it's a slumper

So guys, I'm not sure Hal Hartley movies stand up. I was reallllly into them in my teenage years/early twenties, but I watched Henry Fool the other night and thought it was terrible. Didn't even finish it. But of course that was a later one, and was never one of my favorites. I remember my house used to have a poster of it, but I doubt that I was the one who put it up. Some other Tower worker.  Has anybody watched Trust lately?  Or The Unbelievable Truth?

 

Tomorrow is the Lunar Flower Festival parade in South Sac, starting bright and early at 9am. Will I make it? Probably not. Then next weekend is the Tet festival. I don't know if these have always been separate, but it's kind of confusing. This press release explains the timing. I guess if I watched from Florin I wouldn't have to be there at the crack of nine, since it starts at Fruitridge and travels towards Florin.

 

I went to the Tet festival two years ago and it was fun. Definitely some good food, although since we can get great Vietnamese food all over South Sac at any time, it's not a must-attend like Hmong New Year. Also lacks the costume aspect. I've said it a million times, but IMHO it's events like this that make our city (fill in the blank: interesting, worthwhile, world class), not say, an arena and a terrible team led by a cry baby who nevertheless did manage to defeat the slumping Cavs the other day.

 

I'm judging Baconfest tomorrow. Last year I didn't get asked, after (I think) three years in a row judging. I love to judge (in general). I am kind of dreading it, though, as far as how I feel after. I might try to fast until then, but maybe that would be worse. It's like 30-some bites and dishes at minimum.

American Carnage: over

Trump is prez. Let the long national nightmare begin. Smiller and I were going to the coast but canceled due to the storm(s), so I'll be at the march tomorrow. My mom is going to a women's march in Mazatlán as well, pretty cool. You better believe they are just as bummed as we are down there!

I heard the new Migos hit yesterday, and as a long-time Migos fan (since right after Bando, although Bando has never been a favorite), I'm not quite sure why Bad and Boujee is taking off the way it is. It's pretty good, but they have so many other songs that are even catchier. Regardless, kudos to Migos, who I'm sure are faithful readers of Heckasac. I plan to watch Atlanta soon, I know they are in it in some capacity.

Tonight is some Leanord Cohen tribute show at Starlite that I've heard EC is singing in? I hope I can stay awake to make it.

gruesome twosome

I haven't checked the Halloween blog yet. The calling procedure stresses me out. I should look to see if I can get in on any bands, though. I can sort of sing and I once played a very simple keyboard part. Hire me!

 

Some things about the winter and my job starting really early blow, but a cool thing is how beautiful the light is on the way in over the Causeway when the sun is coming up. Today it looked like a painting, with lots of soft pastels, and an almost-full moon high in the sky still. Then I often catch the sunset when I'm in West Sac on the way home. It's nice to have a few minutes in that wide open space where I can see the whole sky, I wouldn't get that if I was already downtown.

 

Wow, Yianopolous and Shkreli (I refuse to look up the spelling because I don't want to read about them) at UCD this afternoon. That's a real gruesome twosome. What with these dudes and Trump's cabinet I feel like we are living in a Batman movie sometimes, with supervillains. Only no Batman to come save us.

Don't forget about Cockeyed

This is a reminder that very funny local prank blog Cockeyed, is still at it after 17 or so years?!?! I know the guy who does it through a friend of a friend and got to participate in a prank a million years ago where he altered a sign at the downtown plaze to include a golden banana. I will dig up my picture of that. Today I was chuckling at his post of signs he added to gun show signs and it's always good for a laugh.

 

Oh man, and I just remembered that a year and a half ago I was walking through Old Sac and he flagged me down for his age project. So there are closeups of me, including my eye that has a little skin tag ha ha. No one is supposed to notice that. My hair looks good, though! My skin looks similar to the woman who smokes a pack a day. He concluded from his project that there was no difference. I think genetics and sun exposure are equally influential. I feel like I look pretty firmly in my age bracket, which I feel great about!

for MEN

Work project that I don't want to do = looking for R. Kelly Reno tickets online. It's this Saturday! His tours get scheduled in the tweakiest way. I check often enough, so I should know. I'm bummed I missed his Christmas concerts with the giant puppethead R. Kellys on stage. His Christmas album was (shockingly) phoned in. Not any classics on there. I didn't listen to his last album, Buffet, much either. I guess his daughter was on it, under the stage name "Ariiraye". Try to say that name three times fast!

