Hello, 

More and more, my middle schoolers are starting to plan their own time with friends. This is how the hubs and I got a taste of what empty nesting might be like in about ten years (or more if these high housing costs and shortages continue). What to do with a rare kidless weekend afternoon? I remember I had wanted to show my husband the LA Public Library’s Octavia Lab. It’s a creative worker bee’s heaven — the tools at your disposal with just a library card are amazing! We made our way there and he was amazed. Then the library was closing and we decided to head to The Last Bookstore. But why move our car when our magic library card also got us $1 parking in LA for 24 hours with validation? We’d walk. And here is where our adventure began.

• We walked east and downhill on 5th St. to the bookstore, no problem.
• We were ready to return until I realized it was all steadily, steeply uphill. Nope. 
• And so, I forced us to head north on flat land. The blocks were longer than I’d remembered. I got thirsty and we were hungry! 
• We headed to Broadway where I knew we’d run into the oasis that is The Grand Central Market. There, beat and famished, we sat down at a tostada counter for refreshing ceviche. 
• We felt silly calling an Uber for what on paper was a roughly four-block walk. But was I going to try to walk up the hill? No. Thankfully I remembered that the west side of the market was across from Angels Flight! We hoped the world's shortest railway (funicular, really) was in service. 
• It was! And the line was long. Time for a michelada while we watched and waited. 
• We boarded the train and at the top, our crowd emptied onto the California Plaza, where we instantly recalled some great memories of the live bands we’d seen there with Grand Performances in partnership with KCRW’s Summer Nights. “Wouldn’t it be cool if there were one right now?” my husband asked. I told him about June 1st (all of you should RSVP!).  
• After reminiscing, we walked across Grand Ave. and down the famed Bunker Hill Steps (some call it Heart Attack Hill if you’re going up) back to the LA Central Library to get our car.

All that to avoid a hill and keep $1 parking! It was nice though, so go ahead and use this accidental itinerary on June 1st. In the end, it was only (a very long) 2.9 miles.   

Connie Alvarez
Your KCRW Insider since 2001
P.S. What was the longest or hardest walk you were stuck having to do?

Rare PV Blue Butterfly Gets Lift from Volunteers

See that tiny thing on Jana’s finger? That little butterfly — one of the rarest in the world — had about 25 of us UCLA students scouring and sampling the coastal sage scrub for any sign of its existence and the native plants it feeds on. We saw exactly one that day, but that was about two decades ago. Today, Moorpark College Biology Professor Jana Johnson’s Butterfly Project breeds thousands of the once-thought-extinct Palos Verdes blue butterflies and then releases them at various stages in their lives across the PV Peninsula. Recently, Johnson and her volunteers released 285 butterflies. “See the little blue whirlwind?” Johnson points with excitement. “I love it! That makes me so happy!” Me too, Jana, me too. Read on for how a recently secured wildlife corridor in the area can also help airborne species’ survival.

Learning to Control Our Quest for the Ideal

In her latest book, The Perfectionist’s Guide to Losing Control: A Path to Peace and Power, author and psychotherapist Katherine Morgan Schafler explains why we strive for perfection. Morgan Schaflter says it’s impossible to tell a perfectionist “not to be a perfectionist. That doesn't work. That's like telling a romantic, here's how not to be romantic.” Perfectionism is “a really important, essential, wonderful piece of who we are” but like any other human characteristic, the drive and compulsion for perfection can be both healthy and unhealthy. “If you cannot distinguish between an ideal and a goal, you are in an unhealthy place with your perfectionism,” she says. She also offers a quiz to help identify five types of perfectionist profiles that are most common in all of us. Now back to my personal mantra, progress over perfection, progress over perfection… 

Ghosting sucks! with Heather Chelan

On this week’s How’s Your Sex Life questions include: How do I get more comfortable with dirty talk? What type of person ghosts someone? What type of person gaslights? And I can only orgasm with a vibrator — am I alone? Comedian Heather Chelan gives advice and talks about choosing honesty over ghosting, learning not everyone comes from penetrative sex, and how she’s finally having shame-free sex. 

Remember, if you need advice for your love life, send Myisha an email or voice memo at sexlife@kcrw.org. You’ll be kept anonymous.

Raw to Refined, Turbinado to Kokuto: Peruse a Library of Sugars

What’s sweeter, sex or sugar? If you’re in Mexico, they’re the same thanks to a type of unrefined cone-shaped sugar called panocha which is also the colloquial name for vagina (try baking with your grandma asking you to pass the panocha 😳). Good Food’s Evan Kleiman gets into the different types of sugars, the food science behind them, recipes for sugar, what to make with what sugar, and waxes poetic about how “ black Okinawan sugar, is the most complex in flavor with notes of minerality (it’s high in calcium, potassium and iron), smokiness, and even a hint of bitterness. Some say it is the rawest sugar in the world.” Don’t miss this chance to get sweetly schooled.

Last Chance to Win a Box at the Bowl!

KCRW's May Sweepstakes is almost up and you won't want to miss a chance to win a box for four (4) to all six (6) KCRW Festival shows at the Hollywood Bowl. If you haven't seen it yet, here's the full KCRW Festival lineup for the summer:

• Sunday, July 21st: Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, Sylvan Esso, and Uwade
• Sunday, August 4th: Reggae Night XXII with Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley and Stephen Marley
• Sunday, August 11th: Khruangbin and Unknown Mortal Orchestra
• Sunday, August 25th: Mt. Joy
• Sunday, September 8th: Vance Joy, GROUPLOVE, and Tiny Habits
• Sunday, September 22nd: Cumbia at the Bowld

Talk about a grip of Sunday-fundays. Your summer could be set with these sets as the sun sets at the Hollywood Bowl. Plus, the winner will also receive an automatic credit of $75 per show to use toward Hollywood Bowl food and wine menu items!