Asian couple at the bar profile picture

Asian couple at the bar

'Sometimes nothing can be a real cool hand'---Cool Hand Luke

About Me


Name's Antonio. Grew up in Chicago but now residing in Honolulu, Hawaii with my gorgeous wife and rock-star son. Miss some things about Chicago: free tequila shots at Mickey's Bar & Grill on Broadway, catching the head-thumping beats of the Baldwin Brothers at the Abbey Pub, watching suburban goth and punk wannabes parading down Belmont, the Smashing Pumpkins as an opening band at Avalon and spying Liz Phair doing shots at Dreamerz on Damen Ave way back in the day, Xmas shopping at Uncle Fun on Southport & Belmont, laughing at Lincoln Park neoTrixies who "do" Wicker Park like a quasi-Disney attraction, First Fridays at the MCA, listening to "This American Life" on 'BEZ on a cold snowy Sunday, Milly's Orchid Show at Lower Links, Poi Dog shows on their first shows at the "Cabaret" Metro, and getting drunk with my wife at Smart Bar (hence asian_couple_at_bar)...
But living and loving the island aloha--no more below zero wind chill factor temps. Honolulu is lovely, weird, frenetic, palm-tree swaying, crowded, culturally pan-galactic mixed plate of asian slash Americanese goodness. Lovely women who break your heart from a two second glance your way. Horrid traffic. Food so full of flavor your tastebuds explode and then sigh into a passive lump on your tongue with each spoonfull. WILD nightlife. Cool people once you get past their suspicions. Mahalo y'all.

My Interests

Trying to find the meaning of life, the perfect sipping tequila, eternal adoration for my wife, Kal-el's wisdom for my son, the perfect sunglasses, the cheat codes for infinite lives, the ultimate burlesque, mighty Jah's own pristine beach, endless breath, the picquant essence of living at the moment, and all before Aqua Teen Hunger Force comes on Cartoon Network...

I'd like to meet:

Jesus, most definitely...with a couple of bota bags of wine He "made", we'd pass it back & forth with some smokes talking about what He REALLY wanted for all of us...

Then do some jello shots with Albert Einstein, shine a flashlight on Simone deBeauvoire making out with Nelson Algren, sit in while Martin Luther King Jr. talks blues classics with Sid Vicious, hang with Bruce Lee and Steve McQueen getting high by the pool--all at the same cocktail party where we would lob shrimp cocktail at Ayn Rand and blame Che Gueverra for it...

And now...my two year old channeling Bruce Lee on a Hawaiian beach.

One of the best videos never seen:

Music:

Baldwin Brothers, DJ Krush, Kings of Leon, Weekend Players, Kittie, My Bloody Valentine, Madeleine Peyroux, Thievery Corporation, Johnny Cash, Boston, The Donnas, Royksopp, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, R.E.M. (before they got big), Erik B and Rakim, Freakwater, Lamb, English Beat, Poi Dog Pondering, Les Rita Mitsouko, New Order, Led Zeppelin, Bahamadia, Underworld, The Chemical Brothers, A Tribe called Quest, Fiona Apple, Queens of the Stone Age, Cibo Matto, The Replacements, X, The Ramones, The Police, Cocteau Twins, progressive house, trance, The Police, Chet Baker, Public Enemy, The Cure...

Movies:

Anything by Beat Takeshi, most Whit Stillman and Hal Hartley, Carnival of Souls, David Byrne's True Stories, Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, The Year of Living Dangerously, Igby Goes Down, Bull Durham, Amelie, Run Lola Run, any John Woo/Chow Yun Fat collaboration, all Coen Brothers silliness ("The Dude abides..."), Star Wars IV, Casablanca, most Kevin Smith joints, Swingers, Hackers, the Romero Living Dead trilogy, Fight Club, Three Kings, Ocean's Eleven (the Soderbergh/Clooney caper), The Royal Tannenbaums, Laws of Gravity, Layer Cake, Bond flicks (Connery, Dalton and Craig--everyone else is just ham), Snatch, Shaolin Soccer, Superman Returns, Serenity, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, The Incredibles, Reservoir Dogs...

Television:

Arrested Development, Heroes, The BBC Sharpe series, Band of Brothers, Robot Chicken, Family Guy, The Simpsons, Cash Cab, X-Play, Avatar: The Last Airbender, The Sopranos, Deadwood, CSI (Miami and Las Vegas), Doctor Who (classic and new), Firefly, My Name is Earl, Battlestar Galactica(new), Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Monty Python, and Kids in the Hall reruns really late on a weekend night when you come home REALLY drunk and a 420 session with a styrofoam box of spicy hot chicken wings and you have absolutely no reason to wake up whatsover for the next morning...

Books:

Tom Robbins--ANYTHING by him--we share the same passion for waitresses and metaphors smoked from a genie's hookah, The Sharpe series by Bernard Cornwell, anything by Hunter S. Thompson (he was a BAAAAD influence during college but in a good way), The Fountainhead, Le Morte D'Arthur by Steinbeck, World War Z, Razor's Edge, Zen in the Martial Arts, The Tao of Gung Fu: A Study in the Way of Chinese Martial Arts (Bruce Lee Library, Vol 2), The Saga of the Seven Suns series, Batman:The Dark Knight Returns, Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance by Barack Obama...

Heroes:



My boy, Sean...

My Blog

So many musings after so many shots...

I find myself in that velvet predicament of being slightly drunk, in my lanai in Hawaii, typing away on a keyboard as if I were wearing boxing gloves listening to a cello recital off my iPod feeling m...
Posted by Asian couple at the bar on Sat, 26 Apr 2008 03:50:00 PST

Tequila by candlelight in Honolulu

Bloody fucking hell...the title of this blog isn't as romantically suave as it sounds. I'm currently sipping some tequila by candlelight, clumsily typing on my keyboard, in Honolulu, Hawaii...or rathe...
Posted by Asian couple at the bar on Sat, 08 Mar 2008 01:51:00 PST