What follows are some ideas I banged out late the other night while writing  the invite to my 2nd Annual MJ Memorial Flashdance (tonight! y’all should come).  It isn’t particularly well-written (it was 3am!) but I’ll post it anyway, because the thoughts are important to me & I don’t have time to improve it just now (my apologies! – I’ll try to get back to it later I hope… feel free to leave edit suggestions in the comments )

Besides color, what’s different about these two “Michael Through the Years” images?

from the Chicago Tribune

from the Daily Mail UK

I think it is that the Chicago Tribune stopped at 1990? Why? Maybe because it is easier for us.

In the aftermath of MJ’s death, I was once again reminded of the fact that we as a culture have a hard time getting it right when it comes to dealing with our heroes and our villains.

If the person is a hero, like one of my greatest heroes, Martin Luther King, Jr., we try like hell to make them into a saint – someone who was a perfect paragon & could do no wrong. Even if, as in the case of MLK with his plagiarism & infidelity, that is patently untrue. And if the person is a villain, we make them into a monster – someone beyond human understanding.  The problem with this approach is simple – in both cases we put a huge amount of distance between us and them, a distance that costs us in many ways.

In the case of our heroes, it means that we put them on a pedestal and absolve ourselves of the responsibility to attempt to follow in the better parts of their footsteps: “Oh, I’m no saint, I couldn’t possibly do what MLK did.” By making them different from us, we don’t have to apply their standards to our own lives. If we would allow ourselves to see them as flawed, they would become much closer to us, and much more accessible. We would gain a pathway to improve our lives: “Well he/she was flawed just like me, but look what they were able to accomplish.” MLK was NOT a saint, but what he accomplished was saintly – that makes it even more inspiring in my book.  By making our heroes super-human, we allow ourselves off the hook and fail to hold ourselves to a higher and better standard.

For our villains, we do something similar. Obviously, we shouldn’t attempt to emulate or hold ourselves to their standards, but when we treat them as nonhuman, we fail to learn from the great significance of their lives. Why not try to understand why they got where they are (how could it have been prevented?) or in the case of the smarter ones of them – what critiques of our society are they making (Is there anything to be said for their ideas?) By pretending that they are not like us, we fail to see what they are illuminating. By making our villains sub-human, we waste the understanding of our condition that their lives represent.

So what then of Michael? In the near term after his death, someone said that death restored his humanity – and the obvious truth of that really struck me. But sure enough, for some of us, it went to far. We rushed past his failings and tragedies and lionized him. This is almost as wrong-headed as the many years that we could only stare at the sad freakshow MJ had become. In both of those, we failed. To me, Michael was a hero for many reasons, and a tragedy (perhaps a monster – I don’t really know for sure) for others. When it comes to him, there is so much greatness and tragedy: who can really look at Michael’s pale frightening later years and not wonder about the role of race in America. His pushing the boundaries of race through his music certainly played out in my life. Who can contemplate the allegations of child abuse in his adulthood and not appreciate the abuse he was put through by his father in his youth? To ignore all this is folly, just as it is to ignore the fact that he brought so much joy to so many, and inspired the world to DANCE like no one else ever has.

More particularly, I think of Michael as an *American* hero and an *American* tragedy. His life and death reflected so much about what is great about our culture (the amalgam of black and white .esp in music, the optimism, and class mobility) and what is toxic about us too (the pressure of racism, and the dangers of fame, the love of morbid spectacle). And even his death itself showed us so much about who we, as Americans, are, for better and for worse.

In the end, there are no saints and there are no monsters, there are only men and women & lives both beautiful and sad. And plenty to be learned and appreciated from all.

Thanks for all the JOY and all the lessons MJ.

.ps

Here’s the Wikipedia article on MJ...

So another two months, another two good FlashDances. Both of these were a little smaller than I would like to be honest, but I still had plenty of fun. There were extenuating circumstances in each case, but still I can’t help but wonder if people still love ‘em as much as I do… I guess we’ll just see how it goes for the next few…

—

It turns out I had blown a bunch of easily replaced fuses & the next day, Sunday, we were back in business. So we headed back to ferry Plaza on a GORGEOUS Sunday night (three day weekend!) and rocked it out. Again I was hoping for bigger turnout, but given the reschedule & the fact that it had been Carnavale that day, & that many people are out of town, I think the 80 people or so (at the biggest) acquitted themselves quite well. The playlist is below.

Anyway – like I said, we’ll see how FD 27 goes. That one will be the Michael Jackson Memorial FlashDance in late June – it will be interesting to see what that is like – one year out from the best FlashDance ever! Check the videos of last year’s mega-awesome after the jump…

Here is the playlist for FlashDance 25 (4/10/2010) at the 24th St BART Station.

