GIGA GRANADA HILLS

For once, they're not overcharging.

“Is this a toy house?” My four-year-old daughter was struggling to comprehend the garish lavender and green building in front of us. “It’s a tea party place,” I explained, as we walked up the entryway, its banisters still wrapped in Christmas-season garlands on a March afternoon. “Does somebody live here?” my daughter asked, still trying to make sense of it all. “It looks like a house!” The fact that Gilded Rose Manor clearly was a house, with few changes to its architecture, is a big part of its charm, and the former residence turned girly haven on Devonshire Street just west of Balboa is all about charm, of an achingly earnest sort. Fake flowers are everywhere—over the doorways, painted on the walls, even adorning the Christmas tree still standing in the corner, and one room is even painted to resemble a faux-seaside scene. Gilded Rose is the perfect place to go if you want to delight a small girl, or humiliate a small boy. Has any male ever dared set foot in this place? It might...

"Everybody in Granada Hills basically comes to our bar on St. Patrick's day," says Danny Deprest, who co-manages Oh Grady's in Old Town Granada Hills with his partner Melissa, who owns the bar. Oh Grady's, like most Irish-themed bars, expects to have a full house on March 17th, but they're planning to keep things slightly lower-key this year than last. At the height of Oh Grady's 2009 St. Patrick's Day party, Los Angeles Fire Marshalls paid a visit at about 11:30 p.m. and shut the place down for overcrowding and lack of a proper fire permit. The lack of a permit was the result of a simple misunderstanding, Danny explains. "The entire time the bar was open -- from when it was Valentino's, and then became Oh Grady's -- nobody ever caught that it didn't have a fire permit. We took over almost two years ago, and you have to go to Building and Safety, and Alcholic Beverage Control, and no one caught that there was no fire permit. We thoug...

This morning, intermittent power failures plagued businesses along Chatsworth Street from Balboa -- Staples reported being without power for two hours -- to Zelzah -- Granada Hills Charter High School and businesses in the OSH Shopping Center. "We were totally without power for two hours, and now it's just going off an on," a Staples employee said. LADWP representatives could not be reached for comment about the source of the trouble.

Frequently Asked Questions about the Granada Hills Neighborhood Council Elections: 1. There's an election today? 2.  Why should I care? 3.  Who are these people?  How do I know who to vote for? 4.  Where do I go to vote? 5.  How do I know if I'm in Granada Hills North or Granada Hills South?

The Daily News reported that Sunshine Canyon Landfill is receiving 40 additional truckloads per day of waste and debris Los Angeles County cleared from catch basins in the wake of recent storms. The landfill's manager says the stuff is simply mud, but Sunshine Canyon watchdogs the North Valley Coalition and Councilman Greig Smith are raising question about the potential health risks, if any, from the debris, which they fear may contain contaminants. Read the full article at Daily News.com

GHCHS's Science Bowl team took second place in the 18th annual Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Science Bowl, coming in after perpetual winner North Hollywood High. Full story here.