So the curviest road in the world is in San Francisco? I'm just not buying it. I'm putting my money on where I'm living for the next three weeks. This little map shows you that I live on the side of a cliff, facing the great city of Los Angeles. (This is what your hybrid view is for.) Not to go into too great of detail, I live in the best location, right next to the Metro train (to whisk me to work everyday), and with the perfect view.

I don't mind letting you know, since you're freezing your tuchus off over in 15-degree-Cleveland, but I, and the rest of Los Angeles, am enjoying an unseasonable warm-spell of 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Yes, I'm wearing gloves and a scarf just so I don't feel too home-sick. Otherwise, I couldn't ask for a better location.

So, now for the good stuff. I work in North Hollywood for an independent film distributor, Filmmaker's Alliance. I spend just over an hour and a half each way traveling to work. I have about 15 minutes of walking, combined with 2 trains, lots of waiting, and a bunch of old New Yorker Magazines to keep me busy. I will spend, at the end of this month, over fifty-five hours just in a commute. And apparently, I have it pretty good based on LA standards. To think, I don't even drive a car.

Ahh, but I do. Believe it or not, the wonderful people that I am staying with, friends of my boss (the woman who hired me is an actor, her husband directs many of her films), have lent me their old 1980s Volkswagen while they are in Virginia for the extended weekend. I have until Tuesday to see how far the gas pedal will take me. Of course, there are more clubs and bars than I can count on my hands and toes, all within walking distance. But still, I just went to the grocery store to buy three weeks of food, enough to feed myself and a Mexican named Eduardo for the next few days.

I had the opportunity to attend one of these Hollywood parties, a small gathering with a whole slew of various entertainment positions: directors, actors, producers, designers, and a radio producer, of whom I spent a few hours in discourse about various odds and ends. I got to light a menorah, proper, prayers and all, and drink enough wine to drown a fish.

Lastly, thanks to San Francisco, I now have the unique ability to identify the South American dish quinoa from over fifteen feet away. I'll use next week's entry to speak at length about my thought son the city, the people, and the industry. I have just spent these past few days getting acclimated to a new climate, different personalities, and a dog named Scooter.

I just love this fucking town. No, this isn’t some pent-up euphoria I’m releasing here; I’m merely expatiating on my love of this salty taste in my mouth after having walked home last night from downtown and stumbling across some slightly disgusting images that will be permanently etched into my retinas. Yes, it was a turd. And it was sitting in the middle of the sidewalk in the Mission District, probably created by the same ingrate who was only yards away puking into a public trash bin. If only the wildlife would allow me to photograph them in their indigenous drunken stupor, I would have proof of my continual fear and loathing. Oh well, you’ll have to wait for stories when I come home, which is, incidentally enough, in 2 days.

I don't yet know what the effect of this trip will be on me. I do know that I am now almost 2 full months into it and have only 4 weeks left before I travel back to Case for another semester of beat-em-up. Have I experienced a loss of ego? Not bloody likely, but I've certainly been humbled. And no, working the 11PM-7AM shift twice weekly and getting my ass kicked in tips were not the only factors. I have finally begun to make a base here, and that's scary, since I don't even have one back in Cleveland.

Man is never honestly the fatalist, nor even the stoic. He fights his fate, often desperately. He is forever entering bold exceptions to the rulings of the bench of gods. This fighting, no doubt, makes for human progress, for it favors the strong and the brave. It also makes for beauty, for lesser men try to escape from a hopeless and intolerable world by creating a more lovely one of their own.
-- H.L. Mencken

Here I am, in the heighth of fashion, wearing grandpa pants and a sporty button down, standing on top of the southern hill of Bernal near the south of San Francisco. Iím looking back on all that is the city, the two bridges, and lots of really tiny people. Maybe one day Iíll have the chance to meet them all.

I also ventured across the Bay (underneath it, really) to reach the town of Berkeley, home of the superfamous University of California. It is the most pristine, green, and super-clean campus that I have ever laid my eyes upon. Really now, students just canít appreciate what theyíre given over there. (Though I bet the faculty do).

In order to make this a bit shorter, Iíll wrap up saying that I will be heading to San Diego, Long Beach, and L.A. in the coming week, meeting my brother, friends, and nobody respectively. Enjoy these photographs from the hill that overlooks the Mission District, my home away from home (uhh, both literally and figuratively), and of the Berkeley area and campus.

