Friday night we all headed out to Butter for another night of good beats, no dress code, and cheap malt liquor. My favourites. We had decided to try to turn it into somewhat of a bar hop but Wish was packed, Loft 11 too expensive and Holy Cow and Paradise Lounge were spinning hip hop. Caliente is, well, not really our crowd. After that short tour we decided to go back to our comfy old standby, Butter.

As we were walking back to Butter, we passed by Studio Z.tv marked by a small sign and tiny doorway. I heard some good music coming from that little doorway and asked what cover was. $15. We were standing there thinking about it for a bit when a guy came up to us. "hey," he says, "if you guys wanna go in, tell them you know Pekin, you're a long time member of Cloud Factory, and Ernie's spinning right now". We're thinking, this guy's setting us up so he can get a good laugh. "What do you have to lose?" he says. Everyone but Simon and I go in and give them that line, which, after several malt liquors took them a really long time to remember.

Ray, James, Cecil, Shannph all come out... "nope, didn't work". Oh well. They headed back to Butter but Simon and I stayed back to chat with this Pekin character. Eventually he takes us two in with him and it was a small but happenin' party radiating good vibes galore. These Cloud Factory folks, he explained to us, were the ones involved with "Groove" the movie about the old SF rave scene. There was a guy painting on a big canvas next to the DJ and everyone there looked like ex-ravers/burning man types in their late 20s to 30s. In the chill out room, everyone was crashed on a couch all glassy eyed staring at a collection of mirrors hung against the wall swaying about. It was weird to be in a rave environment with people my own age while not "in the groove" myself.

Anyways, I just read a little more about this Cloud Factory Collective. Pretty interesting. Their site says "We are spreading a message of tolerance and diversity in a society that promotes intolerance and conformity, we create community in a society that promotes individuality, we further connection in a society that seeks alienation." What a refreshing philosophy. Not exactly the stuff you read on the web sites of other groups that throw events.

This was the party description.