There is a special place in my gut’s heart, though, for the producers of cheap and great food: taco trucks.

Cue your drool glands.

The burrito is much better thought out than the sandwich. Drippy drippy messy slimy slid-y un-reheat-able and generally difficult (unless you’re eating grilled cheese or cucumber tea sandwiches), they’re a failure of an invention.

The burrito, on the other hand: the flour tortilla (a delicious snack on it’s own, heated or cold) seals the flavor of the delicious rice-cheese-bean-vegetable mix. The guacamole and sour cream just add to the mouthwatering delight of an amazing culinary crusade: all next to the endearing truck itself, where this glorious foil-wrapped happiness was conceived. Who needs Chipotle, where you’re guaranteed to have to engage with the same combination of flavors (whether or not you get chicken, beef, or pork) washed down with Coke.

No. You are too good for Chipotle. Treat yourself right, and have a rancho burrito swilled down with a mango Jarrito– or, if you happen to go wild with hot salsa, some horchata to quell and sooth the pleasurable pain.

http://www.lostacotrucks.com/seattle/

http://www.lostacotrucks.com/seattle/

http://www.lostacotrucks.com/seattle/

down with chipotle!

Graceee

“They have the worst timing too, ya know? if you know, you’re waking up and like, you’re like, doing your early morning jack-off session, they come and like, f*ckin’ like, tell you’re ass to get out and you got your hand on your dick and you’re like, hey man, ya know?”

It’s almost poetic

Graceee

It was half-off. Maybe I should name it. Dandy Bill. We found cats on craigslist that was named WINSTON DOUGLAS PAUL. His brother’s name was Norman Darnell. Incredible. Incredible.

We had to name a a kitty today…

(Isn’t it cute? Does it not make you want to die surrounded by a — a gaggle of kittens?)

Settled on Nimby the Cloud; Sarah’s favorite children’s book about a Cloud who finds an island friend whom with he can “be himself”…

So what’s some fall fashions, kitty-kat?

The rush of fall into winter is too quick… the drudge of winter, too long. I guess it will be a great inspiration to be travelling during December; I don’t remember doing that ever. Studying abroad doesn’t count. It’ll keep me going, keep me… inspired.

Leaves, everywhere!

We went to the SAM for November’s First Thursday…

Saw amazing Native American and aboriginal art. One popular one featured simple white paint strokes on black, somehow manifested an illustration of movement, or wind:

Found Bill Murray looking quite trite on an ancient Roman fresco:

Us in the China room. But man are we finer than china (ha. Ha!)

An artistic celebration for the Day of the Dead at Bagle haus:

And it’s usually around this time of year, when my hair is growing as long as the nights, that I need a trimmin’…

Not enough time for everything I want/love/need to do!

Graceee

via definitivetouch.everyguyed.com

via definitivetouch.everyguyed.com

via definitivetouch.everyguyed.com

But this is not that unfamiliar territory. Seattle’s famous Gasworks Park celebrates the industrial aesthetic; not only is there a fantastic view of the water, the cityscape of downtown Seattle is framed by the I-5 to the east and picturesque hills and waterfront neighborhoods to the west.

via seattletravel.com

Graceee

via marcjohns.com

‘Tis the season. Today we were driving on the 405 when a huge puddle in the next lane hit our windshield, and we freaked.

How *do* we stand to be so gloomy so often? The obstructive rain is really what bothers me; dry grey skies have a gorgeous place in my heart. This morning I couldn’t get out of bed. This wasn’t because I took some heavy relaxants before bed, although that might have helped, but because I couldn’t imagine anywhere else I’d rather be than under my five blankets piled above me (a insular womb, a warm escape from the fluorescence of bright overcast morning light…). I wake up at 10, 11-ish and daydream in my blankets til one.

That’s a lie. I remember peeling myself off the bed and feebly making coffee while pulling up my new favorite sweats (garish purple knits) which tend to fall off my butt.