The Bee had a story about local bathhouses today, mostly about Asha, and they mentioned that Korean one in Rancho that's for men only. It's come up before when I've looked for a local Korean spa. I can't tell if it's legit or sexy, which doesn't really matter since I can't go anyway, but here was an interesting Yelp review:

It is what it is. It is a place for MEN to soak in a cool tub. It is a place for MEN to soak in a hot tub. It is a place for MEN to relax in a steam sauna. It is a place for MEN to relax in a dry sauna. It is a place for MEN to exchange massages. It is a place for MEN to relax enjoying TV And free water, sodas and some sort of food. On the days I've been, one day the food was fried KFC, one day foot long hot dogs, one day sandwiches. Always have doughnuts.

That's Fukin' Nutz

I checked in on fb for the first time in about a week last night, and I can tell you that a nice side effect of the break (or maybe the main effect) is that I have a lower stress level from not constantly reading think pieces about Trump. They are impossible for me to resist, but ultimately pointless since we don't know what he is going to do and there's nothing that we can do (or little). That's not to say I am ignoring what he's up to - I read the Bee every morning and look at the NY Times and google news. I read a few of them last night and the stress was instantly back. Just sayin'

 

OK, can we talk about this? No. Nu-uh. No nukin' way. There is so much wrong here. We were excited because we received a chocolate peanut butter beer? That's like saying we were excited when the rash flared up on our inner thighs. This is like a restaurant critic reviewing a KFC Bowl O'Sadness. I like Carla Meyer's reviews.  A lot. My main beef is that she should be reviewing Vietnamese places AT LEAST 2-3 times a year, or do a big roundup or something. But my second beef would be that there seems to be a big hole in her knowledge surrounding beer (I recall a mention of Blue Moon and an orange slice). It's easy to pick up some basic knowledge. A certain colleague of her writes about beer almost exclusively.

Looks good, despite being a cartoon

 

 The Crocker has some February programming and exhibits to commemorate the order to intern Japanese-Americans. In addition to some ongoing exhibits and other talks, Feb 19th will be an all day "Day of Remembrance" with speakers and a free screening of Day of the Fireflies. I'm hoping I can come to that. This is an important thing to remember, especially with the fuckery going on these days, but just in general. We can never forget that we locked up our friends and neighbors without cause, and then stole their property as well. I brought this up to some older relatives the other day and they started down the path of "well, the camps weren't that bad" and even "the kids liked it". NO!

 

SM will be happy to read that I pitched an article about it, and got it approved before I realized that it's the kind of project that stresses me, and that I pitch because I think *someone* should write about it, but that that someone in this case is not going to be me. I enjoy writing about food/drink much more, so I need to mostly stick to that.

 

I still get PR releases due to my old MidMo email account. I thought you might enjoy seeing the one I got today:

 

Wayne’s World 25^th Anniversary 

Panel Discussion & Red Carpet Event

  

 WHAT: Join the director and cast members for a panel taping in honor of the 25^th anniversary of Wayne’s World (WW25). 

The videotaped interviews will accompany the feature film when it returns to U.S. theaters for a one-night-only celebration in February.

 

WHEN:  Monday January 9^th, 2017 

Press Check-in – 5:45pm

Red Carpet talent arrivals – 6:15

6:15 PM: Doors Open

7:00 PM: Original Pre-show Featurette, live talent conversation, additional on-screen conversation,

followed by screening of full length Wayne's World Movie (1997) PG-13. Run Time: 1 hour 37 minutes.

 

WHO: Director Penelope Spheeris, Tia Carrere, Colleen Camp, others TBC live,

along with an on-screen presentation with Mike Myers, Dana Carvey, Lorne Michaels and Rob Lowe.

 

not really, but sorta

I made hoppin' John on New Year's Day. You don't come here for professional food photos, right? I do feel like it's good luck to eat certain foods on that day. No really, but sorta. I used ham hocks I got from Taylor's. There was a lot of meat in 5 bucks worth of ham hock. And collards. And andouille from Morant's, which was really just over the top. The meat on the hocks was enough. Everything tasted better the next day, and of course needed to be doused liberally with Krystal hot sauce. Speaking of Krystal, I have been craving Souths's fried chicken ever since I had it a couple of weeks ago. Will have to go again soon.

Struggling a bit into the new year, with some bad energy happening, but I think I'm clear of that now. I'm about to go on call for a week so no drinking for a week, which is a good way to start the year. I worked out four times last week! That is huge for me. Or I should say rare. It's not really even #goals, but it felt good. I also checked out the Asha bathhouse. Pretty cool. Go when the weather is cold!

Can I recommend that everyone watch Paris Is Burning (I had to get the DVD in the mail, so I'm not sure how you can access it on your various media outlets) and follow the voguehouseofnewyork Instagram account? OK, well maybe not everyone loves that as much as me. But if you ever saw Paris is Burning and liked it, and are on Instagram, check it out.

