Almost two nights into Tacolicious and things are looking good.
Although the food was great last night (my friends were moaning over the tuna tostada that we modeled after Contramar’s and another friend was all about the short rib tacos), from my point of view—someone that’s had everything on the menu a few times over—last night was all about the art.
Wanting to make sure that the room really showed some character, Joe and I painstakingly considered what to put on the walls of Tacolicious. Opening night was the first time that I’d gotten to see it in all its glory.
In the righthand corner of the dining room is the wrestler, a highly amusing, yet amazing, massive illustrated photograph done by Joe’s longtime friend Tyler Gourley. (For what it’s worth, photography geeks will like to know that it was shot with a Contax 645 camera, with an 80 mm lens, on color negative with 120 film.) This piece came to us in a roundabout way. We’d hired Tyler to shoot scenes of the Mexican parts of town in both Modesto and the city’s Mission District. But before we even got going on that, Tyler realized he’d already done a series of photographs of WWE wresters that included Rey Mysterio, the big time, champion Mexican wrestler who also has gone by the ring names The Green Lizard and Super Niño.
Although Rey is Mexican-American and resides in San Diego, you don’t have to know much about him to know which side (the Mexican or the American) he identifies with. Not only does he wear a lucha libre mask from his days training with his uncle in Mexico, but Mr. Mysterio has a huge tattoo across his ripped abdomen that says “Mexican.” He’s a high flyer and his signature moves include the Bronco Buster, the Suicide Drive and the Sitout Gutwrench Powerbomb (the latter is one I’m pretty sure my older son Silas would like to try on his little brother).
But ironically, Wikipedia puts Mysterio’s height at only 5 foot 6 (and IMDB says he’s only 5’3!) and his weight at 135 pounds—which is only five pounds greater than what I weighed in college when I gained my “Freshman 15” from eating too many waffles for breakfast.
Sidenote: Meanwhile, Tyler is 6 foot 6. Imagine the photo shoot.
All which means the photograph of Rey—measuring in at 6.5 x 4-feet—is truly larger than life.
The whole thing makes me giggle.