Posts Tagged ‘ Palo Alto ’

Mike’s Cafe

This week, we enjoyed a brief visit from my Australian friend Penny and her younger brother Ian.  Ian had backpacked his way around the world for several months before he visited Penny and her “registered partner NOT husband” Chris in the Bay Area.  Los Angeles was Ian’s final pit stop before he flew back to Australia on Wednesday night.

Penny had chauffeured Ian from the Bay Area to Las Vegas for two days of gambling before they arrived on our doorstep Tuesday evening, bearing gifts of 99 Ranch Chinese roast duck, Sun Tropics mango passionfruit juice, and a Cuisinart immersion blender!  Penny and I used to shop at the 99 Ranch in Mountain View on Thursdays after volunteering with Habitat for Humanity Silicon Valley.  Chinese roast duck was and remains a treat, but cartons of Sun Tropics juice were staples in our fridge back then!  We inherited the blender from our German friends Julia and Eberhard, who are moving from Menlo Park to Hamburg next month.  To repay Julia and Eberhard’s kindness, I sent Penny home with a small framed print of Death Valley Desert Gold for them, as they had visited Death Valley over Christmas.  To repay Penny’s kindness, we enjoyed comfort food together at the Nickel Diner in downtown L.A. and Tender Greens in Santa Monica.

Penny’s kindness manifests itself in countless ways.  She pours love into the meals she cooks for her friends and family.  She makes my long commute bearable by Skyping with me once a week as I inch along the freeway.  And despite her occasional tantrums when I’ve taken “too many” photos during a hike or party, she encourages my photography.  She arranged for Ellen and Mike, the proprietors of Mike’s Cafes, to display my work at their Palo Alto restaurant for three months this past summer.  This is a photo of my prints on display at the restaurant.  Scott hung the frames; he did an excellent job.  If you scan the mirrored wall closely, you will see the reflection of Penny chatting with Mike.

2012
01/28
POSTED BY
CATEGORY
Photographs
TAGS




























Leave a comment

Bookmarc

Today, I decided to treat myself to a new book from Bookmarc.  Bookmarc is the Marc Jacobs brand extension / bookstore on Melrose Place in West Hollywood.  I bought On Paris, a selection of articles written by Ernest Hemingway between 1920 and 1924 for The Toronto Star.  I had no idea that Ernest Hemingway was once a foreign correspondent for The Toronto Star!  This is the magic of Bookmarc:  it’s small and well-curated.  Usually, I enjoy the serendipity and thrift of discovering old favourites and new treasures among stacks of haphazardly catalogued used books at Know Knew Books in Palo Alto, Bart’s Books in Ojai, or The Last Bookstore in DTLA.  However, I also enjoy the luxury of being the first person to thumb through the heavy pages of an art book or the deckle-edge pages of a novel.

I took this photo of Bookmarc in March 2011, when it was warm and sunny outside.  That day, I bought The Dud Avocado by Elaine Dundy.  Books I own tend to languish on the shelf for months until I’m ready to read them.  I finished reading The Dud Avocado recently.  Similar to On Paris, The Dud Avocado offers an American perspective about living in post-war Paris.  Different from On Paris (which is non-fiction and written after the First World War), The Dud Avocado is juicy, thinly-veiled fiction set after the Second World War – I highly recommend it for the title alone!

On a whim, I bought presents for Scott and my Canadian friend Dave.  (Dave, thank you for asking me about my birthday when we spoke on the phone today.  I’m sorry I forgot to ask you about yours; please enjoy the book I’m sending to you, Debbie, and Mika in Toronto!)  Mark, the clerk, offered to check the storage area for pristine copies of the books I chose and then wrapped them so beautifully I was afraid to leave the store with them as it was raining outside.  While I waited for the rain to stop, I flipped through a copy of Ron Galella:  Exclusive Diary.  Ron Galella takes old-school paparazzi photographs of glamorous people.  Many of the photos in the book were taken in Hollywood, just a couple miles east of Bookmarc.

2011
11/12
POSTED BY
CATEGORY
Photographs
TAGS




























Leave a comment

“Stay hungry. Stay foolish.” ~ Steve Jobs, 1955-2011

Steve Jobs died today.  Many people will remember Steve Jobs for how he revolutionized the way we create, convey, and consume cultural content.  As much as I admire his professional accomplishments, I will remember him most for his front yard:  I took this snapshot of poppies growing in his front yard when I walked past his house for the first time in June 2009 with my German friend Manuela.  At the time, we didn’t know that the property belonged to him and his family.  All I knew for certain was that a subversive with excellent taste lived there – someone who dared to forgo a manicured lawn in favour of a wildly whimsical field of poppies.  Someone who dared to stay hungry and stay foolish.

2011
10/05
POSTED BY
CATEGORY
Photographs
TAGS











Leave a comment

Allied Arts Guild: The Barn Woodshop

Tom, who owns The Barn Woodshop in Menlo Park, noticed me lurking in the bushes with my camera during my first visit to the Allied Arts Guild in March 2009.  He invited me to look around the Barn once I was finished shooting flowers in the garden.

The Barn is 125 years old, and has housed a Woodshop for the past 81 years.  In the Barn, Tom gave me a pin to mark my hometown on a world map he uses to track visitors.  Tom traveled around the world before returning to his family’s business of building and restoring heirloom-quality furniture.  He likes not knowing who will come through the door of his Woodshop each day.  Once, he repaired some furniture for Shirley Temple; she still lives nearby in Woodside.  These days, Tom works on a steady stream of commissions from Stanford faculty and Silicon Valley honchos who trust him to restore their treasures with sensitivity and integrity.  When I told Tom about my hobby of re-finishing discarded tables and chairs, he offered to teach me how to cane chairs.  I didn’t accept his offer right away, even though Scott encouraged me to give it a try.  Now I’m really glad I did as Tom taught me how to weave cane and replace torn sheet cane.  These skills may come in handy the next time I find a broken chair on the sidewalk!  Before we moved to L.A. last fall, Tom fixed a pair of rosewood chairs that I had inherited from my grandfather.  Now, I visit Tom every time I’m in town.

Last weekend, we visited friends in Palo Alto, Menlo Park, and San Francisco.  At the Guild, I renewed my contract with the Artisan Shop to consign prints of my photos and accepted Tom’s offer of display space for my photos in the Barn’s new showroom.

2010
05/24
POSTED BY
CATEGORY
Photographs
TAGS


















Leave a comment
%d bloggers like this: