From Echo Park to Santa Monica

My wonderful boyfriend bought me a Nikon J1 for my birthday.  I was so surprised!  I took it for a test run in Echo Park while hanging out with Tommy.

I enjoyed a Salmon Tartine from Valerie Echo Park.  I love this local spot.  No lines, open seating and amazing food.  A hidden treasure, that's for sure.  I'm sad that Delilah's closed down, but Valerie is a nice replacement.

When I told my coworkers about walking around Echo Park they asked "were there a lot of homeless people?"  Sure... but there were also picnickers, joggers, brunchers (there's a brunch spot at the lake), dog walkers and paddle boaters.  If you're disgusted/scared of the neighborhoods east of La Brea, I welcome you to stay in West LA.  This amazing park is for me to enjoy.

The lotus blossoms are blooming.

I love this view of the downtown city scape with the fountain and paddle boats.

I do enjoy my time in Santa Monica when I visit Anthony and Jon.  These boyfriends hold wonderful parties inviting different people from all walks of life.  Their friends are very talented, charismatic and just good people.  We celebrated Anthony's PhD over the weekend!

He was serving longanisa hotdogs complete with sliced jalapeño, grilled onions, ketchup, mayo and bacon.  Probably one of the best hotdogs I've ever had.

Grill em!

Floral patterns are in.

I was allured by Ashley.  We posed in spread eagle.

Anthony's friends were in a band.  So we enjoyed some live music.


A little Beyonce.

Looks like I don't have to steal as many pictures anymore now that I have my own nice camera.  Muah.  I wuv this guy.

BootieLA Prom - Blurry Night

We took a nice stroll through Echo Park Lake to get to the EchoPlex where it was Prom Night with BootieLA!  I couldn't get my camera settings right, but it made for fun party pictures.

Toward the end of the night, it looked like most people were done.  Except Phil.  I encouraged everyone to keep going for the party.  "Just once a year!"  Let's stay longer than midnight for once.  Though I was getting pretty tired.

The prom king and queen.  Cute hipster girl and buff nerdy guy with no shirt.  Not as cleaver as a couple years back.  Someone came as Carrie and had blood running down her dress.  She was amazing.

Looks like we're judging someone do the warm.. BUt it was just little people getting it on in the middle of the dance circle.

Happy Birthday Phil!

#Selfie Round Up - Q1 2014

It's disgusting, yet hilarious how narcissistic we've become and I can't help but roll my eyes when I see an Instagram, Facebook wall full of boring selfies.  But I guess #selfies can tell stories so below are the stories from January, February of March of this year from my cell phone only to be shared with this blog and not on social media.

A lot of the kissy-trying-to-be-cute pictures were for Jimmy, but you can see them too.

January 2014

• Neil visited me
• I tried to take hipster photos
• A sleepover
• A coworker
• O.. a body pic.. how did that get in there
• My cousin in town
• When I smuggled a pizza into Rage and was really proud of it

February 2014

• Playing with Pudding Cam ap with the boo
• I kidnapped my coworker's kid who loves to smile
• Adventures in Portland and Seattle
• Met someone who plays for an orchestra

March 2014

• Holi Festival of Colors
• Work events
• Gay Men Chorus Show
• Karaoke
• Kevyn and me doing a photobooth with iPhones instead of paying $4
• Paddle Boat in Echo Park lake
• Celebrating JV's birthday!
• Visiting Yonius and Jae at their work place

THE END.

I Don't Know About You 2014

Echo Park Lake 

I can't seem to get my act together this year and we're almost at the half way mark.  I just don't feel as excited about ... about any thing.  I've been procrastinating on lingering things on my to-do list like submitting my taxes (I got an extension.)  Or getting my finances together in general.  I'm getting anxiety about what to do for my 29th birthday.  Initially I was going to host a large party at an AirBnB rental, but I didn't want to disrespect personal properties.

I'm having issues finishing this sentence:  "I would be happier if......"

I had a better wardrobe? - I don't care
I owned a house? - Yes, but... that's impossible
I made more money? Things are fine... I don't know how to manage the money I currently have
I traveled more? Yes...  I should travel like Luuworld.

Maybe that's what it is.  I feel stagnant.

I'm really disappointed that I'm not going to Bay to Breakers; a tradition thats finally being broken in its fifth year because Jimmy has a work obligation.  But I rationalized in my mind that Coachella was a very suitable substitute... which I can really appreciate as an exciting new experience that is more involved than trashing the streets of SF in a costume during the early morning.  But I love tradition.

I stopped taking pictures with my camera and have depended on camera phone pictures to capture blurry memories... but that's just what they are.   I find myself asking people..."where is this from?"  too often because the photo is smashed between selfies and food pics with no other indication....

