Friday, Sept 23: Equinox day walk up to the ancestral graves for cleaning, incense and fresh flowers… as is tradition. We tended to several generations in Tsuchida, Okayama.
Note we are wearing our “family tie-dye tartan” made by brother Dan (wiped me out so back home to rest fckn #mecfs :()
Continue reading Equinox at Ohaka, saying respectful hellos to the ancestors
In Summer 2015, the “core four” of legendary rock ‘n’ roll band “The Grateful Dead” did a series of five concerts (two in Santa Clara, California, three in Chicago, Illinois) to close the book on their storied career. With brother Dan, we fantastically scored tickets and made the journey to all five shows, travelling by road in various vehicles and staying a various hotels, campgrounds, crash pads.
And, I had a notion to roll like it was still 1990 and that I kept a massive scrapbook of ephemera and eschewed technology (aside from a few logistical purposes) and took a little cork “sardine can” Lomo camera with expired film to capture a few hazy images.
The results are very pleasing because well, they are not crisp and clear in any sense, rather fuzzy and weird like me at the time… I was coming out of the long hard stretch, well I didn’t realize how far I still had to go but that’s neither here they are there. #rough
This assortment contains selected snaps of people in-and-around the shows and on the road trip. Worth noting that with our gaggle of pals, we also stopped at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado on the way back from Neil Young and “The Promise of the Real” at this legendary venue in some cold bewildering rain. Again, neither here nor there.
Note: there’s another collection of an “prairie time lapse” meaning a photo snapped every 15 minutes for driving across the US prairies capturing the redundancy and consistency of the landscape.
Another collection may follow with shots almost psychedelic in glorious hazy sloppiness from inside the concert venues – eventually, maybe.
Remember to check massive scrapbook of ephemera, the prairie “time-lapse” and this is the camera Lomo “Sardine Can” camera (cork covered):
Around 2000 in Olympia Washington, my colleagues and I sold a renegade pioneering Internet service provider (OlyWa.net) to an (evidently) evil national corporation (ATG) who quickly imploded allowing me the sensation of losing *big paper money* before i hit 30 – ugh .Anyhow, I managed to put a down-payment on a house – which had a semi-finished basement (and was also stumbling distance to downtown bars) which is the reason for this riff.
The aforementioned basement was rapidly converted into “the Hockey Lounge” a speakeasy/smoke easy/crash space for touring rock ‘n’ roll bands as well as a resource library for Hemp Lobby activities.
As the name applied, this was about watching hockey games as, in Washington state at the time, the sport was not popular and bars were filled with cigarette smoke an early season baseball games instead of pungent herb and Stanley Cup playoffs. The Hockey Lounge rectified these conundrums.
So, with a couple of first generation time-shifting devices, two satellite dishes and a cable feed and other electronics cobble together by brother Dan – who also procured couch, bar, fridge etc. from various auctions – and extensive hockey and punk rock artifacts decorations, a conversion of the fridge into a 2 tap keg-e-rator, the eventual addition of a toilet, wiring the house with ethernet connected to redundant broadband connections (note this was early 2000s) this became the scene of much frivolity.
There were rules:
and these rules were not followed very well unfortunately.
Occasionally we would host various contest/pools during the playoffs or Olympics in which everyone would enter with a high-quality six pack (they were sent away and shunned if the quality was not sufficient) and winner would take most, second place slightly more than they pitched in, and third place their ante back.
Several times noted touring rock bands crashed out but most memorable was my hometown heroes DOA, who i sang BTO’s “takin’ care of business” onstage (at 4th Ave Tav) while wearing a Canucks jersey. The band – including now-Burnaby city councillor Joey “Shithead” Keithley, now deceased hard drinking storyteller Randy Rampage and the road manager (who was so happy about the high-speed Internet) and roadie who, years later, i met his brother coincidentally in Granada, Spain – all watched Canucks playoffs time-shifted and told tales into the night, signed my Hardcore 81 album, tidied up after themselves.
Of course, many travelling friends crashed out and enjoyed the space including Maddog Mike of Pacifica who destroyed so much Grand Crü beer and was still up early for his business meeting in Portland, Dane came by too (who i think took these photos), we had a “hippie on the couch” from CT or CO for a long time, others who came by at all hours expecting the place to be open like it was there own clubhouse, some disrespect, some sloppiness, some heat started to outweigh the frivolity. A lot of dishes to wash, but also a lot of fun backyard bocce games.
Of course there was the infamous High Times photo shoot in which many regional growers and vendors came by with copious amounts of wares in hopes of being featured in the magazine. Many were, i was rewarded with a massive mess to clean up and a photo/write up in the article which well… caused some community angst and notoriety (possibly covered elsewhere in this archive).
Epilogue: As it goes, economic situations changed with the *great collapse*, I couldn’t find work in any form, and then domestic situations changed with people moving in, people moving out, various tenants and domestic intrigue, then renters, a sewage flood and then a renovation and what not. [I had tried to finish some college, start a new business and relationship and hard to do all of that i suppose.]
