Halloween with DJ Towa Tei

DJ Towa Tei a.k.a. Jungle DJ Towa Towa emailed me about a week ago asking about cool places to visit in San Francisco. He is a world famous DJ and music producer who has worked with Bjork, Kylie Minogue, Jungle Brothers, Biz Markie and Mos Def, among others and had a dance hit with Deee-lite. I kinda know him because he is also a customer of my art website's shop. He also has bought stuff from my friend Erik too who lives in San Francisco. Towa agreed to have us show him around when we offered. He was strictly in the city to check out art mostly Barry McGee. Since music is his profession and he was sorta on vacation, he wasn't interested in going to clubs or record shops like Erik and I thought. In a way, I can understand that. We picked him up downtown, he was smoking underneath the overhang at the side entrance of his hotel. Erik parked the car on the street and we got out and introduced ourselves. He was a short, thin man. He had short, thin (not thinning) hair and wore thin, clearish eyeglass frames. He was not sporting the thick, bob haircut and black, thick eyeglasses that I was expecting. No one would know who he was even if he went in a record store. He was very softspoken, but spoke English very well and was pretty talkative. He researched a lot about San Francisco and had a lot of questions. We talked a lot about art and Erik and I occasionally asked him about music. From what I remember, Towa has a new album coming out around March and he will also have a book of photos released about the same time. The front and back cover will be Barry McGee artwork. No t-shirts or anything else will be reprinting the art, as requested by Barry. Since Towa has sort of a business / friend relationship with Barry, he planned to visit him sometime though he has never met him. He planned on showing us a picture of the album cover from his laptop (at the hotel) because he didn't want it leaked on to the public on the web yet. Because of the busy day, we didn't have time to see it. We first went to Southern Exchange gallery and looked at the artist box sets. Barry McGee had some photos in a stitched envelope printed with one of his characters. Then we drove to Alemany Flea Market. Towa was hoping to find some art. We then looked at the graffiti walls of Pyscho City with the tribute to Mike Dream. Dream was a gifted graffiti artist who was shot a while ago. Erik and I met him and Vogue at the train tracks near Fruitvale in Oakland many years ago. He and his crew (TDK?) dominated the area at that time. And he was a nice guy to us being toy writers, at least I was one. Towa, Erik and I then went to West Portal where Towa took pictures through the driveall the way there. Then we went to the Super7 store in Japan town. I bought a zine by Josh Cochran. His art looks like David Choe - from of his drawing style, I guess Josh went to CCAC too. We then went to Kinokuniya (large bookstore) across the street. Yeah, Towa was not recognized even in Japan town community where I think he is even more popular or recognized in Japan. We then went to Erik's house and talked and looked at Erik's art collection. I joked with Towa that I had a demo CD to give him. He said yeah, he'd like to hear it. I said I was only kidding. I thought he'd get tired of getting CDs from people all the time. He doesn't mind. He said he didn't like when people try to sound like him or someone else and appreciates people who are original. I guess some people probably make demo cds based on what they think Towa wants to hear. We took Towa back to his hotel. He didn't even officially check in to his room yet and he wanted to rest. We left Towa and I had dinner with Erik and his wife at Tai Chi on Polk Street. On the BART train home that evening it was a funny site to see all the Halloween costumes of the people in San Francisco. I saw trains and stations full of revelers on their way to the city. Yep, Halloween came to a close quickly for me as I arrived to home in time to catch my kids going to bed for the evening.

