September 2008 Archives

Rancho Cucamonga, Pomona and Claremont are all promoting the reading of a single novel this fall. Unfortunately, it's a different novel in each city. My life would have been easier if they'd all chosen the same one.

Even if you don't live in one of those three cities, be a citizen of the Inland Valley and read about the novels, and some of the neat programs to go along with each book, in Wednesday's column. And return here Wednesday for links to various websites for the programs.

No, Ontario doesn't have a Moutain Street. This tile shop on Mountain Avenue is presumably better at fitting tile than in fitting all the letters in Mountain into a cramped space. The mistake is repeated on the other side of the building.

"Moutain" -- which I would pronounce "moo-tahn" -- doesn't mean anything, to my knowledge, but the word reminds me of poutain, the Canadian version of French fries that comes with cheese curds and brown gravy. Wonder if the Chaffey brothers would have liked that?

Have you non-cable-TV folks bought your converter box? And, more importantly, hooked it up instead of leaving it in the original packaging?

I'm among the 12 percent of U.S. households that rely on rabbit ears (in my case) or rooftop antennas for over-the-air programming. My analog TV requires a converter box to pick up the digital signals that will replace analog on Feb. 17, 2009.

Armed with my $40 government coupon, I bought my converter box on Labor Day for $20. However, I tried, but failed, to unravel the directions in a short, frustrating session that evening. I have one of those brains that seizes up when confronted with anything technical.

I think this qualifies:

"2. Connect the 'To TV (RF)' jack on this unit to the 'Antenna In' jack on your TV using a coaxial RF cable (R). Your TV must be tuned to the selected RF Output Channel (Refer to page 8) channel (3 or 4) to display the picture. (default: channel 3).

"Connect the VIDEO and AUDIO (L/R) jacks on this unit to the video and audio input jacks on the TV using the video (V) and audio (A) cable."

Did the guy who wrote this manual test these instructions on his mother first? I suspect not.

My first attempt, using the second approach, meant unplugging my DVD player from my TV. Sorry, but no. (Unless I misunderstood how to do it, which is certainly possible. No other likely holes in my TV presented themselves.)

Some weeks later, I worked up my nerve and gave it another go. This time I tried the first way, despite all the bewildering parenthetical asides. Doing so meant unplugging my VCR from my TV so I could use that hole. Well, not such a terrible thing, at this point in history, but a little disappointing. At least the converter box works.

Have any of you made the switch, or had difficulty doing so? I'd hate to think Vivian C. Brown and I are the only ones.

Remember the "real Italian pasta dinner" promised by a Rancho Cucamonga club in comments at a recent City Council meeting? I went. I gotta say, based on the reception I got from the Sons of Italy, they all seem to be Daily Bulletin readers. Read about the Great Meatball Controversy -- you can get a sneak preview here -- and my extra cannoli in Sunday's column.

This week's restaurant: Flamingo Palms, 9223 Archibald Ave. (at 6th), Rancho Cucamonga.

Located in a nondescript business park next to a nail salon and employment center, this is a high-turnover space most recently home to a Mexican restaurant, Mi Casita. Recently a new banner went up over the entrance: "Cuban Food."

A welcome change, since there's no real Cuban restaurant in the Inland Valley outside of Norco's Little Bit of Cuba. (Coco Palm in Pomona, from what I can tell, is kind of a hybrid. Some of us remember the late Mama Inez in downtown Pomona.)

The interior is improved: pale yellow walls with ironwork sculpture and deep brown trim. It's pleasant but spartan. The stackable chairs are strictly hotel ballroom. Partitions and plants would help.

I know almost nothing about Cuban food, to be honest. The menu has stews, salads, sandwiches and seafood. Lots of chicken and pork. Some of the dishes (in the $10-$12 range) indicate more ambition than might otherwise be surmised from the menu's rather homely appearance.