1. Flash – Queen
2. Yo Viviré – Celia Cruz
3. Hot Stuff – Donna Summer
4. O.P.P. – Ultimix Mix – Naughty By Nature
5. Mo Money Mo Problems – The Notorious B.I.G. Featuring Mase & Puff Daddy
6. You’re The One I Want In The Next Episode – Grease Vs Dr Dre & Snoop Dog
7. Bang Bang (feat. Adam Levine) – K’naan
8. Track 12 –
9. Late In The Evening – Paul Simon
10. Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground) – The Jacksons
11. I Gotta Feeling – Black Eyed Peas
12. Don’t Stop the Music – Rihanna
13. Yo Viviré – Celia Cruz
14. Track 12 –
15. Telephone – Lady GaGa & Beyoncé
16. The Real Funk (Original Mix) – Infekto [Money Shot]
17. (Keep Feeling) Fascination – The Human League
18. Touch My Girlfriend (Mariah Carey Vs. Avril Lavigne) – Titus Jones
19. Superstition (fade) – Stevie Wonder
20. Let’s Go Dancin’ (Ooh La, La, La) – Kool & The Gang
21. Hombre is in the groove (Deelite vs M.I.A.) – DJ Prince mashup
22. Track 15 –
23. I Want You Back – The Jackson 5
24. The Love You Save – The Jackson 5
25. Om Mangalam – www.Songs.PK
26. Hot Hot Hot – Bend It Like Beckham
27. M.I.A.’s Lips Ain’t Sealed – DJ not-I
28. Late In The Evening – Paul Simon
29. Livin’ la Vida Loca – Ricky Martin
30. Track 08 –

Here is the playlist for FlashDance 26 (5/30/2010) at Ferry Plaza:
(Note: We started with “Bohemian Rhapsody” rather than the traditional “Flash” for my late great friend, Bob Seymour…)

1. Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen
2. P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing) – Michael Jackson
3. Hung Up – Madonna
4. Tightrope (feat. Big Boi) – Janelle Monáe
5. Another One Bites Da Funk – Party Ben
6. Freedom 90 – George Michael
7. Mo Money Mo Problems – The Notorious B.I.G. Featuring Mase & Puff Daddy
8. Bachna Ae Haseeno Revisited – Vishal-Shekhar, Sumeet Kumar, Vishal Dadlani & Kishore Kumar
9. Telephone – Lady GaGa & Beyoncé
10. Hombre is in the groove (Deelite vs M.I.A.) – DJ Prince mashup
11. Hot Hot Hot – Bend It Like Beckham
12. Yo Viviré – Celia Cruz
13. I Can’t Go For That (No Can Do) – Hall & Oates
14. Flash Light – Parliament
15. Believe In Sexual Eruption (Snoop Dogg Vs. Cher) – A Plus D
16. Bulletproof – La Roux
17. Boyz – M.I.A.
18. Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough – Michael Jackson
19. Baby I’m A Star – Prince
20. Mundeya De Dil Hil Gaye – Kais Feat. D.S.I.
21. Sajanji Vaari Vaari – Sunidhi Chauhan & Shekhar Ravjiani
22. Break It Down Again – Tears For Fears
23. You’re The One I Want In The Next Episode – Grease Vs Dr Dre & Snoop Dog
24. Tightrope (feat. Big Boi) – Janelle Monáe
25. Big Girl (You Are Beautiful) – MIKA
26. Bizarre Love Triangle – New Order
27. Lovely One – The Jacksons
28. Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen

Hiking with Bob, Mokelumne Wilderness, July 2003 (courtesy of Eric Arons)

I have developed a few life rules over the years & I have added one more over the past few days:

Rule #1: Avoid Death

New–> Rule #2: Make Yourself Known (Intimately)

Rule #3: Leave Things Better Than You Found Them

…

Rule #23: Avoid Tusks

—

A few days back one of my dearest friends committed suicide. Even writing that still brings tears to my eyes. It’s a very recent occurrence and we are all sitting here struggling – through pain and loss, confusion and anger, and mostly just struggling.

One of the saddest and most instructive things (yes, I MUST try to make some good come from the chaos) of this whole event is that I just lost one of my best friends and I didn’t even know he was one of my best friends.

Tuesday, I was sitting at work when I got a Facebook chat from a friend – he was looking for my friend Bob’s family contact info, with “horrible news”. Very quickly, I learned that my friend Bob had taken his own life.

Then, in trying to find Bob’s family’s info, I thought to myself “OK – who is Bob’s best friend? Who knew him best of all us?” Bob and I had been really good friends for 13-14 years and he was a constant in my life, but I never felt I knew him really intimately like I do with my closest friends.

So I went through the list of Bob’s closest friends in my head… and one by one I realized that none of them knew him more than I did (Please let me be wrong about this? Anyone?) – sure they knew parts of him more (more time on the playa at Burning Man, more time hiking, more time singing karaoke) – but I knew other parts more and probably spent the most time overall with him. We were probably all on the same level of intimacy. That hit hard. It was me. I was one of Bob’s best friends. Oh god.

I shifted into acting like “the best friend” and thus went into “responsible-in-a-crisis” mode because, well, it is something I’m good at, and it needed to be done, and it gave me plenty to do other than cry my eyes out sitting in my office.

Within short order, I had contacted the friend who found him, figured out how to find his family, contacted his sister (& broke the news to her), contacted the coroner, put the coroner in contact with his sister & emailed all our friends with the news, informed the world on Bob’s FB page* and set up a get-together at my house for all our mutual friends. Then I went home early, went and talked to the friend who found him, set up the event at my house, got more info from the coroner, and then hosted the get-together at my house, and greeted everyone and then pulled them aside to give them the latest that I knew. I even tossed in some baby-sitting for good measure, so another friend could be with the group .

