Sunday, May 30, 2004
I was looking for this Hunter S. Thompson quote some time back and finally found it again (turns out I must have seen it first as the signature on my friend's email. So he just sent me an email & I was like - hey! there it is! :)
"The USA is going to pieces rapidly. This once proud nation of hoodlums and whores and the American Way has finally run amok and is effectively Out of control, and will not recover. The infrastructure is too far gone. The looting, cheating, stealing and failure have stripped this country of its assets, its pride, its success and its security. The National Treasury is empty, the Stock Market will never recover, our troops in Iraq will never come home. You will not find a job, ever again. Your children will drink dirty water for the rest of their lives. You will lose your home and all your personal savings. You will never be able to retire or even stop working, and you will be a serf, a terminally indentured servant to one of the vast anonymous and eternally war-like global corporations that will rule the world for their own reasons and profit."
- Hunter S. Thompson, 2004
This quote sums up the fears I have about bringing children into this world... I mean, I know it's the extreme Hunter S. Thompson talking, but I think he's onto something here.
We'll see!
Saturday, May 29, 2004
Ok, I'll apologize in advance that this will be short. I have to try to get a few more hours of work in today before heading out for some of the most mouth watering, fresh and delicious sushi in the city!!
OK - so yesterday I: worked all day, ran some errands, went & worked out w/ Rebecca, quickly came back here to get ready, met up with Rick, Rebecca and her friends Moses & Ethan for some yummy Thai food, and
then hit the Trans Am show at GAMH.
The openers (we missed
Movies) Les Georges Leningrad were horrible train wrecks of a band. They sorta had some cool beats, and the freak show of it was mildly entertaining (lead singer chick with white face, wig & old hat and scars painted on her arms & face - and drummer dude with bat mask, some sort of batman outfit of sorts and blood and scars and stuff all over him), but the lead vox chic's voice is RETCHID and we were all just wincing every minute in a countdown till they got OFF the stage.
Thankfully they did, and shortly after that we got to see
Trans Am. They don't have a lot of vocals, which honestly I knew I was going to miss a little, but it wasn't that bad! They're great musicians, and the bass player (uh, also does keyboards and vocals and even switched over to bass!) has an extremely entertaining face to watch - and they really sounded great. It can seem gratuitously jammy to the laymen, but this is their deal & they've been doing it for years. It's just fascinating to watch rock that doesn't have a lead singer as most bands do. I actually often thought the awesome guitar sounds were vocals, which is a cool effect (and or wishful thinking on my part). They do break out the vocals here & there - either of the 3 guys adding to a song here & there. Which is cool. I love bands who mix it up & everyone does a little bit of everything.
The coolest thing was watching the kick ass drummer. I had seen
this photo, and fire or not, I was really looking forward to seeing the drummer after reading
Jake's review. He totally ripped it UP on the drums. Plus he wasn't wearing any pants. (oh alright, he took off his pants, but was still wearing small shorts). BeeDub was at the show & he said I knew I'd love the drummer, and then added that he also thought I might like him cuz he's such a "beefcake". hahhaa Who says that? :p But yes, the man was very ripped. I actually really liked his streak of blond hair, too. Anyway - he f*in rocked the drums... and there was one beat sequence he was doing that I would love to emulate someday (aah, the eventual someday). And I wish I'd pointed the song out to BeeDub so he coulda told me what track it was and found it later to practice. Oh well. Anyway - the drummer ruled!
Oh & they also did this awesome mic effect that made the singer's voice all robotic. That's the answer to my voice problems! I don't have to be worried about having a great voice - I can just sing like a robot!! AWESOME! I'll even through in a little
Goldchain's / Nina Oppenheim inspired Robot Dance :D aww yaaa
After the show Moses, Rick & I headed over to The Hemlock for a few more drinks. (By this time I had quite a few and was having a great time!) We all chatted over a few more beers and even got to see the Trans Am dudes stroll in around 1:30am! I high fived the drummer and he talked to us for about 2 minutes about how lame it is that our bars close at 2am. No kidding! :p Then on the way out I gave props to the bass player. I'll bet BeeDub wishes he woulda stayed to chat it up with them!
Anyway - such a great night!
:::
This morning was relaxing and now I'm home working. As always too much to do in very little time. Tonite we're takin it easy - probably sushi & a movie. woohoo!
(hahaa, it turns out it wasn't short! jeeshk - now I really have to work!)
Special K Red Berries cereal is *really* good. The strawberries really do taste like real strawberries! It's delicious! I recommend slicing up a banana on top and eating while watching morning cartoons with someone you love.
::
I think my feet would get too hot in
Uggs, and they're really not my style - but I kinda think the pink ones are cool.
::
Sprouts are a fantastic addition to any sandwich. (namely, mine) Oh, and I switched it up & bought some Monterey Jack. A nice change from the cheddar, but honestly cheddar just RULES.
Friday, May 28, 2004
I love fonts! I got a whole bunch the other day & went to town activating them in
Suitcase. I have used Suitcase before, but I really should read through a manual - or atleast I'd love chatting with someone who knows how to use it really effectively.
I ended up activating a number of fonts before going into the preferences and turning OFF the "override system fonts" option. And now every once and awhile I get this error message:
But I don't know what to do about it - Do you?
UPDATE: My friend tipped my off that it was probably a duplicates issue and my computer didn't know which one to use... so I went into Suitcase & under Tools / Manage Duplicates I was able to clear up the Helvetica's I didn't want the system to be seeing & so hopefully now it's all fixed.
This week's been insane! oy! Lots of work, but it's feelin good and I'm hittin all my deadlines (for the most part). I take on too much! But oh well.. it's a positive problem and I love being busy!
SO today is Friday and that's good because then tomorrow is Saturday. Saturday is my favorite day of the week. Even if I have to work, it just has such a nice ring to it.
Are you guys getting slammed w/ these undeliverable emails as much as I am? Is there any way to stop it? I mean, not just me getting the emails, but to have the spammers stop using my domain? It's always some stupid email like rslkdf@willotoons.com that they've sent it from. Check it out this is what I woke up to in my inbox this morning - All in a row!!
Sucks eh?
Also can the lady with the horrible voice stop practicing her singing so close to her window? (I hope they don't say that about me if I start taking singing lessons some day) but this lady is really not that good. Time to turn my music on...
Happy Friday everybody!
Thursday, May 27, 2004
Soundtrack while my Mom was here:
AIR, Talkie Walkie (which she loved)
Mr. Airplane Man, C'mon DJ
The Beta Band (which she also liked)
The Casual Dots
Sondre Lerche (which I only put in thinking she'd like and she didn't)
Sleater-Kinney (preparing for the show, but it didn't stay in long cuz it was a little too hard for her, I think)
The Evening
Franz Ferdinand
Ambulance, Ltd.
Right now I'm loving all of the above named bands and a few more:
Rilo Kiley
Brassy
Replicator (that Conan just gave me, it's good!)
Metric (still! I can't stop singing "Old World Underground, Where are you now?" Probably because the poster is hanging on my wall now and I subconciously see it everytime I go into the kitchen)
I've also been trying to listen to Trans Am to get ready for Friday's show - but I'm not sure what to think of it yet. I have a feeling they'll be a band I need to see live to "get". The CD is all over the place, but I've heard they're great live, so we shall see!
:::::: Mountain Goats Review:
We went to a show lastnight at BoTH - Mountain Goats w/ openers: Frog Eyes - and - Destroyer.
Frog Eyes was totally entertaining. When we first came in we were both like "oh no"... but after stepping up closer & watching him I got into it. This guy is just going for it up there... he is spastic and his voice is a total instrument as he sings, then goes really high pitched, then yells, then oohs & aahs... all the while freaking out on his guitar and girating around. Now I have respect for this cuz this guy has really found his expression. I mean, he's not just playin it safe or goin main stream - he's feelin it and acting on it and freakin out in his very own way. Good on ya, man! Rick said he reminded him of a mix between Jack Black and the lead singer of Les Savy Fav.
Destroyer came on & it was all the same people from Frog Eyes except a new lead singer and the Frog Eyes spastic lead was now the backup vox/guitar guy. Still the most entertaining member in the band. Rebecca, Dave and a bunch of their friends were there and agreed he was great to watch - gnawing on his tongue and all sweaty (his shirt was soaked in sweat everywhere but on one nipple, hmm - we made up reason why that nipple somehow was immune to sweat :). Destroyer played some very pretty songs - I really liked them, however think they'd be a band I'd rather listen to on a CD at home. They sorta played one song too many (however the crowd was totally diggin em, so I suppose it was justified). I tried to close my eyes several times to get a feel for what that would be like.. but overall it just didn't rock my socks off. But they've got talent, and the spastic man, so woohoo.
