(life) Indents

past two weekends in june

2009-06-22T08:05:00.000-07:00

Wanted to share some fun pictures from the Academy of Sciences that Jeremy and I hit up the weekend before last since it was free for people living in the Castro/Haight neighborhoods (that's us!).
First thing we saw was the albino alligator they have there. Really freaky. We did see it move! I know it looks plastic.

Then we went into the rainforest area. You can see the natural light coming in from the rooftop windows. (You'll see them from the roof view too in a few pix)

A poison dart frog (little bit of red and blue on the leaf)

There's another bird in the nest too

There were a bunch of different types of butterflies all over the place

From the rainforest we went to the aquarium where we saw this big catfish

Afterwards we headed to the 'live roof'. The Academy is known for its sustainable architecture and uses the live roof to help cool the building. (They also use recycled denim scraps as insulation!)

sunshine!

This past weekend Amanda, Jeremy and I started Friday night off by seeing The Shirelles @ The Rrazz Room in SF. They were on their 50th Anniversary tour and they put on such an amazing show! One of the original founders, Beverly Lee is on the left in this picture

The other two have been with her for 20-40 years though. Beverly was clearly the favorite among the crowd, but the other women had amazing voices on them! They bantered with the audience a bunch and invited people on stage a couple of times. The energy was so contageous. Here's them doing 'I met him on a Sunday' with help from some of the gentlemen in the audience. (I think it's worth watching all the way thru, the guy at the end who had 'Saturday' really hammed it up)

Then, of course, my favorite Shirelles song 'Will you still love me tomorrow?'

Here's the three of us at our table

Then afterwards, Amanda and I got to take a picture with Beverly Lee in the lobby

(thanks Erikka for that cardigan!)

Saturday, we headed off to Golden Gate Park in search of the cement slides @ The Koret Childen's Playground, thought to be the oldest children's playground in the nation. But we were sidetracked by the carousel, and had to give it a whirl.

weee!

Then we hit up the slide, both of us completely missing the 'no adults without accompaniment of child allowed sign'. It was fun, you had to slide down on a piece of cardboard, and it helped if you put sand down on the slide first.

We made a pit stop at the Bicycle Music Festival, but didn't take any pictures. It was fun though, it was completely powered by bicycles and while the band played, there were 5 bikes set up that people could ride to generate the electricity needed.

Then, since it was free (actually everything we did was free except we had to pay $2 to ride the carousel), we went up to the observation deck at the De Young museum that Tom and Marna told us about when they were in town visiting.

You can see the academy of sciences in the background!

To end the weekend was Fort Funston. With a name like that, you know you can't go wrong! We read that there would be hand-gliders and dogs, and we saw a bunch of both!

This guy took off right next to us!

It was a beautiful day with tons of flowers in bloom.

Jeremy sitting on one of the bunker/lookouts

Watch out, the cliffs are dangerous for doggies too!

Walking down to the beach

The beach was really nice, the sand was black, almost blue-ish with a golden-tan mixed in

Sea foam

Washed up jelly fish

Fun stick that I think looks like a sea dog

Now back to the work week, (big) sigh...

Russian River Canoe Trip

2009-06-09T21:35:00.000-07:00

This weekend Jeremy and I were invited on a canoe trip down the Russian River. Since neither of us have ever been there and haven't really canoed all that much before, we were game. We left Saturday evening to meet up with Layla and her friends for some camping at the Sonoma Coast State Park. We stayed in Bodega Bay, which looks like a cool place to come back to sometime.

That night Sharon and Manuel cooked up some baddass carne asada tacos. Dylan provided the musical entertainment, while Layla helped to sing along.

We had a toasty fire

Check out Jeremy's artsy can in the fire shot

And what good would a fire be without...
smores!

More songs by the campfire, headlamp light

In the morning Jeremy and I sat by the inlet, a few hundred feet from where we camped out. There were horseback riders about, and people digging big holes in the sand, which we found out was clamming.

On the way to the Russian River, we got to drive along the coast line. It was amazing, especially with all the wild flowers in bloom!

Canoeing was a blast. 10 miles is a long ass time tho! We ended up out there for about 5 hours. Of course there were some excursions along the way. Here are some pix.

This was right before we ended up in the branches of a tree up ahead, due to my taking pictures

Here comes Jeremy on a rope swing we spotted.

To top off the day, we had ice cream for dinner at Screamin' Mimi's on the way home. Homemade waffle cones and ice cream?! YUM!

the surprise visit home

2009-04-20T17:32:00.000-07:00

Recently went home over Easter weekend to surprise Sandy for her birthday and my parents for Easter. It's pretty hard not spilling the beans, but I managed and it was all the more fun because of it!

I arrived off a red-eye early Friday and headed to Jamaica Plain to see Erikka. She graciously let me pass out for few hours, then we hit up Centre St Cafe and poked around a few local shops where Erikka found this awesome number and made me try on

It was a nice day so we hung around on her porch

and pet the neighbors cat, it took like 6 photos to finally get it to look up (see Erikka clutching at it's tail to make it stay)

Then Jason got out early and we went to Doyle's Cafe where apparently they filmed part of Mystic River. It was pretty chill, good sweet potato fries!

From there I headed to Kingston Station to surprise Sandy for her b-day plans. I was greeted with a flying attack hug and enjoyed sipping on some lovely cocktails involving ginger beer.

a little blurry, but you get the picture

On Saturday we headed up to NH for the big parental surprise and Sandy's b-day celebration. Check out the leaning tower of cupcakes my mom made!

awesome!
Really, my dad was thrilled to see me :)

Ok, this picture is too cute not to include

and these too...

i'm being smothered! eek!

That evening Greg hosted a Zombie Jesus Party in the absence of his parents! Lucky me! Here's some pictures of that fun

Ok, I wasn't drunk, I just make really BAD faces sometimes

i like the background action with James in focus in this picture

Next was Easter Sunday. My mom dyed some eggs, I liked how they turned out all speckled even if they weren't supposed to

We took some silly family photos, because it's fun

Then of course I had to play cribbage with my dad, see

Monday I spent back down in Boston, hung out with Gary who showed me the new graffiti by Central Kitchen

Then, before I departed for the airport I got to see Raea and her new apartment in Arlington! We also made a quick stop for some delicious pastries at the Arlington Bakery (I think that's the name). I was lame and didn't snap a photo of Raea, but I do have one of this handsome devil, Charlie

Sigh, it's nice to go home :)

D Park and Hiking in the Pennin

2009-03-31T17:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I've been slacking. Here's some fun stuff from this past weekend

Saturday was 70s and sunny, a beautiful day in the city. Went down to Dolores Park to meet up with Rose. After chilling for a while, we saw a group of people, dressed up for either some sort of 80/90s prom or wedding get into what looked like a pie fight. Turns out it was just platefuls of shaving cream. We found out after Rose went down to join in on the fun and returned smelling like 'Cool Wave'

Then, her and her friend Jen found hoola hoops, and got a free lesson

Looking good ladies!

Sunday, Jeremy and I met up with the Miller family for some good ol' fashion hiking. First attempt was the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve. (Check out the last time I was here!) It was windy, and pretty chilly considering how warm it felt in the city. We braved it...

Butt...we ended up turning around when we found out the beach was closed due to the sea lions being in town!

Yay!
So, we walked around to the cliff overlooking the beach and had a look at a safe distance

Instead of giving up, we found another hike up in Pacifica, called the Brooks Falls Trail. Supposedly during the 'wet season' the falls are supposed to be one of the best in the Bay area. Unfortunately it wasn't flowing as hoped. Either way it was a fun trip. Jeremy did some death-defying stunts

We saw trees that looked like they were covered in chocolate ganache (see Dayana trying to lick this one)

Surreal looking orange trees

...and a nice view at the top

ya, we know how to strike a pose

Coast Trail Hike in Point Reyes National Seashore

2009-02-01T21:24:00.000-08:00

Originally there was a plan to go snowboarding this fine weekend - thinking everyone will be off watching Superbowl and we'd have the mountain to ourselves, but with it being sunny and in the 60s we slept in and decided to go on a hike up in Point Reyes National Seashore. After stopping at the info center we settled on the Coast Trail and headed off. Leaving the visitor we spotted about 3 deer, and continued to see quail, condors and birds hanging out throughout the hike.

At first the terrain was mainly shrubbery and on this fire road path.

Then we headed into a woodsier area

Then we caught a glimpse of the coastline in the distance, right where we were heading.

The sea grass and shrubs were beautiful, as seen here by Jeremy's good eye (you know, versus the fake one :))

This guy seems a little early for the season, but with the weather we've been having...

Then we found this path to the beach...

and decided to take a little detour. The water really was this blue and beautiful. I couldn't believe it.

We found this dead crab shell, he still had his eyes! Creepy, but awesome!

Jeremy got all ghetto with some driftwood and seaweed, but honestly, who wouldn't???

Then I pleaded for Jeremy to take a photo of me on this gorgeous beach (you can see the desperation in my face)

After wandering along the beach for a bit, we found our way back to the trail to loop back to the car. Saw this tree that I nicknamed the 'picnic' tree (because of the log ont he side of the tree that looks perfect for a picnic).

You can see some quail ahead on the trail here

closer up...

even closer....wait, that's not quail! That's the rarely seen bare-assed sell, known to be extremely skinny and sprightly.

At the end of the trail there were these really cool haunting trees

I have to say, not only is it cool that we've managed to go on 3 hikes in the last 4 weeks, but also that each hike has been different - different location, different terrain and fauna, different smells, but all so awesome.
With that said, we went home and made some delicious steak quesadillas

yum!

pleasanton ridge trail hike

2009-01-12T23:08:00.000-08:00

so, sometimes I think about NH and Boston and then sometimes I go on a hike in 70 degree sunny weather in January! This weekend Mari invited Jeremy and I to go on a hike with her along the Pleasanton Ridge Trail. It was great! Oh, but first we started off with 3 waffles a piece (ok, so Jeremy really had 3 1/2!) using Amanda's xmas gifted waffle maker! So good, but I think that may be the last time I eat three waffles in a row.
Enough about waffles, now it's time for photos

mmm, cow patties!

the cows

sunshine head

moon walking

some scenery

Pan

my awkwardness never ceases to amaze me still...

mari climbing up the 'shortcut', which wasn't really a shortcut, just a really steep hill.

a kickass tree

if you look real close you can see mari and i framed among the twigs

lichen, or some other neat looking tree growth

back at the car, hike is over, we are tired!

homestyle holidays

2009-01-12T22:04:00.000-08:00

this one's been sitting around for about a month, oops!
here's a quick recap:
went to nh for the holidays. it was snowing, almost didn't get out there on the sunday before xmas, but caught a last minute flight back due to lots of sad face and complete luck. the american airlines guy literally made a phone call (after acquiring a special 'code') and got us on this direct flight, then once we boarded they made an announcement that it was overbooked by 2 people and offered $500 vouchers to give up their seats on the flight! anyways, we got to boston early the next morning, sore and tired from the cramped conditions, but we made it in 4.5 hours! crazy fast!
so, we crashed for a few hours at sandy's, then wandered into davis square for a bit. look at all the snow! wee!

icicles!

holy outside sandy's apt.

we made it up to nh on tuesday and headed out to the puritan (backroom) for some hangout time.

our waitress called us cute

skinny faces!

on christmas day jeremy brought out an old sell tradition, chocolate and biscuits! for breakfast!

then we opened gifts..pure excitement!

then we got to visit raea

then jerry, char and glenn stopped by

and i made buttermilk biscuits for our xmas dinner

while they hung out and drank beers

jeremy got creative with the camera

my dad seemingly, endlessly, trying to light this stupid stupid floaty candle

sneaky shot

if i look like this when i'm 80 i'd consider it an accomplishment

for our xmas dinner we all have champagne and get toasted!

i mean, we toast.
there were no photos of us eating the actual meal, but it was very very delicious. almost as delicious as the kahlua cake that followed! yum!

oh man, gonna barf...

so, after xmas fun was had at jerry's parent's house. they are SUCH good sports for letting us come over and completely take over, doing impromptu karaoke all night and being oh. so. loud. we are all so seemingly innocent

until...

and for your and our completely sober enjoyment...

