Visit from an Old Friend

Court, DMV, and Grassy Fields

I had to go to court the other day in Moreno Valley to take care of a speeding ticket. The court was in a strip mall/office park. I have never seen the likes and it felt like beurocratic hell having to stand in this massive line in the rain. wonder what court houses will look like a few decades from now. Perhaps they will in Walmart were we can shop while we wait to be dealt with.




The next day I went to the DMV and saw this guy wearing the best shirt ever. Afterwards, I was so happy to have been done with all of this madness that I went to go frolick around in some grassy fields by the box spring mountains in Riverside.

Serious and Personal Update

Hello.

I've been living out if a suitcase in a chemistry lab or in a pretty and cheap hotel in downtown Riverside for the past three weeks.

It feels like a month.

Alright here is the thing... I am working on a Ph.D in chemistry at UCR. This consists of teaching, preparing for lectures, gradings, attending seminars, meetings, classes, designing experiments, doing them, figuring out what went wrong, adjusting, etc. I love the work, otherwise I wouldn't be doing it.

Very long story short, I need to be closer to UCR.

I'll be in Riverside most of the time, and in the historic core a few days of the week.

Yes I will live in both places.


Ever since I was an embryo, I have been riding in public transport. All my life, I have either walked, subwayed, or bused to work/school. Where ever you have to go as a pedestrian in LA, it often takes an hour. When I lived in a different part of downtown several years ago, it took me an hour to get to work on the Eastside via public transport, where as it would have been a 5-10 minute drive. When I lived in Hollywood to get to the same place on the Eastside, it would take me 65 minutes via public transport, even though it was a 20-25 minute driving distance. So I am used to spending an hour of my time to get from point A to point B where ever I had to go.

Then I decided to go to UCR, got my very first car to be able to do it (a used red honda civic) ....

Turns out, that it would only take about an hour to drive to UCR via downtown LA, as long as I go against rush hour traffic. -Which is precisely the case in the mornings when I go, and the late afternoons/evenings when I come back.

Don't even suggest taking the train because the whole commute (getting to union station + traveling on the train + getting to UCR and vice versa) would take about 2-2.5 hours each way AND the schedules are extremely inflexible.

I miss my pedestrian ways. I would prefer to be within a five minute walk/bike ride from my lab. I am on a 1.5 year waiting list for such housing.

In the meantime, I found a cheap room in a big house filled with science nerds I haven't met yet. Its not a sure thing yet, my application is still being processed. It is biking/driving distance. But it will do for now.

I have a lot of things to blog about.

Regular blogging shall now resume.

not enough time to blog, so much to blog about.

working.
hard.
and harder.

will come back soon but not too soon.

Things to do

*Today: Worked from home. Hung out at Banquette. Had a lovely conversation with Neighbor Joe.

*Tomorrow: Massive to-do list to get through. Deal with a multitude of disappointed organic chemistry students as I hand them back their final exams. Meetings. Appointments. Writing. Writer's block. Purim shpiel at the Los Angeles Theatre. Eat small pastries the shape of a genocidal antagonist's hat.

*Friday: Work from home. Write write write for that damn-thing-that-is-due-on-Monday.

*Weekend: Family obligations. Writing. Writer's block.

*Monday: Stop writing. Meet 5 pm deadline. Regular blogging resumes. Possibly sooner depending on how strong my desire to procrastinate and how severe my writer's block is. Both are directly proportional.

*Tuesday: What spring break? Get to work, lab monkey!

Downtown News

One issue of downtown news equals a few days of toilet reading.

The other day I found that I have already gone through the previous issue of Downtown News, and I did not have the latest issue around. So I went downstairs to the free standing Downtown News stand outside of my building to pick up an issue.

It was completely empty, as were the other news stands. I then went a block away to the other nearest Downtown News stand and it was also empty, along with the other news stands adjacent to it. I walked another block to another Downtown News stand and the same thing. Three identical data points. Something was up.

Being the obsessive person that I am, I put "having to go" on temporary hold and walked a few blocks to see if there were any newspapers anywhere. ANY newspaper. - "Okay, just two more blocks then I'll go home" kept adding up and next thing I knew I was lightly jogging all over the historic core for a newspaper to read.

EVERY SINGLE NEWSPAPER DISPENSER WAS EMPTY. This was really fuck'n weird. I have simply never seen the likes of it.