Mountain Goats was next up - I ran into Jeff & Leslie Veen and Merlin (I finally met Merlin!) who were very excited to see the MG go on, so excited Jeff was *threatening* to stage dive or start a pit. HA. (the man is like 6'5", so that's why this is scary and funny all at the same time.) I love running into him though - he's the nicest guy.
I didn't know what to expect from the Mountain Goats. I just hadn't listened to them enough to have gotten a feel for what he was really all about. I actually only had 3 songs at the end of a British Sea Power disc someone burned me - and I JUST got "We Shall All Be Healed", a few weeks ago. But I knew I wanted to check them out live.
Oddly enough I have to admit that I think somewhere in the back of my head I kept relating them to
The Goats, who were this rap band I listened to in college. hahaa. John Darnielle (Mountain Goats front/main man) is *so* not rappin up there.
Instead, he had an acoustic guitar and sat on a stool, and was accompanied by a bass player.. the combo was fantastic. He was funny between songs and just has a demeanor you want to like. I didn't think he was too nasaly (which some people say), I felt the songs were well written and his playing, facial expressions, everything were great.
It was a packed house (sold out, I'm pretty sure) so it was really stuffy in there and near the end we decided to go to the back to cool off. This is actually skirting on this whole post I planned to write about how the glamour of going to shows seems so fun and rockstar lifestyle. But one of the evil side effects is that you're with a bunch of people who haven't showered for a good 12+ hours, and they've just eaten dinner. Which means you're sandwiched in with these people who let these god damn SBD's go and it's GROSS! Please don't fart around me people... I'm trying to enjoy the show!!
ps sorry no linkage love on the above. use your google powers!
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
Here's me & my pretty Momma enjoying my new patio set:
me taking a pic of my mom taking a pic!
And check out this cool caterpillar living on the fennel plant in the backyard!
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
I got home around 7:45 tonite, prepared to be here for Conan who was stopping by to take some old things I had offered up (that were just takin up space in my garage): My old (and broken) AIWA stereo, a throw rug and my old laundry basket with broken handles. He was stoked on the free stuff & I was stoked on getting rid of it. WIN/WIN! woohoo!!
He even gave me a CD of his band,
Replicator. RAD. They're playing with
Lower 48 (that my friend Grady plays a mean bass in) on Sunday at the Edinburg Castle, so I'm gonna try to hit it.
The Moggs are playing there, too, who I've heard a lot about - so should be a good show.
Sunday nights can be tough for shows, depending on what the weekend has in store, but it sounds like a fun show and I wanna get out & support those guys - so I hope to make it. And I'm psyched to listen to his CD a few times to get a bit more familiar w/ the tracks.
So shortly after I got home I decided to pick up my book. I'm reading
The Fountainhead right now, except I hardly have time to read. Well tonite it sucked me in! I made dinner and thought I'd read just a little more while I ate - and then a little later I dogeared it & put it down - but all of a sudden it's 11:15 already! wowie!
I love getting lost in a good book. This one I'm hardly 160 pages into (it's thick) but so far it's good. I'm interested in seeing where it's going.
I can't believe tomorrow is already Wednesday. I have so much going on this week that there really is no time to just be reading my book for a couple hours! But it was nice.
OK, now back to work.
Today my landlords had to switch off our electricity again (they've been installing some new light fixtures) and so I headed out to work in a cafe. It was the FIRST TIME!!! Can you believe it?! I mean, I've gone & brainstormed in a cafe, done some sketches for an illustration or a website - and we worked a little in Austin - but this was the first time here in SF, out at a cafe with my *laptop*. :) Exciting!
After a quick morning here at home, organizing the last lonely pile that never got sorted through before my Mother came, I was ready to head out the door. I met up with my friend (and fellow
Flash Goddess)
Adrienne down at her local hangout
The Grove, in the Marina.
I used to love The Grove. It's cozy and they have yummy food (albeit overpriced) and a nice atmosphere. But, I guess I haven't really been there much in the last couple years though, cuz they've changed it around. And I can safely say I haven't been there during the day where you walk in to find atleast 7 people in there working away on their laptops. haha! Guess that's the place to be if you work for yourself in the Marina, eh?
When I had asked Adrienne if she wanted to meet up today she'd asked if I was going stir crazy at home. No way. I love working at home! And today's virgin cafe experience just drove it home all the more. I mean, sure it was cool to have someone to talk to every once and awhile, but I couldn't help but notice the luxuries I was missing.
First off, everyone is sitting on hard wooden benches. They have pillows on them, but still - they're not my comfy
Aeron chair! And the table I was at was kinda rickety, so when I got to typing fast the table would sway back & forth. Not even a napkin lodged under the foot helped, I think it was the actual screws from the post into the table top. But with only a few tables available and being all set up, I just rolled with it.
Then there's the annoying music (mental note, bring headphones next time!). In a cafe you're at the mercy of whatever they have playing... 'nuff said. Not to mention the various people, conversations, children, etc. One today that was especially annoying, was the hour + long uber corporatey, interviewey, over-used-business-lingoey, shmooze fest. Ug. I wouldn't even work in that office environment for money let alone have to be subjected to it's blabber against my will! I was so glad when they left.
I definitely missed the comforts and conveniences of my little home. I missed my 5 CD player, spinning my favorite tunes on my kickin stereo. I missed my kitty coming up & saying hello every once & awhile (and/or the comforts of being able to take a 5 minute snuggle break when he's looking irrisistably snuggleable. :) And lastly, I missed my big 19" flat screen monitor that I hook up to my powerbook to have a
duel screen monitor. It's sweeeet.
Instead of my tasty homemade melted cheese sandwich creations, I had an overpriced BLT with "gourmet chips" (and a tasty pickle which honestly earned the worth of 1/2 of the entire $8 meal, since it just about topped the rest!). And in the afternoon I split a big cookie with Adrienne.
Total cost of the day: $10.50
Oh & driving all the way to the Marina (way across town from my place) AND having to move my car once, since I don't have the right neighborhood parking sticker you can only park for 2 hours in one place at a time.
All in all, not worth going back to that specific cafe, as mostly it's just out of my way. But with all that said I am still stoked I'm mobile.
p.s. Today was also the first time my laptop rode in the new comforts of my awesome new
Booq laptop bag! It's PERFECT!
Oh my gawd... I can't believe it but I just got a letter from the DPT saying I overpayed something and they're giving me a refund of $25. It's a miracle! For all that I've payed them (which is I'm sure how I lost track, I was getting a lot of tickets there for awhile and disgruntly paying them or disputing them) now they're paying me! wooohoo!!
It's a damn good thing, too, cuz I just got two more last week!
Monday, May 24, 2004
OK, Mom is safely on her plane (or atleast I hope so, cuz I left her at the airport) - and now I'm back to work. Oh computer how I missed you so. Oh shopping how I'll miss you till we meet again. hahaa
Today was shoe shopping day. Oh & my Momma helped me figure out my Quicken - I was off in my balances and didn't know how to fix it so I had practically abandoned the program for the last couple months. But my Mom is an accounting extraordinaire, so she helped me! woohoo! I'm psyched to finally get back on track with that. There's so much the program offers, it's hard to learn it all! That & I've changed up my invoicing between doing them in word, then using Quicken and now I use iWork - so I've got to get it all in there and streamline my deposits - yadda yadda yadda. I'm sure you're so enthralled, but to me it's exciting. I'm learning how to run my small little business better & better every day! The artist part of me struggles with the accounting. Except for depositing checks - I know how to do that really well :) hahaa.
Alright so lets see... My mom found some shoes today, but I didn't. There's these light pink loafers I *almost* got, but didn't. I'm a penny pincher. And it's really amazing how you can look at like 200 some shoes and not find any you like! Well, I'm picky I guess. I seriously just look for ones exactly like my favorites - and end up walking out empty handed.
I'm gonna look on
zappos though - I'm hoping it will let me search for all light beige leather (aka blond leather/tan) I have 2 pairs that are lighter leather and I love em. I also could have like 20 pairs of red shoes. Blah blah blah. Can you tell I have shopping on the brain?
Yesterday we went to IKEA and my Mom wasn't impressed at all. I was sure we'd walk out spending gobs, but she was like 'whatever!' and after all that dealing with the crowds and walking through the store, we came out empty handed! CRAZY! However I did see a bookshelf/filing combo thing that's just what I've been looking for. Except I want a drawer addition, and the guy said they wouldn't be out until July.
I got these super cute jammies though this weekend at Target. They have these cutie #'s on em and make me want to sing that Sesame Street song "1, 2, 3, 4, 5 - 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 - eeelleeven, tweeeheeelve!"
