Serving Larchmont Village, Hancock Park, and the Greater Wilshire neighborhoods of Los Angeles since 2011.

Weekend Buzz – Events for September 23-24, 2017

The Ebell of Los Angeles is hosting a champagne open house on Sunday, September 24.

On Saturday morning this week, the LA DWP is offering a $25 instant rebate gift card to qualifying customers who’d like to recycle their old, working, window-mounted air conditioners.  (The goal is to encourage people to replace them with more energy-efficient new units.) From 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., just bring your old window-mounted AC unit to LADWP headquarters at 111 N. Hope St., in downtown LA., for this one-day-only event, and they’ll give you a $25 prepaid rebate gift card.  You must be an LADWP residential customer to qualify (so bring your most recent LADWP bill and a California driver’s license or state-issued ID – with matching addresses).  Also, the AC unit must be a plug-in type and in working condition (they will test it on site).  Finally, you must also own the air conditioner or have the owner’s permission to recycle it.  Customers may recycle up to three AC units each.  For more information, call (855) 665-9469 or see the link above.

This week’s big event for bargain hunters is the periodic Free Vinyl Record DAY at The Record Parlour in Hollywood (6408 Selma Ave., 90028).  From 10:30 a.m. on Saturday to 8:00 p.m. on Sunday, the  store will be giving away up to 30,000 vinyl LPs in all musical genres, as well as about 5,000 45s, 78s, cassettes, music magazines and posters. Spend $20 at the store, and you can take up to 100 records for free.  Food trucks and beverages will be available throughout the day, and if you’d like to DJ, they’ll have sign-up sheets available for one-hour sets (using vinyl only, please).  Be sure to come early for the best selection and shorter wait times…and bring your own box or bag for your records.

Vinyl records may be the dinosaurs of the music world these days, but you can also learn all about real dinosaurs this weekend at the Natural History Museum’s Dino Fest, running both Saturday and Sunday. The two-day festival celebrates dinosaurs, their prehistoric past and the science that brings their world back to life.  Visitors will enjoy access to world-renowned paleontologists and dinosaur experts, behind-the-scenes look at fossil discoveries, in-the-field research, specimens from the museum’s collections, dinosaur pop culture, and much more.

Just a hop, skip and jump east at Exposition Park, the California African American Museum is one of several local musuems (other include the Zimmer Children’s Museum, the Grammy Museum at LA Live and the Japanese American National Museum) participating in the Smithsonian Magazine’s nationwide Museum Day Live – “an annual celebration of boundless curiosity.” For free admission to any of the participating institutions, just go to the link above, print our your special free ticket and present it at the museum.

If you’d prefer your cultural history live, Saturday also brings us the 27th Annual Living History Tour at Angelus Rosedale Cemetery, founded in 1884 at the corner of Washington Blvd. and Normandie Ave..  Presented every year by the West Adams Heritage Association, the event brings (back) to life the colorful residents of one of the oldest resting places in the city.  This year’s theme is The Artist’s Way: Poets and Painters, Songsmiths and Singers and will focus on the musicians, artists, poets, photographers, dancers, architects and other creative souls who are among the permanent residents of the cemetery. With the grounds as their stage, actors, in costume and at graveside will give first-person portrayals of those celebrated.  Tours will depart approximately every 20 minutes, beginning at 9 a.m.  Please note, however, that tour times from 9 to 10:30 a.m. are already sold out, and only times from 10:30 to noon are still available.  Please see the link above for details and reservations.  All tickets are $35.

Later, from 12-7 p.m. on Saturday, public servants, people with technology skills, community organizers and other interested folks are invited to participate in one of two Los Angeles events in the National Day of Civic Hacking…an “opportunity to show that government can work in the 21st century if we all build it together.”  The goal is to tell a story about Los Angeles using data. This year, one local event focuses on the topic of Education, and features speakers from the LA Times, KPCC, UCLA and more, all talking about data and education with leading local thinkers in the field. It will be held at the California Community Foundation (281 South Figueroa St, Suite 100) and will be followed by a networking happy hour at a local bar to continue the conversation.   The second local event provides an opportunity to work with LA Sanitation recycling experts and civic tech mentors to solve the problem of keeping unrecyclable items out of residents’ blue recycling bins.  Participants will try to better understand the problem, and compete for cash prizes and incubation of innovative solutions. For more information, see the links above or contact [email protected]. Please note that space is limited, so do reserve your spot if you’d like to attend either session.

