My car didn’t pass smog on the first attempt. I went to a place called “Smog Centro” in National City after a gig taking pictures of a chef who was delivering craft meals to senior citizens. It was late afternoon and a quick google search told me most smog places were closing, so I went to the one nearest me.
The name suggested that the shop was going to be run by Mexicans. I thought I would have a nice chat in Spanish about my car. But nope. It was an angry old Asian man sitting behind a shitty desk wearing a disposable mask.
He wasn’t really angry, old Asian men always look angry. He was quite nice though he had limited English. He instructed me to park my car and leave my keys and started to work on the smog check.
A couple of minutes later he asked me if I recently changed batteries, I told him I just picked the car from the mechanic and he disassembled everything. He then told me the car won’t pass the test and told me he was not going to do it. Then he told me to google “Driving Cycle” and the make of my car.
Google… doesn’t help much.
I found YouTube videos that didn’t help much either… But apparently, I’m supposed to drive my car faster than 65 miles for a few minutes and slow down to less than 25 miles without using my brakes. And that will trigger the driving cycle (there were more instructions besides that).
I need to pay registration ASAP and I won’t get car stickers until Donatella passes smog… I’m nervous and unsure of what to do. At least I don’t drive that much…
Without the stickers, I can’t cross the border. Without the car, I can’t drive far for gigs.
I might have to leave the car in the office until I find a solution.
The photoshoot of the chef for a possible cover story went great!
Wearing a mask while taking pictures is not very comfortable. Wearing sunglasses and a mask = glasses fog up, but I learned the trick to put the sunglasses over the mask and it helps reasonably. With a camera, I don’t have that choice. The screen of the camera and the viewfinder fog up after trying to take a couple of frames.
Wearing a mask while taking pictures is not very comfortable.
But it went fine. And I got a free meal out of it (chicken tocino, a Pinoy dish, though tocino means bacon in Spanish, this doesn’t have to do with bacon).
I had another mission, creepy pictures of the park, and some trails. One of the trails was inaccessible. The other trail was packed. The other place didn’t seem that creepy, but I think I managed to take scary-looking pics of the park. That should be another cover (unless they go for an illustration).
Got two birds stoned at once.
Mission successful.
I was going to drink beers with my San Diego friends after that, but neither of them answered, and my phones were running out of battery. Instead, I went to “The Best Beer Shop Ever” in Golden Hill and chose poorly. After studying the labels over and over, I fell for Belching Beaver’s “Melty Hops” because I love Salvador Dalí. Here’s my review:
Didn’t watch? Simple, don’t buy it.
The other thing that’s going great is my next book!
I’m on Chapter 6, Paris Hilton. I should work on that this week. I need to write more for the magazine, I started, then did nothing, and left it all behind. Now I am not sure what to write about.
This whole coronavirus seems sorta over but it is not really.
Confusing times.
It all seems to indicate that things will “normalize” as soon as June. I already have a couple of gigs for June… and as soon as all shit opens up, I might try to do tours again… until July, or perhaps August.
Here’s the idea I had. $50 for a Tijuana tour + signed copies of my book, only 10 people.
Yeah.
That might work.
Speaking of my older book…. go fucking buy it!
I’m tired of promoting it and telling people to buy it, but hey… every little buy helps a lot.
I sold a digital copy yesterday! I just checked… and a physical copy on May 22.
The total for now in May is 6 physical copies, 2 digital copies, and around 200+ pages read on KU. That’s pretty alright.
The next book should do way better. I barely talk about it with people and they seem excited over it. More than anything, they have a lot of questions about what being a paparazzi was like… a lot of questions that I hope I answer!
Those were crazy times.
These are crazy times.
Everything is always crazy… and tame at the same time. It’s always day and night. And today, I have nothing, just drive around and try to do the driving cycle. I was supposed to have a photoshoot, but not sure if that will happen…
I was supposed to have a photoshoot next Saturday, but I told the model “hey, I’m not doing shit today, if you aren’t either, let’s do it.”
She came over at around 3 pm. I never met the girl. She messaged me that she wanted a sexy photoshoot. She just started posing and doesn’t have many followers… and after breaking the awkwardness of the first few minutes and pictures, things flowed WAY better.
It was a really fun photoshoot. And she’s cool as f. A gamer girl… so besides taking sexy photos with game-related material, we also smashed! As in we played Smash Bros for an hour or two (I kicked her ass).
I always have to answer the same questions, it’s always the same answer: “no, I did not sleep with the model.” That’s not why I do this shit. I’m not even sure why I do it? It’s fun? I might make money?
Yeah.
Fun and (perhaps) money. That’s why I do it.
It was my idea to do this. It was her idea to post them first on my IG. They came out pretty great. Not only these pictures, but the whole set.
A screencap of the many shots = fewer megabytes than posting one shot. And it gives you an idea.
There were more outfits, way more shots, more sexiness mixed with nerdiness. And after around 500 photos, we called it quits, I transferred everything to the iMac, we played videogames, then reviewed the photos to see what were the best.
Oh yeah. Go follow her: @Lemoonhooney
We have more photo shoots planned. Hopefully, I also get other models. Hopefully, this all translates to money.
Matingas 