Have I told you how much I love Target? See, we're not the shopping gluttons that hit BCBG or Nordstroms. Oh no! We're down for the DEALS! Give me 5 new peices of clothing for $100 or less, please. That's my kinda shopping :)
Ok, but really I have to work now. Busy week ahead of me!
It's monday and I've had quite the weekend!!!
Friday night was so nice, my Mom and I met up with a friend of hers from Steamboat and her daughter, who's going to the same art school I went to: Colorado Institute of Art in Denver. It was fascinating to hear what the school is like now vs 10 years ago when I was there!
We all went to
Bacar and my Mom and I had yummy cosmopolitans and we all feasted on some very delicious food.
Saturday - let the shopping begin!!! My Mom (in true Motherly spirit) insisted on helping me get a few things for my house. Well, who am I to argue, huh?
So guess what I got? A whole patio set!! It's awesome!!!! I'm soo excited about it. I'm SOO having a BBQ!!! I can't wait!!! I've had random furniture out on my deck for the last year, but have desperately needed a little cafe table & chairs. And this set is darling. AND I got a cute matching bench. It's totally more than I ever would have bought for myself... so it feels luxurious! I'm so psyched.
Saturday night we met up with the Rickster for a yummy dinner at Tin Pan. My Mom loved it and it was fun to have them meet for the first time. My Mom loved him and Rick thinks my Mom is cool - and it's undeniable that the lady is just gorgeous, if I do say so myself. :) Bodes well for your boyfriend to see how pretty your momma is, huh? haha.
So after our yummy dinner, we dropped Mamacita off and then headed to the Sleater Kinney show. Two words: Janet. Weiss. Three more: Oh. My. Gawd.
Janet Weiss is the drummer extraordinaire behind Quasi and Sleater Kinney - and she totally BLEW the top off the place!!!!! I'm so gonna be a drummer and I can only hope to be a drummer who rocks as hard.
Seeing Sleater Kinney was AWESOME!!!!!! It was my first time and I absolutely LOVED it and had a GREAT time!!!!! I can't wait to see them again. KICK ASS.
Sunday was shopping, shopping and more shopping. We didn't get started till late, but then ended the day with a delicious dinner at Park Chow (and 2 bottles of Chimay - yumm!)
Today we gotta quickly go do a little more (yup you guessed it) SHOPPING.
Gotta run - more later. Happy Monday.
Friday, May 21, 2004
My Mamacita lands today - woohoo!
If you heard how hard I've scrubbed my house in anticipation for her arrival you'd laugh. I've realized I'm quite the clean freak. But this is like much needed spring cleaning anyway - really I should have her come more often! :)
Anyway - I didn't post this yesterday & I meant to. Happy 3rd Birthday, baby boy:
::::
Tonite we're going out for a fancy dinner & then over the weekend we may hit Big Sur or wine country... And of course - do what Mothers & Daughters do best: SHOP! woohoo!!!
Have a great weekend peeps.
Thursday, May 20, 2004
I stayed up late working lastnight and meant to get up early this morning, but I think my body refuses to get less than 7 hours of sleep and I completely slept right through my alarm! I don't know *how* that happens when it's the most annoying beeping sound. Selective hearing I guess! :p
So I made myself a delicious soy latte and a bowl of Life cereal and sat down to work. And guess what? My friend Jem wrote me a poem! (note she has a *secret* blog, so I have a code name. And her blog is really really good by the way. I wish I could share it with you all cuz she's so damn funny and her music reviews are really good! but I can't - it's secret!) This poem is from when she came over the other night & we had a little music swap and dinner. :)
Mid-morning Ode
W-gal, W-gal, sweet and fair,
I am glad I burned you Air.
Thanks for sending me off with a spindle of tunes,
I will be occupied til the end of June.
I like Pedro the Lion and Ben Kweller,
W-gal, W-gal, you are stellar!
Thanks for feeding me Pizza (Supreme),
W-gal, W-gal, you're the girl of my dreams.
How awesome is that? :) I love that Jemmy.
:::
So then check this out! Not but 10 minutes later I get an email from Eoin (long time reader, biggest fan of kazoobie posts, and he's Irish! who doesn't love a nice Irishman!?) who found an old old Irish (8th century) poem
online that he'd read in school, called Pangur Bas (meaning white felix). It's about an Irish monk who worked at home (on a manuscript) with his cat. And since it's very much like the way I work at home with my kitty (13 centuries later), Eoin rewrote it for me & Kazoo! :)
Kazoo and Willo
Willo and Fuzzy Pants her cat,
'Tis a like task they are at:
Hunting mice is his delight,
Fixing websites she sits all night.
Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit in screen-lit den;
Kazoo bears her no ill-will,
He too plies his simple skill.
'Tis a merry sight to see
At their tasks how glad they be,
When at home they sit and find
Entertainment to their mind.
Oftentimes a (toy) mouse will stray
In the hero Kazoobie's way;
Oftentimes Willo's keen thought set
Will add a new page to the Net.
'Gainst the toy Kazoo sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly!
'Gainst the web of knowledge try
willo her flashy wisdom ply!
When, to play, Willo leaves her den,
O how glad is Kazoobie then!
And Willo's gladness never sags
She always finds those errant tags.
So in peace their tasks they ply,
Willo and her cat, Kazoo-bye;
In their arts they find their bliss,
She has hers and he has his.
Practice every day has made
Kazoo perfect in his trade;
Willo gets wisdom day and night
Turning darkness into light.
How fun!! These 2 things made my day! Thank you J & E! xoxo
Wednesday, May 19, 2004
Lastnight we went to see
Super Size Me, and it was awesome. The Director and main dude in the movie, Morgan, is hilarious. They do a great job of editing and it's absolutely amazing (and disgusting) to see the effects of his experiment over just a mere 30 days. Go check it out if you can.
Look how funny
this photo is. It made me laugh out loud. There's lots of good one's on this
Found Magazine site, check it out. [link from
Slim]
Sadly
this girl's kitty (or maybe it's her exboyfriend Patrick's), Diesel, just died unexpectedly :( I happened upon her site via comment's she'd left on
Jason's blog, but caught the story on her homepage and It's amazing to me how similar our kitties are in the games they play, and how we feel about them!
I say this *exact* thing about my kitty:
"... I look at every piece of fur on his little face and think what a miracle of nature he is, all that DNA to colorize each individual piece of hair to come together in his intricate tiger pattern. I'd look at his perfect little eye lashes, his brick red nose. Every stripe, every spot, every whisker of him I had committed to memory."
And we even used to sing that "I love my kitty" song to the tune of "You are my sunshine" to Kazoobie, too. :)
I'm not sure how long she'll have the story about Diesel up on her site... but I'm very, very sorry to hear that she's lost him. :( Rest in Peace, Diesel kitty!
:::::::
Also I just wanted to say that I hope Matt doesn't read the post below. I don't want to hurt his feelings... but I don't think he reads my site anymore anyway. They're just my feelings I need to get out, and I think he gets that. Reading that story about Diesel and thinking of the song thing, made me remember one very wonderful thing about Matt - which was that he always made up silly songs. I loved that about him.
I'm crankin away on a deadline today so I'm hardly on IM or email at all... and I have BAM later - oy! But quickly I'll say hello...
Yesterday my ex, Mateo, came over for a little Kazoobie bday celebration. Kazoo got some nice new treats, kitty grass, yummy wet food, fuzzy mice and a even few other toys! Way to go, Dad! (Kazoo's Dad = Mateo) (yes, we're crazy for our kitties)
Kazoo had a GREAT time and we played with his mouse and ball and he chomped on some grass and a few treats. Once again, the FP is a lucky lil' guy and I just love him to pieces. It's nice that Matt does too - cuz not everyone understands that bond and love between you and your pet. He's seriously like my first born, except I hope that I don't yell at my real kids "Can you stop it? You're driving me crazy!" That would be bad.
Seeing Matt was good - he looks good, but we didn't have much to talk about. He didn't ask me anything about me, which I guess means he just doesn't wanna hear it. So I tried to make conversation, but it's all very simple surface chatter that doesn't go anywhere before we just start playing or talking to Kazoo again. How dumb. How could I have been with the guy for 4.5 years and now we can't even hold up a f*ing conversation? It's annoying. There's also just little parts of our conversations where I'm reminded how he used to be. Traits I don't miss, like how I feel like he's somehow mildly making fun of me or putting me down - even when he says the simplest things. I mean, maybe these things he says is his way of trying to relate and joke with me, but instead it comes across as derogatory. ug... I don't miss that at all. But I know it's not his fault, and it certainly doesn't make him a bad person - as I still love him very much and the man has got an absolute heart of gold... but it just makes me clearer on why we weren't meant to be. I also just kinda thought that we'd be better friends. That we could still get along and hang out and be in eachothers lives. But that's proving to be difficult and unrealistic. Wierd.