For the art minded, the William Grant Still Arts Center, 2520 S. West View St., 90016, will host an opening reception for its new show, “A Woman’s Place…” on Saturday, from 3-6 p.m. The show, which runs through November 18, brings together the life, work, stories, and archives of five women of color whose lives illustrate what it is to be an educator serving the community of all ages, through both traditional and non-traditional means, while maintaining a dedication to radical social change and grassroots education…with love as the common root of their pedagogy. Featured educators whose life works will be examined are Angela Davis, Ericka Huggins, Yuri Kochiyama, Elizabeth “Betita” Martinez, and Jewel Thais-Williams, some of whom taught formally in classroom settings, and all of whom built legacies through community action, spreading political ideas through community organizing, journalism, writing, and mentoring others.

Moving into evening on Saturday, if you’re in the mood for a vintage film, the American Cinematheque will continue its Golden Globes 75th Anniversary celebration with a double feature of 1982’s Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean and 1951’s Death of a Salesman – both of which were Golden Globe winners – starting at 7:30 p.m. at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood.

Also, we’re starting to see Halloween-season events popping up, and one of the first to get rolling is the annual Paramount Pictures After Dark Tour: Tales From The Other Side. It starts at dusk with some champagne to toast the coming darkness…and then, in the silence of the night, you’ll descend into the mysteries behind the studio’s our iconic gates via cavernous sound stages and the darkest corners of its infamous backlot. Guided by flashlight, visitors will also creep through the legendary Hollywood Forever Cemetery to learn the tales of Hollywood’s most dearly departed and the secrets that followed them to the grave. Surrounded by the memories of the famous and the infamous, you’ll get a glimpse into the legends and superstitions that weave through Hollywood’s fascinating history. Tickets are available through the link above…or at a discount through Goldstar.

On Sunday, you could head over to LACMA for Palm Trees and Dreams: Carlos Almaraz, an Andell Family Sundays event with artist-led workshops and family-friendly gallery tours and activities thematically based on special exhibitions and LACMA’s permanent collection. This week, attendees will get to know the work of Chicano artist Carlos Almaraz, who painted Los Angeles through color and movement…and then have a chance to make their own art inculding iconic L.A. imagery such as palm trees and freeways.  Drop in any time from 12:30 to 3:30 p.m.  Admission is free with general admission; children must be accompanied by an adult.

Also on Sunday afternoon, from 2-5 p.m., you can get back into the local history groove as the Los Angeles Visionaries Association holds a salon event featuring C.C. de Vere, creator of the Frenchtown Confidential blog, who shines a light on the long-forgotten Gallic roots of the city of Los Angeles. For example, did you know that French and French-Canadian newcomers outnumbered all other immigrants in 1850s Los Angeles…the city’s second-oldest hospital was called The French Hospital for more than 125 years…and until the 1890s, French was the second most commonly spoken language (after Spanish) in L.A.?  The short illustrated lecture begins at 2 p.m,in the basement of downtown’s Grand Central Market, 317 S. Broadway, and then, afterward, attendees will walk (a little over a mile in all) to a number of significant Franco-Angeleno sites. RSVPs are required at the link above.  Please note that each attendee must be registered with their own name and unique email address (no “plus ones”).

Finally, from 3-5 p.m. on Sunday, the history gets even more local with a Champagne Open House at the Ebell of Los Angeles, 4400 Wilshire Blvd. (at Lucerne).  The public is invited to come and learn more about the Ebell as members celebrate 123 years as a women’s club and 90 years on Wilshire Boulevard. You can mingle with a diverse group of women committed to preserving the vibrant club and historic building…take a guided tour of the architecturally stunning campus…preview the exciting restoration of the grounds…and learn more about how to participate in the Ebell’s heritage of leadership, community service and dynamic programs.  The event is free (RSVPs appreciated at [email protected]), friends are welcome and one complimentary glass of champgne is provided. Free parking is also abundant.

Have a great weekend!

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Elizabeth Fuller
Elizabeth Fuller
Elizabeth Fuller was born and raised in Minneapolis, MN but has lived in LA since 1991 - with deep roots in both the Sycamore Square and West Adams Heights-Sugar Hill neighborhoods. She spent 10 years with the Greater Wilshire Neighborhood Council, volunteers at Wilshire Crest Elementary School, and has been writing for the Buzz since 2015.

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