On Education: The price of a fun, safe prom night
If you are the parent of a current high school student, you will spend about $250,000 to raise that child to the age of 18, give or take a few thousand depending on family resources, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Start the Presses: Transparency in print and in life
On Tuesday evening, I had the chance to speak to a class at Glendale Community College run by the school's police chief, Gary Montecuollo. I have spoken to this class before, which focuses on law enforcement's interactions with the larger community, and enjoyed it each time.
A Word, Please: Better grammar means better jobs?
Creators of a software program called Grammarly recently conducted a study of the grammar used in LinkedIn member profiles. They found that people with fewer grammar errors in their profiles ascended to higher positions, got more promotions and changed jobs more often.
Common Sense: Arias trial raises parenting questions
Thanks to Jodi Arias — the confessed murderer who is on trial for the brutal killing of her ex-boyfriend — Pasadena is known for one more thing.
Start the Presses: Remembering the Armenian Genocide
Each year Armenians worldwide commemorate the murder of 1.5 million of their ancestors by what was then the Ottoman Empire in the time around World War I. Each year, the United States government – fearing the backlash of Turkish rulers – fails to officially recognize this atrocity as a...
A Word, Please: A would-be worry that isn't
An island nation you can't find on a map can threaten your retirement savings. Your health insurer could refuse to pay your medical bills by arguing you're covered only if someone drops a baby grand piano on your head, not an upright. On any given day, a celebrity might say mean things to a singer...
Altadena Junction: Pests, poetry and a car show
Tree-killing invaders: Nancy Romero lives in a 1909 Craftsman farmhouse and — up until late 2012 — she had a row of boxelders of the same vintage. But they're gone now. Not only did they have to be cut down, but also ground up. The sawdust had to be contained, and the...
Common Sense: Attending PCC on its merits
I've got some highfalutin' friends — pretentious wannabees — who think their kids are too high and mighty to attend Pasadena City College.
Ron Kaye: Civic engagement and high expectations
It was the changing of the guard — Parcher Plaza at Glendale City Hall filled with people celebrating Mayor Frank Quintero with taquitos and cupcakes, a gathering of well-wishers that included Burbank Mayor Dave Golonski, who offered a framed memento in tribute.
A Word, Please: Who gets to make the language laws?
The Mid Devon District Council in southwestern England made headlines recently when it proposed to do away with apostrophes on street signs, changing King's Crescent into Kings Crescent and St. Paul's Square into St. Pauls Square.
Altadena Junction: Co-op reaches a major milestone
The Arroyo Food Co-op was founded in Altadena almost five years ago by locals who wanted a community-based alternative to large corporate grocery store chains. The co-op reached a major milestone last week as it signed a lease for the old George’s Market neighborhood grocery store in central...
Steve Greenberg: Ballad of "The Tonight Show"
Cartoonist Steve Greenberg gives his take on the departure of "The Tonight Show" from Burbank, its home since 1972. Jimmy Fallon will be taking the show to New York when he takes over hosting duties from Jay Leno in the spring of 2014.
A Word, Please: Copy editing clues to excellence
These days, everyone's a writer. And a reporter. And an editor. Thanks to the Internet, you can report any "fact" you want, be it a UFO sighting in your rumpus room or incontrovertible evidence that Donald Trump has a full head of hair.
A Word, Please: Open yourself up to grammar
A reader named Roy sent me an e-mail recently. He had a question – not for himself but for a friend. And, heaven help me, I really believe it was for a friend. Here's what Roy wrote:
Common Sense: Focus on the meaning of Easter
No Easter bonnet. No frills upon it. Whatever happened to that "Easter Parade" Irving Berlin wrote about and Ol' Blue Eyes used to croon to us on the radio or on our Victrola?
Altadena Junction: Be wary of Eaton Canyon's second waterfall
Eaton Canyon hiking warnings: The second waterfall at Eaton Canyon holds a strange and deadly allure — people keep trying to climb up to it, despite the fact that there is no safe way up there.
Ron Kaye: Throwing rocks at the windows of power
What would your town be like if its harshest critic had a seat at the table of power?
Ron Kaye: Respect for the Council of Governments
One of my first impressions when I called the San Fernando Valley my home nearly 30 years ago was that this vast middle-class enclave suffered from a bad inferiority complex, like it was populated by a lot of Rodney Dangerfields who just couldn’t get respect.
A Word, Please: Grammar rules can't be taken on faith
Most of what you think you know about grammar is wrong.
Start the Presses: Accusations and flying mud
For about 15 hours this week, I’ve been sitting in Vrej Agajanian’s AABC TV studio, serially interviewing each of the candidates for Glendale’s City Council, School Board and City Clerk.
A Word, Please: An Oxford comma could strip JFK's dignity
There's a cartoon about commas going around on the Internet.
Ron Kaye: Democracy wins a round
The setting was beautiful: a hill high above the intersection of the Santa Monica (10) and Long Beach (710) freeways, with panoramic views of downtown L.A. and much of the San Gabriel Valley, even on this dark and misty Thursday night.
Small Wonders: Collection has multiplied like rabbits
It's hard to take a place seriously that bills itself as “the hoppiest place on Earth.”
A Word, Please: Losing the apostrophe isn't always an option
Not long ago I wrote a column about how sometimes in terms like “teachers' union” and “homeowners' policy” the apostrophe is optional. If you really mean that the first noun possesses the second, an apostrophe makes sense. But if the first noun is intended as more of an...
