Reading in Redondo

Building a study under the eyes of Artesia.

What's the story with all the cameras that have suddenly appeared on the streetlamps all along Artesia Boulevard in Redondo? Does anyone know?

When I first moved into my house, I selected one room as the study/library. I spend much of my free time there. It has most of my books, a radio, and very little else. This upcoming year I'm going to refurbish it, and put in integral bookshelves, for both safety and aesthetics. I'm also going to repaint it, put in new lighting and an (if I can find one) ideal reading sofa, and a hardwood floor.

One thing I've noticed, when surfing the net: There are all kinds of how-to pages on the net, but very few of them have anything to do with creating a space in the home to store and enjoy a personal library. I'm going to rectify that.

Part of a balanced breakfast

Yesterday, after dinner, Tina and I split an orange. This was a delicacy made new by my perusal of the John McPhee treatise Oranges this weekend. As with all McPhee books, this is filled with fun and fascinating facts that weave together into a compelling story. For instance:

• An orange is always sweeter on the blossom end. I tested this rule of thumb, and it held quite well for the ochre segments we ate (over the sink, of course) in the kitchen.
• The best oranges on a tree are grown high up, on the south-facing side.
• Navel oranges have a thick skin (as do California-grown oranges) compared to the Valencia orange (or the Florida-grown ones).
• Far from the corporate behemoth I pictured it as, Sunkist is the largest agricultural cooperative in the world.
• Frozen concentrated orange juice (FCOJ, for fans of the film Trading Places) is not simply concentrated orange juice. It's fresh OJ that's been vaccuum-extracted to within an inch of its life, resulting in a tepid acid-sugar syrup with no particular orange character. Packers then add a small amount of fresh OJ and d-limonene (orange peel oil) to give it the flavor we've come to know and love as "orange juice." No WONDER freshly-squeezed OJ tastes so different from Minute Maid.