Buyer Beware #1 / High Tech Woes Part 2

Maybe you have previously read about my purchase of Home DVD Recorder. Well all is resolved as much as can be so I can give the details of it and my other purchase warnings. I bought an Aspire Digital Home DVD Recorder model AD-8091. It was $200 ($150 with rebate) from ECOST.com. A great price I thought but I've had a lot of problems with it. Once customer support at Aspire (which took a few emails at the company website) confirms it is a defective machine, I get a case number to give to ECOST to get a return request (RMA). I had to buy another machine to replace it and would be credited when ECOST got the return. I was pretty scared that I was being billed for 2 machines. I have 30 days since the recorder was sent to return but I waited til I got the 2nd machine to compare and not leave myself without a DVD player. When I got the new DVD recorder, I noticed it had the same problem. What can I do? I took the old machine to Fedex to ship back because I had to get it back within 3 days. Shipping cost like $40. ECOST pays for return shipping if you fax them the receipt but only for GROUND SHIPMENT. I used a slow overnight method because I was sure they weren't gonna pay $80 to overnight a $150 recorder. No one specifically told me I had to ship ground but that I had to return it in 30 days and return shipping would be paid. ECOST told me they were only gonna pay me $25 for the shipping. I didn't argue, I was happy they accepted the return that was probably a day late. And I chalk it up to learning a lesson, so read on. BE WARNED: As of my experience, ECOST's policy is if you return something, you are charged a 10% restocking fee when the box is unopened. If you return something opened and it is not confirmed to be defective, you are charged a 50% restocking fee. You pay for the return postage in those cases too. Not when the product is confirmed defective. Also at ECOST, the website has banners all over the site that say FREE SHIPPING. Yes technically shipping is free but they charged me about $5.95 for HANDLING. My advice is always look at the small print. But in general be wary of return policies especially when you buy big ticket, heavy items. Now so my DVD player still has problems. I emailed Aspire's support dozens of times trying to find solutions. They will take it back and see if it is defective which no one is really sure. BUt I don't want to have to ship again and be without a recorder and then what if they said they don't see a problem??? I told the tech guy to check the one I returned to ECOST. He said he would probably not see it for a while. I pretty much left it at that. I have a year warranty I think in case something really goes wrong. My recorder is workable I guess. I eventually found a website where I read reviews of a lot customers of the same product that had a lot of problems. I can't find the link right now, but I think it was a shopping site.

Buyer Beware #2 / Heroe's Club - Art of Toy.com

I bought what I thought was a KAWS Accomplice (pink bunny) vinyl figure at Heroe's Club / artoftoy.com for like $34 + $10 postage/tax (originally when released approx. $99) and it turned out to be a cheap, plastic, badly painted bootleg figure. I emailed KAWS for help and he confirmed it was a bootleg but said he could not stop the store from selling bootlegs (for whatever reason). Art of Toy claim it was listed as a product in KAW's style but didn't necessarilly mean it was made by KAWS. I immediately emailed back and asked if people can make Mickey Mouse toys and say Walt Disney's Style?? That's straight up forgery in my opinion. Now if it was a Green Turtle figure that said KAWS style - I would have been cautious about buying it because I'm not sure it exists. But it was a Pink Bunny figure which KAWS has really made called the Accomplice. Art of Toy are total frauds. I bought a Michael Lau figure from them before for a cheap price and now I am worried it is a bootleg too. You cannot return clearance items, but after complaining, Art of Toy offered to accept return at 30% restock and I would have to pay postage. 30% is a joke. I counter-offered $25 credit back and I would keep the figure or they could pay me extra to ship the figure back. I figured it was a reasonable settlement because they probably got the bootleg in Hong Kong for $5. Art of Toy responded with the same email about returning it for 30% restock fee but the text was larger and bolder. They did not answer any of my bootleg issues or settlement issues. I said screw them and wanted full refund including return postage if they wanted it back. So I emailed them I would file a claim with the Santa Clara County Consumer Protection Unit. A non-bias mediater reads the case and tries to make a settlement. A woman from the SCCCPU calls me and says well it said KAWS style and I argue my case with the lady. KAWS makes a pink bunny figure called Accomplice and Art of Toy sells a pink bunny that is not made by KAWS but in KAWS style. I had to reiterate these are not just kids toys, they are collectable, limited made art pieces. KAWS' name is being devalued by hundreds of dollars. She realized what I was saying and would talk to a D.A. about pursuing charges. Then I get a call a few days later from her that Art of Toy will give me a full refund if I return the item. I ask if they are paying for my postage to send it back and she said she didn't ask them for that. I said well what about them selling bootlegs? She says that only KAWS, the artist can file a complaint against them with a lawyer. I decided to mail the figure back to Art of Toy with the cheapest postage. It was only like $1.35, so I added a tracking number for $.55 cents thinking those crooks would probably say they never got it. Well eventually they credited me the money but I thought they were very rude when I emailed them about it - they said I should ask my bank about the money. Would you take that as rude? KAWS recommended I tell everyone about my experience with Art of Toy so people will avoid them and that is what I am doing. I know they get community awards in San Francisco and get voted best toy store in the city and even COMPLEX magazine mentions them as a place to go, but I am saying they are frauds and they are very rude when they get questioned on it. They admitted it was a FAKE to the Santa Clara County Protection Unit but said they only get a few of those. Like that makes it any better. Buy your legit figures at www.kidrobot.com or www.ToyTokyo.com.

