Noisy

A few years back, I decided to leave the confines of Corporate America and "do my own thing". I was barely in my early 30's and I was already exhausted from pointless early scrum calls, excessive Outlook meeting requests, and know-nothing Brand Managers who relied on people like me to explain their job to them.

And until recently, my commercially zoned "man-cave" downstairs was where I spent the majority of my life grinding out a living.

My "on-duty" hours ranged anywhere from 6AM to well, whenever I was at a good stopping point (which was usually when I could no longer focus my eyes on whatever project I was working on at that time).

During those hours spent downstairs, I've seen countless cars, busses, trucks, and Sheriff’s vehicles, fly down Santa Ana Boulevard at 50+ MPH–AND THAT SHIT GETS REALLY LOUD!

Not to mention that a majority of the cars seem to either be a diesel truck, have some sort of exhaust system, or worse, be missing their catalytic converter and be just all the more annoying.

And a side-rant about exhaust systems: Kids, if you drive an automatic, DO NOT put a exhaust system on your car! There is nothing sexy or badass about a loud low-RPM automatic gear shift.

In 2006 when I first moved into the lofts, the north side of the complex was still years away from being completed. Every now and then my awesome friend/neighbor Luis and I would stand out front and nerd out about upcoming movies or the most recent "Lost"or "Dexter" (when it was good) episode.

A few years had gone by and Lennar had recently completed putting up the buildings across the street. One night, Luis and I were talking out front and we could barely even hear each other. It turns out that with the buildings constructed directly across from us, the sound of the vehicles was amplified as it reverberated until it dissipated. Think of it as being in the bottom of a narrow canyon and yelling "ECHO!".

Over the years, the sound of vehicles roaring down Santa Ana Boulevard became part of the overall background noise that comes with living at the Santiago Street Lofts. My good buddy Luis ended up moving to scenic Utah and thus my time spent out on Santa Ana Boulevard was reduced to not nearly what it once was.

A few months back, I decided to take up some office space in Downtown Santa Ana. The rent was a deal I could not pass up and the location was adjacent to all of my favorite restaurants. Situated on historic 4th Street (Calle Cuatro), I was expecting it to be noisy, but it turns out it's surprisingly a more mellow downtown city-street-type of noise–and I LOVE IT.

I guess it has something to do with the overall purpose and differences between the two streets: 4th Street is an active street where people want to be versus Santa Ana Boulevard being a passive street packed with churches and apartment complexes.

Man, I miss Luis. He was good people.

[/hiatus]

I'm back (again).

No, I haven't moved, been stabbed, or joined a cult (well, I kinda did)–I just needed to take a break from blogging for a while, a real long while.

Why? Because being a "Type A" personality coupled with being a dude who is super-passionate about the City he lives in can quickly lead burn out–especially if you live in the City of Santa Ana.

Before my self-imposed exile from blogging, I often found myself thinking "why are people so short-sighted" and "gee, how many times am I going to hear the race card be played at this community meeting".

Every time I began a blog entry, I saw that bitterness began to consume my words and eventually my actions and that's when it hit me–the Santa Ana honeymoon is definitely over.

Many of the original residents here at the lofts have (smartly?) moved on and new tenants and renters have filled their spaces, but not their dreams and passions about this area that we all once shared.

My dream of living in a progressive downtown setting such as Portland, San Diego, or dare I say Brooklyn, was quickly fading as empty lots adjacent to our community, now branded "The Station District" were being filled by affordable rental projects (I'll have a few follow-up posts on this issue in the coming weeks). Our Station District was now looking more like The Apartment District.

And yes, I will agree that our downtown has grown up since the days of The Santa Ana Pub Crawl, it's a little too late–at least for me that is.

I love that there's a great music venue just right down the street from us at The Yost, but the thought of partying with an 18 and up crowd would definitely solidify my fears that I have finally entered a mid-life crisis.

I love that there's finally a restaurant on the corner of 3rd and Broadway (ChapterOne), yet I often question the over-complexity of the dishes on their menu and usually end up finding myself hanging out at the bar while making meaningless conversation with someone who is less-informed about the politics that govern and often blindly guide our city.

For so many years, I had lived in this dream world of what this city could be that when the walls of (Orange County) reality finally came crashing in, I needed to get away. So I ran.

Literally, I began running 5Ks, 10Ks, then half marathons, and finally the LA and OC Marathons. When that got boring (because let's face it, running is boring), I began participating in triathlons, relay triathlons, and other goofy grueling events that pushed my physical (and mental) limitations. Essentially, this was my cult., my escape.

