EMILY’S BAKERY CORNER MAY 2, 1962. Mission and Laurel Streets and you can see that gas was only 31.9 !!!! There are exactly two cars in this photo and that’s even more proof that this was back in the day. As someone said “you could get gas there then and you can get…”( just kidding). photo credit: Covello & Covello Historical photo collection. Additional information always welcome: email photo@brattononline.com

SAD COASTAL COMMISSION NEWS. Pat Matejcek writes, “Sara Wan, a 15-year member of the California Coastal Commission and it’s most knowledgeable and stalwart defender, fell victim to others’ political ambition and campaign donor favoritism and was not reappointed to the Commission. Here’s some of what The L.A. Times article said, “Wan, a longtime Malibu environmental activist and chair of the panel, was told earlier this week she would not be reappointed after 15 years on the commission. She was widely regarded as the most consistently conservation-minded member of the panel, which wields broad regulatory power over development along the state’s 1,100 miles of coastline”. Then it said, “Wan earlier this year riled the state Democratic Party leadership with her unexpected election to the chairmanship of the panel. In a Jan. 13 letter, California Democratic Party Chairman John Burton wrote Wan to tell her that he believed she had “screwed” another candidate out of the position. On a panel that is often closely divided on some of the state’s biggest, most sensitive projects, Wan enjoyed the adoration of environmentalists and the ire of developers, who often saw her strongly oppose their projects on environmental grounds. She also has been an aggressive advocate of preserving coastal wetlands, marine life and public access to the coast, at one point setting up her towel in defiance of security guards on Malibu’s Broad Beach to protest beach-access restrictions.

Los Angeles television producer and environmental activist Dayna Bochco is expected to be named this week to the California Coastal Commission, replacing longtime commissioner Sara Wan on the influential panel. Conservation groups heralded the selection of Bochco, calling her an advocate for the environment who has fought for marine life protections and worked to battle storm-water pollution, marine debris and climate change. Bochco runs a production company with her husband, well-known Hollywood producer Steven Bochco, that has produced television shows such as “NYPD Blue,” “L.A. Law” and “Doogie Howser, M.D.” She is a board member of Heal the Bay and sits on the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Southern California Leadership Council. “Dayna has some big shoes to fill. Sara was the best coastal commissioner California ever had,” said Heal the Bay President Mark Gold. “Every time anyone watches birds or marine mammals, visits a wetland or enjoys the beach, they should remember Sara’s courage and conviction for coastal protection.” You can read all of the LA Times story here . Just to watch and listen to her in action on the Commission when they were here was an experience…and that’s politics, Burton politics.

COMPOSTING TOILETS…ANOTHER VIEW. Celia Scott sent this piece to the De-Sal groups and gave me permission to print it here…” I think the discussion of composting toilets is going off track at bit. The feasibility of such toilets for institutional and commercial use is well established, and their use can make a huge difference in water conservation. The composting toilets at the Vermont School of Law (where I was a student the summer of 2002), in a classroom/office building have reduced water consumption from the usual 15 gallons per day per person to 15 gallons per day. The VSL is in South Royalton, VT., where water is very limited, and the school had to find a way to retrofit and expand an old building to without increasing water demand. Their solution has been followed in many places, but not here in California by the UC system unfortunately. Furthermore, the combining of composting toilets with a grey water irrigation system for landscaping is also well established at the Bronx Zoo in New York, which has a huge number of visitors every year. If you want to look at the excellent video the Zoo has made about their system, just google “Poop at the Zoo”, and it will come up first (easier than the long url).

So I am not convinced that schools could not be retrofitted with composting toilets, and am certain that it could work for many other institutional and commercial uses….as well as local government. It may be that the feasibility/affordability of residential composting toilets is not imminent….but the discussion should not be confined to residential use when there are so many examples of its feasibility/affordability as mentioned above”. Celia Scott.

