SoCal Grocery Stores Reach Deal with United Food and Commercial Workers

At LAT, "Ralphs, Vons, Albertsons, union reach labor deal, avert strike."

Apparently, both sides realized a strike would be devastating, as this earlier LAT report indicated, "In the event of a walkout, the chains' competition would be the big winners":

Today, Ralphs, Vons and Albertsons have fewer stores in Southern California, and fewer employees. Albertsons has closed 67 locations since the 2003-04 strike and worker lockout. Ralphs has closed 48 stores, and Vons and Pavilions are down 47.

The competition is filling the gap. Unified Grocers, which represents at least 526 stores owned by independent chains, controls 12.1% of the grocery market in Southern California and Las Vegas, according to research by the Shelby Report, a grocery industry publication.

Trader Joe's, with 106 stores, has 5.4% of the market. Smart & Final, Tesco's Fresh & Easy and Whole Foods combined control another 5.4%, according to the report.

Although these companies all target different consumers, they have one thing in common: They are, for the most part, non-union shops. And like the airline and auto industries, the three big unionized retailers all have legacy health, pension and payroll costs that put them at an economic disadvantage.

Smaller chains can also tailor individual stores to the tastes of the neighborhood.

For independent grocer Jax Markets in Anaheim, that means packaging meat in smaller containers and wooing customers with personalized service. The four-store chain caters to predominantly Latino shoppers. A number of its customers don't have cars, so the grocer offers a free shuttle service for anyone who lives within a five-mile radius of a store and is willing to spend a minimum of $30 in their trip to the grocery store.

"When the gas prices were going up, I wondered, 'Is it really worth it?' But it is," said W. Bill MacAloney, chief executive of Jax Markets. "People are shopping around, and that gives us an opportunity. So we need to do what we can to help our customers."

Serving ethnic shoppers can go beyond carrying brands they like. A number of economic factors persuaded Vons to close one of its locations in a working-class Latino neighborhood of Long Beach. Superior Grocers snapped up the outlet in 2003, before the strike, and transformed it into a mid-size store with bargain-priced produce and fast-moving register lines.

On a recent Monday afternoon, a mostly Latino crowd jammed the produce section, plucking up bags of mangoes the size of softballs for 99 cents each. Customers reached for fresh tortillas made in the store, freshly baked French rolls and loaves of Mexican sweet bread. Flat-panel TVs played Spanish-language news clips. On the overhead speakers, daily specials rang out in English and Spanish.

Four miles to the southeast, in the upscale Belmont Shore neighborhood, Vons operates one of its smaller specialty stores, known as the Market by Vons. Sparkling clean and quiet as a library, the store features a bounty of wine and a limited produce selection. Mangoes there cost $1 more than at Superior Grocers and were half the size.

"I love this Vons, but I don't shop here all the time," said Patty Barnett, 38, an artist who lives in downtown Long Beach. "I shop where there are sales."

Kathia Maria Davis, Laguna Niguel Hockey Mom, Accused of Sex With Son's Teammates

Some of the boys were as young as fourteen. The investigation arose initially out of suspicion that Ms. Davis threw parties serving alcohol for the boys. One of the victims told his mom, who, strangely, contacted the woman's ex-husband. Seems to me you'd go straight to the police. Either way, this is sickening.

At Los Angeles Times, "Hockey mom accused of having sex with son's underage teammates."

Anti-American Graffiti: Marxist Scribblings Sighted in Suburban Orange County

Here's the writing on the restroom wall at Barnes and Nobles at the Irvine Spectrum, found this weekend. Recall last year Gallup found that a 61 percent majority of progressives had a positive image of socialism. And here's another example in real life. Remember Marx's exhortation: "Workers of the world unite." The Marxian system is built on the increasing immiseration of labor. The graffiti implies that no one can get rich without exploiting workers, that is, it's impossible to be entrepreneurial without exploitation, and hence the rejection of the foundation of the capitalist free-enterprise system. It's fundamentally anti-American, as is all progressivism, for as an ideology it rejects the exceptionalism that built the nation to world preponderance, instead invoking the state-socialist model of the stagnant European welfare states, if not the murderous totalitarianism of Stalin. Either way, the Democrat Party's 20th-century socialist model is dragging us down, which is exactly what progressives want.