Since then it has been up and down. This has actually been a super fun week: Disposable Film Fest (Me & my Trike provide the sound for a bike-in movie night projected against the side of a building), Bike To Work Day (always one of my favorite days of the year), and now today Bay 2 Breakers**. I have had a blast, and I have cried and cried, and screamed and beat my fist on counters, and choked back sobs in inappropriate times and places. Mostly, I’ve just cried. And thought of Bob.

I’ve had two fascinatingly sad realizations in this time.

The first sad realization involved how we all knew Bob: People from all over Bob’s life have said the same thing: “I didn’t know him that well, but he was so good, and kind, and generous – I wish I had known him better.” It didn’t matter if they met Bob for 15 minutes on a bike ride with me, or had known him for 15 years, they all said they “didn’t know him that well” or “I wish I knew him better.”

Me too. I tried.

I have known Bob for 13 or 14 years (I wish I could figure out exactly when I met him) and from the get go, I liked him a lot. Everyone did and everyone who meets him does. Bob and I have spent lots and lots of time together – great times – most of the best times of my life have had Bob in them. But if you had asked me before Wednesday if Bob was one of my best friends, I would have said “No.”

I loved Bob, but I did not know him intimately. Unlike all the other people I consider best friends or super close friends, I had never gotten to that level where I felt like I really knew how Bob felt about things.

It wasn’t for lack of trying – I can think of many conversations where I tried to pry into Bob’s world – only to back off due his lack of enthusiasm, or my sense of respect for his boundaries. Usually, when you ask close friends sensitive questions about their lives, at some point they begin to tell you more than you ask & you learn about them. Bob always told me only what I asked – or less.

Even the last year or so, where Bob lived with me for 9 months on and off (while his house was being remodeled), there were ample opportunities and attempts to talk – but none of them bore much fruit.

If I had known Bob was ever truly sad, I would have pushed harder, I would have made it happen – but Bob was almost always pretty happy, and was always even-keeled. I knew of a few times he was down, but they always seemed to be fleeting and momentary….

The second painful realization was for me. The morning after I found out, I suddenly realized the scope of my loss. Bob had always been a rock in my life, a point of solidity and orientation, but I hadn’t realized that by his sheer constance and enthusiasm had become one of my best friends. I counted on him to always be there and life was always better with him around. My girlfriend (who has only been in my life for a few months), said “I was surprised when I heard you say that Bob wasn’t one of your best friends – he was always the first person you called…”

All my birthday parties, all my FlashDances, all my Thanksgivings, and lectures, and Sunday Streets, and Trike rides, and movies at my place, all the burritos, and all the nights going out dancing at Bootie and Non-Stop Bhangra, and the PIXAR movies or blockbusters, all my ImpromtiQs, all the Critical Masses, all my attempts at cooking my Mom’s Indian food, all. of. it. Bob was there 95% of the time. And every time, he made things better. My life was so much better for always being able to count on you Bob. I’m sorry I’ve only just now realized you were one of my best friends. I wish I knew you better.

—

In thinking about all this, my new rule becomes clear, as my friend Amy put so well: “let people, one person at least, in – share yourself, all of yourself, warts and all… ; connect deeply; share your burden; bare your soul…” And my girlfriend, Kimberly, added the other essential part of this: “that friends can only meet you halfway — they can ask, but you have to answer.” That is seriously worth noting – the responsibility is ours to reach out, as much as it is our friends’ responsibility to ask.

Bob was great on #1, #3, and as far as I know, #23. And I guess he taught us all the value of #2.

‘deep

.ps

I wish I believed in an afterlife, and I certainly don’t believe in a god. I think he’s just gone. As we all will be someday. I think Buckminister Fuller once said something like we are all just patterns in the food we eat, much like a knot is just a pattern in a rope. I guess that means, in the truest sense, Bob’s only afterlife is then as patterns in our minds: the cliché about living on in our memories is all we have. I’ll do my part, Bob.

.pps
Adrian Cotter has put up a tremendous set of photos of Bob here: “The Life And Times of Bob Seymour.” It’s fantastic. Check it out.

* People were already posting things on Bob’s FB page that made it clear that something horrible had happened & everyone else was getting worried – so I broke the news.

** All of these were the types of things I did with Bob.

It is done.  I have done it.  I have perfected my Mom’s Mattar Paneer recipe!

You don’t know what I’m talking about? You don’t know what mattar paneer is?  You poor, unwashed, heathen.  Wikipedia will tell you that mattar paneer is “is an Indian dish consisting of paneer (cheese) and peas in a sweet and spicy sauce.”

Swaran Jawa’s Mattar Paneer

This is the latest version of this recipe as of 5/7/10.

Ingredients

• Onions: 3 normal yellow
• Vegetable oil: 6 tablespoons
• Garlic: 4 big cloves
• Ginger: 1inch chunk
• Tomato sauce : 15 oz can
• Frozen peas: 20 oz
• Whole Milk: 1 Gallon
• White vinegar: 4 tablespoons

Spices

• Tumeric: 1/2 tsp
• Salt: 2 tsp
• Red pepper: 1/4 tsp
• Cumin seed: 1/2 TBSP
• Coriander seeds or ground coriander: 1/2 TBSP
• Cinnamon sticks: 2 inches of thin sticks or 1 of thick stick
• Cloves: 4
• Brown cardamom pods: 2 – (best to get Indian cardamom from Indian food store)
• Nutmeg: pinch
• Mace: pinch

Equipment

• Food processor
• Spice/coffee grinder
• Cheesecloth
• Large cooking pot
• Large microwave safe bowl
• Frying pan

Instructions

1. Combine 2.5 cups of water with 1 unit of masala base (see below) in large pot
2. Add 20 oz frozen peas
3. Put on high
4. Add 2 teaspoons of salt
5. Add 1/4 teaspoons of red pepper
6. Cover, leave on medium
7. At some point when peas are close to done, add 1 heaping TBSP of gharam masala (see below)
8. When peas are wrinkled/shriveled, the gravy is done – put on low until paneer is ready (see below)
9. You can add a half cup of water if you want more watery
10. When the paneer is done (lightly fried) dump it in the gravy, stir it up a little & you’re done!

