Creativity

Art, activism and magic will be combined at a lecture from noon to 1:30 p.m. April 10 at UCI. Aaron Gach, co-founder and director of operations of the Center for Tactical Magic, will discuss ?Beyond Field: A Guide Through Practice and Discipline,? as part of the school?s Studio Art Department?s guest lecture series. Admission is free for the event, but visitors must purchase parking. The lecture will be at the UCI Student Center, Room C, building 113. Gach was inspired by work with a private investigator, a magician and a ninja to develop his unique outlook.

Peter Naghavi, Costa Mesa’s longtime transportation manager and acting public services director, has been named the full-time replacement of former Public Services Director Bill Morris. Naghavi had been filling in for Morris, who retired from the position three months ago. “I’ve always been extremely community-oriented — even if transportation isn’t a very well-liked department,” he said. “I’ve been able to make a lot of people happy, and I hope I can use this position to further extend that service.

Eyes glazed over when 20-year-old Veronica Rhoades poured the brightly colored sand onto the paper plates. She stood behind the table in front of the kids, telling them to sit down, stop talking and pay attention, but her instructions proved futile while the vibrant yellow, orange, purple and black sands were within the children’s reach. Before the last grain of sand settled, 14 kids between 6 and 8 years old circled Rhoades’ table, their little heads peering at the piles of brilliant sand they would soon get to play with.

Each Hanukkah, members of Temple Bat Yahm in Newport Beach bring menorahs of all shapes, sizes and colors into the temple sanctuary one night of the holiday. There are menorahs with political or sports themes, modern and traditional styles. “All the different styles and shapes, colors and materials really shows you the different colors and shapes we are,” said Rabbi Mark Miller of Temple Bat Yahm. Hanukkah began at sundown Tuesday. The holiday, which commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, has a different meaning for everyone.

Rachel Rosenblum has always had a love of teddy bears. And at an early age she decided to make sure all kids have their very own teddies to comfort them when they sleep. “I was 4 and had about $60 saved up in my piggy bank and I wanted to give to the hospital,” Rachel, 11, said. But instead of simply handing over cold cash, Rachel asked her parents if she could donate stuffed teddy bears to kids living in medical care facilities. For the first batch Rachel was able to give 12 bears with the money from her savings but did not stop there.

Billie Jo Mouren originally planned to use the expansive back seat of her Lincoln Navigator for lugging around the cabinets she designs and builds, but her 11-month-old puppy, Baby, has since taken over the area. Aided by a special car seat complete with a mini-leash, the 10-pound miniature pinscher/pug mix accompanies her "mommy" to job sites every day of the week and serves as a driving companion when she makes frequent business trips to San Francisco. Today, proclaimed Take Your Dog to Work Day by Pet Sitters International, the drill will be no different.

What do a Goth fashion model, a 15-year-old Mexican girl and an expert on black holes have in common? Years from now, they may all be reading a magazine created at Early College High School in Costa Mesa. Art students at Early College, the newest campus in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, spent the last week designing magazine covers as part of a unit on graphic arts. Each student thought up a magazine name and then laid out the front cover of the first issue, with pictures, headlines and, most importantly, a catchy logo.

Spring is the time of year when creative buds blossom at Orange Coast College, where its Repertory Theater Company flexes its artistic muscles with a festival of one-act plays, most of them spawned right here in Costa Mesa. This year, there were so many entries that OCC was forced to divide the program into two sessions, beginning Wednesday and running through Sunday. Show Order A, composed of seven productions, offers an extended taste of the Rep's energetic creativity. This lineup features comedy, drama, satire — and a particularly impressive musical version of the television show "Lost."

Anyone who spends even a little time driving on that confluence of concrete that is the ending and beginning of the 55 Freeway and Newport Boulevard has probably uttered a curse word or three. The alpha and the omega of the so-called freeway to nowhere is at most hours of the day, and even night, hopelessly clogged with smog-belching vehicles. Residents tell stories that what should be a 10-minute commute across town is now 30 to 40 minutes of bumper-to-bumper headaches. What forces brought this misery to bear upon the good people of Newport-Mesa?

Before I announce an exciting opportunity for Orange County gardeners, let me recap what we talked about during the past two weeks of this column. Standing at Little Corona Beach with a stream of landscape water gushing at my feet. I could have been standing there on any day of the year, watching the water flow by. I told you about the millions of gallons of water that escape our gardens and flow to the ocean, carrying with them a daily dose of fertilizers, pesticides, snail bait and other garden chemicals.