Thursday, January 31, 2008

a day in london

Escaped the reading office to london for mtgs with the media and an evening with a colleague. This is more like it! Afternoon with Mai tomorrow before my weekend near Brighton with the Curpheys.

great thing about london: lunch of fantastic indian food with a very nice shiraz to wash it down.

have spent the last 24 hrs discussing politics with germans and the brits, lotsa fun! Many intl eyes on our US primaries.

love taking the tube here-- its super ez and the ppl are typically very civil to one another. I was given a day pass by a woman passing by who saw me fiddling with my clumsy fingers on the sterling. Apparently she was done with it; classy!

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

rhubard spritzer

God bless the Germans- who else would have thought to liquefy rhubarb and turn it into a really tasty spritzeresque beverage? Back in the midwest we just ate it straight from the neighbor's garden (until we were caught) or turned it into a pie (not bad but no contest versus blueberry and other options. If we'd only known!
(btw, if u look really closely u can see the bottom of a very impressive bavarian beard)

Monday, January 28, 2008

current playlist

courage (UFOs over bamako remix) - vieux farka toure, fabian alsutany - remixed: UFO over bamako
the girl you lost to cocaine (house mix) - sia - some people have real problems
lies - glan hansard & marketa - swell season
our day will come - waldeck - ballroom stories
that's that - cass mccombs - dropping the writ
physical fraction - trentemoller - the last resort
ada - the national - boxer
orion - rodrigo y gabriela - rodrigo y gabriela
l.e.s. artistes - santogold - i believe in santogold
hate on me - jill scott - the real thing
shimmer - booka shade - movements
after all the love - bent - intercept!
hot chick (feadz edit) - chicks on speed - fabric live 33: spank rock mix
price you pay - UNKLE - war stories

welcome to munich

The foto sucks but you get the idea. Airport is clean and modern, pre-arranged taxi was on-time, customs was outrageously efficient. Nice!

Saturday, January 19, 2008

nam & cindy's wedding @ calimigas ranch

Shot of jane and the rest of the bridesmaids. Anyone know where i can get a martini around here?

Saturday, January 12, 2008

walmart + cake = funny

taken from a particularly funny email earlier this week passed along by jane
***
Okay so this is how I imagine this conversation went:

Customer: ' I would like to order a cake for a going away party this week.'

Walmart Employee:'What you want on the cake ?'

Customer:'Best Wishes Suzanne' and underneath that 'We will miss you'.

Sunday, January 06, 2008

mural by david choe @ giant robot biennial




Spraypainted.@ the Giant Robot Biennial Exhibit at the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo, LaLa Land.









Look close and you can see the shuriken stuck in the piece. pretty cool.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

arts & crafts

my father grew up near a rock quarry in ohio. back in the day (50s), you could cruise through the rock quarry on off hours and, with a careful eye, spot fossils that had been unearthed during the dig. you would also occasionally score an arrowhead, iron pirite (fool's gold) or something else of interest. the younger version of my dad made a hobby of collecting the items of interest that he found along the way.

a little over a year ago he handed the fossils off to me at my request. i wasn't immediately sure what i was going to do with them, but after a while i settled on creating a sort of diorama with cactus, air plants, and driftwood. as the year progressed and house search became house sell, job search turned into new job, i had precious little time to make good on my initial plans to create the diorama. finally, with most of my holiday break home improvement projects complete, i found the perfect display case while walking through abbott kinney with jane. below is a lengthwise shot of the case and the resulting diorama we created.



in the center is an air plant i bought for 5 bucks from home depot. sort of pain since you have to remove it and soak the roots once each week, but well worth it for the splash of color it adds as well as the ability to swap it around. from this view you can also see the layers of rocks on the bottom (for drainage), soil (for planting the cactus), and the sand (for aesthetics).



the above shot shows some of the fossils in detail including a few trilobites, a pressed fern, and if you look closely you can see an arrowhead in the back. i've since repositioned it so that it can be seen more clearly.



and the other end of the diorama. i'm going to keep an eye out for a small piece of wood to weave into the piece, which i think will add some nice texture. otherwise, i'm quite happy with how it turned out.

i think the quarries of toledo, ohio today have been mostly turned into other things. there was one that served as a really excellent swimming hole when i was a kid. the water was cold and deep but it had a couple great diving boards, the tallest of which taught me at an early age that i have a genuine fear of heights that cannot be completely overcome but can be thrust aside on occasion to enjoy a daredevil moment.

oh yeah, dad is quite happy with the little piece, thinking it a suitable display for his old treasures or at least pleased at the effort that went into showcasing his childhood hobby.

Wednesday, January 02, 2008

the best hot buttered rum on the planet

arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.... highly recommend this little bar in pirate's alley. lotsa tasty rum drinks and great ambiance.

caught this on the tail-end of the haunted history ghost tour which was also fabulous. our tour guide was a gent named "mirian" whose black hat and pock-marked face suitably matched the event and punctuated his expert story-telling.

would also recommend (though less so) the restaurant k-paul and the WWII museum nearby.

mobile cajun bbq!

See on the streets of nawlins. Hmmmmmm...

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

welcome 2 the sugar bowl



Yeah baby! Bring on dem dawgs!

oops... well... then again...