Luke Odom

On April 3rd at 3:00 p.m., I was at Pershing Square. A picture speaks 1000 words. Here are 83,000 words.

Each year, on the Saturday before Easter, just outside of Union Station on Olvera Street, a tradition takes place. It is the “Blessing of the Animals.” Hundreds bring their pets and livestock to be blessed by the priest.

There is also live singing and dancing, both traditional Latino and Aztecan.

This dog is super excited about have a priest spray him with water,

as is this Alpaca,

and this dog and rabbit sharing a baby carriage.

As cows have given us the most, they are first in the parade.

Since llamas look cool, they go in the middle.

Snakes are scary so they go last. This one goes very last, far far away from me.

There are also a ton of vendors selling various items. Joy wanted a sombrero, but with our small budget we couldn’t get her a full size one

An awesome way to get out and meet people as well as have some fun is by joining a meetup group. They have them all over the US in hundreds of different areas of interest. We are a member of the local hiking meetup group. On March 26, 2010, we had a TGIF hike to the peak of Mount Hollywood in Griffith Park. Mount Hollywood is a very interesting hike. You are in on an undeveloped mountain top. You can here coyotes and other wildlife yet you are completely and total surrounded by a city that stretches for as far as the eye can see. I didn’t bring my tripod so the pictures aren’t as sharp as I’d like. These pictures are representative of the view in every direction from the top of Mount Hollywood at night.

This is from the top of Mount Hollywood looking south. You can see downtown on the left side of the image.

This is the Hollywood sign with Hollywood in the background.

This is looking down at the Griffith Observatory with Los Feliz behind it.