Sunday 12.20.09

As I was walking outside to go to breakfast with Tommy and 818 I noticed a lovely note on my door. Typed up on paper with 3 holes. I am so pissed that I got frazzled and threw it away… but it was something about my disdain and utter lack of respect for the neighborhood. I had sent my neighbors that live right next to me away for the night to a fancy hotel down the street. I even gave them some spending money at the hotel bar. (Not even a thank you… guess that is the last time I try to be so kind. Next time they can suffer through the noise) Anyways, after I kicked everyone out I guess someone must have thought they were doing me a favor and brought out a bag of trash when the party was over…. and then a bum must have dragged the stuff all over the sidewalk looking for some good shit. There were also about 50 cigarette butts out there and I did feel really bad. I mean I have only lived here for a month and I am already throwing loud parties and my guests aren’t even polite enough to dispose of their butts. It is pretty gross. We cleaned the mess up and when we went to the trash area a few feet away we saw this:

I should have grabbed these and stuck them in a jar and kept them. I mean who throws that away!? WTF? So bizarre! If you had that wouldn’t you destroy it and smash it into bits before throwing it in the trash? It seems like a very personal thing to be tossing away in the trash. Much like a credit card statement.

Anyways we ate at Cafe Chloe and drank $10 mimosas flavored with pomegranate and lavender lemon. Once we realized that we had spent enough money to buy a bottle of Dom, we headed to my favorite downtown establishment, the Tivoli! 4 pm crept up quickly and we went back home to gather the leftover desserts and head to #1 on Fifth to meet up with a bunch of people to hop on a bus and search for the best Christmas lights in SD. It turned into the 3 hour tour and we were fucking tired and over it, but it was a lot of fun.

Check out this scary moving robot called the Electric Giraffe … it’s very Burning-Man-esque but very cool. A bunch of kids were riding up top on a platform and it played cool music and hobbled around the streets.

I wanted to kidnap the baby Jesus from this lawn but I chickened out… probably better that way. Getting arrested for stealing lawn ornaments would not have been very smart. If I ever get arrested it better be for something good.

As you can see Tommy was sporting a very sexy Davy Crockett hat and is half in the bag at this point. I believe he began drinking heavily when the 11 year old would not leave his side.

And this nice old lady is about to celebrate her 100th birthday.

Do you think you will live to be 100? Do you even want to? I hope I live to be at least 80, but 100? Not so much. That is just too old. What kind of dementia will I have then if I can’t even remember what I ate for dinner yesterday? How many inches will I shrink? At that point I will be smaller than the elf I hired the other night.  Who knows though, I might just outlive all of my nieces and nephews and be full of energy. Sometimes people mistake me for being younger than I am and I often tell them that I made a deal with the devil. I tell them that he promised me that as long as I was producing porn he would make sure that I had a young looking appearance. Maybe I really did make that deal…. like I said I have a bad memory.

Saturday 12.26.09

The day after Xmas arrived faster than two shakes of a lamb’s tail and we had to take Nikki to the airport. After we dropped her off I thought it was natural to head to Waffle House, the most ghetto of all Southern diners. I had never ever stepped foot inside of a WH. And I want to tell you, I was not afraid, and I do not regret it.

They ran out of grits as we ordered, but I was lucky enough to get them. Sue had the biscuits and gravy and I gotta tell ya…. it inspired me to start recruiting for the Top Chef: Biscuits and Gravy Challenge. Since we were in FL we jumped over to Dunkin Donuts and got a coffee… for some reason there are no DD in GA either. It’s weird how that franchise works….

We called the Humane Society and they said they were not accepting any more dogs at this time. (my heart stops beating, Sue promises to go get Badger on Monday when her vet is open)

No saturday would be complete without a trip to the local flea market. White German Sheperds!? sooo cute!

I found this totally weird monkey thing that only total weirdos would own at the flea market. Oh wait! I have the same thing in my house on my hutch.

I ended up buying this gem! I mean, who doesn’t need a bobble head angry tiger family ?

I tried to buy the jackalope and the snake/weasel thingys but the nice man said they weren’t for sale. He said they were for conversation only. Hhhmmmpphh.