RELATED: At New York Times, "Obama Tax Plan Would Ask More of Millionaires" (via Digby and Memorandum), and Washington Post, "Vast majority of tax breaks go to households."

'The Undefeated' — Lido Theatre in Newport Beach!

My meetup group has organized a showing of Stephen Bannon's "The Undefeated." It's part of the Liberatore Lecture Series. We'll see how it goes. I'm heading out right now and will post an update later tonight:

Happy Labor Day to Opus #6!

That's my friend Opus #6 of MAinfo. We met at the Michele Bachmann rally at Knotts Berry Farm in early 2009. Opus left a wonderful comment at the blog yesterday, at my essay, "Housing Downsizing!":

This housing downsizing post has to be my favorite American Power post of all time. Probably because I downsized in June. And the kids and I, though a little cramped in our 3-br rented condo, are enjoying the community pool with lots of friends to play with, way less stress worrying about bills and repairs, and extra money in the checking account. I also loved seeing your mom. You and I are in the same generation and our parents are on the same track. She looks lovely. And a sweet nurturing woman is a blessing to any family.

I pray that you and your family enjoy the new digs. That you have many happy days in your new place, lots less stress and building character as your kids observe you handing the changing nature of our society and economy not with bitterness but with courage.

I responded at the post.

It means a lot. I've met many wonderful people through blogging. We share our lives online and we meet in person as well. Have a great Labor Day, Opus!

Housing Downsizing!

I don't write about the housing market all that much, because, as longtime readers will remember, I've been right in the middle of the crisis. I reported on the situation a couple of times, in my 2009 New Year's Day post, for example: "American Power in 2009." Well, I'll probably feel more comfortable blogging about housing now. My wife and I sold our townhouse and we've moved into an apartment in Irvine, nearby the old neighborhood, just minutes away. (And just as we got out, the housing market shows little signs of recovery: "New-home slump keeping door shut on U.S. recovery.")



Here's our old townhouse, in Tustin, just off Harvard Avenue and Irvine Center Drive. The location allowed our boys to attend Irvine Unified. Our unit is (was) the second from right, with the brick front wall. The architecture gained accolades at the time. The Tustin Field development was in the news for building some of the first New York-style brownstones in Southern California:

Tustin Field was the first residential housing community to be built on the site of the old Tustin Marine Corps Air Station. The base is historic for the massive blimp hangers that are still standing (the hangers are a staple of automobile advertisements on television). We bought the house in 2005, about two years before the housing market peaked. The government's property at the base was being converted by the City of Tustin into a massive residential, commercial, and retail complex called Tustin Legacy. When the market crashed by 2008 or so, the city shelved plans for the development. Our old community at Tustin Field stands a mile or so from the blimp hangers, but there are a couple other developments that were built right in the shadows of the hangers. They were to be part of a huge redevelopment area of South Tustin, with a great park running through the villages along the lines of New York's Central Park. Not now though. Economic circumstances killed the grand vision. As they say, the best laid plans of mice and men meet such miserable fates sometimes.



Moving day was a week ago Friday. I've been too tired to write anything about this until now. This was the biggest move my family's ever made. If you notice the right side of the garage at the picture here, I'd just finished loading a pile of "Junk-to-the-Dump." Two Latino men loaded everything up, for $225. And that included bookcases, old computers, and my wife's old step-climber. And there was some old furniture and lighting, and a bunch of old toys and clothing. The guys loaded it up in about 45 minutes. They worked very efficiently. The truck driver spoke to his partner in Spanish. When I paid the $225 I gave them an extra $20 for "cervezas." They liked that. The gentleman thanked me, calling me "amigo," and said "God bless you." They were great guys. That's my youngest son sorting through some toys at the last minute. The pile on the left has a few family mementos so we couldn't pitch everything right then:

Walking back inside, here's my office, now with the books all stripped from the shelves and packed in boxes:

Walking back up to the second level, that's my Mom working in the kitchen. I've taken pictures of the kitchen area before so folks might remember the kitchen table and couch, a sectional over by the windows.

