A tour of the Monterey Park Museum has been scheduled for Wednesday October 24, at 10:00 a.m. This tour is open to the public and admission is free. Free bus transportation will be available departing from Brightwood School, 1701 Brightwood Street, Monterey Park.

For reseruvation or more information, please contact Pauline Lemire, Museum Tour Chairman at 626 282-6414

SAN MARINO - Officials of Huntington Library on Tuesday marked a major milestone in the Chinese Garden project, unveiling the garden's name: Liu Fang Yuan, or Garden of Flowing FragranceThe ceremony marking the naming was held about halfway through the construction of the first phase of the project, officiasaid, as 31 artisans continued to prepare the garden for its opening expected early next year.
Steve Koblik, president of Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens, said the successful launch of the Chinese Garden has been the result of what he called "a very successful fundraising campaign that has engaged the Chinese community both here and abroad."
He said the Phase I $18.3-million fundraising goal has been met with generosity of the major donors including East West Bank, Air China, H. Roger and Vivine Wang, and many others. Additional funds continue to be raised for named endowments, educational programs, and other support.
Phase I, covering about 4.5 acres, will be part of what ultimately will be a much larger area of the Huntington.
"It is truly a testament to the cross-cultural appeal and international scope of this garden," Koblik said.
"The naming of a garden is very important in Chinese culture," said June Li, the garden's curator. "It personalizes the place and recognizes its unique artistry, often through the use of poetry, symbolism, and word play."
"The name brings a garden to life," Li said.
Koblik said when Phase I is opened next February or March, the designers will go to work planning additional phases of the garden.
"We will start generating ideas about how it will be completed, if it ever feels complete," he said. "In any case, it will always continue to grow."
Laurie Sowd, the project manager, said the work will accelerate with the expected arrival next month of 20 more artisans from China. The workers from China are building wooden structures on top of the steel framework of the buildings that must meet modern seismic standards as they represent traditional structures.
"They will be carving floral motifs on the doors and windows," Sowd said.
Li said selecting a poetic name for a garden is a centuries-old Chinese tradition. In the earliest known manual on garden building, "The Craft of Gardens" (1631), author Ji Cheng wrote that a garden should combine the scenic beauty of nature with the expressiveness of literature, giving deeper meaning to the landscape through poetic descriptions of its unique character.
A Chinese garden is often thought of as a three-dimensional work of art, Li said, and its name, like the title of a painting, should reveal something about the wonders within, as well as reflect the philosophy of its owner or creator.

The San Gabriel Valley Humane Society will be holding their First Annual « Run-A-Mutt Dog Walk » on Saturday, October 13, 2007 in Temple City. The Run-A-Mutt Dog Walk will allow San Gabriel Humane a chance improve the health and well-being of shelter animals. Our goal is a multi faceted effort to raise money for new and improved kennels while increasing awareness of the Humane Society and educating the public about finding, caring for, and adopting new pets into their families. This year's Run-A-Mutt Dog Walk is a large family oriented event that will allow the community to gather with their family dog(s) and participate in a day of learning about the services the Humane Society provides to the Community. It will be an exciting day of games, raffles, agility performances and shopping, as well as a 1 and 3 mile walk starting at Temple City Park.

For further information about the event, please visit our Run-A-Mutt website at http://www.sgvhumane.org/runamutt/

There is a new construction for the Alhambra Ca library. Sinanian Development, Inc. of Tarzana, CA, was selected by the City of Alhambra to complete the construction of the new Alhambra Civic Center Library, currently being built at 101 South First Street, adjacent to City Hall.The new library will be comprised of a total floor area of 45,000 sq. ft. and a two-level underground parking garage with approximately 240 spaces
Service areas will feature unique design elements to clearly identify where you are with specially-designed portals for each section. These will include areas for young children, teens, and adults, as well as a Literacy center and space devoted to the International Language collection. Each area will include its own seating, shelving, computers and study rooms, as well as reference and other collections. A spacious multi-purpose room, designed for library programs, public activities and meetings will be available; with its attached kitchen and independent, outside access doors, the room can be used "after hours." Another exciting element described by the architect is an outdoor patio reading area off the second floor service area. Following a trend more typically found in bookstore than in libraries, readers may be able to purchase a cup of coffee at an onsite beverage kiosk

This is a design of the future library:

Temptations for the taste buds and moonlight melodies to put you in the mood. This year's Taste of Arcadia will be held Monday, September 24th from 5:00pm - 9:00pm at the LA County Arboretum & Botanical Garden. The event will feature over 30 of the region's top restaurants in an elegant,unique setting. Music by Cheap Sax, a great dance floor and upgraded lighting will combine to make this years's event an evening to remember!

Tickets sales to benfit the Assistance League Arcadia Operation School Bell Project ...which provides school uniforms,shoes,underwear,etc. for over 1000 needy school children in the San Gabriel Valley each year.

