Downtown LA Artwalk

New thing of the day, went to the Downtown LA Artwalk.

This was something I've been wanting to do for ages, and since I had the free time, decided to go down with a friend who's been a ton of times. It was crowded and a good kind of chaotic. Got really good vibes from everyone and it was just a lot of fun to people watch, see art, see life, hear music and be in the middle of things. Tons of smells and sounds wafting in the air. There were food trucks, wine in galleries, interesting and bland art pieces, great architecture and just lots of life all around. I loved it! It's such a different and nice feeling. Apparently not all the galleries were open so we didn't see a whole lot. Spent a good amount of time there and wore out the feet a bit.

My only advice, bring a small purse or crossbody purse as it's crazy crowded and you bump into people often. Also wear closed toed comfy shoes. Although it's a total scene for fashion, we saw a lot of trash, needles and crap on the floors, not to mention your feet might get stepped on. There's a lot of walking on your feet stuff so be ready for that. It's also really crowded.

Loved the architecture. A lot of the galleries were in random buildings downtown you would never go into if not for the artwalk. There were old banks and vaults where exhibits were showing. Some apartment lobbies were galleries along with residents walking through the lobbies as well. Others were real galleries and shops and such. Anywhere there was wall space it was open game for a gallery showing. I saw some really neat art inside a cafe. Some galleries had music playing. The architecture and home for a lot of the galleries was a feast for the eyes as well.

Such a feast for the eyes. Even the fashion was fun to see. I love watching people and this was a really interesting place to people watch. Crazy and cool fashion. Lots of hipsters, youngsters, fashion forward and fashion crazy and fashion cool. I felt an artistic esprit de corp among everyone. It was crowded, but not annoying. Gotta move fast though and know how to move in crowds.

Loved the art. I just love free expression and creativity. I got annoyed when I saw people taking photos of the art, but then again I've done it before but I try to respect the artist's work and copyright and all. One neat thing I saw was you can easily exhibit your own work fairly easily as the sign below demonstrates. Some of the art was affordable $10 prints, and others were completely unaffordable. It was inspiring to see all the art.

 

The nightlife was crowded and the chaos was interesting. I really enjoyed it and will be going back. Next time we might try some truck food or sit at a cafe or restaurant and do more people watching rather than walking. Although the art is hard to resist and is the real draw to this event. 

Eggs & Things & Thor

New thing of the day, Eggs & Things & Thor.

So for some weird reason we were up early, naturally. I was up around 7am and husband at 7:30am. We planned to see Thor at the first showing 10am, so decided to take advantage of our early up to try Eggs & Things - a place that always looks packed but since we were early we had hope.

Showed up to the restaurant at 8:10am, and it was full. There were about 6 people waiting outside so we had a back-up plan to go somewhere else if it was more than a 30 minute wait. We walked in and a waitress looked at us, asked "two?" and then got us at a table/seat. We were sitting down within 1 minute of walking in the door. Pretty cool for a packed house.

Apparently they were sitting the couples as a lot of families were waiting for 4+ seats. Service was super fast and super attentive and friendly. The place was packed and popular. They had one family getting up, table cleaned and a new family sitting down within maybe 3 minutes. Pretty amazing. Even with that they still paid attention and had great service.

We got crepes as an appetizer - amazingly delicious. Husband got a pork omelette, biscuits and hash browns. I got a California scramble over english muffin with hollandaise and fruit. Sorry no pics :( Am just getting back into the blogging. All of it was fresh, highest quality ingredients and delish! We got our check fairly quick, but it didn't feel like they were shooing us to hurry up and get out. We paid quick as there were a lot of people waiting. By the time we left, 8:50am, there were maybe 30 people waiting outside, and 10 or so inside for  table. Incredible how packed and big the place was. 9am and the place was hopping?

Then off to watch Thor. We were the first ones in the theater. I liked the movie but didn't think it was great. Liked the characters and drama between Thor, Loki and his father. I thought Asgard was awesome amazing but it definitely felt like a green screen movie. The setting of New Mexico was a bit blah but loved Natalie Portman even though I wasn't oozing over Thor. I really liked how they developed Loki's character and the development of Thor as well. The movie was missing something though. Not sure what it was, but it was missing something. Maybe a bit of soul? Felt very much produced, blockbuster superhero movie. Thor was a tough character to work, and I think they did a good job, just was missing that certain je ne sais quoi.

Overall it was a new thing day :) Eggs and Things we will go back. Thor, husband will probably get the movie like all the other comic book ones.

My Spirit Animal - The Crow

New thing of the day, found out what my spirit animal was. We were joking around with the topic of spirit animals after I told my coworker/friend his spirit animal was a crab. I claimed my spirit animal as a swan or platypus. I predicted another person would be a bear or monkey. So we decided to see if there was some kind of real spirit animal determinator online. Went to the almighty Google and typed in "Find your spirit animal". Came across the the Jeri Smith-Ready website with a spirit animal quiz. 

