Salton Sea

On the way back from Salvation Mountain, we stopped at the Salton Sea.

I hadn't heard of Salton Sea before I started looking up Salvation Mountain, and even then I didn't know any details about it. I'm still not quite sure how I feel about it. The shore is made of dead fish, which is disturbing enough to look at, but standing on it was such an unpleasant sensation I can't even completely describe how unsettling it was. In some places it was squishy and my feet were almost sinking into the dead fish mulch; I had to backtrack on to a firmer patch because I couldn't handle stepping on the squishy bits. The water looked horrible close-up, almost like sludge.








But then from a few steps back the lake looks gorgeous and peaceful.


It was a very, very strange place, and I kept thinking about it days after our trip. I read about how the sea was created by accident and how at one point they tried to make it into a Palm Springs-esque tourist destination but it never panned out. Now the sea is fed by agricultural run-off and the rising saline levels in the lake (it's currently saltier than the ocean) caused the massive fish die offs that give the sea it's eerie atmosphere. I found a movie on Netflix called "Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea" which goes much more in depth on the environmental crisis that is the Sea, and on the communities that live in Niland/Bombay Beach. I definitely recommend checking it out if you're interested.




Top photo taken by Isabel

FUN in LA: The Huntington Part 2

We went back to the Huntington! It turned out that we happened to go on day 2 of the Camellia Show, so they had camellias for sale outside and inside they had the winning camellias on display.






They were all so beautiful! I had no idea there was so much variation within the species, it was incredible to see the differences in size and petal shape.

After we left the camellias we popped into the greenhouses, and eventually we made our way over to the Chinese garden, which we had missed last time.


The customary shot of the back of my mom's head.





We also walked through the Children's garden, which we had never seen before! It may be built for children, but everything was just my size.


It was the perfect day for a garden stroll! It was so nice to be outside enjoying the clouds and the slight chill. I know people living in places that get a real winter probably think I'm crazy, but there's no fun in 80 degree days in January/February, so I relish the few cloudy days we get.

I can't wait to go back! I'm seriously considering getting a membership. There's always something new to see!

<3

FUN in LA: Salvation Mountain

To be honest, I don't even remember when or where I first heard about Salvation Mountain. It's possible that I first saw it during it's cameo in Into the Wild, or in the A Beautiful Mess archives, or that I just saw a picture on tumblr somewhere. The first time that I thought of it as a place that I could actually go see was when my mom and I went to Palm Springs in 2012, and I wanted to make a detour to see it on the way. We were planning on going, but we ended up just staying in Palm Springs where there was air conditioning. (I don't know why we always end up going into the desert in August, but there you go. Driving out to the middle of nowhere in temperatures over 110 degrees doesn't always seem like the best idea.)

So what I'm getting at is that I've wanted to see Salvation Mountain for about 2 years now, so I was very excited when I brought it up to my friend Isabel and she said she wanted to see it too. We decided on a day and made plans to trek out to Niland to see Leonard Knight's creation. I was so sad when I heard just days before our trip that Leonard had died, and that news cast a different light on my experience of the mountain. It went from a piece of art to one man's life's work.

It took us about three hours to get down there, and the last hour of the drive there was literally nothing around. Just road and desert. When we finally caught sight of the mountain it was this big splash of color rising out of the emptiness. We walked all around it, inside it, and climbed the mountain and I was just blown away by it. Just the sheer size of it is incredible, and then you realize that one man built the whole thing and it becomes that much more mind-blowing.

There are signs on the mountain designating it as an American Folk Art site, and Isabel said something I thought was really interesting, that Salvation Mountain felt "very American." She talked about how the monuments and tourist attractions in Europe are usually religious, and this was like the American counterpart. I liked that a lot, it got the American Studies minor part of my head buzzing. I totally agree with her. I think in relation to the European cathedrals and shrines that were built as tributes to God over hundreds of years by thousands of people, it does seem really fitting that the American version would be built by one man all by himself out in the desert. It was hard to shake the John the Baptist vibes I got from the place too; a voice crying out in the wilderness that God is love.

Book Club: Ready Player One

I haven't bought a book for myself that was not required reading for a class in a quite some time. Maybe the October before last? I get most of my books from the library (especially convenient now that there's an app, so I can request new books on my phone), but around Christmas the Barnes & Noble by my work closed so I picked up some books in the clearance sale. Ready Player one is the first one I've gotten around to reading.

The plot: it's set in the US in 2044, and most of the population lives their lives plugged into a virtual reality called OASIS. When James Halliday, the creator of OASIS, died he set up a scavenger hunt hidden within the game and announced that the first person to find the easter egg he hid would inherit his estate. The prize is especially important because so much of the population is living in poverty, but also because corporations want to win so they can own and monetize the OASIS platform. The book is narrated by one of the egg hunters, Wade Watts.

I really liked Ready Player one. It's got elements of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the Matrix, and John Hughes all rolled into one. Halliday was obsessed with the 80s, so all the characters know obscure facts about music & movies released in the 80s. I'm really glad I read it after You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried; while reading it I kept thinking that Wade would probably have read YCIMIYT for his research.

Also, it made me more interested in Dungeons & Dragons than I've ever been before. So there's that.

Read any good books lately?

<3

50 Book Challenge count: 3

Care Package

I forgot to mention one other thing that happened in January! I received the most wonderful package from Elis!

The package had a lovely card, a mix that's been living in my car stereo, and some beautiful prints. I'm a big fan of Elis' photography so I was delighted to have some of her prints to hang around my house!

Thank you so much for brightening up my January Elis!

<3 

What happened to January?

One minute I'm ringing in 2014 and the next minute it's February and it's been over a month since I've updated my blog. Crazy! So what happened in January?



I snapped some pics of Minka looking adorable

Had a round of ginger ales with my lovely co-workers.

Bowled the night away at our office holiday party

Played Cards Against Humanity

Saw Broken Bells play on Jimmy Kimmel!

And had the most amazing burger at Eureka. (Seriously, if you go try the Fresno Fig Burger)

January was quite an interesting month over here! How was your January?

<3

Slingshot 2014

The start of a new year is awesome, am I right? I feel like there are several points in the year that always feel like a fresh start for me; the actual new year, my birthday, and the start of summer. One of the best things about the new year for me though, is a fresh planner.

This will be my 5th year using a Slingshot planner. It's published by the Slingshot collective in Berkeley that also publishes a zine. I got my first one in 2010, I had been at Mills for a few months at that point and had seen some other people using them so I decided to try one out. It was the first time I had a planner that started with the new year and not the school year, and I found I actually liked it way better. Not to mention that a Slingshot planner is awesome in almost every way.

Firstly, it comes with a menstrual calendar. If you have a uterus, you will find this immensely useful. So useful in fact, that it actually really upsets me that this is the only planner I've ever seen that comes with one. If you don't have a uterus it's just one page that you can ignore, if you do it's a wonderful way to keep track of your cycle. (Seriously, the lack of menstrual calendars in planners is a stupid product of patriarchy. Get yourself a Slingshot.)

Second, every date has little notes on radical events that happened on that day in history, and each page is decorated with drawings. 

Third, it comes with essays printed in the back. The essays are different every year, some that stick in my mind are one on lucid dreaming, one on better communication during sex, and every year there's a section of tips for dealing with the police. 

In the past I've gotten the large size, because I needed the space to write down assignments and such, but this year I got the smaller size. I usually go to Pegasus to get mine, but this year I ordered it from Whoop! Distro. I'm so happy to have this little bit of the Bay with me this coming year.

Happy New Year!