Omri

Holy hell, the memories. The first time I went to the 5 Point was after a long night out partying with people I only met that very night at the Ibiza night club, where I had gone with some compatriots to scope it out for a possible TV pilot we were planning. Our connection was Troy, a friend of one of us, who knew the owner pretty well.

Long story short, after a meet and greet with the very gracious host the others left and I stayed behind, entertained by Troy, his insanely sexy exotic dancer girlfriend, and his linebacker-sized best friend. The night led us to another nightclub before culminating at the 5 Point around 4am.

There was flashing (the dancer), inappropriate groin-foot contact all around (her again), very appropriate greasy food and good stiff drinks and coffee (interchanged as necessary.)

Now I live right by it, I’m almost sad it’s easier to end the night in my own bed than someone else’s…

Just got back from a two-week visit to see some family and friends and attend my sister’s wedding.

Weather was quite hot and humid but somehow I partially enjoyed that. And I was reminded yet again of how vibrant Israel (and particularly Tel Aviv) is, with eateries and bars open late and people out for a stroll on avenue paths long after most other cities settle down for the night.

I can’t quite live full-time in Israel but I love it so.

I really want to go to the beach in Tel Aviv, now that spring and summer are upon us (as it’s been said, there’s no spring in Israel, only winter and summer :) so it’s summer there now.)

Oh, man, I miss living so near a real beach. Israel is pretty much California but with the New York cosmopolitan style.

After attending the Seattle Erotic Art Festival in ‘05 and falling head over heels with the whole shindig, I made a solemn vow to submit something for the next year’s iteration. Guess what? I got in and sold my first and only serious piece of art at the ‘06 event’s auction. It was a series of four photographs paneled together (originally created as a year-end project for my freshman year of film school) and though it didn’t fetch anything high by artistic standards, it fared better than I expected (read: priced) it to.

Somewhere in Chapel Hill, NC bold images of my naked flesh hang in the living room of a fellow art and sex enthusiast. She will forever count as my first patron.

Thanks ConWorks (and, to a much larger degree, Wet Spot) !

Merely days after returning to Seattle in late Feb ‘04, fresh from a few years in my hometown of Tel Aviv, my dad suggested we attend a special one night only aerial ecdysiasts extravaganza hosted by Tamara the Trapeze Lady and held in the main ConWorks theater stage.

Oh, man. The space was amazing but the crowd was what really sealed the deal. Loud, rowdy, cheerin’ hooting’ hollerin’ n’ altogether whoopin’ it up for the performers and the unaware.

Since then, I’ve done my best to attend the shows that promised to involve the zaniest performers and wildest audiences. ConWorks hasn’t let me down yet.

Of course, I’ve avoided quite a bit of their duller, more standard gallery fare programming, and the financial and artistic management upheaval that went down a few years ago knocked some of my enthusiasm a notch or two down. But for an artistic mixed-media space, it’s pretty hard to beat.

My film school class (all eight of us) shot our final 16mm short film on Rainier, in late November 2004. Not too high up, nothing that took more than an hour to scale, carrying heavy equipment in deep snow, but still.

Both one of the best and one of the worst days of my life, at the same time.

The footage we shot on the mountain ended up being practically unusable, as either an odd malfunction with the film canister or loader error caused heavy light damage on the left side of the entire roll we arduously slaved to shoot. The director also abandoned the project just before editing began.

The mountain is majestically beautiful. Incredible at sunrise. Fantastic to behold while driving around Puget Sound, as it sits there, looking at you, waiting, inhabiting a big space in your peripheral vision.

And it owes me a shoe.

Tel Aviv is the most vibrant, most alive, most active city you’re likely to find this side of the Mediterranean (if not all of Europe and the Middle East.) The food is delicious, the people are wonderful, the beaches are gorgeous…

Tel Aviv never stops.

In a tiny little apartment, tucked into the garden of a house that was divided into several other apartments. Space is a premium in Neve Tzedek.

The streets are old, narrow and often dirty.

But the atmosphere, the sense of the nearby Mediterranean in the air… magic. Especially at night. The closest you can get to Jaffa in Tel Aviv (without actually being in Jaffa), which is the closest you can get to Jerusalem in Tel Aviv. That old world mystique…

The kids were getting cabin fever-y.

Flushed Away is really good.

I can’t believe I didn’t have a camera on hand to add a picture to this page.

Wheeee, time to go see The Prestige.

edit: dagnabbit, prestige is over. guess it’ll hafta be The Fountain.

Word going around is the deli closed. Guess I’m not gonna be having a sandwich there anytime soon.