on the way

So now, I am enroute to Salt Lake. The next challenge is getting safely to Reno, which is about 7 or 8 hours away. I am going to get my car checked out tomorrow I think, do some arts&crafts, hang with Erin, infuse 2 large buckets of vodka, prepare and leave Friday night to arrive Saturday am in Reno for more preparations.
By the way, the mp3 player I got in Austria had not been working when I last tried using it a few months ago. Now it is. Cameras&mp3 players have a bad history but I am glad that at this very moment even it it's just for the moment this TEAC thing is working and I am listening to Lee Scratch.

UPDATE: My car was not in storage in salt lake, it was in a parking lot, and half my stuff was gone. stuff stuff stuff. Although I really don't know what's missing besides the snowboard. The guy I stored it with (straight up officially with contract) says there are 2 rubbermaids missing. I don't think there are though.) Either way, I don't have to pay the 600$ to get the car out, but I do have to pay the 700$ to get it fixed. Since it won't run. The past few days have been quite trying, but I am really just letting it bounce off me. I have numbed myself.

Finally, A Stinging Bee

Well, I was waiting for it. My life was going to magically for a while there that I expected something to come and rain on the parade. And this past saturday, it did. It came in the form of thievery- the new fanny pack I decorated was kind of junk and always falling off my waist, so I put it in my larger bag. 10-15 minutes after I had last gone into it, it was gone. My larger bag was in my sight the whole, or so I thought. There was some kid who came and talked to me for a minute or two. This is when I think it happened. I've traveled 17 countries, most of which on my own, with no problems. I think there were pros involved in this. By the time I called my bank the next day to cancel my card, there were alreadys attempts of a 300$ radio shack purchase, 2 89$ subway card purchases, and a 4$ deli charge. The charges were denied. Within an hour of it being gone, I accepted it. Losing stuff that you and society have made almost a requirement for much of your life can be a huge downer. I decided I would not dwell, and I didn't. But, I will reminisce about what I lost here, since this is my place.
So, here is what I lost:
My 2 rings. One is from my grandmother who is dead. I have been wearing it since I was 13. The other I bought when I was 15. These were part of me. I took them off for a project and forgot to put them back on. I also liked to think that because I had these rings, which fit on both ring fingers, that there was no room for any more rings for those fingers, and I would stay happily single forever. Which may still be the case regardless of rings. But it was nice to have those spots already taken up.
Zip car rental card which unlocks the rental car I had for the weekend. This lead me to wait the next evening for 6 hours until past 1am in Queens for a tow truck that never showed up. The next day, another one arrived promptly.
Driver's license- which I needed to register the car I have out in Utah. This was to be done on Monday, and then I was to fly to Salt Lake with the plates on Tuesday am from Philly. Then drive to Burning Man in Reno. Instead of doing it in Brooklyn as planned I drove out to Long Island where my fabulous mother met me with my social security card. For some reason I had brought my passport to NY, just in case I needed it at the DMV. I am witchy like that.
Phone- I hope AT&T can give me back my numbers. I have insurance, and bought a pre-paid to be dealing with my burning man coordination.
Cash
People's cards including a DJ from upstate whom I want to play in NYC
essential oil coconut chapstick and a bottle cap with a good saying, which was to be given as gift
18$metro card
other fun stuff
In the end, everything is working out. I got my car registered, I extended the rental for the zipcar by a few hours, I had to spend a bit of money (I am so good at spending money, I should get paid for it), I met some interesting people while waiting in Queens for the tow truck that never showed up, and importantly, I saw how one person I know acted towards me in my time of distress.

Desiderata...A New Electronic Music Festival

I was fortunate enough to get to go to the first year of this electronic festival. My friend Veronica's fiancee Joey, whom I first met at Mountain Jam 2008 and really liked, had a gig doing glassblowing demonstrations.

So glad I went. I had the most amazing live music experience to date during Adam Deitch and this Dj Muran or something to that effect. They started out with dub step, which happens to course through my veins, and they ended up at one point incorporating what seemed like music from every culture, into one song, into the same moments.

It was also an absolute ball to hang with Veronica (&Joey, aka Jewseppe, and his friend Jeff who is also cool). I have known Veronica for years, and we have the same circle of friends, have hung out many times in group form, but it was especiially excellent hanging out of our usual element after both of us having more insight into ourselveses.