'There is scarcely an occurrence in nature which, happening at a certain time, is not looked upon by some persons as a prognosticator either of good or evil. The latter are in the greatest number, so much more ingenious are we in tormenting ourselves than in discovering reasons for enjoyment in the things that surround us.'
-- Charles Mackay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

It seems that since time began, I haven’t been sure of what I’ve been looking for. Hell, I haven’t even known what I’ve been living for. Still haven’t, and this post isn’t some existential writing on what is and what may be. However, I have found one of my few true loves. Her name is Big Sur.

I always loved some parts of the wilderness, or rather, the Great Outdoors. Outdoors, because you actually have to deal with the animals, insects, and tribulations of real life living, much like an office. And Great, not for the fact that it is simply wonderful, but great due to its sublime and exceptionally large characteristics. Mother Nature is just bigger than us. I felt for the first time the actual continent. I looked out upon the cliffs of mid-state California and could for the life of me, and probably for the first time in my life, not make out how this is a part of the western state, but more of a living land mass, slowly creeping into the Pacific, its long wind-stroked and weathered cliffs bulging its stubby fingers into the sea.

There was, during the day of driving and photographs with Chrissy, Max, and Kim, nothing I would have rather done than stay motionless on the beach beneath the mountains. I mean nothing. And that’s what gave me some clarity in thinking. I could finally make some decisions about where I am heading through University, and what I would enjoy doing most. Well, California is a good start.

With less than $150 left in my bank account, I am beginning to think that in order to live the Highway 1 motorcycle life for the next ten years, I will need to get better grades, and much more importantly, work and contribute to projects that have actual deliverables. Research projects, the kind happening everyday and every semester, conducted and led by the faculty at Case. And all I need is the ambition to write a proposal, talk to the staff, and get a move on. And I found it in these cliffs on the edge of the world.

Oh, and by the way, you are all aware that this is a photo-blog, right? That means that if you click on the photo to the left of this entry (or on the high-lighted title text at the head) then you will be directed to an index of photographs that I have taken and posted as the meat of the entry. This text is just the dressing on the salad.

For this entry, instead of choosing my favorites of the past week, I will instead post all of the relatively good shots, without caption. They are all in and around Big Sur. The photographs of Chrissy, Kim, and Max are almost all in Santa Cruz, on the boardwalk. We were celebrating Kim’s 20th by driving south down the scenic Highway 1. What you will see is the recording of just that drive.

I am now almost into a month of being stationed out here in the great Bay Area. I have been working well over full-time for the past 3 weeks, looking for an apartment, moving 5 times, and gained a new understanding of the inner-psyche of the west coast mind. Most of the time, it's just looking for another dope fix. More on that later.

I work at a chic 50s diner called Mel's, and have been over 50 hours a week, making tips, wage, and overtime. Now, this is not the standard waitering fare that I'm used to (or not, I have tea house experience). This is constant running for 8 hours, screaming, yelling, and all stuff I've described before. But now I'm learning about the beauty of all that work. I worked a 7 PM to 3 AM shift last Saturday, and made over $300 in total. That's a single night. Of course I got home at 6 AM, 11 hours after I came into work, it was all worth it. Now, having four of these beloved night shifts in a row is beginning to take its toll on me (I work tonight into the wee hours), my wallet keeps getting fatter and then skinnier (as I sub my >100 singles into glorious twenties).

More important, Gay Pride. This past weekend was the weekend of pride, and San Francisco beats like, well, a 12-year-old in heat. I've got a few photos, but with my work schedule, I had to miss the parade. (There are far richer photos than I could ever hope to take here.)

Also, Chrissy is in town visiting her friends Kim & Max, and they're having a ball doing all the touristy things that we Californians (hah hah) overlook everyday.

The only problem is that I always have something wonderful to say, insightful or funny, maybe. But they always come to my fluttering head midway through a shower. And for most that means that they just have to memorize those details for a scant 5 to 10 more minutes. Not for me. This is mid-way through my shower. After everything else, that means that a good 45 minutes later I will have the chance to grasp pen and paper and not have it stick to my wet soaking body like a doobie and its coastal brethren.

Alas, you'll just have to live with the crap that I write here. Anyway, while my writing might not always be on target, my shooting is. I have a double whammy for you's guys today. Since I skipped my writing last week, I didn't stop taking photographs. Here I have double the amount, and with triple the goodness (these are creamier and sweeter than the previous batch). Enjoy yourselves, just not too much.

