No More Mr. Hot Stuff?

I went out to Santa Anita solo yesterday and was on fire as a handicapper. I got the pick 4 which means you pick 4 winners in a row, on an $8 bet. It CAN pay hundreds, sometimes thousands, but in my case it paid $84. That will buy a lot of oranges at the Farmers' Market in the morning. Got a lot of other bets right too.

But a horse who's drop dead gorgeous, Mr. Hot Stuff, was running yesterday, and that was actually the reason I went out there. I love this horse's looks, I admit it. He's a sleek well built truly black horse. He hasn't won a race since before the Kentucky Derby and I've bet him to win every time, including in the Derby. He didn't win yesterday either and he still looked like hot stuff. Plus he had my fave jockey, Smokin Joe Talamo on board.

But while walking Molly this morning I thought I could turn him into an internet cartoon strip character, with Whinsey, maybe for the phone. We'll see. I "worked" on it all day. Hard to get good expression on a jet black horse. And then when you're working in Flash you start thinking, gee, if this moved it would be more fun than a still comic- and take a lot longer to do. Rainy weather, sometimes I love you.

There's a goldfish in my soup

In San Francisco we stayed at the Hotel Monaco, a nifty hotel near Union Square. We were bewildered by this goldfish on someone's room service tray, really bewildered. (above- I take terrible cell phone pictures)

When I asked a bell man about it he said this pet friendly hotel offers bowls of goldfish for people to borrow during their stay in case they miss the pets at home. We did miss Molly, but didn't think the goldfish could take her place. We snagged one of the free dog biscuits at the front door for Molly but gave it to a homeless man's dog instead.

San Francisco was looking SNAZZY! I wanted to live there again. I had a wonderful time at breakfast on Sunday with Linda Davick who's so pretty and talented and so darn NICE! She doesn't say bad things about people, a practice I should adopt but probably never will.

Midday Jon and I went to an interesting exhibit in the old mint building on the history of long gone Chinese nightclubs in San Francisco, the most famous of which was "Forbidden City."

I also met up with my old pal from high school and Snazelle Films, Jane Cheshire, and it was wonderful to spend time together again even if only an hour.

On Monday we took the cable car over to the Musee Mechanique down at Fisherman's Wharf . All the wonderful penny arcade equipment which was once at Playland and then at the Cliff House is now in this wonderful museum which seems to be supervised by no one.





This was a really creepy mechanical opium den.



This is Laughing Sal, a very large automoton whose laughter syncs up very well with her movements.

We also paid to go inside a world war 2 SUBMARINE that's anchored next door. I'd never been in a real submarine. It was fascinating and emotionally powerful, imagining what those sailors endured, and they were all volunteers.



These are envelopes a woman painted and mailed to her submarine sailor fiancee. The one top right was returned for 3 cents postage. Some postal peeps are NO FUN!

Our visit with Dinah was also terrific- a splendid weekend. I'm working on a video of Dinah's horse coming home from the hospital and that will be a separate post.

Swim Party at Molly's House

Only in Southern California can dogs have a swim party in mid February. You can't tell from this picture but Molly's friend is about the best looking German Shepherd I've ever seen, a red and black long hair named Tilden.

His owner my pal Calone (ipetsitla) and I were pressed against the fence because the dogs were maniacs running around with no consideration of party hosts. "Hey don't you know you're not supposed to run around a pool?"

Look at all the water spilled. They looked more like otters than like dogs swimming around.



Unfortunately Molly still stands to learn some social skills. (above)

Got the camera out only at the end of a very funny dog swim party, alas, and the battery was nearly dead.

Marti McGinnis delights me!

UPDATE: Another blog feature on Marti with pictures HERE!

Marti McGinnis, aka wegwag on twitter, fabulous fantasy horse artist, has been doing some wondrous little unicorn pictures which she sells at ridiculously low prices through her etsy shop to help cover the costs of her equine rescue network.

These are GREAT VALENTINE GIFTS!

