Winter Update: Pacific Northwest Photos

Voo Doo Donuts in Portland

I went eating up and down Southern California for Thanksgiving.  I gained about three pounds during the day, but in the morning, I'd be back down to size, ready to start up again.  Heave!

Greeter in Seattle

Last weekend, I went to the tailor to pick up my dress, and I parked a few blocks down.  Walking through the garment district downtown is so quirky and feel-good in a down-and-out way.  An old man in a three piece suit greeted me, "Hello, my friend!"  On the way back when I passed him again, he was cleaning his dentures in a small cottage cheese bucket filled with water.  A woman saw me holding my dress and called me over, wanted to tell me it was beautiful.   As I got to my car, a man hollered from across the street, "I like your dress!"  I yelled back, Thanks!  "You a model?"  No, I smiled.  "YES you are!  Yes YOU are!"  My extra marsupial pouch I've developed to tuck into more food was undoubtedly well camouflaged.

Lost dog in Seattle

In other news, wow, there is so little news.  I've been house sitting my favorite house and resident cat again, but seeing as I'm so heavy, it's been difficult to get comfortable on the various couches.  I'm like a walrus tossing and turning on a small buoy.  The cat doesn't mind.  A walrus is real warm, and a cat can avoid crushing seismic flips throughout the night.

Japanophiles in Portland

OMG.  OMG.  I did something in the middle of composing this post.  I went OUT!  I went drinking and dancing and carousing til 2:30 in the morning.  That's breaking a ten-month streak of homebodyness.  Hells ya!  I drank so much whiskey and beer I almost hurled. I don't think I've done that in 20 years.  Unfortunately, I was wearing a bright yellow puffy ski jacket to work that day, so I looked like a giant bumble bee.  Various co-workers had to pretend to be my man to swat away unwelcome dancer uppers.  You know, the guy who dances up on you and then when you scoot your ass away, grabs your hand, and by way of come on, says, "I tried to dance with you!"  Yes, yes you did.  Wooo, I feel ALIVE.  We hugged, we yelled, we took pictures, we crossed streets, we got hit by water balloons, we lost our phones, YEAAAH!!  I feel like a gazillion dollars.  I got wasted!!  I think that's the first hangover I've ever had.  From alcohol.

Japanese garden in Portland

The company holiday party is coming up, and this year's a Mad Men theme.  Rad, right?  I am knee deep in vintage analysis. There are so many directions you could go with this.  Late 50's or early 60's?  Pampered, bored housewife in the suburbs or office bombshell?  Kelly bag or clutch?  Long or short?  Did you know that in the 50's when they figured out how to make non-seamed stockings, women weren't really sure if they were into it?  So, Hanes kept making both; it was ladies' choice.  This lady has too many choices and hopes that after these last couple themed parties, she can get back to work blogging and writing instead of drooling over Etsy.

Oh great, now I am sick at home.  Too much partying?!  I just partied once?  Should've worked up to it.  Hope everyone is staying warm and well-fed.

DIY Khaleesi Daenerys Targaryan from HBO's Game of Thrones

Boy, there is a lot of catching up to do.  First off, I have to post my Halloween costume DIY because it is already November.  Lookie here:

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Target outfit, with modified midriff so as to be comfortable at work.  (Courtesy HBO)

For those of you who haven't seen the show/read the books yet, this character here is badass.  SPOILERS: She starts out as ingenue princess bait that her brother uses to gain an army of wild horse-riding barbarians by giving her away as bride to large, ferocious, and super hot leader of horse-riding barbarians.  Then slowly she gains his trust and love via good sex and guts.  And then she's tried by tragic loss of fierce, hot husband and unborn baby due to backstabbing witch.  Only to rise from glory from her husband's funeral pyre, which she had walked into, as supernaturally fire-proof queen surrounded by recently unfossilized dragons, commanding remaining horse people on her own.  No, I've only been to Comicon once. 

Detail of upholstery fabric bought at Michael Levine.

Suede also.

Aging of suede with coffee, tea, ashes.  Did not follow all aging instructions from Lord of the Rings forum.

Hand sewing going on.

 Really crappy hand sewing. 

