the last minute movie pop culture costume

so tired...about two hours of sleep. was gonna crash now that i'm home...but i'm starting to do some really last minute research on a costume for tonite! talk about major procrastination. i have one idea that won't be too expensive. copying something i saw at the sd comic-con.

some really interesting links to clue you in...

* the straight dope
* stop abductions
* brain shielding

it's hard to pick a costume. it's like picking an identity for yourself...particularly when you're at AC, it's a measure of your creativity. i can't do something half-way lame that i might do if i were in sf. altho...i'd probably care a lot more if i were to be hanging out with a lot of friends...but i'm not. today there was a costume contest at AC. very cool get-ups. the winner was an oompa-loompa. some of the other great ones was a zombie michael jackson, richie tennenbaum (this guy looked just like him), and a fem bot. there were some pretty daring people. a lot of em tended to be illustration majors.

still dunno about tonite. maybe i will do the signs thing.. maybe i won't. let's see if i get any other last minute inspiration. i don't think everyone would "get" this costume. but i think it's better to do this than to do nothing at all.

maybe i'll take a nap and dream up something good.

.

the j-j-jitters

i just drank one of those canned starbucks doubleshot espressos and cream. i'm really feeling it now. i don't know if i'll be sleeping in the next couple of hours. but that's ok...i need that time to finish up my letterform homework. great oogly moogly.

i hope to get 4 hours tonite. maybe i'll nap in the afternoon. i'm sure it'll be a long event filled day. lots of halloween costumed stuff going on. should make for interesting pictures. i'm sure AC people will really get into it. i don't really have a costume. i wish i brought my mcdonald's visor and wig. i dunno...maybe i'll find something in the afternoon last minute.

the cost of time and sleep

i was thinking today...if i had to place a monetary value on additional hours of sleep, how much would it be? i'm a poor student now, who needs to save money...but spending a couple of bucks more on a meal if it'll save me 30-60 minutes...then it's worth it right? especially if i'm averaging 4 hours of sleep?

my new hang out

today i went to concept and gulp down a jamba at whole foods right by my apt. man o man, i should come here more often. there's a bountiful plethora of inspiration, with random people walking by all the time as they check out groceries. i parked myself at one of the tables, drinking my citrus squeeze (with immunity boost) and eating a warm bialy from noah's a few doors down.

it was great to get out of the apt and to isolate myself in a new place. i was sitting with my sketchbook trying to brainstorm ad ideas for spiker. seeing a kid standing in a shopping cart visually reminded me of a jail...which is now one of my new ideas. i really need to stop trying to do my conceptual work in my boring bedroom and get out there in the world. i don't necessarily have to drive far (which i often do to find the right creative atmosphere)...there's so much in my hood just within 2 blocks...i need to take advantage of it. i also need to start walking around the area. we live in such a nice, clean area...and many of my better creative ideas have come from walking/pacing around. if you've lived/studied with me...you'll know how restless i can get whether it's cramming for a test or brainstorming new ideas.

there's also a wherehouse and a bookstore just a few doors down. cd covers and book titles are a fantastic source of visual and graphic ideas. a myriad of different types of photography, typography, and subject matter.

i think i'm going to try to eat in that area too...particularly at the supermarkets. there's a ralphs in the area too. i remember traveling in japan...one of the cheaper sources of good meals are eating at the bakeries/markets in the bottom of the department stores. i should really do that here too. you don't have to pay extra to tip, since it's a la carte. it's fast. and it's fresh. you can expect a lot of new supermarket pictures coming up.

okeedoke...back to the grind. man...am i jittery.

fell asleep too early last nite on top of my bed, but luckily woke up on my own at 5am to finish my stuff. whew. i think plush surfaces do me in and just zap my strength.

housekeeping

whenever we have guests dropping by, it always necessitates a last minute cleaning. finally got the place and household stuff done. laundry last nite. clean toilet and bathroom today. it's kinda funny how girls are always commenting how clean our place is for a bachelor apartment.

will you be mine? will you be mine? will you be my neighbor?

tonite we took elaine to check out the available room that i gave her a lead on via lake ave. it wasn't too bad. nice residential quiet neighborhood. the woman living there is a christian writer. working on a tv spot with a secret agent lamb or something. kinda funny. it looks like its a really ideal situation...and the lady (around our age or early 30s) seems pretty cool. man, i sure wish it was that easy when i was checking out random places to live. i'd definitely recommend anyone coming to live around pasadena to check out the listings at lake ave. the lady doesn't go to that church, but knew about the listings. it's kinda interesting as i'm church hopping, to discover what different resources different churches offer.

big mama's bbq shack

i asked the rental owner lady if she had any recos for places to eat. it always pays off to pick people's brains about local suggestions. had to tell her that we were looking for something local, outside of old town, where everyone goes. she suggested big mama's bbq shack, about 2 blocks away. it's an interesting place. it just opened up last week. the other location is in vegas. this place wasn't too bad. food was good. we got it to go. the interior of the restaurant is pretty nice...reminds me of a really nice californian style chinese restaurant. we shared a slab ribs, fried orka, hush puppies, and corn bread. it took us about 10 minutes of looking at the menu and debating over the math to see how much we would save by sharing a slab vs getting individual meals. (i was right. hee hee.)

it'll be fun to have another neighbor sorta in the area...even if its just for about a month. someone new to eat dinner with and try new places...that is, if our busy schedules can align and find some down time together. maybe even someone who will come over and help cook for us. hee hee. we can only hope. i think if there was a third person to eat dinner with...we'd probably be cooking more...and eating a little better. i don't think i'm getting enough veggies or fruits. it also doesn't help that we pretty much depleted most of our groceries.

