I do not know if it is my advancing age, as I am closer to fifty than forty, or my reputation for not being a night owl; but regarding New Year’s Eve celebrations I am no longer asked, “What did you do to ring in the New Year?” but rather am asked, “Did you make it to midnight?”  For the record, yes I did make it to midnight, in two of the four time zones in the Continental U.S., going to bed not too long after the entry of 2009 was celebrated in my birth city of Tulsa. 

 

John Morris is proved correct once again. Since I was a) in Northern California for New Year’s and b) as stated above were I in Long Beach would have been fast asleep at midnight; I read on the Long Beach Post that the Pine Avenue celebration was a huge success—again.  Morris continues to push for more events on Pine Avenue and for some reason he continues to receive push-back from those whose support is needed for more events to happen. 

 

Yesterday we were visiting friends in the area and ventured into Pasadena to view the Rose Parade Floats.  Having spent about twenty New Year’s days in Long Beach, the visit to view the floats post-parade was a first for me, and I am glad we did it.  The size of the floats and the incredible detail of the construction is fantastic.  Each float was amazing in the use of flowers, leaves, seeds, and other flora required for entry into the Rose Parade.

 

Viewing the City of Long Beach float, my first thought was of Mike O’Toole.  During my first summer in Long Beach, 1981, O’Toole was not infrequently soliciting help from myself and others to haul a Pakistani fishing boat around Naples as he tried to find a “home” for the boat so he could begin a gondola business carrying people around the canals of Naples.  As I recall, O’Toole had created the gondola ride idea for a business class at USC.  He liked the idea so much he found a vessel that somewhat resembled an Italian gondola, hooked up a small electric motor and began shuttling locals around the canal.

 

On Thursday O’Toole’s business class project was seen by millions around the world.  The foundation, if that is what it would be called, of the City of Long Beach “Renaissance Revival” float, was a gondola representing O’Toole’s Gondola Getaway.  To think it all started with a leaky, clunky boat that previously had been someone’s flower box. 

 

O’Toole and Morris, two entrepreneurs who love Long Beach and despite many disappointments for each on ideas they have had to bring more visitors, more business and more revenue to local businesses and the city, they each keep thinking “what if we….”  Am I the only one who wonders what would be the result of any collaboration between these two bright and creative men?

 

While we were in Northern California we visited the California Academy of Sciences in their new home.  We took the ferry in from Marin County where we were staying at my sister’s and my Dad picked us up at the Ferry building and drove us to the Academy, dropped us off and went to look for parking; it was 11:00 on Tuesday morning.  With tickets already in hand we went to get in line to enter the building and view the exhibits.  Thankfully our kids are veterans of lines at Disneyland as when we reached the end of the line several hundred yards from the front door of the building.  We were told it would take us about an hour and a half to enter, they were only letting people in as people left; we were also told that the Planetarium exhibit was full, so if/when we got in the building we would not be able to enjoy that exhibit.  I buzzed my Dad and told him about the wait and that our crew was game for waiting and seeing the exhibits that we had heard so much about.  He thought we were nuts and would wait out our visit at his home not too far away.

 

Almost exactly and hour and a half later we did enter, and immediately searched for lunch before any major melt-downs occurred due to lack of protein and calories—Leslie was probably more concerned about me in this regard than the girls.  Foreseeing a major wait at any food vendor given the lines outside, I was very surprised to experience a relatively quick move through the cafeteria with very quality choices for everyone—while very pricey the food was good, and hey it’s San Francisco where prices are high anyway. 

 

After lunch we hit the exhibits.  There are four main exhibit areas we could define, an aquarium, a rain forest, the planetarium and an African exhibit; in between are other more open exhibits like one on evolution and the Galapagos.  Scratch the planetarium as they had taken reservations through the end of the day already.  The line to walk through the rainforest exhibit was as long as the line to get into the building; the exhibit has glass walls so you can see in it—the cynic in me saw a walk up to the tops of trees and people just standing there trying to get butterflies to land on them.  The one thing we heard many people say when we said we were going was, “see the white alligator” which is part of the “swamp” exhibit which is part of the aquarium exhibit.  We saw the white alligator.  It is an alligator and it is white and it was laying on a small island not moving. 