And of course to make me sadder, we saw puppies in cages for sale. English Bulldogs….

And then we saw some very bizarre African American artwork. Don’t take this the wrong way… but I would be calling this bizarre if it involved any type of person, of any race.

Ummm this lady has a nice booty.

In the summer the flea market has an awesome outdoor patio where you can drink beers outside by the pond. Classy!

After the flea market we went back to the house and watched Jake attack Tucker and he fell from the 20 foot ledge. Aww shit… but ya know what? Cats always land on their feet.

Apparently after they have one of these encounters Tucker likes to eat a bunch of food (don’t we all turn to food in stress?) and then he vomits all over the house. Good times. I am glad we had a 6 pm dinner reservation. Nazzaro’s is supposedly some of the best Italian food in the area. I am not particularly fond of Italian food, so I was ready to be impressed. Stuffed mushrooms for starters:

Why did we order French Onion soup in an Italian joint? No idea. Looks like shit and tasted like a 5 on a scale of 1-10.

Sue and I both ordered the veal… IMHO they were both bland

but Glen’s was awesome.

Perhaps I am brainwashed into thinking that all Italian food must have marinara sauce? Please, someone take me out and show me the way. Enlighten me. When it came time for dessert the waitress said the creme brulee was the “best she had ever had.”

Alrighty then. We ordered the creme brulee and then flipped a coin for the cannoli vs. the tiramisu

Aaaaand…. The creme brulee was far inferior to any that I had ever eaten and I do, in fact, want to add cannoli’s to the list of foods that I will never try again. (Hey! Get in the corner with salt and vinegar potato chips, Oreos and cole slaw!). Really, I gave it a shot. Sorry guys.  The limoncello was fantastic. But at this point in the day anything with a remote bit of alcohol makes me smile.

We went next door to Ziggy’s

to check out the local band of “Out of Work Santa’s”. Seriously, these guys are so happy to NOT be wearing fuzzy red velvet suits! They were a Dead/Phish/Classic Rock cover band and I loved them! Touch of Grey Band check them out if you are in the area….

Totally unrelated to anything: this table reminded me of our old neighbor who worked for the phone company. He used to bring us spools like this that we made into furniture in the backyard. Small coffee tables were made out of the spools used to transport telephone cables. Cool shit! I would love one of  those in my loft now.

And here is Jake again. He really needs to let go of some of his hang-ups.

Friday 12.25.09

I forgot to mention last night that Jake likes to eat fresh cat shit out of the litter box. I mean, Christ, who doesn’t right? Here we are attempting to brush his teeth.

Christmas Eve turned into Christmas morning naturally, and thank God there are no small children in the house to wake my ass up at 7 am. We woke up, made some coffee and mimosas, ate some breakfast and began to open presents. Again, I brought nothing for any of these people, so guilt began to set in. I was handed a few boxes of things… some clothes and small gifts. And another “Non-Christmas” gift from my other sister in CT appeared. Specifically stated on the tag “THIS IS NOT A CHRISTMAS GIFT” lol… ok ok we all agreed to stop sending shit to each other across the country…. but then jesus will you fucking quit it already!? gawd. I will forgive her only because one of the items was a red velvet cupcake mix. Then came the stocking. If there were a #awkwardstockingstuffers topic on Twitter, this would be the start of it: KY Jelly. Oh, Sue, you are fucking hilarious.

The wine ornament is cute!

Jake loved his new toy.

Then of course I had to have a moment in the reflections of the ornaments outside

And here is Tucker the fat cat.

We watched “500 Days of Summer” which I absolutely ADORED!  A total chick flick, but awesome nonetheless. After our amazingly rare prime rib dinner I decided to make love to the blood. I am very very sorry for the vegans who read this blog. BWAHAHAAA ok ok sorry. Seriously, the blood that coagulates on a plate looks really nasty but tastes oh so good.  A little salt… and voila!

Take a little bread and sop it up….

Dericious! Jake enjoys a good LTP moment as well.

Christmas was a very mellow evening, BK came over, my brother-in-laws nephew came over and we attempted to watch “The Hangover” but passed out. Irony.

