I should have made this announcement sooner, but here it is. My exhibit at the Martin Luther King Library, originally scheduled for 2020 but postponed due to the pandemic, is now back on! I'll have my work on display from early October till late November. I'm very excited and a little bit nervous. This exhibit will be almost ten years to the day since my last solo show. Wish me luck!
I did not anticipate was how out of shape I was before DJing last night after a 12 month hiatus. Before covid shut down all weddings & events I'd been DJing every weekend for 7 years straight. I was used to the physical demands of the job. And although I'd been hiking on a regular basis for the last year, I wasn't prepared to be standing for 11 straight hours yesterday. Today I was practically dead to the world. I slept in late and when I woke up my feet, legs and back were all crazy sore. I stayed in bed most of the day, watched a couple movies and only left the house to go eat. I hope tomorrow's better because I gotta start sourcing materials and preparing for Saturday's event. I'll be doing an interactive live painting thingie downtown. It'll be my first time doing something like this and I need to figure out how I'm gonna accomplish it by Friday. It should be a lot fun and hopefully a lot less taxing on my body.
Tonight I DJ'd my first gig in over a year since covid shut everything down. It was my friends Mike & Raquel's son's graduation party on their ranch. It was super casual and laid back. A good event to shake off the rust. The only trouble I had wasn't my mixing, or MCing, but with the song selections. I couldn't remember half the music I used to play at events so I relied heavily on my Spotify playlists, which I have categorized by decades and genres. I was constantly scrolling thru Spotify on my phone looking for what to play next in Serato on my laptop. I still had a decent set even when I played random requests at the end of the night for the last few people there. It was a lot of fun and I had a great time.
It's been over a year since I last DJ'd an event. The last one was at a private residence on June 13, 2020, right in the thick of Covid. Before that, March 14, the day before California was ordered to shelter-in-place. Tomorrow I'm doing my buddy's son's high school graduation party at their house. This will be a good event to shake off any rust. I'm a little nervous, partly because I'm using a mix of my own equipment and my friends speakers, instead of my work's gear which is all a bit different. Either way, it should be fun.
This is a makeup post for Saturday. I was out of town and spent the night at my aunt's house where we had a surprise party for my grandma. We're vaccinated so we felt safe getting together after 14 months of sheltering at home due to covid. It was great to see everybody and even though it's been so long it felt like we never skipped a beat. Just like old times.
I saw my doctor today for a checkup and to go over my lab results. (that bruise on my arm in the picture below is where they drew blood a couple days ago) Aside from being overweight and slightly high blood pressure my doctor said my test results look really good. Better numbers than most people coming back for doctor visits after the covid shutdown. I was pleasantly surprised. I thought they were going to be bad, especially since I'm currently about 10 lbs over what I usually weigh this time of year. There's still plenty work I need to do health wise but I left my doctor's office feeling good. I wanted to treat myself so I visited my local comic shop, Legends, inside Eastridge Mall, and picked up a bunch of $1 comics. All of them are new but they're reprints of old books. After returning home I got ready and went on a hike at Alum Rock Park. I did all of the Penitencia Creek Trail, almost 6 miles, then came home and did some more work on my taxes. I have this weekend to finish as tax day is this coming Monday.
I got my second vaccine shot this afternoon and got a nifty button! I didn’t experience any side effects either. I’m looking forward to hanging out with my fully vaxxed friends & family in a few weeks after the vaccine has taken full effect.
The tax prep is still dragging along nicely. I did a bit of work tonight. Mostly reworking the forms & spreadsheets I use to keep records. I do my best to log everything but I’m constantly trying to improve & streamline the whole bookkeeping & tax preparation process. Happy Star Wars Day! It's that time again. Time to pay the state and federal government their cut of my money. First I'm going to pay California's sales & use tax then I'm getting on Turbo Tax to file my income tax. It aint much. After covid, every event was canceled and I barely made any sales in 2020.
I got my first dose of the Pfizer vaccine this morning. I didn’t have any reactions besides my arm getting a little sore on the injection site. My appointment for the second dose is in 4 weeks. I hear that one might be a doozy.
The day started off awesome. It started with a walk at Lake Cunningham with my buddy then followed by some day drinking downtown. I can’t hang like I used to because when I got home I passed out and woke up hours later thinking it was the next morning. I’m a little bit hungover but still feeling good.
I also got news that all people, 16 and older, living or working in Santa Clara County are now eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, days before the rest of the state becomes eligible. I signed up and got my appointment set for later this morning. The website to schedule an appointment is https://vax.sccgov.org/home I spent today unpacking my luggage, shopping for groceries, and doing laundry. I’m slowly adjusting back to normal life. On the bright side, I received my negative COVID test result, and the bidet I bought online was delivered. Cheers to no cooties and a clean butthole! I meant to record myself getting my nose swabbed at my covid test this afternoon but I accidentally stopped recording before it was my turn. I did manage to record myself doing a booger check in the mirror while I waited. I'm back home after spending the last 3 weeks in Hawaii. I'm getting another covid test, after being on a plane for 5 hours, just to be safe. So now I got a hot date with a cotton swab Thursday afternoon. I've got no complaints about getting tested but I do look forward to getting vaccinated as soon as I'm eligible.
