You've got to burn to shine.

My weekend was quite relaxing - which was necessary given how the past few weekends have been full of visitors or visiting or chores. Not to say I didn't have chores to do this time around. But it was a peaceful weekend.

On Friday, Erica and I hit up Life Cafe after work for some serious girl gabbing. Also, we talked a lot about religion. And boys. Will we ever cease to talk about the labrynth that is male behavior and decision-making? It's too fascinating (and tortuous) to not talk about.

Afterwards, we went to Jesse Lee's latest gallery party at Eastern District. The gallery's latest offering is photographs by the talented Justine Reyes. I really loved the photographs, and if you're in the area, check them out.

The exhibit is called, "Home, Away from Home." From the website -

Ms. Reyes spent the past six years photographing her immediate family - her mother and two uncles. This series pairs their portraits with views of empty interior spaces in the house where they all live. In many of the photographs where the figures of her family are physically present a lonely emptiness and unease hovers, often more insistantly than in the vacant spaces. The family is seen engaging in the everyday activities of cleaning, eating, watching TV, doing nothing in particular. The viewer is forced to adopt Reyes’ vision, incorporating the artist’s own fears of losing her family and trying to capture the moments slipping by with increasing speed as they get older. Ms. Reyes’ beautifully sad photographs focus on age, aging, loneliness and isolation, and the fragility of life and family bonds through her stark depictions of details such as her uncle’s broken nose.

It's really beautiful. I met Justine and took her picture by her work, along with a couple of my favourite photographs on display:

On Saturday, Erica, Gaby and I saw Star Trek (for me, again) and it was great...again. The movie is just really fun. That night I came down with the worst headache and stayed on the couch to watch Sliding Doors, Grey Gardens and SNL. On Sunday, I got a lot of those chores done.

And how was your weekend?

Got a body like a battle-axe.

How was everyone's weekend?! Mine was quite spectacular.

Friday night, Jesse and I stopped in at a new art gallery around the corner called Eastern District. They're currently exhibiting the works of a comic book artist known as Juan Doe. It also has some Kaws art and clothing. Our friend Jesse Lee works there, and I usually only see that girl out in the city, so I'm excited that she's like a "new neighbor." Next month Eastern District is exhibiting the works of Poster Boy - the guy who remixes subway posters.

And Erica got her hair cut!!! She looks RAD. (That's her above with Jesse Lee!)

On Saturday morning, Jesse, Erica, Sean, and I headed to the 72nd Street IMAX at EIGHT AM from Brooklyn. We met up with Keller, Perry, Katie, Adam, and Eli in a giant-email-threaded meet-up. Seriously, we've been planning this for three weeks. We got there an hour before Watchmen, and there was STILL a line!

Of course, my thoughts on the film will be brought to you in a separate post, lest some readers don't care for all the details! Anyway, it was such a wonderful weather day that we decided to walk all the way from W 72nd Street and Broadway to E 14th Street and 3rd Avenue. That's about 65 blocks on foot. And it was glorious!

On Saturday evening, Jesse took me out for our two-year anniversary dinner at Peter Luger's! If you don't know, Peter Luger's is a fantastic steak joint in Brooklyn, that I've seen profiled a zillion times on the Food Network, and has won the New York's Best Steakhouse prize every year since like 1985...or something. It's very hard to come by a reservation. And it didn't disappoint! Jesse has the pictures (maybe I'll add later!), but we got the steak for two and it was HUGE but we finished it all - even the meat of the bone. It's that kind of meat that just melts in your mouth...yummmm. A food coma ensued, of course.

That night, Erica and I went to Kelly's luau where there was some epic renditions of classic songs via karaoke. And everyone was dressed up in beachwear - even a dude in board shorts and a long-sleeved wet-shirt or whatever they're called. Amazing.

I finally made it to bed (remember, still Saturday - I had woken up at 7am!) and on Sunday I clean, clean, cleaned. Then Jesse and I met up with our friends Dan & Kristy, who were in town for Dan's show (he plays in OkGo). We went to dinner with them, Alexa and her boyfriend, Kafi, and Tim (the bassist). It's always so much fun to hang out with Kristy! I look forward to every time she's in town! Exclamation points don't do it enough justice!!!

Okay. After the catch-up, we went to the Music Hall of Williamsburg for the show to see openers Longwave. Then OkGo took the stage, and I couldn't help but dance. They played a lot of new songs, all of which ROCKED. And yes, there was lots of fun paper confetti! I couldn't make the afterparty (given my jobby job job), so I headed home. And thus concludes the adventure that was this weekend.

In other news - I'm messing around with the design of this page, so it'll be changing for the next few days until I find a way in which I like it! Thanks!