The end of the week culminated in the potluck dinner party and Charleen's parents house. Jeremy and I brought Tagine - this vegetarian Moroccan stew that I got the recipe from at work. Came out decent. Anyways here are some pix..
Amy, Logan and myself

Pondering the appetizers

Jesus and the skinny dude

I think Crystals's reading Jon a children's book

Wearily chilling on the couch (before I spilled Jerry's beer everywhere)

doing a-ok

and then, there was apples to apples

and everyone pretending to be Jerry taking a photo of himself

Then we shot the sears catalog

oh - did I mention I miss you guys?!

I dropped my phone in the toilet...gobble gobble

2008-12-01T21:04:00.000-08:00

i really did. drop my phone in the toilet. into pee.
and that was how i started my long holiday weekend! yay! thanks mom for the lender phone, i got it today in the mail.

so, on thanksgiving, mari and i cooked up some buttermilk biscuits with green onions, black pepper & sea salt. yes, they came out good. plus i cooked up some maple roasted sweet potatoes, met up with jeremy and headed over to ashley's house for dinner. the following ensued.
jeremy with ohio

cooking

nut eating

stuffing candles into empty wine bottles for table decoration

eating

eating waaaaay too much food

two of the many graceful hosts

the full table

playing a really 'fun' game that shocked the person who pressed the button last once the timer was up

trying on wigs

the post-t day lounge about

on friday jeremy and i headed down to southern california for the remaining holiday weekend. we made a crucial pit stop at diddy riese for the ultimate $1.50 ice cream cookie sandwich! mawr rrarr yum munch!

that's white chocolate chip cookies with chocolate chip ice cream in between!
j's friend mark let us shack up at his place for the evening, which was really appreciated!

saturday we headed out to the cliff in laguna where jeremy's friend nick worked.

he hooked us up with some mid-morning drinks and food. there was also a really nice view from the restaurant

then we went to thousand steps, one of jeremy's fav beaches. it was a beautiful day out, so we wandered around and enjoyed the ocean for a bit.

afterwards we went to jeremy's aunt brenda's house, where we met this guy

he's looking for a home too! i wanted to give him/her one, but alas, no pet policy at my apt. plus i just wasn't quite ready to take on a kitten.
meet some of the sell family!

jeremy's neice ryann being adorable

then not so adorable!

just a little more kitten snuggle time in before we headed out

then it was off to see charleen! we went to a local bar down the street to play some darts

it was quite the hi-tech machine!

sunday we spent at the huntington gardens very beautiful place i've been wanting to check out for a while now. unfortunately we spent all this time acquiring sandwiches for a picnic, but they no longer let you bring food onto the grass! oh well, it was still really great to see. enjoy the photos.

they have an incredible rose garden, i don't remember how many i smelled!

these ones were one of my favorites

but you better watch yourself on the way out!

bonsai garden

pomegranate tree

ginko tree

bamboo

desert garden

soapbox derby & other randomness

2008-10-20T15:27:00.000-07:00

Caught some of the SF soapbox derby this weekend. It was pretty intense having about 60,000 people in your backyard! Mission Dolores park, where it was held, is literally a block from my house. It was cool, they had a bunch of big screens set up in the park where you could watch from the grass in the sunshine, or you could try to wrestle your way into the sidelines and catch the soapboxes as they whizzed by.

I have some short vids of some of them...if you wait till the very end you can sort of see the soapboxes pop over the jump, yes, that's right, they set up a jump! It wasn't huge, but it's sort of funny to see these boxy things go over it.

The one that looked like the Death Star:

The pirate ship:

The hamster wheel (the guy on the right sort of flies off when they hit the jump):

Plus, here's pix of the taco truck one:

Not only did it have a pinata hood ornament, they threw tortillas out the back!

And the baseball with orange smoke:

In other exciting news, I got a record player! It's a vintage Emerson. Thank you eBay.

It has a cool velvet table and a Bakelite arm. Plus it uses tubes, so it has a sweet, warm sound. I love it. Also, check out the coolest cappuccino design yet!
my happy ghost face morning :)

Tune back in about 3 or 4 weeks after my recovery from Jerry and I's trip to India!

Till then, stay dorky!

santa cruz - the weekend away

2008-10-13T18:36:00.000-07:00

Got out of town this past weekend with Jeremy. First stop, was actually in town - gotcha! Actually, I just wanna give Brenda's a bonjour for some delicious (rich) french soul food to kick start the day...

those are chocolate filled beignets in front of us!

Then, for real, we got outta town and headed to Swank Family Farms - home of the CORN MAZE! As well as...the goat walk ooooo, and the pedal karts! yay, pedal yourself around and pay for it! weeee! (sarcasm here)
The excitement for the labyrinth & corn maze is killing me no really, get me in there!
All the magnificent corn!

The labyrinth had some strange '8' chamber configuration that had plaques set up which Jeremy and I determined was some strange way to get you to join the new church of unity. Either way, at stage 8, there were sunflowers and bumblebees!
So we jumped around.
Me all awkward-like

and Jeremy all kung-fu-ish

So, the labyrinth of the circle of life or whatever they were preaching was completely different then the maze! Can you believe it?!!?! We could hardly stand it, and became so enthralled with all the stalks of corn, we called some friends to come and hang out!
Genevieve and Saffron!
We got sick of all their making out, so we moved on to other ventures awaiting us in the corn maze. Like husk-hair!

and husk-stache!

Then I had to pee really bad, so we left the maze,bought pumpkins then headed out to the Mystery Spot
For those of you who aren't privy to knowledge of the mystery spot, since I wasn't until my coworkers told me about it, the lowdown is that it is "a gravitational anomaly located in the redwood forests just outside of Santa Cruz, California. It is a circular area of effect around 150 feet or 46 meters in diameter." Basically you go here and experience this 17 degree lean while in the house itself, which resides in the center of the circular area.

We really did feel heavy and lightheaded while we were there, which is a common occurrence they warn you about. You can't make this stuff up.

Here's me trying to demonstrate the rolling 'up' of my lip balm. I think it would have been easier with a ball, but you can still see it appear to roll up the plank, especially towards the end.

Afterwards, we headed into Santa Cruz & ate at a wonderful Indonesian restaurant called Batik Cafe. Had some amazing chai called Bandrek that the owner makes fresh daily. I would give up coffee if I could drink that every day. So amazing, and caffeine free! Then to finish off a wonderful day, we hunkered down at The Red Room, drank $6.25 manhattans on the rocks, and chatted with the bartenders who were awesome.

Sunday morning we enjoyed a massage/jacuzzi at the Well Within Spa, stopped in to buy records at Metamusic before eating at the Walnut Ave Cafe and checked out the Antique St. Fair - where Jeremy found even more records and some cloth napkins. Then we hit up the boardwalk, and somehow I managed to not take any photos (???!!!) but it was fun, believe me. Before heading out, we went down to Natural Bridges State Beach. Santa Cruz has a really nice coast line, and it was a beautiful walk to the beach and tide pools.

The rocks looked like pieces of wood

I poked a starfish

We even got to catch some of the sunset

The cool birds cliff club in full force Ok, I made that up, but it was fun to see them all perched on the cliff like that.
Then, due to the fact that Jeremy harbors the same need as I do to fit as much in as possible, we ran over to the Long Marine Lab. Here they have whale bones! Check it out, they were pretty cool.

This one is more well known, as Ms. Blue. Discovered in 1979, which is the largest blue whale skeleton on display in the world!

Weekend aways are fun, but alas, they never quite turn into the week, month, year you always want them to!

books & glass!

2008-09-29T14:27:00.001-07:00

This past weekend, Jeremy and I hit up the 44th Annual SF Library Book Sale. He got somewhere around 20 books and 4 maps for $35 and I got about 7 books for $15. It was pretty awesome.

On Sunday, I tried to go to the festivities for the opening of the new Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, I knew I wouldn't be able to get in opening weekend, but I was hoping to catch some of the fun happening around the park. I rode up to the SF Bike Coalition's bike check & ended up becoming a member! I had thought about it, but hadn't really planned on it for Sunday, but better now then never! Then, as an added bonus I got 2 free tix to see the Chihuly glass exhibit at the De Young museum on its last day! I gave away my extra ticket to someone waiting in line, it felt good to pass along the good deed!

Anyways, enough blah blah, here are some of my pix from the exhibit.

These ones were inspired by Indian baskets

I really like these, which I think were called 'weeds'

They reminded me of those Christmas logs with the candle in em.

I think I could use one of these chandeliers in my room

I liked how they did this room, the color reflecting off the walls was really awesome

Check out the mating squids! There were also cherubs, starfish and other fun things to find

I loved the green and black striping on these guys

...and the hidden yellow and orange one here

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention. The De Young Museum is pretty intense, architecturally. It was designed by Herzog & de Meuron who also designed Beijing's Olympic Stadium. So, it's pretty interesting. It also houses American art from the 17th through the 20th centuries, and art of the native Americas, Africa, and the Pacific. So I decided to poke around and make use of my free ticket.

These were made out of sugar (and plywood, aluminum foil, shellac and a couple other items) They were done by an Australian artist named Timothy Horn

These were outside in the courtyard, I didn't have a chance to get a close view (Raea, these totally made me think of you!)

I found this painting extremely realistic, altho it doesn't really translate well via my digital camera

Then, this thing was just sort of cool looking

trip back east

2008-09-18T11:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, I admit it, I've been slacking. But...oh well! Here's my east coast vacation recap.

Jeremy and I flew into NYC & met up with his sister Mary and b/f Jordan who live in Queens.

After a quick shower, we headed out to Manhattan, yipee! First, we got our very own, Jeremy Sell American Gothic Special

The ignorant bliss here regarding the super late night ahead is astounding

Manhattan

Jeremy with our first Manhattans of the night at the bar we hit up after dinner
Yay! Greg showed up!
Oh, and, well just in case you need just bagels...and cakes and pastries and muffins...

The next day Mary made us some delicious blueberry pancakes and we headed back into the city. Here's Jeremy enjoying a delicious mango strawberry papaya smoothie courtesy of the big brazilian street festival going on.
Then we tried so hard to get down to the pier to take a ferry around to view the waterfall installations. We missed the last boat we could realistically take without missing our bus up to Boston. Luckily, we decided to take a walk down the pier and discovered we could actually see all 4 waterfalls from this great 4 tier deck!
This one was my favorite, under the Brooklyn bridge

There was one other one further away that was hard to see, then they shut off, so I don't have any pictures of that one.
Subway fun on the way to check out St. Patrick's Cathedral
And here we are! (like most of the time when I'm with Jeremy, he takes these lovely pictures!)

For labor day, we headed up to NH for a cookout with the family. But, before we ate, my dad surprisingly let me take his little 'baby' (my mom's nickname for it is 'beauty') out for a spin! Can you believe it?!?!
mmhmm that's right!
Oh, and I was given explicit instructions to let Jeremy have a try too :)
Then, it was time for the feast! Jeremy thanked everyone for their contributions and devoured it all.

That night we headed back to Boston to stay with Erikka and Jason!
The next morning, Erikka headed off to school and J & I met up with Raea, Brett & Sandy at the Neighborhood (pure gluttony!)
Then we stopped by a cute new store called Grand before heading out to Harvard Square, The Other Side Cafe

and the Boston Public Library

One of the special exhibits on display were these old war propaganda posters, which were pretty disturbing

Then, no Boston trip would be complete without a Sacco's Bowl Haven trip!!!