In my frustration I want to say something or pull words out of him somehow.. make him open up instead of being so reserved and "safe" in our communication. But that's exhausting, and I feel like I did that for a lot of years and it's not my responsibility nor is it necessary to extend that energy anymore. He is who he is and I am who I am and if it's not natural for us to communicate and be in eachother's lives, I can't push it.
:( It makes me sad a little, but it takes a long time sitting and thinking about it to get to the sadness. It's covered in a lot of disappointment and an overall "oh well" shrug of letting it go. It is what it is.
But yesterday zapped me a little. After he left and I went on to dinner, I wasn't myself.. and for some reason I felt very alone. Even though I was sitting across from my new wonderful boy who was taking me out for a wonderful dinner, I felt very alone and quiet and even a little insecure.
But, luckily R is good with me when I get in my little temporary funks. And I think he's realizing that even though I may not be able to put it into words at the time, that I'm very accutely aware of being off. And after I can finally bring myself to talk about my feeling off, it usually then only takes me another 10 or 20 minutes to find the words to express what I'm feeling. Which makes me feel better... and I think it's awesome to be able to communicate it with him so he can understand me better. He's really such a good honey.
I wanted to write about a few more things, but I didn't expect all that to come out so long :) So I'm gonna leave it at that & maybe write more later.
xoxo
Tuesday, May 18, 2004
I'm the luckiest girl!!
I can't remember the last time I had flowers delivered to me, but lucky me has the sweetest boy and I just got the most beautiful bouquet delivered to my door! wow!
What a wonderful way to brighten up my week. They're sitting right here next to me so I can look at them and smell them all day! mmm!
They're so pretty! And I'm so lucky! yay!!! :) :) :)
Monday, May 17, 2004
Sunday morning Rick and I had grabbed coffee, and as we were walking back we passed through the park where there were a lot of cutie dogs playing fetch who you could tell were having the time of their lives. I commented to Rick that dogs were soo lucky because their lives are so simple and happy. They don't have all the worries and stress, but instead their main goal is to just play catch, get belly rubs and sleep.
I often comment on
my kitty's oh so leisurely lifestyle, as well. Often when I'm scheming up master plans to somehow get him to pull his weight around here! :) But the Fuzzy Pants has got it good!! He's snoozin right now! He could be mopping for christ sake, can't you see the floor needs it, Mister?
Anyway -
Dooce just happened to post about her dog, Chuckles, today and how she wants to reincarnate as a dog so she can enjoy the ease of a life full of walks and treats and belly rubs. I can totally relate. Our furry friends have got it good!
But one things for sure, is I'm glad Kazoo doesn't have to get up early and leave for work and then come home tired and just sit in front of the TV all night. :)
Instead he's right over there curled up like a furry little snuggly baby boy and every once and awhile I can go over to him and touch his super soft fur and watch him be all cute with his sleepy half closed eyes and his
big sleepy lion yawn that makes me wanna melt and squeeze him as hard as I can all at the same time.
Ok, so you know how I was talking about getting a KVM switch? Well I got one, but it had audio connectors that wouldn't work w/ my powerbook, so I took it back to forgo the audio part and just get one that did the keyboard/mouse & monitor. No biggie on the sound, plus it's less cords w/o it!
So just in case any of you are uber geeky power users like me and you want info on how to control your mac & pc with one monitor, mouse and keyboard - I've been digging up all kinds of info.
My mouse & monitor are a peice of cake, but it dawned on me today searching for a keyboard that the whole command vs alt and other various keys differ enough that it's important I know what I'm getting myself into. Ideally I'd like to stick with a primarily mac keyboard and then just map the keys for the few I'll be missing when I'm on my PC (the print screen key mostly). The good news is that they have info on all this out there. woohoo! I'm sending a big hug to the geekier than I who have put all this info on the web. And should this help any of who've stumbled across it, maybe I'll get a hug too. Let's all HUG! hahaa
>
Apple Pro Keyboard on a PC (Forum discussion)
>
Guide to Sharing Keyboards & Monitors - this is a great resource along with this
long list of resources (but there's a few outdated links on that page). I found the
Users Tips section at the bottom of the page is especially helpful.
So right now I think I'm going to buy an
Apple Pro keyboard - or I was also thinking about this one from
macally.
And this is the KVM switch I'm goin with now:
>
Belkin USB KVM Switch
p.s. I think it'd be really cool if there was a keyboard that when I switched over from one platform to the other, it would light up the keys for the related OS and dim out the others. Probably too small of a market to create something like this - or just too complicated - but it'd be cool!
Ok, I've posted my progress on the events listing thus far - but I'm far from being finished. I need to streamline the way I do this - maybe by just putting it on the yahoo calendar or something - I just wish Yahoo calendar let me do links to the venues!
Anyway - I'll try to finish the list up soon and link some of those that aren't linked etc. I still have a good 5 venues and lists to pull from, so there's more out there!!
::::
I woulda liked to have tried to hit that Gogol Bordelo/Full Moon Partisans show Friday night - my friend went & said it was amazing. And lastnight I would have liked to hit either the Fojimoto show or the French Kicks show with openers On The Speakers (cuz I love them) and The Joggers (but I woulda left before French Kicks, I'm not a fan of his live performance, but I like their CDs).
Tonite I would hit BrightBlack & Joanna Newsom, but my Jemmy friend is coming over to swap some music. Hmm, maybe I can talk her into going over there.
Then I dig Yellow Press, so I could go check them out on Wed night or Elf Power is playing that night too.
Then this weekend is Sleater Kinney on Saturday night! woohoo! Except there's like 3 great shows goin on Sat night - I'd love to go see Richard Buckner & Haley Bonar too. But Sleater Kinney will be sweet... my first time seeing them if you can believe it! I'm psyched.
Ok, I'll try to finish up that list soon - as I am afraid I'll miss good shows if I don't - and we can't have that! :)
Happy Monday!
Sunday, May 16, 2004
Friday night Rick & I enjoyed a lovely evening over at
Sarah and Mat's for dinner. Mat cooked us up a gourmet meal: Linguine with a rich, creamy avocado sauce with shrimp - soo yummy! Mat's girlfriend Paula was there and Helena & Derek, too. Many bottles of wine were consumed! :)
It was really nice to see Sarah again. With her traveling so much lately, and my being so darn busy all the time, we've not seen eachother enough! And it was great catching up with Mat, too... he's a big music head like me and was the one who turned me onto TV On The Radio, and schooled me on older bands like Polvo and much more. Him and a buddy went to
GWAR show recently and had some hilarious photos of themselves drenched in the "blood"... he still had the tshirt hanging in the bathroom, which apparently had started out white, but looked like a messed up tiedye job. WILD!
By the end of the evening, the topic of
Blue Crush came up. Rick & Sarah both surf and I'd never seen that movie but heard about it through them, so I told Sarah I wanted to borrow it. Sarah thought to put it on in the background while we all hung out after dinner, but in our wine induced haze we all got sucked in & before we knew it we stayed up to watch the rest. ha! I was glad to finally see it - it made me wanna surf! But I'm a baby, and I'd prefer to wait till the bathwater comfort of Maui or something, but I have a feeling between Jee, Rick, Sarah and my brother I'll be out hittin the waves this summer before I know it. :)
:::::::::::
Saturday morning my awesome tech buddy Tack came over & fixed up my wireless. It's been all kinds of screwy lately - but he's the mastah and even though it's not set up the same as it was, it's working now and I'm thankful for that! PLUS I am PSYCHED cuz he helped me get all secure with SSH for my outgoing email. woohoo!! I'm very concerned with security and I am thankful that I can now safely hit an internet cafe & not worry about my password being out in the open!
It's amazing to me how many users aren't protected - and it's even crazier that there's really no plug & play solution for wireless security. You pretty much have to have a smarty techy set up the tunnel on your local machine. I mean, I'm pretty advanced and it was even daunting for me - let alone someone who only uses their computer for Word or something! Anyway, now I'm safe - and if you're on a laptop, I recommend you get safe too! Use SSL for your email if you can - and SSH for outgoing and SFTP! I'm sure I could be locked down even more, but this better than what I had set up before. I'm glad I have his mad tech skillzz around! If you're in San Francisco and are looking for someone, he's for hire on an hourly basis. Email or leave a comment if you want his info.
:::::::::
Friday I'd gotten a call from an ex-boyfriend who said he was driving through town Saturday (he lives in Santa Rosa), so right after Tack left I had to hurry and get ready for lunch with Dan. It was great to see him... We dated about 8 years ago, right after I moved to SF - way back in 96/97! But now he's married with a baby and another one on the way, so we see eachother maybe every 2.5 years.
