June 30

Tal's birthday party was today. Only his actual birthday was almost three weeks earlier. Gotta celebrate sometime.


First, I gave Samantha her gift for graduation, since I wasn't able to make THAT party. I think she likes it.


The purple potato chips were quite pretty, but it's the sweet potato chip that was really delicious. Sweet potatoes are magical.


Samantha and Sara play Tangoes which is really freakin hard. Apparently they used to test the intelligence of immigrants coming to the United States by timing them when they do this kind of game. It's a good thing I wasn't trying to immigrate at that time because they wouldn't have let me in.


The birthday cake mango and sticky rice. So delicious.


Tal, pre- and post-candle blowing out. He looks almost exactly the same.

June 29

Kenneth flew in from Northern California. On his first night, we saw a little taste of Los Angeles:


"God Bless The Dead." Seems a little... I don't know what it is.


June bug!

June 28

What was this, a Thursday? Did I do anything? Let's see...


This is what garbanzo beans look like right off the plant. I had no idea that they came in little pods. Apparently (according to Wikipedia), in India, people eat them right out of the pod as snacks. I didn't buy any.


I found my cats sleeping in tandem on the bench in my kitchen. They're so cute when they're sleepy. And Houdini is so silly with his leg and tail hanging off the edge. One thing I can say for Madeleine is that she consolidates her space.

June 27

On this day, my grandmother threw a giant(ish) party for her cousin, Shabtai, who lives in Israel, but who was visiting the US for the first time in 20 years. I don't think I'd met him before, but he swears he remembers my brother and my cousin Allison who are the same age.


He was taking pictures. I was taking pictures. It was a trip.


I drove Aunt Ruth and Uncle Milton to the party and back, which meant that I arrived and left nearly an hour before the rest of my family did. Milton asked me the same questions he always does, because he can't remember, and Ruth was so impressed by the way I drove. I think it's because we didn't hit traffic and I don't speed.


My uncle Eric is telling Ruth that with diabetes she CAN eat things besides lettuce, and that all she has to do is count grams of carbohydrates. Ruth was pleased to hear this, but she'll probably turn around and say that because of her "sugar diabetes" she can't eat anything, so she won't cook and eat anymore.


My dad and my brother just hang out.


My mother, my dad's cousin Rob and my great-aunt Bertha are listening to Shabtai talk about Israel and the rest of the Middle East. I didn't really want to get into that conversation, and I didn't want anyone to ask me what I thought about it because I don't like talking about it.


Allison and Brooke are my second cousins. They live in Redondo Beach and are altogether "cooler" than my brother and I are, probably. Allison wants to be a casting agent and Brooke is interested in fashion. They are also very pretty and popular and are really funny with their grandparents:


I call this: Family Portrait with Condiments.


Brooke, her mother Sheila (Rob's wife), and my purse on the green couch that I always fall asleep on at my grandmother's house.


It's not even the most comfortable couch either, there's just something about it that is so relaxing.


The Siblings: my grandmother Florence, Bertha, and Milton, in order of age. They're so cute.

June 26

A Supermarket in California
-Allen Ginsberg

What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for I walked down the
streets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking at the full moon.

In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit
supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles
full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes! --- and you,
Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?









Also, because Hollywood is weird:

June 25

Vidal and I had nothing to do. So we went to Hollywood.


We went to Mashti Malone's for some rosewater ice cream. Well, I had the rosewater, I think it blew Vidal's mind too much, so he had pomegranate sorbet.


This is the look of satisfaction.


They have generic flavors, but this end of the counter is the one that interests me: the unusual ones. Ginger rosewater, herbal ice, saffron orange... delicious.

After a quick hello to my grandmother, we saw Paprika


which was good, but weird as hell. Successful film, all in all.


It was playing in a beautiful old theater on La Brea. I can't believe I'd never been there before.


Beautiful, but the seats were really uncomfortable.


Apparently Steve Buscemi has a new film coming out. Stay tuned; it's called The Interview.


Credits look interesting on time-lapse. Looks like an old video game.

June 24

Fruit and Ikea.




Since I am not stranded on a tropical desert island, coconut is not that rewarding.





Inside of a cabinet:

June 23

Ariana had a show at the The Cocaine in Little Tokyo, which I attended. I sat kind of in the back, so I didn't see much, but I think that my photos weren't bad, all things considered.

All of these people had a better view than me:


They had to take their food outside, because for some reason, it's not allowed, even packaged up. I think that's a little weird.


The girl with the curly hair with her back to me was also in the previous photo. She moved within the time that I took these photos.


I don't know them.

Then Ariana came on!


With Amanda Lynn, her mandolin.


Saying hi and switching instruments.


I don't think that this is her usual guitar. Hmm.

More photos of her playing:








Then other musicians, Stephanie and Sebastian (whose birthday it was) joined the fray.