A Journey

There is just so much that happened in the last week -- My thoughts are all scattered right now.  I suppose I should start with the trip to Santa Barbara.

On Sunday morning, Dan and I cracked open a bottle of Rodenbach Grand Cru to inaugurate our epic quest to the depths of southern California.  The drive down consisted mostly of loud, awesome music.  We were feeling pretty excited about the next few days so we couldn't stop hyping it all up.

The primary objective of our trip was simple enough:  Beer and Metal.  However, I had several expectations and anxieties about what would transpire in these few days.  Dan would be meeting all my friends and catching a glimpse of my "esteemed" college years.  I really had high hopes for the interactions we would be engaged in, and I wanted Dan to see what I see in these people.  That's kind of silly for me to worry about, but I wanted everything to be perfect.

Upon our arrival to Goleta, we promptly made haste to Chris' house where we would partake in an epic beer tasting.  Zach and Chris selected about 12 different IPAs and we contributed 7 of our selection, including my first homebrew which was supposed to be in the IPA style.  The tasting was blind, but it was not how I expected a blind tasting to be.  There was a lot of preparation and it took a few hours to even get started.  Zach arranged the 19 beers into 3 flights.  We would leave the room and Mary would pour the beers.  We would then return and write down notes on each beer in complete silence.  Also, because the IPA style is typically bitter and the hop taste lingers for so long, extra time between each taste is required.  The session took about 5 hours overall with lots of discussion in between each flight.  While the results were quite interesting, the whole process kind of jaded me to the fun of drinking beer.  I enjoyed the discussions to a point.  It was clear that Zach and Chris had a lot more experience in this and they had a very in-depth analysis for each beer.  My notes started to feel too brief and lacking.  I suppose I'm not a very good critic.

Oh well.  It was a productive venture overall.  I would probably not do it again in the same fashion.  I understand that it can be crucial to be as objective as possible but tasting beer will always be subjective; I'd much rather be able to talk about the beer as we go.  At any rate, it might be worthwhile to switch up the style from now on.  I'm hopped out.

Afterwards, we made our way to dinner at the Hollister Brewing Company.  I introduced Dan to even more friends from my old life.  Somehow I ordered another IPA with dinner which may have been a mistake.  Although... I distinctly remember saying how awesome it is to just enjoy a beer and not think about it.  It was nice to see a lot of familiar faces but unfortunately everything was cut a little short.  I didn't even get much face time with Brendon while I was there and that was a bit disappointing.  Next time I will propose a "musical chairs" tactic to mix things up.

Afterward, I dragged a few friends out to the Mercury Lounge which has to be my favorite dive bar in Santa Barbara.  They have a great beer selection and the quiet atmosphere is conducive to good conversation.  This is a good thing most of the time, right?

So there we were, chilling outside smoking a cigar and drinking Stone Ruination (seriously, I don't know how to not drink IPAs) when this gentlemen decides to join us.  I believe the first words out of his mouth were, "So what's really going on here?"  Intrigued by a stranger's forwardness, I entertained his questions and "welcomed" him into our mundane chat about stoner movies.  Unfortunately, the welcome was worn thin when he changed the topic of conversation to bat-shit crazy.  He tried to convince us that jet contrails are actually used by the government to spread "population subduing" chemicals into the air.  When I asked him how he knew this he simply told me, "just look up, man."  Okay, man.  Will do.  He went on to inform us that his wife just cheated on him and he was trying to keep himself consistently drunk.  Well, I think he covered the whole gamut of misogyny, paranoia, and a bit of racism.  He told us that women are merely vessels, etc and various tidbits of the usual conspiracy theory.  Honestly there was so much I just can't recall the details.  I just remember smiling and nodding a lot.  Perhaps I'm too polite but it was hilarious.

