Taco Loco

Dearest Mexican Food,

I love you so much that I could eat you every meal of the day. From your tasty breakfast burritos to your mid-day carne asada tacos to your delicious dinner-time sizzling fajitas. I want you in my mouth all day long!

OK that's a bit much but do you get the idea that I really like Mexican food?

There is a little known taco cart that lies just in the shadow of the Ballard bridge and right before Leary Way. Look out for it because it's really easy to drive past but it's well worth the visit. I'd suggest getting the food to go because eating in the stone parking lot is a bit harsh but it's perfect if you just want to stop for a quick bite of heaven.

memories of the solstice parade

This past weekend was Seattle's annual hippie fair which is better known as the Solstice Parade. It's been several years since I've been, so my stoner buddy Andy G and I made the trek to Fremont in search of nude, painted hippie-chicks. We drove around for a good twenty minutes looking for parking and finally found a spot about 15 blocks from downtown Fremont. It was really overcast but the rain seemed far off so we made the long walk downhill to the parade route.

When we finally arrived, the parade was already well underway and it was really difficult to get a good vantage point. After about half an hour of people watching, we decided we had seen enough and we began the very long walk back up Fremont Ave. Luckily we happened upon the Buckaroo Tavern and stopped for a couple of beers and we had a great view from inside the bar of people exiting the parade.

My friend Elisa forwarded me this pic of this middle-aged, nudist freak from the parade. My favorite part is the guy's black loafers and brown socks. I'll bet this guy is an accountant by day and you know that he looks forward to the parade every year so that he can show off his bony ass to the world. I really like the look of laughter and horror from the women in the crowd.

organic soap

I know how much my lady blogger friends enjoy new product suggestions so here is my big shout-out to the organic soap from the Ballard Market. I love the smell of lavender and my favorite is the purple lavender soap and Damn this stuff smells good. When I want to RUFF things up a bit, I go for the oatmeal soap. The chunks of oatmeal are soothing and give a mini-massage effect in the shower. I also kind of like the fact that the soap isn't packaged at all and I just plop it into my shopping basket completely nude with the rest of my food. However I am careful not to put the soap next to any fresh fruits or veggies for fear that the soap will somehow contaminate the other food. I also picked up this lavender, foaming soap which is pretty good but you have to really pump the handle several times to get a good amount of foam and I don't suggest that you use it with the other lavender soap because that's just a bit too much lavender, even for me.

wednesday

I am a 39 year old single man that is not currently dating anyone and today is Wednesday evening, June 6th. I left my temp job today at roughly 5:30 pm and I arrived home in Ballard at 7:15. The door to door drive was no longer than 13 miles and it took me a long-ass, fucking time to get home. I didn't see any accidents or abandoned vehicles that would have made traffic slow down. No, that's just the way it is on westbound 520 in rush hour.

I have an excessive amount of mail that has collected around my apt recently and I had to get rid of it. I pay a lot of my bills online (it's a lot faster and you don't need stamps) so I have a bunch of credit card offers and junk mail that I don't want and I don't feel comfortable just ripping them up. A few years ago, someone got my debit card number and paid off their delinquent account with my card. Luckily it was very easy for my credit card company to trace the charge back to the dipshit that used my stolen card number to pay off their past due phone bill.

I decided that I should probably buy a paper shredder to rid myself of the abundance of unwanted paper so I checked my trusty source, craigslist. In the past year I have found some amazing deals such as a barely used Imac for video editing, 50% off two almost new Ikea bar stools and 70% off of a very stylie, retro looking entertainment center.

I found an ad on CL from a guy that also works at the same software giant as I do and I met him at lunch time to make the purchase. He just happened to have 4 brand new paper shredders sitting in the trunk of his car for 60% off retail and he appeared to be the Redmond version of Goodfellas. I really didn't want to know any of the details so I didn't ask any questions and 24 dollars later and a quick hand shake and I was on my merry way with a brand new paper shredder in an un-opened box.

Now it's evening and I've had a few rum and crans and I've calmed down from my commute from Hell. One of the nice things about drinking rum is that it turns mundane tasks (such as paper shredding) into a fun little game. Note to self: Watch your fingers while shreddin' up a storm. And this is how I spent my Wednesday evening.

Still Life

This past weekend I made my directorial debut on a 20 minute, indie, short film. The film is based on a one act play from a local play write and the story is about a brooding painter on the verge of success who hires a nude, female model to pose for him. During the session, the two come to realize they actually knew each other as kids in grade school and they both witnessed the death of the girl's Grandfather several years ago. They each had crushes on each other and now they coincidentally reunite and a budding romance emerges between the two.

I haven't been on a real film set in about 10 years and it felt great to finally be back in the director's helm again. We shot the film in a really cool artist space in Ballard and we were very lucky to have the space donated by local artist Virginia Howlett (click on the link to take a 360 degree view around the space by using your mouse)

The day started at 8am and we shot all day and finally wrapped on time at 8pm. I can't even begin to describe how sore my legs are from standing all day and I really need to get some sleep because we're finishing filming tomorrow but I'm still so excited from the shoot today that I can't quite fall asleep.

I will be posting some of the production stills shortly when I get them from the on-set photog. Now we begin the fun and challenging task of post production. I can't wait to finish this bad boy and then the plan is to submit it to several short film fests.