Buyer Beware #3 / Mixtapecity.com

Straight Up I email them and ask if they sell burned CD copies or do they sell the actual DJ issued releases because I've gotten CD copies before. The guy, Big Mike emails me and says they only sell the originals. Guess what? After spending $40 bucks with them, what do I get in the mail? Burned copies with cheap labels. The CD inserts are even cut the wrong size and keep slipping out of the CD case. Tell me, have you ever bought a CD and the the insert keeps slipping out of the case? I don't think so. I found these guys while searching for the cheapest priced mixtapes and I tell you, now you know why they are cheap. Anyways, Mike Paypals me back the refund but then I have to pay the PayPal fee to accept it. Oh well, I've learned that the Santa Clara County Consumer Protection Unit wouldn't do crap about it. These mixtape burning fools are the worse because it's like they're printing money. DO NOT BUY from them because for a dollar or so more you might as well get the limited-made original made from the DJ's master.

City of God and My Boss's Daughter DVD Reviews

These 2 titles are the best DVDs that I rented in a while. City of God is about growing up in a town in Brazil called "City of God" (in English). The story is of a young guy and his life with gangsters. In this world of crime, he aspires for more in this poor city. It is a violent movie, but has heart. It is a story about brothers, first love, etc. so there is much more going on besides the crime back drop. What is more interesting is that the story is based on a true story. The DVD extra includes a documentary on the state of affairs in a city similar to City of God. It has viewpoints from a cop, a high ranking police official, a working resident of the city, and a gangster. In a nutshell, a city so poor needs organized crime to take care of it and the only way a police force can control millions of poor people is by force. I see a lot of parallels in this in what probably happens here in America. This movie has opened my eyes only because this is a world that I knew nothing about before. You think of Rio De Janeiro and think of it's beaches, ocean and sun, but up in the hills live the people who can only view the ocean from a distance in poverty. Definitely a must see movie. It has internationally garnered awards and great reviews. On a different note is My Boss's Daughter DVD. It is a comedy movie starring Ashton Kutcher of That 70's Show fame. I almost didn't get this movie at Blockbuster. It was a toss up between this and My Baby's Daddy, so I read the reviews on the back of each DVD to compare and I choose My Boss's Daughter. And let me tell you I was not disappointed. There are actually a lot of funny moments and great comedic co-stars like Andy Richter and Molly Shannon from Saturday Night Live plus other actors I've not recognized. Aston plays a character that wants to go out with the Boss' Daughter but aftter a misunderstanding, Ashon's night seems to get worse by the moment. I didn't want to reveal too much but through much of the movie I was cracking up out loud. Great characters and funny dialogue.

IKEA for breakfast?

