Wednesday July 7, 2010

Laura and I were up super early to go to Bikram Yoga so we were able to catch this beautiful sunrise over Casco Bay. I want to say that body of land is Great Diamond Island but I am not entirely sure now that I look at the map. I took a ton of pictures (shocking) and couldn’t narrow it down to just one or two so here ya go.

Laura has practiced a ton of yoga in her life so she was ready and willing to try heated brainwashing with me. She had heard how tough it was and was happy to have someone to go with her who knew what was going on. The instructor  informed me that the guy who owns the Old Town studio in San Diego is actually Bikram’s right hand man and is at all of the trainings around the country. This explains why at every single studio I have been to on my trip they knew who he was and they would say things like ”You must be a serious yogi” or “Oh it won’t feel that hot for you today” or my favorite “Ahhh so this will be easy for you today!” (lol ya not so much… it’s still a bitch every day.) Laura had a little panic attack when we first walked in the room because of the overwhelming heat, but she did awesome and I think she only skipped one half of one posture. The instructor told me that I had “beautiful”  posture on at least 2 of the poses and told her that she was doing one perfectly. Granted we are both named Laura so when she would say “Beautiful posture, Laura” we would both look at each other to see who the hell she was referring to. It was pretty funny. After class she told me that she was shocked that I had only been practicing for a few months. Now don’t get me wrong… I am flexible alright, I just suck at the standing leg balancing poses. I can bend in half but I cannot for the life of me balance on my left leg. Yet. How, you ask, will it improve my sex life? I dunno. If I find myself in the Japanese ham sandwich pose in the bedroom someday I will be sure to share it with you all. On a side note, Laura had yoga brain all morning from her state of deep relaxation (and exhaustion.) She was driving like an idiot on the road and she couldn’t form complete sentences for  hours. The best part of this story is that when we got to lunch she realized that she had forgotten her wallet at home. Not just at home on the kitchen table…she had left it on the front lawn wide open!! Only in a small town do you leave your wallet on the lawn and come home 6 hours later and find it in the same exact spot, untouched. Hilarious.

Before we went out for the day I snapped a fish eye shot of the beach. I don’t always remember to use this lens when it comes to anything other than people or animals…

Breakfast (ham and cheese croissants) was at the famous Standard Baking Company (take note that the restaurant above it is Fore Street. More on that later this evening)

We walked over to the Harbor Fish Market just to take a peek at their operation… Can you believe how cheap lobster is!? $4.50 a pound?! Are you kidding me? I mean, I can’t afford NOT to eat it. I seriously might consider moving back East for the lobster alone.

This is pretty gross…they won’t go away and I am not even sure where I picked these up. It might have been outside on 4th of July. Although I did have bug spray on that night. They don’t itch, they just look like the freaking measels. This is one of the few things that I do not miss about New England.

For lunch we drove out to Cape Elizabeth to a place called The Lobster Shack (are you really that surpised? come on) at an area called Two Lights.

P.S. I am still not sick of lobster one bit. The sun was shining again and we had the perfect view of the ocean while we ate our lunches. Again, thank you Mother Nature for the amazing weather on my trip. I will not ask for much more this summer.

For the very first time in my life I approached this crustacean a different way. I shucked the whole thing before eating it. Normally I crack open a claw and gobble it down as fast as I can. Repeat with each of it’s body parts. Today for some reason I chose to disassemble the whole thing and then enjoy it all at once. I guess this is all part of my “learning how to do things at a more leisurely pace” that I am striving for.

I was so full after lunch that I almost vommed when I saw this algae pool.

When Laura first moved to Maine a hundred years ago from NY/CT she got a job taking people on tours of the coastline so she can probably chime in here in the comments section and tell us all why the rocks look like wood. Or if you are so inclined you can read all of this.

The stones are very brittle.

We cruised on down to the most photographed lighthouse in the whole world: Portland Head Light.

I had forgotten Namwah the Pink Monkey in CT last week so Denise had to fedex it to me… I couldn’t miss an opportunity for him to visit this place! (I really need to update that site, I haven’t put any new pics on there since last summer and I haven’t even put Africa up from 2008. Lame)

The Annie C. Maguire Shipwreck

When Laura lived in Portland right after college with our other friends Mike and Alison they used to go into this abandoned mansion and screw around and take pictures of each other. I was bummed that it’s been chained off, I was looking forward to some cool shots.

