I saw four fighters bank away in the horizon. They were flying only a few hundred feet above street level.

What's up with that?

Rabbs says: "If it was four, then they were likely Navy F18s doing a formation over a stadium before the start of some game."

Probably related to the X Games?

Power was out in much of 90035 from 9:40 a.m. until 11:40 a.m.

Until recently, no decent person would consider living East of Robertson. It was regarded as a trashy place, way too close to blacks and gangs and social dysfunction.

Now the area has nice new apartment buildings and condos.

Until 1980, Hamilton High School on Robertson Blvd was about 60% Jewish. Now it is about 90% black.

For example, theft is not considered wrong if the person doing the taking has a more serious need for the item taken. This is perhaps an embodiment of the scene in the popular movie, “Ushpazim” in which the protagonist steals a sukkah from a more well-to-do member of the community. For the past two (2) years, my family has erected a sukkah behind our apartment building that we have shared with our friends and neighbors. We take the observance of sukkot seriously and invest a lot of time, effort, and expense in building the sukkah and hosting. After the holiday, we store the frame in our garage. While the gate is often unlocked, the pieces are not visible from the street (one would have to be very close to see them) and upon cursory glance the frame does not appear to be anything more than ordinary steel poles. In fact, the poles have quietly resided in front of our car for 11 months. But, now mysteriously, someone has been taking the poles a few at a time. Sadly, this does not surprise us. The previous year, we had stored the thatch roof in the garage only to have it disappear two weeks before sukkot. The timing of both of these incidents makes it highly unlikely that some random person took the parts. The theft of these parts was deliberate. Someone is preparing to build their sukkah and knew exactly where to get free parts.

A friend: "I don't like the perfect Jews. Everybody's like, the kids are gifted and they go to the best schools. You are in a fishbowl. God forbid you go out on Shabbat outside of your house and you're wearing shorts. Acch, I can't eat at your house.

"I know all the people who are in power now. They were always snobby. There are parents at Harkham Hillel who are not observant. We have friends in Pico/Rob who will eat at Souplantation and they'll drive on Shabbat.

"I have a feeling that the people who are in the power structure at Bnai David are very much into your business."

Levi: "I didn't find that. I often wore a suit that had holes in it, or an untucked shirt, and nobody made fun of me. It's just a bunch of nice people. I don't think they pry."

Friend: "Bnai David is suffocating. It's too much. Pico/Rob is too crowded. There's no open space. There's Circle Park and there's Roxbury Park. And that's it. You feel like you are in New York.

"Every major synagogue in Pico/Robertson is run to succeed. Bnai David has realized that its charter is married families with kids. Beth Jacob is somewhat Death Jacob though to some extent Rabbi Weil has gotten his share of the young marrieds, the ones not smart enough to make it at Bnai David, the ones who are not lawyers and engineers and run their own businesses.

"You know the three shortest books? Jewish Business Ethics. Italian War Heroes. Blacks I've Met While Yachting.

"After viewing that thing in Loma Linda University where your dad was speaking, it's 'Blacks I met While Being An Adventist.' You guys don't take them? It's too cerebral?"

Levi: "They have their own churches."

Friend: "That crowd is the Republican party's wetdream. It's not even homogeneous. They even have the same color grey hair. They wear the same crappy clothes from JC Pennys. It looked like the Twilight Zone.

"Why don't you like that religion?"

Levi: "The chicks are hot. But you're out of it. There are no great Seventh-Day Adventist politicians, generals, financiers, directors, producers, writers, painters, journalists. When you're Jewish, you are right in the middle of what's happening."

Friend: "Give it some time."

Levi: "They've been around 170 years. They'll always be out of it. It's an eschatological religion. It's about the next world."

Friend: "They're waiting for Hale Bob to come down and land and take them away?"

Levi: "Yes."

Friend: "It seems like a lot of people leave. I have a friend who was an Adventist. To this day, he's a vegetarian, but he's like, 'Ahh, those people, forget about it.'"

Levi: "They're nice sweet simple people."

Friend: "But there's no action?"

Levi: "Yeah. But a lot of hot chicks."

Friend: "But they're all white."

Levi: "No. A lot of Asians. My Yellow Fever was burning up while I was there. I went to the Korean church and I was in shangrila."

Every once in a while I grab my camera, a Canon Rebel, and walk around our neighborhood, Pico Robertson, here in Los Angeles, snapping photos of, well, whatever.

Here are some snapshots—isolated textures and geometric details—of my local gas station.

It's true, gas prices are painfully high; it's true that bums—drug addicts and alcoholics—panhandle at the station; it's true that the gasoline fumes make me ill, but there is great beauty in this space.

Hey, I'm just a romantic fool.

The round plate, the inner triangle, and the two bolts create an organic composition.

White on white, an elegant window that's never open.

Red and orange spheres, bisected by a slanting shadow.

It's Friday, Baruch HaShem. Time to take a break from politics and terrorism. Time, once again, to take a stroll around my wonderful neighborhood here in Los Angeles and focus on the startling beauty that is everywhere.

Found this beautiful industrial composition on the side of a building on La Cienaga Blvd.

On Pico Blvd., I was transfixed by part of a wall that looks like an archeological dig.

Street display from a Jewish-Persian store on Pico Blvd. This art falls under the heading of the classic Jewish-Byzantine-Elvis style.

On a side street off Pico Blvd., I found this mellow yellow grill.

Discovered these color-coded steel girders on Glenville, off Pico. They look like huge toys.