Turns out I'm a crow, which is kind of neat as in summer camp counselor nickname was "Raven" and it was one of the most fun summers I ever had. Plus I like how crows are black, they fly and are intelligent. They're a bit scary and sound horrible though, so I guess the terrible singing is a similar trait. Time to tap into the power of my spirit animal!

Anyway I should probably watch that move The Crow as I heard it's quite good. Read some Edgar Allen Poe - Nevermore!

Crow

Powers: foreseeing death, communicating with the dead, resurrection

As a Crow, you are analytical, adaptable, and exceedingly clever. You like solving problems, sharing a hearty laugh with friends, and most of all, enjoying a good meal. Your inquisitive, philosophical nature leads you to constantly question authority and the status quo, sometimes just for the sake of asking, "Why?"

LA Times Festival of Books 2011

New thing of the day, went to the LA Times Festival of Books! 

Been dying to go since I heard about this, although every single year it's on a weekend that we're busy or unavailable. This year I'm studying for finals, plus we helped a friend move and had a birthday party, so I wasn't sure we'd make it. I was very good in studying yesterday Saturday, so felt confident we could spare half a day on Sunday to go to the Festival. Also as another excuse, as a library student, I felt it was part of my duty to go to book events. 

It was a lot of fun and 10am-2pm was the perfect amount of time to spend there. We wanted to get there early at opening, so drove down through traffic to get to USC by 10am. Then wandered around the multiple stalls, booths, author signings and other venues.

Highlights

Free Stuff

Free ice cream from Ben and Jerry's, along with free iced coffee sponsored by McDonalds. Such a great way to start the morning. Although we didn't get ice cream, my mom and sister got in line two or three times for the good stuff. We also got free tote bags, laundry detergent, poetry books, frisbees and other goodies. 

We got a copy of Make magazine. It's a neat book on DIY projects that are incredibly creative. Our issue cover shows how to create a cigar box into an electric guitar. It's a bit techy and hip, and we'll have to see what other articles they have but the website and issue look really interesting.

Another great freebie was from the LA Museum organization. I got a flyer listing all the free days at the local LA museums. We also got some coupons for the Skirball Cultural Center's Houdini & Magician Exhibit which is on the list of things to do this summer. 

Celebrities, authors and illustrators

Our morning started out pretty awesome. As we were walking the husband was "Hey there's Patton Oswalt". In case you didn't know him, he's the voice of Remy in Ratatouille, but also a more famous comedian and actor. I was like "Oh what stage is he on?" and the husband was like "No he's right there". Standing in front of us less than 5 feet away was Patton. He looked a bit lost and was making a phone call. The husband is big into comedy and I was like "Want a photo?", but he didn't want to bug Patton. Then a few other people recognized him, asked for his photo, and he was obliging. So the husband and I went over and I snapped a photo of the two of them. Patton was super nice about it all. We also watched a bit of him on stage promoting his new book. Funny guy :)

We saw R.L. Stine of Goosebumps signing autographs. The line wasn't too long so if we were fans we could have waited 20 minutes, but decided not to.  We also saw one of the creators of the Archie comic signing stuff. There were a lot of lesser known authors giving away free copies of their books for recognition, as well as signing and promoting their work. 

Books

My favorite free book copy, and I think the greatest treasure was a copy of the Al-Qur'an below. We saw an interfaith Islam society booth with a sign saying "Free Qurans". My sister and I were curious and interested. The guy handing out the books told us a bit about the Quran itself and it's place in the religion and the teachings it presents. He also gave us a CD of the recitation of the Quran. One of them explained that the book was meant to be heard, to be read out loud. He said that it's kind of an oral tradition and if it's always heard, it's ok, but if only the book survives and no one reads it out loud, they're at a loss. So he read a line or two, and it's very musical and melodic. The guys in the booth were really cool. There was a sense of peace about them, and a sense of wanting to share. It was very much an interfaith and peace mission by the group. There was absolutely no tone of trying to convert or degrade other religions. It wasn't a scientology attempt to join or take the book literally. It was almost like this is our holy book and our culture and we want to share the goodness of it. Islamic faith needs the PR in America unfortunately, so we enjoyed the chat and the book. The booth was hosted by the Why Islam group. Sister and I are both into studying world religions, so we found it interesting and I am curious about what it has to say. It can go along with my reading of Arabian Nights :) 

My absolute favorite booth though, was the Philippine Expressions Bookshop. It took up two booth spaces and was all books on Filipino stuff. They had kids books, language study, culture and history, fiction, and lots of other good stuff. They had a book I'd read years ago, When Elephants Dance. It's a fiction book based on the experiences of the Filipinos during WWII. The beginning quote from the book was "When elephants dance, the chickens must be careful" (Tess Uriza Holthe). I was hooked and the book had some vivid and striking images about what happened to Filipinos and Manila during that time. I forgot about it and was pleasantly reminded of it. I'll need to dig it out and make sure I don't give that one away. Perhaps re-read it. 

