Discovering LA Festivals (Hester, Bloomfest, Renegade Craft)

Outdoor Movie Screenings

Los Angeles LOVES Outdoor Movie screenings.  You don't understand... the city is IN LOVE with the idea of turning a parking lot, field of grass, cemetery into a screening of classic movies through the summer.  BYOLC  (Bring your own lawn chair.)

Cinespia - sit on the dead at Hollywood Forever Cemetery, enjoy a movie
Devil's Night Drive-In - park your car downtown, enjoy a "drive-in" movie
Street Food Cinema - Stuff your face with overpriced food truck food, enjoy a movie
Silverlake Picture Show - Sit on the street painted green that simulates a hipster park... and enjoy a movie

There's a shit ton more in various neighborhoods showing random things. Very LA... like food trucks, DJs, photo booths once someone hears how easy it is to rent the equipment, the urban sprawl goes crazy.  Calm your nerves LA, we don't need a DJ at the cupcake shop, we don't need foodtrucks at the Promenade which already has tons of restaurants, we don't need photo booths at random house parties... wait.. never mind on the last one.

Anyway, closer to my heart is festivals during the summer.



Hester Street Fair - Hollywood Indie Night Market

Under the Hollywood lights, we found ourselves in a parking lot with the usual vendors and foodtrucks.  The lightbulbs strung back and forth caught my eye as well as the illuminating palm tree.  The spice booth was so fragrant and Charles lucked out with two cute shirts from the poster vendor that I see at every festival.

Looking forward to the Indie Design Market on August 18th.

Bloomfest

Checked out the Bloomfest with Sean in the Art District of downtown LA.  This area is covered with amazing street art.  Great neighborhood to just walk around, but don't go too far, you'll hit skid row.  There was some live music, but I didn't get a chance to stick around that long.

 Renegade Craft Fair

Unicorn Crafts had this cute booth with cardboard cutouts.  Photo booth ideas!  I love this free event at LA State Historic Park.  I believe it's my 3rd time going (2011, 2010) .  I grabbed some etsy-like magnets for folks and headed out before the sun got too aggressive.

These festivals were a bit similar to one another.  I need to find me some cultural festivals.

Searching for a Community

During these festivals, I took notice of people with SLR cameras snapping pictures of the same things I was with my point and shoot, but at a different more artistic angle: crouching down, leaning forward, zooming as close as possible, doing the splits... basically looking ridiculous so that their pictures look cooler than mine.... at all costs.

I thought to myself, where do these pictures go?  I did some research and used the festivals as my keywords and the tools of the internet to find interesting people who probably live down the street.

Google Blog Search - Though a more refined search through google made sense, most of the blogs featured were actually news articles with no personal spin, which wasn't what I was looking for.

Flickr Search - Nothing, what a mess of a site.

Blog Catalogue and Blog Lovin' - Nothing

Tumblr Tag Search -  I found an overwhelming amount of tagged posts.  I filtered out the tinyboppers and subscribed to the tumblr's that resinated: Kriziaphoto, Bassanio Gratiano, Always Within Never, Jfluxly, Jam0, Anything and Everything.  And this why the #hashtag has been so important in an effort discover more.


I've gone through all of these people's post to determine if they were worth following and I'm excited to have found some Angelinos who are obsessed with exploring their city and sharing their stories.

Friends would ask me how I would find these random blogs online; simply, you have to look.  I also realized that "hidden gem" and "hole in the wall" make great yelp! keyword searches when I'm looking for unique places to eat.

Food Porn - June 2012

My indulgence.

I write my restaurant experiences and opinions on Yelp! (Elite) Page.  Hee hee.  So my blog will be reserved for food pornography.

Son of a Gun - Lobster Roll

UMAMIcatessen - Umami Burger - Smushed Potatoes

UMAMIcatessen - P!gg - Pigg Style Fries

UMAMIcatessen -the Cure -  Pastrami, Rye, Mustard

UMAMIcatessen - "and A Donut - FG&J - Foie Gras Mousse, Forest Berry Jame, Peanut

Duck House - Peking Duck

Elephant Snack Corner - Bi Bim Naengmyeon .. Korean cold noodles that you can seriously choke on

Whipp'd LA -  World Famous Pineapple and Food Stompin Strawberry Dolewhip

The Park's Finest BBQ - Filipino Coconut Beef

Mexicali Taco & Co - Carne Asada Cachetada with Chipotle sauce

Ikea - Swedish Meatballs, Vegetarian Crepes, Cake

SummerTramp 2012

"The Anti-LA Pool Party."  The last Sunday of the month a bar parking lot is astro-turfed and adorned with pools, slides and DJs.  Tramps pour in.

900 free jello shots

Heineken Sponsored

Free Vitamin water and Monster

This event has exploded since the first event 3 years ago.  Lots of people are dressed to be seen.

We claimed a spot and stuck to it and enjoyed good people watching.  We're just normal sun soakers.  Fabulous photo booth.

The water slide is always fun.  It was a bit too slippery so we slipped right off of it.

Tommy found a duck to ride

They got creative with the porta potties.  Peep-a-boo said the power bottom.

As the party got crazy, we packed our bags.

We escorted ourselves out.  #shameless street strutting in a speedo.  But check out the back muscles on this pink short wonder.