It feels like an adventure, exploring new places with the help of a map. Instead of carrying a sword I got a small pocket knife. My phone’s gps serves as my compass. Grant Park has wild pigs and Hyrule has moblins. Today (Wednesday) I came across a hallowed out tree that looked like the the entrance to level 1 from the original Legend of Zelda for the NES. I was wearing my Zelda: Wind Waker mask today too FTW. This is my 500th blog post! It'd be cool if I had some profound shit to write about. Instead I'm sharing the collection of maps I've printed, highlighted and carried with me on my hikes over the last couple months. I've thrown them away and fished them out of the trash at least twice now and I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with them.
The whole thing started after Covid struck and my gym was forced to close. I started going to Lake Cunningham Park to walk & run until that got boring so I started hiking the Eagle Rock Trail at Alum Rock Park. I kept hiking the same trail over & over till I decided to explore the rest of the park. In November I decided I was going to hike every trail at Alum Rock before the end of the year. I finished Alum Rock sooner than expected and moved on to the Sierra Vista Open Space Preserve and managed to hike all those trails before New Years. Now I'm working on completing Joseph D. Grant County Park and I'm about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way done. Since Grant Park is so big, and has tons of trails, I've been selecting my route and printing a portion of the map (middle pic) to carry in my pocket. When I get back home I highlight the trails I hiked that day on to the full map (bottom.) I'm hoping to finish Grant Park in February and starting someplace new. I'm thinking Ed R. Levin Park. I went out today and bought three more pairs of toe sock liners. My first pair worked great, preventing blisters after a couple hikes, but I didn’t like having to throw a load in the wash just to clean a pair of socks. Now, with four pairs, I can hike every other day with a fresh set and wash them all on laundry day at the end of the week. And no, this is not an ad. No one’s paying me to write this shit. After nine months of shutdown, because of covid, hiking’s become my jam. I just gotta avoid getting blisters on my feet to keep the party going.
Kept it low key for New Years, cause of covid and I'm old. I made a little animation for those who went out and gathered in groups. If they get covid, fuck em! After 9 months I'm tired of feeling bad, plus we should all know better by this point. If they get other people sick, well then then they're assholes too. Besides folks ringing in the new year with covid, I've plotted a short hike at Grant Park, to do later today with my buddies, and got back to work on the EMN Phoenix project I should have finished by now. Happy New Year... even though not a damn thing's changed!
My family has always celebrated Xmas by staying up till midnight on Christmas Eve so on Christmas Day there’s not a whole lot going on. Usually I’m out of town at a relatives house, just lounging around and hanging out with my cousins. This year, because of COVID, there was no get-together. Today I just hung out at home and didn’t do much besides watch tv and movies again. I didn’t want to end the day without doing something fartsy so I did a quick drawing called “Hail Santa,” cause it’s Christmas.
For as long as I’ve been around, and before I was born, my dad’s side of the family always got together to celebrate on Christmas Eve. It’s always been a big deal for the grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces & nephews. It’s a long running tradition that had to be canceled this year because of Covid. Yes, it’s a bummer but today wasn’t a bad day. I hiked a couple more trails at the Sierra Vista Preserve this afternoon and got a little bit closer to completing the whole space. I just need to do the Upper Calaveras Fault Trail, east of the Cutoff Trail, and the Lower Calaveras Fault Trail, which is a doozy. Just the Lower Calaveras Fault alone is almost 10 miles round trip and a 5-6 hour trek. I’m thinking of doing one hike to finish the Upper portion and coming back another day, nice & early, to knock out the Lower part. Depending on the weather the next few days, and how much it rains, I might be able to 100% complete the preserve before the new year.
Incase you missed the sign on the front page or my Instagram posts earlier this evening... I put my t-shirts on sale for $25 each (including shipping & handling) by using coupon code IGOT5ONIT at checkout. The offer is limited to t-shirts currently in stock and runs until December 25, 2020. This sale is in response to Black Friday, (which was today) Small Business Saturday, and all live vending opportunities being shut down due to covid. It’s a small effort to make a few sales before the end of the year and get rid of some inventory that’s been sitting in boxes all year. I also made my FRANKIE MCFLY kiss-cut stickers 2 for $5. No coupon necessary.
I finally framed these four drawings because on Saturday they're going to be on display at Orange Moon Salon in San Jose. My friend, Catrina, is a hairdresser there, and also an artist, and she asked me to hang some work. These were originally going up at my exhibit at the Martin Luther King Jr. Library in May but covid ruined that. Six months later and they're finally going to be available for others see. Please wear a mask if you go!
As I mentioned yesterday, I’m out of town visiting family I haven’t seen since before Covid shut everything down. I’m still gonna be proactive as to not risk anyone getting sick after coming home but I needed this after 6 months of sheltering in place and not having anyone to talk to openly about everything that’s been going on.
Today I felt like I could stop worrying about the fire coming down the hill and possibly having to evacuate. The weather was nice and the air quality wasn't terrible so I went and walked two laps at Lake Cunningham. This was my first time going out after being locked indoors with the windows closed, and glued to the computer, for the last 7 days days. It felt good to not worry about the fire but I still feel bad for those who were forced to evacuate and even more so for those who lost their homes. I wish we could fast forward past the wildfires, covid-19, racial injustice, police brutality and everything else that's made 2020 the biggest shit-show in my lifetime.
My cousin Reyna sent me this picture earlier today. It's Arely and I standing in front our booth at the San Jose Jazz Summer Fest last year. The sales weren't great that weekend but it was still a lot of fun being there and meeting new vendors. I really miss working events. The plan was to do more events this year before the 'Vid fucked that all away.
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Frankie Mcfly's
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