Serendipity...

My camera is lost in the wilds of my life somewhere... it's amazing how not having the ability to take photos to illustrate my thoughts derails my timely blog-updating. Everything I've been doing requires pictorial accompaniment. In words only form: APE was AWESOME. I met a lot of amazing artists, sold some stuff, had the coolest table-mate ever (lots of maniacal giggling and drawing was involved)...I LOVE seeing my work on actual, living, walking people... it's extremely gratifying. I also got the COOLEST $10 piece of art... which of course I'm DYING to put a damn picture of up, but NOOOOO... in any case it's a doodle of Death with a party hat and a cupcake and a speech bubble with a heart! Clearly this artist and I are on a cosmic cute-death trip. My new mission is to collect all cute deaths I find... they will be mine.

The My Trick Pony show went well; again, great to see my creatures going out into the world. Nearly everyone I know in the city showed up, too, so it was pretty much a cheap-wine fun-fest of bawdy, mouthy peet's types... I love you kids.

Ironside is eating all my time. It's much more gratifying work, but is a real 40+ hour/week job, which changes my art-making time. The good news is that I work 9-5 like a "normal" person... now I just have to learn to motivate myself to paint and make between 6 and 10 pm instead of lying in a heap refusing to do anything. Really though, I ain't complaining. Job feeds me, provides me a phone, lets me set my schedule, and the owners and chef are beyond cool...what a relief.

Pekoe is buried in a heap of blankets on the bed, grumbling and growling at some hapless canine walking by outside. As I type this, I have a steady soundtrack of "rrrghhhRRRrrRRRRrrhhhhRHrhrghhhh....."

And the newest excitement! I'm joining ranks with the amazing folk of Swankety Swank on Divis. (in NOOOPA... oooOooh...) I'll be selling various, um, stuff! And if you've been paying attention, you know that's a lot of ... stuff. I discovered Swankety Swank and Yabette, the fabulous proprietress, in one of those completely serendipitous moments, which, in my experience, is usually San Francisco's way of telling me something. I had a very poignant moment with a construction sign once...

Whee!

Sans my camera, I leave you with a few photos from my crappy camera phone...

I make to-go food fun!

DEMON POPSICLE

best. street art. ever.

the pumpkin room!

and as per request, here's my messy/cozy new room. why oh why wasn't i born a more organized person? yes, dad, i will eventually get a picture of the front of the house.

stupid not sleeping disease...

here it is... 6:23 am. what the hell am i doing up? falling asleep was a nightmare of stiff necks, twisted backs, restless legs and even more restless mind. eventually coaxed myself to sleep around 2 am, listening to a lois lowry audiobook, lying flat on my back with a pillow bunched under the base of my skull and my hands tucked into my armpits. woke up thrashing in the blankets at 5:45. ah well, let's look on the bright side. i got to see the sun rise... oh wait, no i didn't, it's too absurdly foggy and gloomy. that wasn't a very good job of bright-siding. in any case i did go to the roof with pekoe and stand around blinking into the mist for a while, which i suppose was poetic in it's own, foggy way. now i'm eating granola on my bed, slurping sanani and wishing i'd had the forethought to go partake of breakfast at boulange to reward myself for being up so early and for a change of scenery from these 4 walls. oh well, i really can't afford to eat out, maybe i'll go have, like, tea there later. anyway, here's my view of the (lack of) sunrise:

siiiigh. dammit, san francisco.

...the city

...just a few shots from a wonderfully misty-fog night...

this was the corner I turned on to get the house I was staying in recently... funny how not really having a home makes you find the solace of home in other things... in a 2 week span I got very attached to this corner; this corner meant home.

walking "home"... you can't really see in the photo, sadly, but there's a SNES and a Sega Genesis controller tied together and thrown over those power lines. Awesome.

still alive...

i'm not dead, i swear. My nearly-four-year-relationship ended (to be frankly personal) and everything sort of went kaboom. Moved from the red room to no room to a room in a red house (which is also, sadly, temporary and will be vacated in a month or 2. Pity. It was so appropriate.) Oh, and there was a wedding (not mine, clearly) and a lot of coffee to be made for the corporate beasts and a million other excuses. Been keeping my head above the proverbial water, just full of hope and anxiety and bad-dog-mom-guilt and all sorts. Not having a room and a home was adventurous and character-building and all, but, well... sort of sucked. I have a lot of sympathy for the real homeless; regardless of their various charming character attributes, etc...damn, not having a space of your own does a number on you really fast. In any case, work has been a bit suspended, but morale is high and there are pictures to be retrieved from a few really gorgeous city days, just as soon as I get the camera back.