Anyway: got excited about sci-fi today. My friend just got Speaker for the Dead, sequel to Ender’s Game, which I only read this summer and freaked out over. I mean, I don’t read Isaac Asimov or Ron Hubbard or anything, (did you know Hubbard’s first name is Lafayette? How ex-tra-vagant!), and I have yet to delve into the world of Dune, but from what I’ve read, sci-fi knocks my socks off. Split Infinity by Piers Anthony, for example, mixes that with fantasy and creates one of my favorite cheesy adventures and epic battles between humans and unicorns, robots and serfs, serfs and Citizens… sorta puts your own life on a swivel chair of perspective.

So what should one do on a rainy day?

Bundle up in waterproof boots,  jacket, and trusty umbrella and go window shopping;

Read science fiction novels curled up in a comfy chair;

Collage a mood board,

Buy a pack of googly eyes and super glue them to every single pair of underwear in your roommate’s drawers;

Make a gingerbread house (it doesn’t have to be a once-per-year occurrence);

Practice your Naomi Campbell walk;

Make postcards to send to friends just because they’re your friends;

Buy a huge canvas and Pollock the shit out of it;

Alphabetize your library of books;

Take an electronic appliance apart and put it back together;

Frame family photos and make a life-size family tree on your living room wall;

Host a tea party;

Make creme brulee, since it takes forever;

Download episodes of Seinfeld;

Be an extreme nerd and snatch screenshots of ridiculous parts of movies;

Get intoxicated and watch television on mute while you blast something appropriately in appropriate, like Disturbed “Down With the Sickness”.

Practice free-style rapping;

Compose a ballad about your one love that got away and broke your heart on the elementary school playground;

Try to make yourself cry on cue;

Write a short screenplay about your life, if you think it’s that ridiculous.

Put on all the embarrassing clothes you own and parade around the house embracing your frumpiness.

Not to say that my agenda consists of these activities. Yet.

Graceee

The road trip lasted an entire week. I jumped on a delayed train down to Portland, land of breweries and friendly, terrible drivers, to meet up with Cara. The train ride was peaceful, quiet, whispers and crackling of chips and seran-wrapped sandwiches narrated sea-side sceneries, stoic farmlands and grey skies…

Skedaddled outta Portland around evening time, then embarked through Grant’s Pass to the coastal 101. Although, the Northwest was in a frenzy of fog and buckets of rain all the way to Crescent City, where we had a slight problem with a gashed tire– but thank the forest rangers! that Wayne was there to save us in his big, sea-foam truck.

Travelling down the 101 was an uneasy epic, slight hydroplaning while the 101 winded and grinded us with curving cliff sides shrouded in fog and exhaling rain; could’ve been worse! we thought as we peered at the cautiously groaning swaying of RV’s and boats trailing Winnebagos trailing trucks. Gorgeous blobs of rock amongst fog; a glimpse of a lagoon, we also spotted magnificent herds of elk grazing. Weaving under the grandeur of red-wood growth, we visited Mr. Paul Bunyan and his Babe, the native american museum, tunneling under the Chandelier tree, whizzing past the kitschy gift stores and quirks of rural-ity (Confusion Hill, anyone? One-log-house?), sometimes swamped by loud stampedes of motorcycle gangs, with their beards and flapping jackets sucking through the wind in an unending gasp of downhill stretches towards and over gorges, valleys, lakes, rivers. Snickering at conspicuous political signs (John Pinches– Cara: “his secretaries?”) and silently gazing at a field of hippies and smelly dreads at the Earthdance roaming road sides, forlornly awaiting the kindness of a stranger given but not deserved.

At that point, we could see the break in the heavy clouds, where the skies were blue and tender with sunlight; finally! after two days of constant glum, by the time we drove out from under them it was nightfall, and dinner-time at KFC was scarfed down without a word. We drove across highway 20 to sneak down the I-5 and save some time, but the 80 miles until then were ominous with dark nightfall and tension as our imagination drew scenarios of smashing into elk or the white truck that had caught up with us since KFC… dissipated slightly with an endless mix of guiltily trashy songs, fond mainstream hits with their silly explicit sexual yearnings fronted with fat beats. Subtle glitter of an expansive lake under moon and starlight gave way to a stretch of farmland, odorous fumes of sour, rotten fruit, and just about the time we neared I-5 a hare almost dies under our newly insuranced front right wheel.

