Creativity

Judy Seckler DOWNTOWN -- The Delta Sigma Pi Leadership Foundation in Oxford, Ohio, has awarded its Outstanding Corporate Citizen award to Stephen Ropfogel, owner and founder of Glendale-based Creative Promotions Unlimited. The award was in recognition of Ropfogel's support of leadership of leadership development in business. Ropfogel contributes his time and financial assistance to many Glendale organizations -- the Glendale Rose Float Assn., Glendale-Crescenta Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross, Glendale Sunrise Rotary Club, Glendale Adventist Medical Center, Glendale Healthy Kids and the Glendale Presidents Advisory Council.

As real estate fraud cases increase throughout region, Glendale police say thieves are becoming more sophisticated in their approach to defrauding the real estate owners. From falsifying documents to paying off people to use their credit to buy a home, detectives say criminals will do just about anything during the recession to make money - even if it means selling a sibling's home without their knowledge. Gregor Tevan was sentenced on Aug. 9 to two years in prison for doing just that to his brother, according to police.

Robert Downey Jr. stared at me all through my lunch. I was eating at Studio Café Magazzino, a tiny, home-spun café across from the massive Warner Bros. complex, enjoying the homemade soup and sandwiches, when I noticed that Sherlock Holmes himself was looking right through the window, his gigantic eyes boring out from a poster covering a beige stucco building corner. The view inside the café was less distracting. A distressed, white picket fence covers part of the counter and potted ivy spills over an old metal icebox and sink in one corner.

La Cañada resident Lauren Agnick and a group of her three friends will be spending some time on hands and knees this weekend as the group of artists participates in Pasadena's Absolut Chalk Festival June 25 to 26 in Paseo Colorado, 280 E. Colorado Blvd. in Pasadena. Agnick, a recent graduate of Pasadena High School, incorporated her love of surfing in choosing what design to draw. "The image has very bright, colorful backgrounds," said Agnick. Her final piece is one of five images that Agnick began drawing as part of another painting on surfing.

Her red lipstick matches her earrings. Her earrings match her polka-dot top. Her sunglasses match her shoes. Dawn Schenstrom, who declined to tell her age, has spent nine years in Glendale. She's been a singer, a model, a seamstress and a stage actress during different periods, but she's always been a snappy dresser. Now she makes her own matching hats and dresses. The other seniors and staff at the Adult Recreation Center in Glendale know her by the bonnets. So well-known are the fluffy, flowered creations that when she doesn't wear one, she gets questions.

Josh Kleinbaum As the La Canada Flintridge City Council prepares to make difficult decisions in its budget deliberations, council members are trying to use some financial creativity. In the second of three budget hearings, the council trimmed an additional $29,975 from its expenses Friday, freeing up a little more money for special projects. The council will consider 32 such items today, ranging from a $10,000 request from the La Canada Flintridge Tournament of Roses Assn.

The boy had no pants. Somehow, in a moment of terror, they had flown off and were suspended in midair. That was the image on art student and Daily High School senior Hector Huerta’s developing cartoon, although the picture was still unclear as to how or why his character seemed so shaken with fear that his polka-dotted boxers were now in plain view. “I still haven’t figured out why he’s terrified,” the 17-year-old said, examining his drawing.

After working for 10 years behind the scenes in the Hollywood film and television industry, Glendale resident Cathie Filian and her pal Steve Piacenza wanted out of the business. But a decade later, the creative pair struggles to explain how that decision brought them into the spotlight of an Emmy-nominated television show. Filian, who worked as a costumer selecting the threads for major motion pictures, and art department variety man Piacenza are the executive producers, writers and stars in “Creative Juice,” a how-to show on the DIY — Do It Yourself — Network that teaches a mostly adult audience how to prepare a party on a budget.

Hundreds of shopping carts abandoned in neighborhoods each day are an increasingly troublesome eyesore. A cart lays strewn in the frontyard of an apartment complex. Another sits empty on a sidewalk at a corner or near a bus stop. Yet, the market they came from is often nowhere in sight. No, stray carts do not represent the downfall of Western civilization -- although they are a problem from Britain to Ohio to Los Angeles -- and stealing a stray cart is not a violent act. But it is theft, increasingly a blight and a public safety concern.