I slept in til 11:00 am and felt terribly guilty about it. I also woke up and realized that I had purchased no presents for anyone this entire Christmas season. Oh I’m sorry I take that back. I got my nephew a $50 gift card for Best Buy and a “The Office” calendar for my other nephew. I haven’t mailed either of these things to either of them. Do I feel guilty about this? Not really. They all know that I operate on my own calendar. I do nice things for people all year long and I spend tons of money on my nieces and nephews all the fucking time. I fly those sons of bitches all over the country and pay for dinners for my friends whenever the bill comes and it gets awkward. I do want to point out that I have a specific family that I “sponsor” every year at Christmas and Mother’s Day. This woman helped my sister immensely during her heart surgery and has now been stricken with many many cancers and illnesses. I wish only the best for this woman and I wish for her health and happiness and each year I anonymously send gift cards to her. I receive a wonderful thank you card from each of her children each time addressed to “The Christmas Angel” and it always brings me to tears. So, really, Saint Nick, I am pretty fucking saintly myself.

We ended up at Toucan’s Ale House again. Classic. Day drinking is the best. I got the fried green beans after all. Quite nasty if I do say so myself.

We took a trip out to the house they have on the river … it’s called the Satilla River and it’s supposedly the 2nd cleanest river in Georgia. Whatever the hell that means. Jake was very anxious to get there, and again, if I had a clue I would post a video of him howling in the truck on the way there. There is also good footage of us driving through 4 feet of water to get there.

They have water mocasions as you can see

They had warned me about the cute yellow lab mutt stray dog that lives out there. He apparently showed up about 2 months ago with a collar … most likely someone just dropped him off and left him. They have been feeding him when they go there and buying dog food so that the crackhead neighbors can feed him daily as well. As it turns out, the neighbor hasn’t really been living up to his end of the deal.  My sister has named him Badger.

I have this same glass ball thingy at my place and makes for perfect reflection photos

Their place is pretty awesome… They have a house on stilts and an entire bar/lounge underneath the 1500 square foot house. Last year the place flooded and the water was up to here: (My sister is showing you the waterline here!)

We chilled out and drank some beers and told some stories….

And of course the Pink Monkey was there

As you can see Jake and Badger were having a blast.

This is Nikki and her new husky (I have 10 years worth of photos of her and her old husky Puma just like this)

We closed up shop and put a bowl of food out for Badger. We tried to drive away as he ate his food but he gobbled it super fast and ran after us. My brother-in-law told us that this was normal and that he would run for a while but would stop at a certain point. We got to that point and he kept running. I began crying. He was running as fast as his little malnourished body could take him and I fucking lost it. We pulled over and I went into the middle of the road to stop the oncoming traffic so I could grab him. Nikki was in the car calling the local Humane Society and we discovered that it was closed for the day. The dog was smelly and stinky and my brother-in-law was not interested in having this mutt at his house for the next couple of days. My sister and I decided that we would bring him back to the house at the edge of the dirt road because they had several adult dogs and 2 or 3 small 6 week old puppies. They could at least hold onto him for 30 minutes until we could drive away safely and then they would come back and get him in a day or two when there was a vet open or the Humane Society was open. She agreed and we hopped in the truck. As we pulled away he broke away from her and I refused to look back once I saw him running after us.

I am sitting here tonight on Christmas Eve hoping that Badger has found his way back to the cabin and found his bowl of water we left him and has nestled into his bed at the top of the stairs.

If  that dog is not there when we go back in 2 days I am not sure what is going to happen.

Sunday 12.20.09

Soooo… I left my office with all of the images that I need for this entry on my desktop. You will have to wait and see them when I get back. Sorry!