I am the absolute IKEA fan. High design and low cost are great goals in a company. Today (Sunday), I had the urge to go out for breakfast so I jokingly suggested to Nich that we go to IKEA (what other furniture store has a restaurant?). She was all into it so I said let's go. We leave after 10 am hoping to still catch breakfast. I've always wanted to try the Swedish breakfast items (I have an adventurous appetite. We drive to East Palo Alto fast, get in the parking lot and run inside. We see a sign for breakfast ending at 11 am so we hurry to get the elevator that goes up to the cafeteria. They are a few people in line and about 30 other people dining with my same breakfast idea. I was hoping to see different Swedish breakfast selections but instead it is just the $1.99 special consisting of eggs, bacon or sausage, hash browns, pancakes with lingon berry jam and a drink. I get coffee. Nich gets the lingonberry drink from the soda fountain. We also order extra sausage for the kids. Since I didn't see a breakfast menu, I ask the cashier if there is another special. She says that is the only one and is a good deal for $1.99. I said, "I know, but I thought there was a more Swedish breakfast offered'? The lady tells me that usually they have Swedish pancakes but they ran out and also offer (sounded like) Petty fors? but not on today's menu. I'm dissapointed slightly but too hungry to have it bother me. Note to self: getting the side of (3) sausages for the kids was $.99, better off ordering the breakfast special next time. The food was a little bland but I'm sure that is to satisfy all customer so I added a little salt and pepper and luckily butter and jam were included on the plate. I wish they had tabasco sauce. The eggs looked hella fluffy. Nich thought they were made from powdered eggs. I don't know about that, real eggs seem cheap enough- but I ate hers too. We sat in the kids area and let Gmar and Emar run around. I really couldn't relax with them running around the dining area. As usual when we go out with the twins, I had to eat as fast as I could.

American Idol in Bakersfield

Drove down to Bakersfield to see the American Idol 3 Tour (from Las Vegas). My sister and I had front row center seats. These were the best seats I've ever gotten for a show. I don't know how my sister got them because she literally got them only 2 weeks ago through Ticketmaster. I think some VIPS bailed out so the seats were available because everybody seating in our row had VIP stickers and backstage passes around their necks. The crowd was a real mix of people. You had mostly the young kids and parents, young couples and some older couples making up the audience. I didn't think I was a big American Idol fan, I mean I watched the show and Nich and I voted a few times for fun, but learning that I was going to see the concert, I got really psyched!!! And yes, I had an awesome time. Because what you see on the tv show, you see on stage. You don't see the competitors, you see friends. You rooted for these kids for weeks, you know their life stories, you've seen their families. So seeing them live, it's like you have become a part of their dreams. I mean when you first saw these kids on tv, they were waitresses, cooks, students but now they have hit the big time. They sincerely look happy and appreciative of where they are and I really felt they gave 110% in their performances. My parents and Uncle Ben came with us, which I never thought would happen in my life that my parents would come to a concert with me. But they were sitting about 20 rows behind us so it doesn't really count. It was a family affair mostly because we have a relative on stage. Jasmine Trias, the 3rd runner up in American Idol is somehow our distant cousin. I'm sure she hasn't met any of us before, but her grandparents sent my family pictures when American Idol was on (probably to round up some votes?). So that's my proof.

