Stan’s Obligatory Blog

Last year I went to the Los Angeles County Fair, and at the time, Susan and I hatched plans to enter my perfect blueberry muffins in the fair this year. Susan is out of the picture now, but the fair is coming up. So I decided to still put the plan into action. And I’ve even improved the recipe a bit since last year.

The contest rules don’t specify that the recipe has to be completely original, but I didn’t want to enter a recipe that I didn’t make up myself. The only exception here is the black walnut bread. That’s my grandmother’s recipe. I’ve never seen it anywhere else, but I didn’t make it up, either. The blueberry muffins and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are my recipes that I’ve developed right here in my own kitchen.

I think this will be an interesting adventure.

Last month, I went to see Cirque Berzerk. I liked it a lot, and I told Lucinda about it. And after hearing about it, she wanted to see it. Since the show had been extended into August, we had a chance, and we went tonight.

She thought that the crowd was pretty amusing. A lot like the crowds she’s seen when she went to tattoo conventions with me. And the show was great fun. She said that her favorite was the trampoline act, but that she liked all the acrobatics. It was a fun little evening, even if it did make for kind of a late night for us.

I’m going on a trip next week. Back to visit Texas and see all my friends there. This will be the first time I’m flying anywhere since last year’s trip to Texas. And I fully expect that there will be nothing like this. It’s going to be Great Fun.

I saw today that the Ketchum YMCA in downtown Los Angeles has the registration page up for their annual stair climb up the U.S. Bank tower. This is the tallest building in Los Angeles, tallest west of the Mississippi, and the 9th tallest in the U.S. 1,018 feet tall, 75 stories, 1,500 steps to the top. So you know that I have to try it. After all, I did the AON Tower stair climb back in April, and that was a good time. And I finished 24th out of 327 runners, which I think is pretty good for a first-timer.

I know that this will entail tremendous pain, and it should also be great fun. As they say on the event page, “Elevators are for Wimps”.

Sounds like a great time.

Friday night’s adventure was a trip to Cirque Berzerk at Los Angeles State Historic Park. The tent was set up in the middle of a dusty field, which seemed quite appropriate, since the Cirque grew out of an act at Burning Man some years ago.

The show itself was great fun. It sort of defies description, and about the closest I could come is to say that it’s sort of like a mash-up of “Cabaret” with a circus acrobatics show, performed by the Transylvanians from “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”. They had a live band and singers on a high platform at one end of the stage. They made a big deal about some seats being better than others, but even the far back row was only about 50 feet from the stage. The tent just wasn’t all that big.

There was a small fenced-in area outside the tent with a bar and a stage. The sign said that drinks were not allowed outside the fenced area, but they had a fenced corridor to the tent, so people could bring drinks into the show. The show itself was about an hour and a half, with a 20-minute intermission. There was a band playing in the outdoor bar area after the first show. They said that cameras were not allowed in the show, but I saw a lot of people at least attempting to take pictures. It was pretty dark in the tent, so I doubt that the pictures would have been very good.

It was very weird, and tremendously entertaining. Certainly worth the trip.

It’s the day after the last day of school. What are you going to do?

I’m going to Disneyland!

I took Lucinda and her friend Claire to Disneyland today to start their summer vacation. We did the whole bit, starting with California Adventure, then lunch, and then the rest of the day at Disneyland. We were there for about eight hours, and we rode a lot of rides. And the girls had a good time.

At the end of the day, we were all tired. We had dinner at the Jazz Kitchen in Downtown Disney before heading home. It was a very nice day.

As always, all the pictures from the day are in Lucinda’s photo album.

This afternoon’s adventure was a trip to the Gay Pride Parade and Festival in West Hollywood. This summer marks 40 years since the Stonewall riots, which are regarded as having started the modern gay rights movement. One of my friends did the web site for Christopher Street West, so she had VIP passes for us, along with about a dozen others in her business partner’s entourage.

I was a perfect day for a parade. I got there a bit late, but still saw quite a bit of it. There was a bus with older gay people touting “Gray Pride”. There were also cheerleaders doing stunts. A fire engine was the float for Mickey’s, which recently reopened after a fire. Hence the “flaming gay bar” banner. There was also a big contingent from the Tom of Finland Foundation.

After the parade, we stopped in to Millions of Milkshakes before going in to the festival. There was the pervasive thump of dance music everywhere, and it was very crowded. We walked around the festival for a bit, and I even ran into a few people I know there. Then I had to leave early to get home to pick up Lucinda.

It was a very fun afternoon adventure.

Today I went down to Long Beach to the Queen Mary for the Ink ‘n’ Iron show. This just keeps getting bigger and bigger every year.

I got there earlier than I have the last few years, which made parking easier. I went inside and commenced wandering around. I saw a lot of familiar faces, and got to visit with old friends. And I even got a new mailbox. There was one booth that was selling mailboxes hand-painted with hot-rod flames. And he had a box-type one, so I just had to get it.

It was a very fun afternoon, even though I had to leave early to go home to pick up Lucinda. And nothing beats a new hot-rod mailbox.

Today I took Lucinda and her friend Alisha hiking. We went up Echo Mountain above Altadena. This is a very nice local hike, about 2.7 miles each way, with nice views and some interesting ruins at the top. We’d last done this hike two years ago.

We started out from the top of Lake Ave and headed on up the trail. After a while, the girls started to complain about being tired, but I convinced them to soldier on. We stopped for lunch at the two-mile marker. When we got close to the top, Lucinda started running. And when we reached the top, they were both very happy to have made it.

We poked around the ruins of the Echo Mountain House, and the girls tried out the Echo Phone. They were very entertained by the echoes coming back across the canyon.

It was a fun afternoon adventure.

On Saturday night, Shari and I went over to Hollywood. The occasion was a party and book signing at Antebellum Gallery for my friend Elayne’s new book, The Piercing Bible. I’ve known Elayne for more than 20 years now, and seeing her is always a treat.

The art on display at the gallery was an odd mix of old Bettie Page bondage pictures, clown paintings, and photos of amputees. And the crowd that turned out was equally entertaining. I saw a number of people who I hadn’t seen in many years. I also got to introduce Shari to my friends Nina Hartley and Ernest Greene. That was some fun.

It was a very fun evening. And as a piece of trivia: I’ve known Elayne since 1987, but she’s never actually stuck a needle through me. The one time I had an appointment to get pierced by her, she called in sick and so Jim Ward did it instead.