I find them irresistible and have bought several. When I opened the package that came from Marti today she'd done an extra, above, a portrait of my Pet Society character, toxic dump. I LOVE IT! Thank you Marti! Toxic never looked so good.

Out of nowhere I heard from a few people I really cared about from long ago in the last two days, thanks to facebook. One is my absolute favorite horse buddy of all time...

We're going to meet tomorrow and I'm going to give her one of Marti's pictures. Serendipity!

Nice Day!

Molly and I had a surprise walk with our best German Shepherd friend and her dog Tilden at dawn, then we went to the Farmers Market and my bud tasted her first cherimoya, which is a wondrous fruit if you've never tried it.

Without doing my usual frantic handicapping, Jon and I headed to Santa Anita because I wanted to try to find the statue in Mary Forney's contest. A season pass to the Clubhouse is an exceptional prize, and I was sure I knew where the little horse statue would be hiding. The hint was that it was amidst some potato chip displays. Do you know how many kiosks and cafes at a giant racetrack sell potato chips?

Between races I scurried here and there looking for the statue. The food stand person would say to me, "May I help you?" "No, thanks, I'm just looking." How pathetic, just looking at the potato chips.

I thought we'd found every possible display of chips but then we went into the paddock room, where I'd never been before, a basement area filled with people, and there in the corner was one more potato chip display. And what was that? The little statue. I was so excited that most of the pictures I took with my phone were impossibly blurry. I emailed one to Mary. I won the contest, I'm going to get my season pass! For someone like me, this is worth hundreds!

Every bet I placed was wrong until the 5th race when I bet on the horse Chantal Sutherland was riding to win, and in an exacta. She won. I won. The exacta too.

If you haven't seen Chantal Sutherland she is incredibly pretty and has a goofy website. I believe she used to be a flight attendant. She's Canadian and has a bit of Princess Diana about her. (be sure you see the first image on the site). She's a really great rider and has just returned to Santa Anita.

The woman next to me said, "Oh yeah Chantal beats the snot out of the guys every time." euw.
Not exactly Chantal's intended image. The same lady told me my jacket was worth at least $800. Jon's been trying to get me to throw it away. It does have a few stains. euw.

Down at the actual paddock we stood next to a friendly young woman who was about to start photographing the horses coming into the circle. We made some jokes and she said she was practicing taking pictures because she wanted to go to Kentucky to take pictures of horses breeding. Um, do you mean like, -breeding? Oh yes, she said, and you have to be very fast with your camera.

Jon said, "Maybe you can sell those pictures as a calendar, with Chantal photoshopped in the background."

We left after I had my wins. Great day. It is such fun to search for something in a contest and find it.

Jury Duty?

This legs table was in a bail bonds window near the courthouse.

Wacky weekend around here but now we're grounded because the biggest rain of the season is supposed to slam Los Angeles all week. We'll see if that's true. It's raining now and still dark out. Glad I'm in the middle of "Gone with the Wind" which I'm enjoying.

All last week I dutifully called in to see if I had to report next day for jury duty. Thursday night I thought I'd gotten off the hook for at least a year, but no, had to show up at 8:30 the next morning. Spent the whole day reading "Gone with the Wind" in a big room with several hundred unhappy people. Around 3:15, when the room was nearly cleared out, they called the last group of potential jurors and we shuffled across the courtyard and upstairs to room F in the criminal court building.

The judge asked for a juror pool of more than 100 people for one case. That's unusual. If I get chosen I can't say more about it, but they aren't doing the selection until next Thursday.

We (last jury pool group) sat in the courtroom behind the FOUR defendants accused of extortion and murder. Two had big shaved heads and skull tattoos, and two were Russian looking in leather coats. Central casting!

Do you suppose their appearance might affect the outcome of the case? It's like with Phil Spector- why didn't his lawyer tell him not to wear the Bozo Clown fright wig to trial? That wasn't his hair. When he checked into jail he just had a little flat hairstyle and looked like an old retired raisin.

Then to add to weekend fun we took a quick trip out to Santa Anita and watched some horses run, came home and went to the Golden Globe party given by Paramount. I was on the guest list- insane, we don't know why.

