I’m excited by these Alexander McQueen shoes as art. I could never wear something that adds 15cm to my height – with the 5cm platform considered, that’s still a 10cm heel (appx 4″!) but I’d put them on a shelf to look at, that’s for sure.
Plus, now I know about Grinling Gibbons and his fabulous wood carvings.

Grilled pears
Nutmeg caramel
Organic pistachios

I took this image at Ocean Beach a few summers ago. I was playing with the macro settings on my S70 so it’s fitting that it would inspire a macro memory of summer.

Rena’s Corn Muffins
Slightly adapted
(I copied and pasted her recipe and directions and edited where I changed it)

Ingredients

* 2 1/3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
* 1/3 cup whole wheat flour
* 1 cup natural cane sugar
* 1 cup coarse cornmeal
* 2 tablespoons baking powder
* 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
* 1 1/4 cup whole milk
* 1/4 cup sour cream
* 1/2 pound (two sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
* 3 large eggs

Directions

- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Line 17 (I know, sorry) muffin cups with paper liners (or just grease the tin with some organic sunflower oil).
- Loosely measure the flours into your sifter and sift into a bowl.
- Spoon the sifted flour into your measuring cup and drag the back of a butter knife across the surface to measure (do not shake or this will increase the flour amount and make for denser muffins)
- Put the flour, sugar, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt into a largeish mixing bowl, and whisk with a loose whisk (meaning, lots of space between the wires – we’ll need this later) to incorporate.
- In a glass 4 cup measuring cup, measure out the milk.
- Add a dollop of sour cream to get the milk line up to the 1 1/2 mark.
- Whisk together well but don’t worry about the little bits of sour cream.
- In a separate bowl, combine this milk mixture and the cooled melted butter.
- Crack the eggs into a cup or small bowl (I used the glass measuring cup), and whisk until smooth.
- Add the eggs to the wet mixture, and whisk until combined.
- Pour the wet mixture into the dry (when I did this all in one pour, it made the cooled PFLOUP sound), and whisk (this is why we needed a loose whisk – it will be thick) until just blended.
- Use a 1/4 cup scoop to measure the batter into the paper liners (one scoop will fill each most of the way to the top).
- Bake for 30 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. (I actually pulled them out without testing because they looked SO FREAKING PERFECT at 30 min mark – perfectly curved on top, with little cracks and just golden brown enough)
- Cool slightly and remove from the pan.

The paper liners come off without trying – it’s amazing.
Shannon said, “I can’t help but think of Mr. Crick.”
I said, “Who’s Mr. Crick?”
“That guy in Stranger than Fiction. I feel like he did when he at that cookie.”

These are the best corn muffins ever! Thank you Rena!!
I didn’t have a second muffin pan so I put paper liners in some ramekins and they worked out just fine. You can see here that we got a little distracted before I remembered to take a picture for you!

While I was putting them together, I discovered some unused fresh egg pasta that I got at Lucca Ravioli last week and realized it needed to be cooked asap. I’ve had fresh pasta in a plastic bag in the fridge get mouldy within two weeks. This pasta was only in the paper they wrapped it in when I bought it so it got a little dried out.
To me, fettucini needs to have a cream sauce so I set about to make the following alfredo from scratch without a recipe. It turned out really well.

Addy’s Alfredo
2 T butter
2 T unbleached all purpose flour
1 c Half & Half
1 c stock (whatever kind you use, know that you will taste it a little bit. I used Low Sodium Organic Chicken stock)
1 1/2 c shredded mixed cheeses
I used – 1/4 c fresh parmesean, 1/4 c or 1 oz cream cheese, 1/2 c monterey jack & 1/2 c cheddar
1/2 t salt
1/2 t black pepper (or to taste)
1/8 t nutmeg

- Mix the half & half and stock together and take the chill off them. You can heat them or they can be room temp – I haven’t found it makes much difference as long as they’re not cold. Set aside.
- Make a roux with the butter & flour.
- I do this by melting the butter over medium heat until it’s foaming and, using a whisk and only ever a whisk, sprinkle the flour in slowly & uniformly, until the entire thing is uniform and foamy. It’s okay, and even recommended, to let it brown a touch, but it’s more important to get everything whisked together quickly and without lumps. And, by no means, will you let it burn!
- Still over medium heat, slowly and steadily add the stock mixture in a steady stream until it’s all incorporated. You should go slowly enough that you’re able to make a consistent paste that gets thinner and thinner as you add the stock. You’ll see what I mean as you’re doing it and if you’ve never made a roux before, it might take you a couple of tries before it makes sense. But it’s SO worth it – it’s the base of so many great sauces and is really easy once you know how to do it.
- Stir with the whisk for a few minutes still over medium heat. The sauce should thicken within 3-5 minutes.
- Once it’s got a nice thickness, take it off the heat and stir in the cheese until it’s incorporated. This will thicken the sauce a bit more.
- Mix in the salt, pepper and nutmeg.
- Pour onto thick, flat pasta like fettuccini or tagliarini and enjoy!

