Books and Authors

Great news from Grunion Gazette! Apostrope Books is coming soon to Second Street. Expected to open in the middle of March, the store will carry cards and gift wrap as well as books, but it's run by experienced book retailers so there's hope that they can make a go of it. More great news from the Grunion! Award-winning mystery author Wendy Hornsby will be writing a biweekly column called No Mystery Here.

Christmas Comes to Belmont Shore

All the merry gentle merchants down on Second Street are gearing up for Christmas. They've teamed up with Food Finders and We Love Long Beach to set up drop off points for canned food or sealed box foods donations. A list of the locations is on their site. The parade theme is "A Magical, Musical Christmas" this year, and 12 marching bands have signed up to perform. Before the parade begins at 7 pm on December 5, there'll be a one mile fun run called the Jingle Jaunt, sponsored by the Gazette newspapers. There's a sign-up page on the Gazette site. And speaking of magical and musical, groups can sign up with the Belmont Shore Business Association to sing Christmas carols on weekends or weeknights to bring a little holiday cheer to us intrepid shoppers.

Friends Get Arty Down at The Lagoon

The Grunion Gazette reported last week ("FOCL Art Walks Add to Lagoon") that the Friends of Colorado Lagoon have a new Creative Arts initiative. Poking around the FOCL website, I couldn’t find any hard dates or any information about getting involved, but the article interviews Timothy Dunham as saying, “We plan to dig posts into the sand and hang or install pieces. It would be a venue for local artists.” Art and nature, can’t get better than that. He goes on to say that an Earth Day celebration at the Lagoon is also in the works.

The FOCL blog doesn’t have any information about these events either, but there are some lovely photos of early morning wildlife at the Lagoon. Dunham gets up at dawn so you don’t have to and posts several photos almost every day. Now if only he can uncover the mystery of why they haven’t taken down the floating Christmas trees yet.

Proud parent alert!

Check it out! Grunion Gazette has a story this week about my vagabond boys who are zeroing in on Washington DC just in time for the inauguration. Or better yet get their firsthand accounts at Obamathon Man and The Daily Reeder. Don't you wish you were wild and crazy enough to celebrate the new administration with the jubilant crowds down on Foggy Bottom?