I thought I'd post my twitter tweets. Many people are bewildered by twitter but I enjoy it and it doesn't track you the same way Facebook does. The 140 maximum letters per post make it challenging but more fun. A weird thing on twitter if a person is trying to tell a story is the sequence is backwards since you read the last post first.

These are my tweets (corrected in order) when we got home:

we only stayed for four races cause we're going to Paramount's Golden Globe party tonite woowoo. Told hub to bet Rummysecretwar - good..

At party tonight: Marty Scorsese, Ray Liotta, Len .DiCaprio & Don Rickles plus about 750 peeps for the food & drinks at Chateau Marmont

also me & hub & Robert deNiro who looked very confused. We stood at side door & watched the stars get wrangled in. Actors smoke a lot.

Party Food: macn cheese, paella, eggplant dish, filet mignon wrapped in bacon, sliders, mystery puffs and a tower of mini cupcakes. I ate 3.

(next day)
Just realized the weird guy with the icky face tattoo we stood next to last night at the Golden Globes Paramount party was Mike Tyson.

Somehow I only managed to identify the guy celebs, but there were many gorgeous women there too. The oddest dress was an absolute lampshade style. Strapless white bouffant with a ruffle on the bottom, which barely covered the bottom. The slightest move and you saw her black underpants. No lightbulb underneath.
There was a pretty strict no photos policy at the party, even outside with the line of valet parkers. With cel phones they can easily pop a shot just like a papparazi.

Here's a link to a gossip report on the party.

ZENYATTA!!!

Here she comes the Queen of England- no wait, it's prancing princess ZENYATTA! Her trainer next to her.



Many wonderful hand made posters. Women were declaring this horse as their horse.



There goes Kentucky Derby winner Mine That Bird above, with Calvin Borel.



Doin the Chanel thing. I need a suit like this.


doin the Diane Arbus thing. This going to the chapel gal was alone the whole day, even at the very end when I was waiting with her to see jockey Mike Smith walk back to the jockeys' room.



Hey, where'd you get your poster?

Below are my twitter posts when I got back from Santa Anita yesterday, where Zenyatta won the Breeders Cup Classic racing against the very best horses in the world. Female beat all the males, unheard of, bigger, better even than Rachel Alexandra's victories this year. I really enjoy my twitter life! My posts:

Most exciting racing day EVER! HISTORY IS MADE!

Squeezed in the basic crowd all day& squished at rail into saddle area. When Z headed to saddle area shout outs SHE'S COMING! Like Q of E!

The dance she did as she passed the screaming squeezed masses is something I'll never forget.

The start of the race was so CRAZY with Zenyatta doing her dressage wiggles on way to the gate...

Then she didn't want to go in the gate, then she came out the open front end, and then QUALITY ROAD oops

Everytime QR kicked out or bucked the crowd roared like it was a prizefight.

When QR scratched (we could hear the phone ring like it was on stage) , the crowd roared. The excitement was so intense.

(since my twitter pals all had seen the race one way or other I didn't describe it- astonishing victory by this great big filly)

and the smile on Mario Espinoza, Zenyatta's groom, as he led her back thru the tunnel, I'll also never forget.

Breeders Cup Day 1

wow how cute are these girls? That's me on the right.



No wait, I guess this is me. oh well.



Wish I could look more mysterious, like she does. I found if you say to folks, "You look so cute- may I take your picture?" you get the shot. Single people take notice.



This guy brought his lucky bear.

The guy below trained this year's Kentucky Derby winner. Lots of cute girls around him. He's no longer on crutches, and looked much jollier than his (snarly) press presentation last May.



The horse below is Mr. Hot Stuff. He didn't win, but he almost did, and he deserves his name, don't ya think?



I had so much fun I can barely control myself, and it wasn't just because I made some dough.

