Weekend Update

This weekend was (mostly) fun and summer-y:

Kram, Henrique, Samantha, Laura, and I met up with Hyphy and co. at the monthly Art Murmur in Oakland on Friday night. I'm not wild about going out in Oakland because the bars close too early and one losses a lot of time going to/fro on BART. That said, Art Murmur is fun if only for the lax open container/public urination rules. It's also fun because it's such a scene with inevitable run-ins with long lost friends. Afterwards, I jammed with Kram and then we went to a "90s" hip-hop night. I am so pissed about this that I am going to save my rant for a time when I can afford to raise my blood pressure.

I spend Saturday practicing being still for many hours at the Korean bath house in Japantown. Imperial Day Spa is a great no-frills place to spend the day alone relaxing and working through issues. I went to Debaser at night and it was just what I needed.

We went to SF Indie Mart at the Parkside on Sunday. It was like Etsy and Dolores Park exploded onto the sidewalk. Items that decidedly need to go away: mustache crafts, Burner fashion, ANTLERS. I did however but a really rad crystal ring after a few bloody mary dranks. I'm going to charge that badboy so hard when we go on our Solstice 2010 glamping trip! After Potrero we went back to Treat Suite for a killer jam session (though I didn't jam, I just drank). Christy is a badass drummer!

See you on the 21st, Pacha!

New York, NY: Always Raving

Shrimp, Lauren, Kati, and I met Machine aka Brolan at one of his homie's parties in the downstairs room of Gallery Bar on my last night in town (morning of departure). At first I was skeptical because I HATE house music but then it got late and the resident DJ made it c-c-c-crunk. It was like being at a rad show in SF except 20 ZILLION TIMES BETTER because there were ZERO Burners there - only normal, all-walks-of-life New Yorkers (not even LES-ers) getting funky. Also! What a coincidence that the guest DJ was 94110.

Shrimp and I closed the party then took our sweet little time getting back to Lauren's. My best friend found out she missed her AM flight back to SF after 2 hours on the A train to JFK. Ouch. Party on!

Gap '93 Resort

Last I checked Doomberg sez no P-funks indoors starting 4/03. Eh-hem

Shrimpdress

(via)

New York, NY: Homeostasis

I finally figured out how to make these youtube vidz directly through the Flipcam software. They aren't as "high production" as the iMovie vidz (see "Homeroast!" and "Getting Fried with Hyphy") but the resolution is much better. It takes 5 seconds to slap clips together with this software. I'm pretty much sold.

This visit was such a lovefest - words can't even do it justice. I love/hate that I don't think about San Francisco for a second when I am in New York. This makes me feel better about moving soon. It also makes me question myself because I really do love San Francisco when I'm there. I guess it's just a fact of being a person who LOVES LIFE.

Some adventures are missing (shooting vidz all the time sort of gets in the way of "being present" - ha!) but here is a little "just the facts" tour of some scenes from my visit home. I only wish I remembered to take some footage of my beautiful sister's high school graduation:


One afternoon I took a walk with Lauren from my house to her house. We stopped for a nostalgic brew at Local 187, my home during the great World Cup 2002 summer.




Next there is a tour of my grammar and high school. Lauren, Sasha, and I went back for a farewell reception for one of our teachers. We took the opportunity to relive some important elements of our years there.




The following footage is of the poorly-lit Frying Pan, which was the first stop on and endless night of drinking with Claire, the ultimate champ. It's amazing how uncharted that space remains. Where else would you find a moldy fruit platter below the DJ booth on the bottom floor of an old ship? I guess this is why the yuppies drink on the doc.




Heather, Nikki, and I spend the night at the Russian bath house in Flatbush. It was VERY relaxing. I highly recommend it. It's hard for me to relax but this did the trick.




Here is a vid from a night of kicking it on the sidewalk and on the fire escape with Rosie and Masha. This clip runs on a bit too long but I think it captures the best of NYC's hot and sweaty summer night.




