Good morning. It’s Wednesday, July 10.
- Airbnb fails to protect guests from hidden cameras.
- Toddler struggles to recover after fireworks explosion.
- And the brilliant colors of Red Rock Canyon State Park.
Statewide
1.
For more than a century, California’s Indigenous people were barred from conducting ritual fires under a law that deemed the blazes destructive. But in 2022, after some of the most extreme wildfires in the state’s history, the law was reversed, reaffirming the right to set “good fire” aimed at restoring the health of choked forests. A New York Times report on a recent tribal burn among the giant sequoias of the western Sierra includes some nice photography.
2.
A new pedestrian bridge in the San Joaquin Valley was designed to evoke the curl of a lizard’s tail. The Wonder Bridge was funded by the agricultural giant The Wonderful Company to link a neighborhood and two schools with a park on the opposite side of Highway 46 in the farming town of Lost Hills. Architecture publications have gushed over its striking design. Architect’s Newspaper | designboom
- See a satellite view on Google Maps.
3.
The latest buzzword in corporate circles is “double-click” — and it’s making people cringe hard. It’s used as a shorthand for examining something more fully, as in “let’s double-click on that sales proposal.” Bill Atkinson, a former Apple designer and the inventor of the literal double-click, was asked for his thoughts. He said he disliked both the idiom and the function he created in 1979. In hindsight, an extra “Shift” button on the mouse would have been more user-friendly, he said. “The double-click was a mistake.” Wall Street Journal
4.
California had a strong showing in the hotel category of Travel + Leisure’s 2024 “The World’s Best Awards,” with four hotels among the top 100. Based on responses from more than 186,000 readers, Pendry Newport Beach earned the No. 8 spot globally, the highest in the U.S. Opened in 2023, the hotel has an art deco decor and rooms with floor-to-ceiling windows. Travel + Leisure
- The resort voted best in the continental U.S.: Mission Pacific Beach Resort in Oceanside.
Northern California
5.
When temperatures get extreme, farm supervisors will sometimes send workers home early. On June 6, a day when afternoon temperatures surpassed 100 degrees, a group of six field laborers in Yolo County asked to leave after a co-worker fell ill. The supervisor told them to go right ahead, said Jorge Santana, one of the workers. But when they returned the next day, they were all let go, he said. “They had a paycheck ready and they told us there was no more work for us,” Santana said. State regulators are investigating. KCRA
6.
“The scariest moment of my life.”
A CNN investigation found that Airbnb has failed to protect its guests from hidden cameras in rental properties. In a court deposition last year, the San Francisco company revealed that it had produced 35,000 customer-support tickets about surveillance devices since 2013. In one case in July 2021, a cottage guest notified Airbnb that he had found a hidden camera pointed at the bed. Five months later, the listing remained active on the site, with a “superhost” label, according to a lawsuit. CNN
7.
An illegal fireworks explosion that left 14 people injured on July Fourth has shaken the North Coast community of Crescent City. A toddler who was struck by a mortar remained in a medically induced coma, unable to breathe on his own, his aunt said on Tuesday. During a public hearing Tuesday, speakers urged county supervisors to crack down on illegal fireworks. “It was a war zone,” said Rose Reppond, 62, whose finger was crushed. “It was a bad war zone.” Wild Rivers Outpost
- Video captured the explosion. 👉 Facebook
Southern California
8.
It’s not just Los Angeles that’s being stripped of its copper wiring. The lights are going out across American cities, the New York Times reported:
“Metal theft has been an urban plague for decades, often rising alongside commodity prices. But the combination of the economic ills and social malaise lingering since the pandemic and soaring demand for metals, especially for copper, has brought this street crime to new levels.”
9.
Just after 11 p.m. on July Fourth, Logan Kelley, 26, walked up to a group of strangers watching fireworks in Huntington Beach and began stabbing them, authorities say. Eric Hodges, 42, and William Collins, 47, were killed. On Tuesday, Kelley was charged with murder and attempted murder. Prosecutors have portrayed the attack as random. Kelley, they said, had been drinking and taking hallucinogenic drugs before the stabbing spree. NBC News | A.P.
10.
On Thanksgiving Day last year, wildlife rescuers were alerted to an injured mountain lion cub on the side of a road in Simi Valley, presumably having been hit by a vehicle. The animal had a fractured hind leg, a guaranteed death sentence in the wild. Veterinarians nursed the starving animal and repaired the break with a metal plate and 10 screws. Seven months later, he was ready to return to the wild. Watch a short video chronicling the cub’s journey. 👉 A.P./San Diego Humane Society
11.
“The tortas ahogadas here are fat and glorious, the crisp, salty bread soaked through with a lip-tingling salsa de tomate, but structured enough to hold in a soft paunch of beans and carnitas.”
A vast new Mexican mercado in Costa Mesa bundles a bakery, butcher, tortilleria, and a lineup of 20 food vendors all under one roof. N.Y. Times
12.
Southern Californians on the way to or from the Eastern Sierra are commonly tempted to make a quick stop at the orange and rusty red sandstone cliffs of Red Rock Canyon State Park, visible from the highway. But delve just a little deeper into the park and more wonders appear: crinkled formations in less showy but still dazzling palettes of peach and sand brown. The whole place lights up at sunrise, above. Modern Hiker | Parks.ca.gov
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