Page 2 November 11, 2021 EL SEGUNDO HERALD
Sgt. Smith passed away unexpectedly
yesterday in his home. We visited his family
today and offered our condolences to his wife
Kathy and his three daughters and all of his
extended family. Yesterday, when I learned of
his death, an email was sent out to the Department
informing everyone of the sad news.
Many of our younger officers never worked
with Calvin, but there are still several of us
here who are lucky to have worked with
Calvin. He was also a long time DARE /
SRO officer at ESHS and many students in
the community still remember Calvin for
his mentoring. He was a great police officer,
husband, father, and he will be truly missed.
In honor of Sgt. Smith, all Department
members are wearing a mourning band over
the uniform badge until his burial. •
Travel
In Defense of Spontaneity—A Winter
Ramble Through Northern Italy
Article and photos
by Ben & Glinda Shipley
One of Glinda’s favorite song verses runs,
“How can I ever miss you, if you won’t go
away?” In the same philosophical ballpark, how
can anyone experience the serendipitous heights
that travel delivers without a basic humdrum
beat of repetition in their everyday lives?
And unless we’re ripping off disguises in
telephone booths, everyday life by definition
involves stability, restraint, and prediction.
Assembly lines, factory whistles, office cubicles,
time cards, weekly reports, coffee and
bathroom breaks. Alarm clocks, school lunches,
bus schedules, grocery lines, chicken pot pie
on the dinner table. Not to mention laundry?
Which brings us to a curious observation—
you’d think that travelers with a mere
few weeks of escape each year would smash
their daily rhythms, throw off the shackles of
planning and organization, and dance headlong
into the paradise of their dreams. But judging
by social media and a raft of conversations
we’ve heard, just the opposite happens.
What is the precise best time of day to
visit the Louvre? How many minutes will we
need before cutting out to museum #6 on day
4 of our visit? Is it tacky to order spaghetti
bolognaise in a Copenhagen café? How do
we reserve a taxi or a train from the airport?
In Cairo, does the Casbah’s Favorite Foreign
Diner accept lunch reservations three months
in advance? Can we get ketchup instead of
mayonnaise with our French fries? How much
will dinner cost in Paris at Amelie’s Favorite
Foreign Diner for a party of five with tax and
tip, and do they allow children?
When we returned from Kerala in southern
India, friends were horrified that we’d reserved
a hotel in Fort Kochi, a house boat two hours
south in the backwaters of Alappuzha, and a
colonial retreat five hours upland in the tea
plantations of Munnar—without a thought for
how we’d get from one to the next. Weren’t
there any English-speaking bus tours available?
Why didn’t we just take a cruise?
Things are a little more complicated today,
but for a half-century, our policy has been to
reserve flights, first- and last-night hotels, and
punt on the rest. All of it. This is how we could
leave Bruxelles for a casual drive to anywhere
and end up two nights and 965km later on
an ultra-romantic ferry from Copenhagen to
Oslo. It’s also how another all-time favorite
trip came together out of Milan’s Malpensa
Airport back in the late 1990s.
In those days, we rivaled the proverbial church
mice for poverty, but cobbled together every
available penny and drove out of the airport east
with no plans or destinations—into the worst
Italian snowstorm in a century. There were so
many highlights to that lunatic adventure. A
few of the more memorable:
Venice: Splurging on Elizabeth Taylor’s
favorite suite at the Gritti Palace took 80%
of our hotel non-budget on the first night. The
Venezia: Peaches and Prosecco—the original Bellini waiting on
the original Harry’s Bar.
Venezia: Le Maschere più belle, all gussied up for Carnevale.
Community Briefs
Time to Shop
Til You Drop at Mattel
Mattel Toy Store is offering great savings and
opportunities to get your early holiday shopping
done. Black Friday sales start November
13 and are taking place all month long. New
deals will be added every Saturday. Also, be
sure to stop by their Holiday Tent and save up
to 70% off open now through December 23.
The Mattel Toy Store is located at 1955
E. Grand Ave., El Segundo, and open Tuesday,
Wednesday, Friday and Saturday from
11am - 5 or go to Matteltoystore.com for
more information.
Free Rain Barrels Available for
Delivery and Pick-Up
The free Rain Barrel Program from the
West Basin Municipal Water District is back.
Residents of the West Basin service area may
now register at www.westbasin.org/rain-barrels
for free home delivery or a drive-through pickup
event hosted in El Segundo on January
29 and in Carson on February 5, 2022.“The
Rain Barrel Program returns in time for what
will hopefully be a plentiful rainy season to
help alleviate the drought,” said West Basin
Board President Harold C. Williams, MSCE,
P.E. “The 50-gallon rain barrels, valued at
$80 each but free to participants, are an easy
way to capture precious rainwater and reduce
stormwater runoff.”
Two options are available for service area
residents to receive their free rain barrels. This
year, there are 700 rain barrels available for
free home delivery. Residents interested in this
option must reserve barrels by a January 20,
2022 deadline. The District will also host two
drive-through pick-up events to distribute 400
barrels at each event. Pick-up event #1 will be at
West Basin’s Edward C. Little Water Recycling
Facility in El Segundo on Saturday, January
29, 2022 from 8-11AM; and pick-up event #2
will take place at West Basin’s headquarters
in Carson on Saturday, February 5, 2022 from
8-11AM. Advance registration for the rain barrels
is required.
Since 2015, West Basin has helped save
millions of gallons of water in the region
by providing over 14,000 rain barrels at no
cost to residents in West Basin’s 17 cities
and unincorporated areas of Los Angeles
County. One rain barrel can save up to 620
gallons per year. In addition, a rain barrel
See Travel, page 15
Obituaries
Sergeant Calvin Smith
See Community Briefs, page 4