Happy New Year

Happy New Years. In Shinjuku people are on the move. People walk around and are going places. It could be just home, a place to eat, and even a shrine. One small detail about New Year's Eve and new year's day is that people like watching television. I guess each channel has their special show. It's not quite like Dick Clark, it's that but way more nuts. There are events in Domes that are packed. Why don't they do that in the US?

I ate the traditional meal of soba which had a yuzu twist to it. That's really great, and went to a shrine.

Tokyo Rain

Rain happens everywhere. What's the difference between rain here or rain there. Is it the signs around the rain? The people are the same everywhere I think. Maybe it's the density of the signs, the colors, and what's under it all. Yet, the 99 cents store isn't that cool in the rain, but it has to be the signs. Then again, is it the signs, or is it the font or the characters? If it says, Bob's Big Boy, would this look cool? It wouldn't. As simple as it may seem, it's nice to see the rain in Tokyo, and although people are scurrying away out of the water, I'm trying to get in it. My Ricoh may not agree.



See the Hypebeast blog for some monjayaki talk.

Tokyo time

Tokyo is Tokyo where a convenience store is amazing. A bit of rain, and tomorrow, the checking stuff out and meeting with folks, begins. It's exciting like that.

Chosun

The new tradition, eat Korean food on Christmas. I guess we can always go to Chinese food. I even saw one of the strip mall 3 kinds and fried rice or chow mein places packed. Everyone goes Chinese. But how many go to Korean? My mother made a funny observation. Not everyone eats Korean food. But Koreans eat Korean food, but not Chinese food. So of course, Korean places will be open. Clever.

Racist Coke Commercial

Ha, this is funny. The oppressed oppress harder. It's insane yellow face stuff. I'm not that into pointing out racist things, but this one is pretty bad. If it were made by non Asian people, it would have been skewered harder, much earlier. From dime slot eyes, to the entire camera routine, to the language, then to hit the tourist had, and vest. It's pretty harsh, but it happens everywhere.

Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays for anyone who reads this blog. I've tried to put some of my thoughts in here, and it's hard to all of a sudden just throw up a Happy Holidays or Merry Christmas blog, since for some reason, it's the last thing I've been thinking about. Maybe it's because I'm going to Japan in a couple of days, or maybe it's something else. While we all shop, and I do this too, I'm on the other side, along with the store manager, Michelle who somehow is able to block out commerce in our own stores, and still seems to enjoy the custom of the holidays by going shopping, and going to parties, and all that to the fullest. Friend Bill goes to malls, and once in a while asks, "do you feel it?" He once took me to a few malls, and we'd walk through the decorations, and see a Santa, and would ask that same question. If I said no, he's take me somewhere else, until I'd admit to something. Maybe I'll be feeling that next year, I'm sort of on a mini search for it. Happy Holidays, for those of you who read this.

XMAS beef

Mr Poon made Xmas dinner, my second holiday event. That's a record. Usually it's just one. See that piece of beef? It was my beef time. It's been a while since I've had a piece of meat, and this one was great. Good job Bill. Gift exchange, white elephant where no one stole, (what's wrong with us?) some Call of Duty playing, and what ended up being a lot of softball talk. Relaxing times that went sort of late.

T Mobile Idiots

The idiots of T-Mobile. So my Blackberry 8700g acts up and goes to white screen every so often. So I call T Mobile tech support, they have me download two types of software, and neglect to ask any questions about my computer. I use a Mac. The files download and it's obvious it's not going to work with my system. I call back and talk to tech support guy #2 who tells me that I need Pocket Mac, that'll save the day. I have that already downloaded, so I fire it up. The tech guy thinks, that some how, I'll be able to upload new software through it. It's supposed to be the files I already downloaded. I tell the guy, it's not going to work. He tells me, that it should work, and all I have to do is use a program called Stuff-It to expand the .exe files I downloaded which will turn them into Mac files! Yeah! Awesome, magic. Well, I break it to the tech guy, that it's not going to work. We go through many steps, and in the end, we get nowhere. Every road he takes is a dead end. He spends sometime surfing the web, and tells me that, no it's not going to work, and he's sorry. Keep in mind this is a guy in Pennsylvania, not India, or Madagascar, or anywhere else. It's the USA and he has the label of Tech Support "Jonathan". He then tells me that not one of their phones is supported by Mac. Since he gave me this piece of info, how did he think that I could put new software into the phone via my Mac computer?

We talk some more, and I realize, this guy is outmanned by me, and the entire tech department is pretty crappy. I find out that they get 4 or 5 Mac calls a week, and that's it. You'd think with perhaps a million Blackberry users, more than 4 or 5 would call in a week, but according to "Jonathan," that's all they get.

So next I talk to someone in "Loyalty" department. Totally clueless folks again, who have no idea of what they're talking about. I tell her that maybe to have my loyalty, they should train the tech support people with one sentence, "none of our phones are upgradeable by Mac." Pretty simple thing, maybe they can tape it to the wall in the office, or maybe on every monitor before they waste 30 minutes of someone's time trying to figure out some off of the shelf answers via their script. I suggest that she makes this suggestion, but in the end, she tells me I can do this, in effect for her. I suggest that she takes the step and make this suggestion herself, since I don't work there, and they'll just screw someone else if she chooses not to help, but she's in script mode and asks, "can I help you with anything else?"