'Nothing in the entire universe ever perishes, believe me, but things vary, and adopt a new form. The phrase 'being born' is used for beginning to be something different from what one was before, while 'dying' means ceasing to be the same. Though this thing may pass into that, and that into this, yet the sums of things remains unchanged.'
-- Ovid, The Metamorphoses

I'm up late today since this will be my last day off in a long long time. My job as a waiter starts to really kick in tomorrow morning. I have a 10 hour shift (8 hours serving, 1 hour lunch, 1 hour sidework) for the next 4 days in a row, then, if all goes well with my interview, I start my actual internship. It's tough being in such a vibrant and alive city at all hours of the day and not being able to live it down in every way possible.

As you can tell by the first photograph in this series, one of these nights I took the opportunity to walk three miles to the Golden Gate Bridge with a cute girl that I met at the Haight (Hessler-equivalent) hostel. Not that I won't be able to do these wonderful jaunts soon, but I won't be able to do them every single day like I've been enjoying thus far.

That's one of the few things I miss about Cleveland. Working has a different meaning here. Working my many hours of the week back home meant that I would have something to do and people to talk to. It wasn't for sustenance (as it so desperately is here), but for enjoyment and widdling. But here it's a shock to me that all I can do while at work is think about what I'm planning to do while off work and how much I can stand before I have to go back to work.

Maybe my current job sucks (which it does), but I think this is one of those dilemmas that I rather enjoy. As for the rest of my world here, things are going great. As of last night, my friend Angel played his first gig with his new band Los Kung Fu, a tangy Spanish-speaking acoustic joint with a trio for members. They played over an hour and a half set at a swanky industrial art gallery downtown in SoMa, introducing the line-up for the evening which consisted of internationals speaking and writing letters for the past four years to America. These letters were collected into a book, and we were honoring the book's release at this party. Poetry was read, people were introduced, and the liberal mindset of bravery and righteousness in this era of imminent terror regaled the air.

Dancing immediately commenced and I spoke with a very pretty girl from Argentina no more than 3 years my senior who is a contributor to the book and was honored. She spoke of how in the past 4 years, from the time she initially wrote the letter as a near English-ignorant new immigrant to the now how different she approached the world and American policy. Everybody changes drastically in that time, but it seems that San Francisco takes something out of the twenty-year-olds and instills in them a new tolerance. Something Western, something a bit devious, but something that gives a new hope to an otherwise disenfranchised people.

Otherwise, a great night that concluded back in Haight, with drinking and conversation. Of course, not everything is peachy, as this is now the third time that I've walked in on either two men or a man and a transexual getting busy. Honestly, did they have to rub each other on the plush sofa in the living room? I just wanted to eat my hot smoked turkey sandwich with sprouts in relative peace.

These photos are my favorite bunch of the group. The days have been consistently warmer, less windy, and generally more pleasant. This means good photography weather. I bring you some of my favorites from the past 3 days, both taken over the city and at my hopefully new digs on Russian Hill, the highest point in the downtown San Francisco area.

If I ever said anything negative about the Mission District, I take it back.

This city is really starting to grow on me. I last posted about the wonderful enjoyments that I could be having and the wonderful people I could be meeting. Listen baby, this is not Cleveland.

I've since met more people than I can count one my hands. I have contacts all over the city, and I am now employed by [potentially] two companies. The first is a 50's style diner in the center of city life in downtown San Francisco, at 4th and Mission. This diner, Mel's Drive-in, is a hellish brutal reality of what waiters/servers really have to put up with. A menu of over a hundred different possibilities, more than 200 seats, 50 tables, and anywhere from two to eight servers on duty at any given time (and the times range from weekdays 6 AM till 2 AM to 24 hour weekends) all give the impression that this locale is efficiently run and organized. And believe me, it is. There is a job that just takes the food from the kitchen and hands it to the servers to deliver. It involves a lot of yelling out 'Runners, X out!' which is very contrary to the quiet and upscale tea house that I'm used to tending to.

More important is the [potential] job that I am interviewing for within a day or two. A company in the Financial District downtown has an open technical intern ship position open for 9 weeks. I've passed the first preliminary interview, conducted over the phone. Now I have a 2 hour technical diatribe to recite to hungry interviewers.

