Everybody knows Albert Einstein spent a good deal of time in Pasadena in the 1930's, lecturing at Caltech, visiting JPL and Mount Wilson, and generally being a science ambassador around Los Angeles.
Here's a center of astronomy that Einstein visited but many Pasadenans don't know about: the Carnegie Observatories. I don't think there are any telescopes in the building but even if there are, in the middle of a residential neighborhood on a residential street, most of the science here is being done on computers and in brains. A huge part of their work, however, comes from Carnegie Observatories' telescopes at Las Campanas in Chile.
In the photograph you see, among others, Edwin Hubble (the tall guy, second from left). Hubble is most known for discovering and proving the expansion of the universe. He also figured out that a lot of what had been thought to be nebulae were, in fact, galaxies. Imagine how all those galaxies boggled minds when they hadn't been considered before.
I think you can pick out Professor Einstein in the picture.
J and I were invited to visit the Observatories by Dr. Cindy Hunt, a Caltech PhD and head of Carnegie's Social Media efforts. In the next couple of posts, Dr. Hunt's going to lead us to some places the public never sees.
We'll visit deep space via the deep, dark basement of the Carnegie Observatories. Stay with us.
In the mean time, mark your calendar for Sunday, October 18th from 2-5pm for the Carnegie Observatories open house. Click on the link and give them an RSVP, s'il vous plait.
I think I know so much about Pasadena, but until two days ago I didn't know about the Jet Propulsion Lab gift shop. My friend, a big fan of space travel and JPL, had surgery. I wanted to get him a t-shirt. There had to be a gift shop. I called.
When I checked in at the gate and told the guard where I wanted to go, he said, "Gonna get an over-priced t-shirt?" and I said that was exactly what I wanted.
The shop is teeny, but it's there, and you can get shot glasses (the blue ones on the top right say "NASA"), mugs, toys, key chains and the like. And the t-shirt wasn't over-priced at all.
The people outside were waiting for a tour. The woman at the shop told me groups and individuals can tour JPL with an advance reservation. Make your reservations here.
All this time I've been skipping the annual open house to avoid the crowds. I'm up for a tour, though, as soon as my friend is out of the hospital.
I'm afraid I've left it to the last minute to remind you (ask, beg, plead) to send the City of Pasadena your opinion about whether or not you want soccer fields at Hahamongna Watershed Park.
Loren Pluth is the Projects Manager for Parks and Landscape, and he's the one to write to. The City needs to know if you oppose building a soccer field at Hahamongna or, more specifically, if you support the building of a soccer field at Muir High School.
You can email Mr. Pluth at lpluth@cityofpasadena.net, and we have until 5pm today to get our messages in.
A short gloss here in Altadena Patch shows why the issue is not a simple one. But we have so many places where we can create a garden. We have only one Hahamongna Watershed.
August 23rd marks the end of the period for public comment on the scope of the Environmental Impact Report on the Initial Study for the Multi-Benefit/Multi-Use Project at Hahamongna Watershed Park.
That's doublespeak for:
Pasadena proposes to build an athletic field at Hahamongna, which is currently mostly open space. The name of the proposed field is the Sycamore Grove athletic field. I'm not sure why, maybe because sycamore trees will be razed to build it, along with cottonwoods and willows.
The city also proposes "creek restoration" and "trail restoration." Some bad stuff and some potentially good stuff. They've bundled these things into one project with a confusing name.
It's easy to register your comments, and you don't have to be from Pasadena to do so. Here's the City's link to get you started. Also, the Arroyo Seco Foundation has provided you with a toolkit. At the most recent Hahamongna Watershed Park Advisory Committee meeting, Loren Pluth of the city staff said comments will be accepted until the close of business on thae 23rd.