Best Buy Scandal.

I've heard of this a while back. Always knew they were scammers.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lazarus23dec23,0,884197.column?coll=la-home-center

Soaptopia

One of the coolest shops that I actually discovered a while back is Soaptopia. On Venice, it's a shop that of course sells soap, but they're not just resellers, they make their own. I have no idea how one gets into making soap and doing it in a shop setting, but they have it dialed in. It's been in Mar Vista for three years, and I have no idea how I've missed it for so long. The exterior looks comfortable, and retro. Something like an apothecary or something like that. Check out this little strip of shops, it's looking up.

The official greeter. The dog walks around slowly.

Most of the things here, they don't make, it's the sponges and stuff in the window.

Norma stands proud in front of the soaps, lotions, and bath oils. See the candy cane themed soap? That's special for the holidays. The chandelier is a nice touch. I'd like to learn how to make soap one day, but for now, I'll just buy it.

I like the open beam ceiling. It could have been just a regular low hanging ceiling, but the wood opens it up. Disco ball? I'm not sure about that.

There's that soap again. I'm digging the cake dish.

This is where you buy the soap. Just pick some off and put them on the table. So many styles and scents. They get featured on TV once in a while, and holiday time, it gets packed. They gift wrap with the best of them.

Some places make cupcakes, but they do soap. What are these baking sheets are all about? Or I mean, what do they use them for when it's not soap? Something flat like cookies?

That's where they make everything. The shop is comfortable, the people nice, and this is a true indie business. They ship of course... from their site, here's their info.

Soaptopia, Inc. - 12228 1/2 Venice Blvd. - Mar Vista - CA 90066
310.398.8333 (phone) - 310.398.7949 (fax)
Store Hours - M-F 10am-7pm - SA/SU 10am-6pm

Giant Robot 1, 2, and eats

The stores are doing it's thing this holiday. It's hard to judge how it's going to be, since retail was down for a while, but it seems to have picked up. The small shop does it's thing and people seem frantic and happy. The employees are holding up, and they're being troopers. They're fueled by pizza and soda. I hear it's pretty good. Next year, one of the projects in early 08 is to replace the ceiling tiles. Prognosis is good. I just found the place that has the original molds. They first told me that the mold was no good, but they were anxious to see photos of the shop with the tiles I have. The fella said that the tiles I have were made 40 years ago! No wonder they're brittle. The wind can blow strong, and they'll crack.

Gloomy plastic bears, they're huge ones.

GR2. That one dude with a beard looks like a ZZ Top dude.

gr/eats Nelson holding it down. I ate the special, which was shrimp, vegetables, and rice. It was darn good. Sometimes, the most home style food is the best.

Thanks for the patronage. Don't forget Giant Robot Silverlake. They're doing it too!

DRx

Darren Romanelli in the Times. I saw all of the jackets for Lupe Fiasco before they were set up, and now they're in the Times, and probably in some music videos. The article talks a little about the work, collaboration, and all that stuff. The writer seems to know a little bit about what's going on which is good. DRx is a good guy.


LA Times link.

Candy is better than nothing

So print shop... where's our mags? We've been waiting and waiting, and the inept delivery people are doing it all wrong. How about dropping it off? How about being on time. How about showing up? Where are you fools? So candy. Yes, Canadians have a lot of candy, but this is all the weird stuff. Do they eat anything normal? I'll bet most buy the imported stuff, from down south. USA.

KERN HELVETICA

So appropriate today, that I wear my helvetica sweatshirt made by Shari. But maybe she was in the house in some way. I'm at IKEA, then I see this fella named Owen Gee wearing a KERN zip up by Veer. I walked up to him and said, let's take this photo! It's perfect. Also we've both seen the documentary, which I know not enough have seen, so it was a great moment. Shari would have laughed at this one. It's cool how an entire statement and full sentence about graphic design can be made on zip ups.

rip Shari Sakahara memorial day

Today is now two years since Shari Sakahara was killed. I hope she's never forgotten. I still live really close by to where it went down, and her apartment is still there too. When I walk or drive by, I look in the window, she's not there. I hope she looks down my way once in a while.

Sensitivetype.com
Myspace

Ken Tanaka meets me

Ken Tanaka's video. People say I look scared. I was scared for sure. But Ken is a nice man. The best part is that Ken is using his fame on YouTube to actually push culture forward, that says a lot about a guy who's online. I wonder if Ken gets Japanese ladies out of all this?

Here's a link to the Japan Probe posting. There's some heated comments.

Hot Cakes

Made it to Hot Cakes today. I've driven by this bakery many times in the last three years and never stopped in. I actually never noticed Hot Cakes until fairly recently to be honest. The stretch of Centinela where this shop is at, is sort of slowly revitalizing. There's a comics and collectibles place on the corner, and B&B, the hardware store institution is always busy. Walking in, you see people working hard baking. They're making cakes of some sort, and of course what catches my eyes are the cupcakes. I'm not sure how hard it is to really mess up cupcakes, but then again, if you go to a market, they're terrible. These are handmade and the many choices with thick frostings are nice.