Masala Base (gravy base)

NOTE: This makes 2 units of the masala gravy base. Save off half in refrigerator or freezer for later use.

1. Chop up onions really small in food processor (small diced)
2. Put onions into large pot and add 6 tablespoons oil & turn up to high heat stirring OFTEN to not burn
   • Oil is important to keep the bottom of the pot from becoming a mess of burnt onion.
   • For slower results put on medium heat & stir occasionally
   • If too dry add more oil, can be spooned out later
3. Chop up garlic cloves & ginger small in processor
4. Turn down onions to low, keep stirring – note slowly browning
5. When dark brown put in ginger/garlic mix
6. Put in 1/2 teaspoon of tumeric
7. When almost burnt, slowly start adding tomato sauce – keep stirring, waiting for oil to seperate? (spoon off?)
8. Put a little water in tomato can & slowly pour it in
9. NOTE you can always put on low & leave for a while at any stage
10. When deep reddish brown, it is done
11. USE HALF, REMOVE OTHER HALF & KEEP IN FREEZER FOR SOME OTHER TIME

Gharam Masala (spice mix)

NOTE: This makes 2 heaping TBSP of the spice mix. Save off half with your spices for later use.

1. Roast 1/2 tablespoon of cumin seed in a pan on the burner for a few minutes
2. Place the following ingredients in spice blender & grind until fine powder
   • 1/2 tablespoon of roasted cumin seed
   • 1/2 tablespoon of coriander seed
   • 2 inches of cinnamon thin sticks or 1 of thick stick
   • 4 cloves
   • 2 brown cardamoms – break pods & get seeds out (can only get at Indian store)
   • nutmeg & mace (pinch)
3. Use half of mix (1 heaping tablespoon) for 1 unit of masala base

Paneer (cheese):

1. Pour 3/4 gallon milk in large bowl (or all if you want more paneer! Yum!)
2. Microwave for 25-30 to BOIL (there will be a large bubble of air)
3. Stir in 4 tablespoons of white vinegar
4. Keep stirring
5. When cheese separates fully and gets clumpy (& liquid gets yellowish and clear) pour into collander with cheescloth
6. Squeeze out as much water as possible. The more water you get out, the better your paneer will be.
   • Initially squeeze out the water by hand, twisting the cheesecloth
   • Put the cheesecloth between two plates and squeeze the plates together as hard as you can.
   • Or, if you don’t want to squeeze by hand, use my Mom’s method instead: put cheesecloth between plates & stack books on it for a few hours
7. When cheese is firm & cohesive it is done – it should not be crumbly! should be like almost like tofu in terms of consistency
8. Put on a plate and slice into cubes – if it is crumbly, you did not press it enough
9. Put a few tablespoons of oil in a frying pan at high & then put down to medium low
10. Drop cheese cubes one by one in at side of pan to lightly fry them
11. Dry cheese in cloth towel to remove oil
12. Rinse cheesecloth after use

To download this recipe as a text file, click here.  As HTML, click here. Also, do check out the pictures I’ve posted – they should help a bit.

*As a fascinating aside, I have spent a lot of time wondering how Indians made this before the “discovery” of the New World – because tomatoes (used heavily in Punjabi cooking) are a New World fruit & thus could not have been in India before Columbus.  The biggest clue was when I asked my Mom, she explained that yogurt could be substituted instead of tomato sauce – so my best guess is that in ancient times, this was made with yogurt instead.  Fascinating!

A few weeks ago, the answer dawned on me:

Project Rickshaw!

Step 1: Find an awesome cute girl
(ahem)
Step 1: Find a rickshaw!

I checked Craigslist up and down the West Coast (& a few East Coast cities) and then eBay, and then Googled everything I could think of. Most of the links were about modern pedicabs and the like – but a few were gold, especially after I realized I needed to filter my search to classic Asian ones.* After much Googling I came up with a few different types like these…

Step 2: Find one actually for sale.
Many of the posts were for ones that were once on sale and had been sold or were otherwise unavailable. Luckily one of my first hits was a guy (Hi Jason!**) down in Orange County who happened to have a genuine ROMP (Rickshaw of My People)….it was gorgeous but was sadly missing it’s canopy. He had bought it off someone a few years earlier who had brought a few back with him from India & had no need of it. I really liked it, esp. the hand painting (see the photo below) , but I was really bummed about the canopy. I kept looking, but in the end decided the price was right, the seller was helpful & really it was just a beautiful machine – so it was on.

Step 3: I borrowed something big enough to fit a rickshaw in it (it turns out a rickshaw will just fit perfectly in a small SUV(!)), woke up crazy early last Sunday and drove down to Orange County. In a brutal day of driving I returned around midnight with a large disassembled rickshaw! (thanks for the loan Sean!)

