This is what space smells like, you will always remember where you were…. Welcome to the Hollywood hills; the year the rains came and unleashed a once a decade spring desert mega bloom. Directions: travel first to that inner ring of man-made hell, Hollywood boulevard, a sort of Times Square smashed small and wide by the pneumatic pump of a cruel god, disappointed by the result of his human experiment. Travel uphill, away from the hobbits and trolls and into the bosom of Mother Nature. The air must be thinner here, so plentiful are the spare oxygen tanks and portable air balloons. Never mind all that, if you persist, a vale of lush green hues, the bleached white rib cage of a giant whale, and pews of concrete and redwood beckon. Within the petrified whale carcass, a space ship lands at dusk each night, first tentatively, feeling out its new home. The next night it returns, determined to impress (perhaps to even overwhelm) its new friends….. a third night, the pilgrims return, hoping to spy just a final glimpse of the spaceship before it’s long journey home. Having already witnessed its power, they come ready to succumb, but the aliens in the spaceship have already proved their dominance, and so on this night they invite the people inside, and to take the full journey with them to the cosmos, and beyond. They say our noses have memories, and I learned this weekend you can’t go to space from the couch any more than you can remember the smell of a picture of a magnolia flower, blooming in that sweet California sun.