I stuck with one of the basics: a Cubano sandwich ($6.75) of ham, pork, cheese (or, as the menu put it, "chesses") and pickles on a long roll, pressed and then sliced diagonally. Fried plantains were on the side. The result was as good as my memory of the Cubano I had once in Miami.

Service was friendly; it looks to be a family operation.

I hope Flamingo Palms lasts longer than recent occupants because it bears further investigation.

Spam eggrolls and Spam dip were the big winners in the L.A. County Fair's annual, and notorious, cooking contest on Wednesday. Congratulations, I guess.

Culinarily speaking, it will be hard to top the year Spam cheesecake won.

Read more at the Fair's Hot Blog on a Stick, with a video to boot.

The 81st Edition of the L.A. County Fair comes to a close Sunday, but not before I can offer a column's worth of impressions of my visits this year.

Pirates! A giant ant farm! Unique cakes! Ridiculously expensive bottled water! All this and symbol-laden art pieces in Friday's column.

Some of you will remember the days when comic books could be found at newsstands, supermarkets, convenience stores, candy stores and the like. In an earlier era, they were ubiquitous.

These days, other than a few in a spinner rack at the Montclair Borders, individual comics can be found only at comics specialty shops, of which there are very few. The entire Inland Valley has just four such stores, in Chino, Claremont, Pomona and Rancho Cucamonga.

Scratch Claremont. After 18 years, many spent in the Old Schoolhouse before a move to cheaper quarters in a business park, the Comic Bookie is closing up shop.

The last day is scheduled to be Oct. 31. Owner Chris Peterson sent out an e-mail to his regular customers this week announcing the end, saying sales aren't even covering his expenses.

He's in the midst of sales to clear out his stock -- admittedly, the prospect of discount pricing cushions the blow to cost-conscious comics fans (i.e., all of them) -- but it'll be a sad day when the shop closes. Not least among the reasons is Peterson's friendly manner, which endeared him to West End comics fans.

He liked us too, as his message makes clear:

"I cannot express how much I appreciate all of the great customers who have helped keep CB alive over the last 18 years! I will deeply miss doing business, and shooting the breeze, with you all. I feel very lucky to have spent the better part of the last 2 decades being your local 'Comic Book Guy.' But, things change, and it looks like it's time to move on."

His store is at 1420 N. Claremont Blvd., Suite 203B, Claremont; (909) 399-0228.

James Fallows, a national correspondent for the Atlantic Monthly, spoke Tuesday evening at Claremont McKenna College's Athenaeum on foreign policy and America's challenges.

For yours truly, one challenge was grasping the erudite Fallows' arguments; for Fallows, the greatest challenge was getting to the point. (He spent a fair amount of time outlining how his talk would go instead of just, you know, talking.)

Here are his four ideas for the post-Bush era, as best I can summarize them:

* We have a window of opportunity to remake ourselves and put our house in order not seen since the post-World War II era. We should think big.

* We should reconsider what measures are worth taking to defend ourselves after 9/11 and what ones undermine our society.

* We should focus on how can America best remain attractive to the world through the power of our example through such traditional American strengths as opportunity, innovation, openness, equality and trust.

* We should take a world leadership role in slowing global warming and energy use.

"If it's possible to scare up $700 billion over a weekend to avert a financial crisis, it would take a lot less to make a significant difference in climate change," Fallows said.

The former Carter speechwriter has been living in China for two years and said that nation is very poor, its army focused on Tibet rather than us, and its citizens largely positive about America.

His only partisan comment was to repeat something a Chinese financial official told him in a recent interview. Noting that the U.S. criticizes China's one-party system while extoling the virtues of our two-party system, the official said that after the American disasters under Bush, putting another Republican in the White House will make us look like hypocrites when we say our democratic system fosters accountability.

Fallows encouraged students, who made up much of the audience, to live abroad for a year before age 30 to gain a better understanding of the world. His final words were addressed to them: "Go forth and save us."