hallow's eve plans

trying to figure out what to do exactly. will probably go to my graphic design departments party. it's gonna be at
castle green. (from the design chair: "the castle is a turn-of-the-century, architectural landmark known for its elegant ballroom, original furniture, and of course, historical hauntedness.") it should be an interesting place for a party...altho there will be a couple of actvities that i won't participate in b/c of my faith. castle green looks pretty interesting from the site. i don't think i've been in a building like this in america before. should be a very visually stiimulating place.

was thinking about checking out the scene at "WeHo" but it probably can't compare much to the castro, can it?

it looks like later on this week i may be checking out other places for creative inspiration...the queen mary shipwreck, possibly dia de los muertos on olvera street, the resfest's "drive me crazy." but playing hard only comes afer working hard.

asian actors who speak english?

one of my friends is a screenwriter...and she's been working on this screenplay . it looks like the movie's gonna be made...but right now she's trying to figure out casting. she asked me for ideas. she wants a list of good or up and coming asian-american actors or asian actors (who speak english well). a lot of the hk film stars probablly wanna break into the american market i'd think.

no chow yun-fat or jet li. maybe more up and coming? i haven't been watching too many hk movies recently. need to get back into it. maybe for a girl...jaymee ong i'd think. (maybe there'd be a good chance that i can meet the people i help get cast.) got any ideas? i'll fwd them on. thanks! i know a few of you are way into the asian/asian-american movie scene and can help out a lot. e-mail or leave comments. thanks!

stuck in LA painting guache

awww man, i'm missing out on the sf jazz festival!

tonite i stayed home, doing laundry and just now completed making 120 different swatches of color spanning the entire color wheel. next i have to cut them out and number them sequentially...finally picking out 24 final swatches equal steps apart in color progressions. no i didn't use 8 or 16 different colors mixed up to make the swatches. we have only 3 primary colors to work with: cadmium lemon, bengal rose, peacock blue. i'm afraid that i might have to redo some of the color swatches b/c the paint i mixed was a little testy.

b/c i was feeling somewhat of a time crunch (along with some slight procrastination to get to work), we went to dinner at a cheap mexican joint. chiquita bonita or something like that. j didn't like it and wouldn't go back. it was just ok. there are a bunch more cheap mexican places to check out. i wonder if my neighborhood is slightly hispanic, mexican. there's a billboard up in spanish close by to us.

hook-up powers

i'm trying to put my growing schmoozing and resource powers to use now. tonite i gave elaine a lead on housing for a month in pasadena. saw a bunch of listings in the warehouse's "helping hand" bulletin. good thing we ended up going to that church yesterday. we'll go check it out tomorrow nite. i hope it's not in a bad neighborhood. finally i can start to pay onwards the hospitality that i received when i was looking for housing.

i met her a year and a half ago as the friend of the ex-girlfriend of one of my friends. i talked with a bud at home who's looking for peeps to hang out with in sd. maybe she can hook him up with some sd people. i dunno. we'll see. i think it might be a challenge. i don't have many friends in sd for this bud to hang out with. will anyone be willing to help out the friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend?

i might even be able to send one of my newer la friends to sf. just gave tishia a lead on an internship opp at a well known branded environments shop thru one of my old art center at night teachers. i think it'd be pretty exciting if she were to go to sf for the spring. then this friend could meet all the friends of her friend (me). i could strenghten the la-sf interexchange. hee hee. it's all about domination of the nor-cal / so-cal scene. i've gotten requests to send some people up north anyways. ha ha.

the la life weekly

86 pictures of my la life week. fun fun.

crammed relaxation weekend

friday was busy...but so was saturday and sunday.

* saturday am went with my neighbor to go to the sgv missions mobilizations consortium at logos seminary. wilbur was one of the speakers. it was good stuff. nothing radically new. lots of similar stuff we learned in perspectives, particularly since the sf class was mostly asian when i took it.

* spent time in the afternoon figuring out our carpool to newsong's ofivina. ended up carpooling down with ally. got the mini tour of hacienda heights. the last time i was there was about 6 years ago. didn't remember anything. we made a detour in westminster to go to the art supply wherehouse, but it was closed. i'll have to go back another time. arrived late for dinner at curry house, so we all ended up sitting and different tables. nice place. curry was decent. i'm not really sure if it's a chain or not.

ofivina was really cool. it was huge. i had forgotten how big new song was. the sanctuary fits 2297 people! it was pretty full with different local christian artists performing. i think most go to new song. there was also a gallery of artwork. also an large installation to explore. it was based on the teaching's of jesus and the different path's and experiences one might take in a spiritual journey. very creative and pretty well done. i didn't quite understand why they handed us tokens tho.

some of the groups were really good. a few i just didn't get. i dunno about the trip hop one. the people in there seem talented, but they just didn't flow well.

i expected to run into some random people there and i sure did. i saw jamie who was just visiting. ran into injoong. i'm sure he'll probably post some pictures soon. also ran into some younger kids from sunset, jon, nate, and dan.

afterwards we went to tapicoa express (which i first went to way back in april). lots of kiddies hanging out. good inexpensive tapioca.

it was fun hanging out with everyone. most of which was the same group that hung out the nite before...sorta interesting how the lumps la relationships are evolving. it's been pretty cool hanging out with everyone down here. some of whom i'd never guess a year ago that i'd be hanging out with now.

* today i randomly switched around my church plans and went to ebcsgv. worship was good. message was about the kingdom. i kinda zoned out a little. afterwards i met up with amy and her guy raymond for lunch at sin ba la. pretty good taiwanese place. inexpensive. right by din tai fung. i learned about the place from asking a guy down here a while back about his local recommendations. the word of mouth way of exploring is working out well. i still need to consolidate all of my info and recommendations in my palm.

