Who Doesn't Love a (Really) Good Brownie?

THIS WEEKEND we stopped by the month-old Atwater Village takeout counter of Sweets for the Soul, 3169 Glendale Blvd. Among bakeries in Los Angeles, this one is quite focused. One primary product, brownies. And one primary flavor, chocolate. That's it. Chocolate brownies. But what they do, they do right. We took home 2 Obama brownies (white chocolate and dark chocolate) and 2 Cocoa Bliss brownies (Valrhona cocoa and Valrhona chocolate). Total damage: $16. Yes, that's $4 per brownie. But the heart-shaped goodies have lasted all week and become a chocoholic nightcap to dream about all day. The store might start experimenting with additional products and a new flavor or 2 this spring. Till then, they won't mess with perfection. Food GPS and Reservation for Three also have reviews of Sweets for the Soul.

Today's New Blog Banner

IS BASED ON my photograph of this mural in South Atwater Village.

The Dave of Dave's Accordion School

Dave & Veronika Caballero, originally uploaded by Michael R Perry.

READ THEIR Atwater Village story on Michael R. Perry's Flickr page.

The Truth About LA Freeways

ONE OF MY favorite reads, the Freakonomics Blog at the New York Times, reveals some answers to its quiz about transportation and urbanization in Los Angeles. Among the revelations: LA freeway system ranks second in the nation (after New York) in lane mileage But LA ranks "dead last" in freeway lane miles per resident Only about three-fifths of the lane mileage envisioned in LA's 1959 master plan was ever completed

Curb Get Painted Recently? Call the BOSS

IF YOUR CURB got painted recently, with or without your consent, by an organization called Curbs USA, the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Services (BOSS) wants to hear from you. From a reader: According to Senior Inspector Rodney Lucas, the only organization allowed to paint the curbs in LA is Care for the Children ... If you received one of these notices [from Curbs USA] and you see these individuals painting in your neighborhood, please call Sr. Inspector Lucas at 213-847-6000. They would like to catch them in the act. If your curbs were already painted and these individuals knock on your door requesting their 'donation,' you can refuse to pay them and call the police. It's highly unlikely that this organization is a non profit and your 'donation' will actually be payment for services and not tax deductible. Here's the text of the Curbs USA notice left on many Atwater Village doorsteps: ****NOTICE TO RESIDENTS**** Curbs will be repainting the address numbers on the curb in your neighborhood. We use white traffic zone paint 4" black numerals increasing the visibility of your address number day and night for emergency vehicles or deliveries. Work will begin in 1-5 days a representative will be in the area after the work is completed. We ask for a voluntary donation of $13.00 or have your curb done with a design for $20.00 we have U.S. Flag, Marine Corp, Navy Seals, yellow ribbon, also sport logos (football) we have the Raiders, Rams, Panthers,(in basketball) we have the Lakers, Clippers, Miami Heat, (in baseball) we have the Dodgers, also palm tree scenery to have your curb painted with a choice of design(s). Donations are collected after work is completed. Checks accepted payable to Curbs U.S.A., P.O. BOX 39141 DOWNEY CA 90239

And Then There's Yahoo's LA Neighborhood Maps

LOST IN THE hullabaloo over the Los Angeles Times attempt to document LA neighborhood boundaries is Yahoo Maps. It turns out Yahoo already provides labels and pastel color overlays for each LA neighborhood. They even mark neighborhoods for surrounding cities like Glendale and Pasadena. Not sure what Yahoo's sources are, but at least around here in northeast LA they're getting it right. Check!

City Promises to Keep Original Look of Glendale-Hyperion Bridge

EASTSIDER L.A. has a good look at the $36.5 million Glendale-Hyperion bridge renovation project. LA's Bureau of Engineers will try to replicate the original look of the bridge system, built 1928-1930 to connect Atwater Village with Silver Lake and points southwestward. The project begins in 2011.

Our Submission to Lifehacker's Workspace Show-and-Tell

GIVE FULL CREDIT to Mrs. Newbie for finding a way to help our San Diego friends build a workable full-time quilting space from a garage packed to the roof with moving boxes. Here's what it took, from the stats we submitted for a future edition of Lifehacker's Featured Workspace:

The $1,200 Quilty-as-Charged Garage Makeover

• 3-day weekend
• 5 friends
• $975 worth of TROFAST storage from Ikea: 8 tall shelf units, 6 short shelf units, 51 small buckets (perfect for small fabric squares), 30 medium buckets, 8 large buckets
• $150 dumpster rental
• 4 levels of 6-foot Elfa shelves (already in the garage)
• 2 existing bookcases (for decades worth of quilting magazines and books)
• 36 squares of FLOR carpet, "bright stripes" and "bright solids," on wicked clearance sale, less than $15/6, found by scouring 5 different Target stores in Southern California
• 1 existing Koala sewing table

The resulting space was put together with blood, sweat, tears, sheer will and an electric drill an with Allen wrench (hex key) attachment. (This was Ikea shelving, after all.)

The completed room keeps 50+ years of quilting materials all in one place, with great indirect light from the garage door and spotlighting at the sewing table.

Privacy for the quilter in the garage. Safety for the pre-schoolers in the house. Sanity returned to the family. And Mrs. Newbie left thinking she should charge for the service.

See the whole Flickr photo set.

Curb Painted, Whether You Want It or Not

NOTICE THE RASH of freshly painted house numbers on curbs throughout Atwater Village this week? Did you pay the door-to-door salesmen who painted yours? You're not required to, says the County of Los Angeles, nor are you required to have your house number on the curb at all! More chatter about curb-painting (voluntary and otherwise) on the AVNC forum.

LA Times Gets Map Right, At Least for Atwater Village

THE AMBITIOUS neighborhood mapping project from the LA Times gets our neighborhood right, drawing boundaries around Atwater Village roughly on the 2, 5 and 134 freeways, and on the Union Pacific Rail Road where the City of Los Angeles meets the City of Glendale. (They are in line with the authoritative map from the Atwater Village Neighborhood Council.) The paper also places Atwater Village appropriately into the northeast region of LA, along with Cypress Park, Eagle Rock, Glassell Park, Highland Park, Montecito Heights and Mount Washington. Elysian Valley, which crawls along the LA River right below Atwater Village, is not considered a northeasterner, oddly; the LA Times lists Frogtown as a central LA neighborhood.

Is This Some Kind of 'Lost' Thing?

Destiny Calls, originally uploaded by Atwater Village Newbie.

SEEN TODAY in Glendale: Truck for Ajira Airlines (ajiraairways.com).