OK, that part I understood perfectly.

Those mockers at The Onion offer this report on two topics of local, but little crossover, interest:

"LOUDON, NH -- Shock, grief, and the overwhelming sense of loss that has swept the stock car racing community following the death by apparent suicide of writer David Foster Wallace has moved NASCAR to cancel the remainder of its 2008 season in respect for the acclaimed but troubled author of Infinite Jest, A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, and Brief Interviews With Hideous Men."

Luxuriate in irony here.

Tuesday's LA Times had a funny story from North Korea on how no one there is talking about Kim Jong Il's health, and also about how venerated Kim and his late father are. Their images are considered sacred and people must hang portraits of the two in their homes: "People who fail to dust them regularly are fined."

But here's what grabbed my attention:

"Foreign visitors are advised upon their arrival in Pyongyang not to throw away any North Korean newspapers lest they despoil a photo of the leaders," the story notes.

" 'Don't tear or crumble the newspapers. Don't throw it in a dustbin. Don't wrap something with it or use it for some other purpose,' warned guide Gil Hyun Ah, who said offenders would have to write formal letters of apology before being permitted to leave the country."

When I rule the Inland Valley -- it will be a benevolent tyranny -- I expect to apply the same rule upon the populace regarding the Daily Bulletin. Do not tear or crumble it, don't toss it away and for goodness' sake don't wrap any fish or coffee grounds in it. You might despoil my image.

If my image isn't in that issue, do whatever you like. Let Blackstock or Sholley set up their own regimes, if they're concerned about their images. See how much freedom I'll allow you?

Did you see the Bangles, Motels and Berlin in concert at the Fair last Friday? I did, and that '80s flashback is my first item Wednesday.

From there we get into Monday's Pomona council meeting, specifically, the move to rename Madison Park. The founding fathers get no respect. Also, a councilman responds, in a surprising way, to Sunday's column about his cell phone use. Look for all this in Wednesday's paper and online.

I went to the Claremont Museum of Art on Saturday evening for the opening reception for "The Passerby Museum" exhibit, in which objects that could fit into a sandwich bag were collected from passersby in the Village and at Pitzer College. The collection was a recent column topic.

Among the items added since I'd written about it:

* An extinguished cigarette and handwritten note reading "Hope it's my last."

* An apple core, beginning to brown.

* A Costco shopping list that included this item: "TP (?)." I wonder what the deciding factor was.

* An Aug. 24 Angels vs. Twins ticket.

The community-driven exhibit is "an intriguing way to get people into the museum who might not otherwise come," executive director William Moreno told me.

In the first gallery space, the walls are covered floor to ceiling with pinned-up Passerby Museum sandwich bags, not just the nearly 300 from Claremont but hundreds from previous stops in Cuba, Spain, Canada and New York City, each city identified near the ceiling in bold letters.

Now that its name is alongside Havana, Mexico City and New York City, has obscure Claremont suddenly vaulted among the great cities of the world?

Well, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada isn't all that well known either, and it's represented, co-curator Nicolas Dumit Estevez pointed out when I brought it up. But he saw my point and thought that when the "Claremont, California" items are shown in other cities -- San Antonio, Texas, is the likely next stop, sometime next year -- the unfamiliar name might spark curiosity.

"When people see 'Claremont,' I think they'll want to look it up on a map, don't you?" Estevez said.

I do.

In the meantime, see the exhibit at the museum through Dec. 28. The first Friday of the month, admission is free.

PFF Bancorp is likely to merge with another bank and lose its independence after 116 years. A missing letter at the 16th and Mountain branch in Upland seems to provide commentary.

Skipping Thursday's Ontario-Montclair School District board meeting, under the theory (apparently borne out) that nothing could top the last meeting, I instead turned for a topic to our friends on the Pomona City Council.

