Sunday, May 17, 2009

I Am So Bad At Blogging, pt. 2: The Month-Late Photoblog

Staycation, guys! Ugh, that term is about as overused these days as "recessionista," "tweet," and "Glen Beck Is A Terrorist." Okay, not that last one, but I'm trying my hardest. But anyway, D and I were ready for a little work ditching, as I had just finished doing a bunch of rich whiny people's taxes, and she had been working harder than anyone else in California, as per usual.
So a Friday was picked, work was ditched, and the mythical Catalina Island was the destination. D had never been there, and I went once when I was but a lad. The original plan was to lead off with an old person breakfast at the Carrow's by our house, but that was of course trumped by laziness. Mastodon's Leviathan was on the Subaru stereo. After barely (of course) making it to the ferry on time, we were off.

In the harbor, aboard the vessel.


My better half.


See what I mean?


Leaving the harbor.


Officially on the open sea.


Twas rather windy.


Though I was not fazed.


Remember this guy (and the people in front of him) for later.


South tip of the island.


And then it happened. The family in the picture above (in front of grey sweatshirt guy) decided to start throwing up, at the front of the boat- which was going pretty much top speed. You do the math. When my sunglasses started getting splashed, I thought it was the ocean. I was very mistaken. Grey sweatshirt guy, luckily for me (and unluckily for him) took the brunt of it, though my sweatshirt was out of commission for the rest of the trip. His may not have been salvageable. Poor guy. Also- the lady came to apologize to him, and the baby she was holding started throwing up again! I may not know too much about the seafaring life, but I do know you should avoid the highest point on the boat if you tend to get motion sick. 


We did make friends with the other thrown-up-upon people, and they took a picture of us, far away on the back of the boat.


Into Avalon Harbor.


My seafaring lass.


 Casino.


Friendly tourist pic.


We basically just did a bunch of hanging around, eating a bunch of food, and enjoying the weather.


And looking at fish via glass-bottom boat. Tourism!


Yes, that is a submarine.


At the end of the day, we walked down to this beach (it is a protected wildlife area) and just lazed around for a good while.


Rocky, but relaxing.


And Dawn almost fell in.


Back to reality. Or, at least Orange County.


 A patriotic afternoon voyage.


A bunch of dolphins started swimming in the boat wake after I took this picture, naturally.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

I Am So Bad At Blogging

[Note to self: Catalina Island Adventure photoblog coming soon. Maybe.]

Ugh, I'm still mostly asleep for some reason. It's not like I don't get enough sleep- my incessant selfishness and lack of any real responsibility probably afford me too much. Luckily, I don't let worrying about my budget for vinyl reissues at Insound keep me up at night. Usually. So here's how I've been spending my days in my general post-adolescent malaise:

-Wedding planning. Almost done (yeah right. Jinx!). Much was accomplished in Paso Robles last weekend (a phrase that has never been typed before!)- cake tasted/arranged for (it's gonna be good, and I don't even like cake. Seriously.), invitations designed (I was a totally wannabe graphic designer for a while, so I was prepared to be a dick about the invitations. Luckily for me, my fiance is more than capable of arranging excellent looking invitations without my faux-knowledgable snide comments), and my Sound System Assistant was arranged for (Thanks, Turtle Boy).

-We decided to take Monday off for a leisurely drive back south, so we stopped in Malibu for lunch/early dinner. As with most things, I was generally unimpressed by Malibu. I enjoy all of the leftover architecture from the 30's-40's-50's-60's, but other than that, I really don't see the big deal. Overrated, like the other 90% of Los Angeles. After we made a Lawyer Emergency Internet Pit Stop at the Panera in Santa Monica (I much prefer Santa Monica to Malibu, btw), we went the rest of the way home on PCH- though only out of necessity, since it weas now rush hour(s). Blech.

-I've sworn off physical record stores. I hate to say it, but it's true. I have a spreadsheet on my phone (nerd) of about 300 different records I need to buy (yeah right), and have only managed to find 1 of them in 3 trips to different places. The exception, of course, is Amoeba, but I can't drive there all the time. At least it took me 15 years of record buying to get to that point. Everyone else: keep going. I am an isolated case of extreme nerdiness and even more extreme jaded-ness.

-The one record I did get was Jane's Addiction's Nothing's Shocking. As I may or may not have said before, I never liked Jane's until this past year or so. I think it has to do with living in Southern California- Jane's is everywhere (even the post office), and they wore me down. I remember hating this record in college. We had this neighbor that lived in an apartment behind our house, above our garage/practice space (which undoubtably sucked for him), and he was an older grad student who commuted (!) from Berkeley (!) 3 or 4 days a week. He was super wierd and tended to invade your space with unsettleing regularity. He used to just roll in through our back door, go through my cds and grab the ones he wanted to copy. He always traded me cds in return, although I rarely listened to them because he annoyed me and I am an asshole. One of the few I did listen to was Nothing's Shocking, which Jason and I hated (also the 2nd Meat Puppets album- the one that Nirvana did all the songs from on Unplugged in NY. I still don't like the Meat Puppets. Kurt Cobain really captures the vibe of the songs, while being 200% more tuneful than the original songs). Anyway, like Jeremy "Bummer" Machi says "We always become what we hate."

Friday, May 8, 2009

TOAF

"I hear Rush, Sean Hannity, Dr. Laura..."

Friday, May 1, 2009

Two Blog Posts That Made My Day (Today)

Not that I was having a particularly bad day... but still.

From Idolator: Dissecting "Superstition" (the song, not the mystical belief). Very interesting to me because of the following- A: I am a recording nerd & B: It's one of my favorite songs.

From Videogum: Uniting Humanity And Squirreldom. Dare I say, my heart was warmed. I've only recently begun realizing my fascination with animals. Growing up with 900 yapping dogs, a bunch of messy horses and a nutso parrott kind of gave me a distaste and exasperatuion for most of the animal kingdom, but thanks to Lindsay at Videogum (and Box Cat, and Nyack The Otter [RIP- too sad to link], and Foxes On The Trampoline, and Lazy Cat, and Baby Hippo, and Crazy Mini-Horse... christ, do I ever digress), I basically have the youtube-viewing habits of an 11 year old girl.