Im gonna hang them on my wall. Once I get a wall.

On rotation

Jurassic 5 - The Lesson

As soon as I played the 'warp speed' VW commercial, (thanks for pointing it out mistah B :) I knew I'd heard the music before.

Ah yes, Jurassic Five's instrumental reprise of 'The Lesson'. Id first heard the disctinctive opening from one of DJ Salty's (aka Rebecca Cherkoss) mixes.

Its not a hummable tune, but you never forget it once youve heard it.

"Lets mix the music of Led Zeppelin and Frank Sinatra together. Edit: NO." heheh.
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Oft-times, it feels like everybody in the Bay Area is an artist.

And when I say 'artist', I mean people who do it because its what they do, and any real job they do is just 'to feed the addiction', as one artist put it to me.

I kin relate.

Now, I have several simple criterion for the art that I like... if it hits me in the gut while I can see it hanging on my wall.

One of my favorites is a transplanted New Yorker, Michael Johnson, who sells his prints on Saturdays at the Embarcadero.

Personable, engaging, his prints are sharp, stunningly printed and keeps you looking.

There are 2 of his prints i want: Lady of the Night Light, Havana and a black and white of the Golden Gate.

Trust me, it has to be exceptional for me to want something I can do myself. His work is.

Then, Zanne Christensen, a transplanted (notice how this word keeps cropping up talking about folk in the Bay Area) upper midwesterner.

I saw her paintings from half a block away. Drawn to the colors man.

Now, this is stuff I cant do, but I can already see her stuff on my walls.

And I usually dont 'get' abstracts. Hers speak to me.

And there are others, but part of the fun of SF is speaking to the arts.

And if god is my witness, I'll be collecting a few before Im done.
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Left the laptop behind today.

Part of the regimen of lightening my load, plus it ensures that I wont go the library and blow a few hours there.

Ensures I will go walkabout more.

Heh, sometimes Im like a little kid.

I jumped on a streetcar, went to the back and put my head out like a puppydog, enjoying the rattling rumbling sensation.

Then as I looked behind down the road (up, in the case of Market Street), I saw an even MORE ancient streetcar rumbling a few blocks behind.

Woohoo. Jumped out to go catch it. But, as it came rumbling up (heh, it even has the old 'cowcatcher' thingie in front, I realized it was on a training run. Drat.

As it rumbled by, I mimed a plead for them to stop and pick me up. The training operaters waved at me as it blew (ok, 5 miles an hour) past.

But COOL, right behind was a famed 'Iron Monster' from 1914.

This fucker is all wood and cast iron and stuff. Cooler than cable cars in my estimation.

I was *giggling* man.

Yeah, yeah - it doesnt take much to amuse me. :)

Mercurial pattern and flow analysis

This Ralfee Finn article caught my attention as the month started:

Mercury stays retrograde until September 2nd.

As mercury 'turns around', life on earth shifts into a sort of slow crawl. Many of you know the mercury retrograde drill, but for those of you who don't, here's the skinny:

Mercury symbolizes all things related to communication and travel, including commerce, computers, phones, faxes, mail of every ilk, and traffic.
As such mercury retrograde is NOT a good time to initiate new projects.
(that's right - *nothing* new.)
If you must put something into motion, be prepared for snafus of all kinds, especially lost packages, system crashes, and having to repeat yourself - a lot.

However, it is a great time to review, revise and reconsider.

Absolutely, as over the years, I've come to look at this condition as a time of useful, if oftimes, wrenching, change.

Now, Im gonna go with it. Go with the flow as it were.

So far, not bad, although Im kinda straining at reining back my feelings that I need to DO something.

Experience tells me that I am already doing it and not trip. ;)
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Virgo

This retrograde is all about rehabilitating your persona and making changes you've been thinking about but havent had the time or courage to implement.

Yes, that sounds counter to the 'nothing new' rule, but you're an exception because it's time to redefine how you want to be perceived by others.

Conversations with family members stimulate an interest in revisiting beliefs about intimacy. As you contemplate these patterns, pay specific attention to how youj learned to express your deepest feelings and how those emotions were received by others.

Hmm. Wow.

I *had* been thinking about this in recent weeks.

Conversations with my brother and my sister in Chicago had me thinking about things, particularly in light of how I handled recent relationships...

Or as someone put it to me today - gotta shed that old skin. :)

Nosh of champions

For breakfast, Im not usually very adventurous.

Specially as Im usually all over, I tend to order the same thing over and over.

Some kinda omellete, hash browns, wheat toast, or an egg sandwich. In fact that was my breakfast when I travelled cross-country.

Otherwise, its coffee and donuts, natch.

But. There WAS something Ive craved. The Hawai'ian brekkfast. Portugese Sausage and rice.

Mmhmm-drool.

I LOVE rice. Man, I was jealous of my hawai'ian friends.

Wouldnt mind it for breakfast alla the time.

Well, at my little favorite hole-in-the-wall donut shop on Sixth Street and Mission, owned by this vietnamese lady, guess what?

Joy.

BIG hotlinks (portugese sausage) and rice. *Melted* butter poured on the rice.

Mm. My current kick.

Good and cheap too. :-D

All I had to do was ask, apparently.

Yeah man, good times.
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Awhile back, I was watching some soap opera from the Phillippines (like I knew what was going on), and in a scene, some bank tellers were having lunch.

They were using a fork and spoon to eat!

Interesting.

My analytical mind ran with this. What was the dealie wit this way of eating?