Leaving for Las Vegas

Took a Thurday night flight to Las Vegas from San Jose. My big sister, Joss was having a 40th birthday at my parent's house. With a lechon pig prepared and a Hawaiian type luau catered. I couldn't miss it!! I took a late SouthWest flight leaving San Jose at 9 pm. When I arrived in the airport, the first thing I noticed was a hint of cigarette in the air. I walked fast through baggage claim to get outside to the smell of 4 lanes of exhaust. I endured a long fiasco of trying to find my sis and her friend at the airport, I'll skip the details. They were waiting for me in baggage claim while I was at passenger pick-up on the sidewalk. Literally after 2 hours, we finally met up and went off to Sam's Town Casino to get something to eat. It is like the closest Casino to my parent's house. I ordered the Breakfast Bar for $4.99. I didn't particularly want it but it was the best deal on the menu and I went to Vegas for the deals. Plus my sister, Vegas resident and buffet expert, reiterated the sole benefits of buffets; eat what you want and as much as you want. Hey, you don't have to bend my arm, I'm sold. The Breakfast bar was small and just opened. It was the usual eggs, bacon, sausage, potatoes, oatmeal, fruits, biscuits. Just normal & not out of the ordinary. No custom made omelettes, pancakes or belgium waffles but I guess that's what you can expect at a midnight buffet. We went to play some penny slot machines. I usually don't like to gamble because I am a big loser, but my sister talked me into having some fun. Now I always thought penny slots were for the cheap people and they never paid off anyways. I mean we're talking pennies. But really they can take your money really fast. You gamble based on line combinations (straight across and zigzag patterns). This ain't the typical 3 in a row stuff. You bet if you want to multiply the value of the lines you're playing (so to multiply your payouts). Doing all this can make it $1.50 a pull. Anyways my sister directed me to a game to try. I don't remember the name. I think it had animated barnyard animals. Anyways, I turned $5 into $25. It happened really fast and I was like wow, so I hit the cash out button, scared to lose it. Meanwhile my sister and her friend were losing money, about $20 - $40 and said hey try something else. I would just watch them play. Joss told me to play the Stripper slot machine. Now don't get excited it is just cartoons and nothing was explicit at all. Joss said, "you got to see the bonus round, it is funny". My sis said $5 may go quick so I put a $10 in. I played it and it was fun. I got up to $37 dollars at my peak and lost all the way down to $12 at my lowest but my average win was at $27. It seemed I could do no wrong. I'd lose a little and win a little but still be around $27. I luckily hit all the little bonuses several times. I was there for what seemed like hours but eventually cashed out at $30 to find my sister. They played for a little while more and we left the casino at about 2:30am. Man, that was late. When we got to my parent's house my mom waited up for us and I got a cold soda. The casinos are so smokey, it made me cough constantly. Being from California, I am not used to smoke indoors. I needed to drink for a while. I finally went to bed at 4 am. Off to American Idol tour in the morning.

Labor Day in San Francisco

Went to San Francisco to hang with my friend, Erik. He lives near the Haight so it is always fun to visit. We checked out The Beautiful Losers show at Yerba Buena Gardens. The show featured KAWS, TWIST, Margaret Kilgallen, Phil Frost,Ed Templeton and many more. There were displays of skateboards, action figures, zines, installations, photos, multimedia, etc. It was great. Also we checked out the Super7 store in Japantown. It is a newly opened store based on the magazine Super7. The magazine is devoted to mostly Japanese Toy Culture and the store has magazines, zines, books,toys and original art. I bought the Super7 magazine with Booska and Gary Baseman on the cover. Gary Baseman is one of my favorite artists. He has done illustrations for Rolling Magazine to animation for Disney. Lately he seems to have entered the fine art world and more recently have been designing collectable toy figures. I also bought "Pencil Fight" - an all art zine published by a cool guy named Bwana Spoons. I did an interview of him in my first zine called "FLICK". This particular issue is the limitedrelease with the signed and numbered silkscreened covers. The zine has plenty of drawings, illustrations, reviews and interviews. I also got a freebie comic called "Reggie 12" based on Ralph Stevenson's (Brian Ralphs) characters that were first seen in Giant Robot magazine. Guest artist in the comic was Martin Cendreda. I interviewed him in my latest zine, "The Collage Dropout". PLUG: To get that zine, hit me up at artchemist (dot) com. That is my website. I don't have a lot of Martin's comix so it is always nice to see his art. Same with Ralph Stevenson. I always look forward to seeing what stuff this guy does next.

Interracial Racism

We (me and Nich)had our first encounter with interracial racism on Thursday. Nich and I had our twins at the park playing, I was sitting at the side watching them. I was approached and asked which kid was mine. "Which kid was mine," I thought? "Well both kids are mine," I said defiantly. Why would he think different. He then said, (referring to Nich) "but she's not Chinese". He was not understanding I can have a wife of a different race and we weren't there at the park separately with one kid each. By the way, I am only about one eighth Chinese. I should mention this person doing the questioning was about 7 years old. I told him, noticing he had brothers and sisters (there at the park too), that my two kids were sisters just like he has brothers and sisters. I don't know why I said it, maybe to help him understand you have parents that have kids and we were parents that have kids. It's kinda hard to create a life long lesson for the kid on the spot that rationalizes and make an analogy that he can understand. Well then he said, "You have to be Ethiopian, because Ethiopian is the best!" (he was Ethiopian). He then said to me, "To be Ethiopian, you would have to gain more weight".(??? huh?)