The painted chalkboard, and handwriting ads a nice touch. Even though this is big on the wall you hardly notice it since you're busy looking into the glass case.

These stare at you and it's hard to get just one or even two, you tend to want to buy a bunch of give to people. That's why cupcakes are cool.

Of course, cupcakes are sort of like snacks you might buy on a whim, and they definitely bring you back into nostalgia, as least in my lifetime. When I was little, I remember cupcakes were cool. I think that's where the idea of a Ding Dong and Twinkie came to be. The idea was the make small cakes. It's great that cupcakes are in now, and I do hope they never leave. A slice of cake is essentially the same thing, but are they really? Is a cupcake, that's handcrafted for one serving better? I actually think so. The care is worth supporting.

Hot Cakes
10-7 mon-sat, 10-4 sun.
4119 centinela near washington blvd
la, ca 90066
310-397-2324

The blue lagoon

I don't know enough about plants, but when the "leaves" fall off of this plant, I don't know what to do with them. So I try just shoving them in the dirt to see what happens, will I get another entire plant? So I put it in thinking nothing will happen, but then look at that little green thing coming up! I had tried this once before and the same thing happened, I thought it was a fluke, but it's no joke. I'll keep shoving these leaves in and I guess I'll keep getting more plants. I must be doing something right.

I guess it reminds me of that scene in The Blue Lagoon. Two kids, a guy and girl (girl played by Brooke Shields) are marooned on an island for years. One day, she's in pain, her stomach hurts, she's fat, and all that, then poof, a baby pops out. WHAT?! is what they were thinking. How did that happen? Well, basically, I shove in a leaf, and poof. WHAT?!

cracked hopes

So, sometimes, good deeds go sour when it's out of your control. Transcontinental printers, our people in Canada are good to us. No doubt. Issue 50 comes out they actually made us the above award, featuring the first issue and the 50th, framed. But somedays are just not waking up for (no, I don't really believe this). The mail comes, I see the package. I wonder what it is, so I open it and it's a framed something. Neat, but the glass has chips, tiny ones, and I cut my thumb. To not risk injury to others much less myself, I decided the safest thing to do is to throw it away. All the packaging had to go too. I could have kept it, and replaced the glass with all of the free time that I have, maybe in 2010, but that also means housing this piece, broken glass with tiny shards around somewhere. It wasn't going to happen. I felt like an ass breaking the news to the print shop that the item they carefully made and sent came broken and that I had to throw it away for safety's sake. A few of you might be thinking that I should have just dealt with it better, but fuck it, right? I like it, I don't love it, it's broken, and I'll never get to fixing it. What would you do with a broken trophy that caused a cut in your finger?

The printer dude felt bad. He called his peoples who packed this and got this done. Their response which he relayed to me was that it's never happened before, and it's impossible that it happened.

1) They made me a special issue 33 - ten years type of award. It also showed up with broken glass. I sort of didn't remember too clear, but Martin confirmed it. The frame is bent too. This one was much smaller, we eventually took it to get replaced. But the point is, the "never happened before" is a crock of shit. They are 2/2 in sending shit broken. Why is it that printers are so self righteous? It's been a common theme since day one of doing GR. Printers screw up like everyone else, they just hate to admit it since it costs them money or credibility.

2) The employee who said, "no way it could happen." That's just stupid. What makes you think you can pack something that a delivery person won't drop, kick, or even dropkick during transit? I told Mike to tell her to "Fuck Off". He said he would, but I doubt it. Maybe the strong Canadian dollar is making the Canadians feel impenetrable or something, but logic still has to prevail. Delivery people will break shit.

Next, our issue 51 that we need to have for the shops, etc, sat in a warehouse since last week. No note, no call, no nothing to tell us that they were ready to be delivered. Basically, they were supposed to come by and drop them off. We were around the whole time, but nothing. We found this out yesterday, and today, this company, Yellow, refused to deliver them. So my printer, trying to make something work right calls a different freighter to come and pick it up to bring to us today between 5-8pm. Martin waits and waits, and at 8:05 he has to leave. A pregnant wife, and a trip to Hawaii tomorrow morning is pretty important. The delivery people never show up. Cut finger, shitty framed object, a complacent packing person, and a shitty delivery company are the hazards of the day. The magazines which we pay hefty amounts for, just sit picking up dust, when they should be for sale. When you look from above and think about it from at least our point of view. Here's what's going on.

The magazine needs to be for sale. Each day it's not a chain of events happen.

a) we lose the sale, we may lose the customer who may buy the mag elsewhere and become a customer there instead.
b) we lose any associated sale from the person. maybe they would have gone home, or showed the mag to someone who in turn would have bought a copy, a subscription, an artwork, etc.
c) the advertisers will think we suck. Even though other places have the mag, it looks bad when we're out at the store. Advertisers mad? Maybe they won't give us the next ad. It's damage that we can't afford.
d) customers will think we suck. Who's subscribe to a mag that can't get on the stands?
e) now we're faced with a late holiday issue in store. That's bad. While the world tunes out, we need to try and build hype for the issue. (keep in mind it's in store, the rest of the spots should have them) Aside from first copies, this is our store copies.

