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Author: The Fullerton Shadow
The Fullerton Shadow is a former Miss Central Nevada and holds a doctorate in animal husbandry from Phoenix University. She has lived in and about Fullerton with her husband Joe for 9 years.
Aw, what a cutie pie. Picked out your prom dress yet?
You know, this post is just too good not to keep sharing with the Friends.
It appears that carpetbagging Precious Princess stopped making her ludicrous “Lorri in 4th gear” videos after the first one bombed so spectacularly.
Too bad. The spectacle of a 57 year-old woman doing her little dress-up teenybopper routine really is priceless.
The Desert Rat
Hardly anymore introduction is necessary. This clueless airhead wants to be a County Supervisor. True, the bar has been set pretty low in the past. But this is ridiculous. I’d rather vote for her little dog “Bella.” Too bad Bella is a carpetbagger, also.
Last summer we thought her “cute shoes” comment was indicative of a frivolous, unlikely candidacy. Now we know better. Oh, and by the way – shame on Anaheim for electing this idiot to their city council.
Back in town for a few days from wrangling wild horses outside Pioche, Nevada, I decided to traipse around downtown Fullerton last night to check out the new Fullerton “Art Walk.” I dragged along my husband Joe who has never gone to an art gallery without the kicking and the screaming.
The idea seems like a good one: walk around and see what local artists are doing, and by doing so help inspire and cultivate art. I didn’t take any notes so my comments are just impressions – and you can feel free to take them for what they’re worth.
While we didn’t get to all the places on the map, I think we stopped at enough places to get a sense of what was happening. The Fullerton “art scene,” if such a term can be used, (and I devoutly hope it can’t) seems to be dominated by the usual avant-garde collage/mixed-media, assemblage creep art that is supposed to be either thought provoking, or unsettling, but that almost always seems to be humorless, self-important and always makes me wonder if the perpetrators can even draw. The target for such stuff is invariably younger people, which is good, but there remains the now-hackneyed Tim Burton-esque mindset behind this stuff that really makes me wonder if 20-somethings even appreciate traditional artitistic expression. The Hibbleton Gallery on Wilshire seems to have staked out this territory, especially.
The Violet Hour on Santa Fe is a pretty interesting place – an old industrial space converted into a performance art studio/gallery – and while going for a hard-core non-traditional ambiance included some interesting photography of a place called Zyzzx.
I have to note one exception to this avant-garde trend is evident at the Village Art Center (we didn’t make it that far north last night) where the gallery is full of simply stunning pastels by Brad Faerge and oils by John Hunzicker; plus paintings and even sculpture from some other really exquisitely talented artists. Philistines like me know it’s good when we couldn’t possibly conceive of doing it ourselves.
We also stopped by a place called the Graves Gallery on Amerige, of which I had some hope; alas, much of it was dedicated to some truly awful acrylic paintings. This is really too bad since this place was by far the best space for exhibiting art.
And I have to mention another stop: the Fullerton Museum Center where a woman named Lora Lingl had a couple of “kinetic” sculpture pieces made out of wood on display. One was an interactive hammer/metal plate device operated by a crank and gears; the other was a motor driven contraption that manipulated leaves on tree branches via monofilament fishing line. This piece had a strange, mesmerizing effect as it juxtaposed the mechanical and the natural. Watching this piece was really engaging.
The highlight of the evening may have been a stop at an office suite over on Malden where they had put up a bunch of paintings some guy had collected over the years from garage sales. It actually made a pretty ironic and persuasive statement about the world of local art galleries.
Next time I hope to stop in at some of the other venues to see what direction they are going in. Overall, the idea is good one and I congratulate and encourage the organizers.
My two-cents worth is that a lot more attention needs to be dedicated to finding and presenting the work of first-rate artists. They are out there, all over the place, in fact – professionals and amateurs alike.
Okay, Friends, this draft fell out the back of the blog sock-drawer and I just rescued it. It’s a couple weeks old, but still germane, of course.
At last Tuesday’s meeting we expected some fun on the agenda item of who gets to be mayor, but boy did we underestimate the Council’s ability to entertain.