* washed my car at may's in montebello. it was nice visiting and also finally having a chance to get my car clean! finally put to use the car supplies that i had gotten for my birthday. my car will probably be dirty again in two days. parking outside really sucks.

* picked up j from the airport, then we went to warehouse, lake ave's evening service. it felt somewhat like first baptist in berkeley and a little what first baptist in sf probably is like. the worship was pretty good. full band. contemporary songs. it was really interesting that they had a 10-15 min break in the middle of service to have a meet and greet with people to talk to. after talking to two new people, i ran out of new people around me to talk to, so i wandered around a little. saw someone that i met yesterday at the mobilizations conf but didn't talk to her. forgot her name already and she was in my sg of three. the message was ok. pretty basic about "re: connecting." for a while we were wondering if he was going to get into the bible. he kept talking about other references from other speakers and expounded on it...almost a little more than scripture. i don't really like that. especially when my old pastor would preach entirely from digging deep into the bible, and not really bring in other outside authors/philosophers. we both noticed that at some parts his style was like pastor john's. the way he phrased things and emphatically communicated a point with his voice. sorta interesting.

one really nice thing i liked about this church was the organization of classified listings within the church community (and friends of the community). jobs, housing listings, stuff for sale, services, misc. go

i can't see myself going to this church service very regularly. i think if i wanted multicultural, cool worship, and a night service, i'd definitely be driving over to la for urban mosaic. especially since i get more out of the teaching. i think we'll probably go to mosaic next week. maybe the next few weeks too. it's really nice that we have an option to go in the morning and the evening. i was originally planning on going there today, but things fell through last minute. (random note: if anyone ever visits us, hopefully you'll leave after 8pm or so on a sunday. that way you can visit urban mosaic at night.)

* i did absolutely no work this weekend. yet i was still productive in some other ways. i was pleasantly surprised last nite that it was daylight savings time today. managed to get 6 hours of sleep. i woke up naturally before my alarm. maybe it's b/c the light filtered through my slightly open eyelids. maybe i should be wearing the mask again.

if i sleep in the next 20 min, i can get 7 hours of sleep!

eyes wide open

i just saw a bonus feature in the insomnia dvd. it talks about sleep debt and how your body needs 1/3 of 24 hours. related to some stuff in the movie. also a lot of familiar stuff that my mom would tell me.

work was chill and relaxing. started to play around with final cut pro. for lunch i had a burrito from wahoo's fish tacos. maybe i should have had the fish tacos. the burrito wasn't too bad. slightly californian taste...with teriyaki sauce marinade. it was ok...but just about $5. man i miss those giant mission burritos. none of the burrito sizes down here come close. it's bigger and cheaper in the mission.

ate dinner in old town with some lumps la peeps and friends. i'm really glad they set it up, and i didn't have to. it was nice having people to relax and hang out with after a long week of crazy busyness. otherwise i probably would be sitting at home by myself trying to do some work...but probably getting distracted or falling asleep. this weekend and week will be busy, but i think i make the most of my schedule that way.

we ate at mi piace, cat's recomendation. it was nice. service was friendly. food decent. not too expensive. then we hiked over a block to tuti gelati for gelato. good stuff that i sampled. but i was pretty full from dinner so i didn't wanna overindulge myself. especially after i finished a lot of ting's leftover meal.

after deliberating asian style on the sidewalk about what to do, what movie to see, what not to see...we ended up finally going back to the pad and getting insomnia from blockbuster. i took advantage of that spidey deal. i hope i win. i was hesitant about going for it...but i guess since blockbuster is only a block from me, closes at 1am on fridays and saturdays, and the fact that my neighbors took advantage of the deal...i guess i had to do it.

movie was good. i could identify with the state of sleep the guy was in. looks like i'll be scraping up 5 hours tonite. oh boy.

week 7 at AC

got buy on 3 hours of sleep last nite. i started my assignment too late. i ended up forgetting it at home too. good thing i have a roommate who goes to AC who starts his day an hour after me.

i enjoy my friday class - "form and letterform." it's a studio class...so most of the class time is spent tracing by eye some script letterforms. at least this week. i chat with mel a lot during the class. today we were talking about big games, things we missed in sf, things that were on our to do list right before we left sf, the best cafes, and other stuff which are really great in the bay area that are totally not here in la.

i'm so glad that this week is over. this next week is definitely going to be slightly easier (unless i totally mess up my schedule). i'm shooting for 5 hours of sleep a nite. ah...i'm dreaming of dreaming.

this weekend my roommate is leaving me again. what am i going to do? it's time to play to make up for the past two weeks of straight work. tomorrow will hang out with lumps la for dinner in old town. some italian place that catherine's picking out. all i know is that we're meeting at pottery barn. saturday is an sgv missions conference that i'm going to with my neighbor. (i have to miss out on the nekked figure drawing.) i'm sure i can find some random connections...probably a lot to drew. hope to do some work sat afternoon. then might go visit some art stores in OC with ally...then meet up with the rest at new song to get a bite to eat before ofivina. i hope to find time to see amy, who's down this weekend. sunday i plan to go to mosaic in the morning and maybe somewhere else at nite.

the thursday run around.

tonite j and i checked out an ebcla sedaqah sg in alhambra. but before that...i got my car it's 45,000 mile maintenance at jack's auto service, inc. i was asking all of my new friends down here for recommendations on a honda mechanic. finally i got one this morning. i asked the sg leader of the group that i was checking out. i think i got a pretty good deal. for $75 i got my oil and filter changed, tires rotated, engine fluid and coolant fluids replace. he also checked out the other stuff in the car. pretty good deal. it woulda just been $25 if i didn't get the engine and coolant fluids replaced. i was quoted $140 somewhere else for the same service (supposedly).