Monday 12.21.09- Tuesday 12.22.09- Wednesday 12.23.09

I had an awesome 13 hour nap last night and managed to completely ignore the mess in my loft. The plumber still hasn’t been there and the place is still as disgusting as when I passed out on Saturday night. It’s truly disgraceful. Monday turned into Tuesday and I had a meeting with an old friend who I am going to call 704. After the meeting we went to sushi, polished off 2 bottles of sake and then went to the Chee Chee for a shot of Jagermeister before heading to my loft to further examine the mess. Still no plumber, flies everywhere. Fantastic!  After 704 left I kept drinking, watched some porn and packed for my trip to Georgia the next morning.Oh and by the way, my assistant of 3 weeks quit in an email Monday night at 10pm. That’s professional! Just wanted to let you all know…. if you want to quit a job, do not be a chicken shit…. call me on the phone or do it in person. Email? Really? I knew she wasn’t going to last when she bailed out on the company Christmas party. I honestly think that she might have been a little squeamish about the nature of the job. Or she heard me scream “rimjob” one too many times in the hallway. NEXT!

I went to the office to clean up some last minute horseshit on Wednesday morning before catching my 11:00 am flight to Atlanta, then off to Brunswick GA. I was seated on the plane next to a kid from SDSU who appeared to be about 22 years old who was in fact close to 28. We played trivia against the rest of the plane and although I came in first place one time and got one of the highest scores of the flight, he still beat my ass over all. We were playing against a sweet little old woman who was much slower than us to the punch when it came to answering, but would just dominate us at certain times with the questions from the 30s and 40s.

We laughed and drank a bit and started flirting. I would like to say that the cougar in me started this, but it was in fact he who started the banter. He might be what you would call a “cougar hunter.” We ended up exchanging phone numbers but had I given the nod, we might have joined the mile high club. I dunno though, he had a serious baby face. I am not sure if I can go through with this.

I landed at 8:30 pm and was told by the fam that we were going to the local pub, Toucan’s Ale House,  to check out some karaoke and because my brother-in-law wanted to introduce my niece Nikki (yes, his daughter) to the bartender, BK. (Of course everyone in the south has 2 letters as their name.) He made Nikki walk in with a plate of homemade desserts to give to BK and I can assure you… this is the opposite of her style.

My brother-in-law is a regular there so they gave him a Christmas present… a stocking filled with homemade beef jerky and chocolates. Pretty awesome… if the owners of the bars that I am regulars at did this for me, I would spend even more money in their establishments throughout the year. (Ahem, Michael from Tivoli take note.)

After 5 torturous country music karaoke songs I was pleased to hear BK’s original music. He writes his own lyrics, and is an aspiring singer/songwriter. I suggested he move out of Brunswick asap but I am pretty sure he knows this already.

I do have video footage of him singing, but I am too stupid (and buzzed) to figure out how to video blog. Next week I will upload it.

I tried to order the fried green beans but the kitchen was closed. Other noteworthy menu items were the Bird Bath Nachos. Any fans of “Dick Tricks” out there!?? come on!!!

We had fun, drank too much as usual and headed home to raid the fridge of random leftovers. I fell fast asleep with visions of sugar plums dancing in my head until Tucker the fat cat jumped in bed with me and tried to make out with me. Then when I started baby talking Tucker, Jake the fuzzy Siberian Husky had to check out the situation and jump in the bed as well. Let me explain the fundamental problem with huskies and cats. They always, without fail, hate each other. And tonight, at 4:00 am, I was no stranger to this fact.  HISS GROWL MEOW BARK JUMP FLAIL. All at the edge of my bed. It was like an episode of “Tom and Jerry” but just a little bit different. The cat was now stuck in the room and the dog would not let him leave. The cat finally fell asleep in the bathroom sink and the dog nuzzled next to me. We all slept in harmony until approximately 11:15 am! WTF get outta bed lazy!

Saturday 12.19.09

At 6pm the sink decided to be an asshole and stop working. Oh that is just fabulous! I am not sure when the last time you hosted a party, and I don’t think I need to remind you that the kitchen sink is essential for many many reasons. FML. Poor Dallas thought she was responsible for it because of her muddled basil strawberry martinis. I couldn’t let her take the heat, I finally told her on Monday morning that it was not her fault.

Let’s just get to the winners of the Top Chef Dessert Competition:

Lauren won the chocolate category with her chocolate, chocolate chip and bacon cookies. I want to make love to her and the cookies. They were fucking amazing, and I sadly only got one of them Yeah I know they look like piles of reindeer poop.

