You can tell fall has arrived in San Diego. Sure, every day is sunny and mild, but the change in season is  obvious in the colors. You can see that these palm trees are being lit up by a sun that’s much more south in the sky than it is in July. Plus, the glorious California sunset happens around five in the evening instead of 7:30 or 8:00.

This is the finest pocket radio ever made. It is the Grundig 100 PE. It gets AM, FM stereo, and six shortwave bands. Here is a little gadget that achieves fantastic performance within a small package powered by two rechargeable AA batteries. Sure, it could use a fine-tuning control, but for what it is this radio is just about all you could hope for.

The fidelity on all bands is good, and with headphones it rivals far more expensive competitors. This radio has been on some long trips with me over the years. Today I’m using it to follow the fires that are consuming thousands of acres throughout southern California. Right now it is tuned to KNX 1070, Los Angeles.

Gerald F. Pearce was one of the two grandfathers I never met. He was in WWI, but not in the European trenches. Instead, Gerald Senior was in the Middle East. 90 years ago today, the Great War ended. My grandfather was in Baghdad, Iraq. Here’s what the main drag looked like on November 11, 1918:

The First World War was supposed to End All Wars. Instead, it ushered in an era of violence without precedent in human history. My grandfather picked up a weapon to “fight for democracy.” I have chosen to devote my life to struggling for peace. Governments don’t award medals to peaceniks.

Here is another of my mom’s great early color photographs from the 1950’s. She took this picture of a kitten named Trinket back in December 1958. The family cats didn’t start to get weird until the 1960’s.

Ours is a society that has chosen to live by the sword. The story isn’t likely to have a happy ending.

Gardner Street School is a block north of Sunset Boulevard and a few blocks west of La Brea. I showed up here for first through fifth grade and I hadn’t been back inside the place since the last day of school in June of 1969. I used to walk half a block to buy the occasional hot dog or baseball bubble gum pack at the Sunset Grill twenty years before it was made famous by Don Henley.

My nephew Sam just started school at Gardner, and Halloween gave me a chance to take a fifth grader of my own to the party. The school is a lot more crowded than it was when I went there, and the nicest building was destroyed by an earthquake a couple of years after I left, but the place is very much the same.  We took the kids out to collect candy.

40 years ago to the day, Alexis and I went trick-or-treating with a big swarm of kids in the same neighborhood. Quite a few of the old houses have been replaced by big apartment buildings, but a surprising number of the old places have been restored with loving care.  The trees are 40 years older and seemed gigantic and vigorous. Most importantly, the streets were crowded with friendly, happy people. Plus, we agreed with most of the political signs on the lawns!

For no extra charge, here is some art I did at Gardner Street School at about this time of year back in 1968.

OK, maybe it was one cricket, but you don’t see one of these every day.

Here’s the view from the front door of the place I lived in on Ocean Front Walk in Venice, California. This shot was taken back in April of 1994. The charming gray apartment building with the little enclosed yard was demolished to make way for two gigantic glass and steel boxes, built up to the property line. Nicholas Cage was the first occupant of one of the big houses. I have boycotted his movies ever since.

Recent studies have shown that common bubblegum does a better job than steel when it comes to protecting old buildings from earthquakes. When the ground starts shaking, the bubblegum stretches without breaking, allowing the building to roll with the punch without falling apart.

The local government in San Diego is distinguishing itself from the rest of the state by embracing this innovative, cheap, low-technology approach to disaster management. The Department of Homeland Security has granted the City $14 million to provide bubble gum to all local public school students, and to transport them to the neighborhoods that most need to be protected from “The Big One.” Under the supervision of armed chaperones, each student will be directed where on each building to place his or her wad of gum so as to provide the greatest degree of protection.

This was one of the crazier cats I grew up with in the Hollywood Hills.  She was named Mad Carew, a perfect description as well as a catchy moniker. Is she using keen powers of concentration?  Is she in touch with a higher consciousness? Or is she nuts? (This is an easy question.)

This photograph is another in the series of winning cat pictures I took back in April 1974. You can check out the other ones here and here.

Professor Whitebread was one of the best lecturers I ever watched and listened to. He joined the faculty at the USC Law School in the summer of 1981, which is when I started my first year at the same institution. I took three classes from him: Criminal Procedure, Gifts Wills and Trusts (GWATS), and Juvenile Law. His classes were packed and people didn’t skip many sessions.  Each 50 minute lecture was a model of clarity and precision, engaging and entertaining. This guy loved and respected his students. He showed up prepared and he inspired everybody to care about the material the way he did.

Here is a drawing of Professor Whitebread that I put on my folder for Gifts, Wills & Trusts back in the spring of 1983. I respected this professor, but the only thing about law school that was an improvement over junior high was the fact that it was OK to drink alcohol in class.

Listen to Charlie tell a quick story about a marijuana dealer, a fleeing felon, and hot pursuit.

Ocean Beach is one of the most fun parts of San Diego. Here we see the view west from a few blocks up Pescadero Avenue. I’m looking forward to winter. When this neighborhood gets a few inches of snow, people snowboard down the hill, off the ski jump and into the ocean, and then catch a wave back to shore. During the warmer months, wheelchair users and bike riders take advantage of the jump ramp.

In the middle of March, 1976, I was a senior at Hollywood High School. I figured my college chances would be better if I could prove that I had super powers. While my classmates were busy in the library, I was hard at work trying to learn how to fly!

I also imagined that it would be cool to be a super hero who went around in Speedos instead of the more traditional tights-boots-cape outfit.

Smoking and campfires are forbidden in the Hollywood Hills.

Public compliance with these rules went up dramatically when the Authorities brought in some rattlesnakes to enforce the laws!