The Breeders Cup races run for two days at Santa Anita. I purchased two special Tweeters Event tickets for Jon and me. It seemed incredible that for $25 we'd get reserve seats, gifts, entertainment and a full and delicious lunch but it was that good. Plus got to meet online racing bud Kevin Stafford (remember the Rachel Alexandra contest?) and Julie the sweetheart.

Going back tomorrow and hope to see more of the buds, but the crowd is going to be a nightmare. Insane that I didn't get pictures of the buds, but I was so excited I was practically foaming.

Ridgway Rodeo

We went to the Ridgway rodeo today and had a full out blast. The bleachers were packed and the rodeo was full of exciting action.

It started with an amazing opening act- a trick roper who snapped a bull whip from his horse that enclosed teenage volunteers from the audience in one tight loop, snapped his whip at his wife who held firecracker like items in her arms so he cut them in two, then jumped his horse onto a big trailer, rode up to a working teeter totter on top, stood on his horse and snapped his whip some more.



I spotted him after the rodeo. He had a Civil War look to him I thought. Weird that they didn't even give him a credit in the 32 page "program" which was all ads, so I'm not sure what his name was. His act was amazing and got the crowd all wound up and yelling, perfect for a rodeo.



But he was happy to pose with Carla and me after the rodeo. I don't know where his wife was. That's the whip over his shoulder. Carla ran a bear off her property the other night by chasing after it and yelling at it. wow. I just wear bears on my clothes.

Thanks!

Thanks all around. Kevin Stafford won the Ultimate Rachel Alexandra Fan Contest and will get all the goodies tomorrow at Monmouth Park. If you get TVG you'll see him walking with his new favorite horse. I know many of you voted, and that was so nice of you.

And I started this twitter drawing chain and wonder where it's going, and what's the protocol. We had Linda Davick, (ldavick), Namowal (othernamowal), RussellSteeleOH, wegwag (Marti Mcginess), tinyowls, and tasha26 all drawing.

If you choose to start a chain or continue one, be sure to add the @biz in the box at the bottom, otherwise the others may never see it or know anything was drawn. It seems to spiral out.

All were based on one lumpy drawing at the start. It's fun to run the playback over at twitter and see what was changed. I don't even know how tasha26 ran into the picture or who tasha26 is, but a nice contribution.

Have a good Saturday. I'm reading an excellent mystery, "Don't Look Back" by Karin Fossum, a Norwegian writer I found by accident in the library.

Rachel Alexandra

photo credit: Kevin Stafford

Don't you love the look of intensity on Calvin Borel's face?

Go to this link on Facebook and click "like" under the video tribute to Rachel Alexandra!! Help my pal Kevin win the contest!!

Kevin Stafford is my favorite horse racing pal on the internet. His great blog "The Aspiring Horseplayer" has helped educate me in the intricacies of betting on racehorses, and his enthusiasm and intelligent commentaries on horses and races are a delight. His weekly racing tips are also reliable and sometimes a jackpot. Thanks Kevin!!

Rachel Alexandra is the amazing filly who won the Preakness this year running against the boys. "Her Royal Freakness" some people call her, because her racing career has been so incredible. She's a gorgeous dark horse with a funny blaze that looks as if she got hit in the middle with a chocolate ice cream cone. Her tongue is always hanging out.

Rachel's running against the boys again at Monmouth Park in New Jersey on August 2, in the Haskell Stakes.

To highlight this important race, Monmouth Park is running a contest via Facebook , " The Ultimate Rachel Alexandra Fan Contest". Here's what the winner will get:

• VIP Haskell Seats (or an upgrade if you’ve already purchased your tickets)
• Designation as the Haskell Facebook Fan of the Day
• TV interview on Haskell Day with host Mike Curci
• Private backstretch tour and breakfast in the track kitchen

And here is where it gets good…as the Ultimate Rachel Fan, you will accompany the Haskell field up the racetrack, including Rachel Alexandra, to the English Walking Ring and Paddock prior to the Haskell!

Help Kevin win this contest- no one would enjoy this win more. Just follow that link and click like. Thanks!

Namowal's "I'm So Tired"

Fellow artist Namowal has just completed her first Flash animated musical piece and it is stunning!!

