So I went to the Pumpkin Festival

So I spent the weekend in the eastern outer Cowlands at a pumpkin festival.

More on this tomorrow.

However, here's the photos.

Rain in Cowtown? Go figure.

Well. It looks like it'll be rainy and cloudy for the entire weekend.

This'll make Barnesville 5 to 10 times as exciting as normal.

Hopefully, there will be no water in my basement.

The Hyatt.

How many months has it been since it was announced and I've finally gotten around to looking at the Hyatt Regency Lexington where Botcon will be held.

There's free wireless internet in the public areas so that means I'll take "Ye Old Powerbook G3 Pismo" and do Botcon blog updates throughout the days we are there... all 4 of them!!! Or maybe we can take Giga's smaller iBook and just use that for both of our high quality blogging/photo posting needs.

I'm also happy that the hotel has a complimentary gym since I'm usually up around 4:30am and I'll be happy to find a treadmill or cross-trainer to spend 90 minutes on. I did this last year in Dallas and just having access to some cardio makes me feel far less guilty about eating and drinking while I'm at the con.

I'm kind of scared to say that I'm actually getting excited to go.

While I'm more of a major lurker and not a die-hard message board poster (since I have plasticcrack.net for that kind of thing) I'll probably be at the hotel bar Friday night for the slowly gaining steam Allspark bar gathering.

With the exception of Jeremy, I really don't know anyone from the various boards.

I miss San Francisco.

In 1997 I threw shit at tranny crack whores giving head to johns down in the alley from this building.

*sigh*

I miss the Tenderloin.

There's nothing quite like the smell of it.

Your crazy insane trannies. Your crack whores. Your dead animals hanging from hooks on the streetside stores.

Oh. How I miss you San Francisco.

Say it ain't so.

Bonfire ban proposed for Ocean Beach Trash, drinking and assaults at S.F. seashore threaten a cherished ritual (SFGate)

"Obviously, without the fires, we wouldn't be out here," he said.

But soon the flames might be snuffed out for the group, known as the Men's Circle, and for everyone else who wants to build a bonfire at Ocean Beach. Under a rule that could take effect as early as June 1, bonfires would be banned from a half-mile strip of the beach, the last sandy shore in San Francisco where the blazes are legal.

But let me tell you.

Memories of the bonfires I've been at on Ocean Beach are part and parcel to my memories and love of San Francisco. Hell, if digital cameras were common place back then you'd be certain of finding tons of bon fire photos from my early trips out there.

As a non-native stuck in the land-locked Cowlands, I can't convey how great it was to sit on the beach with a small bonfire buring and watch the sun set over the Pacific Ocean. It is a very fond memory of me that alas, I've not been able to enjoy again during these past few trips.

Now I can understand people getting pissed about people bringing glass and not cleaning up after themselves. That would piss me off too.

But that's those people that are the problem. Not the bonfires in and of themselves!

*sigh*

Looks like I'll have to get out there sooner than later so I can have one final time on the beach with the sunset going down and the glow on the sand.

And this time, there won't be a creepy trannie on hormones asking me if I want to feel "her" breasts!

*shivver*

That still creeps me out almost 9 years later!

I need my bay area fix something fierce.

Hmmm... I just found a $224 round-trip flight to San Francisco.

I sooooo want to go.

Must... find way... to San Francisco...

I so need a vacation and Botcon in 2 weeks is definitely not my idea of a vacation.

Must find a way to get to San Francisco for a few days. I so need to just wander around the park, Muir Beach, and get my ass up to Sebastapol too.

I can't afford to take any more days off but, and I just realized this, come January 1 I get my 4th vacation week added to my benefits and that will make a whole world of difference.

Must... find way... to San Francisco... need Donley and Doran fix... badly...

Hmm... perhaps if I can hit 95 lost by October I should treat myself to an early birthday present. Hmmm...

Next stop... Embarcadero.

The Embarcadero station computer detected a "ghost train" at 7:30 a.m., requiring operators to drive their trains manually at no more than 25 mph, rather than the normal 70 mph...

One of my all-time favorite words... Embarcadero.

San Francisco Pics!

So I spent the day trying to sort through the hundreds of pictures I took from the past few days.

Here's a brief (well, if you call 86 pictures brief) sequence starting from when we left to Sunday night.

