Mike and his sisters went back to San Diego on Wednesday.

We did the tourist thing. Went to Fisherman's Wharf. Then on to North Beach and China Town. From North Beach we took a Cable Car ride back to downtown Union Square. It was only my second time riding on one. I normally don't do this kind of thing. $5 for a cable car fare? wow. But I had fun.

Funny. I forgot how charming San Francisco can be. I've been so busy moping around and whining about how much its changed, but underneath the surface, SF is still a beautiful city. It still has a lot to offer, it has a vibrant art scene and the Indie music circuit still thrives.

The dot.com bust really kicked San Francisco in the ass, and when the industry imploded, the dot.com nazis began to flee the city. My friends had seen this coming, some have left the city to pursue new things in NYC, some went to Hawaii, others traveled to eastern Europe. Including me and my girlfriend at the time (To Hawaii). We had a hunch that SF was about to get hit, not just economically but culturally too, and it was time to get out of dodge, within a year -- it did, not because we had any solid facts to back it up, but it was more of a gut feeling, and sure enough we were right. Today the city is on a transition. It has survived the dot.com bust, although it may never recapture that same magical aura it once had--(as far as the" scene") like it did from 1998 to 2001, something new and different will come along, it always does.

Sometimes it takes a perspective of an outsider like my friend Mike to help me appreciate my city. He says the city seems to have a lot to offer, and I think he's right about that. It doesn't hurt to stoop to a tourist level to really see that. --Of course this does not mean I'll be making frequent visits to Fisherman's Wharf anytime. I fucking hate that place. I still plan to leave one day. But until then, this is home. It has been for most of my life. I've learned to appreciate this city once more--sans the cynicism.

Theres something very liberating about wanting and liking, and appreciating the things you have in the present moment. I think it's fine to think about the future, but as my old ex had taught me, finding happiness with what you have now is also important.

Having digestive issues today so I'm skipping dinner.
This place looks much better now after taking out the garbage and few of the bottles, took care of the clutter as well. It looked a lot worse earlier. I get irritated at the way I let my place go. I hate the kind of mood clutter can do to my own personal well being, not to mention the distraction it creates. Now I can finally relax. Just a few minor details that needs to be done, but that can wait later. I hate doing the dishes. I don't know how the dishes ends up looking the way it does now, it looks like a landfill. As for the living room, it now looks like --- a living room. I try to find a balance between cleanliness while careful of not becoming so anally retentive about how my place looks. I'm okay as long as it looks habitable.

I spent the evening hanging with Mike and his sisters at Haight Street.

Came home around 8pm and talked to Nichelle on the phone for a little bit. The two of us are going out drinking Wednesday night. She wants to check out the Irish Pubs in the city. But I suggested to Nichelle that we go back to the same German Bar we went to the last time, but she didn't want to. Might had to do with us getting kicked out the last time we went there after a fight involving our group. I thought it'd be funny though if the two of us just showed up and sat on the same stool we sat before and acted as if nothing ever happened. I could still persuade her. But we'll see.

Wheels Of Steel

Mike came up with his sisters Tiffany and Diane to San Francisco. I also got my turntables and Wax back. Been hanging around with them since Sunday night. It's great to see Mike again, we had a lot of catching up to do. We mostly talked about life in general, we talked about Eugene and Jenn back in San Diego while remembering the good times we all had down there.

At home I took some time to examine my old Turntable set. The thing looked so foreign. It was a bit confusing putting the whole thing together. It just looked so foreign. And that's when it hit me: two years have gone by since the last time I've seen them. I couldn't figure out for the life of me which jack went in to where. It took me 45 minutes to make the mixer work right. But patience finally paid off and it worked great. After that it was time to test it out, it didn't take very long for me to get used to the mixing. It was second nature to me, like riding a bike. Now I can blow my money on vinyl again!!!

Sign Of The Times

There is nothing more I hate than fear and the effect it could do to people especially when mass hysteria is involved. Fear is such a powerful force when not put in check.

People have a reason to be cautious, that i understand. It's unfortunate but that's the kind of world we live in today, but fear at the cost of compromising freedom and logic reasoning is something I can't tolerate. Ok. I'll get off my high horse now.