Here's my Mom. She turned 75 in August. I'm going to be 50 this month, so my Mom was a sweet 25 when she had me. And she's doing pretty well. The main thing bothering her is her back. She had a fractured vertebrae a while back, and it wasn't healing. She thought she was going to have surgery, but the specialist put her on some growth hormones that are supposed to speed the healing. She can't do a lot of bending or strenuous activity. She helped in the house for just an hour and I took her back to my new apartment. She's helped so much throughout my life. She's been completely unselfish of herself:

Going upstairs, here's the master bedroom. The movers are all done. We didn't have enough time to pack all that well. Normally, you wouldn't have that much stuff still around, photo albums, and what not. But we moved less than a half a mile away, so mainly we were concerned about getting all the big stuff over to the new place right then, when my wife had the day off:

We hired "Starving Students" for the move. They charge a base fee and then by the hour. My wife hired three men so the move would go quickly. They team arrived about 8:30am. It was two Latino men and a young white guy, tall, probably in his early 20s. First thing he says to my wife is that he doesn't feel well. He asks for some Tylenol. I get him some and then he goes back out to the truck because he's too sick to work. This was a Friday morning, so who knows? The guys was probably hungover after heading out to the sports bar the night before. The movers call for another man to come work with the team. About an hour later a young black guy named Michael comes. He's really friendly and energetic. But he whined and complained, especially when they moved the deluxe queen-sized bed into the new apartment. The bed has a shelving unit built-in at the base (two large shelves, his and hers, at each side). The bed must weigh a ton. So when we tell Michael that it goes upstairs at the new place, he let's out a big moan, "Ohhh, whhaaahhhaaa!!!" I couldn't believe it. If you hire on as a mover you move stuff. That's your job. My wife said she smelled marijuana on him, and he complained about how thirsty he was, so maybe he had cottonmouth. It was in the 90s last week so it was hot, but the other two fellas, both Latino, complained not a bit. The Latino men, from immigrant stock and bilingual, worked way harder than the American men, one white, one black.



Okay, still upstairs at the townhouse, here's the master bath area:

Here's the second bedroom at the third floor. We first used it as a second office, but then put twin beds in there so my boys could sleep closer to us:

My dad's painting at the top of the stairs, oil on canvas, and a baby picture, ages 6 months and 5 years:

Now here's the stairways, from the third floor down to the second, and then the second down to the first floor. That's a lot of work chugging up and down moving all that furniture, and the two Latino gentlemen just keep moving on:

Okay, back downstairs, I'm ready to take a load over to the storage unit we rented. My kid snapped this shot:

Here's the storage:

We had a couple of more loads to do. I was so tired after everything, I think I went to bed about 8:00pm all this last week, on worknights. I'm rested now and getting ready to finish unpacking. I'll post pics of the new place when we get it all set up. Until then, here's the view from the kitchen window, out to the parking lot looking South:

It's beautiful. There's a pool down the walk, and for the first time in over 10 years we're using a laundry room to clean our clothes. Reminds me of the old days, when I was in graduate school, and that's okay. It's good to be out from under that toxic mortgage.

O.C.'s Ocean View Team Wins Little League World Series

Hey, great local news.



At LAT, "Huntington Beach's Ocean View team wins Little League World Series," and "Ocean View Little League players maintain perspective."

Baby Tossed From Parking Structure Dies: Mother Sonia Hermosillo, Charged With Attempted Murder, Got Parking Validation After Alleged Crime

At LAT, "Baby dropped from parking structure dies."

Also, "Mom got parking validated after baby allegedly dropped from garage," and "Mother suspected of throwing baby from garage was 'calm, stoic,' police say."

Parrots in Irvine

I didn't have my camera. But I was out with the whole family last night and we stopped at 7-11 for refreshments. My wife and oldest boy went in and I waited with my youngest in the Jeep. Next thing I know I see this woman walk out of the 24-Hour Fitness across the parking lot and she comes over near us with her mouth just gaping. She looked like she was talking to herself and I didn't see a phone or a headset. I said to my son, "What is that lady doing?" We had the music on loud so I couldn't hear anything outside. But then I looked over at the wild olive trees and I saw them. Wild parrots were munching away. I've never seen them before. Indeed, I didn't even know we had them. So checking online, the O.C. Register has this, from 2006, "Parrots prosper in Orange County":

Parrots might be gravely endangered in their native rain forests, but not in Orange County, where they've taken up residence in large flocks, attracting both love and hate from people who share their space.



