On this day in 1988 – I was 12 and a betty (that’s a chick who skateboards, folks) – I was hanging out with some friends and managed for the first time to do a flawless ollie. And I had a witness. I was so proud I couldn’t think about anything else the rest of the day, and the first thing I thought when I woke up in the year 1989 was “I did an ollie!” For your information, I can still do an ollie today. It’s like riding a bicycle.

A-ha! Look what I found on Steiner Street today!

It’s that time. Time for new year’s resolutions. Since my blog has almost completely monopolized my life, I am going to list my blog’s new year’s resolutions first:

My blog’s resolutions for the year 2003:

• Find a way to reliably ping weblogs.com without having to switch to Blogger Pro or Moveable Type
• Infuse writing style with a little more elegance by using words like anachronistic or persnickety
• Don’t allow any more stupid posts like the one about Bonsai Kitty, which was so embarrassingly obsolete (yes, I deleted the post)
• Attract an exponential increase in regular readers
• See the dawn of the Subastral Lilipad fanclub
• Add at least a couple of more people to the one stalker I already have
• Get some caustic feeback so I can shine with witty comebacks

And here are my own resolutions for the year 2003:

• Pick up some new hobbies like furniture painting or pogo sticking
• Regrow all the hair I lost since 1990: I used to have a ‘fro and I don’t anymore and I want it back.
• Spend less time blogging, thinking about my blog and writing blog posts in my head
• Spend more time small-talking with the homeless and feeding the ducks
• Get a hand-held device so I can check even from the road if my blog has new comments
• Go to at least one thrift store a week and one flea market a month
• Stop beating myself up over the time in eighth grade when Timo said “You have such a pottymouth, Vera. That’s probably why you don’t have a boyfriend.”

If I ever need to have anything pest-controlled, I know exactly who to call.

The city

I love the process of getting to know a new city. One by one, you assemble the pieces that make up the geographic puzzle. Some pieces fall into place gradually and you can’t pinpoint them temporally. Other pieces you might have to turn around and look at from several different angles before you can firmly put them in place. My puzzle of San Francisco is nowhere near complete but it’s getting closer with every month. I think the habituation is especially interesting when you have been to the area in the past but had no idea how the different familiar places relate to each other spatially. In that case you not only try to find your way around, but you overlay your memory imprint of the city with the slowly elucidating mental city map you are building now. I had visited San Francisco twice in 1993 and twice in 1999, and some of the places I had been to before moving here in May were Haight-Ashbury to shop, the corner of Market and Castro to bar hop, Union Square to people watch, and North Beach to eat . After six months of living here, I now know exactly where each of these places is and how to get there. I have finally developed an understanding of how each of them fits into the context of the rest of the city. It’s fun realizing when you have bridged another gap in your head, like when you realize that Carl Street is the missing piece between the Sunset and the Haight or that 16th Street connects Noe Valley and Potrero Hill. The other day I found out that you can take 18th Street just as well, but 18th Street has a strange kink in it. That must be why people tend to take 16th Street instead.

From my 1993 trips to San Francisco I remembered that there was one major street that had a row of artificially planted palm trees in the center divider. Shortly after moving here, I determined that that street must have been Market Street. After a month or so, I came across another palm tree-lined street: Dolores Street. After another month or so, I realized that the two palm tree-lined streets actually intersect in one big explosion of palm trees!

The hills in San Francisco add another level of suspense to the discovery. Each time you climb the top of a hill you have never been on before, you get a whole new angle on the cityscape. Thanks to all the hills, San Francisco has many different faces. I happen to live on one of such hills, which is why I have a view of the entire eastern half of the city. Sometimes, after I come home from one of my excursions, I can trace from my window where I just came from and how close I was, for example, to the water or to downtown.

By the way, I still have no clue where exactly this world famous row of houses is, and I can’t wait to find out!

One of the reasons why electronic music is so appealing to me is that you can rely on it. If you hear an element that you particularly like, be it a howling or a chirping or a rattling or whatever it is that makes you dance harder or your ears smile, you know it will be coming back at least once. It might come back two beats from now, four beats from now or half a song from now. But it will come back at least once. Since electronic music by definition is preprogrammed and repetitive, you know that certain expectations will be met. Sometimes you know exactly which array of sounds is next in the sequence even if you have never heard the song before. Each song has a certain pattern that you will usually have figured out long before the song is over. And if there is an element that you want to hold on to, you can and you will not be let down.

I saw this Christmas decoration while driving the other day, and I had to go back and take pictures of it because I absolutely love it. I love it because it’s so simplistic. If anyone knows where I can get this or even just the big globes, let me know. What? Yes, I know that Christmas is over already. I wouldn’t necessarily use it just for Christmas anyway.

What are you doing for New Year’s Eve? My boyfriend, three friends and I are going to this. While I’m there, I am going to try my darndest to kiss Paul Van Dyk on the forehead. If the music is meritorious enough, that is.

Speaking of photo series from 1998: I found another one. Earlier that year, my friends and I were all at a birthday party when somebody got out a camera and said “Let’s make a Photo Love Story.” What is a Photo Love Story? Each issue of the German youth magazine Bravo features a Photo Love Story. They usually look kind of like this and always involve at least one make-out session.

If you are open-minded, you might find our Photo Love Story mildly entertaining. Juvenile, but entertaining. If you are closed-minded or are at all irked by same sex affection, do NOT click on the link.

Photo Love Story

Four years ago, my bosom friend Julia had to do this photography project for school and asked me to be part of it. Since I will not refuse anyone who volunteers to take pictures of me, I gladly agreed. Here is the result. Only the last three photos actually made it into the finished product that Julia turned in.

Incidentally, I just got a new haircut that looks almost exactly like the one I had back then.