Wonder at 105 years old.

Nadia, our 105 year old neighbor, and probably the oldest person in HaFoSaFo expresses the most palpable wonder at the miracle of Anne Hars' iPhone.

Bike stand Cozy

I am used to people decorating bike stands with stickers and graffiti but this goes over the top: crocheted cozies! I love it. Seen on Sunset Boulevard just down the hill from the Happy Foot/Sad Foot.

Le Fashion Truck

Le Fashion Truck was parked out in the shadow of the Happy Foot Sad Foot sign this weekend. The whole inside has been redecorated to house a nice rack of vintage inspired clothes and accessories by Stacey Steffe and Janine Romo. It even has a changing room. Nice job Ladies!

Birtha's last batch- Serge and Jane?!

Look carefully at these kittens

The resemblance is eerie...

Best of Friends 'til the bottle came between them

The Coronado Street Kitten Society has two fantastic little kittens available for adoption to a good home. These are two special little brothers, rescued by society members when they were 4 days old and raised with cats dogs and even chickens, these kittens are social and fun. They love to play together and promise to provide hours of entertainment. The gray and white kitty has the eyes of Jane Birkin and was initially thought to be a girl, while the white and gray kitty bears the striking resemblance to Serge Gainsbourg, especially when sucking on a bottle!
Here's an oh so appropriate Serge song: Adieu Creature to listen to while watching the above xtreme cuteness video.
The kittens are about 9 weeks old now. Their mom, a feral named Big Birtha for her constant state of pregnancy and her trap savvyness, was finally trapped, spayed and released (thanks Fixnation)! Tears of joy were shed amongst the happy Society members who, lets face it, formed in order to deal with Birtha's abundant contributions to the neighborhood. Birtha lurks around the private home where her kitties are cared for which is located within the boundaries of her colony territory. She helps supervise daytime play and swats the hand that feeds her.
The foster family now feel the kittens are ready to go on to a permanent home. They hope the two kittens can stay together, since it is always best to adopt two kittens together; the chances of running away is lessened, and they always have company when you are away.
Please check out the craigslist post to adopt Birtha's last batch.

Shrink awareness

Our closest Home Depot has everything- even this:


Highland Park!

Hafo Safo on the fourth

Coronado Street is legendary for its stadium fireworks let off in the middle of the street by a large group of very wide men with lots and lots of tattoos all dressed in very similar clothing and belonging to a certain club. This year was no different, the older kids ran wild with small rockets taking aim at one another while the little ones lit sparklers and ran like mad when the rocketeer yelled "Fire in the hole!" After hosing down my house and garden, I spent the evening mostly running, I mean, supervising the wee ones who I found at one point making a little fire out of sparkler boxes in a driveway and playing Campfire. A tent was set up on the sidewalk with a large banner sporting the letters TST. A few years back I made the mistake of pulling out a video camera. It was amazing how quickly the fireworks stopped.... The biggest diiference between this display and Dodger stadium? On the Coronado you are much closer to the fireworks, and there is the real thrill of danger that can only be experienced when one is in real danger of getting a second degree burn. It also doesn't all end in a grand finally. It goes on and on and on and on and on...
This year I mentioned to one of the senior gentlemen of the club that I would very much like to take some videos and pictures. Unfortunately I only had my Iphone but I did manage to take a few videos and get some kind of cool photos of the neighborhood kids.

stairway to Hafo Safo

hedge fund

Will Hafo Safolites help terraform Irvine?

The gardens, embankments, parkways and alleyways of Hafo Safo provided artist Claudia Bucher with all the hundreds of succulents she needed for this incredible sculpture currently on view at the Irvine Arts Center as part of a group show entitled "Earth-Like Planet curated by artist Matt May. Residents contributed bags and bags of of clippings and then helped the artist fill all the little pots on the work with soiless medium and clippings. We look forward to seeing how the plants do on the alien planet of Irvine which they have found themselves. Will they wither and die in the foriegn atmosphere or burgeon into a new far-away outpost? We'll use our succusensory abilities to chart their progress.

dapper dude of the day

Hafo Safo has a lot of dapper dudes. Here's one of my favorites.

Goat Sucker

Goat Sucker: Legendary blood sucking *Chupacabras

Or deliciously creamy caramel confection?
Goat milk Lollipops available in the impulse-buy section at Circle H Liquor!

*"The chupacabras... from chupar "to suck" and cabra "goat", literally "goat sucker"
-wikipedia

Cristina's World

Cristina's garden is a pretty fantastic example of container gardening. The ground around her house is all hard-pan but she has an old Avocado tree and has started to plant fruit trees. She has also started a compost pile and has gotten some dirt from one neighbor and some alfalfa hay from another. She is beginning the process of making soil so that some of her plants can go into the ground.
Besides gardening, Cristina helped found the Coronado Street Kitty Society. She has acted as our local feral cat colony manager for many many years operating feeding stations and providing clean water and food twice a day every day. By developing a trust with the feral adults she is able to rescue and help re-home the kittens through the Society. She has also trapped numerous adult feral cats who the Society then bring to Fixnation to be fixed and released.
And if all that weren't enough, Cristina also has her own house cleaning business with top notch references. She is more than happy to use your all natural products, preferring vinegar and baking soda to the heavy chemicals. Let this blog know if you need some help around the house and we will put you in touch- especially if you have big dogs, an attack cat, brazen fowl, etc., Cristina can handle them.
One of Cristina's very pampered pets:

One Got Fat

If the Shockheaded Peter authors made a bicycle safety film, it would be One Got Fat. Hafosafoans; take heed. Borrow a page from Stanislaw Higgenbottom, Tinkerbell Mcdillonfiddy, and poor Mossby Pomegranite (alas, dead from fallen arches...), as they get steam rolled (Spoiler Alert; literally) for their careless ways. Oddly, there is no mention of appropriate cycling apparel, such as, oh, helmets. No danger, apparently, in riding while wearing paper mache masks.