Have any bets as to when this secondary company will deliver it tomorrow? Will I be in at that time whenever it is? Should the printer just had the regular delivery company bring it tomorrow since whoever was to bring it in the "expedited" method failed?

The only good thing is that "Transcon" sent us a bag of Canadian candy. We got sugared up, and that made us feel better.

Moca planning

Baseman is a joker. Wherever he is, he'll tell jokes. A lot of them. I met with MOCA folks, Gary Baseman, Tim Biskup, and Simone Legno in downtown this evening. The idea was to lay the groundwork for the panel and live painting evening of Pervasive Persuasion, an event in 2008. It's going to also feature Oguri, a butoh dancer. I think that threw everyone off into a what the fuck is going on again? mode. Oguri is going to do a slow butoh move during the event. Strange for sure, and people are going to trip out hard. Butoh is a weird modern dance "thing."

Simone said the first thing he did when he landed in LA the first time from his native Italy was to go to Giant Robot. That's quite an honor. Literally from LAX to GR. I responded with figuring out the trick the car game he had on his site from years ago that got me the first place spot that stood for ages.

Tim and Gary get into lively art discussions. These two are like water and oil when it comes to art. "I disagree" is often said by Baseman. I learned a lot about these two, and a little tiny bit about the importance of art. Tim chows down on a shrimp udon. This shot catches him in mid-shrimp at East restaurant.

Denise and Raul chill and listen to Gary go at it. Jokes and all.

Angry Robot

Whoa weird, Militant Geek website features the Angry Robot in the City t shirt. Filled with vector art, it's something I did actually quickly. One day, I'd like to take a proper glass for illustration using Illustrator. I don't use a mouse, I don't know much except for a few tools, and that's how I go at it. It's minimal, but it's enough to get the job done. Sometimes, when you don't know what you're doing, stuff like this comes easy. It's like how at 17, Jason Bateman won a celebrity car race. No worries about family, kids, or anything, he probably went as fast as he could around the corners, and floored it coming out of every turn. Has he won it since? I don't think so.

Also French Robot wars? No, that's Tokyo Tower!

Militant Geek.

Yelp!

This ad dude from Yelp writes:

Eric,

Hope you are having a Happy Holidays? I have been thinking about you lately and how you just can't afford to be involved in Yelp. I ask myself, how can he not afford to be working with Yelp. Your Los Angeles would be a huge magnet to people who are looking for you in the area. Plus, with over 300 people coming to your page every month to decide to spend money in your store, there is a huge opportunity here.

I have to ask, what matters most, price or profit? Eric, which would you rather have? Price only lasts for a moment and profit lasts for a lifetime. I am very confident that Giant Robot would b a huge success on the site. Plus, your success is directly tied to mine, and I wouldn't have made contact with you if I didn't think I could help bring you more profit.

Let me know what I can do to make this work, I know you will have extreme success, we just got to get you involved. What are your thoughts?

-Best

Brent



Isn't this a fucked up email? It's one of the rudest, condescending emails I've seen in a while, and it came from Yelp.

1) has this guy Brent really been thinking about me?
2) can I really afford to work without Yelp? I've done it so far.
3) "Your Los Angeles" Yes, "My" Los Angeles.
4) I get 300 people looking at my page? That's it?
5) Price or profit and he inserts my name there? There's some fucked up shit. What's more important? Neither, it's doing things right. There's more to it, and if this dude had any business experience, he'd be cooler.
6) Giant Robot would "b"?

Pretty uncool Yelp.

Logo T

This is what I get to do, wear a GR shirt that I just made. It's a brown and orange prototype. It was just going to be a logo-t, but at the last minute, I put a robot in it. Not rocket science, but it works.

videodrome

Ken Tanaka is hilarious. Today, I was filmed for one of Ken Tanaka's video spots. What an honor. It should be up in a few weeks. If you don't know Ken, he's the whitest Japanese man I've ever seen. I don't think he realized that he was holding the Raideen jumbo backwards, which is very Ken Tanaka. Also the Raideen is also missing it's left hand. Here's a video of what he sort of does.



Film #2. Documentary about Takashi Murakami. Happened at JANM, and we'll see how many moments that I'll actually make it onto a documentary. I'm sure I'm there for comic relief, since there's no doubt, big time curators, critics, benefactors, other artists, TV people, actors, rich folks, etc, and then me? Find me on the cutting room floor.

Random SF.

After the Automator suggestion of the Yucatan spot on 15th and Valencia, and driving around the hot breakfast spots which are packed in SF, we were full. So much food, so good and on weekends, posole. I like this spot and the agua fresca is quite good too. I got the cantalope drink. SF never has a shortage of restaurants, but this one always has space.

Check out Mi Lindo Yucatan on yelp.

Dave's car is nuts. I like it, and he's going to give this to me soon in trade.

