California to Metal Balloons: "You're Fiscally Evil" | Photo by Iain Farrell via Flickr Those cute and innocent helium-metallic balloons we give to kids may soon be outlawed by California legislators. Yes, that's right, the great State of California is outlawing fun. Apparently, if you want the f-word, go to Wisconsin or something. But seriously, Sen. Jack Scott, D-Altadena, proposed to ban metallic balloons filled with helium because when they get loose, they can......

The Revolution is coming! K-12 LAUSD kids, look out! Your lunches are about to get a whole hell of a lot better--and better for you. This week it was announced that Revolution Foods, a fairly new company out of the Bay Area, is bringing their goodness southbound, and will be launching a pilot program in three local schools to bring them "fresh and healthy meals on a daily basis," according to their press release. The......

Santee Village Apartments | Photo by atomicshakespeares via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr It's not the same thrill as being singled out as a draft pick when it's the police who want you: "An arrest warrant has been issued by the Irvine Police Department for St. Louis Cardinals utilityman Scott Spiezio on six charges stemming from a Dec. 30 incident." Police in Burbank are investigating the mysterious death of 47-year-old Glen Giles,......

Imagine you're a little kid minding your own business (wait, what kid minds their own business?) and playing on the school yard when a rambling, confused, and chain-smoking woman shows up in a skimpy outfit looking for her kids. No, scratch that--looking for her lawyer's kids. Oh, and that woman just happens to be Britney Spears. That was the scene earlier this month at an elementary school in Beverly Hills, as described this week by......

Downtown Los Angeles is fast becoming one of the city's new "it" places to set up a permanent address and play house. But a new worry is plaguing residents of the high-rises and converted lofts that dot the one-way streets of LA's civic center: What happens when we have kids? The big concern is chiefly becoming options for daycare, which is part of the overall issue of whether Downtown is a good place to raise......

Close, but not close enough: a 3.9 earthquake hit Baja California today at 1:50 p.m. Now that we think of it, getting yourself prepared for a major earthquake is a great New Year's resolution! Those rodes are slick, stay safe! This morning's crash on the 5 near the 170 left one dead and three others injured. Who loves the politics of hair? Pam Spaulding at Pandagon writes that Essense Magazine's Top Ten Celeb Hair......

OOOwww! Good evening Los Angeles! Wooo! How you all fee-ull? People. You know! I don't believe the LA Forum has a chimney... so if y'all want Santa Claus to come pay us a visit you're gonna need to raise the roof off this mother!! And I think if all twenty thousand of you flick your lighters in time with the beat we can turn this place into the biggest Christmas tree in the world!......

CLASSICAL: There's other classical music about town tonight besides Chanticleer. The Calder Quartet is the Colburn Conservatory’s first quartet-in-residence, and these new faculty members will show their chops with a program that includes Philip Glass, Quartet No. 2 “Company” by Philip Glass; Quartet in A minor “Rosamunde” by Franz Schubert and Terry Riley's “Cadenza on the Night Plain.” 7:30 pm // The Colburn School: Zipper Hall // 200 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles //......

So, you know how MTA is considering ridding our freeways of carpool lanes? One outraged blogger blames Bush because, "local officials in the MTA are being forced to take a more free-enterprise approach to freeway management in order to qualify for federal transportation dollars." In a move designed to empower local Iraqi municipalities, the US Army is planning on concentrating its forces in Baghdad as the army continues to draw down its forces after......

The Dodgers continued their off season wheeling and dealing, singing Japanese All-Star pitcher Hiroki Kuroda to a three-year deal believed to be worth $36 to $40 million. "This is a huge pickup for the Dodgers," said The Daily News' Tony Jackson, who may have been first to break the news. It's a lot of money, but winning the World Series does not come cheap. Just ask the Rockies. Two teens (age 18 and 19)......

LATimes.com is well aware of the conflicts that come with contextual advertising -- no ad box appears alongside search results for terms such as "porn" or "sex," for example. But, for now at least, "freaky big, cartoon like muscles" are only a click away....

Want a Wii this holiday season? Well toooooo fuckin bad. The best you can hope for is a rain check certificate that will entitle you to a console at some point in January. Even the Wii people themselves are now admitting what a mess they've made of manufacturing this thing. Two members of a terrorist cell have pleaded guilty to charges of conspiring to wage war: the splinter group was "was poised to attack......

Last year we did a lot of Best Of lists, and this year we are on a roll to eclipse the quantity and quality of last year. One thing I have noticed is there seems to be two ways to do a Best Of list. You can do a politically correct one for the hipsters and cynics - which is boring and a lie. Or you can keep it real and talk about how......

For baseball fans under the age of 35, reading the Mitchell report should be like taking repeated shots to the groin without the Nutty Buddy. With 75 names and guys who get shipped all over the country, you know your idols didn't escape. Me? I grew up in NorCal. Matt Williams? He was our hero on the hot-corner. Glenallen Hill? The only pro player from the small town I was growing up in. That's a......

Not sure what to buy your environmentally conscious friend or family member for the holidays? Opting to make this holiday season's giving more earth-friendly? You may want to check out this weekend's Eco Gift Expo, which:will provide everything you would hope to find including beauty products, fashion, yoga products, sports, bags, shoes, candles, home decor, toys and much more... and everything at the expo is good for the planet, mind, body and spirit. You......

