Walking In Wuhan

Recently we were browsing in one of those fantastic locally owned movie rental places that has a great selection of awesomely bad movies, when I found myself making a passionate, persuasive argument about why we should spend an evening watching Sylvester Stallone's 1987 "hit" Over The Top.

Quick synopsis of my argument: A struggling truck driver (Stallone) tries to reconnect with his son, and fails until entering the national arm wrestling championships in Las Vegas. You can imagine that awesomeness is interspersed on a backdrop of a soundtrack that includes Sammy Hagar and Frank Stallone. Did I mention Stallone's character's name is Lincoln Hawk? It's off the charts.

We ended up compromising (Yay marriage!) with Burn After Reading. We left the video store, my mind still turning.

Let's talk hypothetically here for a second. Maybe there's a gathering where a white T-shirt, suspenders or trucker hat must be worn to gain entry. Once inside, "Over The Top" is playing on a television and a double-elimination arm wrestling tournament is taking place with Sammy Hagar playing softly in the background for ambiance. Sweat. There may or may not be Pabst Blue Ribbon available for those interested.

I don't know, I mean, I'm just thinking out loud here. But would you go to something like that? You know, hypothetically.

I'm a big fan of breakfast for dinner -- or brinner. On Thursday I took down this bad boy. That's onions, broccoli, garlic and cheese on the inside.

I usually don't open forwards, but my mom sent me a forward with works by Chinese artist Liu Bolin, a Beijing based artist who is known for his use of camouflage. Basically, he paints himself and puts himself in the piece. Check out a few of these photos. They're awesome. I'd heard a little about this guy when we were across the Pacific. Kinda wish I could have seen some of his work over there.






Image Source: Google images.

Check out these links for more info:

http://www.homepagedaily.com/Pages/article7671-liu-bolin---the-invisible-man---exhibits-in-paris.aspx

Walking around North Beach and Chinatown yesterday, I made a point of trying to notice details about things around me. Lately we've been feeling that the newness of being in the Bay Area has begun to wear off -- I suppose that happens when you've been somewhere for more than two years. So, when we walked through North Beach, I looked up to admire "Language of the Birds" a public art installation of white books that are made to look like birds. Here's a photo:

I guess I'd always been distracted by looking upward, and never noticed the ground under the books. There are words made to look like they'd fallen out of the books, and come from books written by authors with connections to North Beach. More importantly, the simple discovery left me feeling like I finally had my eyes open for the first time in awhile.

We have visitors in town this week and we hung out in the City. We spent time in Chinatown, North Beach and the Lower Height. When the 'rents came out last month, they brought out my old film camera -- previously a high school graduation gift given to my mom -- and I wanted to take a few photos. I guess the batteries in the camera didn't hold up well since I last used the camera three or four years ago, and only lasted for a couple shots.

For lunch we went to House of Nanking, which had been recommended by several people we know who have come to San Francisco. We finally went for lunch today. I was planning on getting noodles or something, when I saw they had, Bao Bing on the menu. Bao Bing is meat that is cooked with veggies and -- at least in China -- is covered with this bar-b-que type cause and served in a little tortilla looking thing. I ordered it every chance I got in China, but haven't had it since we've been back. I ordered it with tofu and it was just as good as I remembered. Best lunch in a long time. It's not really authentic, but definitely hit the spot.

If you're in San Francisco, check it out: http://www.yelp.com/biz/house-of-nanking-san-francisco

It's been a few weeks, but a few quick hit items from the President's Cup at Harding Park in early October.

• I've seen pro golfers up close before -- Mickelson when he was at ASU and again at the AT&T and pretty much carried on conversations with guys at the Cox Classic in Omaha during the round. Pro golfers are the closest thing to average guys that exist in pro sports. But Tiger Woods walking three feet from you is something totally different. He's got aura. We were on the ropes as he walked towards the practice green, and the guy was dialed in. He had that same look on his face on the range as when he hit a 2-iron to 10 feet to win a match later in the day. There's just this sense around him that he could bring life to its knees anytime he wanted.
  
• Probably the coolest part of the two days we were there was watching each player come through the driving range before their round. More or less, the top 24 players in the world were there, warming up, goofing around and getting ready for a round. One of the more overlooked stats on tour is shot dispersion, which is basically a measurement of how close a player comes to hitting their intended target, we watched Justin Leonard hit about 10 shots with his three iron, and they could have all been covered with a hand towel. Unbelievable.
  
• Watching an event like the President's Cup isn't the best for following golfers. At one point there were more than 30,000 spectators on the course and only five groups playing. The good thing was they had mini-TVs that you could rent for $5 per day that allowed you to pick a spot on the course and wait for the groups to pass through without missing any of the action. Not sure if that's a regular thing at most PGA events -- but it should be.
  

A scan of this ticket is the closest thing I have to an image from the weekend. Unless you went on a practice round day, they had a cell phone and camera check on the way into the gate. Nothing got in.

We were going for the three male characters from Clue. Maybe "creepy uncles" is more accurate.

We had the third go round for furloughs last weekend, so on Monday we headed up to Napa with some friends. It was really the first time I'd been in Napa Valley for any extended period of time. The wine's more expensive generally and there are more tourists, but the views more than made up for it. One we visited sat up on top of a hill overlooking the vineyards, which were gorgeous shades of red and yellow. Since it was a Monday, hardly anybody was around and it was definitely gorgeous. Plus, having two pools on top of the hill didn't hurt the aesthetics. Click the image for a bigger view.

If I didn't already have a Halloween costume idea, this would be a front runner. I'm doubly proud that this gem was made at KXVO in Omaha.

Guess I still have this thing. Should probably fill it up one of these days.