Owl of the day. Amazing work at Upper Playground. It makes noise through servos, and basically it's like a pinball machine. When it runs right, it makes a rhythmic beat.

This is a nice dog. So mellow. The little one is mellow too and has a nice bell.

Later in the day, we went to some print place. SF has this indie thing where people who want to make shit can get stuff done in a community. I guess since it's so spread out in LA, if you wanted to do this, you'd drive for an hour to find something.

Andrew Schoultz's mural still exists. How did this work in SF? In LA, it would be gone.

Object of the day. Mao dogg at his desk writing standards of his own Red Book quotes. He had quite a robust hairline. This object was probably old, and I guess served a purpose of some sort, but was $485. Historical communist gear is expensive. I'd probably break it, but it would look great in a museum or something. I hope someone rad gets this.

They sell some of our books and have a neat shop.

Pens and Needles sells some of ours too. Tim Kerr and Rich Jacobs art. SF is an arty place and it's fun to visit for a bit. I lived here once a while ago, and it remains a great place to visit.

Are airplants in now? Walking through the mission, this arborist type of shop (at least that's what I think it was) used airplants for holiday cheer. I'm not sure if the lights are good for the plant, but they are looking for the warmth of summer and a little bit of humidity. I like the way this whole unit looked actually. Airplants are cool.

Then it was off to White Walls Gallery

Maxwell Smart

Whatever this was, was neat. Wood, thick, weird, depth, edgy, and solid. I liked this a lot.

Katy Horan

Bizarre of Ozz

Bazaar Bizarre took place in SF on saturday, another packed event that costs only $1 to get it. Post running from the Art Center show it was a drive up to get in at 5am, and to check out this event. Modest with vendors behind 6 foot tables, it's actually mellow and a well done event. It took place in what seemed like a community center in Golden Gate Park. I helped at the Cut+Paste booth, which was a busy place. Craft fans everywhere. From late teen to granny, tons of people did their shopping. It was pretty busy as you can tell.

The level of craft has improved a lot in the last few years. The fan base has grown with it. It's a spot that's either going to be, or is being exploited as we speak. The major stores will continue to make crafty looking items, and I think that means, it's started. I'm not sure where and how the t-shirt booths fit into this whole thing, since that's the easiest, and least crafty, but they're there too.

Art Center

Friday night was the grad show at Art Center. I've been to such event a few times, but it seems like it's only gotten bigger and more crowded. It's getting to be more than just a graduation show, it's about just checking out who's on the horizon. We all know many of the artists who like now are from Art Center. Every year seems to turn out a few that go on and become "artists" in this new art economy. I won't name names, there's just a lot. Who will it be this year? It's so crowded, I honestly couldn't get to more than 25% of what was out there. I don't bother with car design, although I might one day drive the prototype that's here.

Yes bikes, a lot of them. Where are they going? I know this fella, and he's Emilio Santoyo. He also did the war of the ketchup and mustard, being rooted on by hotdogs. Come to think of it, relish wins for me every time.

Stantons!

These prints looked great. I forgot the name of this person, but the work was consistent.

This work freaked me out. The faces were on cans.

This was amazing. A world, a Cloud City, a dream of a place, Jack Long's buildings, City of Darkness, somewhere in Brazil, maybe the setting for Amelie 2, you couldn't be at or beat this place.

I like the architecture the airplane view of this piece.

That's smiles for a graduate.

LA Weekly

Vinyl toy article. We get some props in it. I remember those days of the Michael Lau toys. We were just getting the webstore running well, and Michael wanted us to introduce his toys to America. We were definitely first. Thanks Gendy Alimurung. It's linked here.

Comment of the minute

anonymous wrote:

Again your blog entry was able to elicit similar feelings in me, in particular objects associated with my childhood that are squirreled away in my memory.

I wonder if all this reminiscing is a consequence of many of us entering the middle phase of life.

I look forward to reading your blog entries as they are, for lack of a better term, so sincere.

Thanks anonymous. Your comment made me think about reminiscing. I'm not sure if it's a middle phase of life, which I'd say I've been in for a while. When is the middle phase? I suppose our life expectancy is something like 77 now. It's gone up. Divide it into thirds, 0-25, 25-50, 50+. If we talk about Giant Robot, which began when I was 24, I'd think it was right before the middle phase. I think even the name of the magazine, Giant Robot is nostalgic, and we've been writing about nostalgia for many years, especially when it comes in the form of a new person, concept, or idea, that's influenced by something nostalgic and "flipped" to be a 2007 item. I do tend to look at these topics and wonder where they came from, why they are here again now in this new form, and then I wonder where's it going or what's next. So if you like nostalgia, I have jars and jars of tucked away. I've began mentally cataloging memories that then flutter away, since I refuse to write them down. Imagine, sitting and remembering an incident from when you were 4 or 5. When they come, I savor them, and try to remember as much as I can about them, and then I let them go. I wonder if the folks who were part of those memories remember that particular moment. Probably not, and they'd think I was weird to bring up an incident where I lost one of my teeth, hit my head on the monkey bars at a park, was nearly trampled on a train in Japan by old ladies, felt shy during photos... the list goes on.

