The Honeymoon is Over

I am in Oregon now.

Last rendezvous on the Cali coast before making it to Oregon some 50 or 60 slow miles up the road. Photo: Mariella Coello

Photo: Adrienne C. Wilson

My California honeymooning days are over for the moment and what a way to say farewell to my favorite state… I’ll take it back to Tuesday of last week.

8.14.07
There are a few things that can be said for Sacramento. It is a hot city (which I like) and has the type of weather you can go out in shorts, skirts, and little mini dresses (if one should choose too) in the evenings for a nice bite to eat with friends. However, on this particular sizzling Sacramento summer night I didn’t wear anything described above simply because I wasn’t in the mood, but all that doesn’t matter. What matters is I had a nice dinner with my friend Quar, who kindly let Mariella and me crash at his place while staying in Sacramento and the three of us were joined by Ana and her co-worker Jennifer. Ana is a mutual friend of Mariella and I whom we’ve worked with to some capacity in the past. Presently she is on a Listerine Whitening Strip tour and it so happened that her schedule and ours bumped into one another and to celebrate Ana thought it would be a good idea to dine at Mason’s at the Park in Downtown Sac. I won’t kill it here with a full on restaurant review, but I will say that the food was pretty scrumptious. If you go start with the fresh imported mozzarella di Bufala and fried green tomatoes with Iacopi fava beans, marinated hearts of palm, torpedo onions, soft herbs and Banyuls vinaigrette! It is a mouthful to ask the waiter for, but I could hardly sit still once it arrived! It was wonderful! My main dish on the other hand was filling, but not as worthy of praise. Also, the downtown sac area is pretty nice and very clean. I like it.

OKAAAAAY! Photo: Quar Brown

8.15.07
Wednesdays are one of the only days I stay close to a remote control for reality type of entertainment. After a long day of work and a nice 45 minute workout I settled in for Part 1 of the “So You Think You Can Dance” finale. The show was okay compared to the previous week when they were down to six dancers. Still the last four danced their hearts out, prompting me for the first time ever to pick up the phone and vote for my favorite dancer. I called in a ridiculous amount of times for Sabra. When I finally fell asleep that night I felt I had done a good deed.

8.16.07
Tonight was all about bowling, but not before finding out the results to Part 2 of the “So You Think You Can Dance” finale. I had my wonderful mum watch it (she normally does) and call me with the results since she is on EST. Once I learned Sabra was voted “America’s Favorite Dancer” I couldn’t wait to get to cosmic bowling where they turn the lights out and crank up the music. Quar, Mariella and I met up with Ana and Jennifer once more at the Country Club Lanes in East Sacramento and had a blast. Don’t ask about scores. One look at the photos below and you can see there was more dancing and disco posing than there is evidence of a spare or strike. For the record I did get at least 3 strikes and a couple of spares that night. You can see it in the way I move! Yes, folks like the football players that dance when they’ve made a touch down I dance when I get a strike or whenever music is on.

Dancing at cosmic bowling. If you think this was intense you should have seen what the ladies in lane 17 were doing. No comment. Photo: Jennifer

Pictures are worth a thousand words. A thousand words can’t describe how cool we are. Photo: An Unhappy Chick on a Group Date from lane 18

Danger, Will Robinson! I smell a strike! Photo: Ana Chumbiaca

8.17.07
Laundry day, lazy day and movie day. Quar and I went up to Folsom to check out the movie Stardust starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Robert De Niro to name only a small piece of the cast. The movie was brillant! It was funny and magical and romantic with a tons of quirky sci-fi components. Go see it.

8.18.07
After weeks of finals and rotations, my friend Courtney from 6th grade finally had the chance to meet up in SF. I took the BART into SF which was the easy part and the MUNI to her place which was not as easy. Long story short we ended up catching up over Thai food, shopping around Union Square and a quick trip to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. The YBCA was too weird for my friend’s taste, but it was right up my alley. I’m trying to spend more time in museums with mixed media and installation pieces to see what’s presently happening as I currently read a book on installations of the past. From Courtney’s spot I took off again to meet up with my friend Chienchi for a night of Desi style partying at the Rickshaw Stop. First we noshed on sushi then we worked up a massive sweat for four hours. I’ve never moved my shoulders or smiled so much while dancing. Both are practically a must during a Non Stop Bhangra party! I was also pleased that my friend Ian was able to make it and did a little dancing with us. Actually, he did quite a bit of dancing. Props to Ian and more props out to Chienchi for providing me with my culture fill in SF.

8.19.07
On the last day of the weekend we call Sunday, I helped (I think) by taking a few still shots of my friend’s commercial shoot for a clothing line called Urbal. The shoot took place at Twin Peaks in SF and the primary photographer was snappin’ and snappin’. Way to go Faith! There were two shoots scheduled for the day, but I was only able to make the first and then I had to head up to Eureka, CA so that I could work the next day and then head to where I am now.

A nice windy day at Twin Peaks in Frisco. Photo: Adrienne C. Wilson

Quar, Faith and J’Soul at Twin Peaks for the Urbal shoot. Photo: Adrienne C. Wilson

So check this… This is my homeboy Quar and he wants to direct yo video! I said he wants to direct yo video! WORD! Photo: Ian Williams

I am in Oregon now.
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