I’ve been in Cali for a week now and honestly, nothing great has happened…well kind of. Before I left to Chicago, I bought a Blackberry Pearl and am in love with it. Its smaller than the 8700g (which I cracked the screen out of frustration) and the 7105t (which I dropped a remote on and cracked the screen). Mr. Barrett’s post on was the clincher on me buying the phone and I got it for a decent craigslist price.

San Francisco:

I arrived in the Oakland airport around 1:30 am. Unfortunately for me, it was already too late for In N’ Out, but because I’ve been having way too many white chocolate mochas, it was time to cut the coffee intake just a little bit. The next day my sister went to the city and hit the usual shopping spots, however I kind of gave myself an ultimatum on what I could buy; anything art related (books/art figurines) and a jacket. Upper haight didn’t have any of the following (except for a Diesel jacket that wasn’t the right size), but Upper Playground had it. I bought a David Choe figurine and a DVD I was waiting to get “The Run Up”.

Before my sister and I shopped at the playground, we HAD to see the D. Structure shop. The sign in the front let EVERYONE know who was in the neighborhood. The visuals to the front helps bring some appeal to the store. JJ was the man working the front and he took me around for the tour and I made a pit stop to see Mr. St. Sidepipe who had an oversized video tape of Nash Bridges.

I went back outside where Jon finished the tour overseeing upstairs and in the basement where they kept all the inventory. I was amazed to see how well the shopped look and Jon explaining to me that 90% of the customers are NOT rollerbladers.

I scared Tory while he was on the phone outside the shop with a stogie.

Afterwards we heading to my favorite spots, Kinokuniya Bookstore where I would spend over $50.00 just on magazines. I really wanted the airmax book that came out, but it was sold out at this particular spot. San Jose had it, but I’m taking my chances in LA.

To end the shopping day, we headed to Union Square. Went to Niketown where surprisingly they were selling ALL the “One Time Only” shoes for $200.00. I was on the hunt for a jacket and for some reason we ended up in Saks 5th thinking I would find a jacket there, which I somewhat did. It was a Hugo Boss Jacket that was on sale for $300.00 but didn’t have my size. What was available in my size was the Burton Mark XIII Dawson Jacket at the hefty price of $735.00. A little out of my league.
The one I want has a charcoal body.

The next day, unexpectedly we ended back up in the city. Victor Solomon™ hits me up, but unfortunately we couldn’t schedule a proper time to meet since I was still jacket hunting. Sisley had one,b ut not for the price I wanted. My sister is going to be on patrol to see if the price will drop.

We came back to Berkeley and I couldn’t schedule time with two of my bay area boys Garrett Polson and Snow due to phone problems and me still shopping for a jacket. So instead my sister and I went to watch Borat. I was a little optmistic about the movie, but I couldn’t help myself when I cry-laughed. We didn’t end the day without some popcorn chicken…and in the morning before we left to Delano.

Delano:

I’ll tell you straight up; Delano sucks, but there are times where it’ll be both annoying and entertaining. My sister and I were getting messages from people saying that there would be a “reunion” of people meeting up at a shit bar, which I later found out someone was killed there a month ago. Anthony went from ashy to class when he started buying shots of couvacier to everyone. The fun part was to see my drunk cousin, this girl staring at me, talking to my girl Joann who is my gossip queen, and dodging dudes I didn’t want to see.

I also got fat. Eating turkey and leftovers just made me Thanksgiving fat, however I did try my best to balance it with a healthy dose of skating. Delano has this excellent park for what this city deserves and I got down again being the only rollerblader out of 10 skateboarders, but the ipod kept me in check with what I had to do. It was a struggle since I haven’t skated in about a month or two. By day two, I was the sorest and went to a ledge that is MY LEDGE. I don’t think anyone else skates it since I had to rewax the ledge. Delano had occasional rain that permitted me from completing phase two of trick rehabilitation, but then laziness and errands came into place.

Oh yeah, my Christmas sucked balls… gift-wise but I did get to hang out with my half sister’s kids and hear my mom nag at me.

Bakersfield:

I would escape Delano mainly to get good white chocolate mochas and borders, with the occasional Barnes and Nobel. But I couldn’t stop there without meeting up at the shop. I met Northway at his work Fluxar, a web design firm based in Bakersfield. He toured me around the office, met his boss and coworkers as well as his work.

Northway’s new ride.

Ryan’s office:

The cards he designed.

Peeping victorsolomon.com

Some tea boxes he designed

Reconstructing the back and tearing ceilings to give it a loft style office.

Cloudy means we can’t skate. Boo.

Ryan’s first big design display.

The shop was the same, except there was a tree and it smelled very pine-like. Matt and Marcelle were against each other playing pool and Ryan was deciding on buying a hoodie or a pair of pants. Matt was also generous enough to give me two gifts that I enjoyed; Barely Dead and Accidental Machines. By 7:00PM it would be closing time for Intuition, but because of the rain that just altered my plans to head to borders and read while the Mickster went on his date.

Hopefully the LA week will compensate the Delano stay.