Apparently its a very filipino way of eating.

Ok, so I tried it.

Except fer meat-cutting, I actually prefer it now. So, when I eat at my hole-in-the-walls, I get a spoon along with the regular silverware.

Yeah, sometimes I get funny looks. Ironically, not by most folk, but by asians and pinao folk who wonder how I got into the filipino habit.

Heh. TV corrupts. :)

My day isnt *right* without my morning comix

Heh, thats gonna be on a lotta cubicles this morning. :)

Of course, there is the editorial weirdness of 'Bad Reporter'

Then there is the off-centered humor of 'Get Fuzzy', which rarely fails to crack me up..

Heheh.

viet on Da TL

Repeatedly described in most tourist guides as "the worst neighborhood in San Francisco," the Tenderloin thrives despite its bad rap. Sure, there are loads of drug dealers, addicts, prostitutes and mentally unstable street people, but if you can get past that, you'll find it is also one of the city's most exciting and diverse locales.

JPennant: loha, dahta
mars: oh! i was trying to hard to figure out what you meant by that
mars: haha
mars: most people never shorten aloha
JPennant: :-)
JPennant: how ya doin hon
mars: okay
mars: you?
JPennant: copacetic, pretty much :-)
JPennant: gonna go to the big bad tenderloin and get me some vietnamese
mars: where is that?
JPennant: Heh, I like the SF natives way of calling it.. The TL
JPennant: The Tenderloin. Its like the 'bad' area of downtown
mars: ah
JPennant: le me see
JPennant: http://www.sfgate.com/traveler/guide/sf/neighborhoods/tenderloin.shtml
mars: oh ok

JPennant: So, I was sweeping along Ellis Street in the Tenderloin yesterday
JPennant: and I kept seeing a buncha vietnamese restaurants
JPennant: and you know how I love good hole in the walls
mars: mmmmmmm
JPennant: Yup
JPennant: Im always suspicious of clean, white tablecloths :-)
JPennant: plus, I want a good rush of garlic to clear out my system :-)
mars: hahaha suspicious?
mars: wow, you're making me hungry now
JPennant: heheh
JPennant: yeah, I like good an cheap
JPennant: emphasis on 'good'
mars: =)
JPennant: I stay away from places and areas that have too many hip haoles
mars: LOL
JPennant: I stopped by the Mission District yesterday for something good and mexican
JPennant: had Allambre
JPennant: I think thats how you say
JPennant: which was seared steak and bacon and rice and beans and cheese ;-)
JPennant: not a haole in sight ;-)
mars: so lucky that you're in a city with so much variety in such a small amount of space
JPennant: the bus pass helps :-)
JPennant: cuz, as you know - I hate walking
JPennant: but its the only way to find stuff
mars: yup!
mars: ok jp...sorry to cut this short. I have to run around town for errands
mars: fun
JPennant: ohkay m'dear :-)
JPennant: be good, enjoy yer day :-)
mars: take care. eat some good food for me =)
mars: byebye
JPennant: :-)
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JPennant: Im in the mood for a little Pho
JPennant: my first time
yamB: rilly
JPennant: yup
yamB: get the No. 1
JPennant: I was wandering the tenderloin yesterday
yamB: every Pho place has the same No. 1
JPennant: k
yamB: well, that is is you can take tripe and tendons
yamB: but the tripe is sliced super thin
JPennant: not a tripe man
JPennant: childhood aversion
yamB: not me either, but it's so thin , it tastes different
JPennant: like saffron, I leave it alone just on principle
JPennant: but I walked by the back kitchen of one yesterday, and the stench of garlic *wooshed* out
JPennant: and I thought, THATS what I need.
yamB: garlic and cilantro and thai basil
JPennant: hm?
yamB: the usual scents from a vietnamese restaurant
JPennant: oh cool

On humming rotation

Gigolos Get Lonely Too - The Tyme


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Around here, the weathercasters are usually pretty accurate, give or take a day or two.

Yes, by that I mean, theyre usually a day off on their forecasts, not surprising considering the range of weather that can occur from coasts to valleys to mountains.

And thats just the city of San Francisco, nevermind the Bay Area.

That meant yesterday, which supposed to be a cloudy and foggy day, was instead a gorgeous, breath from god kinda day. (Which means it was windy too, yes.)

I guess the lesson is to just head out anyway and see what happens.

With that I was rewarded with the epic kind of scenic beauty this place is famous for. The usual sunday meander to the Marin headlands had me wishing for a nice wide-angled zoom lens (and a camera to hang it off of), then hanging around Union Square gave me the kind of postcard shots I could see in my minds eye.

*sigh*

Today's horrorscope reminds me:

Keep your eye on the ball and keep telling yourself that the longer you hold out for what it is you want, the more likely it is you will get it.

Sometimes Virgos get a bad rap for being overly critical and having impossibly high standards. But are they impossibly high?

Therefore in your mind you're not asking for anything beyond the glories you see everyday around you in a flower or a leaf or the setting sun. Why shouldn't occurrences in your life reflect the same flawlessness?

Stick to what you want and don't listen to anyone who says you can't have it.

Exactly.

Well, today's weather is even better.

Lemme go find that F-Line promenade boat-shaped streetcar I was riding around in yesterday afternoon from the Castro to Fisherman's Wharf(I heard it's distinctive 'toot-toot' this morn) and go enjoy a little more of these days that Im currently experiencing.
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Lilbro's l'l laughing cub. :-)