Tommy Cannon! 

Fishing or lozzing, you choose. That's the bay in the background. 

Same location again, but with better cropping. 

Kids play on a monument, next to a miniature graveyard of the US war dead and the pier. Touching. Surprising number of mercenaries killed in Iraq. 

Tom Francis, the progenitor of many of these photos (that is, he took 'em). 

That old man hippy, he just keeps blowing... 

He's watching you... and everyone else on Venice Beach. 

Before you ask, we didn't go in. 

Out back at the Muscle Inn, journalists wave their pasty faces at the gleaming sun and the smell of pork crackling drifts across bikers' nostrils.  

Threatening Hippy With Bubble Machine. What more needs to be said? 

Ah, Santa Monica pier. I went looking for Vampires, my mind saturated with cultural referents, I found this. 

Grill, taking a photo of a lamppost. Excitement. 

Santa Monica promenade. Journalists at large, beware! 

Man balancing women in chair on teeth. Tuesday. 

Treebeard begging for change. Only on Venice Beach - would have been chopped up for kindling long ago in London town. 

Freedom of speech on Venice Beach. Write whatever you want down, they'll write it up in big letters on these boards for everyone to read; they cover the promenade with them in the daytime.