i went a half block down to chef's kitchen - family restaurant. nice small local place. help's friendly. i had a burger, fries, coleslaw, and medium drink for $3.70 before tax. pretty darn good.

afterwards i got some random stuff at target and shopped around at staples and office depot. i'm aiming to get the last final touches for my bedroom, which will hopfully be put together really soon.

low battery charge

my enegry level is starting to wane. i scraped by last nite with 3 - 3.5 hours of sleep. it was around 5am or so when i finally crashed. woke up early and did more work. i felt good going to class tho. made some breakfast from my leftovers last nite. managed to churn out all the wok i needed to do...except it turns out that my flash files were corrupted on the zip disk. i sure do hope that they're ok on my computer at home...otherwise that's a lot of hours to redo the assignment.

i'm still at school. on wednesdays...i have comm design from 2-7 straight. altho it's ok to leave class to take a break, so i did that a couple of times. i got some mac and cheese and cheesy bread sticks from the cafeteria around 5:30 pm. immediately after that class i had to rush over to the other side of school to the computer lab for my created motion and sound class. couldn't show my midterm animation file. i sure hope i don't have to redo it from scratch. we're taking a 15 minute break right now. so i took the time to give po po a call...who i haven't talked to in many weeks. gave another bud a call for a few minutes.

i should get outta here in an hour. wondering what i should do for dinner. maybe i'll pick something up on the way home. i could cook something at home and save money, but it's a trade off with the opportunity cost of time. i don't think i can spare it tonite. still have a couple of hours or work tonite to do for my 8am class tomorrow. gotta be productive in order to sleep early tonite.

late nite fuel

just drank a hanson's "energy" drink. the frapachino at dinner 6 hours ago just didn't cut it right now. i think i like hanson's the best of the energy drinks out there. about one year ago i tried all of the energy super drinks on the market within a couple of days...when i was burning thru the nites working on my hhh project. i like the citrus taste. it contains taurine, ginseng
& ginko...whatever those do for you. anyways...hopefully it'll keep me going for the next couple of hours.

i also took a 20 minute nap right afterwards. supposedly the ER staff all niter trick is to drink coffee then immediately take a 20 min nap, getting a little bit of sleep, and then tricking your body into feeling rested. when you wake up in 20 minutes, the caffeine kicks in by then. i never got this to work super well before. i already felt my heart beating faster when i tried to start my nap...so didn't fall into a really deep sleep. i wonder if the caffeine in these energy drinks plows thru your system faster than a regular cup of joe.

i'm feeling pretty awake now. need to finish my flash animation project due tomorrow.

oh man...tonite's gonna be a long nite. i'm a few hours off of schedule.

mako bowl dinner

we got food to go from mako bowl, a small la franchise of japanese food to go. most stuff under $5. pretty good deal. this might even be cheaper than getting groceries. well...almost. couldn't finish my large combo teriyaki bowl. right now i'm on a commercial break from my smallville dinner break.

wisdom pearl

say yes more than no. (to yourself. to your peers. to your teachers.) you'll suprise yourself.

just me and my roommate

i tried 5 people to see if they're free for dinner. no one is. guess j and i are just stuck with each other.

another busy day

got home a little while ago. will take a nap to catch up on my 2 hours of sleep last nite (finally finished my guache project and then had to do a modernism paper). tonite i hope to get in about 6 hours of work.

bumpin music driving my designing

itunes on my mac helped me to find digitally imported eurodance (european dance and hi-NRG tracks). good stuff streaming at 128 kbs. i like. i've been playing it for about the last 12 hours. (yeah, i've been up for a while.)

the weekly la-life view-o-matic

it's here. my first of weekly photo installments showing you the images behind the words on my blog. i'm gonna try to share most of the daily random pictures with you right here. it's too much for me to try to integrate single images into my blog...and with time a precious commodity, i just don't have time to edit it down.

over the coming weeks you might find a pattern to my picture taking...
* location/establishment shots of new places that i go to.
* interesting meals
* the obligatory posed table shot with meal partners
* my projects (in progress and completed)
* hanging out with friends
* meeting friends of friends (it's my duty to share the pic with the original friend in common)
* anything that looks visually interesting for future reference
* anything i find funny or amusing
* candid pix to document different experiences and moments (usually without a flash).

sure, some of you might think i'm nuts (or even more nuts), but all creative people, particularly good ones, are cut from a different cloth, particularly if they continually push themselves and explore new things. these images are important to my growth as a creatively visual person and a designer. i guess this will be sorta like a progressive photo journal...tracking my growth as a creative down here (interests and experiences). so this fits in with the main reason why i blog in the first place. it's also an interesting way to help people at home be up to date on me.

you can probably find descriptions of most of the experiences in my blog posts over the past week.

here we go! you can always click on the embedded text link or on the image link above. weekly uploads should be linked here every sunday nite. enjoy! hopefully this might inspire some of you to look at things differently or help motivate you to do something new...or meet new people.

no street parking

this is a weird thing about pasadena, which i learned about recently. there's no parking on streets between 2am-6am without permit. i haven't gotten a ticket yet. (i'm the one stuck with the street parking...my car gets hecka dirty pretty fast. sucks.) i think i might need to register my car.

if you ever visit me and stay over, supposedly we're supposed to register your license plate with the city...and it'll be ok. otherwise you'll get a $25 ticket.

kinda weird. i guess it could be tough for people to have spontaneous overnite guests. not that that would ever happen to us.

only slept three hours last nite. hope to sleep more tonite. need to finish my guache project and also write a 3 page modernism midterm paper.

