The Thousand Yard Stare

Wow, has time flown by.

My work situation went from “Dead Man Walking” to “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On”. Since I don’t have an editor looking over my shoulder, I’ll assume it’s okay to mix my metaphors.

Regardless, I’ve been so busy that I only just got to sit down with an emergency beer and type out some thoughts about what I was up to recently.

The biggest and most entertaining (by far) was the trip to Tiki Oasis 2013. This year’s theme was Hulabilly, next year’s is Beatnik. They’ve been throwing this shindig for over ten years now, it’s massive.

First off, I’m going to admit that I’m stealing some of these images off the internet.  Mostly because I’m really bad at taking a lot of pictures, but also I find I enjoy the event/occasions more if I’m not constantly thinking about how I’ll blog about it. (Lastly, there was a lot of rum involved). I’ll credit where appropriate.

I’ll admit, Tiki is not necessarily my favorite of all the twang sub-genres, but I was coaxed into it once I heard that Southern Culture on the Skids was headlining. I figured I couldn’t go wrong if they were playing.

Unfortunately, we had some plans on Friday that couldn’t be shifted, so our plan was to fly out early Saturday.

View in El Paso from one of the airport bars (I think):

We arrived on Saturday evening, and settled into our local retro-hotel, Kings Inn. I really liked this place.  Here’s a view from the balcony (as usual in California, everything is stacked up). If I remember correctly, that weird purple Chrysler is our rental.

We got decked out pretty quick (starving….since I think my only food consumption was an olive and a celery stick conveniently dunked in tomato/vodka liquid combination in El Paso)

Arrived at the venue, and hooollleeee crap. This place is huuuuuge. They took over the WHOLE hotel. This pic is from last year, same deal.  You can see some vendors in this shot, plenty of people, the walls of the hotel rising up to the sides (filled with Tiki enthusiasts). Some of the balconies were decorated, it was a huuge party.

Here’s a pic from the actual event program. You can see where the stage is located in relation to the pool, and see how massive this event is. Did I mention it’s huge? There’s still two other pages with artist gallery and more vendors. Geez.

Our first pit stop was the hotel restaurant. If there was any issue I had with the entire event it might have been how overwhelmed the hotel staff was there. Everything else was smooth, but we were pretty starving.

I ran into the one and only Tavo Vega of Nocturne Pedals while we were eating. I probably wouldn’t have noticed, but his son was wearing a shirt bearing the logo of one of my favorite pedals, the Ubangi Stomp.  Tavo totally hooked me up with a Ubangi shirt. If you’re a guitar player, check his stuff out, hand made stomp pedals in the US of A. I’ve got the Ubangi, the Fuzz Ray, the Seltzerado, and an original cola sparkle Brain Seltzer.

Since it was already Saturday, we had missed some Friday festivities, and were a little late for vendors – so we ran around and talked to some friends from Texas that were performing. Also began consuming rum.

Easily one of the largest events dedicated to low-brow-tiki-hot-rod that I’ve ever been to, Saturday evening’s official festivities was capped off with a performance by Southern Culture on the Skids. (Yes, one of my favorite bands)

At 10pm sharp, the band shut down with a quick “Daddy was a Preacher, Mama was a go-go girl”. Apparently Tiki Oasis has had some noise complaints in the past (the hotel is in a canyon, so I imagine the sound just ricochets up and down the entire length).

Then, the room parties started.

Wow. Just wow. Imagine hotel suites getting taken over for a room party, bands, booze, dancing….

I didn’t take any pictures, but they were FUN.

We sacked out pretty early after visiting some parties and hanging out.

Sunday, we decided to go check out some of San Diego. There are a lot of palm trees.  And the Regal Beagle (which I thought was hilarious, although we didn’t go there)

One of the last non-Tiki-Oasis things we did was eat at Bali Hai. I can’t say enough about this place, the food is amazing. The decor is very polynesian, the food is superb. In my top five two places I’ve ever eaten.  Nuff said.

We made it back to Tiki Oasis shortly before the vendors closed and picked up some swag. Caught Big Sandy, hung out with Tana the Tattooed Lady (winner of Miss Tiki Oasis 2013!), and gabbed with Dave Hartman.

Monday meant a little more sightseeing in SD, The Bettie Page store, the Gaslamp district, hanging out near some water. I think we were too wiped out to take many more pictures.

I got this one at Kings Inn though (weird? or bloated by alcohol? or both?)

All in all, a TON of fun, and would recommend as a destination trip for anyone looking to have a lot of fun.