We had some left over grilled chicken so I chopped that up and added it with 1/2 a bag of frozen peas and it was quite a treat.

SATURDAY

My friends Jim and Kiki live in a great apartment that overlooks the Dyke March‘s route so they open their doors to us almost every year so we can watch/participate.

The Dyke March is always on “pink saturday” and I had to arrive after working all day. I left work a bit early as this is a super important fun event that happens once a year. It’s like a bday party – totally worth clocking out an hour early.
I stopped at home to feed the cat and change and ran up the street to Jim’s place with my rainbow body paint kit with 15 minutes to get painted before the Dykes on Bikes went roaring down the street.

That was a great start to the weekend.
[click any photo to see it larger]

During the parade I was busy “participating” and only caught one image.

A little girl walked by with her moms and a poster that said “I <3 my 2 mommies." I was slow on the shutter and thought I missed them.
As you can see, one of her mommies asked her to turn around for me. That just breaks my heart open with joy – I wish this photo could show you how freakin’ cute this little girl’s face is.

Violet Blue and I met at this very same party five years ago. We call it our anniversary. Here she is in all her hot gangsta glory (wearing Ben’s hat).

My 89 (??) year old Grand-Aunt Polly is a Old Lesbian Organized for Change (OLOC) and she and her ladies were posted up in the sweet viewing spot of the corner of 16th/Dolores where they got a fab, ground eye view of the parade. I was too busy introducing her to Kiki and Violet and being introduced to all of Polly’s friends that I forgot to get a pic, but one of her friends got a great one with what looked like a really good camera.
I’m really glad I’ve started spending time with her – she’s totally together and fun and has a lot to say and contribute. Her friends were super cute when they found out I am her grand-niece.
Y’all should support all the Old Lesbians in your area – they freakin’ rock!

After the parade ended, Violet took Ben and me to “a sekrit party in the armory.” The armory is owned by Kink.com (NSFW).
It was my first visit to the giant building that I ride past every morning on my way to work, so I was excited to see the rooms and how they’ve got everything set up.
There were a few scenes being filmed that night but the crowd, which was pretty non-usual for that space according to Violet, was really lame and took the fun out of watching.

We wandered around with our free drinks and took pics in the different themed rooms, which was super fun.

Violet took this selfie of us and I totally <3 it.

Just about every room had a row of pegs as well as O rings strategically placed in all kinds of places.

Violet got her first Digital SLR photography lesson while I explored a small closet.

Ben and I both got psyched about the light right here and Violet was happy to oblige us with her keen modeling skills.

We decided we’d have more fun eating than sticking around (again, lame “industry” crowd – boo) so we went to Monk’s Kettle [Their kitchen is open until 1am, btw...] and all ordered burgers and ginger beer. This was my third or fourth visit and I felt confident highly recommending it to these two who’d wanted to check it but hadn’t yet – they were pleased.
2am, time to sleep.

SUNDAY
I woke up around 10 and called the boys to figure out the plan for the day. It was decided that we’d start by meeting at Jim’s to watch a bit of US vs Brazil soccer (wow – the first half was awesome. didn’t see the second.) and have some champagne and glitter.
Fur removed……glitter and sunscreen applied, we headed over to Zuni‘s street party to say hi to our bday friend Janice who was pouring drinks for the first time. She made us some mean margaritas, got some glitter (and sunscreen!) applied and we headed down to Civic Center for the after parade party.

We walked into the festivities via the dance music area while they were in the middle of a Michael Jackson tribute set, which made me really happy.

Yay for gay pride & kissing outside!

This beautiful man and his two little girls looked so sweet to me, I had to ask for a photo. He obliged me with such a sweet smile – I was very happy.

This mirror ball man of awesomeness was sitting on the curb, looking a little sad, when we started dancing in front of him. A few minutes later, he perked up and started dancing as well and people started taking photos almost immediately. I could tell he really enjoyed having his photo taken in that fabulous outfit. That made me super happy.

I saw this tattoo from across the dance-street and had to record it, with permission of course. I think it’s wonderful and really says a lot, even if I don’t believe in God and his/her judgement, per se.

We walked home before the sun went down and I had a long relaxing evening with my man after his return from a weekend riding trip.

Best pride ever thanks to good friends, excellent imbibles and perfect weather in my favorite city.

<3

On Sunday, we went to Baker Beach

View Larger Map
and grumbled at the Blue Angels flexing their military muscle all over our supposed-to-be quiet day. Eventually, they landed and we were able to take a nap that left us hungry.
Hungry and near Clement Street


(which might as well be China Town West here in San Francisco) meant that we were on a hunt for noodles. Part of the hunt included trying to find noodles to cook at home.