Tanned, rested and ready.
Of course Pam Keller was still sore about getting passed over by the “good old boys” in December and still wanted to kick the issue around. Apparently Pam and her Posse of Political Whatevers had been doing some lobbying behind the scenes, because at the end of issue the council collectively settled upon a “policy” approach that will rotate the mayor gig via seniority. And Dick Jones is next in line followed, finally by Keller, presumably in 2012. Unless Jones declines the honor or hits the road.
The proceedings included the usual incoherent ramblings and musings by some of our council favorites and of course a Fullerton City Council meeting wouldn’t be any fun without Don Bankhead re-inventing history and suddenly claiming he was for this “rotation” system all along (even though he was part of the deal to keep himself mayor two short months ago, and despite the fact that there has never, ever been any system of the kind).
Did I do that? I don't remember. Where's Miss Fullerton?
In the end the promises don’t mean all that much. It still takes 3 votes to elect somebody mayor and by next fall there may be three brand-new council persons – some of whom may very well be disinclined to follow the “policy” set by their predecessors. On the other hand the mission of keeping Keller from running for re-election with the title “Mayor” has been accomplished by Ed Royce & Company. So maybe after 2010 nobody will care for another three years who the mayor is.
Over at the Liberal OC blog, the proprietor, Dan C -somethingorother is supporting the carpetbagging 4th District Supervisorial bid of Lorri Galloway. Well, okay. Even though Dan C. lives in Irvine, it’s a free country, right?
What’s really amusing is that Dan has taken to posting pictures of Lorri with all sorts of Democratic luminaries, the tacit implication being that there is some sort of endorsement or even connection. Our favorite pic is the one he uses most – with Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez apparently at some sort of food bank operation.
Let's get our picture taken then clear out. I've got a manicure appointment.
Ah yes! A couple of typical camera hog Limousine Liberals slumming it, nicely accessorized with strings of pearls for their photo op. Make sure you get your picture in the paper, honey, and try not to break a nail!
There you have the Lorri Galloway Experience and, oh, by the way – welcome to her life.
The word in academic circles is that the CSUF is busted. Or at least it doesn’t have the wherewithal to swing a deal under consideration to buy back property it once owned across Nutwood Avenue.
The site is the current home of Hope University and it contains some wonderful buildings designed and constructed as part of a modernist master plan. The rough idea was that the CSUF Auxiliary would acquire the property, and, after a lease-back period to Hope, would start knocking everything down – presumably to throw up more out-of-scale, hideous erections. We first wrote about it here. And our expert consultant defined the term “exaggerated modern” here.
So the recession may have a silver lining anyway – at least as far as historic preservation is concerned, but we shall see what the future brings.
In the meantime, just to the south, the giant hole in the cityscape left by the demolition of perfectly fine modern-style buildings to make way for the Jefferson Commons swindle are a silent yet eloquent testimonial to the lack of foresight exercised by our elected leaders.
We caught some flak awhile back for our posts on the subject of old geezers getting all touchy-feely with the tender young Miss Fullertons at Chamber of Commerce mixers, here and here. Some of our readers thought the practice was harmless or trivial.
Whatever one’s perspective, the images were pretty fun. Remember?
"Never any brass knuckles around when you need 'em" almost garnered a coveted Fringie Award.
Naturally when the Miss Fullerton contestants went on display at the council meeting this past Tuesday we thought it was a likely source of entertainment. We were right: The proceedings did not disappoint.
Enjoy our debonair mayor in action. Quite frankly he was almost dumbfounded.
Last Saturday the hubby and I dropped in on the Maverick Theater to see their production of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” a theatrical adaptation of Ken Kesey’s novel.
Now I’m not much of a theater goer, I had never been to a local Fullerton production, and I have never written a critique of a stage production, so I apologize ahead of time, and you can take this review for what it’s worth.
The Maverick Theater is in the back of a pretty unprepossessing industrial/warehouse building at 110 East Walnut Avenue, and you’ve got to give the Maverick folks a lot of credit – the single scene stage is about the size of my living room, and requires a deft choreography by the director and the cast. The venue lends itself to an extremely intimate relation between performers and the audience – the sort of proximity that lends itself to close study of the actors – for good or ill.