Some weeks back, in a burst of journalistic enthusiasm, I requested and received copies of council members' expense reports. I sweated over a hot calculator to make sense of them. Then it became clear that cell phone use was counted separately. I went back and added up all those charges. I wasn't sure what to do with the results. Then I had a good idea what to do but couldn't find a free column in which to present it. Hence, skipping the OMSD meeting.

At last, the results will be presented to you, the reading public. My editor says the effort was worth it. Decide for yourself on Sunday.

This week's restaurant: Fratello's, 1667 N. Mountain Ave. (at 16th), Upland.

There aren't many places to eat above 16th Street in Upland, which is probably how privacy-lovin' homeowners up there like it. One of the few exceptions is Fratello's, which is in the Stater Bros. center along with Rancho Los Magueyes, Happy Wok, Legends and the Bulldog Pub.

I first visited Fratello's last week. It's on the small side, just a few tables, a bar and an open kitchen, but the ambience is pleasant enough: golden paint, dark wood, comfortable seating and vintage wine posters. The insistent music may be a bit much.

I tried one of the $5.99 lunch specials: a cheese pizza slice, salad and soda. The salad was above average, aided by the vinaigrette dressing. The pizza was quite good. The crust was uncommonly light and chewy. Based on this slice, Fratello's is now my second-favorite pizza in Upland (although I still need to try Petrillo's).

On Thursday I went back for the pasta lunch special (also $5.99): a half-order of either spaghetti or penne, meat sauce or marinara, and a soda. I went for the penne with meat. Pasta is pasta, and hard to mess up, but the sauce was hearty.

So were the '70s rock classics playing over the sound system: "Blinded By the Light," "Rocket Man" and "Brown Sugar," among others. Until the next table asked that the volume be turned down.

In Ontario City Council news, the city touts an oddly timed award from Laura Bush, an Ontario councilman undergoes a drug test (and passes, in case you were in suspense) and the entire council pulls a CAPER (which is an acronym for something boring). Also, I report from the Vampire Weekend concert in Pomona. All of this and more is in Friday's column.

Tired of attorneys who nod their head but don't listen? That apparently isn't a problem in Claremont.

If you're new to the blog today, welcome. Walk around and explore the place.

The Archives buttons on the left will take you to older material by date and the Category buttons on the right will take you to particular areas of interest. And the Search field on the right will also be useful; we've only scratched the surface of the Inland Valley, but we've touched on a lot of businesses and places, past and present.

In today's column, I mention the local community-oriented blogs of which I'm aware. I've asked our online folks for a blogroll, or permanent links from the home page to these blogs (most of which link to my blog), but so far, no dice. Can't blame 'em; they're an overworked crew. They haven't even linked this page to dailybulletin.com.

So here's the best I can do: links from this post to these local blogs.

When I wrote about getting the name of my newspaper into Steve Harvey's L.A. Times column 82 times, I joked that I really ought to get some kind of kickback from the Bulletin's marketing department.

This prompted our marketing department to give me a $15 gift card from Cold Stone Creamery with a note reading: "Here's your kickback." Hey, I'll take what I can get.

Frankly, I'm not a fan of Cold Stone, Marble Slab and the like where they pull taffy-like ice cream out of a bin, toss it on a slab, add the "mix-ins" of your choice (Cap'n Crunch, M&M's, etc.) and massage the whole mass with paddles. I like my ice cream straight.

However, I'd recently read in our paper (story no longer available online) and in the Courier about a Claremont High junior, Loraine Ong, who created a Cold Stone flavor for the Claremont location as part of a national contest.

Heath Wave, as it's called, has French vanilla ice cream, Heath bars, a brownie and chocolate sauce. That sounded worth trying.

So on Monday after dinner I used $5.59 of my $15 to get a dish at the store, 101 N. Indian Hill Blvd. in the Village Expansion. Heath Wave isn't on the menu -- and the official promotion recently ended -- but the scooper knew what it was and how to make it. The result was quite tasty.

