Carolyn Kellogg

Will longtime genius-slash-recluse Sly Stone show up to perform as scheduled at the Grammys? We're dying to know. So we'll be watching later today. But in the meantime, music continues to percolate across the net. Here are some indie-ish downloads to tide us all over until this evening. Local music blog You Set the Scene recommends new releases by Belle & Sebastian, The Ladies and Kelley Stoltz. Catfish Haven is the download du jour...

With thermometers spiking into the 80s today it's kind of hard to imagine winter elsewhere. But winter it is. And the Winter Olympics start in just 3 days in Torino, Italy. Local newscaster Fred Roggin is over in Europe to do some sports coverage ... and some blogging. According to the latest post, he's just now getting the hang of his Blackberry (careful, Fred, we hear those things are addictive) and that he has...

During the Superbowl we were surprised to see an ad from the Beer Institute. We're lining up behind Slate to get a Beer Institute Fellowship. Anyway, with all the hot weather, we've got beer on the brain. Doesn't a beer right now sound good? So this Beer Institute is an industry-wide push to promote beer, a lot like the Got Milk campaigns. Apparently Anheuser-Busch paid for the Superbowl ad. In case you missed it,...

This weekend LA welcomed the Year of the Dog with Chinatown's annual Golden Dragon Parade. We are sad that we missed it, but happy that talented photographer Wojtek Gil was there to get the picture (well, technically, 34 pictures). He also has a photoblog that we think has a good chance of becoming habit-forming....

The Orange County wildfires continue to burn in the Cleveland National Forest. Firefighers say they're making progress; more than 500 are on the scene. But the region's red flag conditions continue. Authorities have issued a public health alert for the smoke in OC and in Long Beach too. A Burbank man was sentenced to a year in jail for sitting outside a Best Buy collecting cash for Katrina victims about two weeks after the...

Jen Sincero is a sexpert, musician, and the author of the bestselling book, The Straight Girl’s Guide To Sleeping With Chicks and the semi-autobiographical novel, Don’t Sleep With Your Drummer. She currently hosts the weekly sex talk radio show Dr. Happypants on killradio.org. Every week in Living in Sin, Jen provides advice for LA's sexually curious. Got a question for Jen? Ask her. We promise to be discreet — all questions will be posted...

The new head of LAMCA is a handsome young swashbuckler of the art world, according to his profile in the LA Times. The byline is from NY — we can't tell exactly when Michael Govan will be moving into the Hancock Park home that comes with his job. Riots broke out over the weekend in two California jails. Last night the system was in lockdown, county-wide. Remember that face transplant story? The frenchwoman with...

Of all the contributors to LAist, I'm the least qualified to say anything about football. But I do know something about live rock shows. Which brings us to the Rolling Stones at the Superbowl. There was something wrong with the audio feed at first, so it sounded like Mick was locked in a closet somewhere. But there they were, the Rolling Stones, whose combined age is more than 230 years old, rocking out live....

While youtube is becoming everyone's favorite addiction, another video site went live today. Turn Here is much more polished and showcases neighborhoods around the US, plus South Korea, Thailand, France and even Canada. In general, the views of LA seem to be pretty spot-on mini-documentaries by people who really live here. Most of these people have your average jobs, you know, like firemen. And fire eaters. Anyway. The tour of The Brewery is led...

Around 9am, the light went weird over downtown. Earthquake weather, maybe? No, it's fire. So far 800 acres in Orange County's Cleveland National Forest have burned. Authorities say that no homes have been threatened; the fire remains in the national forest. The wind is blowing west, towards Los Angeles; that's where the smokey haze comes in. This is obviously the time to mention that the National Weather Service has declared a red flag warning...