Counter Culture

This is a shot of what we look like after a softball game. Maybe it's a little better today than recent games. We're now 1-9. That means 9 losses straight for us. We played decent defense, and kept pace with the game. No big blowout innings, it was a little up, a little down, and we came up a run short tonite. There were some stellar highlight reel type of plays. The dude wearing Adidas is Mike, he made two insane over the head catches that I was sure were home runs. He gets a late jump, but somehow stretches like a person at a finish line to make the play. It's Willie Mays shit. I swear, but twice. Take that Willie. At this point, I can only seek the rad moments of a game, since we've been losers almost this entire season. Single moments where something neat happens is all I can hold on to. A funny base running incident, a good throw, a dive-yet a miss, a great hard hit that yields nothing except for a lot of distance, and some positive vibes, that kind of stuff. The photo above captures the hesitancy after a game, where big dude Jason is waiting for anyone except for himself to make a suggestion on where to go eat. When we win, it's a definite, but when we lose, sometimes, we go straight home losers. So this season, we lose, and we usually go somewhere, but I know Jason is tired of saying, "Norms" or "Carrows" or "Dennys" so he waits for someone to make a move. If not, then he's on it. Bill, the homerun hitter tells it like it is, we are going to The Counter.

At The Counter, you can build your own burgers, there's a clipboard and you pick what you want, on it, from pineapple to salsa. Anything you want. The beef comes in three sizes, 1/3, 2/3, or 1 pound. It took longer to get a seat, but this was our last game before the holidays, so it was a send off from softball and the relationships from it in 2007, at least for some of us. The factions of new friends, old friends, and family will see each other, but some won't see any of us, so it's a "laters" until the first game in 08.

Above is the special Bloody Mary burger, which seems like an odd name for a fish burger. Some slaw, pieces of celery, a thick bread which differed from the burgers, a dark lettuce, adorned, the patty which was filled with spices that pretty much attack your taste buds in just the right ways. It's really good. Our group of 7 shared two orders of sweet potato fries and the onion strings. They open until 10, so once in a while, this can be our spot.

the container!

When I think about the toys, clothes, furniture, the magical blanket, and even memories, there's one object that lasted the longest and it's still going. The diaper container / which is now my laundry basket. This has been with me my entire life. Only my parents can beat this. I remember sitting in this while I watched TV, I'd put my ass in it and sink, and it was comfortable. I remember later using it as a kicking dummy. Filled with clothes, it was something I'd kick around and see where all of the clothes would go flying. Then I remember playing with Hot wheels on/in it, when it was empty.

The rabbit graphic is perfect, I wonder who made this. It has miles, has traveled a little, and has kept my dirty clothes dirty before wash time. I don't know what made me look at this today and remember things about it, but I'm sure more will come.

Vans Damn

Man I need Proper Vans! I've heard about it, but this looks better than I could have imagined. HB.

Camera poses

The poses of a photographer. Using the left arm as a monopod, and the other arm to shoot pictures, he has a rad pose. I captured his flash doing it's thing. This dude took pics for the Orange County Register. Guess who he's featuring?!

I captured the flash again. Look at Martin's pose.

Some releases of products and art

Today, Tuesday, Dec 11 at noon PST - Uglycon 2 Skatedecks ltd 200

Today, Tuesday, Dec 11 at 3pm PST - Adrian Tomine Art
http://grny.net/artshow.php

Wednesday, Dec 12 at noon PST - Uglycon 2 Limited Plushes and Artwork
http://gr-sf.com/artshows.php

Thursday, Dec 13 at noon PST - Saelee Oh and Jill Bliss Art
http://gr2.net/artshow.php

Friday, Dec 14 at noon PST - David Choe Skatedecks
here's the link.

Uglycon Times!

Uglycon turned out to be a fun event. But with all things positive comes some Ugly. Here it is in short, family comes early. 23 hours early. It's cold. I believe it gets down to the 40s. We don't think anyone will come any time soon, much less 23 hours early, which is nuts. David Horvath generously gives up his hotel to the first and only family there at the time. This is still an at risk move. What does this mean for the line? It's at your own risk right? They post that they are first on a message board which most likely then brings out a lot of others who decide to line up at night. The family leaves and then comes back in the morning expecting their spot back. I wasn't there so I don't know what really happened. Did the family sleep in their car which was parked in front of the shop? Did they all go to the hotel to crash out? I'm not sure, but it led to a ruckus. Sorry about that, we solved it the best way possible. It's now done, and the costume contest was ridiculously great. The event altogether was great. We learned a lot from last year which was much more crowded, and there's more to learn from this years event. Uglycon is a cool event for sure. I'm very proud of it. Not to be outdone, the GR2 show is amazing. Maybe the best of the year. GRNY. Adrian Tomine, the author of perhaps the graphic novel of the year! See the pics.

The ryde with pics

Ricoh GRs... yeah, they're still fun to play with. He's shooting something at Denny's on the way back. It was fun to ride with Mr Horvath, the 5 is boring, you can easily drown out into drone music or religious talk radio. But we talked the entire way. It was a great way to end Uglycon. Cows, the road, stops, seeing weird land anomalies, and peaceful looking animals. Grand Slam breakfast still works.