There's a mystery attached to the birds' presence. No one is exactly sure how they got here. One popular theory is that their ancestors escaped from commercial bird importers, surviving because they were wild birds that knew how to forage for food. Another is simply that they migrated north from rain forests in Central and South America.



Large flocks exist in Orange, Santa Ana, Tustin and elsewhere in the county. Some flocks can number hundreds of birds. They generally eat fruit and nuts of exotic plants that, like themselves, have been imported from tropical climates.



Amazon parrots found here include endangered red-crowned parrots, lilac-crowned parrots, red-lored parrots, white-fronted parrots, yellow-headed parrots and blue-fronted parrots. They can be distinguished by stocky bodies and short, squared tails. Mitred parakeets are also common here.

More from Oscar Gonzales.



P.S. My smarty-pants oldest son comes back and I say, "Hey, check out those parrots!" And he says, "I saw them. They escaped from PETCO."

VIDEO: Bill Whittle's Talk in Newport Beach

Okay, one one more entry to hold readers until tonight.



At the Correspondence Committee:

These videos are absolutely worth the time.

I ask Bill a question at about 15:30 minutes at the third video, Q & A:

PREVIOUSLY: "Bill Whittle in Newport Beach!"

Bill Whittle in Newport Beach!

I have College Day at LBCC in the morning, so a big write up will have to wait. Note for now that the Newport Beach event was intimate and informative. Bill Whittle is a captivating speaker, very scholarly and counterintuitive on a number of points. And host Mike Munzing was welcoming and the guests energized and engaged. Great food too. More later!

2011 Jeep Liberty 2x4

I took the Jeep in today to get it washed. We're over in Santa Ana at 17th and Main Street. A full car wash with interior vacuum is $10.99, and they do a fabulous job. Most places around town are at 15 bucks, so I tip the guy 3 bucks and call it a day. The Jeep homepage is here and click "models." It's a V-6 two-wheel drive with the satellite radio I mentioned previously. It's my wife's SUV but we trade off pretty often, and this is the first new American car we've bought as a couple. I'm going to consider a Jeep Wrangler for myself next time we're in the market, although that might not be for a while.

Back From Etnies

This photo's not so focused, and I didn't take any others, since I couldn't get a good vantage point. I'm standing up on the planter as it is.

I'm going to look into getting my own skateboard this week. I need to see how the summer funds are holding out. I'm not paid until September 1st, a couple of weeks after the semester begins (and we're taking the boys to Las Vegas for LOVE next weekend). So it's either a new board this week or hold off a bit, although I'm getting the bug to go skating again. Being with my young son all the time is getting me fired up. I've been enjoying seeing the thrills of skateboarding through the experience of my boy. It's an old saying but it occurred to me today it's true, when my son came up to where I was sitting, after a couple hours of skating, and said, "I want to come back tomorrow!" I told him sure, and I thought what am I waiting for on my own skating? You're only young once!



RELATED: Check the Etnies Skatepark homepage. There's going to be a grand opening for the expansion on August 20th.

Etnies Skatepark Expansion

Etnies Skatepark in Lake Forest has opened a huge new skatepark addition. See O.C. Register, "Expansion done, skaters enjoy 'perfect' Etnies Skatepark." And at TransWorld Skateboarding, "Final Expansion Will Make It the Largest Free Public Skatepark in the U.S."

I'm taking my kid over there right now. I'll post some pics later.

What Do We Say When Johnny Comes Home?

One of my favorite anti-war songs, from T.S.O.L., mainly because it's so haunting on the apathy. Joe Wood sings on "American Zone," during a period when Jack Grisham had left the band. I really enjoyed the studio recording, but I don't see it online, so just turn this up on your tablet:

There's blood on the streets again today
All the people dying what a price we have to pay
Around the world they're fightin'
It's not that far away
feel the darkness
Can we change our ways?