The story itself is the (pretty well known) dark comedy about the battle of wills between the conman Randall P. McMurphy, who has gotten himself committed to avoid a jail work detail, and the control freak-spinster-evil bitch-monster, Nurse Rached, who plays the nuts in the mental ward off each other for her own perverse satisfaction.
The leads are engaging actors; both Brennan Thomas as McMurphy and Julie Patzer as Nurse Rached were able to capture and hold audience attention, although Brennan’s choice of a Southern-sounding accent was a strange affectation in a story that takes place in the Pacific Northwest. I got the strong impression that a lot of Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke had been injected into the performance, particularly in the scene in which McMurphy chastises his fellows for feeding off of him. Still, Thomas’ rollicking performance was satisfactorily charming and ribald.
The part of Chief Bromden, the Indian narrator in the Kesey book, was played by Enrique Munoz. It seemed like one of the toughest roles in the play, and Munoz essayed it with energy, but ultimately in what I thought was an overly hand-wringing and lachrymal manner that seems to miss something of the Native American character: the overtly disturbed and wounded-child of Bromden’s introspective monologues didn’t seem to translate well into the outward character’s relationship with McMurphy in the Second Act.
The performances of the supporting actors was uneven. David Chorley did a wonderful job portraying the shy and stuttering Billy Babbit; Scott Keister as Frank Scanlon, pulled off an uncanny rendition of Christopher Lloyd’s character “Taber” in the film version. But some of the other parts were performed somewhat awkwardly or overly mannered. The ward attendants just didn’t seem to be able to get into the comic spirit of their parts while the sexually conflicted Dale Harding, as played by Stan Morrow, seemed too much like an over-the-top homosexual caricature.
Although it seemed a bit long, the productions was pretty entertaining and is worth seeing. I’m glad we went. The show runs through February 21.
Well I guess technically you have to have moved a first time to be able to move again, by why get all semantical ‘n stuff?
According to “Colony Rabble” at the Red County blog, Lorri Galloway is moving. Again. That makes three times if you are one of the tiny, gullible subset of 4th District citizens who ever thought she moved out of her 3rd District house in the hills to begin with.
Apparently she has selected yet another address – out of the Colony District and into to a place called “Five Points” that is farther west along Lincoln Avenue and is, in fact, halfway to Harry Sidhu’s phoney address at the beautiful Calabria Apartments behind the Linbrook Bowl. The property? Another Bill Taormina special. Gotta assume this one is actually zoned residential. Could it be that the City Planning Department actually did its job?
Anyhoo, Lorri can be serenaded to sleep by the white noise hum of Interstate 5 that passes nearby; and now Harry and Lorri can both ride the number 42 bus in the same direction from City Hall to get “home”! Which of course suggests a money saving strategy for both campaigns: co-habitation at the Calabria!
If avoiding specifics, dodging straight answers, and putting ignorance on public display were virtues, then the crop of 4th District supervisorial candidates at the NUFF forum were virtuous in the extreme.
An hour and half of questioning produced almost nothing in the way of inspired leadership and mostly cliched responses to pretty specific questions directed by the Register’s Jennifer Muir. They all agreed that north County was getting screwed on park funds (or lack of same), that yacht owners should pay something toward patrolling Newport Harbor, and that there was going to have to be a multi-tiered pension system in the future. Well, that’s just stating the obvious.
Here’s a brief and summation of the candidates and how they comported themselves.
He may be slow getting warmed up...
1. Richard Faher. Incapable of constructing a concise, intelligent answer. If someone really wanted an excuse to get drunk they could do a Richard Faher Drinking Game and take a shot every time he starts a sentence with the word “okay.” Faher did provide the amusing highlight of the evening when he thanked “Friends for Fullerton” for putting on the event. Gee, you’re welcome, Richard!
Wait, let me go collaborate with my city manager...