It's a song I never thought about much but here it takes on a mystery and beauty-- love the way the spiral movements echo the clock's movements, the way it captures the beat and the obsessive feeling, the refined and elegant while also charming animation of the girl and the phone. I think the teapot section is my favorite. The backgrounds work well to add depth while keeping focus on what's animating.

It's not easy to use Flash tweens so smoothly and effectively and for emotional effect too. Great work, Namowal. And a brilliant ending too, with such innovation and yet feels just right.

Truly amazing that this is your first drawn animated work as it is quite masterly. I hope some new form of animation will open up so your talent can be more widely seen.

You can read more about it at her blog here.

The Cowboy Festival 2009

We spent a wonderful afternoon at the Cowboy Festival in Santa Clarita: cooler weather than ever before, fewer exposed tattoos on rolling flesh, and actual good food for the first time: bison tri tip cooked by Bristol Farms. And all kinds of music related to cowboys, however indirectly.

As we were getting on the bus taking us back to the parking lot late yesterday, the couple above got on board.

I said: "Ooh, a matching set!" (referring to their clothes.)
She said: "I feel like a movie star."
I said: "You two look great! I'll take your picture."
She said: "Look at the camera dear."
He said: "It was just like travelling in time today."
She said: "I'm from Chile. He made me love him."
He said: "No, you made me love you!"
I said: "Tierra del Fuego!" (hey can I keep a conversation going?)
He said: "There aren't any polar bears down where she comes from."

The bus started up.

They called out, "It was great to meet you" as they got off the bus.

The best act was Sourdough Slim accompanied by my old pal Bob Armstrong whose music was so outstanding it almost dwarfed Sourdough's charming vaudeville act. I didn't think to take a picture when I went up to the stage to say hello to Bob, and when I took a picture from my seat from the phone it was useless.

I was disappointed in Hot Club of Cowtown. The new chick dominates the band and Whit Smith just seemed kind of sad and not miked right.

This band plays Civil War marching band music in Union army attire. Some of the band members looked about that old. Notice all the horns face backwards, so the soldiers marching along behind can be motivated by the music.

Wacky Days of LP covers

This is a detail from an album cover: Les Baxter Space Escapade." You can see it on ebay. We were listening to it last night. The music didn't do much for me, but the cover was quite amazing.

And notice how the girl resembles the tunaphone below!

Fun Nose Work

My German Shepherd Molly and I went to a Fun Nose Work seminar today, and it really WAS fun. It lasted for three hours. Fun Nose Work is a new urban dog sport created by two women who also do real dog detection work for hire.

You can take the classes just for the pleasure of watching your dog get really good at detecting a scent, or you can compete against other dogs at special events. There were nine dogs and about fifteen people at the event today.

Molly's been trained to recognize the smell of birch oil, which is much like root beer. In classes she's progressed from finding a tennis ball in a box to where she is now, finding a single half of a single Q-tip that's been soaked in birch oil. The jar above holds the q tips we practice with at home. I just hide one, anywhere on our property, and she can find it. When people come for dinner we do a demonstration. It's our parlor act.

Today we worked outside at first on a big grassy field, then along two sides of the street. When Molly is released to find the q tip, she nearly pulls me over, she's so excited to find it.

We also worked inside, and that was the most interesting part for me because I'd never tested her in a new interior. This warehouse building had many small laboratories and offices off of one big space. They make airplane parts in the building, so there were all kinds of mechanical odors and strange equipment to work around.

The q tip was hidden in a bathroom drawer, then in a toilet paper roll in another bathroom, then behind a night light that plugged into a wall. There was a bathroom we were supposed to go in that had no q tip. All the dogs figured this out very fast.

Then we moved on and found it in the laboratories, inside cabinets, inside a drawer, one room after the other.

The dogs at the seminar, aside from Molly, included a Rottweiler, two Cairn terriers, two border collies, a poodle, a Malanoix and a mix. All the dogs were superb workers with success every time.

I think the next scent she should learn to find is the smell of my keys.