I really wanted to get a Filipino cookbook but wasn't sure which one. This one book caught my eye and I had to have it. Filipino Ghost Stories! I totally wanted to support the store and give over more of my money, but decided to be prudent. Plus carrying around a lot of books during the festival got pretty tiring. 

In conclusion, we really enjoyed our half day at the festival. It was sunny and I'm sure I have a sunburn. I got tired in the end and should get and wear some better walking sandals. Overall though it was lovely watching people passionate about reading, sharing books and ideas. We'll be going as many times as we get the chance. 

Map of USC Festival of Books 2011

Mustache Animals

One of my coworkers/friends had a birthday recently. He was gone for his birthday and he always likes to draw mustaches on things. So I had a Planet Earth daily animal calendar that at times he likes to draw mustaches on. So I saved all the days, cut off the dates, and took a bunch, drew mustaches, and peppered his cube with animals with mustaches. He came back to this - and I think he liked it. LOL :)

My Calendar

Monitor

Phone

Cabinet

Cabinet

Modern Cubicle Art

I'm back :) Took a bit of a break but I'm ready to start-up again. Not necessarily daily, but every so often.

New thing of the day, made my first modern art piece in my cubicle. This was Desktop Aquarium that I decided to dry and clean out. Leaving water in there made it a bit stale and icky, so after cleaning and drying, decided to play with it a bit. 

I call this piece "Fish Out of Water",

as a statement on artificial life 

and living outside the box.

Chili Spaghetti, an Evite and Cracked Pots

New thing of the day (3) - had spaghetti noodles with chili, sent out our first Evite, and made a New Year's Resolution.

First off, the New Year's resolution. I'm not a fan of New Year's resolutions because I think you should make resolutions all year, not just New Year's, but I suppose a New Year is a good place to start. Anyway - in reflecting, I realize I'm a bit of a perfectionist. I often do NOT try or do things, for fear of failure. This seems weird, but it's true. I don't like to try new recipes until I've seen someone do it and feel I could do it deliciously. I'm very hard on myself in general things and don't want to try if I don't think I can do it awesomely. I resist things, because I'm afraid of not being amazing at them.

Anyway - so I sorta made a resolution, to be imperfect. My goal in 2011, which won't be difficult, is to fail over and over again. To be imperfect. To embrace the flaws and in a spiritual sense, give up perfection. I think my husband told me of some architect or artist, who purposefully creates flaws in their work, because they believe only God is perfect and to create flaws to honor that. I sorta like the fable of the cracked pot - get it? :) At the bottom of the blog is one version of the story. Anyway, I just think I really need to try harder to be imperfect. To fail, to try, to go, to fail and maybe get it right once in awhile. Don't know. I'll let you know how this imperfection style goes.

Ok so next new thing - had some leftover chili. An Italian coworker gave me some pasta noodles from his house and as he said "he was sick of pasta". So decided to combine the two into chili spaghetti. It's not such a stretch since chili is somewhat tomato based. Turned out DELISH! Yum Yum :) The spaghetti was the perfect texture al dente too - so I just heat the chili and added the cold spaghetti. Yum! :) 

Another new thing, decided to finally host a house party. First one. ACK! We've delayed having one because I didn't feel the house was ready, but also, because I'm shy about hosting one. Truthfully it's a little terrifying. I have very high expectations of what a great party should be, and I want my house and party to be great. Unfortunately we don't have a great house, we have a good one, and I'm hoping we all have enough room and people have fun. Truthfully most house parties we've gone to - it wasn't the house that made it awesome, but the people. So I'm hoping that's what works at our place. Plus the food, music, guests, etc. I don't know. I'm very nervous, but I hope we do OK. We scheduled it later in the month since we'll be busy with travels, family and school. Oddly enough, I dreaded scheduling or setting a date for a party, but once I did, I was looking forward to hosting and getting ready for it. I hope it's big enough or nice enough for people. I'm not really sure if it is, but we'll take the chance. If it bombs, well, here's to imperfection!

Anyway - here's that story :) Cheers :) And Happy New Year!

The Cracked Pot -- a Chinese Fable

A water bearer in China had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which he carried across his neck. One pot had a crack in it, while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water. At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.

For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water to his house. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After 2 years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream:
"I am ashamed of myself, because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house." The bearer said to the pot, "Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side?

"That's because I have always known about your flaw, and I planted flower seeds on your side of the path. Every day while we walk back, you've watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house."

Moral: We're a bunch of cracked pots. Each of us has our own unique flaws. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding. You've just got to take each person for what they are, and look for the good in them.