Please send your comments regarding the scope of the EIR to:
Rosa Laveaga, City of Pasadena, Department of Public Works,
Phone: (626) 744-4321
E-mail: mbmuproject@cityofpasadena.net,
Mailing Address: City of Pasadena, Department of Public Works, Attn: Engineering Division, 100 N. Garfield Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91101
To help get you started, here are the comments I submitted yesterday:
Dear Ms. Laveaga,
Herein are my comments on the Initial Study of the Multi-Benefit Multi-Use project for Hahamongna Watershed Park.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
The description of the project is vague. Under the circumstances, it's difficult to make direct comments.
ATHLETIC FIELD
As a frequent Hahamongna user, I notice the athletic field that is already there is rarely used.
Why are we building a second field there when the first one gets so little use?
Are there records on the use of the first field?
If so, where can I see the records?
If not, how do we justify a second field at that location?
FLOODING
Because the athletic field is to be built in a flood plain, sooner or later all or part of the field will be affected by heavy rains. One possible result is that the field will be flooded and/or washed into the dam.
Does Pasadena have the funds to repair the field during flood years?
Does Pasadena have the funds to clean the remains of the field from the dam during flood years?
Another possibility is that the field will withstand heavy rains, and flood waters will back up north of the raised field. In a low rainfall year, this wouldn't be a problem. In a high rainfall year, this could affect Tom Sawyer Camp, Rose Bowl Riders, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab.
Is Pasadena prepared to repair those potential damages and/or respond to potential lawsuits?
Has the regularity and severity of flooding in Hahamongna been studied? Over how many years?
Where can I see the results of that study?
HABITAT RESTORATION
It seems we are destroying habitat only to "restore" it.
How are you defining "habitat?"
How are you defining "restore?"
WATER
Water shortages continue around the United States. The Colorado River is no longer a source for the Metropolitan Water District. Pasadena's watershed feeds the Raymond Basin. Building anything at all in our watershed, at this time in history, is, at best, idiocy, especially something that pollutes with pesticides, oils, gasoline runoff, asphalt, etc.
Can you guarantee 0% pollution of the Raymond Basin, a San Gabriel Valley water resource?
California's governor is proposing a $23.7 billion pipeline to transport water in California, while Pasadena proposes to destroy its own potentially lucrative water resource. Once we've done that, we will have to spend taxpayer money on water we would have already had if we hadn't ruined the watershed with construction, pesticides, gasoline runoff, trash, etc.
Is Pasadena prepared to pay more for water?
What water resources will Pasadena have when the Raymond Basin becomes polluted?
Now that the Colorado River is no longer a source, where will Pasadena get its water?
Can the Metropolitan Water District guarantee enough water to Pasadena in future decades, when we won't have use of our own watershed and/or the Raymond Basin?
Have the above questions been studied?
Where can I see the results of the study?
WILDLIFE
The Initial Study says there will be no impact on wildlife. I have seen a mountain lion within yards of where the proposed athletic field is to be built, not to mention rabbits, deer, squirrels, snakes, and toads.
How have the project's effects on each of these particular creatures been studied?
How are you defining "wildlife?"
How are you defining "impact?"
Have these potential effects been documented, per creature? Where can I see the documents?
Additional auto and foot traffic can't help but impact wildlife. Not to mention lights, which the city says it will not include but which the grant requires.
How does the city reconcile the fact that it does not allow lights in Hahamongna but the grant requires the field be lit until 7pm?
Rare black willow and cottonwood are rebounding in the Hahamongna basin.
How many of these rare trees will be impacted?
Will they be part of the restoration?
The federally listed endangered bird, the Bell's Vireo, has now been documented in the exact area where the athletic field is planned.
What are Pasadena's plans to protect this federally listed endangered bird?
It was a lot of fun watching the JPL team Sunday night as they anticipated the landing of the Mars rover Curiosity. They maintained outward calm as Curiosity approached the planet's surface, but one could watch their cheekbones get tighter and breaths grow more shallow as the anticipation built.
When the cheering broke out I took pictures of the computer screen, but those didn't turn out so well. So I thought I'd show you a picture of where it all happened. No, this is not Mars, this is NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, scooched up between the feet of the foothills at the north end of Hahamongna Watershed Park, where it takes up space in La Canada Flintridge with a Pasadena address. Go figure.
