PUSD Still on the Right Track

Pasadena Star News ran an article today stating that due to the (smart IMO) budget cuts made by the School Board, "the projected ending budget balance has increased, and officials expect to have enough funding for teacher raises and to implement secondary interventions in math next year."

This is totally in line with what I have been predicting since the discussion about cuts was first made public. I wish we could see more factual positive articles with headlines like "District steadies budget." I realize that drama and controversy grab headlines over plain vanilla good work, so Kudos to the Star News for making space for this kind of story.

Updated 3/18: Well so much for the Star News sticking with the facts. Today Staff Writer Gene Maddaus leads off his City Beats column with pure unsubstantiated drama, stating "As the Pasadena Unified School District crumbles, administrators are losing control of internal information."

Neighborhood Watch: Update (sort of)

Well a busier than usual week got by me, and I didn't get a summary posted of what happened at last Wednesday's Neighborhood Watch meeting until now.

Very briefly, it seems there has been a "rash" of minor burglaries in the last six to eight weeks. There are at least two other incidents in addition to the ones previously reported here, bringing the total to at least four burglaries, one stolen car (and of course the break-in at Everest).

One of the people who was burglarized has developed his own pattern MO. He says that based on the facts he has unofficially compiled, they are all in the day-time, involve a minor break-in (screen latch, etc.) and result in, at most, losses of about what one person could carry in one trip (example, a flat screen TV and some jewelry). He also added that some unwanted items are often (or always?) discarded in the front lawn.

Neighborhood Watch Meeting

We just got a flyer delivered to our front door by one of the neighbors:

"Deputy Estrada with the Altadena Sheriff's will be at the home of Rick and Theo Engen's house on 1602 Woodglen Lane from 7 - 7:30 pm this Wednesday, March 1st for a Neighborhood Watch Meeting. I'm sure there will be discussion afterward, but this is when the deputy is available."

See you there :)

Mountain Lion Story with Pics

Thanks to Isaac for the tip off. CBS2 News is reporting that a mountain lion was tranquilized and removed from a yard near Pine Street and Fair Oaks. According to CBS, sheriff's Sgt. M. Jacobs said that Edison Elementary School was locked down as a precaution.


Read the CBS News story (has good video)

NBC4 News has the story too with pictures and video:

Read the NBC News story
NBC Slide Show 1
NBC Slide Show 2

NBC Video (Windows IE only)

[added: 9pm]

The story and pictures are showing up on national outlets like CNN and Rueters.

Also LA Times has a good picture of the cat getting an ear tag.

[added: 2/28 10am]

Pasadena Star News came out with the story and a great slide show.

Snail-mail Spam?

If you're like me, the unruly circulars full of ads and coupons that show up in your real mail box bother you almost as much as their modern equivalent in your email inbox or your fax machine. The good news is, the "real" spam costs the sender money, unlike email spam which is "free" or fax spam where the spammer actually steals your supplies to advertise to you.

I have had a surprisingly easy time getting in touch with the senders to remove my address from their lists. I decided to tear off the address portion and contact portion of all the junk mail circulars that arrived in January. I discarded all duplicates and came up with four publishers so far.

Crime Wave?

Hey, I thought this was a crime free area! What's up with this? First the reports from last month and now this. According to Nick, the owner of our local lunch stop, Everest Burger got broken into and robbed the night before last. They were installing the new glass today at lunch time. I snapped some pics of the smashed door with my phone.

Seasonal Wind Storm

As you can see from this chart, we've been having one of our regular winter wind storms since about 2 pm yesterday. It really started to get going around nightfall, and then got quite intense overnight. Not too many people slept soundly in greater L.A. last night. So far our maximum gust has been recorded at 41.6 MPH. Lots of trees and branches are down, flaky power and utilities everywhere, the usual. These are the so called Santa Anas winds. Other reports indicate that we have not been getting the brunt of the Santa Anas, with other communities seeing nearly 70 MPH gusts.

Lucky me, I have not actually lost power for more than a few moments so far. The "logic" of wind driven power outages is never clear. For instance, I couldn't gas up at the local Chevron this morning and the traffic signals are down a few blocks away, but for once my utilities are mostly still up. My power has fluctuated enough to make the clocks start blinking, but all my computers, and network gear are surfing through it on the UPSs. I did lose one of my internet connections for a while, but my backup DSL is still holding.

Check out this 3.7MB video of the anemometer going nuts.

Here's another 3.7MB video of the blowing trees behind our house.