Step 4: I put it back together, took it to a nearby bike shop, let them do some fixes on it & took it for a test ride. Up until that point, I had never ridden it – it’s chain was broken when I bought it – so there was no test ride. Thus, I was really excited to try it out.

Hmmmm. Not what I hoped.

It was crazy heavy, and really uncomfortable to ride. The seat was like a brick, the handlebars way too low, and the fixed-rod breaking system left me skeptical. But more than anything else – it was just heavy heavy HEAVY. I have strong legs, and bike constantly, but this really had me intimidated – would it be any fun?

I took it back to the bike shop, where we put on a new seat, and raised the handlebars as high as we could (only a little more) and did some other minor tweaks that rendered it a lot more comfortable, but there wasn’t much else to be done & I took it home. The only thing to do was to try it out for real as soon as possible.

I think this says “May your journey be blessed/auspicious”. (Thanks Srikar!)

Step 5: So yesterday was the day: the shakedown cruise. I decided to surprise Kimberly (the alpha-cuteness in my life) by picking her up on a cross town grocery shopping trip (she’s a fan of the Chinese shops on Clement).

And how was it? Well the bad news is that it was still crazy-super heavy, but the good news is that it was nonetheless SOOO MUCH FUN. The ride there by myself was slow (45 minutes) but fun, and the ride back with Kimberly and a bunch of groceries was even better. Kimberly got out and pushed once and decided to give me a ride for a block or so and we had to walk it up a hill – but wow – what fun! People all over town got excited or amused seeing us (We posed for lots of pictures). The passenger seat was comfortable and easy to sit on(another concern I had) & there was plenty of room for groceries It was just a great time, leisurely trundling around town on a gorgeous spring day.

The hardest part was biking up my street on the way home. By that time I was plenty tired & the slope up Valencia St. to my house (& on to Kimberly’s 4 blocks later) is long and steady. It was a big problem and no fun. But at least the rest of the day was fantastic.

CONCLUSION:
In the end, I LOVE MY RICKSHAW. It is seriously FUN! That being said, I’ve decided that as much as I love that it is a fully authentic Indian rickshaw, I’d rather have a somewhat less authentic Indian rickshaw that I’d use more often. The part I’m most excited about is the gorgeous passenger seat assembly with the hand-painted peacocks, lions, and Hindi script (see possible translation above). So I think I’m going to try to get a lighter frame bike for the front half, and have someone build me a lighter back assembly to put the original passenger seat on. I think that will be perfect & even more fun. Also hopefully they can build me a canopy We’ll see! So, stay tuned for the continuation of Project Rickshaw! (and if you know of any bike frame whizzes let me know!)

‘deep

.ps
And fear not Trikeasaurus fans! Trikeasaurus 2.0 is almost here!

Here are more pix from the shakedown cruise:

Thanks Fawn!

These next few shots are from Brian Kusler’s always-fun Flickr stream. There are a few more cute shots there! Thanks BK!

*This also fits in well with my new found appreciation and curiosity about the ancestral homeland, India. But I also have to say, I REALLY want one of these Taiwanese ones, bad!

Here are some more pics of these awesome Taiwanese ones… I found a tiny children’s version (so cool!( but it is way too small for actual use….))

If you ever come across one please let me know.

Also this cool Chinese one is on sale on eBay & I can’t help but to keep thinking about it

** BTW: Jason seems to have another one that he’ll probably be selling soon if anyone is interested.

(photo courtesy of KayVee.INC on Flickr)

Being a simple recreational trike, she was never really physically capable of the hard riding being Trikeasaurus required, but damn if she didn’t make a good try. Bent seat posts, broken fenders, and now finally, a cracked rear axle have taken a toll.

The cracks* in the axle have more to do with my new speaker-mount rig (super awesomely heavy duty, but alas too heavy) than the trike itself, but it just reinforced the fact that this light duty recreational trike was never designed for the kind of wear and tear I put it through…..

Fear not, Trike-fans! I’ve ordered a new Worksman industrial grade tricycle** to become Trikeasaurus 2.0. Trike 1.0 – we’ll miss ya!

*I’m planning on trying to get the cracks in the axle welded so it can be given/donated/sold to someone as it is still a useful light duty tricycle….

**I’m getting a “Mover“

You know that feeling you get on New Year’s Eve? Since there are soooo many fabulous parties and options and groups of friends doing various things, it’s hard to figure out what to do! And then you second guess yourself all night: “Am I at the right party – is this going to be the most fun I could be having right now?”

Maybe you’re lucky and don’t suffer from that – but I totally do. Or did.

These last two years, I haven’t had that feeling at all! I’ve finally figured it out! I was right where I wanted to be & had a fantastic NYE. Since I’m a little slow, I actually had to be convinced both times – but both times it turned out to be perfect. And this New Year’s was even more fun than last!

Last year, my friend Dan & I put together our first “New Year’s Eve Bike + Music Ride” with our music bikes & a good number of our friends. Frankly it was a ridiculously good time. So you’d think we would just do it again this year and repeat our supa-fun time.