Erikka often celebrates her victories with the nearest wall

I kicked ass on my first game (only)

Then we grabbed a drink or two at Redbones

and Yves made an appearance (I think I might burst!)

Then Wednesday we headed back to NYC for our flight, but had a couple hours for Jeremy to hang out by some trash

and for us to eat some Ray's Pizza!

Oh, per Greg's suggestion, we also managed to check out The New Museum

Jeremy was able to snap this shot before we were told, no pictures allowed! Teehee :)

yosemite or bust

2008-08-27T09:04:00.000-07:00

Last weekend Jeremy and I met up with Charleen and Glenn in Yosemite National Park. This was my first visit, first time hearing about Tuolumne Meadows, Half Dome, El Capitan. Apparently, it was one of the first national parks in the US.

(For the pictures below, I know they are small, but you should be able to click on them and see them real size if you want to)

We got up there later then expected on Friday, and were already amazed at how well stocked they kept their bathrooms! Turns out, normal toilets are actually not really in the campsites themselves, but they do have those 'hole in the ground' outhouses with a toilet look-alike thing on top...You would think that they'd be smelly and really hard to see in at night with no lights inside, and they are!

We woke up pretty early on Saturday, and got going. Just so you know, we take our morning gear up time very, very, seriously. Our plan was the Vernal/Nevada Falls hike loop - approximately 7 miles. Of course, we couldn't resist the picturesqueness of the park on the drive over to the trailhead!

Despite how spry we were feeling that day, we decided against doing the Mount Whitney via John Muir Trail hike Gotta save that one for a rainy day!
This drunk totally got in the way of our shot! Just kidding Jeremy!
It was a little crowded on the trail up to the first waterfall, but it was still beautiful and fun to catch glimpses of the Vernal Falls along the way.
Then we climbed

and climbed
till we reached a good midpoint to stop for a snack and enjoy the waterfall

People were down swimming in Emerald Pool at the base of the falls, it looked awesome!

Then it was off to the top of the falls
and to the next destination - Nevada Falls. But first, watching people ass-slide down a large slippery rock!
and eating some lunch
and toasting to good old mother nature
(I really like the reflection off the water in this one)

Ta-da!
These leaves had cool patterns eaten out of them
Then Nevada Falls came into sight
Umm...
teeheehee
Jeremy's 'gansta boy band' pose.
We didn't know if we'd make it
the way was steep

but we persevered.

View from the top

There was a nice pool of water at the top that we took the liberty of jumping into in our underwear. Then Jeremy and I were singled out by a park ranger (Jeremy thinks it's because we looked like we were having the most fun) and told that there was 'no swimming allowed'. Keep in mind, we were NOT the only people in the water. Ah well, we were refreshed and ready to get out anyways, so hmmpf!

But, before we could head back down, deodorant time! Charleen 'claims' it was so that her arms wouldn't stick, but we were all secretly relieved because she really did stink.

(hahahah! I'm KIDDING! Whew, this is a funny one)

More awesomeness on the way back
Oh, and in case you've never seen one of these before (It's a bear trap! The green thing, not Jeremy)

Back at camp ready to cook up some steak burritos.

Sunday we were a little slower getting up, eating and packing, but once that was done, we headed over to Glacier Point. It was pretty awesome. That's half dome behind us
After that we went on the Fissures and Taft Point hike, which was only 2.2 miles round trip. The hike to Taft Point was pretty nice, saw this growth

and some pretty flowers
Then we arrived here which was by far one the the coolest places we went on this trip. Here's Jeremy peering over the edge
Here's me diving!
Don't fall into that fissure!
The actual 'point' of Taft point
Is there anybody out there?
That's El Capitan to the right of Jeremy
We ate lunch out there and then headed back down the trail. But not all fun has been had yet!

That tree was pretty awesome looking
After the hike Charleen and Glenn headed back home (they had a longer ride) and Jeremy and I headed over to the meadow in front of El Cap. We were going to lie down and try to find climbers, but it was already past 4 and it was hot, so we figured there wouldn't be any, so we went into the river instead. Some nice people told us to go around the bend to swim because there was a big rock and 20 ft deep water around it, so we did. Jeremy jumped off of it a bunch, I was scared, but finally dared to take the 5ft jump off to swim to shore and end our Yosemite adventures. As I've probably said with all my National Park blogs, I can't wait to go back! Half Dome, here we come!

friend weekend fun plus skeeball!

2008-07-31T16:14:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I had some peeps come to visit! First it was Charleen who arrived Wed. night, Tom on Friday afternoon and Glenn Friday night.

So, now for the fun stuff we did! We'll kick it off with Golden Gate Park, where Tom, Charleen and I wandered around for a bit, taking in the sites.
Here's a Chihuly piece outside the DeYoung Museum Here's a 'Portal of the Past' which was basically an old facade from the top of Nob Hill marking the entryway to the railroad tycoon A.N. Towne's mansion. I guess this was all that was left after the 1906 earthquake. It was a little disappointing since, from the map, it appeared that there were 'portals' not just one, and also that the only one that was there would be encased in an ugly fence undergoing 'restoration' that was due to be completed in July 2008...but it didn't quite look like they were doing much of anything. On the upside, we saw this guy and we went home and looked it up (try 'red face duck' in google) and found out it was Muscovy Duck. So on the way back to the car, we decided to check out the log cabin listed on the map. Turns out its an administrative building of sorts ta-da!
I was pretty amused, it's not like they were lying to us, it was just hard to tell what exactly you were going to get when you visited these 'sites' on the map. On the way to the Sutro Baths we stopped by one of the windmills too bad we weren't able to go inside!
Then it was time for the Sutro Baths. I've been here a number of times already, and I love it every time. The link I posted actually has old footage from 1897 of people using the slide. It's really incredible. Now all we have are the ruins to run around and play on. look! waves! wee!
Later on we stopped by this graffiti alley down off Valencia St. It's always changing, so I love to go there every couple of months to see if there's anything new. Now, for this next one, there's a pile of poo down in the corner, I didn't feel like peering at it to determine what made it, but I will say it was quite unpleasant Jeremy and I actually saw this one being made a couple months ago, the artist had stencils of each section and would match it up then spray it, then do the next section, etc...

The next morning we got up early and, with Glenn who joined us the night before, we went to Muir Woods for some hiking. I swear, every time I go there I hike the same trail, but I always think it's a new trail. Ah well. It was fairly easy, and even though it's named Ocean View, we didn't go to the top to where the supposed view probably is. Even still, it was really nice, and fun for the whole family! Uh oh! Char tried her legs at some good old fashioned tree climbing Since the hike didn't take as long as we planned for, we ended up taking our lunches down to the Chrissy Field area and eating while basking in some sunshine and the view of the bridge Later on we tried hitting up the North Beach Jazz Festival but we slightly disappointed in what we heard, although their get-ups were cool So we grabbed some thai at King Cha-Cha's and went back to the mission to see The Breakfast Club in Mission Dolores Park mmmmm...captain crunch and pixie stick sandwich! we had a decent view, but couldn't hear much of what was going on. But we did get to holler at the people to 'sit down in the front' as they stopped to lolly-gaggle and whatnot.

So it was a great weekend, I loved having Tom, Char and Glenn in town!

Oh...and before I forget, I started a BrewSKEEball league (that's right - brewskees and skeeball) with Jeremy, Heather, Perry, Reid and Trina (with Mari and Rose as alternate-alternates!). Technically we are only supposed to be 3 to a team with 3 alternates, but we are, uh, taking turns and it seems to work lovely. Last weekend Rose subbed in for us, which we were very grateful to have her on our team. Go Rose! Hit those hundos Jeremy! oops, I mean...
Pure concentration (serious face)

Plus, if that wasn't enough, we hit up my coworker Reid's band Innaway's show at 12 Galaxies which is a cool venue due to its all around balcony. We were pretty dead tired, but the fog machine and rocking and rolling kept us alive.

Oh, and Tom has his own blog up as well documenting his trip if you just can't get enough!

Sequoia Birthday Weekend and Dinner too!

2008-07-21T16:15:00.000-07:00

So, for my birthday weekend, Jeremy and I headed out to Sequoia National Park. I had been asked by Heather and Perry to join them and their friends Melanie, Damien and Brian on this camping venture back in February (? - may have been even earlier then that!). Apparently the bay area is teeming with campers who snatch up all the campsites up to 6 months in advance, so you have to be on it to get reservations in time for certain hot spots.

Anyways, since we left after I got out of work, we didn't even get there till 1am, so we just set up camp and hit the hay, so we could get up all bright eyed and bushy tailed for some hiking!

yipee! Actually, when we got up we watched some chipmunks tooling around our campsite looking for any scraps of food they could find (which was NONE! We were so good at keeping everything in the bear safe boxes!). We also woke to some mule deer that resided a little higher up the campground, behind our tents. That was pretty awesome.

We started on a small hike within the Lodgepole campgrounds that we were staying in and headed to a small waterfall nearby. Saw this cool moss-covered tree along the way (one of many we saw)
You can barely see him with a picture this small, but Brian is crossing the riverbed rocks After this quick jaunt we waited out a small rain storm and then headed on a longer hike to another waterfall, the big one, that was feeding this little one near our campsite.
Off we go! There were a bunch of fallen trees The trail was cool, it followed this riverbed all the way This flower was awesome Tree huggers! Well, we tried at least...(and that is a small one!) At one point we made our way down to the river. It was flowing past quite fast, but it was cool how it just ran over these huge slats of granite (?) Heather was ready to dive in I thought it was amazing how old some of the fallen trees were. The rings got so small and thin towards the edges it was hard to count. Jeremy estimated about 200 years old, so it's just a baby... The rock cliff we were walking towards was also pretty bad-ass, plus there's sort of a hidden face in it too, which is cool. Arh! I am the mountain god 'rock face'! Ok, uh, ya, I should probably have come up with something more creative. That's ok, because this next one is like the viking tree I think it's dead, but it has that awesome vertical branch reaching up as if its holding a sword or something. I was supposed to be acting like a mermaid here, but instead I'm just throwing out the metal sign seems like a good alternative being in a 'rock' oyster shell and all.
This guy was cool, with his blue belly Towards the end of the trail the terrain changed and we were walking among a bunch of rocks up to the waterfall Jeremy scrambled up a couple rocks and took this shot Ah yes, we finally reached our destination. Look out Waterfalls Calendar July 2009, we're taking over!
Later on that day, before dinner Jeremy and I ventured out to catch a glimpse of General Sherman, the largest tree by Volume in the world! It's not the tallest, but it's pretty up there at 275ft! We had to take this one from the road just to get the entire tree in the shot Once we had hit General Sherman we were in the Giant Forest, and saw plenty of other awe-inspiring giants, like these four Jeremy being very 'tall' Me being very dwarfed! I say it's about yea big
Then we went on the big trees trail to learn fun facts about Sequoias and see this pretty meadow and we stumbled on this guy This tree was kind enough to include the rock, or maybe it's just using it for leverage
After the tree walk, we headed back to camp for some awesome fajitas and my birthday cake, made by Jeremy, decorated by me! Thanks mom and dad for the b-day package with the angel food cake mix! This totally made my birthday weekend complete! Yum!
On Sunday we headed out to the Crystal Caves before heading home. It was a quick hike to a from the caves, but you had to descend/ascend on the way back, the equivalent of a 30 story building or something. Not too bad, but still pretty steep. The caves themselves were pretty cool, dark and damp. Just what you'd expect! Plus there was this fun door at the entrance They said they used one with big enough holes in it so that the bats that lived in the cave could fly out with ease. The colors in the cave were pretty awesome, it was hard to capture on film, but here are a few really good shots On the way out, we stopped by this waterfall
We decided to find the tree you could drive through before heading out. We ended up going between these trees, which was pretty cool and saw this guy on the side of the road you would be surprised how many people were snapping photos and standing outside of their cars. It's like no one has heard of a bear mauling anyone before!
The roots to this tree were incredible, and they tried to swallow Jeremy! Then we drove thru this fallen tree Apparently there are even bigger trees to drive thru that are vertical up in Northern CA, we'll have to go there sometime to check it out.