Or as Ong described her flavor to the Courier: "It's smooth, crunchy and chewy."

Mmmm...smooth, crunchy and chewy.

It was no Elvis Special, the peanut butter and banana flavor at Bert and Rocky's, but what is? If Heath Wave sounds like something you'd like, go for it. And raise a spoon to Loraine Ong. I raised one for our marketing department, too, but that's just me.

So, about this blog, post-anniversary.

Definitely it's an adjunct to my column, which is the main event. The trick for me has been giving the appropriate weight to each, making the blog worth your time while not starving my column of material or attention.

Based on comments I get, most of you are happy enough with this blog. And that's satisfying. I wish it were better, frankly, and were blogging my fulltime gig it would be. But I barely have time to think about it, really.

So this is what you get for the hour or two a day I can spare -- something off-the-cuff, mildly entertaining, more personal and casual than my columns (is that possible?), plus responses to many of your comments.

Some stats I've been pondering as I look to the future: Although there are readers at any point of the day or evening, on weekdays there's a peak around 9 or 10 a.m., and then a second peak around 4 p.m. Hmm.

And while weekends have the lightest readership, the 250-ish people reading then, compared to 300-ish to 500-ish on weekdays, is higher than I'd have expected.

In response, the boss has suggested that I post not just weekday mornings but in the afternoons as well, to give the morning people an excuse to check back for something other than fresh comments and, of course, to rack up more page views.

"It doesn't have to be long," he says. "Just something like 'I had a burrito at lunch.'"

Uh, well, I'm skeptical anyone would check back for dispatches like that. But I can kinda see his point. I could do with some shorter posts.

And to be self-critical, this blog hasn't been as immediate as it could be because I'm often holding onto stuff a few days to make sure I can fill the weekend, or in case I need it for my column. I've tried to avoid overlap between the blog and the column.

For Year Two, here's what I'm thinking:

1) Weekday posts in the morning, just like you're used to.

2) When possible, a short p.m. post, maybe a quick preview of the next column. But not about my burrito at lunch. (Unless it was awesome.)

3) Light posting on weekends -- maybe nothing, maybe something -- to lighten my load and give everyone a chance to catch up on the week past. And no more writing posts ahead when I'm out of town; that was only to keep my streak alive for the first year.

4) Continuing all the stuff I'm doing now: Restaurant of the Week, random items from various cities, a silly photo every week or so, nostalgia questions or items, personal stuff and reader mail on occasion.

5) It's possible -- this is just musing aloud -- that some stuff will go on the blog first and then wind up, in the same or similar form, in my columns. Mr. Columnist/Blogger, tear down this wall!

So, here's your chance to sound off.

What are your favorite and least favorite things about this blog? Is there anything I'm not doing here that you'd like to see?

Would you rather have a second post on weekdays than posts on weekends?

Any other thoughts on the intersection of the blog and the column?

Needless to say, your feedback is encouraged and anxiously awaited.

The Ontario location, 201 N. Vineyard Ave., closed recently, depriving Best Western guests of the chance to walk to pancakes or a cocktail, or both. I got the news from reader Bruce Henning, who said Michael J's had been there for years.

A sign on the door blames a decrease in business.

I ate there once, in 1999, for breakfast with my colleague Monica Rodriguez to commiserate on her recent, and my impending, 35th birthday. The food was serviceable but uninspiring.

There was a second Michael J's at 2315 Foothill Blvd. in La Verne. I tried the phone number and it's been disconnected. Uh-oh.

If memory serves, there was a Michael J's on Foothill in Rancho Cucamonga that several years ago became something else, I think a BC Cafe.

Sounds like the Michael J's mini-empire may be toast. Anyone know any history of the place?

This week's restaurant: Nayu's Peruvian Restaurant, 4380 Holt Ave. (at Ramona), Montclair.