Go to Co Do and order the Mi Quang, people

Fucking Kings! That game was pathetic. The Trailblazers were terrible, and went so cold late in the game, but the Kings were worse. They couldn't capitalize on the five minutes where the Blazers didn't score.

I had a burger at Pangaea last night, and yes, their burger is really juicy and delicious, Burger Battle winner, etc., but I just like a small burger. Hope Rodney isn't readying this. Probably not! Like one of my favorite burgers is from that beach shack in Stinson Beach and I like it because it's small and it has mustard on it. I want a thin, charred patty, a whatever bun, some special sauce and shredded lettuce. I was just writing up my piece for Edible on Vietnamese soups and as I was eating that burger I was thinking about how much more vivid and satisfying most of those soups were than just a huge hunk of fatty meat. I want some herbs, and fish sauce, and heat, not just a slab of meat. Long story short: Vietnamese food is tops.

everything's on the table

I bought some tickets to a Kings v. Celtics game in Feb. I'm enjoying the little bit o' Kings winning streak. They are pretty much the worst (cheapest) tickets possible, 25 bucks each. I think you can pretty much see anywhere, though.

I won't go into the details, since this is a public forum, and I already told some of you about this in person, but I had a coworker make a questionable, Trump-related comment about MLK day, and after letting it fester for a couple of days, I asked him about it. Let's just say we agreed to disagree, but now it seems like he doesn't like me anymore! I was willing to let bygones be bygones because I said my piece and what else can you do, and he's snubbing me! It's a strange new world we live in, where we can't agree that MLK is a hero. I feel like nothing's a given anymore, everything is on the table. Very disturbing.

Also disturbing was this Martin Amis book I just finished, "The Zone of Influence", loaned by JD. The blackest of black humor and quite good. Based on the enormous amount of research Amis has done on the Holocaust. Told from three points of view: an Auschwitz commandant, a hunky Aryan nephew of Martin Boormann who is tasked with starting a rubber plant fueled by slave labor (which was a real aspect of the camp), and a Jew whose job it is to prepare the victims for the gas (among other terrible duties). Let's just say the buffoonery and familiar human failings of the Nazis are a little too close for comfort right now. I'd recommend it, but might be better to read it in like a year to spare yourself some anxiety.

RIP

Clip of Morrissey and George Michael on TV show

 

 

 

Morrissey is such a dick! It's funny to hear him talk about how revolting he found the movie "Breakin'". George Michael seems sweet. They just don't make TV shows like this anymore! RIP George Michael. It's rad how much he likes Joy Division, while Morrissey is just a snot about them. Morrissey: I found it really quite impossible to care.

 

I went to a Kings game the other nights, the one where they beat the Trailblazers, and it was really fun. I thought there would be actual craft beer. I didn't spot any. I had a Sierra Nevada for 13 bucks and then a tall can of Modelo for 13 bucks, which was too gross for me to finish. The food seems to be pretty standard arena food, with the imprint of local businesses, but not a strong association. When I was there, I realized that, due to volume needed, the food has to all be ready to grab and go. That's a pretty prohibitive restriction as far as craft or care of assembly. Does anyone have any food or drink tips? I hope to go see another game soon.

soup soup soup

I am on call at work so I have to absolutely stay until 5. I think pretty much everyone else has left, since we are about to go into a four day holiday.  Somehow I also ended up on call on Tuesday, too?

I'm working on a really short piece on Vietnamese soups for Edible magazine. It has new owners, so I'm checking it out again. The old owners had problems, one problem being inexperience with owning a magazine. These new owners own Edible Reno. Anyway, I just keep going back to Co Do. It's my favorite Vietnamese restaurant right now. So far I've had their bun bo hue, bun mam vit, mi quang noodles (kind of a soup, more like a noodle dish) and their bun rieu. Two standouts are the mi quang and the bun mam vit. I'm going back tomorrow and then I'll write some blurbs. I thought the bun mam vit (duck noodle soup) would be boring but it had this smokiness that floored me. The duck was dry, however.

Nine more minutes till I'm off call and I can blow this dive for four days. Yay!

Interactive post

Top albums:

YG

Kamaiyah
Gucci Mane (everybody looking)
Solange (I slept on it and now I love it!)

DVSN (Mike C told me about this one and it's a real between the sheets classic)

Vince Staples EP is good

Schoolboy Q

Drake Views from the 6 grew on me, he usually starts his albums out with a couple of weak songs and this is no exception

 

Life of Pablo was a'ight, couple good songs

Wknd was weak AF!