Probably the best of everything is the ease of getting around the city. Live in a crappy district? No problem, buy a MUNI multipass and travel from bus to subway to railcar to streetcar. I'm anywhere in the city within an hour, typically under 15-20 minutes. This will help when I'm living on the top of Nob Hill. There is a quaint little sublet on Broadway at Leavenworth which lies at the top of the hill that the cablecars climb over. I first read of the cablecars traversing this mountain of hills in a travel guide, where they recanted stories of how the passengers of the heavy-little-trucker cablecars are certain that they won't be able to climb the hill, due to its steepness. I'll show photos in the next couple days when I go to visit and decide if I want to splurge $800 a month on this beauty.

Now, on to more pressing matters. The beer. This city is home to hundreds of micro-breweries (maybe not that many, but still). There is one bar, the San Francisco Brewing Company, similar to the Great Lakes Brewery, where they make eight or nine different beers right there in the basement. Angel and I went to one of these beauts on Broadway Rd., right next to both the strip club central of the city and City Lights bookstore, the famous beatnik generation bookstore of the ages. They have two happy hours every single day of the week: 4-5PM and 12-1AM. Nobody IDs in this city, and when they do, you just say you're 22 and end of the story. We take a seat at the bar at 11:55 PM, shoot the shit with the bartender, wait for the POS to register 12:00 AM, and punch in 6 beers during the hour. One of them is so stout and strong that it can only be served in a wine glass, as the alcoholic content is beyond anything on the wall. This makes Guinness look like Labatt Blue. I feel like I'm swimming in a chocolate river, Willy Wonka style.

We also hit up a bar/venue in the Mission District called Elbo Room. We start sucking up beers, lagers, ales, and cider, and then meet a group of three attractice Latina girls of the same age (21-33). We hit it off, and next thing we know, we're in this sketchy house of some guy that the third girl met (again, Angel and I are here in the Elbo Room cause he knows the drummer in the Brazilian-Funk-Klezmer band). It's 3:30 in the morning and we say good-bye to the girls and I now have a solid connection in L.A., where two of the girls are from and are returning to the very next morning (or rather, the very next few hours).

All in all, based on the food, which is some of the best I've ever had in my life, the beer, the women, the gays, the company, the jobs, and the opportunities, I think I'm in love.

It's been five days now, and I still haven't found a job. But I've applied for a countless number of jobs; anything from clothing to cashier, but still no luck in getting a call back. I'm going to start to try being a bit more aggressive, writing down the names of the locations that I apply to, coming back in a few days later and checking in with the manager. Not that I'm too worried, but I need to find a job as soon as possible, otherwise I might end up homeless like the thousands of other homeless I see every-freakin-where.

Now, on to the good points (of which, there are many). The weather is fine and dandy, every single day. I don't think the weather has changed from 65 and perfectly sunny once while I've been here, and I hear that it won't for a long time. While I don't miss the clouds and depression of Cleveland, I remember what it does to a psyche, and that is beat it into submission, only to reappear again in a week and feel energized. Time will tell.

I've met three people thus far, all of whom I am glad to call friends. (Holy crap, The Velvet Underground's Take a Walk on the Wildside just came on.) I met everybody in the same shop that I've been frequenting every since I came here. I spend an hour or three here every morning, sipping coffee, milk, and chai, and devouring their eggs. They play excellent music (everything I'm trained on, and more than I like considerably), and it attracts more than excellent people.

I just take a seat, plug in my laptop, surf some SF sites trying to decide which free/no-cover show I should go to that night, and I make conversation about anything with the folks who show up. I hung out with a gentleman by the name of Angel the other day and we went out that night, hiking up the many hills of the city, all over the Tenderloin district, through Chinatown and North Beach (Little Italy), and back in SoMa. What really sticks out from that night is the drag bar. A small dive with seedy lighting, a curtain in the back, and an announcer who would call up the lovely Vanessa, who would stalk the aisles running her lips and thighs over the hungry patrons, collecting bucks from each.

We also went out dancing later that evening, finding a show that had a cover, but both of us being exceedingly cheap, hocked up a plan to finesse our way in for free (which worked beautifully). And we danced. Angel knew a bunch of the folks inside, since he works with many of them. (I applied for a job at the very same Whole Foods Market that these people work at, only after meeting a French guy with dreads who refers me over to the Market).

Enough rambling, the only thing that I really need to say is that I need to find a job, then all of the other wonders of San Francisco will fall into place. I'm planning on going to the west end of the peninsula today to take photos at the beach and of the Twin Peaks.

I hope you suckers in Cleveland are enjoying your (*checks*) 94 degree heat.