Also, Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks offer more than 850 miles of maintained wilderness trails...we probably saw like 5-6 miles of that, I totally want to plan a return trip there for next summer!

Then, since I was gone for my birthday, my roommates and friends wanted to go out to dinner, so we went to Cha-Ya Vegetarian Japanese Restaurant in the mission. Amanda playing with her food More food identification? Oh and Amanda was so proud of catching this moment, I have to include it and no, my jaw does not unhinge! Here's everyone enjoying their meal Here's the embarassing, let's get the entire restaurant to sing for you, moment (yes, that girl obviously wants a piece!) Here's everyone at the table going at it Thanks everyone for a wonderful dinner!!
And let's not forget the type of fun you have in San Francisco is always unpredictable. Check out this find on the walk home Looks like one of those telephone cup deals, but with a fish on the end of it.

the pinnacles (of achievement)

2008-07-02T09:46:00.001-07:00

so, I am awaiting photos from when my family came to visit, but until them, I will write about last weekend's venture out to Pinnacles National Monument. I found out that Pinnacles National Monument began as a volcano that first erupted about 195 miles south of its present location.

Jeremy, Mari and I headed out there Saturday afternoon and arrived around dusk. We set up camp and proceeded with some beers and chips.

We weren't able to have any fires, so we decided to try and see the sunset before it went down. Unfortunately the sun had already set down behind the area that we could get to via car. On the way we saw some wild boars, and made up our own fun.

In the morning we set off to the Old Pinnacles Trail Head to do a hike to the Balconies Cave. Basically at this point, I'll just share some photos of the hike. Btw, it was HOT! In the 90s.

Really cool, multi-colored rocks

Cool mossy rocks

Pinecones!
Rawr!

We stopped for a leisurely rest
(No, it was not in the least bit comfortable) Altho look for Jeremy's 2009 Calendar soon to be on the shelves!

Another fun fact is that Pinnacles NM is home to 14 of the 24 bat species in California. Actually, Bear Gulch Cave was closed due to bats raising their young. Luckily we still got to enjoy Balconies Cave. (Mari was really excited! Actually, she was running from us so we couldn't get a picture of her with the headlamp on, teehee)
Inside the caves...
Spooky dark caves See, we still got a headlamp photo! And this was a close call! Cool flowers
This looked like a man (Elvis) lying on his back
I believe this is Machete Ridge
This guy joined us while we ate our lunch

Between hikes, Jeremy and I got IT'S-IT ice cream sandwiches, a local specialty, while Mari got a popsicle and we enjoyed some much deserved pool time.

We were told to go on the reservoir hike before we left by our friendly camping neighbors, so Jeremy and I set off to do the Moses Spring - Rim Trail Loop before heading home.
This is one of my favorite pictures, I like that it's a tad blurry, it helps you imagine the heat
Jeremy "Badass" Sell
Jeremy "Crack Navigator" Sell
Fun trees that had red and black bark
Here's my shining moment, I saved an entire girl scout troop from being crushed under this boulder! They tried to give me a medal and some trail mix, but I declined...all in a days work
Stairs carved into the rock Oh and this is where you can turn the water on and off (Just kidding!)
It was pretty cool though because once we got to the top of the steps we turned to our left and looked over the reservoir

Coming up this weekend is King's Canyon/Sequoia National Park then Yosemite in August!

what do pinballs, steam trains & grills have in common?

2008-05-27T15:42:00.000-07:00

...well, they all made up my weekend, plus other fun stuff. first off, this month has been the month of shows. Got to see Cloud Cult!

Incredible show, I am beyond happy that I got to see them perform, plus they had great openers - Kid Dakota - totally explosive and fun energy and Love is Chemicals. Also Connie Minowa, the wife of the leading force behind Cloud Cult, painted this picture during the show, and then auctioned it off to the highest bidder:

Then The Kills came to town, all rock & roll and acting the part. I swear there was a fan blowing on them the entire time, while the girl, "VV", prowled about the stage like a caged animal. This is the tamest video I have of the show, but I posted it because the sound is the best
Then, last week, Jeremy and I hit up the Mates of State show. Their newest album requires more then just the typical keyboard and drums, so they had a violinist (sometimes guitarist) and cellist up on stage with them. The new additions rocked hard! I don't think I've ever seen a string section more animated and into the music they were playing. I tried to capture it here (the sound quality stinks tho, so be prepared)
Before the end of the month, we get to catch Beirut (only time I saw them was SXSW and it was incredible!) with The Brunettes opening, as well as Neva Dinova!

Now, onto the weekend! Saturday, Jeremy and I went to Lucky Ju Ju Pinball in Alameda (this is a town next to Oakland). Basically you pay $10 and play as much pinball as you want. There are about 3 dozen pinball machines to play. We spent a good 2 hours there trying them all out.

The coolest/craziest pinball there was called Orbitor 1. It is hard to explain, but it is one of the strangest pinballs I've ever played. The ball actually goes behind the paddles and all around an uneven surface. They do a better job explaining it all if you go to the link posted.

Sunday we went to the Jack London Square farmer's market for some super fresh and delicious produce. We basically ate breakfast there with everyone handing out free cherries, apricots, raspberries and other great samples. We picked up a bunch of fresh goods, then decided to head out to Tilden Park in the East Bay, where we got to ride this awesome steam train! It wasn't the cog railway, but it sure was fun holding our own among all the 5 and under crowd.

choo-choo!

zee caboose

We wandered around and Jeremy found this gnarly old tree that had fallen over.

Then we took a little hike around inspiration point and decided to take some silly pictures for our amusement. Enjoy!

Before we went home, I managed to prick my finger on this beaute

twice.
But to make up for it, we went to Heinold's First and Last Chance Bar

with Paul and Dayana, and enjoyed the slanted floor, sea-worthy atmosphere and lamented that we'd miss out on drunken hopscotch.

No pictures from Monday, but we rode our bikes up to Berkeley and rummaged thru Amoeba Music and got latte's at Mediterraneum Caffe who claim to have invented the latte. I'm skeptical, but they were quite tasty.

As with all weekends and holidays, they must come to an end, but I'm going to start rallying for a national week off holiday, in honor of, let's say, the working class! Three a year, mandatory, on top of your normal paid vacation time.

ya.

Sierra Club aka 'The Mature Adult Hiking Club'

2008-05-07T12:38:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday my roommate Amanda and I went on a hike with the Sierra Club. Apparently we are the only two people who didn't realize Sierra Club = Older, middle aged members. I am pretty sure the hike leader was about 80. Don't get me wrong, that's awesome, but it was just funny when we showed up and were quite younger then everyone else there. One gentleman actually suggested looking online at meetup.com to meet younger hikers like ourselves!
(And he didn't mean it in a bad way at all, he was just sharing)

Anyways, we chose this hike in particular because it was on Black Mountain, up in Marin, which resides on a private ranch protected by the Marin Agricultural Land Trust (MALT). They help preserve farmland in the bay area and offer some cool farm tours and educational classes that I may try to partake in at some point.

So, we started off at this farm
We could see Black Mountain in the background (plus this was a good excuse to capture a couple fellow hikers in the pic)
It was a sunny, nice day out, with only the wind becoming a nuisance as we climbed higher.
These trees were super fun
Plus, since it was farmland, we saw some cattle grazing, and fun little things like this:

At parts, the trail was fully covered with tall grass, it was so fun to wade through and watch as the wind created waves through it.

I had a hard time trying to capture how steep part of this climb actually was. The incline was so steep at points that I could barely step one full foot length in front of myself. This is the best shot I have trying to show the incline, that's another hiker way at the top.

But the last little umpf was well worth it. We got to the top and had a wonderful view of the surrounding farms and farmland. Plus the poppies were in bloom!

Enjoying a wonderful turkey & avocado sandwich from Bi-Rite

Resting (when we should have been listening to MALT talk about the land projects, teehee)

On the hike back down Amanda & I took some time to frollick in the grass.
Weee!

Then we posed triumphantly with our conquered mountain behind us

Upon our return, we were greeted by this lovely horse.

And that basically sums it up!

Sandy's Birthday Weekend Fun!

2008-04-15T16:59:00.001-07:00

So, you might be thinking, doesn't Sandy go to San Francisco a lot? Some would say yes, but I still don't think it's nearly enough, but I'm not complaining. I get to reap the benefits of her job, when they send her out to the west coast. This time it just happened to coincide with her birthday!

Sad thing was that I had to work on Friday. The good thing was that I got to meet up with Sandy by 3:30 and give her these lovely flowers on behalf of my parents.

As well as a mini Scharffen Berger Cake, yum!

Friday night we headed out to the Slow Club for her birthday dinner. We met up with her friends Kelly, Rachel W., Rachael G., and Jamee.

The six of us enjoyed our cocktails immensely, while waiting for a table, then enjoyed some great fries with aioli among flatbread, burgers, fish and chicken. Then, I 'sneakily' (Sandy totally saw me doing this) told the waiter it was her birthday, and she got an extra special treat!

Hey, doing that sort of thing is basically mandatory in my family.
After dinner we headed to Wish, a nice, lounge bar. Turns out my roommates were there as well!

Yes, we were silly.

I hope Jamee doesn't mind me posting these, because I found them to be hilarious!

After that, we tried out Bruno's over in the Mission. It was ok, not the best club I've been to for $10, but it was just fun to dance with each other.

Saturday was a slowwww start, but once Sandy and I got some coffee from Philz and had some amazing cinnamon raisin bread (it has molasses in it!) we were on our way out to Sonoma to meet up with the ladies. But first, we had to stop at Viansa, one of Sandy's favorites.

Apparently they don't carry their wine on the east coast either, so she treated herself to a bottle to bring back with her. Plus we shared a caprese sandwich and glass of wine.

They had a great porch, like most of the places we stopped, overlooking the grape fields.

Cool latticing

Our next stop ended up being way out of the way, but we didn't know that at first. It was Domaine Carneros,

known for their sparkling wine. We stopped just to split a glass of their rose.

oh, and stick our feet in their plush grass!

It was beautiful there

Then we made it to the Lodge at Sonoma, where we spent the night (thanks Mike D for the hook-up!) Sandy and I found Rachael, Rachel and Jamee sleeping by the pool. After they got up, we rallied and headed out to catch one of the films at the Sonoma Film Festival.

We got in to see Elvis and Anabelle. It was pretty good, a little predictable, but the father character, played by Joe Mantenga was awesome!
Dinner ended up being at Maya, and I have to say their top shelf tequila-jito was delicious!

Sunday, Rachael G. and Jamee headed out early to catch in some SF sites before they flew back east, while Sandy, Rachel W. and I hit up The Girl and The Fig for brunch. (yes, a lot of this weekend revolved around food and drinks!) We had a very, uh, haughty waiter, who liked to talk slowly and deliberately, but with a very strange and snotty air. They had this amazing fig spread that they had samples of at the bar. So when they brought the bread out, I decided to go 'sample' it for the table and bring it back for our enjoyment. When the waiter came over he said something to the effect of 'I've never seen that done before' to which I retorted 'well you should put some on the tables then, it's delicious!'. My other memorable interaction with him was when he told us our cheese plate would feature bleu cheese, and seeing the look on our faces asked if that was ok. I then told him I thought it tasted like crap, so he immediately went to change it to a triple cream something or other, which ended up being the most delicious cheese on the platter.