I once saw a photo of this. In pen it brilliantly said, PUSH BUTTON, GET BACON. That's magical.

The ride offered up the snow on the 5. It's been ages since I've seen snow. Over the weekend, it came down. The roads were clean, the air was cool, and the sun shined nice in the grapevine. I usually hate driving on the grapevine. It's the worst part of the trip.

The skies are perfect. This actually looks nice. People were pulling over to build snowpeople and to frolic.

Even David had to take a gander at the snow covered mountains.

on the road

Coming back on the 5 now riding with mr Horvath, I wanted to tell you to see the Uglycon pics at the transmissions page! We'll be adding more pics soon. It's also on the giant robot flickr page.

Virgin America

Pretty neat concept. It's supposed to be like the iplane or iairline. Things are white plastic cased everywhere. The check in place has a flat screen set up that works easily. Even the table has the white plastic acrylic vibe going on. Molded plastic is the way to go. Seems simple, right?

That's the gate. It's a nice white table, rounded corners like your ipod or imac, behind the counters, same thing. The check in area has only two monitors. Super simple and sleek.

The seat looks like a goofy pod. Yeah, the entire system was down, and that's bound to happen. They blew it and they knew it.

The only way to fly... I think. We'll see next time.

weekend hat trick art shows!

Did some promo to some masses at hypebeast.

Sawtelle West Los Angeles's Japantown book

I got this book today. It tells the story of Sawtelle from a few people's points of view. That sounds ominous, but it's certainly not the whole story, since I recall Latinos living in the area as well. Gangs? SOTEL13? But as a Japanese American story, it's fun to check out. As a lot of you might know, I like the Sawtelle area. I enjoy it from way back when, I also enjoy it for the changes that are happening today. I'm part of that. GR is part of that. So it's important. Jack Fujimoto, is the fella who put this together, and he's a local "community" person. I recognize him, but never met him. I've seen his photo at the Japanese school I attended way back. He's part of the "old" neighborhood.

This photo is funny, since I was a kid eating the donut on the string. See how far back I go with donuts? I'm not in this pic, but I've played this game when I was little. Maybe that's why I buy a lot of donuts, when I get the chance. I had to eat my donuts on a string, in a hurry, and just one!

Check this dudes out. Who are they? What did they do? Check out their hair styles. That's a pool table they're leaning on. Where was that? It's cool they're fairly young, and all hanging out together. Do people in the area still do this? Where do they do it? What do they do? The "men of Sawtelle" from way back are sort of the folks who built the area up. It's different today, you won't get a solid crew like this. The guy with the smoke in his mouth, he's the Joe Pesci. Starts battles but then pulls out a weapon. The mysterious dude who's partially cut off with the glasses, he's the hitman. Front right is the playboy. The dude on left is the party man. "Hey bro, I just drank 8 Kirins! I'm drunk." Far left standing, the muscle of the group, sizing up how to break drunk guy's neck. Who are the rest of the dudes?

I was having some fun with the book, checking it out, seeing how it leaves GR out completely, as if we didn't help the area, but oh well, but it does include a few folks I do know. The photo above is amazing. Not that amazing to everyone, but for me. The woman with the black hair fourth from left in the front, is my grandmother. Yeah, I guess at 80+ in this photo, she dyed her hair. This photo was a special dinner for folks over 80. I don't know when it was photographed, or by who, or when this happened, but since my grandmother passed away a decade or more ago, it's nice to see her in this book - curing any omissions from the story of Sawtelle for the minute. I guess it's up to "us" to write the next book.

Shaka Lesson

The other day, while watching a Hawaii game and seeing fans do the SHAKA, we tried to imitate it. My mother was doing it and telling me that it made her hand hurt. Her pinky could quite stick out right. Then I started doing it, and realized, I couldn't do it either. See how the pinky sticks out? This hurts and it's not done right.

See how the pinky won't stick up right? It should be sticking out better or up higher. I should be a hand model, right? Cousin Jason who should be the mayor of Waikiki looked alarmed with his plate of New Year's food in front of him. "No. You're doing it wrong! People always think your hands are all tight. You're supposed to do it relaxed, like this." Jason demonstrated it, super loose.

Your hand isn't supposed to close at all, and it's super lazy and loose, as in "hang loose bra". I guess Hawaii is a laid back place. People don't have too many cares in the world, right? Crackseed, poi, and sumo. So a tight SHAKA is completely not necessary.

EASTside

Tons of boxes, this is our storage space. What's in them? Book distro, some back issues, old paper work, receipts, and spiders! The best thing about seeing the spiders is I'll know that my stock is protected from little critters. Gladly, I don't have to go out there too often, but it always feel good to see this spot. The converse is that ideally, it should be empty, which means, it's all in other people's hands.