Chris won a prize for his amazing bread pudding. I can always count on him to kick some ass in cooking contests.

Dallas beat Erin in the drink category with her martini. (Sorry Erin, your pumpkin whatever the fuck it was tasted nasty! LOL)

Sully got an honorable mention for his eggnog cupcakes, Tommy got the worst dessert award for his family recipe of dog food nuggets, and Yvonne beat every baker in the history of the world with her red velvet cupcakes. I swear to you they are the best red velvet cupcakes I have ever had. And I eat them all the time… I seriously try them wherever I see and whenever I have the opportunity.When she showed up I tried to take them straight to my bedroom and hide them under the bed, but the 3 dozen people in my kitchen saw me and began calling me a hoarder. I did manage to “hide” a layer of them at the top of the kitchen cabinets. All of the winners got gift bags with some cool stuff and some very random weird stuff. Gift cards to dessert shops, BevMo, Cheesecake Factory, etc… some got cookbooks, Dallas got “The Hangover” for her winning drink and then all of them got very bizarre things that I have been collecting over the years. Like socks from Japan that have weird cartoon characters on them. Also like little plastic crap from vending machines in Tokyo. And wooden magnets from Africa. Also a bar of soap shaped like a koala bear. And monkey bookmarks. You see, I wanted to get rid of all of this during the yard sale but Kim wouldn’t let me… she talked me into giving door prizes away at my parties and now everyone thinks I am a whacko. Well at least Lauren does. She wants to have an intervention and call the show Hoarders. Personally I think I am doing much better because I am actually GIVING it away.

When Leif the Elf showed up, it was very awkward. Several people were already there and he walked in with some other people. No one knew quite what to say. I mean, they wanted to laugh, but they also were very confused about why a small man that no one recognized was in an elf costume. After I introduced him and people eased up on the awkwardness of “Holy shit, there is a midget in the room” they realized that I hired him to entertain them. Leif was doing this weird thing with his shoulders (which I thought was a nervous tick or disorder) in order to jingle the bells on his collar. Ok, the whole thing was fucking strange for the first 10 minutes. And next time I want someone shorter!

Noel and Emma were apparently the only ones who read “Bust out those tacky Christmas sweaters” at the bottom of the evite. Love the outfits ladies!

Jesus Christ Lauren! You are an amazon! (Hey btw have you guys seen her on TV at all lately? hahaha We made it to Chelsea Lately! SWEET)

And here we are getting just a wee bit drunker. Well, Tyson is anyways.

And here is where it gets really funny. You might remember my tweets from the summer about the tacky lawn ornaments that my jerk friends put on the lawn in the middle of the summer? Yeah, the penguin with the moving wings, the polar bear who skiis and the giant igloo. Well, unbeknownst to me in the middle of the yard sale last month they lied to me and told me that they sold them but in reality they went with Kim’s sister to her garage. And, of course, they magically appeared in my living room during the party. I can’t even tell you the amount of times these fuckers broke into my house and dragged them onto my lawn (or pretended to do that and tweeted an old pic sending me into orbit while I was out of town). The last mother fucking thing I wanted to see in my new loft were these dirty peice of shit lawn ornaments that spent  months outside. Yeah, that’s right… when they brought them out in June on my birthday I left them there to piss Lovey the 94 year old neighbor off.  It was truly hilarious that they went through the trouble to do this…. but didn’t last very long and the polar bear and igloo ended up on the sidewalk out front and the penguin ended up “flying” out the window into the trash area outside.

By the end of the night I was so sick of losing my cup that I opted to just drink straight out of the bottle. Drinking prosecco is classy if you have a flute, not so much out of the bottle.

And of course, it wouldn’t be a party if Rich and I didn’t get into a food fight. Red velvet cupcakes are mashed all over the place and Kim is very very angry with me

I kicked everyone out at 2 am. A fun time was had by all. Except my neighbors…..