After a half of hour of roaming all over the historic core, it was time to call it quits and go home to do my thing. When I got to my building,, I saw a man walking passed the original newspaper dispensers right outside my building. He was pushing a blue shopping cart filled with newspapers.

ME: Hey, are you... delivering papers?

PERSON: No, I am collecting them to recycle. I am two months pregnant and I am just trying to get a bite to eat.

ME: Oh, OK. You gotta do what you gotta do.

I look at her neck and notice no signs of an Adam's apple. I consider myself to have a pretty good "gender dar", but damn I love it when my assumptions are wrong. I took a few steps closer to take a look inside her cart, I saw massive stacks of Downtown News papers!!!

PERSON: Do you want one?

ME: Umm.. yes please.

PERSON: I'm just trying to get a bite to eat.

ME: Here you go.

I reached into my purse and gave her something. We said bye and then I went home.

I have heard that a significant amount of women in skid row purposely take on masculine exteriors to pass as men as a way to minimize sexual harassment. I am pretty curious about this.

Where do I go to....get my hair done?

Whenever I get a hair cut, usually I just find a random friend willing to run scissors through my hair for free. This takes 2-5 seconds.

I recently wanted something different, so I went to Fandango in Silverlake to get my hair done [cut 5 inches, dyed it black, and got purple highlights].

Steven of Fandango

I had the good fortune of having Steven do my hair. He has good skills and a sense of aesthetics and intuition that I can trust and connect with. I was very indecisive about what exactly I wanted and he was somebody I could definitely trust to do something that I knew I would like. I have never had this connection with a hair stylist before.

For the shits'n giggles I asked him what was his strangest experience as a hair stylist, and he said it was the time he did Sharon Stone's hair at her house in San Francisco and he was locked in her crazy compound for four hours.

I am definitely going back.

Fandango
1601 Griffith Park Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90026
Phone: (323) 663-6965

Ed's Digital Mural!!!

Yesterday I got a sneak peak of Ed Fuentes' digital mural (I am a co-sponsor) that will be going up above the Regent Theater.

Its beautiful.

It will be going up soon. Possibly by this month's art walk. We'll see.

This is exciting.

Open Letter II

Dear Asshole Neighbor,

Please do not throw your your cigarette butts out your window. I do not want your trash on my window sill. What if you flicked it out the window and it fell all the way down and landed in some poor shmuck's coffee?

Fuck you,

Your Angry Neighbor

Riverside's Raincross Symbol

I was walking around downtown Riverside and I saw some guy sitting down with a tattoo of the symbol of Riverside on his arm. I asked if I can take a photo and he said yes.

I have never seen anybody with a tattoo of that bell symbol before. I've been looking around for a necklace of that symbol, so that I can wear it out of an expression of my hate-love relationship with Riverside.

Having spent my teenage years in Riverside (and my mid 20's/present), that symbol has a special place in my heart. And it apparantly does as well in Jeff Soto's.


Here is a painting he did back in 2006 that showed at Jonathan Levine's gallery in NY.


I found some information on the history of that symbol on Riverside's official website:

"The unique City Raincross Symbol is derived from combining a replica of the mass bell used by Father Junipero Serra, missionary priest and founder of the California Missions, and the cross to which the Navajo and Central American Indians prayed for rain. Called the "Raincross" symbol, it was designed for the Mission Inn and given to the city by Frank Miller. The Raincross symbol has been identified with Riverside since 1907. Variations of the symbol are used extensively throughout Riverside in architecture, street signs and lighting standards, and is used on the City flag."

Quite fitting for my awkard Chican@ context. That can be some useful imagery if anybody from Riverside wants to write a "Yo Soy Joaquin"/Corky Gonzalez style poem.

Throw away your annoying pets

Whenever I am working at my desk and one of my cats interferes with my work by crawling all over my papers and computer, I half jokingly tell them "You are so annoying. I am going to throw you away." So I then pick them up and throw them away.





This strategy works out quite well because it turns out that they enjoy being in the trash bin and will then stay there for several hours and not bother me anymore.

How I Roll

I wish I could ride my bike around town and be safe doing so.- Or at least have the illusion that its safe. But the truth is, I just do not want to share the road with cars and people who are driving them.

Instead, I stroll around town in this:

My scooter parked in my office.


When I am rolling around the city, people often ask me "What are you riding?" And then I say "a xootr." And then they say "what?" And then I spell out "x-o-o-t-r".

If I am not in a hurry I will get off and let them try it.