This must have also been some sort of old military bunker. It’s covered in graffiti now

We got our feet wet in this bay… it was pretty effing cold.

The houses along the coast are just massive

Hey Christian! Look at my new mansion! You are still going to have to sleep in a tent on the beach though.

It was Wine O’Clock at this point so we went to Salt Water Grille and enjoyed the view of the marina.

Geary’s local brew

Omg tell me this isn’t the cutest waiting area for kids in a restaurant that you have ever seen?

Laura picked up the little one and we tried to go check out the neighbor’s chickens but were afraid that they would escape the little house they were in so we chickened out. Ladies and gentlemen, chickens do not like fish eye lenses.

Back to the beach for our nightly ritual…this time we had a spectacular view of the yacht races.

The little man fell face first into the water and got up laughing.

For dinner we went to Fore Street! You might remember Lance and Tina, the couple that sat next to me during my 25 course tasting at Alinea in Chicago in May? They arrived about at the halfway point of my meal and we started chatting about good places to eat in Boston and Maine and Chicago… They both work here at Fore Street and told me that if I made it to Portland I had to check it out. I emailed them and voila! we had a reservation. I was disappointed because they were supposed to have a whole boar delivered there this afternoon and Tina was going to let me come in and take pictures of them disassembling it. Unfortunately with the holiday the delivery was going to happen the next day.

She saved a tomato tart just for us Holy crap this thing was amazing. Goat cheese, juicy ripe tomatoes and a flaky buttery tart.

She made sure we had Wood Oven Roasted Maine Mussels sent to the table asap as well…they are from Orr’s Island and were served in a garlic almond butter broth. (I didn’t want to lick the plate for the LTP award just yet because a) I didn’t want to stick my face in a skillet, b) freak Laura and Bob out and c) eat raw garlic this early in the evening. Ya never know.) They were really delicious. (Side note: one time Bob ate 100 mussels in one sitting. And then ate a lobster afterwards. Hey what’s up Man Vs. Food!? )

Something new they were testing this evening: lobster tartare with a dressing of butternut squash oil, aleppo sauce, grape seed oil, chervil, tarragon, scallions and tomato. Then topped with sea salt and olive oil. I have tried raw crab and raw shrimp before and they were both pretty flavorless but I was willing to give it a shot. Especially since this whole trip is lobster lobster lobster.  Sadly, I learned that shellfish just shouldn’t be served raw. The texture was not like any other raw fish…it lacked substance. I don’t want to say slimy…just not meaty enough to be delictable. I was honest with the server and told him that I felt like they were overcompensating for the lack of flavor in the lobster itself by adding too many things to the sauce. It was pretty, but that’s about it. (they took it off the bill so that was nice)

Pan Seared Heritage Pork Belly from South Berwick. Prepared with pickled onion, garlic scapes, mustard, herbs and rich jus. Bob tried to get me to not eat the fatty part and I just laughed at him and threatened to order another one. lol The mustard was an interesting twist on all the pork belly I have tried in the past.

Oysters from Maine and New Brunswick, Canada: Muscongus Bay, Pulpit Harbor and Peacock Cove. Melt in your mouth delicious of course. I am definitely spoiled this trip and will think twice about ordering oysters just anywhere from now on.

I was getting full so I chose another appetizer for my entree: Oxtail Terrine from Montana (I know it doesn’t really fit in with the local fare theme of the night, but the server was raving about it and I have only had oxtail one other time) It was a cold pate served with whole grain mustard, green beans and cranberries. It was great…I think some people might not be able to get past the texture of the oxtail cartilage in there, though.

Laura and Bob ordered the Whole Wild Black Sea Bass which is filleted right at the table. The thick buttery sauce was out of this world and when I discovered that there were chanterelle mushrooms in there I almost jumped across the table and stuck my whole face in there. But it wasn’t mine to lick, and Laura was doing a number on it as well. HAHA! Our server Gabriel was fantastic and so patient with all of my questions and note taking. He was a photography buff, too so we had some shop talk as well. Overall an awesome dining experience and something you cannot miss if you are in Portland.

After dinner Tina and Lance (who were not working tonight) met us out at a place called Sonny’s where it seemed like everyone in the town stopped in and everyone knew them. I had no idea how small of a city this was… it was hysterical. You know when sometimes people come and go in your life and you don’t know why…this is Tina and Lance. There is definitely a reason our paths have crossed. They are good people and I hope to continue our friendship despite the distance between us.

