My buddy, Jon, and I went to Vasona Lake and walked the Los Gatos Creek Trail Monday afternoon. We were in my car, drinking beers, laughing & reminiscing of good times for at least 20 minutes before hitting the trails. Once we got going we saw an ice cream truck in the parking lot. The ice creams were expensive at $5 each but we bought them anyway. The last time I bought ice cream from an ice cream truck (I was a kid) the most expensive ones were $1. I picked the WWF bar and as I walked away I thought I saw Mark Zuckerberg in line to buy ice cream.

My buddies and went hiking along the coast at Wilder Ranch State Park this morning. While we were there we saw a vulture eating away at a dead seal thru it's eyehole. Pretty fucking metal! Afterwards we went to a brewery in Capitola for beers and lunch then off to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk for more beers, deep fried Oreos, a train ride, bumper cars, & arcade games. After coming home I didn't have much energy to do anything else besides draw a couple new button designs on the iPad. I drew six of them last night. The plan is to have new buttons available for the next First Friday Street Mrkt in September.

I took my bike back to Good Karma Bikes to get looked at this afternoon. Yesterday I took it for a ride and I wasn’t able to shift into the third/highest gear in the front. Today, at the shop, the guy tests it by turning the pedals and using the shifter and it starts working fine. He tells me to take it for ride and It worked like normal. So weird. Afterwards the repair guy said if I have any problems with it to bring it back and they’ll swap the shifter. I’m really liking the service at Good Karma Bikes. After returning home then working on the computer for hours I stopped to bake cookie dough that’d been sitting in the fridge all week. My friend made the dough and the cookies came out delicious. Tonight I also pulled out the DJ controller to start practicing again. I’m DJing my friends 40th birthday party next month and need to shake the rust off. And if that wasn’t enough, I also started sketching something weird on a 18”x24” sheet of paper. I was hoping I’d finish inking it tonight but I stated getting too wrapped up in details and didn’t come close.

We got up up early Friday morning for another sunrise hike. This time at Diamond Head State Monument on the southernmost coast of Oahu. Afterwards we spent the day driving around the island and stopping at different places to eat food.

Another day hanging out at home. This time there was a documentary film crew at the house interviewing my cousin (actually my cousin’s wife but we consider her a cousin too.) It was fun talking to the them, watching them setup and asking them a bunch of questions about the process. They also bought us all a ton of Thai food that we ate for lunch & dinner. Tomorrow, my cousins and I are going hiking.

Last night I drew the Extra Super Duper Jumbo Size soda & fries. Tonight I drew the cheeseburger to match. Both sketches are really small at about an inch and a half tall.

I didn’t do much today besides clean and do laundry. I did do a little bit of sketching with a number 2 pencil tho.

The day started off with an early morning hike at Grant Park with my friend Martine. I was already running late due to phone issues then I was stuck behind a slow moving fire truck for miles going up the narrow winding road leading to the park. Then the hike was cut short after realizing I’d made a wrong turn and we were headed backwards. After coming home, a little disappointed in myself, I showered and got ready to go shopping. I went to the new Costco Business Center near the house, Office Depot across town, a regular Costco, then to the Safeway back home. I had about half a cart full of groceries and was next in line at the check out stand when I noticed the guy behind me only was buying a single bouquet of flowers so I let him go in front of me. After he paid for his flowers and left I loaded my items on the conveyer and walked up the cashier who said the guy had given her $20 to pay for part of my groceries. How cool was that? And as an added bonus I received an additional $10 discount at the register. What an awesome way to end a long day.

AKA: Netflix and Eat.

...but I roasted the fuck outta some garlic tonight! It took longer to peel 4 bulbs of garlic than it took to time bake them. I only added olive oil, salt, pepper and seasoning and it came out pretty damn good for my first time. I also baked some biscuits (from a can) and spread the garlic on there like butter. 

Today I made a screen recording of how to view the SCU Lightning Complex affected areas and evacuation maps after a couple friends on Instagram mentioned how the maps I've been uploading have been helpful. Processing all the information about these fires has been confusing so I'm happy to share what I've learned. At night I made eggplant parmesan after the temperature cooled down and the air cleared up enough to open windows and fire up the oven. This recipe skips breading & frying the eggplant, to cut back on calories, but is still delicious. I'm having leftovers for breakfast, lunch & dinner tomorrow.

Last week I hurt my back after working out. I woke up the next day with pain behind my left shoulder. It hurt every time I moved and walked around. It's gotten better, but not 100%, over these past few days. Yesterday I felt good enough to go for a walk and today I did modified work out, to avoid hurting myself again, and went for a run. When I got home I had to cook up some chicken, bell peppers and mushrooms that were gonna spoil if I left them any longer. I threw in a few other ingredients and it came out really good. Better than I expected. Bork, bork, bork!

I did my stretches & workout at home, cooked dinner (chicken & mushrooms,) went for a 3.3 mile walk in the neighborhood, came home, ate left overs and made microwave-s'mores. The only thing that would have made today better would be if they arrested all the cops who murdered Breonna Taylor (only one has been fired)

I gave it a full sleeve of eyeballs then I ate it. 

I had few beers watching the 49ers beat the Packers in the Championship game, ate dinner, laid down to read some Preacher comics and passed out. Now I’m awake in the middle of the night. Maybe I should drink more beer, eat more food and read more comics to fall asleep again.

This weekend and last weekend I DJ'd doubles. Friday & Saturday gigs. Tonight, and last night, I DJ'd at the same venue and was able to leave the rig setup overnight. Today I came already dressed in my suit, versus load-in clothes. My dinner was waiting for me when I arrived. And I had a fun dance floor going for most of the night. The only issue was my DJ laptop freezing half hour before the end of the night. It killed my dance floor. I played some Spotify music playing from my personal laptop while my DJ laptop restarted and got the dance floor going as soon as I was up and running. Unfortunately, there were only half as many people by then. If it wasn't for that incident tonight would have been perfect.

Today I ate breakfast. Animated the arms on my little robot guy. Cooked my "household-famous" lentils, but was light on the lentils. Ate the lentils plus more food with the family. Watched the new Rick & Morty episodes. Read a couple comics and ate more food. The only thing left to do is post this blog entry and sleep off this food.