It's amazing what these scientists have done. They've landed a craft on Mars, with precision, and they've done it basically with tin cans, rubber-bands and string. Imagine what they could do with an actual budget--a budget, say, half the size of the Pentagon's. Or even a quarter of that. We'd have had resort hotels and spaceports on Pluto by now and Pluto is only a plutoid.
The people who landed the rover Sunday night are not the only folks who work at JPL. The geniuses and support staff working there, some of whom I'm privileged to call friends and neighbors, study everything from the earth's oceans and atmosphere to the planets in our solar system to background radiation in deep space. Every time we walk at Hahamongna I think of them. What a privilege. What a team.
I haven't taken you to Hahamongna Watershed Park in a while. I suppose I've mentioned this before: nobody I know actually calls it that. We call it "JPL." For some reason we don't confuse the park with the aerospace research center. When someone asks if I want to walk dogs together at JPL I am not confused. I know they don't expect to wander among research labs and allow the dogs to pee on the telescopes. They mean Hahamongna Watershed Park.
Can you blame us? JPL is so much easier to say.
The reason for the nickname is obvious if you look at a map. The real JPL (NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab) sits perched sideways atop Hahamongna rather like a jaunty beret. And calling the park JPL isn't wrong; some of the earliest rocket experiments were launched there and even later ones have been tried on its sandy acres.
This view is closer to the Devil's Gate Dam than to NASA's JPL. The dam is close to the bottom of your map view, near the 210 freeway. (You can see it if you use the zoom in satellite view.) You can't see where I took this photo; it's off to the right, under cover of trees. But the Google shot of the dam looks relatively recent.
There may be cobblestones in Pasadena. I don't remember any offhand but that doesn't mean they're not here. The city was founded in the late 1800s and vestiges of the early town remain.
But mostly when I think of the stones we walk on I think of what we sometimes call "river rocks." They come from the Arroyo Seco and the mountains as well, and they're everywhere: lining walkways, decorating columns and adorning every other garden. Pasadenish have been building with them for the last century. Entire homes are made of them. They're part of our architectural vernacular.
This path leads off the main road into the Angeles National Forest north of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL). I haven't climbed it in quite some time. Boz declines to take it anymore (it's a bit steep) and for now I don't mind, because most of that greenery you see is poison oak. But I think the photo gives you an idea of our rocks. They're embedded in each woodland path, every trail, even in the history of our Pasadena home.
City Daily Photo's website was the victim of -- well, not nice people. So the wonderful Julie of Sydney set up a special page for us to use this time around. I posted a little early this time to make mine work.
Here on Pasadena Daily Photo, Monday is the day you tell me about the photo rather than me telling you. Because sometimes I'm baffled by what my camera sees.
Last night my family and I took a walk at Hahamongna as dusk began to infiltrate the park. I decided not to bring a camera but of course I didn't leave my phone behind and Hello, my name is Petrea and I am a photography addict.
I'll soon be trading in my primeval iPhone for a new model. But I kind of like these photos of the women runners from (I assume) Occidental College, with NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in the background.
As thy sky darkened, the poor old phone camera kept its (digital) shutter open longer. That made the runners more blurry and JPL more glowy.
L-R: Boz, Matt Seng, Dylan, Otter, Sophie and Augie at Hahamongna Watershed Park, with NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in the background)
When you come home after a long day and a longer commute, your dog wants--needs--all your attention and even more exercise. You need to veg out with TV and a beer. If the dog wins, you're exhausted. If you win, you feel guilty. For you, it's a lose/lose.
Matt Seng knows this first-hand. He's done the day-job thing, and the coming home and sitting on the couch thing. Then five years ago he decided he needed a change. He started running. He joined Team In Training. Now he's head coach for the LA American Cancer Society marathon training team. Tomorrow he'll be running his first 50 mile ultra-marathon, the Ray Miller 50/50, in the Santa Monica mountains.
The guy is kind of motivated.