2. Rose Espinosa. Despite the attempts by the Local Left to paint her as some sort of credible politician, she came across as, well, just plain dumb. And by dumb I mean a sack of door knobs kind of dumb. And ignorant. She appeared perfectly clueless about County issues and kept deferring to what others had said. She spoke in the lamest sort of generalities about every single question put to her. She repeatedly referred to getting her information from her city manager, and that’s bad. She talked about “collaboration” several times. Ouch.
Speak with confidence and they'll follow you anywhere...
3. Shawn Nelson. Came across as pretty articulate and knowledgeable about the ongoing harbor patrol budget scandal. His statements about getting County government smaller and less intrusive was cliched stuff right out of the GOP playbook, but his comments about why the Clerk/Recorder performs marriage ceremonies was right on. He also may have surprised some by his observation that the County’s current lawsuit against the Deputy Sheriff’s retroactive pension spike was a sure loser, and that he would share information on-line about all meetings with lobbyists. But he dodged answering the specific question about supporting regulating those lobbyists.
Nelson also took credit for courage in supporting Sharon Quirk to be mayor of Fullerton. That elicited snickers from many of the NUFFsters and maybe even from Pam Keller who was sitting toward the back of the room.
Knowing the County ropes can get you tangled up in blue...
4. Tom Daly. He appeared to have popped too many quaaludes before the program, but maybe that’s just his style. He talked a lot about all that he got done as mayor of Anaheim, perhaps hoping that the NUFFsters were unaware that the Anaheim mayor is simply one of five votes. He appeared to be the the most knowledgeable about the way the County government is actually constituted, but that sort of familiarity comes with a price tag: career politician; and it did not produce any inspired ideas of reform, restructuring or right-sizing.
Daly took some oblique shots at Chris Norby for failing to deliver park funds which was fun because Norby was hovering in the back of the room like the amiable chorus in an Aristophanes comedy. Whether Norby was even paying attention is unknown, though unlikely.
At the end Daly rolled out his big guns. 1) He was opening his satellite office in Fullerton on Sunday, Feb. 14 to perform bureaucrat weddings (no mention about paying employees overtime to do it); 2) he had worked out a deal with the Lincoln Library to host a road show of Old Abe memorabilia. This produced some chuckles later in the FFFF editorial room as we recalled our post on Daly and another dead Republican.
Harry and Lorri ponder the perplexing crossing of the 91 Freeway
5 & 6. Harry Sidhu and Lorri Galloway both took a powder. They were not missed. Their presence would no doubt have simply added another half an hour to an already pretty depressing evening. Still, credit to the NUFFsters for putting the event together, and shame on Sidhu and Galloway for blowing it off. Were they afraid of having to deal with the carpetbagging issue, or just their inability to talk cogently about bedeviling County problems? They needn’t have worried.
The other day we mentioned the 4th District Supervisor candidate forum sponsored by Neighbors United for Fullerton (NUFF) held tonight at the Fullerton Main Library.
The Register’s Jennifer Muir is the moderator and has posted a piece about the event, here. Apparently two of the would-be Supes aren’t going to be there; and coincidentally both – Harry Sidhu and Lorri Galloway are carpetbaggers. Harry is pretending that he lives in a crummy pink stucco tenement behind the Linbrook Bowl; Lorri that she lives in an old relocated house converted to professional use on the busy corner of Lincoln Avenue and East Street.
Harry’s a no show.
Sidhu’s excuse for skipping the event is pretty standard: out of town on business. Galloway, on the other hand refuses to attend because the filing deadline hasn’t arrived and and she says one of the candidates may not be running! She asks for a re-schedule after the deadline!
Galloway is used to having people bend over backwards to accommodate her, but she can’t be serious. Does she really want to reschedule? Or could it really be that she’s not quite sure how to handle the carpetbagging and residency issues that her political ambitions have created; and that she has such a feeble grasp of County issues that she wants to avoid humiliating herself. Come to think of it, Harry won’t be able to bring his ghost writer with him and he could be in for a rough time improvisation-wise.
You will soon make a fool of yourself
Either way, north Orange Countians are going to miss an opportunity that Anaheim council watchers enjoy twice a month: to actually see Sidhu and Galloway in action. Apparently the show is entertaining.