A skip and a hop, up to 3 or 4 hours later, a tired entry into Holiday Inn Express: Westley, the morning breakfast of plastic eggs and watered-down coffee followed by an emergency trip to McDonalds, and we’re driving under the golden sun amongst the golden hills, spotting little dust devils and hot fields– through the San Joaquin Valley to the Fort Tejon State Park, through Pyramid Lake (“Is that faux-pyramid really necessary?”), before we knew it Los Angeles had arrived under our very tires.

And we are lucky enough to have a good friend in this sunny, hot city, who immediately hi-jacked our thoughtlessly boring plan of bearing straight to Anaheim and introduced us once more to real food– Korean wonton soup, beef bowls, purple rice, kim chi…

And the excitement of a real flea-market-swap-meet! Free of the Northwest curse of rainbow knits! Thick with aesthetic pleasures and indulgences, vintage this-and-that, a tiny dress wearing a dog, art, patterns, fresh graphics…

…followed by an evening in and near Korea-town, where she resides. Neon lights, crazy font, and towering palm trees lining streets and dimpling the sky…

…joining some natives for a going-away party; a boy leaving to teach English in Rio– another in glasses, a  hip haircut, and knit turtleneck, the other with a freshly groomed, thick mustache on young baby face. Bad jokes about Morpheus’s daughter, pornography, Star Wars…

…ending the night with a trip to Yogurtland!

Thus concludes part 1.

Graceee

Walking down Elliott, the daunting line into Olympic Sculpture Park stretched for blocks and was thick six people wide. The Chan bros. and me decided to skip the line and walk to the northern entrance, across the train-tracks next to the silos.

Elliott was lined with little camper vans, havens blacked- out by makeshift curtains clenched in the window cracks and historic buildup of stickers. Dogs everywhere; pit bulls, puppies, bulldogs, dirty-mouthed children with elephant ears squeezed between their fat fingers and tender gums, their face powdered with jam and sugar. There was a boat docked under the silo arm that reached above the sea; not a boat, a ship– and it echoed whatever reggae music bumped at the stage decorated with a huge sculpture of a blunt (someone went “Dude, I swear that boat is playing music”). Tye-dye shirts, being worn, being sold (“I live off tye dye, man”), celebrated with leis of pot leaves twisted into bushel-like bracelets or waving lazily around slightly sweaty necks.

The sidewalk constantly thick with people and movement, of turning heads and the pulsing rhythm of festival life– but the atmosphere is relaxed; people don’t mind the bustle as much; most people are looking for semi-covert areas to smoke the pack of joints they rolled on the way over, looking for their hook-ups, their friends who promised them a good time; perhaps make some new friends in order to have a good time.

There are some who have too much of a good time; we passed a boy that looked sheet-white and stood stock still as both his friends grabbed him and murmured calmly while their fingers pressed savagely into the back of his arm; ten minutes later we were down the park but heard sirens…

Funnily enough, internal conflict was found in young pot smokers against 1) the younger pot smokers (“Those girls are like, 15!!!!”) and 2) families; particularly the women-and-her-child (boys: “yeah, I wouldn’t bring my family here”). I saw a young boy– definitely younger than 15– cheekishly wriggle up and ask “hey, can I bum a cigarette?”

The Chan bros. met up with their greater group of dude-friends, one of which was celebrating his birthday. They all chipped in to buy a spectacular bong for him– olive green with the clear bowels of the bong displaying ten tubes, what they called “splash shields”; people stopped him on the street and asked to see him “rip it”. The magnificence had a gold label near the lip, a giant RX designed into RelaX… while the wet grey blanket named Scott whimpered in the corner, because the social mingling with the trophy of a bong made him increasingly late to pick his parents up at the airport. And he was their ride in.

Read here for more information on 1068, legalizing medical marijuana in Washington state.

Graceee

Trimble Gilbert is a chief of the Caribou People. Learning @ the zoo.

Yesterday, I had a fantastic adventure at the zoo. Usually, I go at least a couple times a year– some feel this is sadomasochistic, and I usually end up sad for animals locked up in their artificial habitat– but it’s there, and I love to look at animals.