2nd Place–Also known as "1st Place Loser".
Especially since there was only one other relay team!

These events offered a wonderful support group for those, like me, who are perpetual dream-chasers, by giving them an achievable goal along with a shiny little prize at the conclusion of the event (plus, my body weight, blood pressure and cholesterol all returned to normal levels).

But I never once took my eyes off my true passion–my city. As I trained for all of these events, I did it in this city. As my endurance grew and mile times improved, the downtown improved as well with cleaner streets, better lighting, and best of all, new faces coming to explore our city.

And for a while, I gave up chasing the dream of supporting street car projects, reviving a farmer's market, growing the Santiago Art Walks, supporting cool bungalow developments right down the street, and instead, chased finish lines and personal records.

But now, I think it's time to get back to focusing on my true passion, my beloved city.

A Road Better Traveled

There are people that you come across in your life that make you re-evaluate your long-established practices and methodology. If you are smart, you surround yourself with them as they will challenge you, inspire you, help you be better at what you do, and most importantly, not give up hope for this world.

A few years back, my wife and I were lucky enough to befriend such a person named Delilah Snell—a kind-hearted purveyor of great ideas and a shepherd of goodwill, with an infectious belly laugh that could liven up a mortuary. Delilah was a wealth of information as I was, at the time, hoping to help bring a Farmer's Market to either the Second Street Promenade in Downtown or the train station parking lot located (conveniently) right across the street.

At the time, Delilah owned and operated a wonderful eco-friendly store located on the corner of North Main Street and Buffalo here in Santa Ana. If you were driving too fast on Main Street, you would most definitely miss it. I likened giving my neighbors directions to her store to navigating one's way through The Lost Woods in the original "Legend of Zelda"–up (Main), left (Santa Clara), down (Broadway), left (Buffalo). Alas, just like days of old, even with these simple directions, many still got lost.

But like all hidden gems, this store was one worth hunting for. In a pre-Pinterest time where online crafters were just getting started with Etsy, The Road Less Traveled Store was years ahead of the crafting trend and doing it the old-fashioned brick-and-mortar way.

Meanwhile down the street, Downtown Santa Ana began blossoming again with new restaurants and Brave New Urbanists occupying a series of loft developments. And as the demographics began to oh-so-slightly shift, the need and desire for unique retail began to grow—and this store's destiny became clear.

At the end of 2011, Delilah began packing up her store on North Main Street and returned to her Second Street Promenade roots (having previously worked at the Gypsy Den many years before).



On February 1, 2012, Delilah reopened her now pedestrian-friendly store with much success with endless possibilities for awesomeness to come.

The Road Less Traveled Store's new location offers more space for workshops, increased inventory, new partnership opportunities, as well as a symbiotic relationship with the existing Cal State Fullerton Grand Central Art Center.



In time, this store will help inspire others to create—not only at home with crafting, but also new stores and ideas in this retail-starved area of Downtown Santa Ana.


The Road Less Traveled Store

Address
125 North Broadway-C, Santa Ana, CA 92701
Phone: 714.836.8727
Website: http://www.roadlesstraveledstore.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/rltstore

Hours
Tue - Sat: 11:00 am - 6:00 pm
Sun: 11:00 am - 3:00 pm

Goodbye AT&T DSL

I remember back in 2006 when we first moved to the lofts, getting our Internet up and running was a top priority. From switching our billing addresses, setting up service appointments, and all of the other fun things that come along with moving, Internet was key in getting our new home up and running.

At the time, Adelphia Cable was the sole Cable Internet service provider and boy did they suck ass. From their customer service down to their network infrastructure, everything was terrible.

In the coming year, Adelphia ended up filing for bankruptcy and Time Warner took over servicing the neighborhood, but that transition was pretty rough for us as our Internet turned from terrible to just plain crap.

Fed up with our lousy Cable Internet, we signed up for AT&T "Elite" DSL at a promo rate of $20/mo for the first year, jumping to its standard rate of $35/mo the second year.

At first, we were getting pretty solid download speeds and all was good in the universe. But as time went on, things once again turned to crap.

Thinking it could be a wireless issue, I plugged my computer directly into the router, which did help a bit, but overall, didn't do much when it came to gaming on the Xbox/PS3 or worse, streaming Netflix movies.

A few weeks ago I was chatting with a neighbor and they were telling me how happy they were with their Cable Internet service from Time Warner after switching from AT&T U-verse. I looked up TW's prices online and found that their standard rates were not only cheaper than what I was paying with AT&T, but also allowed for more bandwidth.

