HOLIDAY HAPPENINGS

The long arm of the Internet stretched out from Santa Barbara
this past Thanksgiving holiday, as the music video for Spencer the
Gardener’s “The Gobble Song” – filmed at a Tuesday State Street
Farmers Market and starring numerous familiar faces – hit
YouTube.com and garnered more than 300,000 views and nearly 600
comments (good and bad) from all around the world. As of
Thanksgiving Day, the song was the top featured video, and as of
press time, it remains on YouTube’s homepage, one of the most
visited sites on the Internet. Said Russ Spencer, who filmed the
video, “It’s basically become one of the biggest videos ever on
YouTube.”

Winter celebration parades will close several roads this
weekend. State Street in downtown Santa Barbara will close for the
54th Annual Holiday Parade from 6:15-8:30 p.m. on Friday, December
1, from Cota to Sola streets. Starting at 5 p.m., Sola and
Micheltorena streets will also be closed just east and west of
State for use as parade staging grounds. Further north, Highway 1
and Highway 246 in Lompoc will close from 4-8 p.m. on Friday for
the Children’s Christmas Parade. In Solvang, Highway 246 (Mission
Drive) will be blocked Saturday, December 2 from 10:30 a.m. until 1
p.m. for the Winterfest Christmas Parade. Traffic will be
detoured.

Sometime in the early morning of Friday, November 24, an
as-yet-unidentified vandal lopped off the tops of 39 Christmas
trees at the Earl Warren Showgrounds lot, sticking owner Anthony
Dal Bello with a $5,000 bill. The vandal struck again in the early
morning hours of November 26, halving nine large, pre-sold trees at
a cost of $9,000. Dal Bello, who also owns a Milpas Street
Christmas tree lot, has been in the business for 53 years. Asked
about the vandal’s motive, he said, “I guess it’s someone who
doesn’t like me.”