Shaolin Soccer DVD review

What happens when an unemployed, ex-soccer star and an unemployed Shaolin Master come together? They decide to form a soccer team! An oddball assortment of Shaolin masters are recruited to be in the team and they must rise against all odds to come together, learn soccer, and compete. The movie was more over the top than I expected. I thought it would be pure kung fu and athletics, but it was more about flaming soccer balls and floating in the air special effects. Nothing wrong with that. I am just not used to seeing such big budget, special effects in Hong Kong movies. Stephen Chows wrote, directed and stars as the Shaolin Master and star player. I believe this movie has earned great reviews and movie awards internationally. I have waited a long time to see this on dvd. The dvd has no special features but contains the US theater and Chinese theater versions. The only difference I've seen is the US version edited a few parts out to make the story flow faster and they took out some gags. Overall the movie is entertaining.

Hi-Tech Woes Part 1

Well it seems I have bad luck with hi-tech or probably bad luck in general. I broke down and bought a Home DVD Recorder. I got a killer price through rebate at ecost.com. I figure it was about time to get into DVD recording. Our VCR is crappy that I wouldhave wasted $50+ bucks to get another one that'd be obsolete next year. So anyways, I have this DVD recorder and it has given me some grief.You first have to understand, it is not like a vcr. First you have to use DVD disks, just like for the computer which have different rules and formats like: DVD-R, DVD+R, or DVD+RW disks. Some other differences 1) Set up is hard to understand. They do not make it easy to set up, in fact depending on your tv, there are 3 options in setting up. 2) The dvd remote has double the buttons your vcr remote had. More to learn. 3) Online menus aremore complicated than your vcr. Settings, tv format, etc. Ugh. Well it took me a while to get it working which I think is right but the volume of the audio duringdvd playback is very low. Also viewing or recording a tv show through the dvd unit, you notice the picture is degraded (grainier than normal). I put inan email to the company, Aspire Digital with no response, not even an automated one. Today I sent the question again to support, info, and sales departments.Hopefully they can solve my problems. There is a known screen freezing problem with this model (number AD-8091), but you can download firmware onto a cd to fix it. I didn't notice a freezing problem but I figured if I install it maybe it will fix other problems. So I downloaded the file to cd, installed as directed and now it seems tomake my dvd player freeze occasionally. When I first saw the model on sale at ecost, I tried to do research on the model like eopinions.com or shopping.com but could not find any reviews. I'll let you all know how it all works out.

We just watched "The Debut" on dvd. It is the first movie by and about Filipino-Americans. Starring Dante Basco and Joy Bisco. I related to it in many ways with themain character, Rueben. He wanted to be an artist but did not get support from his parents. Coming from the Philippines, Rueben's dad had higher aspirations for his son in coming to America and could not understand what could come out of drawing cartoons. Between Rueben's comic book collecting to the clothesline in the backyard, that was all me and my family. The DVD was filled with extras. And you learn how hard itis to get an independent movie made. I think it took them 7 years to complete the movie because of their grassroots funding. Traditional dancing, modern dancing, suped up hondas, flips playing basketball: maybe I'm a bit biased, but I thought it was a great movie.

Saturday by myself

My wife and kids went to the inlaw's house for the day. That usually means I get to clean the house. But if I do then it makes for a sad weekend. Instead there are a few things I wanted to do. I am working on a sticker design. I've been wanting to make a sticker for years but never did anything about it. I always have high goals like: I want it to be awesome and be like no one else's. So basically I never come up with nothing, but excuses. So today I got out a lot of reference books for inspiration. I got Computer Arts magazines (the U.K.'s best illustration/design mag), Draw! magazine (how-to for comics and cartoons), Relax magazine (Japanese Pop Culture mag) - this particular one has a Barry McGee Twist cover, The Jack Kirby Collector mag (I can draw nothing like him, but I like looking at it) - The "King" Kirby makes awesome splash pages, and some graffiti zines & graphic design magazines. I been flipping through the magazines and doodling whatever comes to mind. While I was in the garage getting magazines, I pulled out some of my old CDs. So right now I am listening to the best of the Fu-Schnickens. Yeah. That's what I'm talking about. Originators of the Kung-Fu Rap genre. "On the left side...on the right side" - aw yeah. Track 9, the collabo jam has Dres of Black Sheep. That takes me back.

