Brunch with Bots
This might be boring to some of you (and the same can be said of my vacation pictures…) but I had brunch with a bunch of Bots yesterday. A generation of GR Lounge members glossed themselves that, became tight through actual meetings, and even manage stay in touch. Sometimes they'd meet on Sawtelle, but more often their business has nothing to do with the magazine, shops, or site. They're totally autonomous. Above, Eloise and I are bookended by Wonki Wonki, his sister, and Aaron. (I'll use their screen names.) The beloved Wonki was in town this weekend from San Francisco, prompting the meetup that I was privileged to crash! You might recall his travel story about doing scientific research on the South Pole. Aaron has helped construct various aspecis of various iterations of the GR website. Eventually, he married another Bot, ja.net, photographer, filmmaker, and student of too many things to count (below)…
That's their daughter in between. Cutie! Below in stripes is Charlos, who used to contribute to the cars and Dodgers threads quite a bit and would show up at art shows on his motorcycle. I haven't seen him in a while. Yes, he is married and has a little girl, too. Nice. No, they didn't ride up on a cycle with a sidecart. I haven't seen him in ages!
Wendy and Eloise decide what to order. Eloise decides to get the excellent sweet potato pancakes and let me eat them for her.
After brunch at Canele (which was amazing), Wendy and I crossed the street to buy some produce and local honey at the Atwater Farmer's Market. There, we ran into GR's old ad dude/lifetime family member/Drunken Master, zine maestro, and printmaker, Kiyoshi. He's the one who used to kick my ass every issue, and I miss that. So great to run into him.
Did I mention that we spent time with another GR Bot the night before? We used to see Shammy at GR2 art show openings now and then (or Pogues concerts) and she came to town for the Theo Ellsworth's art opening. Here she is afterward at Beard Papa with my brother Greg (and GR contributor) as well as budding artist Saoirse Wong. All the way from San Diego!
I'm name-dropping people who aren't usually name-dropped, and maybe that's the point. While the GR mag and site features a lot of semi-famous artists, musicians, and filmmakers, we've also built up a real community of family and friends. Sometimes it's easy to lose sight of that while cranking in front of the computer monitor all day, and this weekend was an awesome reminder of a something special that's evolved outside the pages, walls, and sites of GR…