Jeff who runs the So Cal division of Shipyard also happened to be in town so he came out for a drink too! Jeff and my nephew Danny went to college at USM here in Portland so Jeff comes home a lot to see his family. I was hoping to spend more time with him in his home turf but the timing wasn’t right. He lived with me for a few months at my house a few years back and it’s so dumb that  we never see each other in San Diego and have to be on the other side of the continental US to spend time together. Wicked retahded.

Laura and I had a great few days together, I am lucky that she was able to take time off and show me around town. She is so positive and full of energy and is fun to be around and I cherish the fact that we have remained friends after all these years.

Friday June 25, 2010

Some of my West Coast friends keep forgetting that I am on EST time and like to text me at 1:00 am. I haven’t been sleeping very well due to insomnia (aka sobriety) and I went to yoga this morning at 6am on 4 hours of sleep. There were only 5 people in the class and the instructor was a bit of a toolbag. He wasn’t mean, he was just a little bit tool-y. And his voice was bugging me. Maybe I was just grumpy. Anways, I came home and packed my stuff up for a little road trip…

My friend Betsy and her boyfriend Bob (names have been changed to protect the innocent and because someone might lose their job simply by knowing me) are avid antique collectors and they invited me to go to Hudson, NY with them. Hudson is a quaint little town about 2 hours north of Manhattan and is known for attracting hippies, artists, gay men and antique dealers/shoppers. The main street is lined with restaurants, bars and antique shops so we started with bellinis and champagne at Le Gamin. I ordered the escargot and it was probably the best escargot I have had in the whopping 12 times that I have tried it. Betsy had never had it and is now a fan! I love introducing people to new food and having them love it. Of course it was served super hot and it burned the roof of my mouth because I cannot control myself. NOT the way to live, folks.

Chicken ratatouille crepe (poulet aux legumes)

 We went from antique shop to antique shop so that Betsy and Bob could shop for giant pieces of furniture that they have no room for in their house. They have a huge place chock full of amazing Victorian sofas, chandeliers, hutches, tables, etc… and are continually shopping for more. It’s kind of ridiculous, but fun to watch them get so excited over a shelf from the 1700′s. I personally would love love love to have one of these gaudy gold fish eye mirrors in my house. I remember that my parents had one and I honestly don’t know what happened to it. I will have to ask my siblings if they know. Trying to take a fish eye photo of a fish eye mirror doesn’t quite work the same.

These columns would look pretty sweet in my loft with 50 foot ceilings.

After hearing the story about the kitten at my sisters house they insisted that I come see what this place was all about. Animalkind is a cat shelter that sells kittens and does adult adoptions. (cue Sarah Mclachlan music) They have a strict screening process and they actually check references when you are adopting a cat from them.

Upstairs is where all of the adult cats live…somehow, magically…harmoniously together in one space. I think that they somehow have a new appreciation for life and are simply so happy to be fed and have a warm place to sleep that they just get along. Or they are drugged.

I mean, I am not even a cat person and I am in awe of this place.

 This is by far one of the best fish eye shots I have ever taken.

They even have an outdoor patio area for them to lay in the sun.

This guy invited me to take a dip in his pool. I declined despite the heat and humidity. And the other diseases lurking in there.

He bought this house in the mid 90s for just $73,000 and is in foreclosure now I guess. I am not really sure what the situation is but he hangs out on the weekends outside telling his story and trying to get rid of some of his stuff.

Betsy tells me that there is a local artist whose “art” (loose interpretation of the word) is featured in many of the antique shops around town. Fascinating. I had no idea Obama was a merman.

I am sorry, but it’s a little bit hideous. This “artwork”.

I bought this bear head for $175! I am so excited to hang it in my loft next to the other animal head that I cannot identify. I think this was probably a female bear (maybe even on her period judging by the mean look on her face) and I need a good name. So far the only one on Twitter that I liked was Sylvia. Thoughts on naming my bear head? Someone on Twitter also suggested that I take that as my carry-on home back to San Diego next month! Bwhahahahah what a fucking brilliant idea!!!!

One of Betsy’s things is picture frames and mirrors so we had to go check out this place.