Although I was proud to have figured out how to alleviate bunching at the back of my top by cutting slits and adding triangular leather to the bottom.

Pieces of hardware from ebay and etsy, replica Viking cloak pins and Celtic torq made by enterprising Hungarian or Australian.

Vintage purse reminiscent of Khaleesi's husband's horse pants.

 Husband Khal Drogo.  (Courtesy HBO probably too)

 Voila.  Violet contacts not visible.  Wig braiding more difficult than imagined.

Khaleesi eating lunch at her desk.  The white stole is made from one piece of fur called Mongolian.  Mongolian what, they couldn't tell me.

98% of party attendees were not aware of who this character was.  But maybe in a couple years, you will be able to buy the stripper version!

The Same But Different

I have been thinking about being the Other, having considered some feedback I got on my work in my online writing class.  It's a classic story line, the not fitting in, the underdog, the foreigner, the half-breed.  The thing is, as Americans, we might all want to be Other.  We want to be different and individual and unique.  We all have our stories about how we were Other and how hard it was to be that way and isn't it great now that we have grown up and realize the asymmetry of our own snowflake is the very secret to our beauty?  But the thing is, everybody identifies with that story, our Otherness is a commonality.  I wonder if in other countries, they don't necessarily want to be Other, they might want to be a certain type or they might want to be same but different.    

A friend of mine is getting messages from a Colombian dating site because there is somebody with the same name as him out there who is into Colombian girls.  I was fascinated by the way the Colombian girls described themselves as a particular type.  They were either "affectionate and sincere" ones or "uncomplicated" ones.  The hot ones apparently describe themselves as "happy."  Also there are "little" women.  Are these types that actually exist or are these some kind of defensive declaration against a preconceived notion that Colombian men have about Colombian women being crazy, depressive, and gadunkadunk?  I don't know!  How do women declare themselves here?  I glanced through Salon personals just now, and we appear to want to be both of everything.  We are girls next door who are sexy too.  We are many-sided diamonds in the rough.  We are stripper librarians.  Super complicated, cool, funny, serious, adventurous, home bodies.  Me too!

Which reminds me, our neighborhood version of Christina Ricci cat came the closest to me that she has ever dared.  She is a wild thing, always having babies and not being catchable enough to be fixed.  Can you tell that she's pretty?  She's difficult to photograph and perhaps pregnant again.

The other thing about the Other is that we get all huffy when there's another one of us around.  That's why there's a Charlotte and a Samantha and a Carrie and the other one in your group of friends.  It's hard to have the same type in one gang.  You are much more liable to run into another you when there are more people around, like in school, which is why you might recall all those evil twins and frenemies from your youth.  Even if you have eliminated other you's in your adulthood, they are all still out there, in the world.  I never felt so demoralized as when I was trying to be an actress for a year or so in my twenties, and I'd audition for a part as an Asian news broadcaster, and there would be a hundred other me's, all with our Connie Chung hair and crepe suiting.  I didn't love acting enough to live like that.

But now, as I'm trying to craft stories, maybe all the other me's is exactly who I should be thinking about.  Maybe it isn't that I have to stand out as a special me.  Maybe what I want is for everyone to relate.  You know what I'm talking about.

D3LiNQUENTZ Review

I went to see a one-woman play written and performed by Stefany Northcutt and directed by George C. Stiehl, and it was great!  Plays in L.A. can sometimes suck, but this one was fast-paced, funny, poignant, and the one woman wowed.  Not only did she deliver a heartfelt story, she also entertained with her super split second switches between characters and her complete physical embodiment of each.

The story centers around four juvenile delinquents sent to a Group Home to straighten up and how each of them addresses the challenges and decisions they have to make there that will affect the rest of their lives.  The material could easily have been painted in overwrought strokes in less capable hands because of the personal and teenage nature of the story.  Thankfully, Northcutt deftly manages to intertwine levity and pathos.

Check it out at the Write Act Repertory if you're local.  It's running through October 1.  Details for D3linquentz.

