Kokochi

ze zebra

The week before Burning Man is busy to say the least. I've been meaning to post some of my new costumes (for Mlle A.), but haven't had the time. Still gotta finish one tomorrow, along with having a conference call with friends to organize our kitchen resources.

At the least, I'll have pics from Burning Man, so you'll see the other costumes later. For now, here is Zebra, from a Saturday party. I hacked it together half using a pattern, half by wearing the cloth and cutting it! The top back is open, tied by strings. I'll upload another picture with Dav included later after I get it from Dav. :)

Btw, it's hard to tell, but I'm wearing 4 inch platform boots that are flat...which means perfectly comfortable for hours on the playa!

Three poses

It's so hard to take pictures of my cats. But here, Mr. Kats practically posed for me. Now which one to choose to express how luxurious it must be to be a cat...

Random photo

Titled "Three faces"

A delicious evening at Aqua

Last night, I was lucky enough to get to go to Aqua (downtown San Franciso restaurant) for dinner with some work colleagues. It was, of course, fantastic. It's too hard to get photos of the food that even begin to show how gorgeous and yummy each plate was. The best part was that instead of dessert, I opted for cheese...3 wonderfully pungent cheeses. With Dav, I eat a lot less intense cheese - which I love - so I couldn't resist this opportunity. I chose one of the cheeses because it was named Wrinkled Paglierina, from Italy.

I got a pic of Miyagawa-san taking a pic of the gigantic steak he was served. Then I got some good pics of Barak, Joi, and Ben working on their phones. Goofed around exchanging pics with Joi via bluetooth. We must look like a crazy bunch when we eat together; too many phones!

I also loved that we were all dressed casually amongst the frilled up folk, and that I had the beat up JAVA FU with valet parking (I love that car!). When I stepped into the car I asked, "you probably don't get this sorta car here often, don't you?" to which the valet person responded, "not really...uh, your door is broken, you know?" FUNNNY!! I giggled all the way home.

Blog Business Summit 2005

Right now I'm listening to Scoble and Dave Taylor speaking about building traffic on blogs. This summit is to introduce blogging to businesses and how it can/should/will be a part of their marketing/PR/communications, along with nuggests of great info. to send the audience well on their way. Everyone is obviously quite interested in what all this blogging 'stuff' is about, asking good questions indicating they are serious about this, but understanding it's new territory. Us working in the blogging realm are sensing this, but blogging really is becoming so mainstream. It's kinda fun to watch this unfold.

Sitting right behind my brother too! Now that is a nice twist to this conference!

In Mission, after dinner...

...walked around and found a crazy cat, and petted some wild looking creatures. San Francisco is indeed full of life!

folding benches for Burning Man

Dav, Elida, and Jon of Campalicious are in the garage now cutting wood to make folding benches for the camp living room (you can easily take them apart to make them flat). We're hoping to bring up real soft sofas, but just in case we can't, we'll have these too since they won't take up much space to bring up.

I'm not that much of a handy-person, so I watched in awe as this threesome measured, cut, and created benches (plus, Dav looks so handsome when he's at work like this).

[LATER...]

Here is the result! They are a lot more comfy than I expected. Now the three will take time to decorate them with their artist's touch. Another wonderful addition to Campalicious assets!

House party

We threw a fun party Saturday night. The invite was:

Lots of people seem to be learning all of a sudden: Ezra's going to grad school in Scotland, Dav is taking sailing lessons, & Mie's learning to make hats.

In honor of this, we're having a Back to School party--come dressed as someone connected with the enterprise of scholarship. Or a sailor. Or someone with a significant hat. In the end, we just want everyone to come, so don't worry about clothes.

We got people with hats and even a friend who wore real sailor water-proof gear! I particularly enjoyed creating my hairdo. A great mix of people since all the housemates (6 of us) invited our circle of friends. We estimate we got about 50-60 people.

The downstairs was the lounge area, with chill music and lots of conversations. We set up a disco ball and cleared all the furniture in the upstairs living room (yes, we have 2 living rooms; thus a great parthouse!) and blasted beats. At first the downstairs was super crowded and the upstairs was not very happening. But by 2am, the upstairs was in full swing. I think they partied until 5am or so (I retired around 3am).

It's work to throw a party, but I love seeing people enjoying themselves in our home, meeting new people...and I especially like being able to walk to my bed when I'm ready to say good night!

Tatsuhiko took some great pics too.

This is cool

This was bound to happen and I can't say I'll be running out to try it myself, but check this out. So what kind of scenarios can you envision with this? I suppose it would be helpful if you're stuck in a crowd and can't see where the center of action is (a scenario that happens to me all the time), you could send your cam phone up flying to see what you're missing...

Putz the cat

Amy sent me the cutest picuture of her cat, Woodstock, otherwise known as Putz. Betcha he was hoping he could grab a few of those colorful fishes!

As she said in her email to update me about her life, no email is complete without a cat picture. Indeed!