On New Year's Eve, some friends of mine, including Ken & Robert whom some of you
met while visiting, were walking over to my area to meet me as we were going out for
some celebrating and this is what they came upon.
In West Hollywood, Los Angeles County firefighters were called to 1035 N. Sweetzer Avenue around
8:30 p.m. They found an apartment house carport with two vehicles ablaze and spent 25 minutes dousing
the flames, said an on-scene fire inspector.
This is one of the 55 arson fires that have been occuring since two were set Thursday night. There
were twelve more last night! The sound of fire trucks and police sirens have become common each
night the past few days, along with helicopters flying around. One third of these fires have been set
in West Hollywood where I live. A smattering have been in the valley area and the rest in Hollywood.
One was even set in the underground garage at Hollywood and Highland.
By the way, the above photo is only about 1000 feet from the Silver Spoon restaurant where we
had our after-screening gathering in 2008. And on another note, the Silver Spoon restaurant closed
its doors on New Year's Eve after thirty years as the Silver Spoon. (Before that it was the same
style place but was called Theodore's.)
It was sold to people who are going to open another restaurant there, but it will not be a coffee shop.
All the coffee shop style independent restaurants are disappearing. The neighborhood is unhappy about
this, but what can one do. The owners were tired of running it and new owners want to change it to
a more upscale place and it has a huge valuable asset--a parking lot! Ring out the old, I guess.
Ring-a-ding-ding.