Beach Bonfire of the Ex-boyfriends

What’s up, Universe?  The past couple of weeks, five ex-boyfriends have let it be known that they have new girlfriends.  Normally, that’s just news for congratulations, but I was a little inclined to say uncle.   I mean, is that really necessary?  I figured I was being hit over the head with either: 1. I have too many ex-boyfriends, 2. I should get off my tush and start dating, or 3. I should concentrate on finishing my book.  I can’t really do anything about having too many ex-boyfriends.  One can never have too many ex-boyfriends?  What is the ex-boyfriend limit?  #2 just seemed reactionary.  The answer was to do #3 because really until I finish that, I don’t have time to troll dating sites and do the witty-email-exchange dance until we get to our appointed drinks date.

Sigh.  Even Saboteur, who I speak to on a weekly basis, has a new ungirlfriend.  I asked him, "Hey, can I crash at your place some time Labor Day weekend, I have to see my folks and some of my high school friends."  "Oh man, homegirl is coming up," he said.  "Whut, really?  Everybody has a girlfriend!" I moaned.  (Maybe that was #4, to express the discomfort.)  I texted him later to see how his long weekend with her and her gang went.  He wrote back, “Better than I expected, but the saboteur is on the loose.”  Meaning, he’s already looking for excuses for why it wouldn’t work.  Poor Saboteur.

So, I saw two sets of my high school friends.  The gang in Huntington Beach had the eleven children running around again, which I love because I get to see my friends being parents.  This includes keeping the peace and making sure the kids eat and preventing small ones from wandering over to the pool, and also, most admirably, keeping their space, not letting their conversations get interrupted by mayhem.  I stayed late into the night, talking to my sweet, smart Mormon friends (30% of my high school friends are Mormon) about everything from parenting to religion to pole dancing to teaching junior high.  We also reminisced about when we ourselves were in junior high and then when we were 19 and back from our first year of college, when J-Bozz was sad because suddenly all the things we used to do weren’t fun enough anymore and everyone wanted to drink.  “And didn’t someone OD on something at some party, too?” J-Bozz said.  “Uh ya, that would’ve been me,” I said.  “ODing” on too much weed.  You know, one of those newb moves when you panic because the room spins and pins you down to the floor and your limbs are twitching uncontrollably, and nobody else is experienced enough (my gang were late bloomers) to let you know that it’ll pass, and whatever you do, don’t call the paramedics.

It’s nice and funny to talk to people who know your 13-year-old self and completely apropos, as I was just working on a chapter about that period.  Every time I’ve looked at my primary source material for junior high -- my diary, I’ve felt like there’s absolutely nothing of use in there.  But this time, after talking to my friends, I saw it fresh.  The stilted language and the boring details were hiding something big and galumphing.  They were hiding the Herculean efforts we were daily engaged in to try and control our uncontrollable foolishness.  Our hormones and our burning desires and our ceaselessly uncooperative bodies and impulses and things being blurted out of our mouths.  Bam!  I was off.  Hopefully, it’ll make a good Chapter 10 or 11. 

And yeah, I’ve been quiet cuz that’s what I’ve been working on.  I’m taking a three-week book writing class with my former retreat instructor because I’ve come to terms with the fact that I can’t finish this thing unless I’m held accountable.  So far, we’ve had two short writing marathons.  Today is the big one.  The six-hour monster.  I’m gonna love every minute!

Labbits & Lomo Saltado

 Firehorse at Hotel Cafe; she's got pipes somewhere between Bjork and Gaga, check em out

Wooo, I did one of those things that you never do because you live too close to it.  I went inside the Japanese American Museum. 

Pink glow bear hanging from telephone wires in the night sky

 

I was worried that it was going to be all internment, all the time, but that was only the second floor.  I say that because I thought I already knew all I needed to know, but I actually learned something up there.  Japanese-Peruvians got jacked.  They got shipped out of Peru and sent to the U.S. internment/concentration camps during the war because the U.S. wanted to use them for hostage exchange since they were technically illegal aliens.  When the war was over, Peru said, na-uh, you can’t come back anyway.  So then a couple thousand of them got deported back to Japan, where some of the second-generation had never been.  Double deportation!  How effed is that?  The remaining three hundred fought deportation through the courts and eventually settled in New Jersey because the town of Seabrook needed farm labor.   A hundred eventually made it home to Peru. 

