San Francisco Part 1

I wanted to make post #50 something special so I waited until I did something special. Also it is in two parts, I can do that, it is my blog...

Friday, I had visited San Francisco for the first time and hung out with my long time friend Pawl who goes to the Academy of Art University. I got off the Cal-train at the depot and walked toward Market Street. Little did I know I was passing through the "Tenderloin" district, where I was accosted by a homeless person selling unwanted hugs for a dollar. After a quick stop at 7-11 for some Gatorade and hand sanitizer (my skin crawled all day), I made my way to the Alexander Book Company to await Pawl. Whilst waiting outside, Ian McConville walked by me, at least I thought it was him. I was even more sure the second time as he passed me again with lunch in his hand. I felt like talking to him, but his ear-buds were blasting away and he was in the zone.

I found Pawl and we got some food. My appearance was enough to mistake me for a student so I was able to ride the Academy buses for free. We walked though the Tenderloin district again making our way to Folsom Street where we had an "east coast" giggle at the stores and bars that inhabit that part of town. We found fliers for the Folsom Street Fair and felt that we may need to do that too.

We then found ourselves on Haight Street, where the hipster artsy people live. We found a good comic store and a gaming shop; the record store Pawl wanted to visit felt like closing four hours early.

We ended our trip in Japantown, the nicest part of town I had seen so far. Signs were everywhere for a J-Pop festival that started the next day... I felt the need to come back.

In California At Last

The trip may be over for Brice, but my adventure continues. For me, I want nothing more to see the sun set into the Pacific Ocean (or at this point the ocean in general). It does make it rather difficult to do seeing as how I do not have a vehicle in any shape or form.

I am glad those of you who saw the pictures posted on Facebook enjoyed them. We had a blast and managed not to kill each other.

I have taken up residence in a storage shed that hangs on the Brice's deck. It is cozy and humble and I have the piece of mind of a small amount of privacy that I do so often require. There is room enough for my chest of clothing and some bedding. I even managed to get my computer up and running by installing a power outlet in the light fixture. "Black and white make a light." Thanks dad!

The computer however is on its last leg. It barely survived the movers and the trip out here. A gig of RAM has been fried and the second partition on my hard drive is corrupted and is reading redundancy errors. I worry if I reformat it, the hard drive itself will become totally corrupted, so I'll just leave it alone for now. I'm just glad I got it working.

My BB Storm is also broken, it has a crack along the bottom of the screen and prevented me from doing too many things with mobile Facebook. All these things can be rectified as soon as I find steady employment.

Until next time, wish me luck!

On the Road

I have been guest blogging on my friend's blog as we have trekked across the US from Hackettstown area, New Jersey to Sunnyvale, California. Along the way we experienced many great things this nation has to offer including the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Mount Rushmore, Yellowstone National Park, and several continental breakfasts of several different varieties... good lord I am going to miss Taylor Ham.

Check it out and send us your love.

http://2-guys-1-car.blogspot.com/

So, So True

Rifftrax: Reefer Madness

Recently, I went with my good friend Katie and her friends to the Fathom Event’s presentation of Rifftrax: Reefer Madness Live. After seeing both of their live events- Plan 9 From Outerspace and Rifftrax: Christmas Special- I expected teary eyed hilarity to ensue. Being a long time fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Rifftrax in general, I believe these live events are a fantastic way to bring the culture together in a more social and less digital interaction. This performance I felt very pleased and then thoroughly disappointed.

Because Reefer Madness is not long enough to be a feature film, Michael, Bill and Kevin added a few shorts to the beginning to keep you in the seat for the full two hours. The shorts were beyond hilarious; I often felt the need to clamp my hand over my mouth to keep other patrons from mistaking me as a hysteric. I never thought I could be so entertained by a PSA on grass’s artistic uses.

Once the PSA of the evening had finally come on, the mood switched to one of confusion with smatterings of forced laughter. I wondered during the film if I had exhausted myself and was all laughed out, however I found that not too many others were laughing either. The jokes were a bit stale and related specifically to subjects that went over the head of the demographic. Is it that they believed stoner comedy has some way equated itself with observational humor? At the end they even said that they read some jokes that were submitted by the audience. I don’t know what they were smoking. *bud um tss*

Regardless, I felt no reason to tear down the walls and scream to the world about it. I just remember leaving the theater feeling a bit strange, like seeing a movie that had a bland, vague ending.

I still look forward with indescribable anticipation for the Halloween special, the Vincent Price version of House on Haunted Hill. Two minutes laughing the way they make me laugh is well worth the price of full admission.