Hollywood and Wine

My student, Jolbert Arami, who is originally from Iran, had to do his senior project yesterday in front of about seven administrators, including the head of high schools for LAUSD. He was great. However, he has a slight speech impediment which makes it very difficult for him to say the letter "V". He says it as "W", hence Vine street becomes Wine street. This is quite eye opening for me as a recovering alcoholic. So when he says that he works at BigLots on Hollywood and Wine I find it a touch ironic. So I gave him some encouragement and coaching. I sat with him and tried to teach him to say the "V". Well, no such luck. As the time for his presentation got closer I decided that the closer fricative would be "F". In that way you get "Fine" street as opposed to "Wine". Now isn't that recovery in a nutshell. We are brought to Hollywood and Wine and, if we stay the course, we eventually get to Hollywood and Fine. This may not mean that much to everybody else, but I certainly saw the irony in it.