While this was entertaining for me, things quickly escalated for everyone else.  Chris, Mary, and Zach decided that they didn't want to sit here and listen to his nonsense.  I admit, he was a bit abrasive.  His behavior could be the reason none of his friends were out at the bar with him.  But whatever -- not every person I meet in my life is going to have congruent viewpoints.  I was still learning from him even if it was mostly examples of what to avoid.  Anyway, there was a little shouting and then the gentlemen started to get angry.  He made it clear he was in a bad place and "not to be fucked with."  So we left.

At any rate, our new friend Jeff made a vivid impression on me.  I don't get too many strangers coming along and trying to offer unsolicited... information.  While it's not (in my view) ethical to jump to these unwarranted conclusions about a government, I suppose I did appreciate his nature to reject norms.  However, his sense of entitlement over others was a bit frustrating.  Oh well -- I gained a lot from this engagement.  A crappy blog entry at the least. :)

It's hard to capture the gravity of a moment in words, let alone through such an impersonal medium as a computer screen.  But just pretend I'm throwing some hand gestures at you.  Yeah... that will do.

When I saw the sky that Sunday night, I felt such an overwhelming, ambivalent euphoria caused by the awe-inspiring beauty of millions of stars contrasted with the usual insignificance I feel when gazing into infinity.  The sky was too clear that night.  So Dan and I drove up into the Santa Ynez mountains to immerse ourselves in the canvas of stars and witness the meteors burn up into dust before our eyes.  It's interesting to think that all of these stars are usually blocked out by ambient light.  But escape the city a little and the night sky allows you to fall into thought so easily.  There's nothing like a perfectly clear night to make me appreciate all the faculties of perception.  So glorious.

The following day was momentous in a different way.  Dan and I spent our morning decompressing by enjoying the UCSB campus and the beach.  Our bodies took revenge on us from the previous night.  So we decided to perpetuate the vicious cycle by cracking open another beer at Goleta beach.  Also, we endeavored to be as relaxed and lazy as possible.  Take that, stupid body.

The rest of the afternoon and evening was spent getting our ears exploded by one of the best metal shows I've ever seen.  I really appreciate/admire the guys in Nekrogoblikon for arranging the bus ride to take us down to LA.  That saved us a ton of trouble and they even took a significant hit on the cost, allowing us to keep some extra dollars.  Without getting into detail, the show exceeded all expectations.  Nekrogoblikon and Powerglove delivered amazing sets.  Everyone was going absolutely ape-shit and the energy was enormous.  It was my first time hearing Conducting from the Grave and they blew my mind.  John Abernathy shreds so hard and my jaw was on the floor for a good twenty minutes during their set

You know life is difficult when you have to watch all these amazing musicians blow your mind with such technical ability and beautifully crafted music.  Bummer.  Overall, it was an amazing show and I couldn't be more grateful for the bus ride home.  Our awesome bus driver had to deal with 50 obnoxious, energetic, and drunk metalheads going to LA, but it was most definitely sleepy-time on the way back.

We missed the peak of the meteor shower that night because Santa Barbara was in a shroud of death-fog.  Boo.

The next day, Dan and I returned to Los Angeles to pick up my sister, Laura.  We ate the most bestest Pupusas ever and then started back home to Los Altos.  We stopped along the way for a short hike, coffee, beer, and a massive steak dinner with Justin to top it all off.

Too much gluttony, though... wow.  I'm still working all that beer off.

The drive back was full of refreshing conversation and I was able to internalize a lot of the things I learned.  Instead of blasting Pendulum for 6 hours, we actually had some really great discussions about our lives and our perceptions of people.  It was so rewarding to learn new things about my friend and my sister.  I was also really pleased with our level of openness considering this was the second time Dan and Laura had ever met.  In summary, we kick ass.  I get a boat-load of pleasure from having these limitless conversations about anything and everything.  Everything starts to feel a little more significant and beautiful.  Massive thanks to them for making a short trip into a memorable journey.

Kind of a trivial post, but I just wanted to get some events down into writing before I completely forget them.  I also wish I could have gone into more detail about the specific conversations we had but the specifics escape me.  I should really get in the habit of carrying around a pen and paper :)