But somehow, we just couldn’t commit to it. Neither of us were super excited. Neither of us were quite motivated. We had this vague sense that it should/could/probably would happen – but that is not quite enough activation energy to get our selves into gear…

Luckily, our friends insisted. By the night before New Year’s we had agreed. By a few hours before our ride, we were getting seriously excited. About 30 seconds into our ride I realized “Whoah – there is NOTHING I’d rather be doing right now” and it only got better as the night went on.

This year our ride was bigger, but also it was a warmer night and tons of people were out on the street and cheering when we came by (sorry I don’t have more video of that). The cops were tolerant, the streets were full of happy people, we picked up new folks along the way, and entertained MUNI drivers, revelers, skateboarders, and the general public – it was BIG fun. We started at around 8 and biked til 2am!

I can tell you right now what I’ll be doing next New Year’s Eve as long as I’m physically able! You guys should come too! SUPA-FUN! I guarantee it.

(And if you want more video – I posted Dan’s excellent video after the jump – note that some of the footage is the same, but some is different)

.ps
And yes, just like last year I got up super early the next day and made it out to Breakfast of Champions with the Space Cowboys & danced out the morning til I collapsed. I LIKE MY NEW YEAR’S TRADITION!

Ed. Note:

1. Ok, it has taken me a month to get around to posting about my Halloween party. LAME. Sorry! I hope some of you (any of you?) are still interested.
2. If you are just looking for pix of this year’s Halloween costume, check out the previous post … Rowrrrrr! (click here)
3. Finally, if you wanna skip my blather & see all the pics of the festivities (rather than the select few I’ve used here), I HIGHLY recommend Kevin Kranzky’s pix (& video!) here, and Steve Rhodes pix here – BIG THANKS GUYS!
4. Also, feel free to send me copy-edits and the like for this post (or any others) – I never have enough time to do a decent job on them! I’d appreciate it!

Courtesy of Steve Rhodes

Late September: David Miles* (a.k.a. “D. Miles” a.k.a. “Skate Godfather”) and I ran into each other and started talking about the need to remake a great Halloween party for San Francisco, in the wake of the demise of the Castro St. festivities.

Early October: My enthusiasm for the idea gets weighed down by my fear of getting smashed by the City and my fear that my Halloween costume will be a huge FAIL.

A week or so later: My continued fear about my costume began to be overpowered by the notion that something BIG and FUN needed to happen to fill the void of the old Castro Halloween. My fear of party failure, however, remained intact.

A week or so later: I realized that to attempt nothing was far sadder than a failed attempt. So, in my mind, it was ON. The biggest question mark was what would the City do if I tried to start a new free public Halloween party, like the Castro, but perhaps, eventually, even better? Would they shut us down? Throw us in the hoosegow? Look the other way? Realize that this was Good Thing™ and embrace our efforts? There was only one way to know…

October 22: I talked to D. Miles, wrote up an invite & sent it out to all my peeps, especially my FlashDance peeps. The idea was simple: the party would be like one of my FlashDances, but with more DJs and soundsystems than just mine! It would be like the Castro, but away from neighbors to annoy, and with a strong ethos of “costumes” and “fun” rather than “drunk” and “gawker”.

Later that day: I began trying to work various back-channels at City Hall to gauge their position and chance of shutting us down preemptively.

Days later: My invite had spread to the local blogs: the SFist, then SF Bay Guardian’s blog & then SFStation. The Facebook invite was steadily gaining attendees. I began to hear numerous rumors that City Hall was aware of what I was doing & was planning on looking the other way as long as nothing destructive was happening & no traffic was being blocked…. I began to stop worrying about a shut down & started worrying about many other things

Friday, October 30th: Trikeasaurus breaks an arm during Critical Mass. The sound system was OK, but my ability to transport my sound system easily was compromised. Dag. Unbeknownst to me this was the beginning of many small tragedies that made for a tough weekend. At least my Halloween costume was finished. (I give it a B-.)

Saturday, October 31st: The numbers on my Facebook invite came in at around 550. I noticed that a great deal of them were kids from high school – which was great, but would they appreciate my kind of dance music? That became my primary worry. (I don’t have any Jonas Brothers!) I also worried about the possibility of getting shut down, but not nearly so much. Would enough people show for it to be fun (at least 100). Would too many people show up who were more drunken-mob than fun & cool? There was PLENTY to worry about.

That night I packed up my gear and costume (Thanks Bob & Palak!) – made all the more difficult by the broken Trikeasaurus – & headed out to Justin Herman Plaza, nervous as hell.

I arrived to find somewhere around 500 (!) people already there and rarin’ to go! Yipes! We were ON!!!

I immediately started setting up my equipment.

Within seconds 3 cops showed up and shut me down.

We were OFF!!!

The cops made it very clear that since I had no permit, if I turned on my sound system it would be confiscated. I was stunned. They were nice about it, but completely unyielding. Ugh. SO. DEPRESSING. I was really upset.

I think my contacts at City Hall did reflect City Hall’s intent, but I wasn’t dealing with City Hall, I was dealing with SFPD. And they were having none of it.

Anyway, I had planned slightly for this contingency (thanks Dan!), but was sure that whatever we did, the cops would just show up and shut us down again. So disappointing. It took me about 10 minutes to clear out my head and decide what to do: Yes, I was certain if we moved to a new location the cops would shut us down AGAIN. Which would mean just jerking everyone’s chain a second time. But on the other hand, I felt like I owed it to everyone who showed up to TRY didn’t I?