On our way back to San Fran we stopped at Cline for one last sampling.

It was a good one too, Rachel and I both bought ourselves a bottle.

Unfortunately for Rachel, but definitely fortunate for me, she left her bottle in my trunk! I hope I can pass along some of her good karma in return!

Then, since it was such a gorgeous day, we stopped at a lookout over the bridge before crossing over into the city.

After we made it back to my apartment, Jeremy head over, and we all got dinner at Pacific Catch and ate out in our 'zen' garden before heading to Cafe du Nord to see Georgie James perform an acoustic set. The two openers, The Old-Fashioned Way and Tempo no Tempo were great, and they both had various and unexpected instruments. Tempo no Tempo debuted a string quartet that very night.

I will leave you with the links to all the photos from the weekend. First, Sandy's Birthday Night out, and second Saturday and Sunday from Sonoma to San Francisco.

Saint Diego aka Whale's Vag (Anchorman Reference)

2008-04-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

Ah yes, good ol' San Diego. It was awesome taking a weekend jaunt down to visit Jerry, Krysia and Brian for the weekend. Plus it was Brian's 29th birthday so I got to enjoy the festivities.

Once again, my flight was delayed - I don't know if you remember, but I had a delay when I went down to LA to visit Charleen. This time I flew Virgin America, and it was delayed a little over 2 hours! How frustrating, the worst was that I was told there was a mechanical malfunction and they had to fly in a part from LA! (Of course, after sitting through hours of engineering courses, images such as this

come to mind...altho, luckily everyone survived that one, unfortunately my imagination isn't as optimistic)

However, I arrive in San Diego, no harm done, just tired and ready for bed.

Saturday, Jerry and I got up and went for a run around the neighborhood, got some lunch and went shopping with Krysia to prepare for Brian's bonfire birthday party in Mission Bay.

We made him a very special cake, here's Krysia putting on the finishing touches (with her fingers! ewww!)

ta-da!

of course, the rest of our $1 store barbie rip-off was a great compliment to Brian's gift

Bonfire!

Oh, and Jerry brought some money to burn

That's how he gets all the ladies

Brian liked his cake...but honestly, who wouldn't!?

Then since we had such a hard time lighting the special candles we got for the cake, we made a call and had Sea World set off some fireworks...you know, we spare no expense

Some more bonfire shots

Plus, what bonfire wouldn't be complete without dumb attempts at breaking big plywood boards? Or jump kicking some newspapers?!

After the bonfire we made our way to the Turf Supper Club, where they have this really awesome wallpaper

Plus you cook your own food on this grill in the middle of the room

And they have a jukebox, which Krysia invested in wisely.
All in all, a fantastic night!

The rest of the weekend was pretty lazy, we got brunch, played Guitar Hero and met up with friends for Sushi. I only wish I could have stayed the week!

march madness! or a compilation of things i've been up to

2008-03-26T12:20:00.001-07:00

Here are some things I've been up to.

Charleen came to visit the weekend of the 14th, well, she had to travel up to the Bay area for work related things, but I got to reap the benefits when they changed her flight from Friday to Sunday! Yay! So we went out for some Thai food with Perry and Heather in North Beach before heading over to see Beach Blanket Babylon. I was turned onto this by my co-worker and it is apparently the longest running musical revue. The show is basically a musical spoof of pop culture, complete with extravagant outfits, wigs and hats.

Yes that's Prince Charles AND a ridiculous hat! (disclaimer - Prince Charles was NOT at the show we went to see, this was taken off their website)

The hats are so big they actually put the performers on a motorized cart to move them around stage due to the weight.

Then Saturday night we ended up heading out with my roommate Mari and her friend Karin that was in town from Sweden. First we started at Mike's birthday party, complete with Irish Car Bomb Races.
I barely beat Mari...

YUM!

But Charleen totally kicked Mike's ass!

Then we headed out to the Elbo Room for their Saturday Night Soul Party, where we danced...or at least tried to.

That picture makes it all look very awkward.
Sunday was pretty low key, Charleen helped me shop around IKEA for a bed frame (which I didn't find) and under the bed storage boxes (which I did find one) before I dropped her off at the airport.

Then this past weekend lots of fun things happened. The first was hanging out with Ferris, Ashley and her roommate Josh on Friday night. We hit up the 500 Club which, by the way, is NOT open at 6am. (Tricky signage!)

Saturday I bought a bed frame from craigslist! The search is over, finally. It looks great, thank you Jeremy for helping me set it up!

Leeni, better known as Celene Ramadan from Manchester Central High, and her sister Jeannine came to town! I met up with them for a fancy smancy and delicious dinner at the Hotel Rex Restaurant. Then we headed over to 1505 Oregon St. in Berkeley for a House Party!

Turned out to be pretty chill, with a bunch of younger folk present, but that sort of also made it fun and awkward and all things amusing. Plus, they had a wood paneled shower, which I have never seen before.

Unfortunately I do not have video of the first performer, Sludgehammer, of the night. Luckily Jeannine did, and I'm pretty sure she caught the time he picked up a girl from the crowd then pinned me against the wall while he screamed in my face.

I liked this album review he posted on his site:
"well, i kinda felt nauseous and i wanted to knock things over and maybe knee someone in the groin and then makeout with them. i can't say that's what i feel every time i tune in to sludge, but it worked this time. it was a weird day"- Jennifer Sullivan

In short, it was worth every second and left you feeling uncomfortable and wanting more.

Next up was Padraic Finbar Hagerty-Hammond who was really great to see perform.

Then, for those of you kids who either grew up in Hooksett, or went to Manchester Central High, Matt Carano

performed as Palefighter.

It was strange seeing him and officially meeting him for the first time. I always knew of him because his sister Emily was in my grade growing up, but I guess it wasn't until now that we actually met. Funny how that can happen.

Then Leeni went on and rocked the house out! It was great seeing her perform her new stuff, since the last, and only time, I've seen her play it was completely different and she just played her guitar. Now she has all these 8-bit, gameboy inspired beats and sounds to accompany her beautiful voice.

Oh, and I highly enjoyed her little 8-bit clip of 'I'm so excited'

Then after staying up too late like a schoolgirl at her first slumber party, I got up and went on a wonderful hike with Amanda out in Mount Tamalpais State Park, where we hiked from the East Peak Parking lot to the West Point Inn.
(Oh, but while I was drinking my coffee, I got to see the Easter bunny

walk by my apartment with his friend, on their way to the Hunky Jesus contest.

We saw some condors!

Here's my attempt at a panoramic from the West Point Inn

Tada!

I kept this flower in my hair the whole time. It reminded me of Erikka.

I even squeezed in some egg dyeing (thanks to my parents Easter care package!) and bunny bowling with Jeremy in the hallway

before heading out to Bring Your Own Big Wheel (BYOBW).
It is what it sounds like, people ride big wheels and other various plastic toys with wheels down a steep and curvy street. Trust me, the videos get better as you go down. Every time they went down we found a new prime location to view.

I like this one the best

People had some great outfits.
An hour or so after the shin-dig Jeremy and I came across this graveyard of Big Wheels, neatly piled up in the back of this truck

Rest in peace glorious chariots, rest in peace.

the tahoe experience

2008-03-19T22:57:00.000-07:00

So, I have to admit, there is no replacement for Mt. Tremblant, but going to Tahoe was pretty darn close. I think the only thing lacking was a snowstorm and my cousin's home cooking! I tried to make up for it by cooking 2 lasagnas - one vegan, one ground turkey to accommodate the variety of dietary restrictions.
So, we stayed at the Lake Tahoe Vacation Resort. It was pretty decent, the 'room' slept 6, but since it was broken out into an 'a' and 'b' side, we actually managed to get 9 people on beds, and two on a blow up mattress. Not to shabby! One room had two full sized beds, a small kitchenette and a bathroom, plus this great backlit light:

The other had a full kitchen, bathroom, king sized bed, and queen pull out couch.

Everyone arrived Saturday evening/night and then we got up Sunday to head to Heavenly Ski Resort, which was about a mile away. This place was huge! Plus the day we went was pretty windy. It has some beautiful views of Lake Tahoe.
Jeremy boarding:

Gearing up at the top of the mountain:

Cool airplane/tree shot by Blake:

Afterwards we hit up the jacuzzi at the resort and drank some lovely Mai Tai's and beers. This basically became the norm for the remainder of the trip.

Monday we packed up into our rental cars and headed to Northstar, up by North Lake Tahoe.
Who would have thought a car ride could evoke so much emotion?

I thought this mountain was so awesome!! I could spend a couple days there alone. There were a good number of intermediate trails, plus some more technical options and parks for the adventurous.
Here's Sandy, ready to roll

Since I don't have everyone's pictures, I don't have any more from Northstar to share. But I have something better, a little video going down 'Drifter' at the end of the day.

You can see Susannah Tele-Mark skiing in front of me and Rachel waiting down below.
I also have these great shots from Blake of the drive home! Crazy cloud:

beautiful sunset, even in a parking lot!

So, on Tuesday, it was a free-for-all. Some people took off for Northstar again, some drove around the Lake while Patrick, Susanna, Jeremy and I decided to go snowshoeing. This was Jeremy and I's first time snowshoeing, so we were pretty fricken' excited! Jamee let me borrow her boots and shoes and everyone else rented some from a local ski shop that directed us to Carson Pass for some good trails.

This is funny because of how awkward we all look, but also because we apparently didn't need to bend down so far.

Of course, like any good snowshoe hike, there has to be some man to man bonding. Susannah and I just let nature take its course, what else could we really do?

The best part was what happened after:

Patrick fell over! Lovestruck, I can only imagine.

Oh, and consider this your warning if you ever find yourself out in the back country of America...you just might come across something like this:

We stopped for some lunch on a couple rocks and watched some people snowboarding off on some untouched terrain on the mountains surrounding us.

Peek-A-Boo!

After lunch we decided to head up this hill known as Elephant's Back. It was cool, we took off our snowshoes and hiked up this rocky terrain to the top.

(that's me in red up there!)
Unfortunately my pictures are a little washed out because the sun was shining and there was snow all around, didn't figure out the right setting until the end of our hike. However, the view was really cool up there.

Funky angle shot of Patrick

Cutest prom pose picture taken on a hike ever:

That night we all went out for dinner at some local Mexican restaurant. I can't even remember the name. But it sure was fun! I definitely remember eating too much and I think they laced the tortilla chips with crack.

Then came Wednesday, sadly. I had to say goodbye to Sandy, give her back up to the East coast along with Vincent, Faye, Jamee, Rachel, Patrick and Susannah. Blake wasn't ready to head to Minneapolis just yet, but it was coming.

But...before we could leave there was one order of business left.
Chinese Sushi Coffee!

Sassy!

Till next year!

ps...If anyone has more photos to share, please send them my way, I'd be happy to send you what I have in return.

welcome to the jungle, meow.

2008-02-25T21:53:00.000-08:00

Just a tad behind, but not too bad. Two weekends ago I went down to LA to visit Charleen in anticipation for her up and coming 28th b-day! Once again, the novelty of being an hour flight away was just so exciting! Of course, with that said, my flight got delayed an hour there AND back. Go figure.

So, I got there Saturday afternoon. We grabbed a bite then hit up the Santa Monica/Venice Beach boardwalk. On the way there I saw this on the side of a building and Charleen pulled over so I could take a picture.

The beach was nice, we walked around for a while and caught a street performance where one of the men in the group jumped over 10 people! Wait, not only did he jump over them, he did a somersault jump over them. It was definitely impressive. Plus they did some break-dancing and balancing poses.