There's just so much to talk about. But forget all that. I'm sitting in a coffeeshop in the very very gay Castro district. I mean, we're talking gayer than Marvin, and it's his fucking name! But don't let that worry you; the colors are alive and everywhere. Colors I've never seen painted on to the sides of houses, colors I've never realized humans would wear (or grow), and colors that seem to scream, 'I'm gay!'

It seems that the whole free Internet thing that I like so much back home is a luxury I've taken for granted. I have to fight for the right to get online here. My hostel has no such thing. (Ten cents a minute? You're crazy, dude!) I am forced to walk anywhere from three to fifteen blocks to find a coffeeshop that will graciously let me use their wifi after purchasing a five dollar latte (and I'm sitting here writing this in threedollarbill cafe).

Such is life. One of the things I hope to learn here is that, so far, moost great wonderfulities in life have been handed to me on a bronzish/silver platter, and having taken most of the amenities that I subscribe to daily for granted, I'm going to be given a rude awakening and a slap in the face (in a gay patois, of course). The first thing is that I'm running out of money. Fast. I spent $45 on a MUNI multi-pass, that little card that lets me ride all of the buses, trains, subways, and railroads unlimited-like. As wonderful as it is, nobody actually scans it. You just kinda flash this RTA-pass thing as you walk onto the bus, and bam, you're home free.

Oh yeah, unlike New York City, everybody is definitely NOT beautiful here. Not counting the gays who couldn't care less what they looked like (or how they carried their sweet selves/hair), most of the run-ins you have are with the homeless, who seem to flock to San Francisco like a drunk fly and some tasty tasty vinegar.

I have posted photos of my first run around the city, where I hit up the Mission District (where I live), The Castro, south-of-Market, Little Italy, China Town, the Financial District, and Fisherman's Wharf. I'll continue to take photos, but as I progress in the city, I'll try to focus more on subject matter instead of landscapes.

Lastly, in my search to find sustenance, I applied for god knows how many jobs, both retail and technical. We'll see by this weekend if any of that paid off. My buddy from Case, Sajan, lives out here, and he graciously offered to forward my resume to his company in the southern Bay Area.

As for this weekend, I'm going to a slam poetry event at high-end art gallery downtown, and maybe even clubbing. Otherwise, I'm going to be applying for job after job, everywhere that doesn't smell like homeless or fish.

'I yearned mightily to enter this fascinating yet repellent city, and besought the bearded man to land me at the stone pier by the huge carven gate Akariel; but he gently denied my wish, saying: 'Into Thalarion, the City of a Thousand Wonders, many have passed but none returned. Therein walk only daemons and mad things that are no longer men, and the streets are white with the unburied bones of those who have looked upon the eidolon Lathi, that reigns over the city.''

-- H.P. Lovecraft, 'The White Ship'

Well, it's the day before Memorial Day and I'm all wired up in survival gear. The skies of Cleveland have turned against me, black-frosted and charred with fear that I may have finally outgrown this wretched stench (and unfishable) excuse of a rust-belt city.

Pardon me for my desire to leave Cleveland, as I've been cooped up in this bankrupt alcove between Chicago and New York City for twenty years, but it's time to face the facts and hear the music. Or whatever, I just want a piece of action in a city that isn't the most impoverished city in the country or the laughing stock of the world.

Here's the plans so far: Fly out of C-town Wednesday afternoon, arrive in California only a few short hours later (ooo, it's almost like time travel!). I will be staying in 4 different hostels over 4 different weeks for the month of June. Come July 1st, I will be travelling to Yosemite National Park in northern California to spend 9 days in forestry and folliage. Then travel back to civilization to the Green Tortoise Hostel in San Francisco. For the last week of July, I will travel by bus or by car (hitchhiking) to Los Angeles and San Diego to visit my brother. About a week or two there, and then back to the Bay City until the end of August, and then to return to Case Western for some more schooling.

I'll elaborate on details of my individual plans, like inteviewing Craig Newmark of craigslist.com, and seeing Chrissy 3,000 miles away from home, later. For now, enjoy these few shots of the land that I'm leaving behind.

Well, I've been humbled. I applied, interviewed, scoured, and begged for jobs, internships, co-ops, and gigs all freakin' semester long. Nada. Nilch. Nothing. Enough with the parallelism.

So what better to do than give the big finger to the city from which I hail? One answer. The most European city in all the land. So far, I have booked my plane tickets and three hostels for a total of one month of living accomdations.

I will be leaving on Wed. June 1st and returning almost three months later on Sat. August 20th, just in time for freshmen orientation and my apartment move-in on the following Sunday.