So, I sent out a message via SMS as to the new locale and biked off (in the opposite direction I needed to go). Minutes later I doubled back & arrived at the new location to find a news van already there (not good, they’d just attract cops) but we went for it (a bit aways from the van)… and started setting up shop & hoping people would show.

Within about 30 minutes, we had around 250 people The new location was gorgeous (what a view!) and the people were, as usual, fantastic. D. Miles made it over with his lighting rig and sound system and we had a great FlashDance! Another DJ (go Blayze!) showed up and set up a second dance party near mine & D’s. And this time, the cops never bothered us.

Many, MANY, many things went wrong that night** – but wow what a great time. Numerous people have told me that it was the best Halloween Party they’d been too and the best FlashDance I really really want to thank everyone who showed to both parts of the evening, and give a special thanks to those who signed up for the SMS list & showed up at the backup location – you people rock! Thank you for making a GREAT night for everyone! And my apologize for the copsmack to all of you who just made it to the first location & not the second….

Now we just have to fix it for next year! No Copsmack in 2010! Here is Steve Jones’s (my favorite crusading local journalist!) take on the SFPD’s Halloween-stomping in the Guardian…

‘deep

* David is the center of the roller disco folks in Golden Gate Park, and the man behind Black Rock Roller Disco at Burning Man. He has been throwing street parties for skaters for 30 years here in SF – D. is legendary.

** After our second set up, I was plagued by sound system problems perhaps due to moisture (that’s my best guess?) – I’m really sorry for all the frustration the intermittent sound caused! And super thankful D.’s sounds system was there to take up the slack. Additionally, a forgotten-at-home hard drive meant I had to DJ from an iPod which is a good bit more difficult and a lot less fun. These and a lot of other small scale snafus really made the evening a struggle

So my long tradition of ridiculously ambitious Halloween costumes continued this year with my second attempt at a dinosaur (to see more, click here for a quick summary or here for all the pics). I did pretty well – I give it a B-.

(click the picture to see all the pix)

The genesis of this year’s dino, other than my general fascination with the beasties, was the last dino costume, the Deepasaurus (from Halloween 2006). While parts of it worked well (the head!), the totality of the costume left a LOT to be desired. As my friend Peat generously put it at the time “It’s a good 1.0″ Ironically, just as I was finishing that costume, I realized how to make it much better, and with MUCH less effort!

So now, 3 years later – I tried it.

(click the picture to see all the pix)

What I ended up creating, while much better than Dino 1.0, was a far cry from what I wanted (I made some mistakes!), but still I can’t really complain. It looked great in the end! My costumes are always an iterative process anyway… and I’m pretty happy with Dino 2.0 – The Glamosaur!

Read on if you want to know how I did it…

Before I go any further though, I should also give a shout out to my co-conspirator Catherine Tullner! I usually do these things solo, but as Cath is the best costume maven I know, I couldn’t resist having her help me out & she was HUGE help! Here’s her Halloween costume – fantastic!

[Ed. Note: before reading further, I STRONGLY RECOMMEND opening this link (to the Making of pix) in a separate window so you can follow along with the pix as you read what follows.]

So the key to my idea of a dinosaur costume is making the bulk of the beast. The last time I tried that by stacking foam – which turned out to be a bad idea One of the biggest points of failure of this “stacked” method was the tail. I made a tail that way for the last dino & days before I was done I realized that it was horribly problematic & essentially my dino had no tail! I scrambled and came up with another tail idea involving a foam “noodle”, like the ones kids use for swimming (at the local hardware store, the sell hollow ones to wrap pipes). I basically just wrapped carpet foam around one of these noodles & voila, I had a tail….

Immediately, I realized that that technique was MUCH better than how I created my costume at the time – so I filed it away for the next attempt. Which was this year.

So I took some noodles and made a basic skeleton (just some ribs attached to a spine) & then wrapped carpet foam around it.

This is where the first problem arose: how to close the carpet foam around the skeleton. Sewing would rip the foam & duct tape doesn’t stick to it. I considered gluing it together, but would I be able to find a glue that didn’t just get absorbed into the notoriously absorbent foam?

As I was thinking about this, I was also getting increasingly worried about the second major problem I knew of – which was coloring the body after I made it. Trying to paint the last dinosaur was a HUGE pain because of the aforementioned foam absorbency. I ended up using latex house paint last time to put a paintable base coat on it, which worked but was super heavy and a ginormous pain.

Eventually, I decided to kill two birds with one stone. Both problems would be solved if I just wrapped the whole foam beast in duct tape. A. lot. of. Duct. Tape. Despite various misgivings about this plan, time was running short & so I decided to go for it. In hind sight, I wish I had tried the glue, or come up with something better.

So thus began the process of duct taping the hell out of the body. This mostly worked well and made for a pretty sturdy costume. But again, like last dino, the tail was a big problem. The first problem was that in taping it we had weird bunches around it that required more tape and more cutting of the foam & it ended up being less bunched, but also not looking right until I added more foam layers – which turned out to be fragile (the costume is currently ripping on these extra layers.