A few of us from work had lunch at Nayu's last week after a recommendation from our colleague Elaine Lehman. It turns out to be located in the slightly seedy, if hilariously named, Larry's Plaza, which I visited in May, to my horror.

Nayu's currently has no sign but it's in Suite K and is, well, the place without the sign. Inside the place is reasonably comfortable and the service was friendly. There's an A in the window too. This was looking up.

I had the lomo saltado (sirloin, peppers, onions, tomatoes and fries, with rice, $9.99) and an Inca Cola. Two others had pollo saltado (the same but with chicken), another had lomo chow mein and a fifth had a ceviche.

We all liked our food quite a bit, and the portions were so large we each took some home. The ceviche may have had too many onions but was loaded with good-sized shrimp and had sides of sweet potato and corn.

I'd say Nayu's is comparable to Kikiryki in Claremont, except Nayu's has table service.

As we ate, a TV played soccer in Spanish, then switched to the studio, where a man was wearing a crown and an ermine cape, carrying a scepter and carrying on to the amusement of the other soccer commentators. Meanwhile, in the restaurant, a customer entered wearing a T-shirt with this message: "I got out of bed for this?" I hope he found his meal worth the trouble.

Believe it. The Pomona-based Repertory Opera Company is performing Donizetti's "Don Pasquale" at 5 p.m. Sunday only at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, 242 E. Alvarado St. in Pomona. Tickets are $25. For reservations or more information call Repertory Opera Company at (323) 969-4602 or visit its website.

To be honest, I'd never heard of the Repertory Opera Company until its artistic director e-mailed me about this performance.

"Repertory Opera Company (ROC) is an earnest Pomona-based opera company that has been performing in LA and Pasadena for four years and is now actually having a chance to perform in Pomona," LizBeth Lucca wrote. "You can see reviews of ROC's past productions at www.repertoryoperacompany.org. ... We are hoping that the success of this performance will launch a new creative presence in the Inland Empire."

On behalf of the IE, we could use a new creative presence.

Not being an opera buff, and preferring to keep my weekends as work-free as possible, I'll probably skip the show, but I wish them luck, and if any of you go, be sure to post a comment, good or bad.

The website describes "Don Pasquale" as "a lively opera with careening plots, desperate love pursuits and quirky personalities." It features piano accompaniment and narration "to keep the story moving briskly."

This blog launched on Sept. 12, 2007, or one year ago today. How about that!

Becoming a blogger was unexpected in a way, given that I'm not computer- or tech-oriented. But not that unexpected, in that I volunteered to do it.

That summer I had slowly discovered, and been impressed by, our valley's handful of local blogs, and became captivated by the form. I liked its informality, its immediacy, its possibilities for interaction with readers. Also, its unlimited space. I felt I could do something interesting with a blog as an adjunct to my column.

Whether I have or haven't done something interesting is up to you to judge. Regardless, from my standpoint blogging has been a lot of fun, if more time-consuming than I'd expected going in. (My debut predicted that my posts might be just a few lines long. In reality, I've tended to go on at much greater length.)

I committed to posting daily, at least while building a readership, because as blog readers know, it's disappointing to click one of your bookmarked blogs and have a page pop up that you've already seen, sometimes multiple times.

Posting daily, even when time was short or nothing obvious presented itself, forced me to get creative. And, just as crucially, lower my standards. Whatever, I did it. Every single day for an entire year, I've posted at least once. (No such commitment is being made for Year Two, by the way.)

In its first year, this blog has seen 390 posts (some days I've posted twice) and 1,789 comments (and growing). That's an average of 4.5 comments per post, which isn't bad. And this blog is averaging 400 page views a day. My wild, unsupported guess is that maybe a thousand people are reading the blog semi-regularly, some checking every day, maybe multiple times a day, others coming in once a week to catch up.

I'll write more about my first year of blogging in an upcoming column -- mostly to entice more people to visit, of course -- and I'll write more here soon with some thoughts on Year Two, while probably soliciting your feedback on certain points.

