Giant Robot Store and GR2 News
The best day at Safe N Save Market on Sawtelle. Dec 31st. It’s the busiest day of the year there, I think, and it’s when all the troops are working. Gregs gets the bags ready, it’s a tough task, since those things are heavy. His greaser style hair sans hairnet is in place. The chops are groomed. He’s ready for the old ladies who are cooking up a storm. Two pieces of mochi and the orange head. This is a plastic coated version. Strange how this is something people buy. Inside there’s mochi, and you eat that later for good luck. Mochi is important for New Years. Just don’t choke on it, people do this annually in Japan. I feel bad for the families who served up the mochi in the soup. A lot of mochi is gone! Sold to families in the area. I bet each family will have a nice day. Let’s hope for that. So much fish goes out for sashimi, they can’t slice it for you. But “hint” get a knife and slice it. It’s not that tough. That’s how busy it is at the S & S on New Years Eve. I told you in the best day of the year there.
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The new year is here, a lot happened in 2006 within the GR world. Here’s a few highlights. If you read GR over time, and you’ll know what we’ve been up to. 1) Award at JANM. GR wins an award for being a “visionary in the arts” – something like that. JANM is the Japanese American National Museum.2) Madrid. I went there in Feb to be on a panel discussion on art at ARCO.3) GR helped the Imprint conference, and we even had a sneaker panel that was pretty cool.4) GR goes bimonthly. 6 a year starting in 06.5) I judged at Takashi Murakami’s Geisai art fair. Fun and more.6) I went around the world From tokyo, HK to england (for the Spank the Monkey art show).7) We spoke at Harvard, Walker art museum, and Irvine! There were others, but I can’t remember right now…8) I showed in two art shows, at GRSF (haha)9) Met a lot of great folks and got to see others thru GR. Shepard F, Carlo McCormick, Dzine, Mr Murakami, Ai and Shingo, Dan Wu, Cut & Paste folks, Hiroshi Fujiwara, Jeff Staple, Michael Lau, Towa, Ryan McGinness, John Jay, Everyone who showed art at GR stores, Ashy, Kohei, Taroshooten, Cube, Ray Fong, Nao Harada, Edward Templeton, Gargamel, Kaws, and so many others.10) I curated an art show in upstate NY. St. Lawrence University. There were many other highlights in 2006. This list could probably be 10 entries longer. I think I went to GRNY 6 times, and GRSF 6 times and took a lot of other flights. It’s nice to be back at home for a while. We built a lot in 06 to hopefully set more up for 07. Other than that, all I ask is for people to be fair and decent.
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Don’t buy a new car, ever. Did you know buying a car is like talking to a guy like Borat. The guy will say whatever he needs to so you can pull out your wallet and buy a car. Some of it won’t make any sense, and you’ll be scratching your head. Also a lot of dealerships have the sleasiest sales people, don’t get one of them. Be ready to leave! 1) Did you know buying a car averages 4 hours, it can take 6 or more!? Why not just 1 or 2 hours? It’s a long process.2) If you want a certain car, it can take months, so you might be stuck with one that has extra features that you have to pay extra for.3) It’s possible you won’t get what you want, so you’ll have to settle for something else. Different color outside, inside, etc.4) the car negotiation process is a drag. It’s the most ridiculous song and dance ever. It’s goofy, you volley prices across a table. It’s as dumb as can be. It’s hard to keep a straight face in this, but I guess the way to do it, is to walk away and see if they chase you. It never gets regular, it’s completely surreal. If you want to laugh go for it. Who cares, right?5) Know what you’re doing before you walk in. Figure out how much the car costs, figure out how much you want to spend, and how much you want to try and lower the price. Who knows where this info is, but in the end, it’s all a terrible experience. Just try and get money off. Start ridiculous and then see if it works.6) Be ready to be hungry and eat food. If you’re there for 6 hours you’ll get hungry. Use it to your advantage. “Let me think about it while eating food.” See ya. Maybe that’ll help.7) Bring a negotiator. Want a deal? Bring someone who can do this. It’s worth bribing someone for this help. It’s unfortunate, that it takes a special person to help buy a car with the best deal. What happens to the folks are great, honest, but can’t negotiate like a swap meet seller?8) Be greedy. If you can do it, be a dick. I guess in the end, they expect that, and they’re on commission! Do the best you can. It’s a terrible process. The commssion supposedly happens after a phone call comes. You supposedly will get a call asking you about your experience at the dealership. Two people very sternly lectured me and told me, I must say, “extremely satisfied” to ALL of the questions. I felt like I was acosted to say that answer to everything. They even asked me, “will you do this?” I answered with, “It depends on which questions they ask.” Fair right? But they didn’t like my response, and drove the point harder and harder and even said, “call us first. Or hang up” before I...
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Little Sunday Driver This is the size of a Hot Wheel. It’s Sculpy and will drive for a long time. The idea with Sculpy is to try and not make it look like something you can buy from Hallmark for $5. This dude is wearing ear muffs, a pink tie, white shirt, weird car with faces on both sides, and a crazy hat that’s part Rege, Woodring, and Moebius. Try Sculpey sometime. SxK.
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Dave Choe is a ham, watch him play video with a high school band. Dave’s career is experiencing good things right now, and if you’re in NYC, go see him on Saturday, January 6th, 7pm-9pm at the Jonathan LeVine Gallery_529 W. 20th Street, 9E_New York, NY 10011. It’ll be a solo show.
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