Friday 12.18.09

It was a little bit of stress this week finishing unpacking and getting my place decorated for the party on Saturday night. There were 40+ people coming and I was trying desperately to make the place look perfect. This was no easy task and of course my pseudo bf Kim was instrumental in making things happen. Costco, Lowes, IKEA, Ralphs, BevMo, Best Buy (yay! a new camera!) etc… you get the idea. I had a ton of original artwork framed and I also had eight 20×30 posters made of photos that I had taken over the years that had a Christmas or wintery theme. There is a very long narrow hallway when you walk into my place that I like to think of as my gallery… Kim and I were playing museum curator and speaking in our best snooty British voices while hanging the posters on Friday night.

So here is a mini tour of my place:

This first one is pretty self explanatory. You should have seen the look on the guy’s face at the Del Mar Fair when I asked him to carve this 3 years ago.

Now remember, I fell in love with this loft 13 years ago and always dreamed of this hallway as a “gallery” of sorts. Do not think that I won’t be dedicating this hallway to you if it’s your birthday and I am throwing a party in your honor. All of these 20×30’s were shot in the month of December over the years…. gotta love Costco for printing posters in 3 hours for $8.99. Granted, the quality is not the best, but who cares when you plan on changing them out every few months.

^^ RIP Sierra. This was taken in the mid 90’s.

The SD skyline in the early 90’s. I can tell you that the skyline has changed dramatically and there are many more buildings now. The line coming from the right side is an airplane landing.

Sierra and her best friend Vanity, who passed away earlier this year. (This was probably around 1996?)

This was my Christmas card one year in the late 90’s during the heavy “Got Milk?” years. Mine said “Got Eggnog?” and I miraculously caught the very last drop of eggnog coming out of the carton…. WITH A SELF TIMER AND RUNNING AND GETTING INTO THE PICTURE. Pure luck!

Lake Tahoe 2006 for Tiffany’s birthday, we almost got snowed in! I love to take the pink monkey and chuck him in the air next to monuments, and this seemed like an appropriate time to throw him up in the air.

This is Ushuaia, at the southern tip of Argentina. I was on my way to Antarctica in 2004. This shot was taken at about 3:00 am from my hotel window, and as you can see the sky is almost like dusk. (The sun doesn’t set in the south pole during those months, remember. Sucks for insomniacs) The white glowing thing is a giant pine tree dressed with lights.

This is somewhere in the Antarctic Peninsula. I don’t remember at this moment where exactly… I mean shit it all looks the same. This is one of my favorite shots from that entire trip. It shows so many different kinds of ice and the more blue that it is, the older it is. We are talking hundreds of years old. Antarctica is one of the driest places on earth and there is very little precipitation… less than 8 inches a year! Cold as fuck, but sunny a lot of the time. I was totally sunburned in small spots on my face only when I returned home. OK, enough discovery channel shit, if you want to see more of those pics check it out here: Pink Monkey Tour. Obvi click on the map at the bottom

This was my Christmas card in 2005. I love to take photos of myself in reflections of things. Call me narcissicist. I think it is interesting and I love it when I look utterly hideous and deformed. One time I was on the Amtrak in the bathroom taking pics in the cheap warped mirror and I almost pissed myself laughing. I gotta find those and post them! Funhouse mirrors rule.

Nothing like a little swine flu hysteria inspiring the tacky lawn ornaments this year. This bad boy is staying there for the rest of my life. I might change out his collar.

Kim did an amazing job decorating. She got those shiny balls over the pipes by attaching a weight to a pot holder and throwing it over the top. Pretty MacGyver-ish if you ask me!

And since I was planning on being out of town all through the holidays I didn’t get a real tree. This is my eco-friendly version, complete with ornaments.

Then! She had the bright idea that we should have hired a midget for the party to greet people at the door dressed like an elf and escort them in while giving them the museum tour. (lightbulb illuminates over head! DING!) We went to the interwebs and searched and found Tiny Entertainment . By morning I had genuine little person scheduled to arrive and greet guests from 7:30 – 10:30 pm. I was so excited knowing that I had a guy showing up like Santa, too. I was planning on telling everyone that the elf had put up all of the decorations while I was sleeping … come on, you’ve seen Elf!