Buy your tickets now at www.tasteofarcadia.com or call  626 447 2159

Today is a good day for housing, noted the National Association of Realtors®. On the same day that the Federal Reserve cut the discount rate by half a percentage point, the U.S. House of Representatives has passed the Expanding American Homeownership Act of 2007, H.R. 1852. The legislation will offer home buyers a safer alternative to risky mortgage products and help many homeowners who may be facing foreclosure, and the combination of efforts could have a positive impact on the housing market and consumer confidence.

"It's That SPAM Again!"

It's happening again. It's always happening, but lately my inboxes have been filled with them as if the spammers in all of us have been awakened. What's that, you don't spam? Never! You may be an indentured spammer but don't know it! Trying to pass along a boycott of gasoline to bring prices down? Or you think that 3 die-hard competitors made an announcement on the news that you can make money forwarding emails? So you pass along these chain letters because it's hard to resist the part of you that wonders if it's true. I think we've all been there.

As people in an industry of service, we want to help people...clients...or potential clients. So we forward these emails to our entire address book, because we think, "hey, who wouldn't want to know what they can do to help lower gas prices ", right? What ends up happening is that you just gave yourself your own bad press. You did not investigate the truth of the claim on any of the popular email hoax verification websites, you just forwarded it along. And, if you didn't BCC (blind carbon copy) everyone, then your entire address book is now being forwarded to millions of others who continue to pass the message along.

What's the harm, really? Well, aside from clogging email servers with these messages, and increasing the cost of managing email, you increase the risk to your computer, and the computers of others. The risk becomes a little more clear when we realize that the majority of these emails originate from spammers trying to get the message around and back to them enough that they will be able to gather some good email addresses to which they can send their junk email. Each time you hit that forward button, you are helping them win and clogging your own inbox! This is why using the BCC option is important whenever you send any email. Protect your family, friends, colleagues, and clients from more SPAM by simply deleting the email. As a courtesy, you may first want to reply to the person who sent it to you and refer them to an email hoax verification website such as Snopes.com (which is where we found the popular "gas out " email used in our example today). Other risks include the ability for people to begin attaching viruses to the emails. So, your "virus warning " could become a virus email itself. Think about that scenario.. "my real estate agent sent me an email that crashed my entire system... ". You don't want to be that agent!

So, how can you be sure an email is a hoax? The first step is to be on the lookout for these characteristics:

• The email says, "This is not a chain letter " or "This is not a hoax "
• The email says to send it to "everyone you know " or to "as many people as possible "
• The email contains technical sounding language to sound more credible
• The author of the email identifies him/herself as a leader of a foreign country or part of the leader's family or staff
• The author of the email claims that the original email was sent to them by someone who works for the company involved or is a lawyer or doctor or some professional who supposedly "backs " whatever is said in the email

The easiest way to check on a hoax if you are unsure is to visit a site like Snopes.com and search for the subject matter of the email. For example, we found the gas out email by searching for "gas prices " in the Snopes.com search engine. Another great site is Symantec.com where you can see a list of hoaxes collected by email subject line.

So, the next time you get an email promising $800 from Microsoft for forwarding an email, think twice and use the delete button instead of the forward button. The people in your address book will be happy you did!

You're welcome to forward this email to others for educational purposes...but alas, there will be no special reward for forwarding this to as many people as you can in the next 10 minutes. ;)

• Green building and design. Increased pressure on communities and businesses to promote environmentally sound designs has led developers to incorporate green elements into their projects. A plan to develop a parcel of land for retail might include green roofs, rain gardens, or gutter water retention and irrigation systems. LEED-certified environmental experts soon will become "must-have" team members as demand for energy efficient, healthy spaces grows stronger.

• Assisted living centers. Assisted living developments are on the rise due to higher life expectancies and the influx of aging baby boomers. By helping seniors lead independent lives in noninstitutionalized environments, these projects are designed to incorporate nature trails, community dining, exercise facilities, music rooms, libraries, salons, and game rooms. Opportunities exist to work with both private developers and public government-funded projects.

• Hospital expansions, education campus additions. The hospital and education expansion trend is fueled by institutional projects being funded privately though corporate gifts and individual endowments. These "recession-proof" resources mean even during economic downturns, the market segment moves forward with plentiful building and capital improvement projects.

• Mixed-use developments. Mixed-use developments are growing popular today because they reduce risk. Retail and residential can adjoin each other, and it's common to see large, national retailers combined with smaller, boutique-type stores, as well as housing varying by size, budget, and amenities. With this approach, the developer's investment is spread across the spectrum so it remains viable even if one segment does not perform as expected.

• Urban revitalization. To attract and keep people in their communities, municipalities and townships are working to make their downtowns, retail hubs, and central business districts more inviting and accessible. Streetscape improvements, including attractive landscaping, decorative streetlights, brick sidewalk pavers, and strategically planned parking areas, are examples of how municipalities are proactively transforming their space to appeal to potential and current residents.