[Chorus:]
We live in the American zone
Free of fear in our American home
Swimmin pool and digital phone
What do we say when Johnny comes home

Johnny just got back from war today
Beruit weekend, the powder keg
He was 20 years old and he lost both of his legs
We're all really sorry today

[Chorus]

What do we say
What do we say
What do we say
When Johnny comes home
and he lost his legs.

RELATED: "Washington Mourns U.S. Troops Killed in Afghan Helicopter Crash."

Big Day at U.S. Open of Surfing!

Well, we're back.

I hung out with my youngest son while my oldest tooled around Huntington Beach with some friends from school.

We parked at 12th Street and Pacific Coast Highway, just North of the Sun'n Sands Motel:

Here's the scene looking toward the pier from the BMX grandstands. Vendor booths are under the tents. The Skullcandy sound booth is at right:

Actually, I didn't have time to watch surfing. I usually do, but I couldn't leave my youngest kid alone. But Los Angeles Times has a surfing report, "Brett Simpson is eliminated at Nike U.S. Open of Surfing":

So we mostly hung out by the skateboard ramps:

The weather was awesome. Good for a couple of Pacíficos:

Hundreds of thousands of fans visit the U.S. Open every summer. It's mostly young people, guys with board shorts and girls in bikinis. One thing I found interesting is how people write on themselves, with erasable ink, I guess. Mostly these are good-natured messages, like "Free Hugs Here," seen on a lot of the young guys. That said, I saw one hot little number in a bikini with a slashed line running from her bikini top to her bottoms, with an arrow pointing to her private area with the message, "INSERT HERE!" Well, I'm all for truth in advertising! And honestly, some people have no problem writing "F- Me" all over their bodies. I asked my oldest son about that and even he was surprised. He then showed me his Skullcandy tatoo, so what can you do:

Heckuva lot better than "F- Me", that's for sure!

'The D-Boyz' at X-Games

My boys hanging out on Saturday at Staples Center:

We might be going to Huntington Beach today, so check back from some fresh photo-blogging. The weather is really hot too!

U.S. Open of Surfing at Huntington Beach

The surf contest schedule overlapped with the X-Games, so I wasn't event thinking about it. But my oldest boy asked if I'd drive him down to the beach tomorrow, so I checked it out online. Here's this at Los Angeles Times, "U.S. Open of Surfing at Huntington Beach begins Saturday." Cool Twitter feed here as well.

Vans Shoes Digs the Debt Deal!

Vans shoes are cool!

Angels' Ervin Santana Pitches No-Hitter Against Cleveland

I wish I woulda caught that game. Santana's long been one of my favorite Angels starters. His Wikipedia entry notes:

In the pivotal Game 5 of the American League Division Series of the playoffs against the New York Yankees, Angels ace Bartolo Colón went out with a shoulder injury in the second inning. Santana filled in as the long reliever, and pitched 5-1/3 innings to earn his first playoff win in his first appearance.

Here's some video of the final out, at Fox News, "Angels' Santana no-hits the Indians." And this one from Associate Press:

And at Los Angeles Times, "Angels' Ervin Santana throws a no-hitter against Cleveland Indians," and "Ervin Santana's no-hitter should spark well-deserved interest in the Angels":

Baseball season challenges our attention span. It can be a 162-game drone. In Los Angeles, multiply that by two.

Before Wednesday, the Dodgers were a well-documented disaster, the stories more about loans and bankruptcy than wins and losses.

As for the Angels, most of the time they were more confusing than compelling.

You'd get solid pitching and little hitting, day after day. Texas went on a hot streak and the Angels seemed unable to close the gap. It was a team of Jered Weaver and Dan Haren, and had their last names rhymed properly it would have been the 2011 version of Spahn and Sain and pray for rain.

Then came Wednesday's bolt of lightning.

Ervin Santana threw a no-hitter at the Cleveland Indians. Not Weaver. Not Haren. Ervin Santana. It was done before lots of us on the West Coast had figured out what to order for lunch. The noon start in the East gave Santana and the Angels an entire day to dominate the sports headlines.

It was the kind of thing that can jump-start a team, and this is the kind of team that has needed a jolt for several months.