ebcla

back to this church again today. stopped by the missions sunday school that sylvia led today. heard from some guest speakers from south africa. that was pretty cool. i learned a couple of new things. one which is kinda sad...is how rampant aids is in that area. the vast majority of people have aids or are born with it. if you follow the math...the whole population will be wiped out in 30 years. another thing is that witchdoctors will tell men who contract aids that they need to rape a virgin to be cured. so many of them rape babies who are a less than a few years old. so sad. gotta pray for them.

service was ok. today was a follow up to the heavn's cent thing that is going on at the church. 50 $100 bills were being distributed to small groups, fellowships, and individuals for them to then invest in and give to the community. not a money making scheme for the church since no money will be collected back. it's a really interesting way of putting into action the gifts and resources that god has blessed the community with. the church is gonna track over 10 weeks the creative ways that the groups and individuals decide to use the money. exciting stuff.

had lunch afterwards with brian, syl, rayna, ally and friend. went to shau may. pretty cheap. about $3.70 for a 3 dish combo. the green apple icee kept giving me a brain freeze. the place only has a C rating for cleanliness. i guess that's why it's cheap too.

very cool halloween invite

this invite originated from a friend of a friend of a friend. check it out. it's pretty nuts. movie parody videos to hype their parties. man, i'd think about going to the party just to meet these guys. too bad i'm gonna try to a different creative experience instead.

a slow saturday

after a slow start this morning...i finally made my way to school for the life drawing workshop. it was a good experience. we were drawing this white figure model who was clothed at times with a robe but mostly not. he held 10 and 5 minute dynamic, active poses, sometimes with props like a rope, a cane or a sword. it took me a while to get my drawing muscles warmed up...did about 6 or so sketches. i think i have a long ways to go compared to the other illustrators in the class. i think i'm going to spend a lot of early sat mornings as much as possible doing this.

we met up with dshih at school and browsed around the gallery. there's a really cool temporary exhibit about british pop and experimental architecture. very cool stuff. i need to go back to there and check it out.

i took dshih and j to saladang on fair oaks. pretty good thai stuff. jen had taken jerry and me there back in august. it's one of the top 10 restaurants in pasadena (according to citysearch)...and isn't too expensive.

hung out back at the pad for a bit. now trying to do some work. it's taking a while to get started. i have to do a composition for design I based on the golden mean...using 11 shades of gray/black...which i need to mix up in guache (if that doesn't mean squat to you...it's a heck of a lot of work). i had to make a run to staples to enlarge my design to 160% to get it precise. i just finished masking the borders to get it clean in the end. my oh my...this will be a long nite. i probably have about 5 hours ahead of me if i'm lucky.

random smatterings from the week

* work was ok today. i added japanese subtitles to an english hour long promo piece for a japanese non profit. i can understand how a lot of subtitled movies have funky titles. no, i don't know japanese. i was pretty much tediously and repetitiously copying and pasting over and over.

* i checked out wicke's by our place...a furniture chain. that's where our slightly used living room loveseat orginiated from. i paid $150 for it. i saw that it retails for $667! it's a really nice couch. you can easily fall asleep just sitting there...it's so plush.

* went to ikea tonite after work. got a bunch of picture frames. need to find a good hanging file thing to put under my desk. i'm still looking for the right way to display my photos on my wall. anyone remember going to the apple store about a year and a half ago? in their windows they used to have a mobile of photos hanging by metal clips attached to fishing wire and some rods. i wanna do something like that...hang a lot of photos with really nice metal clips (not wooden clothespin style) to the fishing wire attached to the walls and ceiling...so that it kinda floats. i'm still on the hunt for the right clips. if anyone has any ideas where i can go down here for cool metal clips or somewhere online...lemme know! i'm dying to finish setting up my room. especially before i get too busy.

* this weekend looks to be not much fun. dshih will be passing thru tomorrow...so that will be great seeing him for a little bit. another friend to sign our visitor wall of fame scroll. yay. in the morning i'm planning on going to school to check out a life drawing workshop. there will probably be nekkid people...which would be a brand new experience for me. i need to improve my drawing...so that i can advance faster here at AC. after that i'll be spending 6-7 hours painting a design composition with 11 shades of grey/black and all aligned to the golden mean. hope i don't mess up. it's gonna be a long weekend. already saying no to a couple of movie hang-outs this weekend. i haven't really seen many new movies down here.

* i'll have to make up for this coming hard-core week playing more next weekend. friday nite might be the next lumps la hangout...and not initiated by me! i just don't have time to really plan stuff anymore.

* i'm trying to consciously look for new things to stimulate and inform me. whenever i have time to go to the school library...i try to skim three newspapapers (la times, wall street journal, pasadena star-news). if i have more time...i'll pick up adweek and a couple of other magazines. i'm looking for new insights and information.

* i'm still looking for fresh and good sources of info down here. i don't think they have anything like sfstation.com down here.

pooped out week

sigh...week 6 of school is over. next week's gonna be tougher. need to be productive this weekend. i'm really tired right now...

form and letterform class was ok today. left early to go to a graphics dept meeting. it went a little long, after that i went to a business dialogue presentation by a guy from the sony design center in sf...he does interface design. that'd be an interesting place to work after i leave here...who knows. somewhat informative.

robin's wood fire bbq

tonite we went to robin's woodfire bbq. i read about it in the la times. it turned out to just be a block and a half from where we live! ribs were great. we got all you can eat beef ribsm, since it was thursday. out ate pat and j...total about 8 large beef ribs...different bbq sauces. really good stuff. messy stuff too.