On the way to or from the space, I stop at SHAKAS. I've been back from Hawaii for a while, but with that clear memory in tact, it's nice to have Hawaiian food in LA. But why is it that Hawaiian food isn't really "hot"? It tastes good, and you'd think it would be more popular that a Yoshinoya Beef bowl, but it's not. How many Hawaiian food besides Islands, can you name? Mochiko chicken, sesame chicken, hulihuli chicken, chili rice, saimin, it's all there. But again, why aren't they more common? Is it too fatty? A lot of Hawaiian food is based on size and quantity, and savory flavors. Is it just weird, since Hawaii is a state with it's own cuisine. As in, "let's go to Nevadan Food!" and it's buffet, or "let's have some Idahoan food!" and it's potatoes. Maybe they need another name besides, "Hawaiian food". What else could it be? "Island food?" Either way, even if it's not popular, I like Hawaiian food and wish I could have it more often. Maybe it'll take Colt Brennan to win the Heisman, and Hawaii to take the Sugar Bowl to make Hawaii just a little more known. Check out this fan site / business. I do hope Hawaii wins the Sugar Bowl on January 1. In lieu of Christmas gifts, that's what I want.

Back to Shaka's. Here's their shave ice. On par with Hawaiian shave ice, since I hear they use the same machine as Matsumoto's - as you saw in some blog photos past. The Hawaiian syrups make this really good. Strawberry and passion fruit are probably among the best flavors.

JANM sketchbook

The coolest thing about the show, which I went to again today to speak to a large group is the sketchbook at the end. There's a book with press which I never noticed, but then at the back of it, is blank pages to write and draw. I took a few pics of them. It's pretty awesome how kids can be so creative on the fly. I don't think I could just bust out a six legged, big eyed character who speaks in alienese. AWsome! AW. I like this Eliseo Gonzalez.

I swear, I'll keep it up. Thanks! I'm sure the museum will do their best too.

Today's talk was with a mix of museum folks, great volunteers, some staffers, ex-curator, and tons of folks who looked like they drove up just to be there. It was a stunning turn out, and I feel at home at the museum. Age range was from elder to younger, and I thought it was important to put people on the same page to know who I am, what I'm into, what the show is about, what GR is, and the fact that I'm a "local" product. I thought it was funny, when museum man, Clement, announced that we donated all 50 issues to the museum. I heard a gasp, like "whoa". Without knowing me, I think they got a good idea of who I am, and what the art means, and why it's important. Although the museum broke records, got more press, bla bla bla, it's still their help that makes the ship run, since I dare not be there every day. We have to be on the same page.

This is a weird one, it's like an anteater dinosaur with a weird growth coming out of it's nose area. The "love it!" is definitely by someone else, but the pic below is amazing.

The butt farter... I like this one for a few reasons. Farting is #1. Enough said. I think. But whoever drew this, I think drew the one that's in the back of GR2. In the "map" of the shop, there's a very similar drawing. I think it's David Magdaleno who did this one as well.

In the end, I think the art works in different ways for different people. Some of it is just cute, there's no other way to put it. Some of the others might be more cerebral. It's great that it's all under one roof. (I sure sound positive today. What's wrong with me?)

romanelli bearbrick

DRx Bearbrick gifted to me by the man. Yeah, small toys, cool design, detailed, all for a travelling exhibition. He also has a different color variant for a BE@RBRICK series. I dig the big scissors on the back. All points and details done well, typical Medicom.

Handling that phone like it's a walkie talkie. I ate the greats shrimp "oyako" donburi. It was quite good. Oyako actually is a chicken and egg dish, but shrimp and eggs are fine with me, but maybe not shrimp eggs.

Stinckers

New Stinckers. We have this machine at GR2, it has the stickers of Steve Weissman, Mats! and... the second from the left, I have no idea who that is. But this is cool. I wish they put in new stickers more often. For some coins, you can get some cool limited designs.

Toy Drive at GRLA

GR2 toy drive. You're in WLA, you have toys you don't want, bring em and throw em in the big box at GR2. No, you can't have what's in there!

Uglycon Deck

200 of these decks were made for Uglycon. Can you name each Uglydoll? The special Ice Bat in the middle is the best. See you up there.

Donutman II

Back, twice in a week. Brickwall making time for holidays means donut time. I don't eat donuts often, but Donutman does it well. When you look at them, you may not think too much of them, but quality ingredients mean more. I feel good about buying donuts from Jim Nakano, he does great work, and his free standing shop is amazing. There are so many donut shops in corner strip malls these days, so it's great to support old school businesses. So what donut would you choose if you saw all of these?

Random days

Random pics, the top, GR2 gets small props in Wallpaper and Los Angeles Magazine. It's amazing how many people see something like this. It could be a few sentences, and more people will see this over big articles elsewhere. Maybe it's because we're in LA. Actually, now that I see this clip, I can't figure out what magazine it came from... That little asterisk looks like Wallpaper, but then again, is it? I have no idea.


Ebisu in Little Tokyo in Little Tokyo. Interesting place, and there were some higher pitched speaking dude there which was interesting. It's relatively new place, but the decor looks sort of old. The chirashi above was well proportioned, and actually pretty good. Usually maguro doesn't rock that well in these, but it wasn't bad at all.

That's what this looks like. The original is a little darker.