Find the Pink Monkey! (another edition of my version of Where’s Waldo)

We stayed at a small inn owned by the owners of a restaurant called Ca Mea. We had a 2 bedroom suite in a large house. The coolest thing was the adjustable bed…. it had a remote controlled dial that allowed you to change the hardness and softness of the bed. A level 5 was like a waterbed. A level 100 was stiff. I slept at a 65 perfectly.

For dinner we ate at Ca Mea. I ordered a dish called “Bresaola della valtellina …Mountain cured beef with arugula and lemon vinaigrette” … an appetizer which was pretty much beef carpaccio, but made with a better, leaner cut of beef. So delicious. I could have eaten a few pounds of it. (We weren’t really hungry and didn’t want to be in food comas for our show. Bad idea since this town doesn’t have any late night dining.)

Now onto the portion of the evening that words cannot describe: Bindlestiff Family Cirkus.

I was asked to put my camera away so I only snapped a few photos of the emcee…

…and Musty Chiffon singing a few songs.

The Bindlestiff Cirkus is the weirdest, most eclectically amateur group of circus performers I have ever had the privilege of seeing. Imagine one of your friends calling you up and saying “Hey…do you have any skills that you can perform on a stage this Saturday night?” because they were putting together a show and were desperate for acts. Strangely, all of it was entertaining and perfectly acceptable as-is. The other acts included Coney Island Chris (a cute and funny guy in his mid 20′s who pretended to do acts of self mutilation with nails, mousetraps and bear traps but who only actually did one at the very end), a sad clown who blew up balloons shaped like penises, a juggler, a contortionist (the closest semblance to a real circus act), unicylists and a musical duo named “Deer Head Church” which consisted of two women facing the back of the stage with giant deer heads on their backs facing the audience while playing wabby sounding instruments while a black man walked through the audience and onto the stage wearing a hooded cloak carrying a cross made out of sticks. The venue, Helsinki, has not received their liquor license yet so at intermission we made an executive decision to head outta there. Deer Head Church (not even showing up on google as of now…) was by far the highlight for me, although I would marry Coney Island Chris in a heartbeat.

Close to a full moon tonight…

Here is an interesting play on light. When I set the camera to “think” based on my choosing the f-stop  (Aperture priority for those of you who give a shit) it chooses this setting. Making the church look yellow. This is hand held at 1/2 second. The fact that I can hold the camera that steady is remarkable in itself, but I want you to know this is not at all what the church actually looked like.

I set the camera on a manual, underexposed setting, which was more like what it actually looked like, but far less interesting.

A new bar in town… very “chainy” and very needed according to locals. “It serves a purpose” meaning that it is a magnet for the douche bags and clears the cool places for the actual cool people.

After the show we headed over to this place owned by a fellow hag… the Red Dot.

…where Musty had clearly ditched her circus pals to come drink. Just like us. I absolutely love her purse. A functioning telephone.

 I have really two awesome cat videos which are taking forever to load so I will post them seperately.

Tuesday April 27, 2010

I don’t mean I had the front desk call me and wake me up.

My brother had a heart attack this morning and had a stint put in. He’s in ICU at the moment and they are keeping him for a few more days, but he is doing ok. You see, we have a history of heart problems on both sides of our family. I used to have ridiculously high blood pressure (like 150/99 was the highest it ever got. I know… that’s crazy.) but I lost 20 pounds and started working out and have since gotten it under control. It’s normal now but I definitely need to watch what I eat and take better care of myself. I might want to ease up on the bacon intake, eh? Good thing I don’t smoke.

I heard this song the other day for the first time in forever and I love it… no relevance to anything, I just wanted to share it. Genesis, “Home by the Sea”

 The last few days I have been chipping away at editing the 3600 photographs from our trip to Australia and New Zealand and it’s so fun to relive it all over again. I have had several people tell me how inspired they were by my updates while we were away so I want to say thank you for thanking me. It was annoying as fuck having to sit in my hotel room and update it. The photos that you have seen here don’t even scratch the surface of what we saw and did, so I am diligently going through them and will be posting them on Pink Monkey Tour as soon as I get them narrowed down to a reasonable amount.

I had 2 meetings today with people that are going to help me with interwebs stuff. I have an addiction to buying domain names and I am trying to sort it all out and prioritize which sites to build first and what they need to look like. (reasontochewyourarmoff.com was definitely in that list and might be moving up to the #1 priority soon.) I forgot to eat dinner so the few glasses of wine I had kicked my ass and I was home in bed by 9pm.