Until then, I give you the consolation prize of me and my new housemate and pal Nikki at Bay to Breakers. Aaaand the Vagina Lady. Because, well, it's San Francisco.
What else can you say, really?
She hearts them.

oh gloriousity...

...when will i learn that i need to take my camera EVERYWHERE? Everytime i leave without i see more snippets of lovely that needed documenting, and i know my head cannot hold them all without assistance. I just went on a post-dinner run/hop/skip up the hill to the park and back, wearing too-big jeans, buffeted by typical San Francisco gusting and full of springy-air glee. i amused a German tourist with my fancy-dance over the vista of the city, but then he decided i was safe to ask for directions. The sun was cutting over Buena Vista Park, flame outlining the black tree-horizon and splashing the sides of the buildings in gold. Devil-tower stood, proud and majestic, taking on a classic air with gilt edges. The city sprawls before me and i could just eat it all up.

no, i didn't take this. done stole it. was so purty. credit to jim stanley.

artist dilemma

how to convey what moves me the most? The moments of such clarity and intensity, walking through the city at midnight, fog drifting its tendrils over everything, street-lights hovering, casting tom-waits shadows on the pavement. Jasmine blooming and glowing bay windows hinting at their jewel-toned secrets. The wet tang of the air that wakes me up and makes me know that I'm in a coastal town, throwing me into nostalgic memory-drift and making me soul-hungry. How to translate that into art? How to take these transcendental cookies of time and share them, bring someone else in to feel that same moment, or inspire them to remember one of their own. Michael Shankman can do it, at least, he can for me, but I feel ill-equipped to follow his lead. City-scapes impress and intimidate me, and maybe that right there is a reason to pursue them, but I'll admit the prospect overwhelms me--I don't know where to begin--plus I feel like I've already met the master. Big sighs. It is both exhilarating and frustrating... to feel so moved and fascinated by this city; by all its private moments of beauty, but to also feel so incapable of using and translating that energy into something tangible. It's like an itch in the mind...

at least I can SEE the transcendental brilliance at all...next, what to DO about it.

A few quick city shots, a few quick fire shots...

city being all picturesque and shit.

INVISIBLE BIKE!
We have the best street art here.

Me being pensive (read: terrified) before the Fire Expo in Union Square.

Gorgeous Bevin the Fire-Safety Captain. She puts out.

Michael and his personal insulation system.

Fire Drums! OMG!

Jess and Bevin reveling in the glow.

Firedrums was INCREDIBLE. 3 days of adventures in the redwoods, flames, amazing people, wonderful food, mind-blowing spinning. And rain. Lots and lots of rain. I'm so lucky to live in this city, in this environment, where this shit comes from and thrives, where studying circus arts and running around like a glitter-covered beastie is totally normal.

the city today...

The castro being charming in the 80-degree april heat.

um. yep. this has "oscar" written all over it.

George the club-foot pigeon hoping i'll share my gelato. pigeons, in my world, are usually named george, unless of course they're named ethel.

blurry west portal doing the warm twilight thing. west portal feels like a remnant that got forgotten in the 50's. Buildings are short and there's diners, barbershops, shoe and vacuum-repair places lining the tiny main drag. i wish photos could capture the sense of space better. and the feel of air on skin, while i'm wishing.

jewel-toned dinner!

...good night...

city love...

recently i've been trying to remember to take my camera along for the ride... i'm by no means a photographer, but GODDAMN i love this city. it's amazing. and the more i take time to notice the small beauties around me, the scraps of life lying all over the place, the happier and calmer i am. and having the camera reminds me to look. i think i came full circle there.

sharing is fun!

colorful scrolly cafe. everything is saturated with color and glowing here.

more color. best. houses. ever.

the amazing door to nowhere.

just a great tree, really.

lost piggy...

rainy-day light and a really badass looking bar. there's some very cool stuff in SOMA that i've run across while doing my part-time personal assisting. cool in a different way than my neighborhood... new-money-revamped-warehouse-cool...

...and finally, just my city raining, looking pretty in that mussed-up running eyeliner sort of way.