Seeing that my AT&T DSL account wasn't on a contract and I wasn't getting anywhere near the download speeds I was paying for, I decided to give Time Warner Cable another shot, five years after first leaving them. The saddest part of all was when I called AT&T and told them I wanted to cancel, the thought of "business retention" never crossed the operator's mind!

Below is a screen capture of my previous AT&T DSL speeds and my new Time Warner Cable download speeds. From 1.33Mbps down to a whopping 25.21Mbps–it's a shame I've long outgrown my porno-downloading days.

As for pricing, get this–I'll be paying $180 LESS/year AND it looks like I qualify for a $100 cash card for telling them why I switched!

With Internet connection speeds this good I have no reason to not blog in 2012!

Back in the Saddle

Remember me?
It's been a while hasn't it.

I made a promise to myself I'd come back to writing this year and to continue with this story.

Happy 2012 and see you soon!

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

Santa Ana needs more gay people.
There, I said it.

Having grown up in San Diego, I've seen first hand how the (GLBT) community can refine once rough urban areas like Hillcrest and further expand its positive gentrification into surrounding neighborhoods such as Normal Heights and North Park into desirable pocket destinations.

Don't take my word for it–here's an exerpt on Gay Villages from Wikipedia (yeah I know, Wikipedia isn't de facto, but I strongly agree with what is written).

These neighborhoods are also often found in working-class parts of the city, or in the neglected fringe of a downtown area – communities which may have been upscale historically but became economically depressed and socially disorganized. In these cases, the establishment of a gay community may eventually turn these areas into desirable, upscale neighborhoods, a process known as gentrification – a phenomenon in which gays often play a pioneer role.

That first sentence in the above quote sure sounds like both the Lacy and French Park (are you listening Santa Ana/Related California) neighborhoods, wouldn't you say?

So...who's with me on giving the water tower a fresh coat of rainbow paint this weekend?

Back from the Dead

"Downtown Orange County"–that definitely has a ring to it. But I often wonder if the folks who decided to paint that slogan on our beloved water tower have ever been to a real downtown.

Don't get me wrong, I love the current flavor and charm of what sits between 1st Street and Civic Center Drive, but come 7PM on a Monday night, the lights go out and the sidewalks are rolled up.

One of the main issues I feel that's stunting this area's development is that the Residential Zoning Code mandates that only Live-Work developments can be built in Downtown Santa Ana (though I've heard this might be changing soon).

A few years back, the Olson Company breathed new life into Downtown Santa Ana by building both the Main Street and the award-winning East Village Lofts. But for some reason (I've heard a few speculations why), they never got a chance to finish up the final phase of their project (to be named Sycamore Street Lofts) located on the corner of 3rd and Sycamore.

After years of being a vacant lot and one of Santa Ana's (many) under-utilized assets, City Ventures has stepped in and is picking up right where Olson left off.

I've always hoped that this 1/2-acre lot would be the catalyst for bigger and better things for Downtown Santa Ana (like making Memphis want to be open on Monday nights). I'm not sure what the original specs called for, but image ground floor (quality) retail with 3 stories of residential sitting on top–that would be the tits.

Check out the press release below that was forwarded to me by my good amigo:

City Ventures’ Latest Acquisition Will Add More Life to Santa Ana’s Artist Village

Continuing its pace of aggressive land acquisitions, City Ventures has purchased a fully-entitled, half-acre community in Santa Ana, Calif., where it will complete development on a much-anticipated collection of live/work artist lofts. City Ventures acquired the property – adjacent to the downtown artist village – from a New York-based capital management fund and is now working with the City of Santa Ana to complete the community. The purchase was an all-cash transaction.

Situated on the corner of North Sycamore Street and West 3rd Street, less than a mile from the City’s Metrolink train station, the neighborhood is planned for 16 homes, ranging from 1,227 to 2,134 square feet with one to three bedrooms. Homes – expected to be complete in 2011 – will have an estimated average price of $400,000.

City Ventures is independently financing the community’s acquisition and construction.

In addition to this parcel in Santa Ana, City Ventures currently holds more than 2,000 lots within 13 California urban, coastal counties with more than $1.0 billion in revenue potential. The company also owns or controls – land in cities including Pasadena, Newport Beach, Santa Barbara, Encinitas, Yorba Linda, and Claremont.

To meet our team and learn more about City Ventures, please visit our website at www.cityventures.com

Special thanks to my good buddy El Diablo Blanco for the heads up.