The biggest mistake, though, was in the body geometry. I should note that the dino geek in me wants to make it clear that this mistake resulted in the body having a biologically more accurate design, but was not what I wanted / needed

When we were taping up the body, we taped the tail going straight along the spine – which is anatomically accurate – it is how modern science realizes that dinos must have been shaped. But it is a horrible geometry for a human costume. I needed a geometry more like how we thought dinos looked when I was young: with the tail dragging behind, rather than waving in the air as a counter balance. Fundamentally I needed the “Man in A Godzilla Suit” look, not the “Jurassic Park Velociraptor” look. To wit:

(from “Dinosaur Odyssey” by Scott Sampson)

So the good news is that I made the tail anatomically correct! Straight along the spine. The bad news was that I was a guy in dino suit dammit! I needed the old-school tail drag geometry! You have no idea how much anguish this caused for me But there was no time to fix this…. so we moved on…

After duct-tape-a-palooza, I then made the head by folding a square of thick foam around a balloon & then taping it into the shape I wanted. Then, I made a lower jaw out of another piece of thick foam & then more taping to shape it right.

I then made gloves and feet out of more foam & in the case of the feet I taped the foam around some cheap bedroom slippers I bought. These feet and gloves were MUCH better than dino 1.0′s.

That left me with a giant duct-tape-asaurus. Amusing enough – but without that essential ‘Deepness! But really, ‘Deepness is just a few bottles of glitter away!

That brought me to the next mistake, albeit not a huge deal – I started applying the glitter with Elmer’s glue – which is fine but not great for a flexible surface. Spray mount was a much better choice and I did a lot of it with spray mount. Finally, after the glitter dried, I painted the whole thing with a coat of water based polyurethane so that I wouldn’t flake off all the glitter everywhere As it is, a week later, there is still a bit of glitter sprinkled along the hallway at work

I also added some green tights for the workday & some green sparkly pants for Halloween itself. Oh and I put LED blinky lights (from my bike) inside the yellow ping pong balls that I used for eyes. I wish there were pictures of these touches, but oh well. [Update 12/1: This video at the 30 second mark shows the eyes pretty well - Thanks Kevin!]

And lo – Glamosaurus was born.

.ps

The irony of all this is that just like last time, as I was finishing the costume, I came up with a way to make it much better, faster and cheaper. If I had a few more days, I probably would have tried it So this means there will be a Dino 3.0 in a few years…..

I could go on and on explaining that love, but suffice to say there was a point when the young ‘Deep, circa 5 or 6 years old, decided to seek a better parenting opportunity* by running away from home. To begin my new life on my own, I carefully chose the three things I’d take with me: a blanket, a spoon, and a jar of JIF Extra Crunchy: I have always been serious about my peanut butter. It is a conscious effort not to eat peanut butter every day of the week**.

So about a year & a half ago, I came across this blog post by someone who loves peanut butter even more than I do (shocking! & perhaps a bit scary, actually) & ever since I have been looking for this “Parkers Farm” Peanut Butter of which he speaks. It had been a long and fruitless search and I had all but forgotten, until one day on Facebook, one of my friends mentioned her favorite snack*** & happened to include the brand of the peanut butter involved! I realized that she knew where to find it! Woot!

After getting the scoop, I immediately went and bought some. And……. lo! I had been delivered from darkness! It is truly the best peanut butter I have ever had. Whether you like all natural or not, whether you like creamy or not, whether you like sweetened or not, it doesn’t matter. This is IT:

• in San Francisco, it can be found at Whole Foods South of Market. [UPDATE 11/23/09: I have been informed that it is also at Whole Foods in Noe Valley & Delessio's Market near the PanHandle.] All Whole Foods don’t carry it, but here is a link to the Parkers Farm company & I think they have a link to some of the distributors.
• It is kept in the refrigerated case (like where they keep cottage cheese and butter.)

If you like mainstream peanut butter (as I do), you’ll find the honeyed ones are where it is at!
If you like natural peanut butter, I still think you’ll like the sweeter honeyed ones, but by all means go for the “Plain” if need be. I prefer the “Honey Crunchy”, but the “Plain” is also great & a significantly different excellent experience from the honeyed ones. The “Honey Creamy” is practically as good as the “Honey Crunchy.” There is a “Plain Crunchy”, but they don’t seem to carry it at my Whole Foods.

The second amazing thing about this peanut butter, after the taste, is that it’s ALL NATURAL – and the ingredients are ONLY: peanuts & salt or peanuts, honey & salt (in the honeyed case). WOW.

The third amazing thing is that unlike all other natural peanut butters I’ve tried, the oil doesn’t seem to ever separate! They have some process miracle going on in there. Fascinating. My mind keeps returning to this question – how do they do it?!!!

So, get to it people! You won’t be disappointed! And if you are ever at my house, feel free to ask for a taste spoon. And thus I shall spread The Gospel!

‘deep

* Since my Mom will no doubt read this, let me state for the record that I was getting fine parenting of course.

** Unfortunately, the latest pictures of me suggest that I have been… BUT I HAVEN’T – which of course, begs the question “What is the point of gaining weight if you aren’t doing it by getting to eat peanut butter 24/7?” – clearly my life (& my waistline) is amiss! I need to fix that – but the good news is that means more PF Peanut Butter for all of you Use it well!

*** THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU SHANTHALA!!! And big thanks to my favorite blog Daring Fireball, & ESPECIALLY Davenetics for bringing me to the light.

.ps It is amusing to me that both of my food reviews have taken on biblical tones, and probably heretical ones at that. I’m clearly gonna burn in hell.