In the meantime, thanks for your help in making this blog work.

Can't sleep? How about sleeping permanently? These dueling billboards on West Foothill Boulevard in Upland constitute a cautionary tale. File them in the Be Careful What You Wish For category.

What should we call the Village Expansion west of Indian Hill Boulevard? The Claremont Courier had an online poll that overwhelmingly backed the dark horse name Village West. Some ideas got only one vote.

In response, a man named Bill Rook and his coffee club friends at 42nd Street Bagel in Claremont came up with a list of Names That Did Not Get a Vote.

Among them:

* Village Idiot Square

* The Packing House Lemon Center

* Budget Breaker Restaurant Row

* How Do I Break My Lease Commons

* No Indie Art Film Plaza

And, in reference to the frozen food manufacturing plant still operating next to the boutique hotel:

* Rich Foods Entertainment Plaza.

No votes? I'd give mine to that one.

Walter Knott of Knott's Berry Farm fame grew up in Pomona, as did his wife, Cordelia. He was in Pomona from about 1898, when he was 9, until 1913, when he and Cordelia, who had met at Pomona High, left their house at 1040 W. Fourth St. for the high desert.

This was all laid out in my Aug. 19, 2007 column. The photo with the column was a current one of the house, which still stands.

At the Pomona Public Library's Special Collections Department, we had looked in Pomona High yearbooks in vain for a photo of young Knott. (I think the Library was missing his senior yearbook. Also, it's possible he dropped out before graduation.)

Then, some weeks after publication, I got this note from library assistant Allan Lagumbay: "We may have found a young Walter Knott in a class picture circa 1901."

The photo was found in the Library's collections. In latter-day comments on the back of the photo, classmate Lotta Whipp (now there's a name) identifies the school as Pearl Street School at Pearl and Garey and IDs many of the students, including Walter Knott.

I didn't have a good way to share the photo in print, especially at a size where you could see it, but here it is now. (It's still not very big but it's the best I could do.) Based on the handwritten and incomplete IDs, it appears he's in the bottom row, all the way on the right in the jacket.

After a monthlong break, the Pomona City Council is back in action today, and you can practically smell the excitement. I think that's what the smell is.

Should be another big night for The Issue That Would Not Die, i.e., police traffic checkpoints, with protesters and counter-protesters and, for all I know, counter-counter-protesters showing up. Even though the checkpoint discussion is actually scheduled for 5 p.m., I expect a full house, several TV cameras inside and a lot of chanting outside.

Having sat through several of these unwinnable arguments about race and immigration, suddenly the last lines of Matthew Arnold's "Dover Beach" come to mind:

And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Britain's Telegraph has a charming video asking authors what famous literary work they've never read. I found the link through my friend Greg Stepanich's blog. He offers thoughts on authors whose names pop up repeatedly in the video or in the reader comments -- such as Melville, Faulkner, Joyce and Dickens -- and addresses the challenge in reading long-winded old novels in 2008.

Is there a famous novel you're sheepish about not reading? I could list reams of them, but you'll find my choice as a comment at the end of Greg's blog post. It's a book in a series I almost, but not quite, finished 30 years ago. I keep meaning to read the whole series again from stem to stern, but a more sensible approach would be just to read the darn book. Maybe in 2009.

Feel free to comment here or on Greg's blog, or both places, on your own secret shame.

This week's restaurant: Nancy's Tortilleria, 348 S. Towne Ave., Pomona.

Many are the times I've passed this Pepto-Bismol pink building with green awnings on Towne Avenue at Third Street and thought I should go in sometime. They seemed to sell food in addition to housemade tortillas, but would they have seating? Not knowing what to expect, I put it off.

With business in Pomona on Wednesday afternoon, I decided to try Nancy's for lunch while I was in the neighborhood.

