Nice tassles.

An audience favorite.

Opening performance.

Opening performance #2.

Gutsy girl.

Front row. Isn't that the girl from Project Runway?

My personal favorite.

Best dress of the show, part 2.

Socks and heels...

Flowerhead.

Flowerhead, part 2.

Very patriotic.

All in all, San Diego is something like L.A.’s armpit when it comes to fashion, but I loved getting to shoot this show. While most of the outfits weren’t amazing, there were some standouts that REALLY impressed me. And most of the designers were local novices.The opening dancers were a plus, as well as the performance by MANN, who recently released the song “Buzzin” with 50 Cent. I had heard about these Project Ethos events before (they take place in different cities all over the country) and I can understand the hype. It was darn fun.

YES.

Why? Because it was awesome and it took me three hours and I burned my hand AND cut my finger in the process.

What do we have here?

Chicken — my family is too small to cook a turkey. I roasted it with lemon, thyme and garlic stuffed inside the bird and it was delicious.

Sweet potatoes — scalloped (thinly sliced) with layers of apples and pears, with brown sugar and sunflower seeds. Yum.

Stuffing — a mixture of Stove Top sage recipe and fresh baked and crumbled Jiffy sweet corn bread. Sauteeed onions and celery was added with chicken broth poured over the top before cooking it about 30-45 minutes or until the edges started getting crispy.

Green beans — fresh. Sauteed. With bacon, which was cooked until crisp before adding the beans. Toward the end of the sautéing I added a little dash of balsamic vinegar, lemon, olive oil, salt, pepper and chicken broth.

Broccoli salad — Main ingredient is chopped broccoli. Add to that a small amount of cucumber, more bacon, sunflower seeds, diced red peppers, dried cranberries, and a lemon-mayo-balsamic-dijon-type dressing that I concocted and stirred in, making it all cohesive. This dish is, hands down, one of my favorite things ever, and so many things can be substituted, as long as there is broccoli, bacon, some type of dried fruit, some kind of nut (pecans are good to use) and a couple other dice-able raw veggies and a vinaigrette, either sweet-ish or tangy.

Mashed potatoes — While the potatoes were boiling I threw in some fresh carrots and then I mashed them all up together with a little bit of sweet cream butter, salt and some parmesan cheese.

Gravy — from the lemon-y thyme-y juice from the chicken, stirred in about half a packet of instant chicken gravy mix and a splash of cranberry juice to sweeten it up a bit and give it a tangy flavor.

I put a spoonful of cranberry sauce on the stuffing. I don’t even like cranberry sauce, but I felt like I should have it, even though I didn’t even have turkey. And it was well-recieved.

The winners are The Grant Grill at the U.S. Grant Hotel, and the Noble Experiment, pictured consecutively.

My job has its perks.

Photos by Clayer. Drinks made by Amy Bissel (Grant Grill, first two photos) and Anthony Schmidt (The Noble Experiment, last photo).

A few recognizable names. Old friends. Woop woop.

I did this for my application to BNAT. Which I thought required a bald pic (that was last year – oops) … But the picture was actually supposed to be of yourself committing a crime that is deserving of the death penalty. So photo 4 is what I came up with…

I screamed… I stood up and took a few steps back, thinking he would back off, and he started going at my knees, and I didn’t really know how to defend myself or what I was up against. I realized I wasn’t even sure if a goose could bite or what — you just wouldn’t expect that from something so graceful and cute.

A dog, for instance, gives you some warning — a growl, a bark. A cat’s eyes turn red. But a goose just leads you on…

I apologized to the goose and we made up. I walked away — quickly. I was admittedly intimidated by this fowl, and I had attracted the attention of a few onlookers. Not good attention.

Then, I was walking away and I felt something at the back of my knees… and then i heard honking… and I ran.

This here photo is of an avocado salad that somewhere in the ballpark of 12 ingredients in it. The whole thing started when Vadim brought me a huge bag of avocados he bought on the side of the road for $2.

There for about two weeks, I was putting avocados in everything — or sometimes just pulling out the pit and eating one whole with a spoon… ignoring the fat content, of course.

The photo above, as well as the below, I made as part of a three-course pre-fasting Yom Kippur meal for Vadim and I. Even though I’ve never practiced Judaism, I thought I’d challenge myself with a fast too… and there’s nothing wring with a little repentance to go with that. But it all starts with indulgence. Well, however much you can indulge in an entirely vegan meal…

Looking at the photo, I’m trying to remember what I put in this avocado salad — cilantro, dried cherries, cumin and garlic, lime juice and zest, Cholula sauce, balsamic vinaigrette, avocado, tomatoes, chives, carrots, cucumbers, red peppers… I’m sure I’m leaving something or some things out.

I then used a lot of the same ingredients to make a black bean and cous cous dish with corn, red peppers cilantro, cucumbers, tomato and lime balsamic dressing (on a bed of fresh spinach). I julienned the carrots and roasted them for about an hour with salt, pepper and a little bit of olive oil — my favorite way to make carrots.