Olympic Flame

It's been months since I've hosted a party and this passed/past Saturday was perfect for an Olympic theme!  We encouraged everyone to dress up and to my surprise most people participated.  Though I guess some folks cheated by just wearing gym clothes per my recommendation.

I got really creative with the decorations and I'm quite proud of myself for the innovation.  Though I was inspired by pinterest.  The party supply stores gave me nothing; it was the dollar stores that gave me the gold.

The Olympic rings hanging in the living room and in the photobooth are made from wreaths wrapped in streamers and hung from the ceiling with string.  I printed out flags and found medals as party favors.  I was also able to print out the official Olympic torch and added streamers to simulate fire.

I also turned the hallway into a faux swimming lane line by adding flags across the walls and blue lights along the floor.

The athletes that attended:

Marathon runners

Tennis Players

Boxers

Crazy Fans

Studly Wrestler

Gymnast

The IOC Chairman

Table Tennis

Soccer Player

Trampoline

Track People

Cyclist

Swimmers and Divers

"I was completely unprepared for the amount of bulges and camel toes I saw last night....thank you." commented one of the guests.  Yes,  Olympics or Gay Porn.

The party turned into a drink, chat and take hilarious photos sort of party ... wait I think that's the usual 321 formula.  Pretty good for planning this in one week.  One thing missing:  the Olympics playing on the TV.  We couldn't get our old TV Tube to work.  Almost.

Go for the GOLD!

Photo edits by my wrestler lover.

When You're Ready

Canon sd1000 sd750 100hs

Retail Therapy

I don't spend much on anything.  Maybe food, but I rarely go to places that are ranked higher than 2 dollar symbols on yelp unless it's through my work. I have a laptop and a point and shoot camera. And I probably buy a new shirt once a season.  I'm trying to think of the most expensive thing I own, but nothing comes to mind besides the two mentioned electronics... and maybe my iPhone 3G.  


I've gone through 3 Canon Point and Shoot Cameras since 2005.  Lost my first one in the bushes jumping parties in college.  The second one was dropped too many times.  The third one was actually Jimmy's.  During Bay to Breakers this year, the lens barrel jammed for no reason.  I could not fix it with compressed air so I invested in a new 100HS.  I really don't like the "Smart Auto" feature which determines the best presetting.  But it's more like a Dumb Auto since it thinks you want to be in macro and 1/3 of the pictures come out blurry.  Can there just be a normal auto please?  Anyway...


The other things that I own are sentimental trinkets or stuff that no one wants anymore like old clothes/furniture from friends and garage sales... So when I think of "retail therapy" I wonder what I could purchase that would make me feel better about my day/life.  I also think about how buying things would just clutter my room.

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#ratchet

Luxury

Jimmy's computer sits in a little cubby space in our room.  It's not mobile because the monitor hinge is cracked so the screen can't stay up without leaning on something.  The battery is dead and the power cord can only charge at a certain angle.  Forget about the DVD/CD drive.  He borrows my computer to burn music CDs because his car doesn't have an AUX port OR Tape player.

I hate that there was a time of about 2 years where new cars were built without the proper ports to play MP3 players.

Jimmy sits in his cave using a computer that he's had since college editing photos and applying for jobs until he goes insane from cabin fever.  The device is going to die despite how much he takes care of it. And I was waiting for the day he lost all of his data. For him, he can't just replace a computer...  that's a luxury that he does not have.

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grateful eyes

When You're Ready

When I came home from work last Monday I surprised Jimmy with a new HP laptop.  In a card I told him that I turned down an opportunity in New York.

The opportunity was an internal move within my company on a beer brand as a project manager.  But they couldn't meet my salary request nor did they offer relocation compensation.  I was relieved that my company made my decision easy by being so cheap.  To live in New York was never a life goal and even though Jimmy told me he would follow me, I knew that he couldn't.  And what I would be leaving behind wasn't worth it.

He told me he couldn't accept the laptop, but I told him that it's for his career.  So that he's motivated to apply, build his portfolio, be inspired so that he doesn't have to worry about keeping up with everyone.  It's a present to celebrate us and a reflection of both of our efforts to improve our lives, our careers and our relationship.

...and one day when we're BOTH ready, we can move to somewhere new and exciting.  But for now, Los Angeles is our home especially since we have keys to a pool. #LASunShine

Streamers

My work place does a good job at celebrating people's birthdays.  Your cube gets decorated with streamers, balloons and printed pictures of photos or things you like.  We love burning color toner.

Decorations more often than not stay up for a long time.  So folks wait until their birthday for others to decorate their cube for them.

A balloon octopus to match her octopus tattoo and a really good photoshop-ed mural of her as Martha Stewart.  Creepy.  Her floor was lined with black tarp to simulate the sea.

Folks get really creative with the streamers.  I guess this the person who did this was also an interior designer.  A very elegant approach.

The note on her desk read, "if you move any of these balloons, you are fired.  Please make sure to complete all your work."

For my assistant, we turned his cube into an app store and put in an extra desk.  "your cube mate is here!"  We tricked him all day.  We also convinced him that there was an Oprah sighting, only to turn around to say happy birthday.  He shouted, "NO!!!" like it was the worst news of his life.

The remains of my birthday - Batman themed madness.  It was pretty amazing.

My colorful view.


I also helped turn my other assistant's desk into a night club, complete with lights and VIP table.