Stairways

It's an exercise that doesn't demand sleek attire or a fancy helmet, but it pays big dividends in a short time. That's why indoor stair climbing is growing in popularity, industry experts say. Sales of home stair-climbers tripled from 1989-91, according to a spokesman for the National Sporting Goods Assn., a trade organization.

In the last decade, Apple made the 99-cent download the standard unit of music sales. Now, Apple is reportedly poised to try a second transformation, enticing music fans to store songs online — "in the cloud" — instead of on a hard drive. If the company's iCloud helps persuade the masses to embrace cloud-based services, that could help reverse more than a decade of sliding music sales. That's a big "if," however, and much depends on the labels' willingness to change. The shift from physical CDs to digital files has been a mixed blessing for the music industry, opening the door to rampant online piracy as well as promising new business models.

For those who think traffic jams only happen on the freeway, just try working out on the Santa Monica steps. The steep concrete walkway, located at the end of 4th Street at Adelaide looking out toward the majestic Santa Monica Mountains and the Pacific, winds its way down to East Channel Road, which eventually leads to the shore. Very few people take the steps to get anywhere.

So this guy goes to the doctor for back pain and the diagnosis is pretty awful: The patient is going to need spinal surgery again, for the third time in three years. Charles Fleming thought back on all the misery he'd endured the first two times he was cut open like a Christmas goose. He gave about two seconds' worth of consideration to the doctor's proposed disc-ectomy and said thanks, doc, but not just yet. He couldn't face the knife again. Just one problem: What to do about the crippling pain?

It didn't take long for Janet and Greg Armstrong to name the steep flight of steps that their 11-year-old son must climb each day to get to class. The Laguna Niguel couple have dubbed it "the death staircase" and are praying that it will not live up to the name. "I don't want to sound like I'm hoping for the worst," Janet Armstrong said Friday. "But it's an accident waiting to happen."

Patty Mickey is not one to take no for an answer. Her Costa Mesa PMA Design Group had created an unusual stair rail design for Lee West's elegantly appointed condominium on the Lido Peninsula. Several carpenters said it couldn't be done, but interior designer Mickey persisted. What was it about the design that made carpenters reluctant to try? The wooden handrail had unusual curves and no corner support post at the top where the rail was to curve up as if doubling back on itself.

In 1981, mechanical engineer Richard Charnitski, who saw that climbing a ladder was good aerobic exercise, labored in his garage to assemble a device that allowed the user to climb and do upper-body exercises at the same time. "For the first three years, the machine, known as VersaClimber, was considered a weird contraption," said Charnitski, president of Costa Mesa-based Heart Rate Inc. Since then, however, the company has grown every year.

For years, a stairway wall in Los Feliz Heights was a target for taggers walking through the hillside neighborhood after concerts at the nearby Greek Theatre. But the graffiti is no more, and what was once an eyesore has been transformed by residents into a mosaic mural, which was unveiled Saturday morning--the culmination of a years-long, $14,000 effort.

Up among the spiffy new skyscrapers of Los Angeles' Bunker Hill--the nucleus of the promised 24-hour downtown of the future--the hot topic Thursday was "steps." Not that everybody understood what it meant. "I thought they were talking about a new restaurant," said Tracy Oliver, a 33-year-old receptionist. No, not another Stepps, the trendy downtown eatery, but 103 stairsteps descending from the new L.A. on the hill to the old Los Angeles along 5th Street.

How do you turn four sets of obscure stairways that seemingly go nowhere into a genuine Los Angeles cultural landmark? If you're Diane Kanner, you go about it step by step. That's how the Los Feliz resident this week managed to convince a city preservation board to designate concrete stairs in her hillside neighborhood as a historic-cultural monument.