We had yummy burritos at Papalote and caught up. I had one of those embarrassing wrong tube/choke my ass off moments that was delightful, but other than that it all went well :) He's playin the drums, too, so it was cool to rap w/ him about that.
:::::::::
Saturday night Rick had bought us tickets to the Cracker/Camper Van Beethoven show at the Warfield, so after a few hours of getting some things done around here I met up with Rick to hit Rebecca's BBQ before the show. I was psyched to see Jee, Rebecca, Jim, Scott & that whole crew. Especially
Jee - it's been forever!
So we hung out, had some yummy food and then left to get to our show. We dropped off my car here to avoid parking/driving - each did a shot of chilled jäger and then grabbed a beer to drink while we sat out front waiting for our taxi. Aww yaa, let the evening begin!!
When we arrived Cracker was playing and had already been playing for an hour! CRAP! They hadn't listed the lineup very well, but they had this horrible comedian on the bill & we thought for sure he'd open up. But come to think of it, since both bands share most of the same members, it was their way of giving themselves a break in between. Rick was bummed, as he's way more into Cracker than CVB, so that was too bad. The comedian was so bad I won't even name him. My feelings were just that we were there to see music, not just hear a comedian go off about how sucky Bush is. WE KNOW! Now play some more music dammit!
Camper Van was just ok - I'm not so into this type of music anymore, although I can appreciate their skills. It was pretty jam bandish by the end - and by looking at the 80% male audience, I'm sure most of them love these bands cuz of the guitar. But full of beer and my honey by my side, I made the best of it.
Eric & his girlfriend Claudia were with us, too, and we all left before the show ended. We decided to hit
Anu, a bar just around the corner on 6th St (aka crack central). It's a sketchy street, but the clubs around there can be fun.
Rick & I had actually been to Anu waaay back (in the just friends stage) after we'd gone to Popscene for a Stills show & then tried to catch an art show over there that closed early. So we hit Anu since we were already over there. We had a great time that night and after I dropped him off, I remember thinking that I felt attracted to him, but I brushed it off not wanting to make something of nothing. Lastnight Rick admitted he kicked himself for not kissing me that night. ha :) so cute.
Anyway, it's a cool bar with great DJ's - so we went there, ordered drinkies and even ran into
Darren! woohoo!! Darren actually had spotted me first apparently, but didn't want to "interrupt" us. Sorry, we're guilty: We can't keep our hands off eachother! But it was fun to see him and then we even had our friends Guam & Dave show up, too. PARTAAY!
:::::
Today, as you may have guessed, was all about sleeping in. Aaaah, SLEEP!! Aaaah, SUNDAYS!
We didn't feel like hitting Bay to Breakers (Sorry Brian and DJ Shooey! I'm sure you all had a blast!!). My weekend was crazy busy already and I started realizing I'm going to run out of time if I don't get a head start on my week. My Mom is coming into town in a couple days, so I'm on a serious deadline to get everything ready for her arrival, let alone my work/client deadlines!
So today was pretty productive for that. I've cleaned up my place a ton and reorganized some things, but still have a more to do! I was thinking she was flying in Wednesday or Thursday and I was stressing about all the work I need to do, but tonite I realized it's Friday afternoon, which is perfect. I'm looking forward to seeing her and showing her my place!
Friday, May 14, 2004
and for my umpteenth post for today - I just thought I would tell you I signed up for
emusic! And I downloaded
New Black and
The Fuse! and they're both AWESOME!!!!
That is all.
I've been meaning to write this down for a long time. Those of you who know me have heard the story, but there's a lot of you who don't! So here it is... The story of how Rick & I met:
Last September I went to a ROCKIN show (In the Top 3 of my favorite shows in 2003!) Super Furry Animals/Grandaddy (
my review) and when I got home, I got an IM from my friend
Jee saying "this sounds like you..." and a link.
It was a link to a Craigslist post where this guy was going off about how his friends never want to go see live shows with him, or they always have some excuse about needing to save money, or clean the house, or just give him the "who's that?" and don't want to go cuz they've never heard of them. And just as Jee had said, that totally sounded just like me because I was always complaining I didn't have enough people to go to shows with!
Oh & actually his post was really him selling extra tickets to 3 shows he'd bought 4 tickets each, thinking of course his friends wouldn't want to miss these kick ass shows (The Kills, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Hot Hot Heat), and was having to find buyers for them now that he realized nobody would rally and go. But all I saw was a guy who liked the same awesome bands as me, and also didn't have peeps to go to shows with - So I emailed him!!
MUSIC FANS UNITE!
So he wrote me back and I wrote him back and then we decided to meet up for what I called a "Freak Check" just to make sure he's even somebody I want to be standing next to for 2 hours at a show! :)
Now, mind you I was not looking for a boyfriend or a date or ANYTHING at the time. Matt & I had just split in May and although I had sorta been toying with the idea of flirting with boys, I really didn't want a boyfriend or anything like that! So I was out purely for the concert buddy opportunity.
We met up on a hot September day and had iced coffees during the Polk St Festival. We chatted for about an hour about bands and shows and such. Nice day, nice talk, nice guy. Cool.
At the end I thought, he's cute, but he's not my type anyway. He doesn't meet the "height requirement" (which was the big joke between the Six Girls last summer - I'm 5'10", so I guess I was trying to go for someone who was atleast 6'... which is silly I know, but this only came of me becoming single again & realizing how many men are too short for me! talk about cutting my options in 1/2!). I should note here, however, that Rick is 5'11"! haha
So I wasn't looking - and just thought as far as dating goes he was cool, cute, he surfs, has a good job and is funny AND has great taste in music - "He'll be perfect for one of my friends!"
So, shortly after we went to our first show: Hot, Hot Heat - who was one of my favorite bands of last year, top 3! And I was aaall fired up. AND that night I met Jem for the first time through
Kristin! Awesome!
Rick & I started hitting about 3 shows a week - as you can see from
the list (look at October 2003 on, my show going picked up something fierce!) and we quickly realized we both loved to party & loved live shows. woohoo!!
We talked all the time on IM and email, and because we were going to so many shows, I was seeing him more than any of my other friends!
About 3 weeks into it at the Rogue Wave/Thermals/Mates of State show, Rick landed a kiss on me. And the rest is history... :)
As you all know it took me a long time to stop calling us "just friends", but now there's no denying he's officially boyfriend status.
I could list out a gazillion things he does to make me so happy. We've had so many great times together and it just makes me look forward to many more. :)
Funny how it all started with Jee IM'ing me some guy's Craigslist post, huh? Thank you Jee! Thank you Craigslist!
And to Ricky G. = mmmmoooooiiii xoxoxo
We first had ourselves some long overdue & tasty Goat Hill Pizza. My favorite pizza in town (or atleast top 3, I don't frequent enough pizza joints!) and ironically I don't think I've even been there since I took Rick there way back last October, when we were just "friends". Anyway, it was super yummy - and the dinner salads there are to die for.. garbanzo & kidney beans, a big fat pepperocini, olives and the best blue cheese dressing you'll ever have!
We finally arrived at The Fillmore for the show (which I scored us free tix too - woohoo! and they even stoked us with drink tickets! aww yaa!), got a drink & ran into our show buddies Jem & Tania. The 2nd band was just finishing up, but from what I heard I would definitely go see them again. However, as a 15 year old in the audience humbly pointed out - they're not punk, therefore they have no business being an opener for the Distillers. Wow, what we can learn from the children of today!!!
I wouldn't have thought to classify The Distillers as punk (as I generally am just not so good at classifying music), but they definitely are. Then Jem schooled me that The Distillers are on the
Epitaph label, and therefore inherently punk. Oh. Duh. Alright, so bring on the *punk*rock*please*!
Do you know
Brody, the lead singer from the Distillers? Well she's amazing. Her deep raspy vocals are awesome and she's hot and plays a mean guitar - sweet!! I was psyched to see her live for the first time and pretty much didn't take my eyes off her the whole show. Um, except to check out the drummer of course, but then it was right back to Brody!
The show was awesome. We were up front a bit, so we knew we'd have to deal w/ the mosh pit - and moshing there was! These kids go nuts... so we eventually end up on the peripheral (like most and that gaping hole gets bigger and bigger till the 5 moshers left are having to go 10 feet across the floor to get to slam into the other side of it). But it was fine.. and Rick does the cutest thing where he is kinda like my "moshpit bodyguard". I mean how cute is that? He stands in front of me and watches the pit for oncoming slammers and keeps them off me as much as possible. I mean, I'd like to think I can handle myself in the pit (I haven't actually participated in one since college probably), but it's the most endearing thing to have him take care of me. Lets hear it for Love and Rock & Roll, people!
