It was a fun night at SCOWL (aka “sewing & crafting… or whatever, losers!”). Armed with only a few crude printouts, we attempted food alchemy with gummy bears. The above video sums up the bulk of our projects fairly well. The green gummies are now soaking in Czech absinthe while what’s left of the red are soaking in vodka. I did pop a few of the heart molded gummies out and was a little displayed by their extreme stickiness. Basically, they were going to stick to whatever you put them on and refuse to come off. Wondering what the best way to deal with that is.

Totally had a ball and I can’t wait to try out alcohol gummies out next week!

My friend Paul Nathan has recently posted a video of his tour of the Distilleries Françoise Guy, one of the oldest absinthe distilleries in the world. The video follows the process from anise to absinthe. Paul has also posted a great blog about the tour on his Myspace blog.

If you live in the Bay, check out Paul’s Louche parties at Whisper SF. In fact, there’s one tonight.

Last year my girlfriend and I invited her aunt and uncle to one of Paul’s famous absinthe parties in San Francisco. They were worried about the legality and risk of a party like this, to which we responded “The parties are fine, we’ve been going for a few years now with no problems.” So the four of us dressed to the nines and headed over to the SOMA district. Picking out the first drink of the evening was fun for all of us as our bartender, Cat, walked us through the selection and gave us her opinions. Finally we placed our order and I through the cash down, at which point a police officer, wearing a bulletproof vest and helmut, asked what exactly we were doing. The party was raided and we gave Shannon’s aunt and uncle one hell of a an experience.

That all happened one year ago.

The only charge they laid on Paul was “selling of poisonous substances”, a charge which Paul and a chemist his lawyer found were sure would be easy to beat. Luckily they didn’t have to, the district attorney didn’t show up on the court date, thus all charges were dropped without setting any legal precedence and all of Paul’s liquor was returned to him (see the photo above).

A few months ago, absinthe was re-legalized in the US thus creating a new wave of absinthe-terest. Kubler (the company responsible for absinthe’s re-legalization in both Switzerland and the US) is available in BevMo, Colbert talked the drink down on his show, and the first legal absinthe is distilled right here in the Bay Area.

When Paul’s legal troubles disappeared, many of us wondered if something big like this was going to happen. Perhaps the DA had gotten wind of the legal changes underway and decided it wouldn’t be worth a battle with Paul. Maybe if he had, and Paul was found not guilty on the charge, that would have been the move responsible for the drinks new legal status, at least in the Bay.

Now, one year after the raid and 95 years after the prohibition of absinthe, Paul is preparing for his first legal absinthe party at Whisper in San Francisco. You can read the full details and sign up for the mailing list on AbsintheParty.com. Legendary electro-lounge pioneer Tipsy will do a dj set, I’ll be doing some walk around yo-yoing, and (according to the site) they’ll be serving St. George. I’m trying to confirm that last bit from Paul considering how quickly everyone sold out of the original batch of St. George and the crazy lengths people are going through to attain a bottle. The distillery is sold out and the next batch isn’t due out until February. It sounds like the St. George opening event in Alameda was well worth the crazy line.

Sorry to be so vague, but I’m sure most folks reading this already know the important details. If you would like to attend, but don’t know the info, CALL me.

BTW, mention your a friend of Doctor Popular, and they’ll let you in for half price. Yeah, I’m totally the man.

Paul, the promoter, kept the details of the raid quiet until his court date. It turned out that the case was dropped, which means that all of Paul’s confiscated absinthe should be returned and according to Paul’s myspace blog it finally has. The blog is a very good read, especially since it concerns the legality of absinthe ownership. From Paul’s blog:

“I want to be clear about why I am posting this. Since I first became interested in absinth I have searched for answers about the legal status of absinth. Answers are few and far between. The few answers that do exist are nebulous and often misleading. I am posting this story online so that interested parties can have a firsthand accounting of my interaction with the legal system in the hopes that it will answer some questions for fellow absinth lovers and to avoid having to answer the same questions over and over again at parties.”

We were all looking great, especially Sal and Beth (does anyone else see Telly Savalas and Bette Middler in that picture). We had been hyping up this party for a long time and I couldn’t wait to show my new yo-yo routine during the midnight cabaret.

We arrived at The Climate Theater at about 10:30 and headed straight to my favorite bartender to get our absinthe experience going. We introduced Shan’s family to the bartender and she gave us wonderful descriptions of the drinks she was going to serve. After about 5 minutes of planning, she was just about to pour our drinks, starting with mine.

As she tipped the bottle a light appeared on the drink. There was a police officer holding a flashlight, behind him were 5 more cops. I didn’t notice ‘em come in, but as I looked through the doorway I could see several officers in the other rooms.

The officer spoke, “Miss, what do you have in the bottles?”.

“I’m uh, not the person to talk to.”

She walked past me and whispered, “Doc, you and your friends should probably leave.”

I went to the performers area to grab my doctors bag full of props. I must have looked really suspicious because of the officers stopped me outside and checked my bag.

The event was shut down, and I can’t find any info online. Obviously it’s still very recent.

I would imagine the raid had little to do with the presence of absinthe at the party, I think the main legal issue would be serving drinks without a license. The guests had nothing to worry about from the police, I’m not sure about the bartenders, but I would assume the only folks that will be affected by the raid would be the promoters. I’m sure they will get a huge fine and maybe confiscation of all their absinthe.