Update: Actress Deborah Pratt, who wrote, appeared in and co-produced the time-travel drama "Quantum Leap" (1989-93), has sold her Holmby Hills-area home for $2.9 million. The traditional house, built in 1936, has a curved stairway off the entry, an elevator, high ceilings, a step-down living room and a formal dining room with a silver closet. The main house and separate guesthouse have six bedrooms and 5 1/2 bathrooms in 4,555 square feet. There is a pool. Pratt, 58, purchased the property in 1996 for $1.27 million, according to public records.

Kelly and Jake Thomason, 30-year-old scuba divers from Laguna Niguel who often descend long stairways for forays into Laguna Beach's waters, took the 89 steps from Victoria Drive down to a secluded beach surrounded by picturesque bluffs and homes to be photographed with their Pomeranian for a Christmas card. "Without this we would die," Kelly said as the couple made their way toward the sand, a photographer close behind. Narrow stairways and walkways such as those at Victoria Beach are often the only way for the public to get from the road, between houses and hotels and down to the beach.

Let's BE clear about one thing: They were a great band. I thought so wholeheartedly in 10th grade. But then my musical taste broadened, grew more "sophisticated" or "adult." They became a guilty pleasure, a reminder of my adolescence, the kind of band I was embarrassed I ever liked. But man, Led Zeppelin could play. When they were on, they produced heavy metal with nuance, with roots in not just the blues but Middle Eastern music, flat-out cranking rave-ups and English folk rock.

One . . . more . . . step. Almost there. Top of the hill. Don't step on the smashed guavas. Step over the giant philodendron. Ignore the snapping dog. More than 75 years ago, Laurel and Hardy struggled to maneuver a piano up these 131 Silver Lake steps in the classic comedy "The Music Box," cementing the staircase in cinematic history. Hauling an oversized load up the oxygen-depleting ascent hasn't gotten any easier, but it's worth the trip. Huff. Puff.

The coastal protection agency that secured a public beach path last year through entertainment magnate David Geffen's Malibu compound now is being asked to approve several projects that previously had been constructed there without permits. Officials said Geffen built a 42-foot-long deck extension, a private stairway to the beach, a large storage shed, fencing, a gate and a concrete walkway without California Coastal Commission permission.

After being subjected to unwanted music and noise all Saturday and Sunday afternoons (Aug. 2 and 3) from the Beach Scene Festival at Cabrillo Beach in San Pedro, as it traveled over the air to my home, I protest the invasion of such a large crowd into what is usually a quiet community. I also protest the amount of litter left behind in the usually neat and tidy community. Why was not more thought and planning given to the need of parking places and restroom facilities so that residents would not have strange cars in their driveways and people relieving themselves in shrubbery and stairways?

Kelly and Jake Thomason, 30-year-old scuba divers from Laguna Niguel who often descend long stairways for forays into Laguna Beach's waters, took the 89 steps from Victoria Drive down to a secluded beach surrounded by picturesque bluffs and homes to be photographed with their Pomeranian for a Christmas card. "Without this we would die," Kelly said as the couple made their way toward the sand, a photographer close behind. Narrow stairways and walkways such as those at Victoria Beach are often the only way for the public to get from the road, between houses and hotels and down to the beach.

BEFORE the age of photography, fame was a small club. God and the gods were founding members; there were kings and queens. Education was only for the privileged, and there was no need to know the masses because they had no power. In our cultural history, rumors were the first attempts to generate "legend" or stories among the unknown. A rumor might spread about how, seven leagues from here or there, lived a beautiful woman -- or she might be ugly. Tales, fairy tales, might be told about her.

Corinne Bailey Rae "Corinne Bailey Rae" (Capitol) * * * CORINNE BAILEY RAE has a passion for Led Zeppelin and a past that includes a teenage stint fronting a noisy indie-rock band. But the 27-year-old British singer-songwriter's debut (in stores June 20) betrays little of that, instead showcasing a freshly minted soul artist whose breezy tunes stylishly blend modern and retro touches, ruminating without cliche on love lost, found and eagerly pursued.