About the above picture: The Rawking Refuses To Stop!, a blog of all things Los Angeles pop culture and MP3, shares with us their best concert photos of 2007. Above, they sneak out of LA to New York to see Les Savy Fav at the Bowery Ballroom (we'll just say they did the same thing when they came here). Don't forget -- you still have today and tomorrow to enter our Rufus Wainwright/Belinda Carlisle......

It’s a holiday tradition at this blogger's house (long before I had kids, which says a lot about me) — sitting down and watching the 1964 classic Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. What’s not to love about a quirky cast of characters teaching a lesson about acceptance? Well, I suppose the lesson of incessant marketing of the show is not a great lesson, but like many things around Christmas I choose to blatantly ignore what......

Why do all these songs about frostbite conditions sound so wonderful in sun-drenched shirtless reverb? Ever try pushing a sled through sand? I don't recommend it. But I heartily recommend each of the following experiences. Don't worry, we'll get to more Beach Boys later on, today (with the exception of track four) it's all about those chiming guitars. THE VENTURES - Sleigh Ride This comes from their fantastic Christmas album, one of the greats......

Tonight is the 8th and final night of Chanukah and I am exhausted. My kids have lit candles at several parties, made cookies, eaten tons of potato latkes, and opened many presents. Please enjoy our new holiday tradition, the annual viewing of the "My Menorah" video. The tune may be a wee bit familiar to you.......

TALK: Pulizer Prize-winning food critic Jonathan Gold moderates a Zócalo discussion that focuses on “The Mexican Restaurant in Los Angeles.” Joining in on the roundtable are Gilberto Cetina of the Yucatecan restaurant Chichen Itza, Martin del Campo and Ramiro Arvizu of La Casita Mexicana, and Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger of Border Grill. 7 pm // Central Library – Mark Taper Auditorium // 630 W. 5th St., Los Angeles // Free. (Reservations are recommended.)......

As soon as we arrived at the Obey sale on Saturday in Santa Ana I told my friend, "fuck this, I'm out." The line was longer than anything I'd seen outside Magic Mountain. All you could see were high school and college-aged kids in hoodies and tapered jeans messaging their friends and they were probably saying the same thing I was saying, "fuck this." But my friend was determined. She had Christmas shopping to......

The Holiday season is in full swing in NYC, with holiday lights in Brooklyn, a giant snow globe in Bryan Park and Chanukah specials for ham. One citizen decided to go vigilante on annoying car alarms, a murder suspect used a fake Asian accent on the stand and a video of a man being beaten up by teenage girls on a subway shocked the city. And we interviewed soon-to-be-leaving-Gawker editor Choire Sicha, who said,......

Three people were injured and dozens evacuated after an apartment fire in Sherman Oaks gutted at least two units at 2 a.m. this morning. It was cold last night, but there are better ways to stay warm people. Australian police arrested a man in Melbourne who threatened to attack The Grove Friday. There is no evidence the man, who has never been to the United States, intended to carry out the attack. Still, days......

If you've attempted shopping this weekend, you have our sincerest sympathies. At this point in the holiday season, it's a good idea to take a moment, try to let the yule-rage subside, and remember the true meaning of Christmas: giddy little kids. GAYLA PEEVEY - I Want A Hippotamus For Christmas Truly childlike in its all-consuming greed, this song is a testament to the power of possibility in a child's mind. There is no......

As traffic worsens on Ventura Boulevard, a new L.A. City report found that developers could add 3 million square feet of commercial space to the Ventura Boulevard corridor under current zoning rules. If you thought getting from Sepulveda to Van Nuys down Ventura was bad before. Umph... Not sure what to buy that ragamuffin who has everything this holiday season? Franklin Avenue found a great set of Lego-ish toys featuring people in casts, babies......

The Mods and Rockers invite all Beatles fans, Anglophiles and latent mods and rockers to attend A Holiday Rave-up: A Very British Sixties Christmas! tomorrow night. This celebration of sixties music will feature The Ravers, the premier sixties cover band. Special guests performing with The Ravers will be Stephen Bishop (On And On, It Might Be You) and Spencer Davis (Gimme Some Loving, I'm A Man). I saw Spencer Davis perform with The Ravers......

Saturday mornings in the 70s and 80s were defined by Schoolhouse Rock -- the mix of catchy songs and cartoons that served as infotainment for impressionable young minds (like yours truly). Now the Greenway Arts Alliance has brought the familiar pop tunes back for the enjoyment of Baby Boomers, Gen Xers -- and their kids -- to enjoy. The Schoolhouse Rock Live! musical revue is couched in the premise of schoolteacher Tom's (Eduardo Enrikez)......

The Hollow Trees are the best folk band "for families" that you have never heard. By "for families" we mean little kids would love it as much as their parents. Mixing Americana, folk, and pop, The Hollow Trees keep it simple enough for children with the G-rated lyrics. The music, however, is authentic, pure, and as good as anything you'd hear from your grandpa's best bluegrass records. This year the Hollow Trees have gone......

...and then America pants and wheezes after half a block The state fitness data released yesterday found that LAUSD students "are less physically fit than the state average" (Daily News). There's no surprise in that. But you have to admit, it's really lame. We live in California for heaven sakes! This isn't flatland cornfield Illinois where gym class is a required five days a week, kindergarten through senior year (and that state still has......

photo by abraxas3d via flickr Remember when Charlie Brown had a bad case of S.A.D. and after he gave Lucy a nickle, she tells him that he needs more "involvement." Then they put on a nativity play and well, you know the rest. It's December and Los Angeles is rife with holiday plays and musicals. Just because you're too old to land the starring role in the Christmas pageant, or don't happen to have......