We skipped a week, due to mitigating circumstances, and now co-editor Josh has handed over the reins of R&B to us for a couple of weeks. We're not sure we can handle the pressure. The last time we were left in charge, there was crying, moaning, and goatse. If you find us in a fetal position near the water cooler by Thursday afternoon, muttering something about 'no more Orsinis' under our breath, know it was the awesome responsibility that is R&B that finally made us crack.
1) Los Feliz: This question seems to be an evergreen. It pops up in our email boxes as regularly as communication from our dear friends at Nigerian banks and all the hot but lonely girls who want to chat with us: "I was wondering if you all know anything about the goings-on at the innocuously hideous glass and stucco building @ the NE corner of Prospect and Hillhurst. The location is ripe for a resto, and it looks like things have been going in, in big cardboard boxes, over the last few weeks. But the graffiti'd exterior remains the same. The homeless guy who used to sit on guard at that corner, across from the Cap'n'cork has (been) relocated. And the block just below has the wonderful new fish taco place. Have you heard any news? Inquiring minds want to know." When we checked in last month, we still didn't have an answer, but perhaps one of you do.
2) Mid-City: LACMA isn't the only building(s) getting a facelift. A reader wants to know: "Any news on what's coming to the building across from LACMA, by the LA Fitness on Wilshire? The lower floor is covered to hide the construction going on with a big image of a fork cutting through unidentifiable food, the other says something like 'reimagine your potential' or some such bs. I didn't catch the builder's Web address on it."
3) Los Angeles: This one may be rhetorical, but it will no doubt elicit a ponderous essay in our comments from Pete McFerrin or maybe a gleeful treatise on how the housing bubble is bursting from *Pop!* John regardless of the topic at hand. "This is a question that I have been asking myself for a while, how can LA build a subway to the sea if it can't even finish the less than 1/4 of a mile Angels Flight?" Have we mentioned how much we love the word "funicular"? Its got fun written all over it.
4) Mid-City: And one reader decides asking just one question per email isn't enough so we get two Mid-City q's for the price of one: "There's a building going up on Fairfax's west side, a bit north of Wilshire. (It's behind that closed restaurant they used for Seinfeld). It's up to about four or five stories, maybe growing. What the fudge is it? And another Wilshire question, there was murmurs of a tacky one-story at La Jolla (karate place and Italian restaurant) getting torn down for a 17-story tower. Still happening?"
5) Elysian Park: A short but succint query from a reader on some eerily vacant Craftsman: "What are those wonderful rows of vacant California craftsmen homes along Stadium Way across from the Barlow Respiratory Hospital? Prime Elysian Park quietness, but sit in a squatter state of disrepair."
6) Downtown: Apparently someone has confused us with someone who knows stuff. Like math. And accounting. And taxes. Dude, that's why we hire other people. But we'll throw it out there for you. Maybe there is a tax accountant among our usual reader base of pissed-off planners, angry architects and Patty Cake (she gets her own category): "i'm going to be renting out a condo in downtown la for the first time. was wondering if you know how i deduct appreciation. i've heard you divide your unit's value by 27 years and that is what you can deduct from your taxes. is that right?"
7) Northridge: We've mentioned the Pearl Lane project before, (Web site still 'coming soon'!) but now a reader needs to know "who the developer is for the Pearl Lane project in Northridge?"
Answers will be posted on Thursday. Leave an answer in the comments or drop us a line.