We got to catch some of the sunset as well.

Afterwards Glenn met up with us and we took Char out to a nice dinner then glow in the dark miniature golf!!!

That was fun, I am not very good at it. I think Charleen beat Glenn and I, but I beat her at air hockey!

Sunday more fun was to be had once Jerry and Krysia showed up. We started off with crepes.

Then it was off to the LA Zoo!

Not only did we see fun animals, but we also got to enjoy the signage, such as 'don't feed muppets popcorn', and my personal favorite 'fake snake'.

And what birthday would be complete without cake?

With our belly's full, we played 90s trivial pursuit, I think Krysia was declared the winner when we gave up, then watched Adventures in Babysitting. All-in-all, a good day.

j-dawg 'n da house

2008-02-11T13:53:00.000-08:00

So, this weekend Jerry made an impromptu visit up to SF to hang out with me as well as his bro Perry and lovely wife Heather. I don't think the novelty of being an 1 1/2 hour flight away (or 1/2 days drive) from hanging out is going to wear off anytime soon. Altho, I can't leave out the fact that Jerry missed his first flight out due to some sort of shortage of personal at the security checkpoint. Luckily he still got in around 6:30.

We decided to go to Cafe Gratitude, basically because I have been wanting to go there, but Jerry was down. They are known for using organic foods, mostly from local, self-sustainable resources. Only in California, I know. It definitely had a 'hippy' feel, complete with self empowering menu dish names, but their 'I AM SASSY' Virgin Healthy Mango Margarita and 'I AM INSIGHTFUL' Spring Rolls made up for it. Jerry had a pretty awesome 'I AM THANKFUL' Thai Coconut Soup. Our entrees were a little less exciting, but still tasty. I would like to go back and try some of their other juices and cocktails sometime.

Saturday day was a little dull for me, but Jerry went to have Dim Sum with Perry and Heather, and saw some cool Chinese New Year celebrations while walking around. Even after 5pm when I headed out to meet up with them, I came across three dragons dancing outside a business with fireworks going off.

Saturday night we ate at Za Gourmet Pizza. As I've mentioned, good pizza is not as easy to find out in CA, this place did a pretty good job. Altho my stomach wasn't all that happy with me afterwards. Not sure if it was the pizza, or the pound of cherries and two white russians beforehand. But, seriously, check out their artwork!?!?!
Then we walked over to Cobb's Comedy Club to catch Janeane Garofalo with Mary Lynn Rajskub, better known as Chloe from 24. To be honest, I was hoping for a bit more laughs. 'Chloe' was amusing, but I sort of couldn't get over her being a comedian and her way of talking and acting on stage was a little nerve racking. Janeane had some fun things to say and rant about, but still, overall, I lost interest at points and had to make myself pay more attention, instead of it keeping my attention.

Sunday, Perry and Heather found a hike near Pacifica at the James V. Fitzgerald Marine Reserve.
It turned out to be not so much of a hike, but more walking along the beach looking at tide pools.

We got there as the tide was coming in, but we still saw some cool stuff. The beach had very pebbly sand...

A neat sea plant:

A star fish jerry found:

There was an abundance of seaweed, some that Heather tied Jerry up in:

The seaweed was really strong and felt almost like an extension cord...so after throwing it around a little bit, Heather decided to jump rope with it. Unfortunately the Wagner brother's couldn't find a good swinging rhythm.

Then I came across this gross fish carcass:

After the beach/tide pool walk, we went up the bluff (where I saw these) and walked back along the ridge. It was really pretty overlooking the water on one side, and then full of trees on the other.

At the end of the train there was this little plank bridge you had to cross to get back over to the parking lot. It doesn't look it, but it seemed pretty dangerous.

And, well, I couldn't resist taking a souvenir

Then, like all good weekend visits, we ate out AGAIN, this time at Pacific Catch. This place is also very environmentally aware and serves up only sustainable sourced seafood based off the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch. People may look at California sometimes and rag on it for being so 'hippy dippy', but I really appreciate these small things in my community and want to support this type of mindset. I think it's just another reason I enjoy living here. We decided to go there though because not only did they have a basket of sweet potato fries on the menu, they offered up Wasabi Bowls, complete with seaweed salad, ahi tuna (marinated in an awesome sesame/spicy sauce), brown rice, ginger, cucumber and avocado. So tasty!

Three more down, more to go...

2008-01-30T12:35:00.000-08:00

***This blog is a result of extreme work procrastination. I wish I had posted it earlier, but I couldn't find the time and my internet has been down at home***

There are so many things in and around San Francisco that I want to see, do, explore. Two weekends ago I got to take a bite out of 3 of them, which was pretty damn rewarding.

Yerba Buena Gardens
It was a windy, sunny, yet chilly Sunday, so when Jeremy and I were biking past the gardens we made a detour so we could soak up some sun and explore some inner city green space. There was a waterfall with quotes engraved in the walls behind it by Martin Luther King, Jr.

Looking out from behind the falls
Chilling in the sunshine

View of the Museum of Modern Art

Embarcadero and Museum Mechanique

After our impromptu pit stop we continued onward and ended up taking another random stop when we saw this thing

I love public art, it was hard to get a good picture of the bow and arrow, but I like this one with the bridge behind it and the yellowy grass on the ground

Afterwards we finally made it to our original destination of the day - The Museum Mechanique! It is basically a free museum full of mechanically operated musical instruments and antique arcade machines. You do have to pay to use them, but most are only a quarter or two. Some were pretty cool to watch perform. Others, well...

Ok, so I still found that amusing.
These are from this carnival scene that would 'come to life' after depositing 50 cents.
Mmm...doesn't that cotton candy look good?
Jeremy got a pretty high score on Ms. Pacman. I think he ranks 26th based off the Twin Galaxies website from another high score he achieved, but this one kicks some ass too!

Palace of Fine Arts
Despite being hungry and tired we decided to make a go for it and bike over to the Palace of Fine Arts. This is a building that was constructed out of six million dollars in donations, plus another ten million in bonds and taxes for The Panama Pacific Exposition of 1915. The Exploratorium is also located there (we didn't have time to go though) and a nice park. Unfortunately for us, but probably fortunate for it's future, they were undergoing construction and we couldn't go under the main dome.
We got there at a pretty cool time of day, as the sun started to set.

Can you see me?

There were some swans out in the pond, they were pretty brave, one of them almost ate a 'punter' as Erikka puts it, better known as a little lap dog.
Attack mode

You think they could have invested in a cooler fountain.

Afterwards we ate at Baghdad Nights in the Lower Haight, who serve Iraqi dishes. The place was practically empty, but we had the nicest waiter in the world plus some really great food. Their bread was unbelievably awesome. I am a huge naan fan, and this bread is one step up. It has both the softness and crunchy bits making it a great compliment to the food.

Another cool thing about that weekend was getting to reconnect with Joe Kowalski! I hadn't seen him since probably some random Acrobrats show in Boston, and him and his girlfriend Emily just relocated to San Francisco. We went to see The Disposable Film Festival, which wasn't as exciting as it sounds, but was worth it to just hang out and catch up.

Unrelated to that particular weekend I went to see two bands I like perform - The Blow and Mirah. This was part of my Christmas gift from Jeremy. The show was great, I don't think my videos do it justice. Khaela Maricich from The Blow is such an entertainer, her set was basically half talking and half singing.

Mirah's set was more focused on just music, which was beautiful. I would like to get more albums of hers now.

Lastly, thanks to Joe, I was informed of Get Mortified. I got to see it this past Friday with my roommates at the Makeout Room. The deal with get mortified is "a comic excavation of adolescent artifacts (journals, letters, poems, lyrics, home movies, stories and more) as shared by their original authors before total strangers." It is awesome and totally worth checking out. They have performances in different cities around the country.

Anyways, guess that's all for now...

Tech my Advice

2008-01-24T12:30:00.000-08:00

I found this article about technology ruining relationships. This is actually something I think about a lot these days. First email replaced snail mail and cell phones replaced home phones. As a result, postage goes up, and people are instantly accessible. I tried not to get a cell phone for a long time, waiting until I graduated from college. Now, 5 years later, I would be lost without it, like many people, and almost get panicked if I forget it at home. What if my car breaks down, or I get lost?! It's so hard to remember those days when I would just pull over into a gas station and ask for directions, or find a pay phone, put in a quarter and actually remember, off the top of my head, the number of the person I needed to reach.

Anyways, I know I usually blog about things that I do, and I will be blogging about my last weekend pretty soon when I find some spare time, but I also thought this was something worth thinking about. I feel technology has just allowed us to become more impersonal with one another. Interaction with people is more often taken for granted. People definitely use text messages and email for serious conversations that should actually be done face to face. Written text can only convey so much emotion, and with that, it can be so easily misconstrued and misunderstood.

I still like to send snail mail. If there's something important I want to talk about, I'll set aside some time to meet with the person face to face if it's at all possible. Sure it's not as convenient, and technology has it's place in my heart, yet I hope I never stop reaching out and truly connecting with people, not just my newest techie gadget.

the reward

2008-01-11T20:59:00.002-08:00

So I've been blogging on my myspace page about the 7 day cleanse Amanda, my roommate, and I did.

Well, tonight, we had our reward. Massages at
International Orange. Incredible. I cannot say enough good stuff about this spa. It was not cheap, but I felt like royalty. First we steamed, then showered and waiting in the lounge area. This is where there's a never ending supply of water and tea, plus little treats like dried cranberries, almonds, chunks of dark chocolate and ginger chews. After the massage we steamed and showered again. I am still on a high from it while I'm writing this. The world has slowed down. I just feel great. It was the perfect reward since it actually compliments the cleanse very well in getting the toxins out of your body.

Not only that, I feel like I had an affair! His name was Iyla. This was my first male masseuse ever and he completely rocked. We talked about the cleanse and eating healthy for the first half. He told me about roasted barley tea and how it's caffeine free and has a similar taste to coffee. It was nice and relaxing and made it more comfortable.

I'm pretty sure this is the feeling I've been waiting for throughout this whole cleanse. I just feel good and healthy and whole.

home for the holidays - revisited

2008-01-09T16:27:00.001-08:00

This was officially my first year 'traveling home for the holidays'. I was stuffed onto a jam-packed plane, amidst tempting offers at $500 vouchers to take another flight. I thought about it in a fleeting second as I was boarding and realized how badly I wanted to go home and that they'd have to up it to maybe $1000 for me to consider it seriously. :) The flight was pretty tight, but I got this cool airplane shot.

Luckily, even though I went through Chicago and was scared of inclement weather, I made it out of there and to Boston with a slight delay. All seemed swell. Sandy was there and waiting, and I just had to grab my bags........wait, where the 'F' is my other bag?@! Apparently it was left in Chicago. They told me they would deliver it the next day to my parent's house in NH. Of course this was the bag with ALL OF MY GIFTS IN IT! All I could think of was fighting with AA all week long in a struggle to get a hold of my luggage before I had to go back to CA. BUT, worrying was unnecessary because they delivered it promptly the next morning, everything still in tact.

As I walked into my parent's house, I might as well have just been visiting from Boston. The only difference was the shiny new hardwood floors. Everything else was status quo. It was good to just be around my family though, talking to them in person and seeing their smiling faces. Plus, I came bearing a cold and it was comforting to be at 'home'. Thanks to Jerry I started my 'resting' immediately by staying up till 1am mindlessly and compulsively working on a puzzle in the basement.