In some cases, like snakes, I rather enjoy the privilege of a glass pane between our interaction, but of course if we were inter-special friends I would probably sympathize a lot more.

But I digress; the zoo was fantastic. Little child-monsters running everywhere. One called me a pretty lady, and I was much more flattered, because he was not a gross slimy grown-up male in a bar or the side of the street looking to get some desperate female attention (…yet?). Seeing matching field-trip shirts (brite neon green), the buddy system in action (holding tiny hands), and eavesdropping on the random-est of conversations (“Mommy, when do you pay rent?)”, it was as much as a people-watching day as it was for observing wild creatures dumbed down with heat and the lack of wilderness survival skills. So! great aspects of the zoo-venture witnessed:

A silver-back gorilla transferring fecal matter from the butt to the mouth;

A pooping brown bear;

A peregrine falcon ripping apart pieces of quail;

A braying donkey;

The reticulated python cage was cleaned, and the caretaker crooning to this giant anaconda of a snake while she scrubbed his pool;

And the best: A child who got her head stuck posing in those painted boards with face-holes. She was a snow leopard. Her parents were pissed, and yelling at her to stop screaming as they tried stuffing her head and ears to the other side. It was perfect.

We also chatted with some zoo employees about giving us free taste tests of the most expensive of frozen treats: DIP ‘N DOTS, but it Was Not Happening.

Too bad.

I also went canoeing recently, and spotted several duck lounges where group preening took place, and a big crane lurking a few feet away from our canoe watched us come and go. Seattle is so sweet. I might be celebrating Portland this weekend, too.

GO PACIFIC NORTH WEST

Graceee

…and so I’m sitting here, poised in half-darkness, licking my strawberry-stained lips, impatiently clicking through the ritualistic tradition (honestly, I’d love to just rent one), and although this synthetic fabric will have an only one-time honor of brushing against my college-graduate-skin, there is something emotionally nostalgic of the entire thee-ay-ter (as Tobias Fuenke might add). And how much more emotionally powerful the anchors of tradition are within this posing in over-sized robes and nice receptions. A strangely out-of-place celebration compared to the actual experience– like romanticized shots of espresso and guilty procrastination. No, it’s been wonderful.It has. Unrealz.

On a different topic– I reunited with some friends today, and we killed time n a most wonderful way. Went to watch a Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) feature “Cyrus”, starring John C. Reilly, Jonah Hill, Marisa Tomei, and Catherine Keener. I don’t think I’ve been to a SIFF feature before, but the movies are really cool; too bad there isn’t someone else to foot the ticket bill. To purchase tickets, you have to register and “shop” through the SIFF calendar schedule, but they do have some sweet selections.

Cyrus, for example, channels Awkward through oedipal themes and Marisa Tomei’s love life as a single mother. John C. Reilly falls for her. Her son, Jonah Hill, resents  this and sparks a war: the potential step-child/father or mother battle behind the clueless parent’s back. The cinematography was spot-on in terms of framing awkward reaction-faces, to the point where you’re studying the dead-pan tension in their pores. The darkness of the comedy thrived in the painful vulnerability of their raw, voyeuristic-shyness or past and present failures in life. As well as John C. Reilly’s lost, tender-hearted appearance.

Check out the films! I might be struggling with the world of plays, but I love the movies.

and

Springtime is filled with apprehension and gasping realizations! Hopefully the weather will walk it out and be kinder to our poor pollen-addled brains.

Graceee

Which explains the 6 hour marathon of Mad Men in bed this morning. Having the option to simply not move was so luxurious I lounged the day way. And then I’d get lazier, and less favorable to actually moving from my bed. Vicious cycle. SO: lazy days brings lazy posts.

The book-in-the-upstairs-restroom

CakeInABox

My friend's party notes

Awesome Shoes Great Job

At the house of a man with 11 children: Battle Grounds, WA

Fave dessert: MangoStickyRIce

Mantis

Baby pterodactyls

Sweet Suzuku motorcycle outside my house

My Lactaid fix

Take it Eee eee zeee

Good night and Good Luck!

Graceee