December 7, 2017
"In his boxer shorts, he ran out to the sidewalk on Bellagio Road — where, 56 years before, Zsa Zsa Gabor lost her house, saying: 'My three dark minks, my white mink, my sables, some really very nice little jewels are gone.'"
From "During a week of flames, upscale Bel-Air homes burn as fire roars through canyon" in the L.A. Times.
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I didn't write this post because of the tags, but this is in the top 20 best collection of tags in the history of this blog.
Thank you for the laugh (it was a deep and hearty one, I can assure you.)
Rogow planned to go to a friend’s apartment in Westwood with a rooftop where they could watch the fire. But he made one stop first.
“I needed a smoothie,” he said. He picked up his regular order: a blend with probiotics, strawberries and kale.
Sounds revolting. But it's interesting how people still seek the comfort of routine or normalcy in crisis situations.
What concerns me is the potential loss of art as these properties go up in flames.
Daily Mail link at top of Drudge has some incredible pictures and video, including the guy rescuing a wild bunny. I didn't know in Bel-Air the firemen will load up your Bentley for your getaway. That's your property tax dollars really at work!
The tags:
fire, fur, L.A., underpants, Zsa Zsa Gabor
Would make a good Punk Rock song.
Well, the history of a locale might advise against building homes in that setting.
Floodplains tend to flood. Chaparral tends to burn frequently, and even has flora that evolved to require fire to reproduce. And, since it is California, someone will pontificate about how climate change is responsible for this, when it has been going on for millenia.
And Zsa Zsa was such a wonderful housekeeper.
The rich lose a lot more than the poor when their house burns up.
Why does this remind me of Sodom and Gomorrah?
I'm looking forward to someone explaining why there seem to be no firebreaks.
So is this an passable exception to your men in shorts rule Althouse?
Assrat said...
I'm looking forward to someone explaining why there seem to be no firebreaks.
Given how dry and windy it is, you would probably need fire breaks a quarter-mile wide or more.
>Given how dry and windy it is, you would probably need fire breaks a quarter-mile wide or more.
That is a very good point.
I guess these filthy rich people could not hire anyone to CLEAR OUT THE BRUSH IN THEIR COMMUNITY.
So they waited for the 'guberment' to act.
Bad choice.
In his underpants? Who does he think he is, Charlie Rose?
Most of the brush, etc. is on public land, and it is very difficult to get permits do do environmentally impactful things like clearing brush.
In places its a problem getting permits to remove trees, etc., on ones own property.
>In places its a problem getting permits to remove trees, etc., on ones own property.
Be nice if the government was financially responsible for the damage they do.
During Santa Ana winds the fire will advance a half a mile or more in scattered locations. They don't know where the new fires are unless someone calls it in or until it becomes big enough to spot.
Homeowners are supposed to maintain a 100 foot defensible space around our homes.
(in San Diego you can be fined), and we get lectured a lot about using equipment that can spark and start a fire. With budgetary woes the county does not get out and clear the public land very often. I will say San Diego County has gotten a little better about this.
I'm not complaining it's just the way it is. Some of my first memories include my dad hosing the roof of our house down (60's and 70's). It wasn't for major fires just brush fires that would start in our community (eastern LA County). That was back in the day when the neighborhood men (it was all men) would go and help out the fire crew. Now the fire crews tell people to stay away.
So between the fire storm and earthquake swarm it's a tense December in SoCal. I guess we could move...Do we pick tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, tsunamis? I just pray that people stay safe. It is what I am used to.
Another memory...My mother always said if we were going to have an earthquake she wanted it to be on New Year's Day during the Rose Parade (it was a joke! - she wasn't evil). I believe it happened a time or two and fewer people moved to California in the months afterward.
A lot less sympathy here than maybe I should have. A lot, lot more houses burned last summer even in just MT than are going to burn here. One fire engine per three houses? You have to be kidding. We had better than a month last summer of smoke that was bad enough that going outside and breathing it was not recommended. Mostly because liberals, including probably some threatened here, banned logging in the surrounding National Forests (which helped the fuel buildup, and eliminated the firebreaks that logging creates) and because fires have been suppressed for maybe a century through much of the west. When you had multiple fires at the same time that size last summer, and a bigger one the previous summer, sympathy gets a little strained.
Rich people in Bel Air, Los Angeles pay the taxes that fight fires in South Central LA man-made riots. So why shouldn't poor people's taxes pay to save rich people's homes & property from a natural disaster? Rich people in Los Angeles with no children have to pay taxes that educate poor people's children, in a school system that does not work. If rich Bel Arians don't mind subsidizing failing Gov. services in poorer areas, the least the poor can do is pay for services that are actually effective.
"I'm looking forward to someone explaining why there seem to be no firebreaks."
Back in high school, I lived in a corner house that was across the street from where the foothills started, and while there were buildings (a boys home and scattered houses) it was a lot of trees and brush and such. I woke up hearing screams and sirens, as a fire was taking over the hillside, burning buildings, lighting 100 foot palm trees on fire, went outside and it was like being in hell, blowing embers everywhere. My brother was on the roof with a garden hose, wetting everything down, I helped pack the car for evacuation, my dad stayed around to help out.
The next day every house on our block was spared. Scattered houses downwind for about a 1/2 mile away burned down. The wind just takes everything crazy far, so that firebreaks really are useful when the fire is just driven by fuel. LA has some of the, if not the, best firefighters in the world, but those Santa Ana winds, this late in the season, means that the fires go where they want to go. After the crazy horrible fire in NorCal I thought we'd had our fire season done with for the year.
1. Collect Zsa Zsa's underpants.
2. ????
3. Fire!
Imagine living where you don’t need a coat and having 6 fur coats.
We wear coats. It was 34 last night. I have also ended up with two mink stoles. I haven’t decided what to do with them. They are adorable, but don’t go with jeans and yoga pants. I wish I had some really nice little jewels that I had to deal with.
I remember well watching the KTLA channel 5 coverage of the 1961 Bel Air fire with reporter Stan Chambers. Steve Allen watched as his and Jayne Meadows house went up in flames like a box of matches. Even on the old Black & White TV's, it was dramatic. I learned then that the houses at the top of the hill with the great views were the ones that usually burned down while the houses at the bottom of the hills with the lousy views were the ones that survive.
Ann Althouse said...
"Imagine living where you don’t need a coat and having 6 fur coats."
I spent a Christmas vacation during college out in Santa Monica. People were wearing parkas with temperatures in the 60's. I didn't even bother to bring a light coat with me.
Also, my very first thought on reading this post was how great those tags were. Fun to see observation that in the comments.
Who, what, when, where, why, and how. We are told that these are the questions that journalists are supposed to address. This story says that "Jackson Rogow [who], 24, woke up at 6 a.m. [when] to the smell of smoke and the wail of sirens. In his boxer shorts, he ran out to the sidewalk on Bellagio Road [where] — where, 56 years before, Zsa Zsa Gabor lost her house, saying: “My three dark minks, my white mink, my sables, some really very nice little jewels are gone [what].” So I guess this is journalism.
Still, I had to read it twice to figure out whether Jackson Rogow, age 24, had lost three dark minks, a white mink, some sables, and some nice little jewels. At first I thought the furs might be a tie-in to the guy who rescued the rabbit from the fire.
And yet people elsewhere, or who first meet us, still ask us why we would live in Kansas City, what with the tornados and all.
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