 

Albums I will probably get into but haven't fully checked out yet:

Danny Brown (maybe - seems to rock-y for me. I like my rap and rock separate and actually I don't really like rock too much)

Beyoncé (hey, put it on Spotify!)

Miranda Lambert (on a friend's recommendation, it's a double disk and I didn't make it all the way through)

Tribe Record

Chance record (his baby talking annoys me, but he is obviously rad)

Frank Ocean (so meander-y, but I need to listen a couple more times)

 

What about you?!?!?!?!?!?!?

 

Twice yearly posting whether I need to or not

So, it's been a good six months since I posted. Maybe it's time! Partially this is because my browser is having some fight with facebook and I was stymied in posting that E-40 had just posted a (fabulous) picture of himself on Instagram that he captioned "E-Feezable Belafonte Balogiono Bellwether". That's it, simple. I wanted to share that, but I might as well make a post.

 

 

Yesterday I checked out the new Kru. Man, it is fancy inside! I was actually relieved to see that the menu seems exactly the same (maybe smaller?) because I thought it might be too cool and expensive for me now. Like when you have a friend in a band and they kind of blow up and get press but then you hang with them and you're like, "Oh, it's just so-and-so, they're still chill". I started off with a drink of Nikka Taketsuru because the description on the drink menu contained the words "sherry" and "smoke". It was very smoky and Scotch-like. I ordered it with one ice cube. I had actually started the night with a Pulp from Fieldwork, which was good enough that I got a crowler of it. So at this point I'm sipping pure liquor and reminding myself to drink slowly! That's hard for me, I am a chugger.

 

We had a reservation at 8, and one thing I hate is when you make a reservation for a restaurant and then when you go it was clear you didn't need one and there are a bunch of empty tables. For some reason that always makes me feel like a rube, but in this case, not only was it packed at 8 on a Thursday, but we had to wait at least 15 minutes (maybe more?) for a table. Anyway, crowded, beautiful yadda yadda. I really like the huge black and white seafood x-ray photos  near the bar.

 

The table got the mushroom salad, which is a Kru classic. I think it's bigger than it used to be but with less mushrooms and more lettuce. The only problem was with pacing. Two people got their entrees and two people got nada for a long time. It was awkward for those that had food. And then my appetizer came out way later than my nigiri mix, but I guess the waiter had made that decision based on the heaviness of the appetizer, and told someone else. Regardless, I didn't hear.

 

My nigiri mix was good as always, but the real standout was the smoked duck skewers. Wonderful. Will order again. I want to go for omakase there, I have never done it. I'm excited for new Kru but bummed it's not in my neighborhood anymore but glad they take reservations. How much does omakase cost? Is it like "if you have to ask you can't afford it" territory?

 

Top tens? Who is interested in some top tens for 2016. I'll tell you bottom ten was either a) ovarian tumor or b) Trump.

 

Movies:

 

 

The Witch was probably my favorite. I nominate Black Phillip for best actor. Midnight Special was really good, with Jeff Nichols being a favorite young director and it's always awesome when he teams up with Michael Shannon. Not as good as Take Shelter, though. Walked out on Everybody Wants Some, was that maybe my only walkout? I can't believe Linklater made that crap. I wish I had walked out on that terrible beige Woody Allen movie, I had to look up the name just now. Café Society. Conjuring 2 was not as good as 1 but not bad. OK, I'll rank:

1)The Witch

2) Moonlight

3)Indignation

4) Manchester by the sea

 

I don't think I saw a single funny movie this year. I don't tend to go to comedies, and the ones I did were not really funny.

 

Maybe I will post about records next week. Or whatevs.

 

Boogaloo 2016

 So yeah, Burger Boogaloo. What a rad fest. Even though there wasn't a band on the bill that I think of as a don't-miss, it's still the best fest around. I think I will try to go every year for at least one day. I guess we dodged a bullet by just going on the second day (even though the lineup wasn't as good). I hear people had to wait in line for hours on the first day. It was hot, too!

 

 The last time I went was in 2014, when the Bananas played, but this year (and I guess last year), they moved to two stages, which made things run better. All the sets pretty much started and ended on time. This is the Dwarves. I had never heard them before and I only watched a few minutes. I found out that Stinky's Peepshow was going on in a tent at the same time, and MOM was in there pouring ranch dressing into people's mouths. I watched Lil Heather get a dry packet of gravy get poured in her mouth, too.

 

There were two stages, Dirty Mouth and Tassel Castle. This is Death Valley Girls at Tassel Castle. I thought they were good!

 Seth Bogart was the headliner. It was rad. I got emo about it and wrote a thing for the SNR, because he mentioned Orlando. John Waters introduced him and called him a performer of dubious distinction, putting him in league with Divine!