BOYCOTTING GIRL SCOUT COOKIES, ANOTHER GREAT CAUSE.. Dan Dickmeyer notes from Canada…” ABC news had story tonight about two girls who were using cookie sales to raise money to help stop palm oil tree destruction of orangutan habitat only to find GS cookies are laden with the product . They failed to get much of a rise out of the national office of the Girl Scouts except they will think about a substitute”. What Dan didn’t mention is that 200 million boxes of this junk food are sold every year. I’ve written so many times over the years about why the Scouts won’t sell environmental, natural products, maybe even locally produced goods, items that promote health and instead of giving more than half the profits to the conglomerate bakers, and keep the money for the organization? Watch Dan’s and ABC’s news story here…

PATTON’S PROGRAM. Gary’s on vacation for two weeks. (Gary Patton is “Of Counsel” to the Santa Cruz law firm of Wittwer & Parkin, which specializes in land use and environmental law. The opinions expressed are Mr. Patton’s. Gary has his own website, “Two Worlds / 365”

VINTAGE DE CINZO. Roaring Camp is still doing their annual Memorial Day Weekend War Re-enactment spectacular and I’m repeating this extra special DeCinzo super pertinent masterpiece. Plus the link to Roaring Camp’s own website to prove we’re not kidding…wonder if they’ll add our water boarding sideshow???

http://www.roaringcamp.com/events.html

Now scroll down to see what DeCinzo had to say about that vainglorious exhortation.

EAGANS DEEP COVER. Tim Eagan shows us what we needed to know about Debt Ceiling. Scroll down a few pages.

LANDAU’S PROGRES. Saul asks, « WHO’S THE NEXT ENEMY” in this week’s Progreso Weekly”. He opens with, “How did this country survive before it found formidable enemies around which the government could mobilize hatred and fear? I don’t remember the 1930s when poverty, capitalism, godlessness, fascism, communism, Jews and alcohol competed in the American mind for the role of number one adversary. No clear winners! On December 7, 1941 – I was almost 6 – the Japanese boldly and in retrospect foolishly bombed Pearl Harbor. Japs and Nazis, the perfect vile duo. Hollywood took over. Every Saturday, I fought them vicariously in the movies – our good guys beating their bad guys. Since then – with brief exceptions – a viable enemy has united us. To keep that evil from our shores we’ve maintained a “defense’ budget.How did this country survive before it found formidable enemies around which the government could mobilize hatred and fear? Read the rest here…
Saul Landau is an Institute for Policy Studies fellow whose films are on DVD from roundworldproductions@gmail.com

MORE MORGANI ART. Dwight Smith did this extra spacey portrait of the movable, memorable, mirthful Morgani. You can hear him actually talk on Universal Grapevine this Tuesday May 31^st 7-7:30 p.m. KZSC 88.1 fm

LISA JENSEN LINKS. How seaworthy is the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie? How fishy were the American Idol voting results the week James Durbin got eliminated? How awesome are the 32,000-year-old French cave paintings revealed in the new Werner Herzog doc? Explore these and other mysteries this week at Lisa Jensen Online Express (http://ljo-express.blogspot.com/). Lisa Jensen has been writing film reviews and a column for Good Times since 1975.

FILMS…IN DESCENDING ORDER

BEAVER.It’s not easy to imagine Mel Gibson being married to Jodie Foster, and it’s not easy to imagine an extrovert as Gibson being so depressed that he has to communicate using a hand puppet. In spite of all that imagining, this film is nearly great. It’s long, but seems like parts are missing. See it only if you aren’t depressed.

BRIDESMAIDS.This film is a genuine surprise, it’s sad, poignant, dumb in parts, touching, gross, and proves that Kristin Wiig can act. I’m guessing that it’s the Judd Apatow directed sequences that are the gross minutes. It’s worth seeing just for the touching moments.

HESHER. Natalie Portman is in this “crazed and silly attempt to shock” movie and believe it or not so is old and heavy Piper Laurie!!! Joseph Gordon Leavitt is excellent in every role I can remember him in and he’s fine in this one too. But the plot and dreams and aims of the director are so amateurish that the movie does nothing except baffle. Don’t go, no one else is either.

HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN. This jerky quirky film is supposed to be a Quentin Tarantino grindhouse, chopfest, “Machete”, exploitive update homage type thing. It stars Rutger Hauer who must be very desperate…he hasn’t had a good part in years, and this certainly isn’t it either. Watching a busload of school kids’ burn to death isn’t that much fun, neither is all the buckshot in the chest stuff, or even chopped off heads rolling in the streets. But that said it’ll be a cult hit with folks who think all that’s cool.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN, part 28 or something. Johnny Depp and Penelope Cruz have exactly zero going for them as a couple. Believe it or not this film is almost as boring as the last 27 episodes…or more. Even the 3D is boring, the plot makes no sense and even though it’s Disney, it’s no Pixar film. Rent it if you have to but otherwise try never to even think about these Pirate films. No fun at all.

HOSTETTER’S HOT STUFF. Paul’s going to some island near the Equator, or so he says, that’s why this link is so late. “Here is a last-minute reminder about Harry Shearer showing The Big Uneasy at the Roxie in SF on the 10th of July. Not to mention the SC Baroque Festival’s Annual Garden Tour being held this year in one great big single garden, the amazing UCSC Arboretum, on the 29th of May, and the Britten comic opera “Albert Herring”, coming up on June 2-3-4-5. details here, as usual: http://www.lutherie.net/live.music.html If you scroll down the page, there are a couple of fat links to general area events, and of course there are all those little links up top to event sources of all sorts. This will be my last update for awhile. An island near the equator beckons. All the best, ph

ORESTES TERRIORIST. UCSC’s Danny Scheie directs a student cast in this new adaptation of Orestes by Mary-Kay Gamel – it’s a modern retelling of the tragic and bloody myth of young Orestes, son of Agamemnon and Klytemnestra, and his sister Elektra. Score by Philip Collins. This is the final weekend. Special 2-for-1 tickets on May 26. “Talk-backs” after the Saturday performance. May 26-29 7:00 pm (Thu-Fri-Sat) 3:00 pm (Sunday).UCSC Ticket Office (831-459-2159) Santa Cruz Civic Box Office (831-420-5260) www. santacruztickets.com

CADENZA, The Chamber Orchestra presents its final concert this season, it’s titled, “PASSION”. It features Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco – Guitar Concerto No.1, Op. 99
Agustin Barrios Mangore – La Catedral, Piazzolla – Oblivion, Piazzolla – Los Quatros Estaciones Portenäs. Artists are Mesut Ozgen – Guitar, Patricia Mitchell – Oboe and Cynthia Baehr – Violin. The press release says, “Passion with no limits… an evening of limitless emotional range and depth, featuring works of passion ” con sabor”!
One of the most beautiful Guitar concertos by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, followed by two of Piazzolla’s most enthralling and passionate works – a musical evening to sweep you off your feet!” Which is a lot, especially in church. It’s Saturday May 28, 2011 @ 8pm at First Congregational Church. 900 High Street, Santa Cruz. Tickets are Available at: Streetlight Records or By Phone: 1.800.838.3006.Or at the door.

UNIVERSAL GRAPEVINE. Each and every Tuesday from 7:00-8:00 p.m. I host Universal Grapevine on KZSC 88.1 fm. or on your computer (live only, or sometimes old programs are on “blog”) at WWW.KZSC.ORG. Shira Bogin talks about student art and MAH on May 24 after Shira, David Warren will give us the lowdown on his local production of TED that happens June 11. Frank Lima, aka The Great Morgani reveals just some secrets to his success on May 31, then Paul Whitworth fills us in on the plot behind Krapps Last Tape which he doing for Jewel Theatre Co. 6/2-6/5 . Santa Cruz County Supervisor Neal Coonerty helps me celebrate 5 years of Universal Grapevine on June 7. The Santa Cruz Bookshop Short Story Winners read their entries for the full hour on June 14^th. Ellen Primack details this year’s Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music on July 5^th followed by a return of Sue Heinz telling us more about Tarot, The Qabalah, and astrology of course. Don Young, author of Battle For Snow Mountain will be on July 12.Any and all suggestions for future programs are more than welcome so tune in and keep listening.

QUOTES. “A Boy Scout troop is a lot of boys dressed as jerks, led by a jerk dressed as a boy”, Shelley Berman. “I have already given two cousins to the war and I am ready to sacrifice my wife’s brother”, Artemus Ward.” I think husbands and wives should live in separate houses. If there’s enough money, the children should live in a third”, Cloris Leachman.