In amongst much of this transition, aforementioned brother Dan became their “sole proprietor” of hockey lounge as it became his apartment. As things descended into malaise, various pieces and parts were sold off for cash to pay the mortgage, eventually the house sold, and I headed north and continued hockey culture with the Canucks Outsider podcast, then Dan later heading north as well to attend UBC engineering school. The Hockey Lounge still lives in the way/spirit at his current abode.
There is scant photographic evidence of this era though the legends live on throughout the streets of Olympia (or so I tell myself) plus at Olympic Plaza in SLC, and oh yeah if you’re reading this pay your fcking tab – this means you!
In 2001, three of my four brothers and Dad gathered in Seattle (some of us came from Olympia WA, others down from Surrey BC) for some activities including a visit to the Experience Music project which is a sort of interactive museum at Seattle Center.
Amongst all the fine exhibits is/was a “live concert simulator” in which you are announced on to the stage with lights and crowd and play along in a kind of *deluxe karaoke* of sorts / with if I recall correctly ” twist and shout”. Really quite fun.
Brother Bob wasn’t in attendance so, we called our band “Bobless” which has become sort of our de facto codename for events and activities in which Bob is elsewhere.
Related: brother Dan and I were charter members of the Experience Music Project and received a special piece of tile as an artefact to commemorate this membership I will share this elsewhere in this archive at some point, probably/maybe.
Charter member medallion / memento with tile (from the roof?) of the then-new Experience Music Project (now Museum of Pop Culture, was also: Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame (EMP|SFM) and later EMP Museum) building in Seattle Center, along with “Acoustic Duo” charter member card (purchased with brother Dan).
As is the case with most every bail receipt i suspect, there’s a story behind this one… I’ll save it for another time but in short involves: a baseball I didn’t get to keep, and two policeman with the same name, and a 4:20AM drive home. Thanks Dan.
Project: Upon turning 50 years old on August 16, 2020, Dave Olson (me, hello) is posting a photo a day per years staring with 1970 on June 17 with intent of chronicling existence through various evidence. Primarily sourced from studio portraits, class photos, ID / passport photos, or occasionally other “casual/group/random” shots when the above don’t exist in my archive (note: not “artificial intelligence,” really me, pulled from shoeboxes, journals, wallets and whatnot – diligently scanned and dated via glasses and haircuts, lightly annotated).
{Catching up with…} Leading up to Ichiro’s birth, another wonderful package arrived – this one from brother Dan (with postal assist by brother Bob) containing an assortment of handmade treats and other related goods.
Most noteworthy were a variety of tie-dye t-shirts including one for papa (hello!), mama and the forthcoming-at-the-time baby in our “family tartan“ which he also made for various brothers and nieces and nephews. Will make a splendid family photo one day.
In the meantime, here’s two of us, and the tie-dyes on standby for little Ichi-Stan.
Also in the mix there’s a few gifts of soccer scarves for some friends Dan met during his last visit and, a variety of Grateful Dead socks for us and the notable Deadhead/goat farmer Mac.
Ichiro being extra special got an additional tie-dye which, paired with his various bibs and hats would be extra cool.
Thanks brother/in-law-uncle Dan for being so thoughtful and we’ll soon I’ll put on our tie-dyes for a photo with the young nephew.
Note: Dan learned his tie-dye trade, well perfected it anyway, from Lance who along with Leslie were proprietors of Aaron’s Tie-Dyes for many years. Dan and I were able to assist – in my case, purely as a “road trip logistical assistant”, and indeed, it was the tie-dye is that introduced me to Lance and his cohorts other then-new ISP (OlyWa.net) in a totally life-changing coincidence of asking for change for laundry machine.
After being birthed in Saskatoon and flight to Calgary to Vancouver at 15 days, living in Eugene, Oregon for first year and some, we moved to Lansing, Michigan where Dad took a professor gig at Michigan State University and brother Dan was born.
Then, changing jobs again to University of British Columbia, we were on the plane again, westway to the world.
Not sure details of route (did they drive to Windsor/Toronto and then fly?) but based on sizes of the 3 brothers, believe this is the flight west on this Air Canada bird in 1974.
(Is this a 737? or 707 like the Gordon Lightfoot song?)
Back in the days of rambling around to Grateful Dead shows with pals in various (usually Volkswagen) vehicles, cameras weren’t really part of the kit. Usually, ticket(s) if possible, contraband if practical, maybe extra clothes to accommodate climates, hopefully a few bucks.
However, as part of my documentary instincts, i hauled along a tripod and a 35mm Alpa camera for taking “family photos” in which i would cajole (with much whingeing usually) the assembled renegades to pose, i’d hit the timer and run back (as such usually right in front) and take 1 and only 1 shot. Years later these would usually get developed.
Many are lost to the fog, however, some are gathered here for posterity and memorial.
Continue reading Grateful Dead rambles / “family photos” (with renegade pals & VWs)