The original Mummies ambulance was there! I wish I could have seen them Saturday. I heard they drove it up to the stage and played on top of it.

 The Bananas played at the Starline in Oakland with Panty Raid after. I thought it would be a dive, but it actually had fancy food and biodynamic wine. I had a nice glass of Gamay downstairs.

Finally, their name in lights! Panty Raid had only practiced once but they were really fun and Seth wore a jock strap (hot!) Burger is allrightallrightallright!

Burger Box set

Burger Boogaloo was really fun! I will write more soon and post some pics but right now I am trying to get something together for the SNR, so I can get it in this week. One thing I just discovered from looking at the Burger website while I'm writing, is that the Bananas cassette box set is almost sold out! See this little clip here about it. Scott has a few, so better get yours before they are gone!

My Brazy Life

My mom's in town. She lives in Mexico on the coast but she a) hates the sun b) hates the beach/ocean c) told me this morning she never eats out because she can cook better things at home. Yep, sounds like the Mexican Riviera is the perfect place for her! She was saying the peso's down to almost 20 to a dollar. That is crazy! I have to go to Mexico at some point soon. It's so rad, I don't know why I don't go there more. JP was just in Mexico City and from FB his trip looks rad. It's been a few years now since I was there but I loved it.

 

I've been listening to the new YG Album a lot. It's a'ight. I didn't like Twist My Fingaz when it came out as a single a long-ass time ago, because it's too on-the-nose G Funk and not that creative, but in contrast to the rest of the album it's almost the best song. YG needs to get back with DJ Mustard! I was texting Nic about it and he pointed out that Mustard needs YG, too, which is true. He's getting into some like, adult contemporary territory lately and needs to get back to his roots. It's still good, but not a classic like My Krazy Life. The best part is that there's a track with Kamaiyah and Drake, but it's not Kamaiyah's best. It doesn't really showcase her talent. Still, it will bring her to the masses. Look how cute she is! I recommend her album, maybe the best of the year so far?

missed opportunities

So I like Carla Meyer as the food reviewer for the Bee. She's got a bit less of an edge than BAR, but there's still some bite (heh) to her reviews, she's no pushover. She uses a certain turn of phrase like "the celery thrills" and "the harissa tantalizes" a bit too often, but that's not too bad. BUT she's been in over a year and there is a decided lack of interest in cheaper spots and "ethnic" spots, especially in the south area.  I am getting bored with reading about some spot in El Dorado Hills I'm never going to visit but nothing surprising, no little discovery out on Mack Road. She doesn't seem particularly interested. I don't think it's out of line to point out that BAR would sometimes glean some of his tips from this very blog and go on to review the place, like with Asian Café (which by the way has different owners now and I had a very sad meal there a few months ago).

For instance, tonight I'm going to go eat at Tanoor Halal before I go see Conjuring 2 (so excited!) There's a spot worthy of a review. I'm probably going to eat this meat pie thingy that they have that is bomb. And pretty much the only Mexican she has written about it Cielito Lindo, and like, a review of Dos Coyotes for it's 25th anniversary. Little Saigon is the culinary jewel of this area, and if she's not reviewing places there at least a couple of times a year she's not reflecting the food culture of Sacramento.

long-awaited post

Yes, I am doing my first post in 5 months and yes it is a screenshot from a hearing conservation training I'm doing. Has anyone out there very washed their hands before they inserted earplugs? Well la di dah if so! How about inspecting them (step 2)?

 

 

George and Martha

I desperately needed a new banner photo and my mind was blank and I just threw this one up there, to get that other one down. Smiller and I recently watched Night Of The Iguana (I have mixed feelings about it), but I was loving Richard Burton and we talked about Virginia Woolf so I thought of this. Voila! Why doesn't anyone locally produce any Albee plays? I've never seen one live. I'm excited Big Idea Theater is going to produce The Motherfucker With The Hat in a couple of weeks.

 

OK, so this Tamaya story is just the weirdest, in that, really, you can cause hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage to a space and the cops aren't even going to investigate? It obviously looks like the Tamaya owners, or maybe employees who didn't get paid or something. They poured cement down the drains, so how about looking to see who bought cement right before this, Columbo? This story is just bizarre for what is not said in it.

 

I just noticed Eatuscany Café (not into the name!) yesterday and here is this very fun to read review. JB does well with the dis reviews, could have used a better closer but hey it's got a great opener. I just don't really eat gelato so I may not go there. You know what I do eat - Russell Stover candies that my boss gave me because I am bored at work and everything on campus is closed so I can't get a snack. I feel sick.