what happens in vegas....

what happens in vegas normally would stay in vegas, however, not this time. it's going to be posted online for all the world to see. yeah!

i dragged kat on a long drive through the dessert to get to las vegas. she was a trooper. i'm glad she had the sense to say "take a picture" when we were at the rest stop. i've seen the desert so many times it doesn't occur to me that it's picture worthy. she's from a part of CN that you can't walk more than 5 feet and not smack into a tree.



once in vegas, we did what any normal person does, grab a drink and loose some money, not necessarily in that order. i was happy to be able to smoke indoors.



i took kat to see ceaser's palace, then we walked over to the venitian. i'm used to the heat in vegas, but kat didn't seem too thrilled to be walking in 118 degree weather.



of course, we were in vegas for tisha's bachelorette party.



the girls went to chippendales (who knows where the guys went... didn't care to know).





after that we hopped in a limo. can you guess which one is getting married?





we were headed to....



this is where i have to stop, because even though not everything that happens in vegas stays in vegas, some things do.

kat's visit

kitty kat came to visit me a few weeks ago. unfortunately, i had to work, so i didn't get to go out with her during the week. my sis took her out and she seemed to do more in 1 day than i get to do in a week.





kat and i met up with some friends that we haven't seen in a while. this is the first time i've seen shino since just after my high school graduation (some years ago) and the first time i've seen andrea in a year. even when i saw andrea last year it was the first time in about 15 years.



notice the pizookies. aren't they beautiful?

as a side note, andrea used to be a singer back in thailand. very cute. i used to sing along to the songs, they're rather catchy. through shear, dumb luck i found her music videos on youtube (thanks to whoever posted that). i shall now put them here for your viewing pleasure. sorry andrea!

after you check out her videos, check out her jewelry at Stones & Starling.

The Orange County Fair - Say Cheese!

every year there are two fairs that happen around where i live - the Orange County Fair and the Los Angeles County Fair. Every year i try to attend both. I usually go for the food and to pet random farm animals. As you can imagine, there aren't many goats in suburban Los Angeles County. Really though, it's about the food. Fair food is a cuisine in and of itself, like no other. Healthy is not someone you think of when you eat fair food, not even in health conscious southern california.

i ate sausage dogs a foot long covered in peppers and onions that were grilled over the largest bar-b-que pit i've ever seen. yes, that huge cloud of smoke is from the pit.



they grill corn in the husks there too. i don't know what the heck i put on that corn, i grabbed a little of everything, but i'm guessing there was garlic powder, onion powder, lemon/pepper salt, paprika, and of course lots and lots of butter. it was very yummy.



my friend greg works with a rare fruit growers group and they had a stall in the fair so i stopped by to say hi. he's the one in the green tigger shirt on the right.



he was even kind enough to give us a taste of some of the rare fruit like this cherimoya. okay, so, we're asian. cherimoya isn't that rare to us, but it is to other southern californians. yeah, more food.



last but not least is of course the deep fried twinkie covered in powdered suger and chocolate. doesn't that sound like a heart attack waiting to happen. i've seen it at the fair for a long time now, but this is the first year i've actually tried one. it's actually pretty good and not what i imagined. i figured it was going to be this digustingly greasy delight, but it was actually really wonderful. it was a light and crispy on the outside and warm and delicious on the inside. i really recommend trying one once in your life. then, go home and work out for 3 hours to work of the twinkie.





this year was special for me because i entered some pictures into the fair's photography contest. see the picture with the blue ribbon? that's mine.



the the other picture with the blue ribbon? that's mine too.



we saw the petting zoo, got some cotten candy, and checked out the spa displays then went home. all in all, it was a great night.

Amber the Puppy Princess

several months ago krista's cousin found this pink fluff ball. the fluff ball turned out to be a lost puppy that someone had dyed pink. krista couldn't keep the puppy herself, but the puppy found a good home anyway.

these days the pink fluff ball is no longer pink and goes by the name of amber and she is a princess. despite being a little princess, amber was not happy with her crown. i'm not sure if she looks depressed or is really pissed off at us for doing this to her.

she was a little trooper and put up with us for quite some time. hopefully, princess amber will let me shoot her again one day. pet portraits are more fun that i imagined.

Chase's Birthday Party

the family decided to have Chase's 1st birthday party at randy's aunt and uncle's house, the one we all go to for 3rd of july as well as new years.

obviously, with summer comes BBQs and that means hot dogs. i've always had a weakness for hot dogs cooked over an open flame. if it were not for hot dogs, i may have starved to death before my 8th birthday.



chase's parents decided to get one of those water slide/bounce house combos. i could resist! i want one of these for my birthday party!



i'm not sure whose kid this is, i'm never quite sure at these family functions. i've been with randy a number of years now and i still always end up meeting someone i've never met before. he has a big family. anyhow, i really like the picture, so here it is.