Ron Kaye: Glendale seeks straight story
Twenty months after Gov. Jerry Brown and the state Legislature abolished community redevelopment agencies statewide, local officials have gone through all the stages of grief — from horror to anger to confusion.
A Word, Please: Don't let language cops impact your words
There are a lot of people out there who will think less of you if you use “impact” as a verb: A longer storm season will negatively impact tourism. Failure to study will negatively impact your grades. Technology will impact higher education.
Ron Kaye: A forefather's forethought
When I retired five years ago after a career as a rather maverick newspaperman bristling at the restraints of corporate journalism, I vowed to speak what was in my heart and to say “yes” to just about everything.
A Word, Please: An adverb lesson not for the faint of heart
Count the adverbs in the following sentence: Therefore, we should wait outside awhile because the very lovely and kindly family will be there soon to tell us fast whether everyone is well.
Altadena Junction: Another Neighborhood Market could be in the works for Calaveras Crater
One of Altadena's continuing enigmas is what's going to go in the Calaveras Crater. It may not be an enigma much longer.
Ron Kaye: It isn't utopia, but it's far from dystopia
Once long ago, during my year as an old-fashioned rewrite-man at the National Enquirer, the demonic man who owned and ran the tabloid as if it and its journalists were a figment of his over-active imagination sent a reporter around the world in search of utopia.
Start the Presses: Sweeney Todd at Burroughs High a hair-raising experience
About 30 minutes into watching the Wednesday night dress rehearsal of “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” at John Burroughs High School in Burbank, I had an unsettling realization.
A Word, Please: Solving the case of the missing apostrophe
Somewhere out there, in the teachers' lounge at a teachers college, people are chatting and laughing and sipping coffee — blissfully unaware that they're living exhibits in the Weird Punctuation Hall of Fame.
Common Sense: Tune in to 'The New Jim Crow'
Some years ago, during the late 1960s, my younger sister, who at the time was attending UCLA's law school, was part of a project that took her to one of California's state prisons for men.
Altadena Junction: Sheriff cuts squeezing unincorporated areas, Walmart Neighborhood Market update, and more
Sheriff Lee Baca has clashed with the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors recently about cutting deputy overtime, which has the immediate effect of reducing patrols in unincorporated county areas. Supervisors felt that Baca was favoring cities that contract with the sheriff's office for police...
Ron Kaye: The Gatto plot thickens
The clumsy statements by Assemblyman Mike Gatto's political team denying that he ran a slate of delegates for the 43rd Assembly District's seats at the state Democratic Party convention — and that challengers were threatened and intimidated — also contained a direct attack on a single...
A Word, Please: Misspoken word makes a point about precision
Here's an insightful observation: People don't like to sound stupid. In fact, that's the No. 1 concern of most of the people who ask me questions about language.
Altadena Junction: Voluminous book collection heads to auction
Even as a child, Art Ronnie loved two things fiercely: aviation and books. He would spend his odd-job money buying books about fliers and aircraft. When he was 14, he got a job washing planes for a flying school for 50 cents an hour (an extra dollar if he had to clean up some student's vomit), which...
Start the Presses: Recovering from a wrenching experience
I walk around my neighborhood with a long-handled socket wrench now. The metal has a comforting heaviness.
Ron Kaye: Party needs to clear the air
Assemblyman Mike Gatto's political director sent out an email blast urging Democrats in the 43rd Assembly District to show up with “as many friends and family as possible” on Jan. 12 at the IATSE union hall in Burbank to elect a dozen delegates to the party's state convention.
A Word, Please: Don't look here for the valuable en dash
There's a punctuation mark that most people have never heard of or noticed, even though they've probably seen it in print 1,000 times.
Common Sense: Black history meets Art Linkletter
’Twas Art Linkletter who let it be known that “kids say the darndest things.” On this Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, Linkletter's classification brings me to think about a darndest and how it evolved into an Oprah Winfrey “aha” moment.
Ron Kaye: A few people can change a lot in a community
The radical community organizer Saul Alinsky, whose insights are used today as much by those on the right as on the left, once wrote:
A Word, Please: A singular way to confuse verb agreement
I recently fielded questions about two subject-verb agreement errors that readers noticed in the media. One was heard on an NPR program. The other was committed by, um, a columnist who should have been more careful.
Ron Kaye: L.A. has gone to potholes
Cracked and potholed streets don't just damage your car and annoy you, they also kill — causing accidents, slowing emergency response times, endangering pedestrians, even increasing the risk of West Nile virus by allowing stagnant pools of water to accumulate and become the breeding ground for...
Altadena Junction: Aveson charter school set for big move
After three years of uncertainty, the perennially unfinished commercial building at the corner of Altadena Drive and Lincoln Avenue in Altadena will finally have a tenant: the Aveson charter school.
Start the Presses: Putting stress on the community
The bomb threat at R.D. White Elementary School on Monday set thousands of sets of teeth on edge, including mine. News it was a hoax brought relief, and anger at the knucklehead who would do such a thing.
A Word, Please: Sometimes subjects disagree with their object
A recent headline from the Los Angeles Times, “Teens plotting attacks tend to tip their hand,” highlights a particularly difficult grammar problem.
Ron Kaye: Scott Ochoa sits down for a chat
For Scott Ochoa, it was a year to remember given the 41-year-old city manager's leap from a small suburban town to Glendale, a city five times larger and far more complex.
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