Nancy's is three businesses in one. Their business card calls it Nancy's Tortilleria Carniceria and Deli. Besides the tortilla operation, Nancy's is a small market with a large meat section. Up front the deli sells takeout tacos, burritos, sopes and other items.

The white-jacketed counterman lifted lids off a series of metal containers to show off the various meats. They all looked good; I had planned to get carne asada but went with chicken instead.

I got a chicken burrito and a small horchata to drink ($6.23 total). There is no seating inside but two tables outside in the parking lot. Not the most pleasant seating on a blazingly hot day, but at least the building cast a shadow over them.

My lunch was very good, helped along by the very fresh and tasty tortilla. I'd go back, and if you don't mind takeout, I'd recommend Nancy's to you too. With that color scheme you won't have trouble finding it.

This newspaper launched a Rancho Cucamonga-themed blog named RC Now. It's having what you might call a soft opening, which is why you might not know about it yet.

The main blogger is my colleague Wendy Leung, with some kibitzing from colleague Canan Tasci, and there's some fun stuff there.

Even if you don't live or work in Rancho, I recommend the very funny posts Councilman on the Job Hunt Part 2, Children Say the Darndest Things, RC Day at the L.A. County Fair and Government Containment. You might also find the news about the Archibald Library remodeling and a possible Morton's Steakhouse of interest. (Those are two separate projects; Rancho isn't pioneering a library/steakhouse.)

For two neighboring businesses on Claremont's Indian Hill Boulevard, it's fire vs. water. If you stagger out of the first with a fire within, the second would seem well-equipped to douse it. Although you might not appreciate their angle of attack.

(Actually, A Fire Within is a pottery studio. Colonics is just what you think it is.)

The photo was taken by me but was suggested by Marshall Taylor, the mayor's husband. Um, did you want credit for that, Mr. Taylor?

"The statue is located in The Country Club Plaza, Kansas City's legendary shopping, dining and entertaining district," Shapton says.

I'd never heard of the place, but according to the Country Club Plaza's website, the plaza was built in 1922 as "America's first shopping center" and contains 14 blocks of shops, artworks and fountains. "Only Rome has more fountains than Kansas City," the website brags. Who knew?

As for the figure in question, "down the street in a quiet courtyard sits an original bronze of Pomona by Italian sculptor Donatello Gabrielli," the center's website continues.

According to the plaque at its base, "From his original model only two figures have ever been made -- this bronze casting and a marble carving that stands in the king's palace, Bangkok, Thailand."

Wow!

Anyone want to visit Thailand and send me a photo?

Shapton, by the way, sees a marble Goddess daily in her display case in the Library. That one is more modestly attired than the one in rollickin' Kansas City.

Notice anything different on the blog lately? Namely, an occasional photo?

Sorry this (ahem) innovation took so long but your blogger isn't the savviest at tech-oriented stuff. I procrastinated at trying to figure it out. It didn't help that I barely have time to write these furshlugginer posts anyway in between columns.

But a colleague has helped me out on the computer aspect of posting photos, and while I still can't do so on my own, I'm slowly absorbing the multiple steps required.

(Sizing photos to fit has been the big challenge, each requiring three or four attempts, the post going up in a dead period in an afternoon, coming down for resizing, going up, coming down, etc., until the photo looks right and the post can be safely scheduled to pop up automatically the next morning.)

Readers of my column -- and that's all of you, right? -- occasionally send me funny photos from around the community. The way my column is presently configured, i.e., vertically, it's virtually impossible for me to use photos in the paper anymore.

But what I've decided to do is post such photos on this blog from time to time, amidst the texty stuff you've come to expect. I've saved a few submissions from readers over previous months that may still be relevant. I'll take photos myself.

Look for the first submission Wednesday.

As we approach The David Allen Blog's first anniversary, who says this blog can't learn new tricks?

...thanks for taking the time to read mine. And when you're out and about today, say something nice to anyone working on Labor Day.