sf paradiso

Invigorated

: etymology in+vigor

:to give life and energy to: animate; stimulate.

That's probably the best way I can describe myself in the month of February thus far. I feel like I've recovered a little part of me that forgot how to lose control. I'd fallen victim to a subtle routine that went undetected for the past few months and it wasn't until I was forced to be at places against my will where I took notice of it. After a special little midweek getaway to Big Bear I was summoned by the almighty powers of SBE to drive directly to Hyde Lounge located at Mammoth to train new servers. Having with me only a bag of snowboarding clothes and a trusty companion, we took off for a 7 hour trip down one mountain and up another. It was nice. Work didn't seem like work. The whole trip felt like a rebellious act of liberation where we used the excuse of a long drive and long days to have twice as much fun than we normally would. Play hard, play harder. Then after 3 days of hard playing, we went home. But something didn't feel right. I got a taste of something familiar but couldn't hash out what it was. It was fun but fun in a different way. I needed to get away again. I then remembered making plans to head up north for the opening of Marisa's play. Yesss. So my good buddy AVG and I frantically got our shifts covered for the upcoming week and set sail.

The drive up was nice. We took the scenic route which took us to our first stop at Splash Cafe in Pismo Beach. We had their acclaimed clam chowder and later on stopped by an espresso bar called Espresso Bar. We thought it would be a great idea to keep a photo journal with descriptions of each cup of coffee we drank (being coffee snobs ourselves), but lost interest after having the horse piss they called coffee at this sordid establishment. So I guess that was that.

Espresso Bar review: sucked.

Hello SF, hello Marisa.. She's in her second year as a MFA student at ACT in SF handing out BJs to the IRS to avoid getting audited. Hotel Paradiso was the play her class put up and I will say that it ranks among the top 5 plays I've ever seen. It's amazing what magic comes about when you mix a bowl of flawed heroes, prefect losers, a plot, great acting with a sprinkle of absurdity. It was delicious. It was... invigorating.

Being with Marisa and Aaron felt like slipping into a familiar old shoe. Even though we've all been separated since last summer and another year prior to that, the chemistry between us still felt as smelly and comfy as our snotty undergrad years. We did a lot of catching up and talked about life and love. We didn't need to paint the town red or drift about after some bong rips, we just needed the company. Aaron and I got to sit in on one of Marisa's rehearsal of the play she's creating titled, "Alice". It was incredibly inspiring to see her work as a director and to see how much she's grown. Not height-wise, she's still 3'2", but mainly her focus to the work. It was like watching a cat do cat-stuff. I'm truly happy for both her and Aaron for pursing fulfillment through their art everyday. Incredibly, yep... that.

goodnight!

current read: The Peep Diaries- Hal Niedzviecki

current listen: Sade

recent inspirations

I'm not one to wander into a museum alone because I'm not that cultured. I never studied fine art so I can't tell you what brush strokes were used on what type of canvas and how that affected the surface of the bladdity blah and I don't know history well enough to understand the significance behind the 300 paintings of men wearing powdered wigs either. The only thing I can articulate is how something makes me feel. When I can get lost in a picture and can create some sort of dialogue from the painting, I get stuck. Sometimes I get stuck for a while and others maybe 5 seconds at a time. It usually depends on whether I've exhausted my perversion to it's potential.

Up until now, I've had tendencies to gravitate towards surrealists like Magritte and Dali plainly because they've got the universal sticky factor of making people go... "duuuuuude, that's a trip." But it wasn't until my recent visit to the Getty where I discovered the sticky factor of a fellow named Gustav Klimt. Now I'm sure he may be a household name for some but my Gustav hymen was still intact until recently. Don't snob.

I got stuck. I got lost in trying to figure if her look meant "I'm high" or "Gustav is the shit." Either way it turned me on. I rushed to the nearest art store and went to town on his stuff. I felt like a kid who's discovered tamarindo candies for the first time. Turns out his painting were even more arousing than his sketches.

This baby's called "The Tree of Life"

And this one is my favorite right now... "The Kiss"

So I think I'm going to start wearing more gold.

Happy February Februar Fevrier Febbraio Febrero!