Per usual, Christmas eve was spent going to the relatives after a quick stop off at friends of the family's house. This is where I always rock at least one toasted almond cocktail. Sooo good! All in all the whole Christmas eve ordeal was sort of surreal. Perhaps it was due to being jet lagged, slightly sick, or just not being fully in the holiday spirit. Either way, Christmas day was nice with the family, opening gifts. I got this super hipster Chrome bag that I've been dying for - it's waterproof and gives me street cred. But seriously, my old bag basically had the structure of a wet paper towel and was just waiting to disintegrate. Plus I got a DVD burner for my computer and a mango cutter - which completely rocks! Have you ever tried cutting a mango? It is not easy, but this cores it so simply. Seems frivolous, but if you like mangoes, it's worth it. I got a bunch of other great gifts too, like some artwork in hand painted frames, fishing rods, ski pass, word games, birdie salt and pepper shakers...the list goes on. Brag brag brag :)

After the holiday dinner, the rest of the day was spent with friends. It doesn't get better then that. Which leads into the day AFTER Christmas! The Potluck Party! How fun. I was so looking forward to this mostly because almost everyone was able to make it minus some NYC folk :(. Even Patrick made it up from MA to say hi. I feel it was a success. Everyone cooked food and brought it over. I don't think there was anything we didn't like. Plus we raised over $300, which is now over $600 with Jerry's company's match plan for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Not only that, there was game playing! See how excited, anatomically correct and shocked everyone looks?!
I hope we keep doing this every year, and knowing that I feel that way probably means it will happen! mwahahaha!

Thursday I headed down to Boston with Sandy. It was good to bop around Harvard Square together, do a little shopping, check everything out. Afterwards Gary and I caught up at Fugakyu! I absolutely LOVE their sushi and it was delicious! Plus on the drive to Erikka's house in JP we saw this! Then I got to see Erikka and Jason's new apartment in Jamaica Plain. It is great, and so perfect for them. I liked the handmade ornaments and decorations. There were also lots of little things showing both their awareness of being green - cloth napkins, natural soap and toothpaste, etc... Plus Erikka let me use Jason's pillow! (shhhh...) It was super comfy. Erikka and I spent some time walking around downtown JP and playing games. It was great just hanging out together, as always.

Friday night I got pizza on my way to Tom and Marna's. The cool thing was I was just walking by a place, and got a slice and it was good. It's tough to find good pizza in SF, although I've been pleasantly surprised a couple times. It was nice catching up with T&M and they even let me borrow one of their vehicles for the weekend so I could bring up my storage items from their basement to my parents to get ready to ship out to me.

Saturday I got to catch up with Greg for a few, drop by James's football watching party then chat with the lady's up at Char's parents. I wish there was a tape recorder for the conversations we had! I think I ate half of Charleen's food while I was there.

Then Sunday I headed back to Somerville. Got to go bowling at Sacco's Bowl Haven! It was the perfect ending to my stay on the east coast. That night it started sleeting and got really cold and it sort of made returning to SF a little easier.

Being home was really nice. I totally enjoyed hanging out with people and catching up. I feel really lucky to have such a good group of friends. It makes me sad to be so far away sometimes, but I know that we are always there for each other however we can be, no matter what, and that's pretty fricken' awesome.

I realized I didn't take nearly enough pictures while I was home, so if anyone has pictures from while I was in town, please send them! Thank you!

hi ho, hi ho, it's off to cut a christmas tree we go!

2007-12-16T23:27:00.001-08:00

ya, cheesy title, I know. I am very very aware.

So, today Jeremy and I went to cut down a tree for his condo! We tried to on Tuesday night, we made hot chocolate and everything

turns out they close at 5. Guess they don't want people sawing away at tree stumps in the dark. The whole cutting down your own tree thing was very exciting to me. I remember my dad used to cut ours down back in the day, but my sister and I never got to go with him. Not sure why you wouldn't want to bring a whiney kid along with you to complain about being cold and wanting hot chocolate :)

Anyways, we regrouped and decided on today instead. We drove through the entire tree cutting area, looking through lots L, J, G, D, B...A. We found 'the one' in A.

Jeremy starting the cut-down

me, getting prepared

me, trying to saw the tree, but not being very successful (but I do have a look of determination, or frustration, or constipation...

Jeremy being all 'manly'

The stump

I reassured the tree it would have a good home for its remaining days.

sister sister

2007-12-11T18:29:00.000-08:00

Ok, I'm going to say it. I'm lucky to have Sandy as a sister. I'm happy that we are able to get along and hang out. I was psyched to have her extend her work trip from the LA area and come up to SF to spend time with me. I even got to score a day off work!

So, we didn't make any solid plans, we took things as it came. Saturday I was having a craft party, so we started in on the gingerbread house that my parents has sent in a care package. That icing proved difficult to use tho! What didn't help was that a couple of the walls were cracked from shipping it 3,000 miles. We were almost done too, when it finally caved. Oh well!

Sunday I took Sandy to the infamous Mama's, which is basically a staple that I MUST TAKE EVERYONE WHO VISITS ME TO.
At least it seems to be the case. I don't mind though!
Afterwards we went to Golden Gate Park, to walk through the Botanical Gardens
and hit up the Conservatory of Flowers.
The conservatory was pretty awesome. It was broken up into five different rooms, each with various fauna for the region. I'm just going to post some pictures that I really enjoy from the day, but if you want to see more, check out the full album.

I like this one because the leaf was so huge!
Cool tortoise shell like plant

orchids (they had a lot of orchids actually!) i didn't realize some orchids grow on trees

some carnivorous plants

Ah yes, the obligatory face cut-out picture wall

After the conservatory, we happened upon a roller skating party complete with pumpin' jams and people doing hula hooping tricks! I know there's more video that Sandy has on her camera, but for now, this will have to do for your enjoyment, (oh and I apologize, I do not have the software needed to rotate them upright. You can always turn your monitor!)

The last one is obviously the finali! I'm pretty sure Sandy has one that shows me looking even MORE awkward if you can believe it.

A day at the park that ends in hula hooping is a damn good day!

Gallery 1988 Luke Chueh and More

2007-12-02T21:58:00.001-08:00

More art fun around SF. This weekend I caught the opening reception at Gallery 1988. Erikka told me about this artist Luke Chueh and I thought this would be a great opportunity to check his stuff out. He only had three pieces there among a bunch of other really fun and talented artwork.

I'll try to write who did what, but for those I don't remember, I'll just post them for some visual entertainment/stimulation.

Amy Sol

Peter Gronquist

Robert Fayze Pellicer

Walt Hall

Paul Barnes

Phil Holmes

Mari Inukai

Here are others I couldn't find the artist for:

Oh, I also wanted to mention Luke Chueh was there with another LA artist doing FREE one of a kind sketches, for their fans. I wanted to wait in line, but realized it would be at least 1-2 hours before I got my own drawing, so I moved on with my night. I just thought that was really great.

Then, I didn't make the opening of this, but did get a chance to head on over to check it out this afternoon: Post Postcard 11 @ The Lab.
It is basically a small format art sale. It was fun to see various work from local artists and I even bought a few.

guest weekend

2007-11-30T20:51:00.000-08:00

So in honor of having people visiting all last weekend for the holiday, I figured I'd share a little bit more and show off some of our adventures. It is cool having visitors because it definitely gets you to do fun things you've probably been wanting to do anyways.

Friday morning we met up with Perry, Heather, Jerry and Brian up in North Beach for some breakfast at Mama's. This is the best breakfast place I've eaten at in San Francisco, and probably one of my top 5 breakfast places ever. I plan on taking as many people here as possible. Anyways, there was a crew, my roommate Amanda came, plus Charleen and Jeremy. Afterwards, we walked up to Coit Tower
Yarrrr!

Later on we went to the Union Square Tree Lighting. Before...
I'm pretty sure it was a full moon! You can see it blurry in the upper left hand corner.
After!

After debating what to do next, we headed up to North Beach to get dinner with Perry and Heather and play some Guitar Hero III on Wii. Good choice! We ate french fry sandwiches from a local eatery (sooo good) and turned up the ROKK! Apparently, while Jerry and Brian were staying there, they stayed up till 3am at least every night playing Guitar Hero. SICK!
We tore ourselves away ONLY because it meant we could go to Bow Bow for some amazing karaoke. Somehow I only managed to record one song! This is Charleen singing Summer of '69. A classic.

Saturday morning we took the ferry to Oakland to eat at Kincaid's (Jeremy's place of employment).
He offered us some free clam chowder and, well, we are from the east coast! Plus we all got to admire him all dressed up in his 'work' clothes
Not only did we get some great, cheap food, we also got to taste 150 year old Grand Marnier!
This was sort of random
Later on that night we went to Vesuvio.
This is a cool little bar known for being famous writer's hangout, such as Jack Kerouac. It is located at Jack Kerouac alley too!
This is from upstairs, looking down onto the bar
The bathrooms had fun little vending machines. In the men's: and the women's:

Lastly, on Sunday, before Jerry, Brian and Charleen went to head back to Southern CA, we had brunch at Tangerine. Where Jerry threatened to hit me, or maybe it was give me a hi-five.
Something about rye bread if I remember correctly...

Turkeys in my house!

2007-11-28T12:14:00.000-08:00

Yup, it's true, Charleen, Jerry and Brian came up from Southern CA for Thanksgiving! I hosted about 9 people last Thursday. It was definitely the best alternative to being home with the family. Everyone chipped in and there was a ton of food to eat. I got a 14 lb turkey to cook, and with the thoughtfulness of my mom I had all the recipes and ingredients to make herb roasted turkey, stuffing, beer bread and pumpkin pie! So I did.

This is me holding the turkey and bagging it, and Brian peeling cukes:

Once all the prep was done, we got to relax with some cranberry mimosa's. Jerry doing the honors of opening the champagne

Then, tada! Look at all this food!
slowing down...

Here's everyone around the table

Then of course, per tradition at least in my household - cleaning every last bit off the turkey for leftovers! If this isn't enough to make you go vegetarian, not sure what is.

We took a little break and watched the Big Lebowski, at least till the second dream sequence, then had some pie!
helping myself, of course
yum!

I had so many leftovers! We tried to do a re-thanksgiving dinner on Saturday night. I think we finished off the candied yams and mashed potatoes but still had tons left. I had to toss everything out this week. There are still 3 flavors of pie left, thankfully I got roommates to help out with that! Just yesterday Mari had 4 pieces!

Thanks again for everyone that came and made food - you made this one of the best Thanksgivings ever!

zee Apartment

2007-11-11T17:44:00.000-08:00

Drum roll please...
Apartment pictures!!!

So, let's start with the exterior. Here is 95 Hancock St. It is a 3 story house, broken up into 3 separate apartments. The landlords live on the top floor. The people on the middle floor, I haven't met, but someone snores pretty loudly and I can hear it sometimes at night!
From there we move on into the house. To the direct left is Mari's room. Mari is one of my roommates. She's been in SF for about 10 years from what I gather and she recently sold her half of her dog walking/pet sitting business to her partner. She's from Sweden, and totally looks it too!

To the right and up a couple steps is the living room.

It's fully equipped with a fold out couch, TV, bookshelves, chairs and a view. I like it because it's cozy. That's Amanda, my other roommate sitting on the couch studying for her license exam. She's a therapist/social worker who's been in SF for about 4 years now. She's originally from NJ and she also owns a Bianchi! (we rode bikes today). The only strange thing about the living room is that our windows are at street level, really really really close to street level. One side of the house is on a hill, so literally it is about 6 inches from the tar.

If you walk into the living room, to your direct left is the 'blue' bathroom. What you can't see is a mirrored double closet opposite the sink.

Ok, so the other direction after you walk in the door, past Mari's room on the left is the hallway which takes you down to the two hallway closets (on the right) 2nd bathroom (on the right), my room (on the left), Amanda's room (straight) and kitchen (all way down on the right).