It was a weird day. My mind is racing with “What’s Next?”, my own mortality hit me in the head like a piano falling out of the sky and I was generally just feeling bleah. Luckily I ran into a super cute French Bulldog named Chloe and she put a smile on my face. She belongs to a friend of Michael’s (Tivoli) and I got her info so I can stalk her and her dog downtown. I offered my dogsitting services…

I was waiting for her to so something funny but that didn’t happen so just enjoy her cute little face, and disregard the conversation they are having in the background about Mexican food.

March 27, 2010

I have to admit I have been a little overwhelmed and haven’t concentrated on the culinary aspect of this trip. We just stumble upon something and if we are hungry or thirsty, we make it happen. Today we went to the Fish Market (a big fat fail, it was nothing like the one in Tokyo) and after a disappointing “no-raw-fish-for-breakfast” we went to The Rocks and found a little French cafe called  La Renaissance Patisserie, complete with angry bitchy French women running it. They are known for their cakes and we can just start our day right off the bat with a LTP award going to the Passion De Pierre! I never realized that I loved passion fruit so much… but today I learned that the yummy gooey stuff on the top of this dessert was in fact passion fruit sauce. The first time I ever had this in my mouth was in Dubai and the second time was back in November at the Food and Wine Festival where Chris and I were licking plates. Ironically I called the sauce from November a caramel pomegranate sauce and if I had to go back in time and make that same assessment again, it would be passion fruit. What an amazingly sophisticated palate I have, huh? oh well… please remember that I am learning how to live.

It was so adorable I almost didn’t want to eat it.

This is so creepy I don’t even know what to say.

Kanagaroo jerky, of course.

I lost count of how many pictures I have of the Opera House. I have every single inch of her covered, I almost feel like I am violating her. Just wait til Ayers Rock in a few days, though. Every single angle in every single lighting situation.

All morning we kept running into and trying to stay out of the way of these crazy people. They were in a relay race/scavenger hunt type thing called City Chase and were in a mad dash to complete a bunch of tasks. I wanted to ask them what they were doing but most of them were in a frantic hurry and I certainly didn’t want to be responsible for making them lose. Ann Marie and I keep talking about signing up for Amazing Race. I really need to check into that now that I have some free time.

After hitting up every open air market in the Greater Sydney area and Pete was bored to tears of shopping we headed over to Bondi Beach, the most famous beach in all of Sydney.

Dogs were running around playing and this one in particular looked almost identical to Pete and Ann Marie’s old dog Chelsea. I think they are very close to getting another one soon (Although they claim that I am close too. (I love dogs, but clearly a dog is not conducive to my lifestyle at this moment.)

For some odd reason there was a splotch of hot pink paint on this rock that 818 noticed. It’s almost as if the monkey took a shit on the rock.

This never gets old. I laugh every time I take one of these.

Umm nice hair, Laura.

and my favorite photo of the day…

And this is Peter Travis, inventor of the Speedo! He was so excited to talk to us and tell us about the Speedo and how he invented it… 83 years old and the guy is full of energy!

After sightseeing all day we went to Prime for a lovely steak dinner. No photos. I am tired. Good night.

March 26, 2010

I am so exhausted that I can barely keep my eyes open. We completely lost an entire day in travel and got only a few hours of sleep on the plane, so today’s entry will be very short commentary on a few good photos. The pink monkey has been to all of the continents and is in rough shape these days. When I return home he will be retired and put in a class case forever. He smells real bad. He has sat in penguin shit, been fondled by stinky kids at a Masai village, has had his face planted in the street in Manhattan, been burned by cigarettes and has been dragged around by many dogs mouths. He has had a good life. Follow along as we throw him around down under….

I wasn’t about to lose him in Sydney Harbor so I have the grip of death on him here.

Syndey Harbor Bridge

Of course the Sydney Opera House

818 looking hot with his scruff.

My brother Peter

Traffic jam in the harbor

If you look very closely you will see the monkey. This is like playing “Where’s Waldo” …

If you look closely here you can see my reflection in the mirror at the end of the hallway of this theater.

And finally, the view we enjoyed during our lousy dinner at an Italian place called Baia.

I gotta get to bed, we are getting up at 5:00 am to hit the fish market. ZZZZZZZ for now…

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.

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.)