It turns out Matt's dogs Dylan and Sophie are motivated, too. They love running, and Matt loves them. He's one of those people who really gets dogs, you know what I mean? And dogs get him. Fortunately for Dylan and Sophie, Matt is also one of those people who figured out how to turn his passions into his business: Paws In Motion LA. Matt walks dogs and babysits dogs and, if your dog doesn't have his driver's license, Matt will give him a ride to where he needs to go. I think Matt's favorite thing, though, is taking dogs for a run.
Matt gets dogs and Dylan gets Matt.
When I first met Matt I figured the dog running business was an okay idea. But then John and I ran into him out at Hahamongna Watershed Park and I knew Matt was onto something beyond the usual neighborhood saunter. If he's running with your dog out there you are going to have one happy dog.
If it's true that a tired dog is a happy dog, then after our walk yesterday morning Boz was ecstatic for the rest of the day.
Here at the old Pasadena Daily Photo blog, we celebrate Mondays with a bit of Zen.
Zen learning comes from experience, I'm told, rather than lectures or books. So please experience the photo and, in the comments, tell us what you've learned.
There's no right or wrong. We're here to have fun.
If you follow the Saga of Boz (and why wouldn't you?) you know he had eye surgery about two and a half weeks ago. He had to wear a (shameful) cone for two whole weeks, during which time there were no none zero zip trips to Hahamongna Watershed Park (for his sake we call it JPL because it has fewer syllables, though I doubt he'd find the real JPL nearly as interesting).
First we inspected the Devil's Gate Dam. The County has dug out a good deal of silt in what might end up as an ongoing project. If you enlarge the picture you can see, left of center, a bunch of ducks ("bunch" being the scientific term), swimming as far away from Boz as they can get, even though all he ever says to them is "murph."
We usually walk all the way from one end of Hahamongna to the other, or at least from the dam to Johnson Field and back, but it was our first trip out in a while and the Pooper was easily pooped. You would be, too, if you had to stop and smell every damn thing in the whole watershed.
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Now, this is totally off the subject but if you like cowboy music, the Coffee Gallery and Rocky the Flying Squirrel, I hope you'll read my latest article on Patch.
I sort of make new year's resolutions, but not exactly. (Maybe this year I'll begin to consider using slightly more definitive language.)
I'm not going to resolve to do anything I don't want to do, even if it would make me a better person. I wouldn't, for example, resolve to learn how to cook (why would I do that? I don't enjoy cooking) or run a marathon (tried that last year and ended up in physical therapy).
Better for me to lose a bad habit, or do more of something I've been wanting to do.
So:
quit worrying
garden more (the condition of the yard is getting to me)
I've had my head in the proverbial sand for some time now. We unplugged our TV a while back and I've turned off my car radio so as not to hear about politics because I want to enjoy life.
Today I drove John's car. The radio was on when I turned the key in the ignition and I heard "brush fire near JPL." I forgot my errand, turned west and took Oak Grove Drive above Devil's Gate Dam.
The radio said the flames were moving slowly uphill, away from the Jet Propulsion Lab. I could see that, yet I had to pull over when I saw the smoke. My reaction was physical, a loss of breath, an almost-sob. Look--a 5 acre brush fire is nothing compared to the Station Fire of 2009, but of course that's what I thought of. I've seen flames on these hills before. I've stood on the dam and watched the mountain burn because I couldn't take my eyes away.
I'm not the only one who remembered. 115 firefighters shut this baby down in fewer than ninety minutes. I may have watched an inferno from atop the dam, but they've seen it from within.
There are worse things you could do than sit on the back steps of Pasadena's Central Library on a Sunday. (Not all branches are open today, but this one's open from 1-5.)
And it's open house weekend at the Jet Propulsion Lab, when our normally modest rocket scientists get to show off.
No matter your plans, keep in mind that the Pasadena Marathon is also today, so check the map for street closures before you head out if you want to find the runners--or if you don't.
This is part of the grove at Oak Grove Park. It's close to the Jet Propulsion Lab. This part of the park can be found by walking north out of the Oak Grove Park parking lot across from La Canada Flintridge High school. It's a serene little forest, rare in an urban setting.
