your exams. Nice. If your headed for a test: go find a Jacaranda!

Sunday, while Hollywood was getting ready for its big night, with Oscars, red carpet, and gowns, we travelled to the mountains to enjoy the snow. We loaded the skis onto the Jeep and headed for our favorite local ski resort, Mount Baldy. Here's what we found: I am sometimes reluctant to make the journey to Mount Baldy. Not that it's a long one by L.A. standards (45 minutes from our home to the parking lot) but - when it comes to skiing I am spoiled because I grew up on a mountain. Anyway, the view from the top is reward enough: the Mojave desert to the north, the Pacific to the south, and a checkerboard called Los Angeles county in between. Mount Baldy is one of those L.A. excursions that make me wonder how one place can have it all: the desert, the beaches, the mountains; surfing, skiing, hiking... Is it a surprise that the movie industry should have settled here? Images from top to bottom: palm trees against the San Gabriel Mountains ;  Lord's Candle, ...

Last week a friend here in L.A. asked me whether Austrians celebrate Thanksgiving too. At first I was stunned because I thought of the origins of this day  and the Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony. But then I reconsidered. Doesn't everyone have something to be grateful for? Why shouldn't all countries recognize a  national day of giving thanks? I celebrated my first Thanksgiving in a small café in Prague, Czech republic, which was called Red Hot & Blues. The place unfortunately closed very recently but it used to be a  favorite hangout for American expats. It was there, in 1996, that I ate my first sweet potatoes, my first pumpkin pie, and my first pecan pie. I remember the food as good but most of all I recall engaging in lively conversation with the two strangers at our table and that the café was filled with laughter and happiness. It was like a giant family party. Thanksgivings since then - one at the home of friends in Prague, another in a cabin ...

"Overconsumed America: are we big, fat, gluttonous jerks?" Patt Morrison asked this question today on her show on Southern California Public Radio. Her guest was Gayle Bessenoff, assistant professor of psychology at Southern Connecticut State University. Go to "overconsumed"?  to hear the interview and comments from listeners.

The decorating season is upon us;  Martha Stewart leads the way. Since September and until the end of the year we in America are going all out to adorne anything that can be adorned - and what can't? - with the accessories of Halloween, Christmas, and fall. Right now it's about pumpkins, skeletons, ghouls but cometh November we will box those things up. We will make room for the symbols of Thanksgiving and fall, for leaves, turkeys, and nuts. (Admittedly, this second wave of decorations is not nearly as powerful as the Halloween wave, though it did seem to be gaining momentum in the wasteful years that led to the economic downturn.) After Thanksgiving, on the following Saturday or Sunday, we get ready for the ultimate decorating show: Christmas. We will string lights along our roof tops, blow up plastic Santas and reindeer, plop them in our front yards, drape clouds of artificial snow around them. We will put up our Christmas trees with their ribbons...