A year after closing, the story poles are up.

Sometimes there may be a boo-boo on the website, but all it takes is a backspace and correction. Too bad that banners on buildings in Salinas can’t be backspaced.

Notice that Moammar’s Chamber Of Commerce had the address wrong in the website. Should get a refund on the dues for that mistake.

It’s really at 612 Lighthouse. If your business is silly enough to bend over for Moammar, check what you are getting . .

Found in the basement. Remember when the house had the huge antennas?

Here’s today’s view:

Seemed that it could have made it with longer hours. Was only open from 11:00 to 4:00. Even with those short hours they never took down the “open” signs.

Bookstore Out Of Business

Apple Computer’s Steve Jobs:
“It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don’t read anymore,” he said. “Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don’t read anymore.”
Does the furniture business get any weirder?

This store often had pieces out on the sidewalk – free retail space at the cost of blocking pedestrian traffic. The list prices were insane – $400 for a painted wooden bench.
A typical retail furniture store must maintain warehouse inventory and a showroom, commission sales people etc. and incur a fairly high overhead. For this reason it is normal for a furniture retailer to maintain a high markup. A typical piece of furniture that has a “suggested retail” of $500 will usually cost the retailer $175 or so and actually sell for about $350. Ever notice how furniture is always on sale? That’s how it works. It is safe to say that notwithstanding sales and discounts, retail furniture prices are usually about double the wholesale cost.
And that other perpetual in/out of business furniture store down the block is open again.

Biggest northern storm to pass through in a long time. Many are still without electricity. LHAcom’s estate was eerily quiet without the hummings of machinery, electronics and other distractions. Totally hated it. Though it did not keep the cement-obsessed neighbors with gas powered leaf blowers away. Guess they needed something to occupy themselves with. How did we stay sane? Think camping.
Propane camp stove & lanterns. Those small propane bottles are 2 pounds when full, 1 pound when empty. Postal scale told me so. Don’t wait until dark to find them. Get them out before you need to read the labels.
Ground coffee. After a fling with whole bean coffee and a preference for French roast, no powered coffee mill could keep up. I now grind it at the store, and use it within a week. With that and the above stove I had coffee in the blackout.
Flashlights. I keep several in a picnic basket by the fireplace.
Candles. Be extra careful. Don’t leave a candle alone in any room.
Radios. Recommend the GE Superradio series. It is a sensitive radio with an old fashioned analog tuner. That means it can hear many distant stations and the batteries last a long time. Listen to KPIG FM 105.7 or KSCO AM 1080. There is little in the way of public information on Monterey’s local stations. There’s also a police scanner to snoop for hints of what those sirens a block away are, ours is a Radio Shack Pro97.
Cell phone. Call your loved ones, see if they are ok.
That’s about it. It’s not the maniac with the 10,000 watt gas generator and satellite phone, but it’s enough to get by with and not have to maintain.
Some pictures taken Sunday afternoon.
Broken poles in beach tract. Never touch low or downed wires.

Falling pine tree cuts through middle of house. (No one was hurt)




Add to the storm some exceptionally high tides and there was evidence of waves breaking over Ocean View Boulevard.

Waves flipped the ice plant neatly combed over like JW.

Surf And Turf!

Crespi Pond now looks like a Monterey Bay Aquarium kelp exhibit.

Men’s Tee, Ladies Tee and Hermit Crab Tee

The Fog Horn turnout was full of seaweed washed up by waves.

Costume shop, looks mighty empty. It was open less than 3 months.

plus rats, mice, gulls and other vermin. P.G.’s businesses try and keep costs down by not paying for trash bins large enough for all the garbage they create. Some even cram the sidewalk cans with their business garbage.
This is particularly bad

Must belong to Sea Breeze Motel.

Lots of garbage on the ground –

Juice N Java still sustains a fire hazard

And Lighthouse Cafe offers a little waste wheely loaded with 50% more than it’s made for, fire hazard bin and barrel of grease.
