You might not know this, but it makes sense that Sacramento is officially “Camellia City of the World”. You also might not have known that today is Camellia Day. One thing is for sure. You can’t miss the fact that there are probably a million of these brightly hued flowers blooming across the city, as the always do in the waning days of winter.

Camellias are native to Southeast Asia and first came here, like many other things, during the Gold Rush. Colonel James Lloyd Lafayette Franklin Warren came out West from Boston in 1851 to open, among other retail establishments, a seed shop. A year later, he imported the first batch of Camellia seeds into Sacramento and they quickly took root as one of the favorite local blooms.

Continue reading “Camellia Day” »

We have really missed a trick thus far in not having a “Where are they now?” category. Although it’s sort of understandable: with the steel-trap minds here the list of possible candidates would be so large as to be unwieldy. So I’d like to start with Matt Wokas.

Continue reading “Matt Wokas: Where is he now?” »

Don’t check the Bee’s comics page. Today is the day that The Bee pulls the plug on the Sunday Peanuts strip. Say it with me: Good grief! Along with your Sunday dose of Charlie and gang, say goodbye to “Frank & Ernest,” “Rose Is Rose,” “B.C.” and “Family Circus.” More tragically, if you’re a fan, say goodbye forever to “Mother Goose and Grimm,” which has been running only Sundays for a while and is now gone altogether.

If Sunday just isn’t the same without a 40 year old Peanuts rerun, remember that the Official Peanuts Website has a daily strip. Mike Peters, creator of “Mother Goose,” (which I actually kind of enjoyed) has a web page but as of Saturday morning it seems not to be working.

Memo to the Bee’s comics dept.: Don’t mess with my Dilbert.

Few businesses in the history of capitalism blew as badly as Tower Records. The Sacramento-founded and West Sacramento-based company went from having must-shop stores in Hollywood, Tokyo and Manhattan to being the current generation’s edition of a buggy-whip manufacturer.

The Bee is reporting that Tower Records founder and Sacramento-area legend Russ Solomon has signed a lease for the former TR site on Broadway, with plans to open a … um … would it still be called a “record” store? For the history-minded, that location would be right across the street from where it all began, in the corner of the Solomon family’s Tower Drugs.

Fergoshsakes, Russ, you’re 81 years old. Why don’t you open an iTunes account like the rest of the world and enjoy your retirement? Still, gotta admire the spirit and wish him the best.

As an aside … isn’t it strange that after all those years Tower didn’t own that property? The family that does has also leased the Tower Books site, to the Avid Reader.

The Crocker Art Museum has a special exhibition starting tomorrow, “Without Words: The Sacramento Bee’s Most Powerful Photographs.” From the catalog:

Protests. Tragedy. Disaster. Despair.  Each day in the pages of The Sacramento Bee are photos that tell a story few words can. Since the first photographic image appeared in 1898, The Bee’s photojournalists have taken our readers to the frontlines of the most important events that have shaped our history.

Commemorating the 150th anniversary of The Sacramento Bee, The Crocker Art Museum presents the photography that brings to life events seen through the lenses of The Bee’s award-winning photographers.

A collection of nearly 20 images will be on display in the Crocker Art Museum’s Ballroom. A highlight of the exhibition is Assassination Foiled taken by longtime Bee photojournalist Dick Schmidt, who captured the image of Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme after her failed 1975 assassination attempt on President Gerald Ford in Capitol Park.

You can hear Dick Schmidt (long-time friend of mine, by the way) being interviewed today at 2 p.m. on CPR’s show “Insight” (KXPR; FM 90.9). He’s a low-key, charming and funny man, so I’m guessing the interview will be a great one. The Crocker exhbition runs through March 21.

Had the sacrag been around 10-20 years ago, we’d surely be writing about the demise of some of these establishments that I’d like to see make a comeback:

Continue reading “Bring ‘em back” »

Turned to the back of my Entertainment book to find a page of great money-saving coupons … for Tower. Choked up a little, what am I, made of wood here? Also how sad is it that I have tagged this post to the “Nostalgia” category.

News10.com reports that a local elementary school principal has banned the telling of “yo mamma” jokes on campus.

We see good kids just sitting there going back and forth with each other and I’m like what are you doing? Oh, we saw it on TV and were just doing ‘Yo Momma’ jokes, don’t worry about it.

And he was like, “what are you doing?” and they were like, “nothing, just telling jokes” and he was like “oh, no you’re not” and they were like…

When the kids get in trouble, when the kids get in fights and the cyber-bullying starts and they tell me specifically that they were doing ‘yo momma’ jokes, then yes it changes their behavior…

Cyber-bullying? At any rate, I’m not sure what to think of this. Will a ban on certain types of jokes really control behavior? I can just see this spawning a new line of jokes whereby the kids find a loophole in the rules and get there digs in. Maybe something like “Yo Daddy” or “Yo Cousin”.

Yo cousin so stupid it takes her two hours to watch 60 minutes

Doesn’t quite have the ring to it, I know, but stick with it kids, it’ll catch on.

This reminds me…I’ve been meaning to bring back, “that’s what she said”. Who is with me?

I was bummed today to read this article about the land that used to house the Oakwood Lake Resort in Manteca (aka Manteca Waterslides).  As mentioned on this here web log several times over the years, it’s somehow more painful to know the details of its future. I know many of us spent our summer days trying to swap out our colored mats without getting caught. And for those moments of childhood bliss, I say farewell!

Maybe they’ll build a commemorative slide on one of those artificial lakes…