I guess they'll have to change the name of the Arcadia Woodlands. Arcadia means " anyrealorimaginaryplaceofferingpeaceand simplicity." I don't know what they're going to call it once it's a dump.
If you want to help preserve the Arcadia Woodlands, there are some good suggestions at the end of this informative post from LA Creek Freak. It's late, but worth a try.
We in Pasadena still have our Oak Grove Park, adjacent to Hahamongna Watershed Park. We can still even call it an oak grove. But I recommend we don't get cocky.
When I moved here from Illinois I thought of living in southern California as a vacation on another planet, especially when it came to plant life. Sometimes I still do. Click on this picture to enlarge it. These are bean pods.
The brownish stream on the lower right of this photo is bean pods. The branches above the stream show where the pods came from.
What kind of tree drops bean pods in purple, orange, yellow and green? Surely something not from our solar system.
This photo was taken awfully close to JPL. Maybe I shouldn't be wandering around over there.
I get over to Hahamongna Watershed Park about three times a week and I've been taking pictures there for two and a half years. You'd think I'd have enough photos of the place. But it's different every time I go, with new colors, new angles or, right now, a new family of ducks. I tried going without my camera one day last week, but when I saw JPL and the mountains sandwiched between the expressive sky and this field of wild yellow, I ended up taking out my iPhone and shooting away. I couldn't help myself.
In case you were planning on attending the City Council meeting this coming Monday to help defend Hahamongna from soccer fields, it looks like the issue's been put off until the July 12th meeting. Sure enough, I don't see it on the June 7th City Council Agenda. I was feeling optimistic about preventing soccer fields in Hahamongna, but apparently the City Council is under some pressure. Find out more and sign the Save Hahamongna petition at savehahamongna.org.
By the way, the spring flood waters have diminished to small streams, but they're still flowing.
Soccer fields on a flood plain. Call me crazy, but I'm thinking it's not the ideal spot.
The sign keeps no one out of nowhere; it's a remnant of the old days, but of which old days I'm not sure.
A skilled rider leads young student riders across the northern part of Hahamongna Watershed Park with NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in the background. I took the photo last Sunday. The ground was wet, but it's practically arid compared to a week or two before when the flood waters rushed through. That could all be changing as you read this because we're expecting more heavy rain this weekend.
It's been a long time since we've had so much rain in such a short period of time.
Horses have been part of the Tournament of Roses Parade since its beginning in 1890. This year is no exception: 23 different equestrian groups will prance down Colorado Blvd. with the floats on New Year's day.
As kids, my siblings and I watched all the big holiday parades--the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade with its huge balloons, the Hollywood Christmas Parade and its movie stars, and finally the Rose Parade with its flowery floats. The horses have always been my favorite part.
I was a horse-crazy kid. We had two horses, first Pandora from 1963 to 1967, then Brandy from 1967 to 1971 (about when my interest in boys beat out my interest in horses). My sisters and/or brother may correct me on this but I did the most riding--I rode across meadows and down the country roads between our town of DeKalb, Illinois and the little surrounding towns, through fallow fields and alongside the Kishwaukee River. I rode through the NIU campus, and more than once visited the drive-through of the local Jack-in-the-Box.
There are several stables in the Pasadena area. Boz and I often see these guys riding at Hahamongna Watershed Park. They're about the age I was when we sold Brandy, maybe a little older. They said they ride out of the Altadena stables. They seemed sweet, just happy to be out on their horses.
I wonder if they ride absolutely everywhere, like I used to do? Though I've seen people riding horses on N. Lincoln Avenue, Pasadena's too urban to ride a horse through the drive-through at Jack-in-the-Box. But we've got so many miles of trails these guys aren't missing a thing.
City of Pasadena Holiday Hotline is up and running at (877) 793-9311 for answers to any and all questions about the Rose Parade, Rose Bowl Game and BCS final game. Volunteers are standing by through Jan. 7. More info at VisitPasadena.com.