I was at http://www.urbancowboy.net/ today. He is an illustrator / designer that I found in "Computer Arts" magazine. He does cool vector style people. His site is mostly Flash. I double checked the prices at http://www.stickerguy.com/ for my stickers. He seems to have the best price for vinyl stickers. That is probably where I will go to order stickers. I went to http://www.1001freefonts.com/ to get a unique font for my sticker. Unfortunately they are free for a reason. All fonts are pretty homemade looking, plus a lot of ads pop up. Watch out if you go there. Today I added AdSense to my blog. If you hit the sponsored links I somehow get paid. How and when - I don't know. We'll see how it goes. I didn't want to do it because I thought they would be bothersome, but I think if you surf as much as I do, you get used to them, plus the links usually relate to what you are interested in. I'll mention Viagra now. Maybe there will be a link for it.

For lunch I went to the local Vietnamese place down the street called "Pho My". I got a Tai Nam Pho bowl because I usually don't like eating the weird fatty parts. I also got the spring rolls and iced coffee. I've always felt the Pho with the hot peppers went well with the sweet, bitter coffee. The spring rolls came with leafy lettuce and basil, something I am not used to getting, but very tasty to wrap around the roll. I also got a Chicken & Tofu rice plate with extra rice to go for later. The kids love rice.The Chicken and Tofu is one of my favorites recently. Something about braised tofu. How they do it - I don't know, but Very good. At 3:30pm. I originally went to the Pearl River Chinese restaurant, but they were closed and opening for dinner at 4:00pm. Not usually a big deal, but I am driving my wife's car. It is a stick-shift that I am not very familiar with it, so any extra driving is always risky for me. But it went off without a hitch. I had the car die at one traffic light, no big deal. A guy in the van behind me gave me a puzzled look and I gave the "I'm sorry I don't know how to drive" wave. At the same strip mall as the Chinese restaurant, I got a chance to get a lotto ticket at the liquor store. The win is approx. 110 million today. Wow. I bought 5 tickets. That was all the cash I had. Wish me luck, I want an Eichler house, nah forget it - I'm paying an architect to design me a house... Yeah, a bunch of them... In Hawaii. Then I can have an assistant type my blogs. Ha.

Finally finished watching the Triplets of Belleville DVD. It is actually a great animated movie. Lot of detail. I wish there were more special features. The director guy draws a basketball player. Awesome. Makes me want to find a book on the art of the movie.

Fryday of fried prawns

Blogs. What did I do today? Nothing much. It was hot. I took the kids to the park for like 30 minutes. HP released a bunch of products today and I had my hand in participating. I drew an illustration for the employee website announcing the news this week. Gil, my art director emailed me the final image today. It was cool to see it in it's final version. I put a lot of effort in that illustration. My friend, Erik said it was my best drawing out of the other illustrations I've done.

It seems everytime I get an illustration job, I get on the web trying to spend the money. I need new shoes. My Adidas Superstars are peeling apart. I also want to buy art, books, or toys, then I think to myself I don't need them. Basically talked myself out of it. I did subscribe to Computer Art magazine today. It is a magazine from the U.K. I don't think there is a better graphic design/art mag around. I am excited to get the first issue.

So tonight we had fried prawns & fried rice for dinner with the in-laws. It was basically a fryday. hah. Nichole and I tried to finish watching the Triplets of Belleville. It is so far a great movie. 2 Academy award nominations. The animation is incredible. It looks somewhat European comic artist with computer animation. Nichole fell asleep on the couch like she always does so I tried to figure out how the DVD recorder works. It works but something with the setup makes the sound and audio quality low for some reason.

My First Blog!!!

Hi. This is my first attempt at blogging. I hope to inform and entertain. Stay tuned for more.