3rd of July

every year, la mirada holds a fireworks show at the park on the 3rd of july. randy's family usually gathers at his aunt and uncle's house near the park to watch the show. everyone has a lot of fun spending time with family and the kids love their uncle. i'm not sure how much his back loves how much they love him.



when randy and i went to las vegas we brought back some sparklers, the good kind, not those darn morning glory things that should hardly be considered sparklers at all. claud and i decided to have a little photo fun with sparklers.

pack rat

i am a pack rat. i have so much stuff, it's getting hard to walk around my room, and the back yard, and the other room. i get sentimentally attached to everything. eeek.

Walkin' in LA

down the street from a place "gallery buddy" took me to is a used furniture shop called nick metropolis.



i stumbled around the place a few years ago, and lately have just been driving past it. so, i dragged gallery buddy to it. there is so much cool stuff in there. i wanted to buy so many things, but i wouldn't have a place to put it. maybe when i get a warehouse or something.

the reviews about the place online say that nick is con artist who doesn't pay the people he gets stuff from on consignment, so i'm torn. do i want to deal with a guy who screws people over? that's messed up, but the furniture is so cute!

Bees and Meat

my gallery buddy took me to see bees and meat at ace gallery in los angeles. lauren bon's new work is something difficult to describe and excellent when experienced. yes, i said experienced. this is not one of those exhibits you go to look at the pieces and try to figure out the deeper meaning or artist's intent, it's just bizar and fabulous.

i didn't even bother trying to find the meaning behind the different pieces, they were just weird and wonderful, even better when you can go with a friend and just laugh at how insane this stuff is.

i thought the stuff jerry did was weird.

where do i begin? how about the random piece of transplanted earth? this just amuses me because it's grass and it's "art".



hmmm, how about the dried lamb carcass fountain? i'm really not sure what the ooze dripping from the carcass was. i'm not sure i want to know. interestingly, it didn't smell bad.





when i first walked in, i saw a pile of irrigation stipping on the ground. it's another one of those things i was amused at because it's art. really, it's all about context. had it been me doing this and not lauren bon, this would just be crap and my teachers would just wonder what i'm trying to bullshit into art. very duchamp. me likes.



next stop, large room filled with 21 cornstalk bales shaped like hives standing 9' tall. it was just neat being in there.



walking down the hall, we came upon this seemingly random gold animal head hanging from a rope and pulley. my first thought was that it was some sort of dinosaur head, but it's supposed to be bronze casting of the lamb's head she stuffed the bee hive into (long story).



somewhere in there was a room full of totems. did i know what they were at the time? no. it looked like old planks of wood with mattress stuffing tied to it. yes, it too is art.



the chandeliers room was very cool. frankly, it was a bunch of honey jars tied on twine with lights. you had to be there. much more impressive in person.





oh! oh! and then there were the scary light bulb rooms (actually a series of 6 rooms with dim light bulbs suspended from the ceiling and the artist uttering 1000 fears from little children in a eerie voice). creepy. i wouldn't go in alone (chicken), i made gallery buddy go in with me. he laughed at me. he usually laughs at me.



did i mention the 24-hour, streaming audio of living bees in the gallery? the "library of honey? the desk dipped in tar? the floor to ceiling sized photos?

i wanted to see the corn room but the guy from the gallery said it was closed because they had "a little infestation". i wouldn't have cared, it still would have been cool to see. so what if little critters would be jumping all over my legs. i wonder how they got the 33,000 pounds of corn in there. who was carrying that up to the gallery?

if bees and meat is ever shown anywhere else, it's a must see.

One Orange Balloon

a while back, i went out with some friends to help light paint a giant orange balloon at el toro, a marine corps air station decommissioned in 1999 in irvine, CA. the base is being developed as a residential and commercial area as well as a great park. the balloon is the first major attraction of the orange county great park and is free to ride. you can soar from 250 - 400 feet into the air to get a bird's eye view of the air station's transformation into the great park.



these friends, members of the legacy project, are the same ones behind the great picture, the world's largest contiguous photograph.



the guys are a hoot to be with and i look forward to any time i can tag along and help them work.





there is a semi usual crew that helps out with these wild endeavors. of course, everyone is put to work.





you'll have to wait to see the results of the light painting. i can't wait to see it too.

as a side note, el toro translates to "the bull" and since it's an air station, the insignia is a flying bull. the insignia was designed by walt disney studios. isn't that just so california?

Orange County Fair

this year, i finally entered some pictures in the contest at the OC Fair. i got all three in! yeah!