Here's the "pink/brown" bathroom with claw foot tub!
Seriously with all the bathroom space, I sometimes feel a little cheated with my 10x10 room.
Here's my room...I painted the walls Victorian yellow, or so it was called, and it has a nice golden tone to it. I think I spent a full hour at the paint store hemming and hawing over what color I wanted to go with, but it was worth it because I am pleased.

So this is looking into my room from the hallway. You can see my bedspread and queen sized bed that I acquired. I got it off craigslist and got a deal. Basically paid half of what I would of had to pay for a brand new full sized bed. It does take up a lot of room, but I think it's worth it, and it's so much more comfortable then my old IKEA mattress! You can also see my green bureau find, also off craigslist. The woman I bought it from is pretty sure it was hand built, and it definitely looks like it. It has really fun lion face handles and I lined it with some vintage inspired black and white flower vinyl stuff.
On the other side is my desk, some shelves I just put up this weekend and a little cabinet thing. All from IKEA.

This one is looking back into the hallway
Then there's the eat-in kitchen, which I think is a decent size with good counter space.
That little door on the right is just a mini storage area with the hot water heater. Then if you walk through the kitchen to the left there's the laundry area.

Then....the backyard zen garden! This one is looking out from under the deck stairs at the cottage out back. We share our laundry facilities with the woman who lives there.

Our landlords own a flower shop I believe so they like to take care of this area. It's basically for everyone to enjoy that lives in the house.

Well, that's all I got. I hope you enjoyed your little tour! Come visit soon :)

Gallery 16 Rex Ray Exhibit

2007-11-10T14:29:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I had a few minutes to squeeze in an art gallery exhibit opening for Rex Ray. It was held at Gallery 16, which I thought was a cool little art space. I find his artwork really colorful and fun to look at. It is hard to tell from the pictures but it is collage work, layered paper over paper and probably some painting, I'm not too sure.
Here are some pictures for your enjoyment.

These were my favorite, I like the long shape and they had a gloss overlay. I think it could make a really funky coffee table.

I really liked the choice of brown in this one:

And here are some others:

While I was there, I noticed they also have a custom letterpress print shop there as well called One Heart Press. I liked the name.

Hallow's Eve 2x

2007-10-31T22:47:00.000-07:00

So, I sort of got to celebrate Halloween twice, once this weekend (would have been twice if the Two Gallants show got out earlier!) and then tonight.

This weekend I was in sort of a dilemma, not having time to prepare, find a costume, shop around, etc... The thing is, I always feel I need to 'be' something, but honestly, half the people who dress up, just dress up all crazy, and they aren't necessarily anything in particular.
Anyways, my Halloween shopping consisted of me leaving work early and hitting up one store before my Friday night began. I bought a whistle.
I got invited to a party through a coworker I don't know all that well. He actually picked us up in his Element or something like that, which didn't have seats in the back so Jeremy and I were sitting on the floor of the car getting tossed around. Anyways, here's an overview of the party scene:

It's a good thing I bought that whistle. As you can see, or not see, I'm some sort of gym teacher/camp counselor. Still haven't really decided. Probably more like a gym teacher though.

After they ran out of booze, we wandered out, and found the inner mission. complete with pinball. so we played.

Then we snagged two stella artois goblets. oh ya, we are the COOL-est kids around.

Tonight was a little different. When I got home from work I placed my carved pumpkin and Andy's (since he left it here) out on the stoop for festiveness. Please notice the pumpkin banner thing on the front door, that's from my parent's Boo package!

Then after sitting on my ass watching Crazy Love and not really knowing what to think, I wandered out onto the streets, using some gear Amanda had lying around in her Halloween costume container. She dubbed me little dead riding hood.

I met up with Ferris, Ashely and some of her friends at Transfer. But I saw this guy first when I was crossing Market. He honestly stopped and posed for me for about 5 seconds while I tried frantically to get my camera to take a picture

Ashely, her friend and Sharkhead
ooo, scary!
meep!

NOTHING was really going on. There were tons of cops out patrolling the streets, which Ferris noted probably made the rest of SF scary to be in.

At least we saw these costumes!
This was probably the scariest.
front
and back

I apparently handed my camera to some stranger on the street and told him to take my picture. I honestly thought it was Ferris, but it wasn't. I swear I didn't have one drink! At least he took a decent photo.

So, after wandering up Market and down Castro I made my way home, satisfied with myself for at least getting out of the house for a little while. Plus I got to see about 6 cops taking a picture with a black and white spotted great dane that was wearing a fireman's cap. Priceless.

Pumpkin Carving Extravaganza!

2007-10-28T09:41:00.000-07:00

This past Sunday I had some friends over to do a little festive pumpkin carving! Here's how it went:

Everyone hard at work:

Kate drawing out her raven
Ashley heavily debating her handlebar mustachio-ed man or bat idea
Brad's completed jack o' lantern
Andy trying to make sense of Jeremy's creation
Jeremy digging deep, uh, maybe too deep from the look on his face

Then of course, pumpkin carving wouldn't be complete without lemon meringue pie, pumpkin raisin oatmeal cookies, hot apple cider and some red sox? Whaaaa?!

Last, but not least, our finished creations
Kate's

Andy's

Mine

Brad's

Jeremy's (which is in the light so you can see all the detail)

& Ashely's

Happy Halloween!

muir woods

2007-10-27T21:47:00.000-07:00

Went to Muir Woods National Monument this weekend with Jeremy, Dayana and Paul. It was a beautiful Saturday, sunny, not too hot. However, Paul and Dayana brought their dog Chica - seen here trying to squeeze onto the middle console
Muir Woods apparently does not allow animals. So that was a bummer, but they found some other trails to stroll around on though while Jeremy and I tried to do a little hike for about 2 hours.
This is the type of place better explained through pictures. So here you go.
These are from the path on the way into the park

Here are a couple from the trail itself

This one shows the remains of a burnt up tree

I love how the branches spiral upwards on this one
tree face!

there were so many ladybugs all over this fallen tree.

The Jeremy series...walking over a fallen down tree

Some more great shots

It was great to be out in nature, walking around in the trees. It is astounding how incredibly tall they are.
The only thing that could have made the trip better would have been hot chocolate with whipped cream waiting for us afterwards. Oh ya, and Chica not getting a tick on her 'you know what'. (It's true! She went pee in some leaves and got one on her private part! Poor dog...I'm happy to report it has been removed and she is fine.)

graffiti alley

2007-10-24T22:18:00.000-07:00

So there's an alley way off Valencia St., next to a thrift shop. I've dubbed it graffiti alley, although I'm sure I'm not the first to call it that. I had posted a couple pictures already for when Ferris and I went there the first weekend I was in San Francisco.

I don't think I'm going to write much, but instead just post the pictures up for your enjoyment. I find them incredible.

On the way into the alley:

Ferris checking stuff out:
My favorite one:

Hearts of Gold, Fists of Fury!

These are more I took this past weekend when Jeremy and I revisited graffiti alley:

Oldie but goodie:
These two bunnies framed the middle of the building where there were stairs and windows. If you can't read it, the left one says 'No War for Heavy Metal' and it's farting a bubble that says 'We are scum'. The right one says 'There Goes the Neighborhood'.

I love seeing artwork up and around in the city. I already have a number of random sidewalk stencil art as well that I've taken pictures of.

They are definitely not as impressive as the wall graffiti, but they are really fun to come upon walking around the city.

Sealife and Ice Cream

2007-10-17T21:30:00.000-07:00

Took the day off work and went down to the Monterey Bay Aquarium with Jeremy. It is a pretty popular aquarium. My roommate told me they even had a great white shark there at one point. Anyways their newest exhibit is sea otters!
They are so f'n cute! They like to float around on their backs and look all cute and cute cute CUTE! ack! Just in case you don't believe me, check out this youtube fav:
I didn't see that happen while I was there, but, that's ok..
Another highlight was watching this guy: move around the glass. I accidentally took this photo with my flash, didn't realize the setting I chose had auto flash. Poor Mr. Octopus.
I was also really impressed with all their jellyfish! They are mesmerizing to watch swim around. They really freak me out in nature, I can only imagine one of them wrapping their long tendrils around my leg and stinging me to death. However, these photos are just so surreal.

I think the highlight of the entire trip was experiencing what they call the Ocean Sunfish. Jeremy and I decided it looked like some floating rock blubber type creature reject from the neverending story. I could only sort of capture its oddness on film.

Another bonus to the aquarium. Monterey is fricken pretty.

After all that fun, we grabbed some awesome food at Blue Moon on Cannery Row. I had one of the best Ahi Tuna sandwiches ever! Then it was off to Santa Cruz for some old school arcade games. I'd like to point out I beat Jeremy 3 times in a row at air hockey. Then he schooled me at pretty much every other game we played. I was disappointed to find out that the skeeball room was closed! What the hell?!

We finished off right though at the local creamery - Marianne's. I had some delicious caramel ice cream with fudge swirl and oreo mix complimented with bittersweet chocolate.
Talk about some happy campers!

Pumpkin Face

2007-10-13T20:30:00.000-07:00

So, this weekend I heard about a Pumpkin Festival in Half Moon Bay. I was stoked. Being a little homesick, I was determined to check it out with my 'free' weekend. I'm pretty sure this was my first free weekend that wasn't already planned out for me since I've been here. (Trust me, I am NOT complaining).
Anyways, Ferris came with me. After the shitty rain we had on Friday, the weather was gorgeous. My co-worker warned me to take the 1, which was not a problem. For those of you who aren't familiar with the 1, it is the pacific coast highway, the route that hugs the coast for the length of CA. I only stopped off once, but I was more then pleased with my pictures. I couldn't get enough of those feather looking plants. They were all over the hillsides, blowing in the breeze. Plus, the sky color was just amazing.

The festival itself was free, and packed with people. Ferris and I walked around and happened upon the Kahlua truck! So, we stopped and sipped/gulped on some delicious frozen treats. There was some music and way too many arts & crafts being sold for my taste. I did get a glimpse of the pumpkin pie eating contest. It was hard to see around the crowd, but one girl looked up from her pie with a 'oh my god, what the fuck am I doing right now' look on her face, then her dad did all but shove her face back into the pie with his 'c'mon! get back in there!' cheering.
We finished off the trip with a sugar high, I opted for the pumpkin 'tart' which was basically a miniature pie with some canned whip cream on top and Ferris got the pumpkin roll. We figured this place would be good seeing as they've kept the same pie recipe since 1927.
It was pretty darn good, but then afterwards I saw an even better looking slice of pumpkin pie complete with homemade whipped cream and I couldn't help but feel a little cheated.

The Job Scenerio

2007-09-26T09:10:00.000-07:00

The past couple of days have been pretty crazy for me. Last Friday I accepted a position at Teecom, an architecture engineering consultant firm. This was sort of unexpected, since the position was offered to me within 10 minutes of me leaving the interview! Needless to say, I called my Oakland newfound friend Jeremy and we got ice cream...wait, it was gelato, to celebrate.
The thing about Teecom is that the position isn't quite for a mechanical engineer, it's a junior design engineer. Doesn't sound much different, but it would be a completely different field for me, and sort of a niche. This was both scary and exciting.

Fast forward to Monday. Sparkfactor Design. This is a product development consulting firm. Similar to the days when I co-oped at Fitch and Altitude. Fun company, great people, very creative environment. We interview and THEY offer me a position. This is the type of job I dreamt about in Boston, having a product development company take me under their wings and teach me the ropes. I feel this is the type of company that will make or break me as a mechanical engineer.

So, after a lot of debating back and forth, I realized I need to work for Sparkfactor. If I have any hopes of really becoming a good mechanical engineer, this is where I need to be. Granted it's going to take me twice as long to commute there, but in the end, I think this is going to be the best decision.

Now, I'm going to sit back, enjoy the rest of my week/weekend and set up my new bedroom! Yay!