starting the year off with a full cup of nor cal

Our first trip of the year led us north. We, in this case Ryan, Randy, and I, stayed a night and day in Santa Cruz with our buddy Mike, where we cruised downtown, rode some bikes, ate some delicious breakfast, got some cold but clean surf, and did some fun foto shoots.

the sign on the bike was for a place called 'the tiki lounge' - so coco!!

these girls were kicking out the jams on the street

post foto shoot fun - jump around!!

From Santa Cruz, we drove to the city and raged until the weeeeeee hours in the Mission. We ended up crashing at my aunt and uncle's house where my mother was conveniently staying for the weekend. As you may have guessed this aunt I write of is my mother's little sister. and in true mother fashion, she showed up with a gift for us - what she called 'party glasses.' (My mom usually gets me the funniest and most random shit - this Christmas she gave me a 24" inflatable shark that shoots water out of its mouth, a ninja turtles shirt, a calendar of 'bathrooms of the world,' and a spatula in the shape of a guitar so whoever's cooking in the kitchen can play air guitar in between flipping pancakes or burger patties...ya, my mom's a bad ass.)

mother o' mine with 'party glasses' between the curly-haired twins

After another great breakfast, we moved to the coast to celebrate our friends Alex Pasternak's 30th birthday. He had a party, or 'brunch' as he called it at his parents' house in Martins Beach, just south of Half Moon Bay...brunch started at 2pm, and went until 7am the next morning, when Alex opened a bottle of champagne with a sword like a French soldier. There were bowls of dungenous crab, cornish game hens, wine, cheese, beer, booze, live music, and other festivities including fireworks, on the beach at midnight, followed a couple hours of tasty living room dance party...not a bad way to celebrate one's 30th birthday - good work, Alex!!

the long lasting partiers after a delicious juevos rancheros breakfast the next morning

We drove through Santa Cruz on the way back and stopped at a place called 'burger.' (with a period after the word burger). They had served one of the best burgers I've ever had, they have a great bar with Chimay on tap, and it was crawling with a huge influx of cute girls...most of them were probably college girls, but I don't like to discriminate. They also had great shakes...shortly after we got on the road and mozied on home to Ventura...another victory!