And boy did we find them! The May Wah Supermarket made our night. We got oodles of noodles, veggies, soy milk, tea, a wok cleaning brush, some nice porcelain soup spoons, lots of different versions of bean paste filled cookies, a small bottle of sake and one small can of basil seed drink.

Below, you’ll see two photos (I have SUCH a hard time deciding!!) of me and the latter two Asian market finds.

Ahh, basil seed drink. I was pretty nervous to try this stuff, hence the drink not quite hitting my mouth.¹

Mmm, nigori sake in a pretty pink bottle. It was a half bottle so my huge hand is actually not huge.

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¹Once he did it…

…I couldn’t back down!

It’s actually filled with these little gelatinously coated black seeds that taste vaguely of basil. The juice that they float inside tastes mildly of banana flavoring and the fun part was chomping down on the strange little seeds – it was easier to do so when only a small mouthful is ingested at a time.

The technique of filling the mouth with a big gulp and then trying to catch the seeds between the teeth…

…didn’t work so well.

Yay!

I love food and I love photographing food and I love taking self portraits. I’ve just never focused on doing them together so this is super fun for me (rubs hands together with glee).

The hardest part of this challenge is choosing only one image to post here.
I’ve narrowed it down to just two¹ and if you feel so inclined, I’d love to hear which is your favorite and why.

These two are from my “candy obsession” session. Feel free to click to see the image larger.

I like this one best for the composition overall, but I don’t like that the Cyprus Delight² I’m pulling from the shelf is cut off.

I like this one best for the look on my face, the fun, sharp perspective and the fact that the Cyprus Delight is shown off better, but I don’t like the overhead light that’s, well, directly over my head.

¹Actually, I wanted to share this one too because I felt like a 10 year old when I was shooting this part of the “candy obsession” series. I was giggling and trying to get the chocolate to show without it looking too gross. Then my man walked into the kitchen and said “are you taking pictures of yourself stuffing chocolate into your mouth?” and just kind of shook his head and laughed as I cracked up. I couldn’t stop laughing. It was a super deep, belly laugh and it felt really good. Be forewarned, if you click thru to the larger image, it might gross you out like it did him. I think it’s hilarious and it makes me giggle to look at it.

²similar to Turkish Delight, a la The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe, only made in Cyprus instead. I got it at Bi Rite Creamery and it’s got lots of yummy bergamot flavor – deelish.

i found the bathroom topic to be intriguing for a few reasons.
the first being that i love the bathroom here at my boyfriend’s apartment and was excited to photo-document myself in it.
the second being that scene in Say Anything when James Court gets into his empty tub, with all of his clothes on to cry about how his world is collapsing around him. that scene has always made me cry with empathy.
the third reason takes the second reason into consideration. i’ve been going thru a lot of changes emotionally and mentally and find that i gain solace when in the bath.

in these photos, i attempted to capture the strong, yet emotionally challenged state i’ve been existing in for the past few months. it just so happens that these two images were, respectively, the first and last photos i took for this challenge.

we ate brunch inside and then decided to go to the park.

we saw my bike messenger friend by the video store.

we all decided to get ice cream and then go to the park – my friend would meet us there.

i chose honey lavender ice cream – one scoop, in a biodegradable cup. my roommate got one scoop of chocolate and one scoop of roasted banana – they were yummy. I liked mine much more but noticed that after eating a bit of the chocolate, I could taste the honey a lot more in mine.

my bike messenger friend didn’t show up so we went to the park without him.

there were a lot of people, in little groups, sitting in the sun, on the grass.

i trod carefully to avoid stepping in any poop. i didn’t see any poop, nor did I tred in any.

we took a couple of Polaroids before we figured out that we wanted to take shots of our hands against nature.

my bike messenger friend found us – he’d gone to get a 20 oz of some hand crafted beer, which he opened with a key.

I saw someone I’m friends with, sitting a few yards away and I waved and smiled. but I did not rise and go say hi. then we talked about park/beach/public lounge area protocol regarding seeing friends and acquaintances.

a man walked up and passed out next to us, on his back, with his face smartly covered by his hat. he lay there with his arms out and his legs splayed, like a baby, and snored. we secretly took a Polaroid of him.

my bike messenger friend got to see a girl’s butt as she put on her bikini under her little dress. that made him happy.

my roommate and I continued our quest for Polaroids of our hands in front of nature while we made our way home. at one point, my roommate was on the ground with the camera and some guys drove by and yelled “i’ve fallen and i can’t get up!” it was funny.

when we got home, we put the Polaroids on the wall where we’d put the tree branch and leaves stickers. the Polaroids look like they’re leaves falling from the tree branches. We like it.