eating a lot of ribs and having really minimal sleep the nite before sets you up for a fatty food coma,

back to citylight

we went to the sgv citylight fellowship in el monte tonite. it was very odd how few people there were considering how many chairs they put out. when we got therer it looked like like 8 or 10 guys and 4 girls...something like that. really odd. worship was simple, but nice. a little older style. kinda mellow. one guy leading. jojo gave an ok message. a little more on the theoretical tip than what i'm used too. a clear communicator, tho. ally noticed that i was really tired. i guess i have to take her word for it. pat and j didn't really notice...so it couldn't be too bad.

ledo cafe

we followed everyone to ledo cafe in san gabriel/rosemead. of course didn't have room for an ounce of food...but got some hk drinks there. i had coconut milk with sogo and red bean. not too bad. nice drink menu. ambience is ok...nothing too special. it was cool chatting on a casual level with the guys there. all of them mostly older.

tonite was a tiring but sorta nice way to decompress from earlier this week. i'm just so tired now. looks like i can get 8 hours of sleep tonite. gotta charge up for a work filled weekend. sigh...

finally done with my letterform work. looks like i get 4 hours of sleep! (i think i napped for about half an hour or so when i got home. it's a tough thing to have your workspace right by your bed.)

drive-thru in-n-out

after finally leaving school at 10:15, i decided to take the local route home. spontaneously made my way to a new route home...which i think is actually the most direct one. passed by an in-n-out and stopped in. this one was just a drive-thru. no sit-down areas. sorta odd. there are drive thru windows on both sides of the restaurant stand. i ended up on the left hand side one...so i had to strangely reach thru the passenger window to give my money and get my food. when you place your order...they ask you if you're going to eat in your car. funny.

the fast food burger culture is a lot bigger down here compared to up north. there are a lot of local chains, like tommy's and tops. i need to try both of them. i think i'm going to eventually stop in on the random decent ones...get a burger and take a picture.

back after a blogging break. blogger was having problems remote publishing. oh well.

living thru these long long days

i'm in the computer lab now, after getting out early of my comm design class. last nite i got 3 hours of sleep. (tho i did get to nap in the afternoon again...recovering from the nite before.) the product of my labor: ~50 logo design sketches. 5 poster layouts. 20 storyboard frames.

i've decided that after a long day, i will not drive home via the freeway after getting only a few hours of sleep.

last nite i was looking for some caffeine and creative inspirations for my concepting for comm design. i just can't concept too well at home...sometimes it's hard to stay focused. even if i didn't hear my roommate buzzing around and if i lived by myself...i'd probably still have to get out of the place.

so following the reco of some recent commenters, i drove over to equator in old pas. it closes at midnight. it turns out to be a very cool place. i think the type of coffeehouse i'd really like to hang out in. too bad that it was really dim and a band was playing. i'll probably try to go there some afternoon to get stuff done. i took a pic inside. look for it in my now weekly sunday shutterfly upload. 90210 filmed here.

since i couldn't settle down at equator, i walked over to barnes & noble a block down. ended up looking and gaining inspiration from a few magazines. i picked up a thrasher mag, tattoo mag, motorcycle mag, an ozbornes mag, and a couple of others. was looking for some related graphic language to use in a logo design for spiker, a line of extreme, colorful styling glues for the hair. it's really cool stuff. work it in. wash it out.

barnes and noble closed at 11...so i had to move on to somewhere else. still had to get some caffeine...so i ended up driving to tea station in san gabriel, which closes at midnight. did some more concept sketching there. drank a coffee/tea drink and ate a taiwanese meatball (minced up mushroom and meat with some kinda funky sauce in a dumpling wrap). inexpensive dinner. i think the only other option besides these places in "chinatown" are the fast food places...in-n-out and jack in the box. maybe if i'm really desperate.

i really need to stockpile on the caffeine at home. all i have is tea.

after it closed i headed back home to do more work. music helps to keep me going. so in itunes, i'm listening to the streaming trance, freestyle, electronica stations. i like the ones which stream in from europe. sometimes the music is kinda like the ddr stuff with lyrics. music keeps me going.

i pretty much plugged at it til maybe 4am or so. i lost track. crashed for a few hours on my bed...then back again at it.

today i happily managed to get everything done before my 2pm class. i even managed to get to school 20 minutes early. got all the work done that i manged to do.

okay...now to do some letterform homework in the lab before my class at 7. it doesn't let out until 10. then i go home...swallow some food...and do a tight mechanical tracing of the caslon letterform phrase, "great oogly moogly." wed nites are usually my lighter nites...if i'm productive. maybe i'll get 5 hours of sleep hopefully. class in the morning at 8. and it's the one class that tardies are strictly noted.

whew! finally done with my design I assignment. time to sleep.

random meeting

girl: hey didn't you go to my high school?
gw: yeah...aren't you wendy?
girl: no. my name is amy.
girl: is your name wesley?
gw: no, my name is greg.

that was the encounter tonite. went to urban mosaic in la for church. ran into sam from college there. that was really random. it was his first time at the church also. while we were chatting...i saw amy who went to lhs with me. after the funny little interchange...sam asked if we really knew each other.

it's funny continuing to run into random people. amy introduced us to 4 or so other people...and was pretty helpful to try to point us towards small groups and to find a church.

coming down here...i didn't expect to start seeing people from college and high school. just shows how small the world is...when you have a common thing like faith tying it all together.

mosaic was pretty good today... the message was about living in the epicenter for god's will. often times we're paralyzed from doing the wrong something...when that's a mistake in itself. we need to seize the day. carpe diem. [dead poet's society movie clip shown]. story particularly as a 20-something young adult...you don't really have a job...or a family to hold you back. later on in life we'll be trading the revolution for the institution. people often love what god has blessed us with more than god who blessed us. we might lose the future to secure the present. [~ clip from the patriot] we need to have the passion and urgency to act now. we often focus on avoiding the wrong...when we should really be focusing on doing the good. so much good is out there to do...we just need to do something. thru acting in obedience...clarity will come. we just need to do something and act. this message was a continuation of the series and book seizing your divine moment.