I’m heartbroken and concerned for my friends involved. The absinthe scene has been real good to me, lots of cool people and one of a kind experiences. I’m so bummed that this might be the end of the absinthe scene in the city. I’m also bummed that I didn’t even get a sip of that “330″ last night and that I just ran out of Tabu two days ago.

I posted a performance on youtube from an absinthe party a few months ago. Here it is again… so I can relive that… man I’m gonna miss those parties.

As we were walking to the 24th St BART, we saw a big crowd on the East Side of Mission staring above the Chinese Food and Donuts shop on the corner. So, we crossed the street to see what was going on and saw the Live Billboard Project.

The dancers were harnessed to the top of the billboard, I couldn’t really tell what scene if any they were playing out and what any of it had to do with the giant feel good text behind them, but I liked it enough to track a volunteer down and make a donation. It was a really neat thing to see in my hood.My only big complaint would be that it would have been nice to know what was going on and when. I mean I had seen the set up for the event for a week (or two?) but had not ever seen anyone on it until the very last day it was up. If only there was some place they could have put information about what was going on… maybe some sort of banner or big sign that they could use to put up a website link with show times, or even a description or name of what was going on… if only there was some sort of giant sign that local residents would pass by and say “hey that sounds neat, I should see that thing that is being described on the sign”…. Maybe some sort of board, upon which the show’s bill could be posted on.

Then we moved along to our party, where I rocked a pretty good show for being as drunk as I was. The performance can be seen below, please note the most spectacular Robot ever.

I asked my friend Mike to come over and check it out early last Sunday morning. We poured a couple glasses of absinthe (Pernod) and hatched the plan for a mural on the loft.

Since I’ve got a couple of audio cassette themed pieces of art in my room, I told Mike that I wanted to do a cassette piece on the loft. We chatted it out more and developed the idea into a Bosch-like setting, with angelic tapes and demonic tapes and tons of clouds. The cool part is that the clouds will be the unpainted wood, everything else will sort of be the same color as the new Bolt yo-yos.

We’ve been working on it ever since, with mike doing most of the cool illustrating parts, and me doing the bitchwork. We worked on it until 3 in the morning a few days this week. Finally, at 2am this morning, we finished it (mostly). I still need to put the final coats of lacquer on it, but I’m very happy with it! Here is a picture of the unpainted loft as Mike lays down the first sketches. I’ll post the finished studies next week.

Coincidentally, Mike is planning on making his second 24 Hour comic book this weekend. Good luck bro.

So last year I wrote about an Absinthe party I attended here in the city that had a decent amount of public sex going on. It wasn’t a sex party, it was just an underground party that sort of evolved into something a little heavy.

I had been back to the venue for several parties since then, but they remained primarily absinthe related with no signs of sex.

Last week I went to this same venue for my first fetish party. I have somehow gotten on a little more exclusive list where I can attend all of these underground parties for free, and often times get a good deal of free Absinthe in the process. I don’t know how I got on this list, I’m the biggest fucking square at most of these parties. I just know a bit about absinthe and stuff.

Anyway, I’m not into the leather and spandex fetish scene, but I felt obligated to go to one of these parties, at least once. It was a fun experience and it’s pretty much true that anyone can get laid at one of these parties, as long as your not picky.

Standing in line you might be passed by a woman on all fours being walked by her dom. Or maybe while sitting down and enjoying your drink, you’ll get into a chat with a co-worker that you bumped into. She tries a sip of your drink and asks a few questions about the fax machine at work seemingly oblivious to the fact that her skirt is hiked up and her date for the evening has her bent over and is smacking her ass. The rest of the room notices, it’s one of those sounds… Wherever you are in the room, you hear that “smack” sound and you know exactly what’s happening. A crowd forms and we are still casually conversing, “Sometimes you have to hit 9 to get the outside line-OW! but usually you just have to send the send transmission button.”

“Make her scream my name” Cat the bartender says, then she leans over to me and says “I love that trick.”

smack… smack… smack- “CAAAAT!”

I heard some of the greatest quotes while at this shindig (a few of the actual quotes are on the sketch). A few of the folks at the party where over fifty, you could say that I saw some pretty unattractive stuff, but when your in this environment you don’t really tend judge people. It’s their world, you have just stepped into it, so I didn’t really find myself imposing my rules of beauty or morality on anyone there.

The strange thing is, nothing there was that shocking. People were hung from crosses and spanked or humiliated. There where lots of exposed body parts. I guess sex was implied, and/or occurring in some places. But the whole thing to me was just comedic. I mean you see a guy in a leather vest, a huge black mustache, and those ridiculous shiny police officer hats and you can’t help but laugh. Really, it’s like somebody came up with the looks 40 years ago, and it’s never really occurred to most folks that styles and fetishes change. That stuff might have been shocking then, but I can’t imagine that it hasn’t changed in all these years.

For me at least, it’s far more exciting to see a couple ordinary people going at it in near the absinthe bar then a couple of costumed people going to such extreme measures to give the appearance of kinkiness. What it comes down to, is that I obviously don’t get it. I’m not saying what I think is “hot” is better than other peoples views. I just can’t get the appeal of the “Fetish” scene… and the Cure does not make me want to fuck.

I’m also assuming that this was a milder event than others, I’m not looking to go to some huge (and well publicized) fetish ball, I like ‘em underground and grimy, so maybe I’ll check out another one and tell you what I think.