I also met some amazing people from upstate/Utica area. This chick Angel and I really hit if off. She is awesome. Seriously.
By the way, the festival was on this estate with an old, dilapidated castle. I guess the property is owned by Jamaicans now, but it was owned by a Russian guy. There were some beautiful views. The security seemed to be done by Russian people, and there were a lot of people of Russian or Eastern European descent, and lots of Israelis (I believe that hacidic Jews or Israelis were organizing the festival). Anyhow, what was really strange was that Crystal Method got their power shut off, and for a half hour, the two Crystal Method guys were really upset and waiting for it to get turned back on. They were pissed, as they should be- here they are, performing as the headliner, and for some strange, fucked up, politically-fueled reason they can't play. Such is life.

It was the strangest festival I have been to ever- there was no atm, there was no ice for sale, there were 2 tents selling food and one had beer in bottle for sale. Trance dominated latenight into the day on the main stage, so of course I enjoyed the Renegade stage with the electro, breakbeats, etc. It was kind of like taking a vacation to Europe for a festival. So is this the sort of thing that Rainer and Larsen are used to? There was also this fabulous area with all this art& fun stuff, organized by these nice freako people from the Copycat Theater in Baltimore. Should I ever go through Baltimore, I will be sure to check them out. At the main stage, they also had these globes for visuals to be projected upon..- pretty cool.

All in all, it was a very special time at a very special place.

Wow, what an eventful afternoon. I went to an amazing asianfood superstore. Dangerous. Of course, I bought way too much stuff I did not need but will definitely enjoy. Other places that are dangerous for me to walk into include Michael's Arts&Crafts and the duty-free liquor shop at the airport. These places are my downfall, for real.

Then, I was severely harassed in broad daylight outside of a liquor store by a truck full of ghetto boys in camden just hanging around. new jersey ;(

Then, i couldn't find a parking space in Philly. Parallel parking a long stupid car like my mom's is annoying. And people in Philly are not nearly as nice as they are in New York. it is official.

So I crashed into a car. Or two, as I thought at first. Neither of the cars had anyone in them, since they were parked on a strange narrow side street. Yeah, I used to drive all the time everywhere. not sure what happened. I could not drive away, as some guy was hanging around making sure I would not drive away. Plus, I don't do that anyway. Not that this has happened before. So I called my friend Rachel, since I was incapable of doing anything in my irrational state of mind. I was shaking too much to hold a pen to write notes to leave. My parents would not be pleased. Rachel shows up and we discover that one car had a big smash up with rust from a previous accident, and that in fact, I only hit on car, we think. I guess I hit the one car twice and thought it was 2 cars. I guess I really am retarded. So, After some thinking, I call the philly cops to come check out the car(s). And, the chick, oh boy, I LOVE THIS CHICK COP, in the report, which is NOT an accident report, I possibly grazed the mirror of the second car. That's it. The one time when it really payed off to involve the authorities. She had me reverse my car and as it turns out maybe I really didn't hit either car too much. Just the mirror, " Maybe".So, I went from thinking I would be leaving 2 notes telling these people i will pay them anything not to involve my parents' insurance company to having an official report saying maybe I hit the prius mirror (which is retractable).

When I thought I'd be paying thousands of dollars for being retarded, I still had visions of Burning Man, and no intention of cancelling that. I told myself 'well, you did it last year and were broke and you will do it again should you have to". But, I don't have to. all cause I called the cops. the cop even laughed every now and then. The weirdest thing was I was not on drugs, but felt like I was on drugs after the multi-uni-weirdo-fender maybe-not bender(s) happened.Finally, good parking spot right across from "accident(s). I don't have to move my car until I leave this place.

My big computer is dead, but my computer nerd roomate (Rachel, friend from above) hit it a bunch and it turned on just enough to get my work portfolio pictures off, which are the only things I have not really backed up but sort of the most important. i can't blame my computer- she is so old, and has been AROUND the block a zillion times. I am tempted to give her a real memoriam, or at least, some flowers. Rachel said "if you spank your computer a bunch, it might turn on". like owner, like computer. And my tiny computer's screen is cracked... badly. So if you see typos, which you won't too often, that is why.