another church hop

earlier today we visited mbcp, in arcadia. tony's church. i met tony thru dshih. we met a girl who dshih also meet. he commented that i'm reliving his la life! it was a really small church...felt like fec down here. pastor invited all of the new people over to his place to welcome them over dinner. it's a refreshing feel. message was somewhat applicable to our boat, since they're starting a series called the "40 days of purpose." it's interesting to see how that sort of connects in terms of what we're hearing about at mosaic. it'll be interesting to see how god calls us.

i have a bunch of pix from today. you'll probably have to wait til the end of the week to see em. i decided to just make weekly albums and link em. that'd be the most efficient thing to do. occasionally i'll insert pix in my blog. only if i have the time. so from here on out...you can probably see a bucketload of random pix (particularly stuff i may have blogged about) every sunday nite or so.

bouncing around la

busy day of errands today. see today's pix of...
* an osh hardware store visit (it was no-tax day and laker girls were making an appearance)
* visiting ranch 99 in san gabriel...we ate at the cove ("noodles and exotic thai food"...good stuff)

see pix from last nite of velocity and broomball."

velocity: a spiritual jouney through the arts

i was very impressed by last nite's velocity event that mosaic put on. very well conceived and executed. it was much like the cafe nite events which i helped to concept and coordinate, but even more so and bumped up a few levels all around production wise. (hey, take notes and pass em along, alf! i took lots of pix particularly for you guys to check out in planning for a spring cafe nite.)

it was more than a musical showcase. there was a dance performance, monologue, a gallery of artwork set-up in the lobby. it was also part musical with a skit and theme running thru the entire nite. the set-up was that there's a professor who has this illuminator machine or something which embues normal ho-hum people with creativity. that's the context for introducing the acts. (very well-concepted, however it could have been even better with some changes in the timing...but anyways...) so different groups come on stage to perform a song or two. most of them were good. a couple of them i just didn't get. i'd say over half of the groups were on the talent level of my bud alice. pretty darn good. there's also one actress girl who does a hillarious monologue about her family speaking and dressed like her mother. the running joke is that koreans do not eat dogs (that's the chinese).

to enter there was a suggested $10 donation...but it was okay if you couldn't afford to pay that much or anything at all. good for us broke AC students. it was set up in a church sanctuary with seats and a bunch of sofas from ikea.

there was an interpretive dance of leann rines's "i miss you." i didn't get it at times. there as also some sorta new agey type of music...done with multiple instruments and a video screen.

multimedia was very well executed. sort of like a conference...all of the performers were capture in the front row on a live video feed....so that you can see their faces or videos. i hate it when no attention is paid to the backdrop of performers...so that directly behind them is a bright white or blue screen...hard to focus.

the story unfolds with more acts...and the discovery of the hoax of the illumniator. it's just a scam to make money and true talent unfolds from inside of you. intermittently more and more acts were introduced. some of the songs were directly relevant to faith...some weren't. hard rock...alternative...folk...lots of different genres.

multimedia overhead was used between some sets. motion graphics and video collages...sharing about life perspectives. also some segments tying directly into some poetic or song lyrics.

pastor mcmanus closed after the evening. explaining that we all have creativity and something special inside of us...and with god you have the ability to tap into what's really unique/creative inside of you. he invited ppl to come to mosaic to discover what god has for us and to celebrate it together. very relevant message. very strong tie-in. this whole event ties really well into the focus for the church. i definitely got some ideas about some of the things that i could possibly do in the future with the body...possibly back at home. we'll see...we'll see.

i really liked our past cafe nites at my home church. i think that there's room for growth in terms of stage set-up and cohesiveness of the entire nite. this annual velocity event obviously takes months for the planning and prep. it sure is a lot of work...a lot of invisible work that no one sees except for the coordinators. but it's definitely worth it. one really great thing about our cafe nites compared to velocity was the comfortable and cozy feel. (food, drinks, environment to relax and mingle...that was lacking from velocity, since it was more of a production.) those are just some of my thoughts.

it's sorta cool being exposed to so many new environments and stimuli down here...creative and church-wise. seeing the good and bad in many things. it's really great for me to be in this new environment and to explore...to look at things with wide-open fresh eyes. (as wide as they could get with what little sleep i'm getting now). it'll be really interesting to see two years from now how i've changed and transformed...what kind of new person i'll become.

scrapping by in week 5

definitely over this past week my work was 50-80% more than the past week's worth. i think i put in 4-5 hours to first redo last week's created motion assignment and another 4 hours again to create a new animation project for wed. sunday i got 3 hours of sleep. monday, under one hour...but took a 3 hour nap to recoup later that day. tuesday i slept about 3 hours...(while i was only planning on getting 2 hours...i inadvertantly slept in). wednesday nite was really great with about 4.5 hours of sleep. i told some other people how much sleep i got that night, and they said that i was really lucky!

comm design

i think the class that took me the longest was concepting for communication design. i spent 3-4 hours concepting a first stage of logos, and about 4-5 hours pushing my poster concept to the next level. but during my crit in class, it looks like all my work was for nothing. i'm going to have to pretty much throw out the work and go back to where i was last week.

my concept for my france poster has to do with french corsets...yeah, corsets. from my crit...it looks like i was taking a real conservative and intellectualized approach...when i really need to do something that "shoots double-barrel" and "comes from the gut." i had spent 2 hours on the web researching traditional french-corsets, but it looks like i need to throw away my findings and spend another few hours looking for corsets that aren't um...really traditional...and sort of really grab you, communicating visually and emotionally about france.

for the next part of my crit, i talked about the company that i'm doing the logos for (which is the same one that i'm working for now). ry felt that because it's a more of a conservative place...that it would rip out my heart as a designer...and that i'd do really safe stuff. he also saw the contrasting energy in my sketches...and flat out told me to pick another client. no room to debate.

sure, i coulda been pretty mad about not even getting my hours of work reviewed...but like he said...i know that there's a lot of pain and stretching that i need to go thru to push myself up to the next level as a creative. i think inside i also recognized that he was right...he had nailed a personal limitation of mine (too conservative, analytical, intellectual), which was consistently showing thru all of my work.

if it's starting to sound like you've never met a guy like ry before, you're probably right. he's particularly hard on 1st term ppl...to try to help us figure out who we are and to raise us to the standard for the industry and for AC. some stuff he's said this week...