 

The aquarium exhibit was poorly conceived in the eyes of this veteran of many, many, many visits to the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific.  Leslie commented that she liked that some of the viewing windows were low and at the kids’ eye level—but this required parents to stoop down to see what was in there and read the sign for many of the kids.  As well, there were plenty of viewing windows that were well above the kids’ heads requiring us to lift them to see in the tank.  It was dark and there appeared to be no consistent theme to the exhibits; as well they had snakes and reptiles mixed in with fish and crustaceans.  Did I mention it was dark?  In a crowded public place with kids and people milling about one thing a parent likes to be able to do is easily spot their children.

 

The African exhibit was a left over from the 1960s with static dioramas of stuffed animals from various parts of Africa.  It reminded me of class field trips in 1972 to the Natural History Museum in Philadelphia.  I did enjoy the display on the Galapagos and Darwin’s work on evolution. 

 

In general I give a higher visitor ranking to our Aquarium of the Pacific than their Academy of Sciences.  The tickets were oversold resulting in visitors being denied the opportunity to experience exhibits they have paid to see.  The floor plan is difficult to maneuver through.  And in my opinion the exhibits were not that great—especially comparing apples to apples in the aquarium exhibit to our aquarium exhibits.  I would like to visit again when it is significantly less crowded and see the planetarium exhibit.

 

Last week our Editor Ryan ZumMallen wrote a post on the trials and tribulations of MediaNews, the Press-Telegram and the print media in general.  Regular visitors to the Front Porch are aware that have strong feelings about media bias in the mainstream media, which includes most major newspapers.  While they can blame the growth of the internet as a reason for their demise, what is being ignored by those who run the print media is that the growth of the internet has exposed the biases in the reporting of the likes of the Associated Press (where most papers like the Press-Telegram get their non-local news), New York Times, LA Times, Tribune, etc.  When those who are supposed to be the main purveyors of news are editorializing rather than reporting it creates mistrust with their subscribers and the community where they are located.  The bias and misreporting is exposed because of the internet and the numerous sources available to check facts and read other reports of the same events and compare them with what is being written in the local paper.  As long as the publishers and editors continue to stick their heads in the sand and refuse to acknowledge their news departments have become extensions of their editorial departments they will continue to lose circulation and advertising.

 

A classic example has been the treatment of Israel.  I do not recall very many articles and huge headlines for the past several years as Hamas terrorists have fired thousands of rockets aimed at innocent Israelis.  I do not recall any editorials admonishing Hamas for breaking cease fire agreements and supporting the targeting of civilian Israelis.  In recent coverage I have not seen too many reports of Hamas terrorists dragging their fellow Palestinians out of hospitals and shooting them because they or their family members had somehow done something disagreeable—such as get treatment in an Israeli hospital.

 

I hope that Israel does not stop their current mission until Hamas is wiped out.  Hiding their arms in homes with children, firing rockets from hospitals, schools and mosques, using their fellow Palestinians as shields while they attack Israel, Hamas is a group that has twisted morals and values and does more to harm the Palestinian people than Israel ever will.  Reading between the lines of statements from many leaders in Arab and Middle Eastern nations, it seems they too wish Israel success in this current conflict.

 

Personally I like to read a paper in the morning with my first cup of coffee.  Unfortunately, with the Press-Telegram these days it only takes about a cup of coffee to get through it given the lack of local reporting, news and commentary. 

 

Back on to normal schedules for everyone with the passing of the Christmas and New Year’s holidays.  Whenever they are mid-week, schedules get really wacky and the past two weeks have been no exception.  A great excuse by the way for our legislators in Sacramento to waste two more weeks of not solving our financial crisis.  By the way, how come drilling offshore as a way to generate revenue has not even been discussed?  It works for Texas, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi.  They have many of the same issues our state faces, including the illegal immigration impact on public services and finances, but their revenue from oil production greatly helps them with their budgets.

 

A hearty welcome to John Greet!  An email in my in-box from John B. is always welcome and an invitation to see an idea or issue from his perspective, a perspective I appreciate and admire.  Now John is one of us here at the Long Beach Post and I welcome the opportunity to read his thoughts on the various issues of the day.

 

Your thoughts welcome, click here to email me or on “Leave A Comment” below for public response.