I went to see Marina Abramovic with Heather. Absolutely amazing. I was a real hater going into it but it was truly a special experience. It "changed" me! (also I know there is a typo in the opening credit. I made the clip when I was flying home on zero hours of sleep and no ADD rx).




Alex Taylor took me out for a schnazzy dinner at Commerce in the Greenwich Village around the corner from our beloved Chumley's (rip). We then went for a few whiskeys at Kettle of Fish, which is sort of a mess but a good place for a pre-subway cocktail, and I iced Lauren's bro at Daddy-O. Alex and I high-tailed it uptown for a 2am tour of the Whitney Biennial. I don't care if it's corny but the Whitney has always been my favorite museum.




New York is huge but I always run into friends on the street! I found Nick DeMarco (of 94110)smacking on a Mister Softee on Broadway and Spring! I caught Austin riding his bike home from the ferry!




I spent Memorial Day with my long, lost friend Lina Marin (2 intense 2 blog!) and Claire and Nazli. We met Sandra (♥) and Samantha then schelped out to Bushwick for a BBQ at Leslie's house. What a treat to see my starni Dee Dee on her way to Paris and finally meet famous Emily. Masha, Nikki, Heather, and Meg came too.




On my last night in the city I went over to Alex and Hannah's new pad in Prospect Heights for a dinner party with Katie and Elana and miscellaneous (not miscellaneous, really just Aidan and Blake) Vassholes. Hannah cooked us a delicious dinner, which she more or less instructs us how to create on this video.




xx!

Millerton, NY: How to Glam Camp in the Country

We spent Memorial Day weekend glam camping at Sasha's country house in Millerton, New York. Having moved through a zillion apartments in my life, it's really the only land in the world with which I have any continuity. Sasha and I used to come up for the weekend when we were kids to frolic around in the fields. It became the site of our summer parties as we grew into teenage degenerates.

This year's opening weekend upheld the Millerton tradition: I think we maxed out at 17 bodies sleeping in the guest house with a few Boston dudes in a tent outside plus whomever else crashed in the main house. I pretty much boogied for 36-hours straight only stopping to kick Tyler's ass in a heated game of lawn tennis and for an occasional dip in the pool. We iced bros and had massive bonfire. The Source Vol. 2 and like music was on heavy rotation. Darby and co. prepared multi-course candlelit feasts for 30. We kept it pretty glamorous despite the odds (elements! bros! sloppiness! "root"!) against us. Everyone loved (or hated!) the tambo by the end of the weekend.

New York, NY: Video Fail

I've ditched my sister's shitty digicam for an HD Flip camera. The motion and sound better capture the spirit of adventures! Unfortunately, it is a pain in the ass to upload because the highdef files are so huge that I have to "render" them through a few programs before I put them online. It's tedious - especially since I come from the Wham-Bam-Thank-You-Ma'am School of Video Editing.

Here is a video with clips from my first few days home: breakfast with Antonia, the walk from my mom's house in Morningside Heights to Lauren's in downtown Brooklyn (8.3 miles!), a trip to the Coney Island Banya for a proper Russian bath house experience, Dr. Spencer's farewell reception at Sacred Heart (regard! Mme Chipriani!), exploration of the underbelly of the Frying Pan. THE PROBLEM: there is no sound and I don't know where it went. Grrrrrrrrrr. Let's see if I can fix it back in SF (yeah right?).

Ruby and the Lulas - East Coast Tour

Lu and I are zipping off to SFO now to fly to NYC. We'll be home (UWS!) for a night then I am going to Philidelphia on Thursday for my union's National Convention through Sunday. We'll be in NYC for the week then Thrillerton for Memorial Day weekend. I'm in NYC again for a few more days for my sister's high school graduation (!) festivities. Lu and I fly back home on June 3rd. I am super pumped to see my NYC homies and get a little East Coast summer in my system.

Catching Crabs with Hyphy, PGW, Melinda