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Mayor Villaraigosa got heckled a bit for using Spanish last night — and also got an ovation. Details and the rest of the Morning Buzz inside.
Starters
Dowie and Stodder face the music today
Former Fleishman-Hillard executives Doug Dowie and John Stodder go back to court and seem almost certain to be sent to prison over the DWP billing case. Today's Daily Breeze does a feature on Stodder, focusing on his blog that I've recommended here numerous times. The current post on From the Desert to the Sea addresses a recent siege of writer's block and says it's only partly related to what he calls his "legal travails," which seldom merit a mention.
Hello, friends…
When I started this blog, I had no idea what I’d do with it. At various times, it has been like a friend, my own media channel, a shingle, a distraction, a guilty pleasure and, above all, a place to give my writing and photography skills a chance to develop.
The post before this one is the 400th I’ve completed since I started up on December 14, 2005. If anyone had told me I would write 400 posts on this thing in a little over a year, I would have said:
a) that was a madly ambitious goal;
b) gee, how many books and screenplays could I have written if I’d put all that writing energy into those things?
Politics
Mayor heckled over Spanish
I'm told that at last night's Dorothy Chandler Pavilion event, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's customary mixing of English and Spanish to accommodate the Spanish-language media did not go over smoothly. When the mayor slipped into Spanish during his introduction of former Mexican president Vicente Fox, my source says, a spectator in the seats yelled out "speak in English!" Villaraigosa stopped, bristled and retorted "I'm bilingual, and proud of it." The mayor got a nice ovation in return. Many empty seats for Fox, by the way.
California Majority Report adds an L.A. editor
Andrea Adleman, a former Villaraigosa staffer in the Legislature, has served on neighborhood councils in the San Pedro area and headed the Democratic club there. She's being billed as L.A.-based editor and contributor to the party's Sacramento blog.
Blogger alleges Villaraigosa marriage on the rocks
Luke Ford posted yesterday that Antonio and Corina have split, offering as evidence only his own claims that they "haven’t been seen together in public in about ten months. Villaraigosa no longer wears his wedding band. His wife does not live with him in the mayor’s mansion." Then the post wanders off onto some rant about the late Frank del Olmo, who Ford has long had a grudge against.
Media
Slip o' the tongue
On last night's 11 pm news, Channel 4's Colleen Williams attributed the 67-year-old Spanish woman's pregnancy to a local "fraternity clinic" before she caught herself. She got out "fertility clinic" but the rest of the way it looked like the whole cast was stifling a laugh, her included.
Noted
42-story condo
The William Pereira-designed Crocker-Citizens National Bank tower at 6th Street and Grand Avenue downtown wants to go condo via the city's adaptive reuse ordinance. The city planning department is expected to give the OK this week, despite the condo market slowdown downtown. LAT
Long, cold trip
It's possible the South African teenager whose body was found in the wheel well of a British Airways jet at LAX stowed away in Cape Town early last week. His body may have gone undiscovered for days. Breeze
Legal beat
Jet Blue bomb threat earns probation
Yechezkel Wells got off easy for calling in a bomb threat to make a Jet Blue flight he missed at Long Beach turn around. He gets six months' home detention with an electronic bracelet, 200 hours of community service, two years' probation and a $1,000 fine. But not jail time. LAT
From yesterday's LA Observed
Perfect excuse
When Judith Regan uttered whatever words got her fired, she was deep in the throes of a 21-day liquid diet that had made her, shall we say, a mite testy. LABO
Board of Supervisors hire a CAO
He comes from Orange County. News & Chatter
New TV partnership
Gail Berman and Lloyd Braun, the former Paramount president and Yahoo media/entertainment head, are launching a multimedia production house that will focus on TV but also include film and Internet projects. LABO