This gallery starts out ok but is definitely not safe for work as there's lots of ass and other nudity on the Sunday pictures.

Sequential 2004 San Franscisco Gallery | Day Zero / Day One | Day Two | Day Three

Back in the Cowlands

So it is 11pm Eastern Daylight Savings Time and Nala once again finds himself back in the Cowlands.

The Hoont is very happy I have returned.

I really wish I could have spent a few more days in the Bay Area and gotten to Sebastopol to see Liz and Matt. Plus I really wanted to see Courtney and to meet James before he moved away.

Alas, t'was not meant to be this trip.

I am definitely thinking I need to travel to SF 2-3 times a year instead of my typical September mini-vacation.

I really really really miss my friends there.

Anyway, I've got 250 or so pics to preview and edit from the trip. If I'm lucking I'll get 'em up tomorrow.

But honestly... sleeping in my own bed and not on a floor is something I'm really looking forward to.

My time is almost through...

Well it is the end of the trip.

Spent yesterday with Casey and his boyfriend and had a fantastic time at the Street Fair and assorted other Mission-esque places.

More later when I get back to Cowtown.

And photos. Lots of photos of ass. You would not believe the amount of ass photographed!

Get retarded... get retarded... get retarded!!!

The amount of wine that I have consumed has been an all-time high this past weekend.

Last night saw to the death of 2 more bottles and a bottle of champagne as well.

Y'know what is the worst thing about coming to California?

The damn 3 hour time difference.

I never ever stay more than a week so I never fully adjust to the difference and wear myself thin with lack of sleep.

I mean, we only stay up until midnight or 1am here but for me that's 3am or so!

Now Matt and I typically both go to bed around 9pm so we basically get out here and just through good conversation with good friends end up staying awake to the equivalent of our 3am and then waking up after only 3-5 hours of sleep.

It is kind of like a perpetual non-sleep cycle because once the sun creeps in the window there is notkeeping me asleep so I'm stuck awake do'n the shit-shower-and-shave way before anyone else gets up.

I suppose it is for the best since that means I can stay out of the way of the people whose house I am temporarily occupying. But man... the lack of sleep wears you down.

Anyway, nobody wants to hear about my bitchy lack of sleep.

Today brings us to our final full day here in Sodom. We'll be heading to breakfast soon (found a 24 hour place with steak and eggs we want to try) and then to the Folsom Street Fair. Actually, I'm more excited now about our planned detour to Cartoon Art Museum of San Francisco than I am about scantily clad, if clad at all, S&M/Bondage folk to gawk at.

Then again, I am a geek before most other things.

Mmmm... food... hungee...

Another birthday party for Deb...

Wow. The ToysRUs here in San Francisco sucks the same major balls as in Cowtown.

Super mega balls!!!

You'd think I'd come 2400 miles away and would find something different? Hell no!!!

However, while at this place called Jeffries on Market I finally found the much sought after Homie-Praying-At-The-Cross. No more vending machine crack for us now that we have it!

Anyway. We're making a light dinner for another birthday party for everybody's favourite Fabulous Deb Doran tonight here in the Panhandle.

Hope Casey gots my v and email about it.

Communists on vespas and other nonsenical things...

Greetings from a chilly damp San Francisco morning in September.

Oy! What a night!

Anyway. After a really fantastic breakfast at All You Knead in the Haight, yesterday found us driving up to Napa/Sanoma in a van with no brakes. Indeed. Yay for no brakes while driving up and down Bay Area hills and packed roadways. Vijay was driving and handled it admirably. Far far better than I ever would have.

The wineries were ok. A little too commercial and touristy for me but it was fun in a commercial-touristy kind of way. Matt bought several bottles and so did Jen.

We eventually made it back to the city in piece and with the brakes no doubt destroyed from calipres to rotors.

Last night found us 15 stories above the Tenderloin in Deb's new pad she bought. It is small but is really nice. It being a corner apartment, she have views fromTwin Peaks to the Transamerica Pyrimid. Watching the fog roll in was great.

Several glasses of wine and other evilness later, we found ourselves consuming massive amounts of Indian food at some place I'd never been since Shalimar was packed. This shit was da bomb nonetheless. Excellent and spicy, much like the women I was spending the evening with.

