Happy New Year!

Settlers of the Tate house...

Game night in Idyllwild, I get the rare joy to visit with people I usually only see online... and look at these beautiful people;
        
                                    The Game;

Pretty Sarah;

John                                                                   &                                               Lisa

I couldn't get any good shots of Josh, but I did get the castle he was building...

Yea, I like these people.

Gross cake

Oh nasty store cake.

People eat you on birthdays...

but then you still look like this three weeks later.

The past in abstract.

Anyone want to guess what I was taking photos of?

Sewing terms

Dear everyone in the world,
I've got a couple of semantic details I'd like to clear up;
There is no way yet invented to fully automate sewing clothing.  This means that absolutely everything that you wear was HAND MADE.

If you have something that was made for you, unless it was made by a member of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture, it is Custom Made, not 'Haute Couture'.

Saying that something is 'Couture' is implying that it is Haute Couture, but the term has been bastardized so much that Websters will now allow the use of 'couture' to mean custom made.

k... that's all, thanks so much.

Love Al'xae

Christmas Music

The one thing I really need... to get through the Christmas season, off tune, insincere "I just made this Christmas album because my agent said I should" crap ... are my headphones. 

This is what I am playing to drown out the Jingle Bells. 




I am enthralled with Gogol Bordello.

San Francisco in the Golden hour.

When the sun sets on a crisp San Francisco day,

it stops to embrace the city as it leaves the world to the night.

The golds and greens of the painted ladies

  embrace the sky in rounded eyes.

Light shimmers into the coming fog as the sun trips into the Pacific.

Plans.

We did Thanksgiving at my place this year! It was so much fun, I had to share our "planning" chart...

Yes, we are a bit crazy.

(sorry words are sparse... Nutcracker and Winter shows have eaten my brains... so BUSY!)

Doctor, I'm thinking about starting a new excercise regime...

Really, just read this.

Just in case you thought your eyes went all crazy, here let me make that last part larger.

(I found this on my tea box.)

Production Values!!!

Dear Everyone;
When you pull the flag, shirt, or curtains out of the box, Please find an iron.  I cannot pay attention to anything you are saying otherwise.

Thanks,
Me

p.s. Yes Mom & Dad, I'm looking at your curtains too... it makes me nuts.

Occupy

I am including this web news clip here because the main stream media is skewing what is going on in the Bay Area, this seems fairly well balanced;


Occupy Berkeley is pretty much a few dozen people camping out downtown, with no threats of police action or evction, I had a chat with a few of the occupiers yesterday.

Occupy San Francisco is (by my estimation) a couple hundred people camped out by the Ferry Building, and the police have been pretty chill about that as well, I haven't stopped there but drive past it on my way to one of my theatre jobs.

Oakland is not burning down.  The police haven't been dealing with the situation very well and there is a group of jerks that every protester I know is trying to figure out how to stop because these miscreants aren't helping the cause, but Oakland is clearly the Occupy to keep your eyes on at the moment.

  The general strike yesterday was huge and peaceful, and the vandalism didn't happen until late at night.  So there you go... it's not as bad as the television says, and it's not just a big drum circle full of hippies, there is the full spectrum representing.  More info as it unfolds, but don't trust the television completely, they are peddling entertainment more than they should.

when good ideas go bad...

Whenever I see something like this it makes me pause to think about how many design meetings went by...

and no-one thought to ask;

"Hey guys, don't you think the disembodied hands lifting kids' shirts and skirts is a little... molest-y?"

(This window wasn't the worst I saw either.)

Um...

Should I be worried about how many fictional history books are included in this search?

40 years...

and my parents still seem to like each other...

At their wedding my Mom wore a sweet empire cut dress with a pink and lace vest (for the reception) and my Pop wore a ruffled powder blue shirt (with extra ruffles) and this swank plaid suit coat (bell bottomed pants were not saved for us posterity)...
Happy Anniversary (a month ago)!

Sunset in San Francisco tonight was like this.

Scents

Idyllwild smells like cedar, pine and vanilla crushed under your feet.
New York City, in the summer smells like thunder and sweat, in the spring it smells like cinnamon.
Berlin has this odd mix of spices I cannot name, but it is oddly savory.
London smelled of wet concrete and brick.
The redwood forest smells like petrichor even when it hasn't been raining.
Monterey smells like salt water, fish, pine, and funnel cakes.

Berkeley must smell like something but I can't tell.  My nostrils refuse to clear. They have shut tight so that I can only detect the strongest of smells through a perpetual allergy induced sense blindness.  This season seems to be worse than ever and frustration is building.

The Best? FIre?

This is my favorite building in my neighborhood... It is the Best? Fire Equipment.

Makes me smile every day.

Returns!

About a week too late to take any photos of my last design of 2011... my Nikon has returned from the repair shop after a two month stay...

and now I wait to be paid enough to get the CPU lens I really want...

... but I am excited anyway and taking pictures of anything that gets in my way!

This time; Do not drop the camera!

"During" (That which comes between Before and After)

When you look at it from the dog's perspective, my housemate and I spent Labor Day doing terrible mean things... First we cleaned out everything and moved all of our stuff into compact Tetris piles... mounds of hidden dog hair were removed.

Carpets were covered in plastic... the whole house smelled of paint...

At least there were awesome people in the house all weekend... I think DeWalt was pretty happy with that.  The only bad thing was that they were helping Adam and I upturn the entire place...


Adam found a wee bit of mold behind his bed.

So... he replaced the wall...


We had grilled shish-kabobs... food was a temporary relief for the hound... but still, this trial was exhausting.

In addition to the fresh paint, my carpenter/welder/accidental designer housemate made a new gate for the front.  We claimed new yard much like the British Empire... I think we need a flag, but the gate is a good start.

I think it might be a bit much for a little in-law apartment but it's rather fantastic and our land-lady (who did pay for the steel) thinks it is beyond awesome...

We steam cleaned the carpets before moving the furniture back into place... a further insult.

Not to worry, DeWalt has forgiven us and the house is mostly back in order. "After" photos should be taken, but I've been so busy I haven't done it yet... it's all a little mundane but I'll put the after shots up later on anyway.

Dear Mr. Sinatra...

This is from a 1946 edition of "Screen Guide" magazine.

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