If where I have to go is less than 1.5 miles, I ride the xootr.
If where I have to go will take me a half hour or less via walking and public transport, I do public transport. [This has been my new policy ever since I finally got my own car a few months ago (I'm 26 years old). Before then, I would do foot and public transport because those were my only options.]

Venting

Dear Students of mine,

I'm tired of marking your shit wrong. Follow the directions I gave you so I don't have to spend so much time correcting your avoidable errors. You'll never pass organic chemistry without paying attention to our construct.

-Your overworked instructor

**


Dear Neighbors with dogs,

Pick up after your dog after it craps on our sidewalks. Its really disgusting to leave it out.

-Your neighbor that is not a coprophiliac


***

Dear Lost Souls Cafe,

OK seriously, must ya'll be closed on a Saturday? Everytime I walked passed by your closed gate (on a Saturday), I almost always see some dissapointed and slightly confused person look down the alley through the bars hoping that somehow you guys are really open.

-A frequent customer that would like to consume your products on Saturdays

***

Dear Push Emporium,

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! I HAVE SUCH STRONG CUSTOMER LOYALTY TO GET MY STUFF DRY CLEANED THERE!!!!COME BACK!!!! Where did you go?

-Deeply dissapointed to se you go

Carne Asada

One of my favorite things to eat is a carne asada taco or burrito.

When I was a mid-teenager, I used to work at my cousin's taco stand in Hermosillo, Mexico. He made the best carne asada anything ever.

EVER.

No carne asada anything has been able to top it. -However, one carne asada burrito has come close. Several months ago I went to San Francisco for a few days and ate an extremely good carne asada burrito at this one place in the Mission District. I forgot the name of their place, but they have a picture of an attractive brunette with a bandolier across her chest on their menu and on their business cards.

The best carne asada burrito I have had in LA is at Terre's on Melose, close to Vine in Hollywood. Its really good, but I think that there must be some better version out there that I have yet to discover. The best carne asada taco I have ever had in LA is at that one place on the corner of Vermont and Santa Monica Blvd. Why my favorite carne asada burrito and taco are not at the same place, I don't know.

A few weeks ago I ate this one carne asada plate at this one Colombian restaurant close to the corner of Sunset and some other street that is close to Benton Way. I don't know why I can't remember the street name since I used to wait for the bus (when it was the RTD, not MTA) on that corner all the time as a kid on my way to school.

Also, at my cousin's joint, he served onions in a manner I have never seen done in the US. We would chop an onion in half, wrap each halfs in aluminum foil, and roast it on the grill for a while. Then you eat it with some salt and lemon and that is the best way I have ever eaten an onion. Does anybody know of any mexican or non mexican restaurants that serve onions that way?



But my main question is.... where in LA can I find the best carne asada burrito?

Brief update

I'm working 65-70 hours a week these days. No time to procrastinate and write in this blog. I have to schedule when I can take a shit.

The People's Gallery

This month I had a showing of my recent stuff at The People's Gallery on University Ave in downtown Riverside. Here are pictures of some of the stuff:

712 S. Santa Fe
Price: SOLD

I used to live in the industrial district of downtown Los Angeles in this building that used to be a Heinz ketchup test kitchen, and Robert Rauschenberg’s studio back in the 1960’s.





Hollywood is over rated, but its still kinda pretty
Price: negotiable






On the rooftop of the Chateau de Fleurs
Price: negotiable

I lived in Hollywood for a few years. This painting depicts the city view from the rooftop where I spent several hours painting, relaxing, and looking into people’s open windows.







Pedestrian Hollywood
Price: negotiable

These are some of the buildings on Vine St, close to Hollywood Blvd. I used to walk down this street regularly on my way to work via the subway station at that intersection. When I think of “Hollywood”, I think of the geography and diverse social demographics, not the entertainment industry or the concept of Hollywood (i.e. its association with wealth and fame). And when I think of the geographical location, I think of its demographically diverse inhabitants, urban decay, historic buildings, teenage runaways and disappointed tourists.






Ms. T’s Ties
Price: negotiable

Not long ago, there were these ties tied to poles all over the Arts District of downtown Los Angeles. I found out that they were put up by Tatiana Schulenburg, a local artist protesting yuppie scum* like myself from moving into the neighborhood and raising rents.




Most of my other stuff did not photograph well, so they are not included in this post. You'll just have to see them in person. -But they were mostly paintings depicting the chemistry and pollution that would be found in urban environments.

Vintage Memo, Age Five

My old RTD bus pass.