The Sisters of Perpetual Fabuloscity (Christine, Deb, Rebecca), Angie, and Erin (Deb and Rebecca's sister I had never met before) are a trip. Jen and Vijay came down to the Tenderloin and their friend Adam cought up with us. Apparently he's currently in residence somewhere in the Tenderloin too.

It was a good night of incredibly stupid conversations, mega-skankiness, moderate whoriness, and overall way too much to drink.

But it was good nonetheless.

And what does today bring?

Let's just say I found a ToysRUs up the street at Geary and Masonic.

Booyah!

Ok. So I lied.

Ok. So I lied.

I'm on Christine's laptop.

She's got a great new apartment near the Panhandle/Western Addition area. She's also got 2 great roommates too.

We're do'n Napa/Sanoma wine country today.

Hopefully 85 in Napa doesn't equal 85 in Cowtown.

Off to Never Never Land...

Well kids we should be in San Francisco soon.

I didn't bring the laptop so no uploading of pics or other shit until we return to Cowtown.

To my San Francisco peeps: Email me and I'll try and snag my email at a cafe or something. I really want to meet and see you all.

14 Days And Counting...

Fourteen days until I temporarily leave the Cowlands and fly to San Francisco.

Mr. T. is renting a van four our excursion into Napa and Sonoma wine country.

I've never been up there so that'll be new territory for me.

Any of you SF geeks wanna do something Saturday afternoon or evening? Email me and let's start making plans.

Enought about SF for now... OTFCC is in 2 weeks...

Well, I originally had decided not to go but Brian D. convinced me that "you aren't a real geek unless you've attended a con" so I'm off to Chicago July 31 - August 1 to attend the Official Transformers™ Collectors’ Convention and Club.

In the end it'll be cheaper to attend both days and hide out in Brian's hotel room than fly in for one day and fly out later in the evening.

Understand my beloved internet acquaintances... Nala has never been surrounded by plastic crack geeks in his life. This will be a first for me.

So with this trip, and September's Super-Mega San Francisco Sodom On The Bay Extravaganza I'll have actually had some vacation time.

San Francisco: Confirmed!

So yesterday we got our tickets for San Francisco.

Matt, The Fabulous Jen™, Mr. T. and I will be arriving at SFO around 8:30 on the evening of Thursday, September 23.

Friday will probably be a Napa/Sanoma trip, my first actually in all these many years. Hell, I am so not the tourist when I'm in the Bay area but I've kind harbored a wish to drive up there and see the country. And of course to consume wine. I hear they bottle some of the most choice vintages of Boone's Farm Strawberry Hill up there.

Friday is also the birthday of The Fabulous Deb Doran™ which will hopefully result an intense amount of fun, as well as me possibly getting drunk, which I haven't been in over a year really. Once a year is good I think and what a better reason and place to be drunk in.

Saturday is open and hopefully I'll be able to get together with some fellow net geeks and such.

Sunday... oh boy... and this will be quite the experience... we'll all be heading to our first (and no doubt last) Folsom Street Fair attendance. Perhaps we can drag Christine and Deb and make them wear there leather and steel thongs. Personally, I'm not a fan of leather daddies and S&M girls, or that entire "culture", but this should be fun for an hour or two.

Alas, we'll be flying out Monday late morning.

Gotsta put Hoont watching, feeding, and pooping plans into place in a month or so. The meows can handle themselves, though Chester will no doubt be freaked we will be gone for a few days.

I am so pysch'd for this trip!!! Really!!! I miss Christine and Deb so much and haven't seen them since last year's excursion and it'll be a bizarre clash of worlds as Cowtown meets West Coast with my travelling with Fab J. and Mr. T.

Ok. If you can't tell. I'm gank'd!

San Francisco Bound?

Well it looks very promising that The Fabulous Jen and I will be heading to San Francisco the last weekend of September.

I need to get out of the Cowlands and Jen wants to go back to San Francisco too.

This weekend also happens to be Folsom Street Fair and Jen and I may take a small detour through that so I can get my S&M quotient filled for the year.

Then again, Folsom is pretty insane from what I've seen and may just fill my quotient for an entire lifetime.

So all my Bay Area peeps. Be on the look out for forthcoming confirmation on this future endeavour!