Anyways, I was beat and this was the first Friday in a long time that I actually ate dinner and didn’t get shitfaced at happy hour, so I was feeling like a million bucks on Saturday am. I slept in til 7:00 am and then hit the ground running with last minute errands. I had big plans to chill out all day and get ready for the big soiree in a calm leisurely manner, but I had grossly misgauged my timing and was freaking out by early afternoon.

(I will save the images and explanations of the original artwork because I know you are on the edge of your seat about the midget.)

Saturday 12.12.09

I spent the whole day unpacking more of my shit. I am so over this. And believe me, Kim has been the one dealing with most of it. I am such a pack rat! Gawd! I got my hair done at a place downtown called Dearinger’s that I can walk to. I love not having to drive anywhere, although the rain this week sucked the big one.

On the way home I stopped at Ra Sushi which is not my favorite sushi bar in San Diego, but is edible. (Get the Gojira Roll and the Crispy Spicy Tuna) I ordered a big fat 22 oz beer and a hot sake and waited for my order while blowing up Twitter.

When I got home I took a nap and woke up at 10:00 pm to go out. I can’t even tell you when the last time I had to take a nap in order to go out at that hour was. My co-worker Phil (who I knew back in the scene from 15 years ago from my ex bf Victor) text me earlier saying that DJ Harvey was in town and playing downtown. When I said that I would go and boogie with him, I had no idea I would be in a open warehouse type space and not a nightclub. My instructions were to go to the corner of this and that street and look for the red door. As we approached the building and heard the music through the walls it brought me right back to the early 90’s. Luckily there was a bar and they were serving alcohol or I might not have stuck around. We lost Sandee pretty quickly, I think she and her date had a different agenda. Phil goes by the name Phil Aye in the DJ world and has many many connections. He was like Mr Fucking Popular and pretty much knew everyone! Barry Weaver and tons of people who looked familiar to me (but whose names escape me) were also there. It’s funny how you would spend hours rambling and talking to people and you would learn so many personal things about them and then the next day you would barely remember their first names. I ran into this guy named Isaac who drove me and Stephanie to my very first rave down by the border of Mexico in 1992. It was called Barbarella based on the 1968 Jane Fonda movie. There were giant screens playing the movie and hundreds of people running around this strange horse ranch. I couldn’t understand for the life of me why we were driving this far away to go to a party at midnight with no keg. Stephanie left me alone for about 30 minutes and that is precisely when I discovered nitrous and ecstasy. What the hell else was I going to do with my night and twenty bucks?

Anyways, last night was a blast and I hope that I get the opportunity to do it again soon. I did not do any drugs… those days are over for me. Funny story though, on the walk over there Albert was like “Hey why are you wearing high heels? Wouldn’t you be more comfortable in different shoes?” and I retort “Albert, this isn’t my first rodeo.” Can I just tell you that I almost walked home barefoot in the rain and my feet are fucking killing me today? Arrrggggh.

(pardon the shit photos, I haven’t replaced the point and shoot yet)

It was awesome running into Anna! Love her!

DJ Harvey playing for his cult followers

Hello _____,

I called your hotel last night and spoke to an employee in regards to a situation that occurred on Sunday December 6th at about 1:30 AM. An intoxicated woman that I know somehow talked one of your security guards into opening my hotel room door. Her name was not on the room, nor did she have a key to the room and one of your staff members assisted her in getting into my room by opening the door. There was no knock, and no one said anything, it just opened. I don’t want to get into the details of my activities when this occurred, but I can assure you I was mortified that your staff member saw what he saw. I am sure he was offended as well.

Is it customary for your security staff to allow visibly intoxicated people wandering the halls of the hotel into rooms without being authorized? Is it typical for the staff to let themselves into rooms without announcing their presence?

I am angry and humiliated at what happened. I have been a regular at your hotel and have stayed at the downtown Los Angeles location many times, have recently stayed at the Standard in Manhattan and have stayed at the Hollywood location twice in the last several months. This disappoints me because I do truly like staying here.

Please remind your security staff to be polite, knock before entering and announce themselves before barging into a room, especially in the middle of the night.

Sincerely,

Laura ________