An unfiltered fire hose of flaming condemnation
 
An unfiltered fire hose of flaming condemnation
Daily Photo

View of L.A. from Runyon Canyon circa October 2002

By Heather B. Armstrong January 15, 2005
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  • sophie

    first?

  • alyssa

    smog! it still looks beautiful.

  • sophie

    and it was just a fluke! ha!

  • RazDreams

    Just lovely!!!

  • Goose

    I can’t believe I’m actually gonna say this, but Utah is just so much nicer.

  • Carol

    *cough*

    I love LA. I wish I had lived there.

  • DG

    Kinda creepy.

    Reminds me a bitta that Magritte painting where it’s dark on the ground and light in the sky.

  • MrsDoF

    Whatcha doing up this early on a Saturday morning? I thought it was only this old lady who is having night sweats and heart palpitations.
    Oh wait, maybe the baby had a rough night…been there with that, too.
    At any rate, missing LA and its nice weather must have its reasons. A very pretty picture–smog and all.

  • Yeah, it is kind of creepy. It looks like an abandoned ghost city or something. 😛 Really cool picture, though. 🙂

  • Smog-a-lishous.

    Have a great weekend Dooce and all!

  • I went to L.A. last year, and was amazed at all the fake boobs that are REALLY THERE! No, people, it’s not a myth!

  • mjm

    long time reader, first time poster… i’m originally from southern california (live in arizona now) and miss that smoggy haze. *sigh* home sweet home.

  • Awesome shot, Heather.

  • bb

    Really cool. sometimes blue, sometimes green, nice pics!

  • Ana

    I love the colors.

  • Ya dun gud ba geddin owwt.

  • BarefootGoddess

    I was in LA once, making a connecting flight to Hawaii. Seeing that I was terrified of flying and was making my first plane trip, alone, from NC to Hawaii, I don’t remember much. Not that I actually saw LA. Just the airport. I remember being freaked out when the plane took off over the ocean.

  • i love the green hue. beautiful view 🙂

  • Michelle

    I hurts to breathe just looking at that! great picture though.

  • So, I looked at the thumbnail and thought “well, it _looks_ like a city-scape, but yesterday’s pic looked like plumbing, so who the heck knows what it is really going to be.”
    (yes, I have bad grammar even when I think to myself)

    click

    bummer. It really is a city view.

    No, really, I wasn’t that bummed out. It is a good shot. I like the shadowy buildings in the foreground. And the comment about it looking like an abandoned ghost city (maxigumee) fits with yesterday’s skeletal/ghost-like picture of Chuck.

  • Michelle Brady

    That really is a cool picture. I wonder where it was taken, and how far away from the city Dooce actually was when she took it.

  • Michelle Brady

    Now I just want to kick my own ass for not reading the title before asking my ridiculous question. Although I don’t know where Runyon Canyon is, so I suppose it’s still valid.

  • Lewis

    I never liked LA, i don’t like places that they write songs about usually.

    You’ll never hear a song about Sandy Ut.

  • Gia

    Oh! I love LA… and I hate it too. Lived there for 3 years… There is just something about that “city” that makes me go back yearly – and that is quite a trek from where I live now!

  • Wow. The smog is out of control.

  • Auch, that’s awsome

  • I just can’t picture Dooce in L.A. Not that you aren’t super fabulous. I’ts just my own perception I’m sure. When I think L.A. I think billions of cars, and boobs, and botox and Jean Claude Van Damme.

    Oh..I just had a little panic attack.

  • Carol

    hee hee. good mornin’ mandab!

  • Sarah in Alaska

    I’ll take Alaska and the cold ass weather over that smog any day!Currently it is -36…..

  • squish

    About boobs, somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 million American women have breast implants. That’s 4 million fake boobs.

  • squish

    Barefoot Goddess said:
    “I remember being freaked out when the plane took off over the ocean.”

    You should try landing in Reagan International in D.C. The runway ends about two feet from the Potomac. Very scary.

  • When Eli sets off to conquer Constantinople, please advise him to go to Istanbul, not Constantinople.

    (Been a long time gone, Constantinople. Why they changed it I can’t say. People just liked it better that way.)

  • I need my asthma inhaler.

  • All that black shiny stuff in the bottom of the picture makes it look like there’s an evil pond in between you and L.A. Or, maybe an evil tar pit. Or, maybe shadows. Maybe that’s why this picture appears slightly sinister (sinister means left, which I take handed offense at).

    Or maybe, it’s just that NO ONE should be up this early on a Saturday morning!

  • Ranger Rick

    what are you putting october 2002 photos up for?

  • Interesting picture…have never been to L.A. (well, never outside the doors of LAX airport, so that doesn’t really count) I might be a bit afraid.

  • You live in Utah, and you miss that?

  • Dude, you’re making me homesick. I miss LA.

    I can’t believe I actually said “dude.”

  • This picture makes me want to play with Legos. Damn you, Fish.

  • Rob

    Ugh. How can anyone breathe air like that. It ain’t quite as cold here as #29’s Alaska (-30’C here) but she’s got a point – I’ll take cold air I can breathe over big city smog.

    #30: I’ve always wondered … do they call it a boob job because of what parts of the body are involved or because of who it is being done to ?

  • I used to work on the 48th floor of the building second from the right. Hated it. My boss was this British bitch with a moustache and Dorito breath.

  • Smog-haters, quit clutching your pearls. Even in your no-doubt crisp, pristine mountain paradise, you’re breathing enough dead skin flakes and dust mites and those little bugs that live in your eyelashes that hey! A little smog doesn’t sound so bad right now, does it?

    Also, there are boogers in your nose. Every breath you take, every breath you’ve ever taken in your LIFE, has touched boogers. So there.

    Anyway, it’s been beautiful the past couple of days. Amazing what a few days of record-breaking rain can do for the air quality.

  • beautiful. l.a. is beautiful.

  • Southern Fried Girl

    Being a transplanted Angelino, one would think that picture would make me homesick. It so does not – moving from there was the best thing I have ever done. Thank God.

  • Amy

    Very cool. It does evoke a feeling of longing..even with all the eerily beautiful smog, there’s a sentimentality attached with the skyline of any big city one might be from. ( I’m that way with Philly. )

    Seeing the big picture from further away can make your heart feel a little flutter of excitement and longing.

    It’s also cool to look at that skyline and then think about all the ppl there and all that could be going on in LA that day!!

  • I had lived in the LA area for a full YEAR before I actually even SAW the skyline.

    You couldn’t pay me enough to go back to that soul-sucking slough.

    I’m lovin’ Nebraska, despite the fact that it is -15 this bright sunny morning. *sigh*

  • DG: The painting you’re thinking of is called “Empire of Light” .

    It’s odd that one of the side effects of pollution is that it produces such spectacular sunrises and sunsets. Maybe it’s not so attractive; the foods we love the most are the ones that are most likely to kill us in a hurry.

  • byrneout, that’s funny. boogers.

    it looks like the city is rising from some dark swamp land or something. cool.

  • sak

    hahahahaha that’s so true claude.

    mmmmmm froot loops (choke choke CLUNK)

  • Marj

    Ew…not gonna lie, but LA’s kind of ugly. I’m not too fond of the city. I prefer the Utah pictures, Heather!

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Heather B. Armstrong

Hi. I’m Heather B. Armstrong, and this used to be called mommy blogging. But then they started calling it Influencer Marketing: hashtag ad, hashtag sponsored, hashtag you know you want me to slap your product on my kid and exploit her for millions and millions of dollars. That’s how this shit works. Now? Well… sit back, buckle up, and enjoy the ride.

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