It\u2019s generally pretty cordial in the Post\u2019s suite of offices high above Ocean Boulevard in Downtown. You\u2019d be hard-pressed to find a more companionable group of people.<\/p>\n
Things turned ugly on Wednesday, however, when the newsroom broke into a full-scale brawl, because our Hi-lo editor Steve Lowery tried to bully a member of his staff into mispronouncing the name of Junipero Avenue.<\/p>\n
At first it was laughable, because Lowery, of faraway Hermosa Beach, was attempting to school arts writer Asia Morris, of Long Beach, on the \u201ccorrect\u201d way for a Long Beacher to say \u201cJunipero.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s \u2018JOON-eh-pero\u2019,\u201d gargled Lowery, sounding like he was choking on a small trout.<\/p>\n
No, countered Asia, correctly, \u201cLong Beachers say \u2018Juan-eh-PER-oh.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSHUT UP!\u201d screeched Lowery, launching himself out of his chair, with all the speed you\u2019d associate with a man currently entitled to all the benefits and courtesies afforded him by his AARP membership.<\/p>\n
And it was on; every member of the Post\u2019s staff shouting out their preferred pronunciations.<\/p>\n
In a misguided attempt to settle the issue, one of our social-engagement gurus, Valerie Osier, sent out polls on Twitter and Instagram on the subject of whether the street\u2019s name should be uttered as:<\/p>\n
And it would have been a nice way to settle the matter if we were to agree that the matter should be settled by a democratic process, especially a flawed one, which this clearly was, as evidenced by its outcome.<\/p>\n
With nearly 900 votes cast on Twitter, Choice No. 1 received 49% of the vote. No. 2, also incorrect, had about 30% and the most common way, \u201cJuan-eh-pero,\u201d got 21%.<\/p>\n
Steve and his cartel of wrong people prematurely rejoiced in their perceived victory.<\/p>\n
Cackle away, my friends. You can do a lot of funny things with numbers. Funny and crooked.<\/p>\n
Look, I know pretty much everyone in Long Beach and every one of them say it with a \u201cJuan\u201d in front of it, to which pedants and purists protest, \u201cNo, because there\u2019s no A in Junipero.\u201d And there\u2019s no I in team; nobody\u2019s claiming there\u2019s a literal A in the word, but there\u2019s an \u201cunderstood\u201d A in it; an invisible A, if you will (and you will).<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s go to some of the right-mined LOCALS on Twitter.<\/p>\n
PuxnDux: \u201cLB Native. How? Juan a pero. Why? That\u2019s worth some deep research.\u201d<\/p>\n
Charlee \u201cDemocrat Savage\u201d: \u201cI grew up in Long Beach and I\u2019m still here. My family has always pronounced it \u201cJuan-IP-per-ow.\u201d<\/p>\n
Les: \u201cI lived on Juan-eh-pero for 15 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stargazer: \u201cI always say Juan-eh-pero. Lived in Long Beach my whole life and my family all pronounce it this way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grobaty: \u201cIt\u2019s Juan-eh-pero.\u201d<\/p>\n
OK, enough. These people are starting to pile it on too much.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m just happy now that we can all agree and get back to work.<\/p>\n
And peace once again reigns in the newsroom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Nobody\u2019s claiming there\u2019s a literal A in the word, but there\u2019s an \u201cunderstood\u201d A in it; an invisible A, if you will (and you will).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":208,"featured_media":70597,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3107],"tags":[9753,69],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[2792],"class_list":["post-9489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-history","tag-junipero","tag-tim-grobaty","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/208"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9489"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=9489"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}