Bollywood Dance Party at Los Globos

Friends are blurry too.  I love reaching out.  I love planning LA explorations, but it's not like before where we had a solid group.  People are scattered... as they should be.  This is  the natural progression of friendships. We're all growing up and focusing on ourselves and personal life projects.

Jimmy tells me I need a hobby.  Blogging and taking event pictures used to be an obsession, but not anymore.  I don't think my stories are that interesting.  I don't think my pictures are worth sharing either especially since everyone else is doing it and doing it better through microblogs. And my late twenties self has less to complain about.  But I do keep my Yelp! reviews up to date.  That, I'm proud of.

I proposed an idea to Jimmy to do a mock fashion blog that's self deprecating.  I would pose in an outfit that I usually would wear and tell stories.  "This shirt has a stain, but I really like it so I keep wearing it."  Or "I bought this shirt because it was like $5... it doesn't match anything, but whatever."  Or "my parents got this for me during their trip to Hawaii... I think it's really ugly, but I need to wait a few years before I can get rid of gifts."  or.. "these pants are too tight, but I just don't button it and it's all good."  Something like that... thought it would be fun to do, but knew that I would run out of material fast.

Maybe my boredom is body and soul telling me that I need to mix that shit up.  MIX IT UP and SNAP OUT OF IT.  But what do I need to do?

I think.... 2014 is the year of being complacent.  Which is probably why I don't like it.

Eat, Drink, and Be.... Mary

Hamburger Mary's bingo night is pretty popular.  Drag Queen bingo!  It's a $20 buy in, but you get 10 games and a really great time.  We made reservations and got front row seats.

This is our bingo caller Drag Queen.  So fabulous.  And there's Phil enjoying his monster sided alcohol.

You can win prizes that include porn, coffee table books, trips... etc.  Things that were donated.  The proceeds go to charity which is great.  If you win, they make you run around the room while people throw their losing bingo sheet at you.  We won one round and now we have a house dildo.  Yay.

If you call a false bingo they slap your butt with paddle.  I captured this moment on instagram.

Book of Mormon Date

Took Jimmy to see the Book of Mormon at Pantages.  We had a nice Thai dinner right before.

April Recap

Spring Cleaning

I'm always impressed when I find out that my friends are talented.  Will had an art exhibit in Little Tokyo called Monochromatic where he featured his paper designs.  The detail is amazing.

California Through My Lens blog sent us on an adventure through Murphy Ranch in Santa Monica.  Well actually Brian gave me the initial idea, but I found this blog very helpful to find the hidden spots.

This building is always changing with graffiti artist constantly cover over others' work.  When we arrived we noticed some kids enjoying 420 and painting the inside.

Phil actually went again another weekend and found this place fenced off and the graffiti painted over.  Looks like we visited just in time.  He also found a rope swing and other painted areas.

The hike itself involved many stairs.  And there was really a clear path to the buildings, but we were able to ask around.

We supported our friends at the CalTech 2nd Annual drag show.  It was very entertaining.  And very different.  Wilton was the perfect MC and the greatest drag queen doing a death drop during his performance.  It was also fun to watch drag Kings.  The after party was awesome at the karaoke bar The Boulevard.

My car stereo was damaged.  My coworker asked the guy she was dating to if he could fix it because he works on race cars.  He dismantled my dash and found a shit ton of extra wires.  He told me that someone tried to install a woofer which I thought to be odd since I bought my car in 2012 from a car rental place.  SHADY.   We were able to get the sound to work, but the stereo lights no longer turned on.  I guess I'd rather have sound than light.  LOL.

I was lucky, he didn't have the correct wrench, but someone across the lot was working on a motorcycle and had the tool.  SCORE.  He saved me a lot of money.

We checked out the Brewery Art Walk which I've gone to a couple times before already.  Again, it was more about the living space than the art itself.

Aww - me and Alysia at Yelp! Elite Event in Pasadena.

I'm curious what this is for.

EATING OUT APRIL

Myung Dong Grill (Sunnyvale) - Seafood Pancake
Lasa Filipino Pop Up (Eagle Rock) - Pork Cheek Kaldereta.
Cinco de Mayo (West Side) - Drunk tacos
Trencher (Each Park) - A sandwich
Banh Cuon Phu Ho Tay (San Jose) - Bun and Grilled Fish
Perilla (San Francisco) - Garlic Noodles (Joe's FAVORITE!)
Neat Bar (Glendale) - Neat Bourbon and "Chaser" which was more of a mixed cocktail $12!
Badmaash (DTLA) - Poutine Masala - sop it up!
Banh Cuon Phu Ho Tay (San Jose) - Bun Mam.  Ppl always impressed that I like this.
Badmaash (DTLA) - Random other dishes
Heywood (Silverlake) - Game changer and Caliente - If you want to pay $10 for grilled cheese

Yes - I would like my Spam Musubi loco moco style!!!!  Gravy and with an Egg on it!  Thank you Aloha Cafe in Little Tokyo!