At a couple points it got really hairy & a bunch of people fell down... and of course in loving mosh spirit you always help the person up as fast as possible (one of the things I love about mosh pits!). One girl was near me and when I was down trying to pick her up I got slammed a little by someone else falling into us. Whoa near miss mosh pit accident! I'm totally fine, but it woulda made a good story if it was worse. Remember the Peaches pit incident?
It was ugly (but a great story).
We watched the whole show, we watched most of the moshers get tired, we saw Jem & Tania again at the end (who had left the mobbymosh scene for safer ground), and we saw my friend Kristin and her badass Fillmore bouncer boyfriend Dave. Oh & I had 2 Tom Collins. Free! woohoo!!
:::::
Tonite: I think we're gonna try to hit Gogle Bordello / Full Moon Partisans at Slims. I'll letcha know how it goes. The weekend is already turning out to be so busy!!
Hey there! I finally posted my
videos from Coachella! woohoo!
p.s. please excuse the overt loviness between me and a certain someone in a few of the vids... :) we were having a very nice weekend.
Happy Friday!
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
It's
Kazoo on
Infinite Cat! Go there & click "Next Cat" to see the infiniteness! I think
this one is particularly funny. Those kitties look so interested in whats happening! And the guy on the left looks like Kazoo, too!
arg - yes, I *still* have yet to update my music calendar! jeeshk! I thought I was going to get to it lastnight - and the day before, and last weekend - I just need to do it, but it takes a good hour or so to go through it all, and right now I've gotta put clients first.
Aaanyway - I just happen to be taking a peek on news/message boards trying to figure out why the heck the new Fiona Apple isn't out (!) which if you're curious, it's been put on hold by Sony, but now they've got it slated for June 22... I can't wait, so I sure hope they stick to that.
Anyway, while I was searching for that I found this
list of when things are gonna be released - as well there's one on
Pitchfork Media.
::::
I've also been looking into
eMusic.com - it's only $9.99/mo for 40 songs - that's like 3 cd's a month - AND they have stuff iTunes doesn't! woohoo!!
CD's I would download today if I signed up:
The Distillers:
Sing Sing Death House (cuz we're seeing them Thursday night, and I only have Coral Fang)
New Black
The Fuse
OK, back to work.
Oooh! I finally installed
Adium (a multiple chat client for mac) & it's awesome! I've been using Fire, and I tried Proteus - but this one rules.
On the PC I used
Trillian, which I LOVED. Trillian Pro actually is the best, totally worth the money if you're a PC user... and one feature that it had that I really missed on the mac chat clients I've tried, is the history (shows the message history with that person right in the window). And now Adium has that! woohoo
update: check out this
screenshot
update #2:
settings explanation and history example
It's SWEEEEEET!!!!
Ok all you with digital cameras and your guerrilla digital video making skills - listen up!
Do you find yourself taking videos sideways and then realizing you can't rotate the movie?
Well, I do. And what I've been doing is going all the way into After Effects and doing it, but it's such a hefty program - and honestly I could use a lesson! So it's labor intensive to me to rotate the darn video & reexport it - but guess what?
I opened QT tonite - and I don't even think I have my pro registration working, or maybe I'm just not used to this
v 6.5, but I couldn't find Get Movie Info so I clicked on Movie / Get Movie Properties and in there under Video Track / Size you can rotate your movie!! woohoo!
Tuesday, May 11, 2004
So if you didn't know already,
Blogger just announced a redesign and access into thier revamp - finally! I've been using it for awhile now and I think it's quite nice!!
So if you haven't signed up for a blog yet, now's the time cuz they have a bunch of great new templates and stuff.
::::
I'm loving my mac right now. Today I installed
iView Media Pro, and so far I like it. As long as I can get used to the catalogs idea, and really set it up and keep it organized, it could be a good thing.
I also updated my
Launchbar app, got a key code for
Synergy (woohoo), researched SSH and GPG for a possible solution to my worries about wireless security. (aka, I want to go to a cafe & work!)
And how's this for geeky? I updated the firmware on my wireless router, and had to reset it all. I'm on full power now! woohoo
I installed
AutoHide - which I am *loving*. It keeps my desktop so clean. The only problem is that I forget what I was doing cuz it's all minimized. HA!
I have clean dishes and 6 loads of clean laundry. I uploaded 3 or 4 different albums and used Cleaner and batch optimized and resized a bunch of videos that I'm getting ready to post - wooohoo!!
Which leads me to my tip...
...from the GAMH show from a couple weeks back with The Evening/The Killers/StellaStarr*... they start
here - and in that same album you'll find photos, from almost 3 weeks ago now, from
Kat's BBQ/Happy Hour with cutie little Ella baby!
I also just posted the photos from the Schmidt/Obana going away party at the end of
this album (the start at #17).
I'm catching up!
Now if I can just get some of these videos posted, I'll be really caught up! :)
update:
Videos posted
So I realize I've not given ya'll a proper wrapup of the AMAZING weekend we had down at Coachella... well here it goes :)
Jem, Tania, Rick & I all cruised down on Friday night. With a mean set of tunes at our disposal we had fun on our *first* road trip together! woohoo!!
We arrived in Palm Desert (after an 8 or 9 hours trip, with a few stops) around 11:30 or so and Jem & Tania dropped us of at Susan's house where we were staying with Cameron & crew for the weekend. Susan was an absolute sweetheart and had already set up a tent with an air matress in it for us - WOW! Soo sweet! She is Cameron's half-brother Jared's Mom. Got that?
Well we couldn't have asked for better place to stay.. with air conditioning and a fridge stocked with food for us, we were in heaven!
We crashed out Friday night since none of the other peeps had arrived yet, and we wanted to be well rested for our weekend ahead.
Saturday: Day 1 of the Festival
After seriously lathering up with the SPF45, we hit the polo grounds for our first day of music and fun in the sun!
We got there around 2 and hit
Sahara Hotnights first. We're big fans of their CD
Jennie Bomb, not to mention the fact that they're 4 hot swedish chics! If you like Sleater Kinney, The Donnas, or (one of my absolute fav's) Seagul Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her (SSKHKH), then you'll dig this CD.
They were good, but they didn't play enough off Jennie Bomb... I think they either played new stuff or really old stuff.. either way, we wanted to hear more of what we knew. And honestly even what they did play of what I knew, didn't sound as good to me as the CD... but it was still WAY kick ass to see them live.
Next up was
StellaStarr*, who we've now seen 4 times! The first time I fell in love with them when they opened for The Raveonettes
last September, then we saw them at SXSW (albeit not much of them cuz it was packed! but it still counts :) and then
2 weeks ago right before Coachella and then AT Coachella! I'm a big fan!! :) I think people who are discovering their "big hit" on MTV or whatever will be pleasantly surprised to find out the ENTIRE album totally rocks. Their big hit isn't even the strongest track IMO.
So just to give you an idea of how incredibly hot it is, we're in these tents for some of the shows, which is great, because the sweltering sun is off of you... but it's also a bit of a sauna. In a lot of my photos you'll see the good ol' Heineken fan, which was a savior!! We'd drip water on eachother & fan eachother the whole time to keep cool :)
After StellaStarr* we decided to find a spot of shade & listen to Trail of Dead. We shared a little ice cream and enjoyed the quality people watching. We tried to head over to the Beck tent, but it was packed - so we caught a little of Deathcab for Cutie while we were grabbing a quick bite to eat, and then cruised over to
The Black Keys.
These guys are talented! It's very bluesy, and it's just a 2 peice with the lead guitar/vox guy, Dan Auerbach (who I think will be around for a long time, he's got a great voice) and a kick ass drummer, Patrick Carney. And Rick will have you know - they're from Ohio! :)
It was fun to see them live, but with being pretty close and in the middle, I got hot fast & didn't last to the end of their set, but we saw a great deal of them, which was cool cuz we missed their show here last fall.
After that we went & hung out with the peeps in the beer garden till the Pixies came on. We had just been drinking mass amounts of water all day, so now that it was cooling down (under 106 that is), it was nice to have a cold beer.
The Pixies were totally the highlight of the weekend for me. They sounded AMAZING and it was just awesome to hear them kick out so many of our favorite songs. AWESOME!!!!!
After that we caught a little of the Rapture, which sounded great - I'd like to go see them in a smaller venue sometime, their whole CD is a lot of fun. And then Radiohead!! was awesome!!!
And then we all headed over to Kool Keith, then Kraftwerk and then Phantom Planet! woohooo!!