"Slim knew that his big sack would be hard to handle so he asked Orville Slump if he would carry it."

Thanks, Internet Archive!

Free Van

This 1969 VW Camper Van is being given away free to the best non-profit business that applies. The owner wants the tax deduction. The most creative use wins! This belongs in HaFoSaFo, don'cha think? More pics here.

Plant a Cat Tree

The Cat Trees are flourishing just a block up from where Eagle Rock blvd ends Fletcher (technically that is Ave 36). In a garage on 3737 Eagle Rock, with the sign painted on the outside that says "Carpet Center" resides a Cat Tree Nursery with brilliant designs.
These guys run from $65.00 to over $200.00, with hideouts, scratching posts, and all sorts of perches upholstered in a variety of piles and shags. They also do custom work. I spoke with Oscar (below) as he contemplats his next design.

Signs of the Times

Nowadays, you have to have an ID to buy a paint pen, the spray paint is in lockup and you have to bring your own labels to the Post Office. Why? Because of the Art In The Street! Can't you see the signs? There everywhere in HaFoSaFo- This one especially across from 7-Eleven on Sunset.

Gardens of HaFoSaFo

I stumbled upon this garden in the middle of the night on a feral kitten rescue at 110 S. Rampart across the street from the infamous "Original Tommy's." There was something just so HaFoSaFo about it that I went back the next day to photograph it and happened to meet gardener Angela as she tended her vegetables.

She informed me that many of the tenants of this building have little flower,vegetable and herb gardens along the driveway.

I asked Angela about the landlords, who live at the apartment complex, and she told me they encourage the tenants to garden. You can tell from the street that something is a little bit different about this place. For one thing, there is a sort of homemade suit of armor decorating the facade of the building. There is also an ancient looking wagon/fence and a sculpture made from a wagon wheel.

One could argue that calling Beverly and Rampart HaFoSaFo is infringing on Westlake, but the boundaries of HaFoSaFo are not traditional hard and fast lines drawn on maps, but subject to sprawl anywhere our sign seems to leave its humble footprint(s).

So, in the name of the quantum foot, I claim this building as soveriegn territory and a southern outpost of our noble land/state of mind (does this make us a landmind?).

The Great City/State/Barrio of HaFoSaFo ratifies its legitimate and non-prescribing sovereignty over... and offers its great abiding bare-foot kicking power to the above aforementioned property..... or something to that effect.

The Wheel is an Extension of the Foot.

Another sound business on wheels. This guy has a shoe repair usually situated at the north side of Logan off of Sunset in the Echo Park side of HaFoSaFo. He can do house calls and make your feet happy if you call his number:
(I can't really make it out either. I'm guessing that is 1(626)240-9238ish)

Insane Clown Payaso

By and large, I am not afraid of clowns. At least I wasn't until I saw the graphic for Payaso's Original Horchata. It may be the vividness of the hairy eyebrows peeking out from under the pancake makeup eyebrows, or the size of his tongue. This is not a clown I would leave alone with my children.

Backing up a few paces, I have to shout out to my local HaFoSaFo Mexican Food supplier where I found this wonder:

If you haven't been there, you wouldn't ever guess... and if you have, well you don't need me to tell you: Rite Aid Pharmacy betwixt. Alvarado and Glendale. Everything you need from 5 lb cans of hominy to solid hot chocolate. Go figure.

Things with things

Why do we love the Happy Foot / Sad Foot sign so much? Is it because it shows a foot with... feet?

Why is a foot with feet so loveable when a tooth with teeth strikes me as just menacing? Nevertheless, several area dentists find the icon to be just as good for business.

This sign is to be found around 14891 Burbank Boulevard,

And this one on Sunset and Echo Park.

I am sure there are many others of these to be found.

Submissions are always welcome in the comments!

Bag of Cash found

Here's a poster you don't often see:

Found just uphill from the very civilized Vintage Eyewear shop Gentleman's Breakfast Sunset & Mowhawk. To my knowledge no one has claimed the prize yet.

Welder on Wheels

I've always been impressed with businesses on wheels, other than the standard food truck. This place is set up (for now) in the lot between The Flores Recycling Center and The Circle H Market & LIQUER. Has anyone had any work done here? They aren't even on Yelp, but it sure would be handy to have someone I could bring my metal to.

Playing Possum

Saw this poster on the corner of Glendale and Fletcher - and it looked familiar, but still funny. There is a viral video from 2008 collecting all the called-in "concerned citizen" responses. Still, the sign itself and the person who put it up is way funnier than the people who believe it.

More Love Hours Than Can Ever Be Repaid

Found this sale on stuffed toys at the corner of Fletcher and San Fernando- 3 for 50 cents! This pile is available, by coincidence usually on weekends. For service ask at the nearby Pupusa grill.

Moped Army

I just found out that HaFoSaFo is home to at least 2 active Moped Gangs within bike pushing distance of the Happy/Sad foot sign. Due to Landlord Objections, I can't divulge their exact secret hideouts, or they might buzz my house and party in my driveway, suffice it to say these Chicks and Dudes are Fabulous. If you see a woman in a catsuit riding a Puch it may be one of the Gaskettes who do endearing things like make valentines and deliver them via moped. All images here come from their blog- an essential hipster wall calendar without all that stupid date chart stuff. Had I been paying closer attention, I would never have missed this:

Also local, somewhat scruffier and maybe more about the bikes, are The Wooly Bullies, brother chapter and official members of The Moped Army. Check out the top tanks, and upside down skateboard plank seat.