Jennifer and I were riding on BART today and found an unclaimed backpack. I looked at it and started to wonder about it myself. But Jennifer got all excited about it and so did the other passengers. Suddenly people were starting to fear the worse. So I called the call box and reported it to the operator, on the next stop the train stopped and the police came over with his trusty German Sheppard and took the thing away, it turned out to be just some clothing. The whole thing was just stupid to begin with. There's risks in everything we do. Sometimes you just have to take a deep breathe and use your right judgment. I don't know why I did what I did. Don't know if I felt like my life was in great danger or if I just got swept along every one else's hysteria. The whole thing was just ridiculous.

I don't mind working saturdays once a month. 4 hours went by pretty fast. I just got home a minute ago. Checked my voice mail, Nichelle called. Guess I should call her later.

This is frustrating me. i want an ipod. But looking through my finances it's just not a practical idea for me to do this. Fuck. It's gonna take at least two more weeks before i could get one.

This is taking longer than I thought it would take...

lord of the rings

Burger Bistro in downtown SF serves the best burgers in my opinion. I love their burgers and its the only place where I would ever eat one. (screw fast food places whose names are not even worth mentioning).

But on this day, I went for their onion rings. Bad mistake. I came back to work after lunch and I was hurting real bad. My stomach felt like it was going places in all directions. It was the grease. Even after I got home I was still hurting and had to go on a few trips to the bathroom. Those rings kicked my ass. Well, that's the end of that venture. From now on I'm just sticking to their burgers which is still the BEST. I'll take the onion ring fiasco in stride as nothing more than an isolated incident. Gotta watch those from now on.

Cut Chemist

I'm beat. I didn't get home last night until after 10 pm. I went straight from work to a quick dinner then went to amoeba records to see Cut Chemist do a live show. It was great as always. I took some photos of the show. I plan to post them very soon. There was a live drawing on stage from this Artist whose name is Forrest Stearns who was traveling with Cut Chemist. I'm glad I got to see him up close. Cut Chemist is a great artist. I think even better than DJ Shadow even though I have much respect for Shadow's work, even if he gets a bit weird sometimes with his music. After the show I got his new cd and got him to sign his autograph on the front of the disk booklet using a silver maker, he even signed a limited edition Forrest Stearns poster of a Cut Chemist sketch that came with the cd. That's two autographs from Cut Chemist!!! How awesome is that!

Fired up the OLD camera

I have an affinity for the old and archaic. Rotary phones, old typewriters, vhs players, and my old manual camera. I took my pentax k-1000 to a camera store over to downtown SF, I needed to get a battery and a battery compartment that was missing. Fortunately the store specializes with old vintage cameras as well. Luckily they were able to help me out. They also cleaned the lens that was full of dust. I also went ahead and bought a black and white film for the camera and I was ready to go out there and shoot. I've been wanting to get back into doing black and white photography. It's been so long. Unfortunately, many of the pictures I took in college have all been lost. But my dad managed to save a few of my portfolios, though the negatives have all been lost.
I went to the nihonmachi festival and took some photos during the festival performances. I'll be posting some pictures later. I'd like to get a digital camera one day, but I love manual cameras. I'll make the transition someday.

Meat

I was trying to see if i can go back on a vegetarian diet again. From '99 to '03, I lived on a strict diet of fish and vegetables, but over the years I went back to eating chicken and occasionally beef, though I don't eat much beef, I guess if I really wanted to eat meat I'd stick with chicken instead.
For a few days my body started craving protein, I forgot that when you are a vegetarian you have to constantly feed yourself so you don't pass out. I felt weak and light headed a few times, but I finally gave in and ate some hot wings today from the nearest supermarket near where I work. Having said that, fish is still king.

Audrey The Magic Rat

It's been over a year since I was visited by a medium sized rat. I wonder whatever happened to it. Last year before summer, I was sitting at home watching a movie when I noticed something furry with a tail trying very hard not to get noticed, each time it took two steps it would stop, and then look at me, hoping that I didn't see it. Then it proceeds to take more steps. I waved my leg to scare it away, then it ran towards the desk where my computer is, I looked around for holes around the apartment, but I couldn't find any that was visible. This deeply concerned me, surely if I didn't take care of this now, it might become a bigger problem later. I didn't want a family of rodents living in my place, for weeks I looked around for it, I also kept my nose open for possible stench of a dead rat. Nothing. It's almost like it disappeared into thin air. If it was here I would have found it by now. My apartment isn't that big. The rat is just simply gone.