SUNDAY: Day 2
We partied at the house for awhile and didn't end up getting over there till quite a bit later. Then we tailgated and had a blast running our own obstacle course for all the passers by :) *video of that coming soon* The parking lot was a lot less insane on Sunday - apparently Day 1 had oversold to thousands more people, and you could tell the difference on Sunday. I hadn't minded the crowds at all though on Saturday.
Anyway so we finally made it in, hit the beer garden with the peeps and then headed over to catch Bright Eyes where we ran into Jem & Tania. We all hung out & listened to a little AIR and then headed over to the beer garden before Flaming Lips.
I wanted to try to get close for Flaming Lips, but that meant taking a good 1/2 hour to spider up through the crowds, before we just hit a wall around the 125th row. Much closer, but still so far away compared to our 3rd row shows here in small venues :) But it was cool ... Wayne Coyne was on fire as always and he talked a ton about how f*d up our government is, namely George W. - and at one time had us all chanting F* Bush! F* Bush!! It was awesome.
He'd walked out on the crowd in a plastic ball in the beginning, but I think we missed that part on the way there and into the crowd. We did however get to see them play the 3 songs they did play (yes, only 3 since the whole plastic ball/wayne coyne jabbering took up so much time :) and it was epic as always. I love them!!!
Last show on tap for us that night was The Cure. I had been really psyched up to see the Cure, I couldn't believe it honestly. I used to listen to them in H.S. aall the time, so seeing them live was so exciting!
We went down in the crowd to get closer on that one, and here's how it went:
"oh my god, we get to see the cure play!"
to
"wooohooo, the cure!!!!!!"
to
"wow.... Robert Smith, your songs really *are* depressing"
to
"awww, can you
please play
something off of "
Staring at the Sea"?
to
"zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"
Talk about not goin out strong, it was a bit of a dud ending to such a kick ass weekend... I know it's selfish, but I just wish they woulda played more hits for those of us who had their cd's on repeat 15 years ago! But oh well... It was still cool to see Robert Smith all white, bloated and with his gelled up curly hair everwhere, up on those big screens. :) And I'm sure serious serious die hard fans had a good time, so that's cool!!
We said goodbye to our peeps (who had once again set up camp in the beer garden, hilarious! :) and Rick & I then went & rounded up Megan & Chris who were already crashed out in the car waiting for us - and we all headed back to the house to try to get 4 hours of sleep before our taxi arrived the next morning to take us to the airport!!
We had SUCH a fun weekend!!
And now as a reward for your actually reading through that entire post, check it out:
> Photo's Posted!
> Videos Posted
Monday, May 10, 2004
My kitty is sprawled across my lap as I type. Actually he's lying in my arms like a baby... and somehow I can still type. I wish I could grab the camera, but I know he'd move. Any time I move and it wakes him up a little, he puts his paw on my face as to say "please keep still momma".
I was gone a lot this weekend, so he's been quite the loverboy today. He's almost 3 years old you know! His birthday is comin up in 10 days! he's a big boy. Then my birthday is coming up shortly after that - I think it's time for a party!
:::::
SO, I'm just going through some of the great suggestions that were given to me
way back when I first got my mac.
I just installed
AutoHide and
CleverKeys - thanks
Leen! and I'm checking into
ToyViewer.
I've been wanting a better photo management tool. iPhoto is cool for some of the features... I like how easy it is to quickly auto-levels photos and such, but I dont like how it puts my photos into folders by month & date - I am used to being able to put photos in a folder by event, and I like that better. Plus, it doesn't even download the videos off my card... lame!
So now I'm just pluggin my camera in & dragging all the files into a new folder myself. I've tried to use my ACDSee for the mac, but it's not as nice as it is on the PC at all... and I was even using Graphic Converter for awhile, too - but really that offers more than I need. And it makes all the images have that icon instead of being able to see a little mini thumbnail of the photo (anyone know how I can change that?)
My wish list for a photo management tool:
I just want something that is an easy tool to navigate through folders, viewing thumbnails, maybe batch rotating some photos, selecting them & dragging them into another folder, and when I open one I'd like it to automatically be a slideshow type (not necessarily full screen) where from there I can click back & next within the folder. Also, ideally it would let me customize a list of editors, so that I could choose the editor I want to take it into. However, I realize I can do this just as easily by having those programs in my launchbar so that I just drag them onto the program icon... but thought I'd add it while I'm making requests. And/or it would be as convenient as iPhoto to edit quickly, cuz I do like that one feature. Oh & it'd be great if it previewed movies too!! Basically just have it perform the way ACDSee on the PC does!!!
Let me know if you have a suggestion and/or a preferred program/method you've tried & tested. I would think there's something out there that does what I'm wanting!
Also, I've been using Launchbar, but am now debating between Butler and Quicksilver. In that last post I'd gotten 2 votes for Butler, but maybe since then Quicksilver's gotten more robust?
Oh & I've been using Fire, and I've tried Proteus, but now I'm hearing great things about Adium? Need to go check that out.
Anyway - thought I'd break out the geek talk with all of you.
Saturday was a lazy day, and I was so happy that it was! I worked so much last week that I needed a break this weekend!!!
At the end of last week I had even been fighting a weird sore throat, so I needed sleep and rest! What's that mean? MOVIE NIGHT!
Thursday night was even a movie night, too, but it didn't even start till 10:30 or so. We watched
The Cooler - Did you see this yet?
It was much more of a love story than I thought it'd be... I really thought it was going to be a lot more about gambling, but then again I dont pay much attention to trailers on purpose so that I can be surprised. The girl in it was cute and refreshingly normal for the most part... and tell me you're not pleased as punch you finally get to see William H. Macy's lil' bum! No kidding! :) And you want to *hate* Baldwin's character.. so I guess that means they did a good job there. Anyway - it's a cute story.
Friday night's movie: Swingers! Can you believe I'd never seen this movie? I wasn't getting the inside joke when
Brian was calling me and repeating over and over "Vegas, baby, Vegas!" Now I get it. :)
See, we technically "should" (that is if we were moderately more wealthy and active than we already are) have been in Vegas this weekend. Rick's buddy
Bruno (who has a
new blog!) has a house there and returned from his job in Korea for a weekend of insane partying. No doubt we missed a good time - but we watched Vegas themed movies in tribute and we'll get there this summer for sure. (I haven't been there in like 10 years!!!)
So a bottle of wine and Swingers and sleep! Just what the doctor ordered! Saturday consisted of sleeping in, hiking up the awesome hill behind my house and then having breakfast up on Cortland. Then we cruised back by my old place on Lundys and peeked in to see if my neighbors were around.
Sandy and Jim are awesome. They've both been in bands over the years and they continue to be actively into music, they rock! They hit shows here & there and I love chatting to Jim about new music. He's a huge Super Furries fan, and they were at the Grandaddy/Super Furries show last fall I went to (and LOVED!)
Sandy sings backup in
Tom Jonesin' right now - and Jim's preparing for a reunion gig in LA for his old band, in which he played: THE DRUMS!! woohoo!! Over the last year I have seen his basement recording studio become a dream little room, padded to keep the sound hidden from the neighbors, painted with awesome inspiring cool colors and FULL of his instruments. Piano, keyboards, guitars, recording gear and the latest addition for practicing: His drum set!! I was psyched! So for the first time in years I sat behind the drums and played around for awhile. It was so fun!! That's twice this weekend I had drum sticks in my hands. awww yaaa, it's coming! :p
So we chatted with them a ton - I told then they *cannot* miss the Wrens show coming up, and that he should check out Broken Social Scene - they'd like them, I think.
All of a sudden our day was pretty much gone (sorry rick!!!) and with a few hours left in the day I dropped Rick off & made it over to a going away party for my old bosses and friends who are moving to Japan!
> update: photos posted at the end of
this album.
It was great to see everyone, including the hosts who are so darling. And I caught Jan & Layne, who it was great to catch up with as well. Layne & I can geek talk it up for hours, I love it!! We talk cameras, software and Saturday since I was fresh from beatin on the drums - we talked instruments! sweeeet! He was tellin me about the
Roland V Series (i think that's the one he mentioned) that his brother has and it's sweet. And it would fit in my little place should I want something to practice on down the road and use headphones as to not wake the neighbors. ya!!
We'll see if I get that hard core... but it would be pretty cool and I'd definitely learn faster if I had something to practice on. We'll see :)
:::::
Saturday night the R guy and I had a nice dinner (despite a temporary grumpy willofit). But then thanks to a little attitude readjustment, we proceeded to have a *GREAT* time after several drinkies at The Hemlock. woohoo! My buddy Stig was there with his friend Kim - and she's so nice!
We went to see the A-Frames play, and I was psyched to see them - but after poppin them in that day, I thought the show could go either way so I didn't have my hopes up. I did however have my hopes up to see
Ajax there, since it's his fault I love that band in the first place! Thanks a lot Ajax! But good news - he was!! Him and his drunken coworker - woohoo! Suburbia can make you a light weight - don't let it happen to you! You can read his story about that night
here.