There was a baseball in the exhibit, owned by a Japanese-American kid who went to Berkeley.  It was signed by his teammates before he left for Manzanar or one of the other camps, and one of them said something like,” goodbye, hope you come back soon.”  Ouch.  I always imagine the interned Japanese Americans as strawberry farmers and fishermen and hardware store owners and seamstresses and baseball players.  Ooo, Axis Powers!   

Downstairs was rabbits.  Bunch of those art toy labbits recreated by various artists.  Notice the perishable corn dog one, which was on sale for hundreds of dollars. 

And a whole room dedicated to the comic Usagi Yojimbo, which was fun.  And then had afternoon tea at the adjoining Chado Tea Room where a party of ten cosplayers arrived.  Their leader was a skinny girl in a pink gothic lolita dress with black polka dots.  She had a wig that was half pink and half black, and she was very aggressive about their 2PM reservations, like Little Miss Cruella De Ville.

Tim Burton and Cosplay

Notice 4th generation Hawaiian amongst 1st generation OG cosplayers

I started to obsess about my Halloween costume.  Yes, it’s August.  It’s never too early, if you want to avoid the last minute dash to Forplay on Hollywood Blvd to pick up your Sexy Navy SEAL costume.  My choice this year is gonna be sooo cosplay, I can no longer be bemused at the Japanophiles roaming around my neighborhood. 

Anyway, too many hours staring at etsy and ebay, studying kilt pins and cloak pins and celtic torcs led to a fruitless drive to the fabric district right when the stores were all closing, so I turned back around and ran into some festivities near the Japanese American museum.  It was the Tanabata festival.  Woo, I never been!  

Arthur Nakane singing "Sukiyaki"

 

It’s a summer festival where you write wishes and prayers on pieces of paper and tie them to bamboo because it's the one time of the year that these two stars who are lovers get to meet each other across the river of the Milky Way.  (Her dad, the King of the Universe, won't let them be together the rest of the time because they don't do their work.)  It was kinda lackluster though.  Aw, Little Tokyo, there just aren't enough of us are there?  I had some octopus balls.  “No, they are not actual testicles,” the man next to me told his friends.  Sort of half paid attention to a magic show and a one-man band, scanned the stalls, listened to a monk loudly inspiring a small group of ancient Buddhists in earnest Japanese, ate some chirashi zushi AKA a bowl of rice with sashimi and sauce on top.  Gave instructions to German tourists on how to eat said chirashi zushi.  Done with festival.

Streamers symbolize umm, the weaving that is the female star's occupation

 

But seriously, if you haven’t donated to Japan cuz they are liable to be ok by themselves, please do, they still need help, that thing is still leaking and entire pre-schools are getting bloody noses.

Sunday was LACMA.  Tim Burton and $20 heirloom tomato and salami salad (bunch of us split it, but still) at the museum café.  The new section of the museum is really pleasant though, it’s like pleasant eveningville.  You can hear some jazz or chamber music, you can look at Hakuin calligraphy, and then munch flatbreads and swill white wine at Stark Bar which looks like a truck stop a la Design Within Reach.  If you haven’t understood this entire paragraph, you are totally cool, call me.

Tim Burton, though.  “Eehh,” people are apparently saying about the exhibit.  I liked it.  V-Dawg pointed out that he seemed to be funnier when he was younger.  You can see it when he’s drawing a rather fleshy nude in some art class and then draws a very similarly fleshy monster in the corner of his paper.  I liked his titles, like “Curse of the Crying Woman” and “Woman from a Prehistoric Planet.” 

I loved the Edward Scissorhands costume up close, with all the belt buckles and seams and different leathers and mismatched metals.  Hmm, silver buckles at the chest (one giant moon-shaped one, so awesome) but brass colored ones on the left boot.  Maybe it’s only me that has mixed feelings about mixing metals, but it was inspiring to see the kind of messy creativity that he and his team have.  Oh right, it's the camera and the lighting that adds the final layer of perfection.

In fact, I should stop zooming in on photographs of the character I want to dress up as for Halloween and throw some shit together that FEELS like her.  Haha, yeah, right.