This was my bowling alley.  A few blocks east on Pico, at Westwood and Pico, The Picwood Bowl.  I could walk there and I did.  Endless entertainment because it was open 24 hours.  Damn!  Three levels of steps & chairs down to the main floor where the balls were tossed.  A sunken cocktail lounge with trophies and forgotten odes to alcohol behind display glass.  Always felt a bit weird sitting on a bar stool in that sunken bar – tall on the chair but short to the rest of the world up on level ground bowling.

But one day the lanes were stripped of their wood and the building flattened for one gigantic ugly hell of a shopping mall.  Some post modern monstrosity. Designed by an architect raised on junk food & profit margins.  Yes, the family who owned the lanes sold out.  I hope the hell they made a lot of money because they made a lot of folks pretty damn unhappy when the sold out.

Across the street the Apple Pan still flips out burgers and pies, some of the best in Los Angeles.