After many a tasty Tom Collins and bathing in the most wonderful love and adoration a girl could ask for, from a certain sweet someone I can't stop hanging around, we went & rocked out to the A-Frames!! WOOHOOO!!!
It wasn't too crowded at all (considering the Hemlock's show area is the size of a shoebox), and we danced and enjoyed their small set. They were great! They were totally just as good as the CD if not better! I love the sound of the bass on their tracks. Short and sweet set - they didn't play the Nobot song, much to my dismay - but hey! Atleast they didn't suck!
So we said goodbye to
Ajax and his drunken friend and headed home. A very nice Saturday night indeed!
I had wanted to go down the peninsula and see my friend
Nancy's Open Studio... even if it was just us popping in for a bit to say hello. I know her from
my days at Care2, and she has had a few of these that I haven't made it to yet, so I wanted to go down and support her.
ROADTRIP!!
We got up & ate a TASTY breakfast at
East Coast West Deli on Polk. OH. MY. GAWD. You HAVE to go get their breakfast, because the home fries are to die for!!!! Seriously the BEST I've ever had in my LIFE!! I was looking around at other people's plates and I couldn't even believe some people had left a few behind - are they crazy!?!? They were the best. I can't wait to have them again!
Ok, so then we hit the road... 280 is beautiful with lush trees and mountains most all the way down to Sunnyvale. And of course, we've got a mean music selection for road trips :)
We popped into Nancy's studio and chatted it up with her & her studio mate, Photographer
Susan Prather.
Then we headed over to a friend of Ricks who just bought a new house a few months back, and they're expecting twins!! wowie!! And he's a gadget feign (like us) and he knocked our socks off with his sick speakers, total THX theatre set up!! WOW!
Then Rick & I went & played mini-golf!! woohoo!! 18 holes, and quite possibly the best mini-golf I've ever played. Besides those cursid little volcano type holes, those'll rack up the points every time!! In the end we were close, but then Ricky pulled off a Hole in 1 on the last (and most incredibly difficult hole EVER)!!! I tried and tried, but since it was so hard there was quite a bottleneck when we got there - and after a few embarrassing attempts and knowing Rick had already kicked my butt, I swallowed my pride and gave up. Let's hear it for quitters!! Hey, atleast I did really good the rest of the game!
ARCADE TIME! We're huge fans of the air hockey... and fairly well matched at this game, Rick & I... it's a heated game. He gets a point and BLAM! I'm right behind him... 1-1... then 2-1, then 2-2... I keep catchin up - but he is pretty good :) I love air hockey!!
So then we look around for another game and GET THIS: There's an arcade game to play the drums! woohoo!! This kid is on it and he's kickin butt. He's even doin the crossed arm thing with the snare and the tom-tom. Nice!
So we get on - and it was so fuN! It's a game from Japan, so all the songs are in japanese, which is funny.. but I think I did pretty good! woohoo! Drumming career, here I come :p
We were hoping we'd build up an appetite for
Chef Chu's Chinese (wow, nice site, chef chu!) and we did!! By that time we were nice & hungry and headed over for some tasty chinese food. It's apparently always packed there, and this being Mother's Day didn't change that. But it was well worth the wait. Hot & Sour Soup for starters, and then Candied Pecans with Prawns & Kung Pao Chicken - yummm!!!
I know I haven't blogged it up in FOREVER - so maybe I'll start backwards?
And only a few of you know this, but I'll out myself right here and now and admit I'm pasting [most of this] review from where I wrote it somewhere else. So sue me :)
:::::
lastnight's performance = braaavoo!!!
lastnight rick & I were so tired - i will tell you why later, but it's a wonder how we actually made it to "The Smallest Show in Town" at The Hemlock. I wanted to go to support
my pink & meatysweet friend, Ajaxxx (with the triple x, cuz he's that cool) (and for all you peaches fans: I'm only double a, but I'm thinkin triple x)
So we were driving up from down south (again, that story later) and we were debating... "what should we do?" "oh we're so tired" ... "can we make it?" "no, i'll just drop you off", I say - but then I think "I might pop in, but I sure would like you to come with me" - so finally we decided, let's just stop by and HOPE that Ajax is miraculously going on shortly after we walk in the door otherwise we'd just say hi, break a leg and take off.
Well, luck was on our side! cuz literally we parked, walked in & no more than 5 minutes later Jaxx got on stage! woohoo!!! We got to see his full 20 min set and it was delightful.
He first took us all back to the fond days of summer camp in true "word to your mother" fashion. (uh, it was mother's day, you see)
Everyone was sitting and behaving very well... and ajax soothed us with his voice and then dedicated a a song to his momma: Oh What A Night by the Four Seasons. Very sweetand we all hurrah'd cuz it was so good and fun!
And he's so damn funny. shiiit is that man funny (if you read his blog you'd know that :)... as Ian says, we have a love for his "brand" of funny. Well I'm here to tell you, he's funny and talented! (but if you've been fans of the A-Man for awhile now, I wouldn't have to tell you that either. He was in both
Granfaloon Bus and some crazy rocker band . Now *that's* talent!
(update, that other rock band was called:
Thunderbleed A.K.A. Blind Vengeance. What a great name eh?)
So ya, I was psyched to see him play guitar and sing. awesome!!
Then on the second song he did a clap along!! woohoo! we all clapped so good - ajax was proud and a guy near us even turned around to give us extra props for our "section" of pro-clappers in the back. oh ya, that's right! only the best for the meaty.
The last song was Ajax singing a darling tribute to his friend chris, who you may recall from his slaving away on jaxx's tardwork and not even complaining - and then he whom put on this grand event and twisted Ajax arm into performing. So Ajax sung'em a song - and we were standing next to Chris... and I think he was teary. I mean - who wouldn't be!?! Ajax singing you a song all about you and how much he thinks you're the greatest. Chris Leone is MY hero now.
Bravo Ajax! You did great and you should do more! We'll show up - even though we're really tired from drinking with you the night before. (which I will attempt to blog about in a second)
Thursday, May 06, 2004
If I used
LiveJournal (lovingly referred to as LJ for those who use it regularly), I would have a little emoticon that showed me as PROUD! (if they even have that one)
I'm beaming proud and even on little sleep I'm near the end of this project and I'm PSYCHED!!!!
I feel like an actionscripting WIZARD!! woohoo!!
more later :)
Wednesday, May 05, 2004
I'm wiped out. As soon as I got home and got that call on Monday, I've been behind my desk ever since... only to go out and enjoy a short sushi dinner with the ever so rockin rick, jem & tania (at godzila sushi - mmmm!) and then today at BAM for a few hours.
Anyway - I'm tired! I need to clean my house and wash all my dusty desert clothes and post all my photos and update my concert/event calendar (!!!!) and all that fun stuff!
anyway - that's what I'm doing. So ya, hopefully tomorrow afternoon I'll have a little more time. I can't wait to go to bed!
signed,
temporary complainer
Tuesday, May 04, 2004
I have *SO* many awesome photos & videos from this weekend - I love it!
I don't even have time to look through them let alone post them though - so here's a few of my favorites to hold you over...
UPDATE: Photo album & reviews/storeis/debaucherous details are posted here!
:::::
I got
my new BooQ bag today! wooohooo!!!
Monday, May 03, 2004
I'm sleepy, but I'm here! After an *AMAZING* weekend.... (oh my god was it sooo amazingly fun!!!) I'm working on maybe 4 hours of sleep... and wouldn't you know it, as soon I stepped into my house this morning I got a call from a new client who needs a couple hours of flash work done by tomorrow morning... so there might go my day off of napping ;) but hey, positive problem right?
We had roadtripped down with Jem & Tania (so fun!) but had decided to fly back since we knew after a weekend in the heat and on our feet we wouldn't want to deal w/ the 8 hour return trip in the car. Jem & Tania had stayed on the campgrounds and we stayed in a house in Palm Desert with 7 other friends. Two of whom decided to fly back as well, and since their flight left an hour earlier than ours this morning, we all ended up getting up around 4am (!) for our 4:30 taxi to pick us up at the house & drive us to the Ontario airport. Crazy. We all slept the whole way there, and then Rick and I passed out on the floor of the airport, to try to get a little more sleep till our plane started boarding - and then we totally zonked on the plane from take off to landing.. So all in all, maybe 4.5 hours of sleep. Not much! But with the weekend's memories so fresh, we've got huge smiles on our faces.
A ton of INCREDIBLE photos and videos and stories to come. But right now (pending if I do this job today or not) I need a nap!