I also learned about this jetblue special for flights, but at first, in the text message I got about it, I thought it was for a year and not a month. I went crazy, running around half naked with my debit card, dizzy, TOO excited. Now I know the terms and it will not work out for me, but I was estatic for a minute and it felt nice.And so, I am going to make an udon noodle soup, with bok choy, scallion, spicy red pepper, and either a miso base or a tom yum goong thai base. or a simple soy&red pepper base. garlic and tofu are also involved.

I spoke with an AMAZING chick I met at a festival. And with Myk Tumelo, with whom I have decided to throw a party with in NY at the end of September. Pick Your Poison Potluck. Perhaps.What an eventful afternoon.

All Points West... free tickets thanks to Lauren Seracene.

Alright, Lauren Seracene hooked it up with free tickets for myself, Erin, and this crazy kid Brett to go to all 3 days of All Points West, a 3-day, no camping, festival in NJ. Going for free was amazing- if I actually had to pay for a ticket, I would not.

Here are some good points of All Points:

-great lineup varying from Jay-Z, gogol bordello, pharcyde (who put on a really funny&entertaining performance), kool keith, mstrkrft, coldplay, vampire weekend (so impressed with, in addition to gogol bordello), tool, list goes on.

-some cool sculptures

- full-time electronic area with GREAT music by dolab

- great view of manhattan skyline&statue of liberty

- nice vibe overall in crowd; douchebag level was low

- i got a veggie jalopeno corndog, which is impressive

OK, just some the bad points:

- public transportation took WAY too long for where it is, and is way too complicated, with many transfers, etc

- not enough portapotties, AT ALL> the lines had literally 50 people waiting at times; a line that winded across the span of the concert field

- beer garden is the only place to drink booze& on top of it, it is way too far from any stages to benefit drinkers

- garbage cans were made out of cardboard, for a festival that rained 2 of 3 days

-recycling not up to par, if even existent at all

- large screens would list who played previously, which is of no help to concert-goers looking to see what's next where

-after arriving from public transportation, there is a 1+mile walk to the actual concert

-No parking if you drive

- Much of the food& other areas were set up so you could hear 2 of the stages at once, which sucks if you have ears

- No where to do a renegade piss/ no trees hide behind

- My luxury sandals were stolen when I was busy

As I said before, I very much enjoyed myself. But if you are going to throw a festival, you should know what you are doing, and if you don't, then do some research. I guess people from the city just don't know any better, so the All Points people don't have to go by the standards I am used to. There really were like 99 reasons why the festival sucked

And by the way, I missed Sunday, cause it was torrential downpour. Instead I had an amazing time at these Turkish/Russian baths. Then indian food at a weirdo place. I laughed so much i ended up not being able to stand by the end of the evening. I was literally falling on the ground cause I could not stand up.

Greatest Time as Usual

Alright, Camp Bisco is an electronic festival I have been attending for years, and will continue to do so, probably forever. I will not volunteer at it, because I will not jeopardize fulfilling my maximum level of absolute enjoyment there. And so, as usual, best time ever. Don't forget CRAZYTOWN was founded during Camp Bisco a few years ago, and now serves as a model to all benevolent and malicious dictatorships, universally.

I missed some of the music I went for (too much rain&exhaustion), but in exchange discovered artisits I did not know about. BOOMBOX really blew me away. I also met some great people, and got down with an old friend Vanessa with whom I don't get down with too often.

On the otherhand, Gathering of the Vibes, which I have also attended for years, I can deal with having to compromise my time&fun a bit. My friend Kevin (who happens to be the best) ran a beer tent, which happened to be the cool beer tent, with magic hat, sierra nevada, and awesome people. He got Erin&I in early for volunteering, and we were all set to float around selling beer. We painted a bunch before the festival even started, and I created this survey, sponsored by the FDA, the Fruity Disco Alliance, to find out people's favorite fruits. Why? Because I felt like it. It is what I have been asking people for years. I particularly like getting people to think about the things they love and enjoy.

Strawberry won, and pineapple, banana and mango came in 2nd basically. I'm not sure, there was a huge bar graph I did with all of the results. I was happy and surprised at teh banana, because before I did the survey, I thought banana did nto get as much credit as it should. Thiis, I gathered from my informal surveys.

I had another ball, all and all, at Gathering. I took it pretty easy, really. Technically, I even took it easy at Bisco. Believe it or not.