* be free and open
* get close to the primal edge and let go
* there's something about your instincts that drives you
* what are your gods now? ... it determines who you are.
* sometimes you have to rise up to adversity
* manage your time for conceptualization
* how much does one make an hour? e.g. creating vs painting a house. [know where the worth is placed]
* never lose the concentration on creative assignments. (i know that i need to focus more and earlier)
* don't judge your own work, put up the sh!# and you don't know what will happen. [pretty much all we do is crap...he needs to look at it all to figure out what's us...and to push us in the right direction of our communciation and creative.]

bruno monguzzi

this past wed, there was a special guest speaker at AC....bruno monguzzi. really famous designer. (tho i didn't know anything about him.)

his bio...

A graphic designer based in southern Switzerland, Monguzzi is known for his conceptual designs grounded in the tradition of modern Swiss typography. His work includes the pavilion that he designed for the Montreal Expo of 1967,which brought him international recognition, and his design of the logo for the new Musee d'Orsey in Paris in 1983, which was chosen in an international competition.

i picked up a few things which i wrote down to remember...

* visual communication > syntactic dogmas. the spider needs the fly to break the perfection of the web. you have to find the problem to solve it.
* you have to learn to disobey bad briefs. understand the briefs to know what the problem is.
* graphic design puts form over content.
* typographic design should perform optically what the speaker does orally.

happy days are here agan

i'm now complete...my baby's returned to me.

long long post tomorrow...i've been busy today...

* home depot in the am (discovered tax free day tomorrow)
* sending packages from the post office (i never send packages)
* work (first real day...got lost going there...did some simple design...ate at the hat...oh yeah...now rejoining the technonerd culture)
* coming home and discovering my camera(yay! i've been waiting for this day for a few weeks!)
* got a frappachino from starbucks right by my house (the caffeine sooo hit the spot...i immediately felt the liquid charge to my tired brain...they're offering hotspot wireless down here at the starbucks)
* pasadena art night: free museums (my brain was again sooo exhilirated. visited the pacific asia museum and the pasadena museum of calfornia art...loved the photographs at the PMC...inspires me for the start of my third go-around with my camera)
* mosaic's velocity (a spiritual journey thru the arts. a blown out version of the cafe nites which i helped to concept and coordinate. very very cool stuff. review and pix later...interesting neighborhood)
* broomball in burbank (surprising just how long this day can be...played in the wee hours at the pickwick center with the ACchristianfellowship...i came outfitted in gear...rollerblade pads and extra t-shirt stuffed in the butt.)

i'm going to sleep in a little tomorrow. but will probably try to visit osh tomorrow (right by my house). it's free tax weekend and i think some laker girls are gonna be there at noon. won't really be having much fun the rest of the weekend...besides going to church...a lot of work ahead.

time to crash.

man...blogger wasn't publishing my posts. dunno what happened...but the hiccup is over. i'm also finally all set-up to do some real web publishing. as of yesterday i got my software. now i have it all...
* a decent computer [ powerbook 667 ]
* high speed access [dsl]
* real versions of the latest software [ studio mx ]

looks like i have a little more time to breathe this weekend too...maybe i can whip something up.

more on my week later...

man o man...today was a long day. i got some of my work rejected in my comm design class. going back a step. maybe about 6 hours of stuff down the drain. but it's ok...i know there's a lot of pain in the process. more on it tomorrow. i should sleep and will reflect on it tomorrow. will have to play catch up a little bit...

the picturesque LA life

* pix from week 1 in la. special sf guest stars: jw, jho, and pob

* pix from our fabulous pad-party. maybe you know someone who went? there were lots of random connections and i'm sure that there are more. see an old high school friend or chinese school buddy? do holler and lemme know!

sleepless in school

getting by on a few hours of sleep...my projects are sucking up my rem time. the only caffeine we have in our place is vanilla cream soda, unless i make some tea. i was at school for 13 hours today. about 4 of those hours in the computer lab animating a little ball and string in flash. yay.

no, it's not just b/c of personal poor time management skills. it's the school and the demanded work load. it does it to you.

i took away the shortcuts to aim off of my toolbar dock today. i'll get on still occasionally...but i'm gonna make it harder for myself so as not to waste time.

talked to my teacher bc today...and relayed to him that my old AC at night teacher cj says hi. cj was one of bc's first students years ago. it's like i'm now the second generation of students for him. funny how everything comes full circle. i think i'd think about teaching an AC at night class in the way future...if i was good enough and had some sorta expertise in something.

was gonna post my old pix from our first week in la...and our pad-warming party...but shutterfly is down now. more later.

i wonder if i should take a nap now and then work.

the weekend in review

3-4 hours in the school computer lab saturday afternoon and sunday nite. yuck. i had to redo that assignment that got corrupted. great oogly moogly. i hope i can finish the next assignment quickly. had to squeeze work in whereever i could, balancing my schedule...

lumps LA lives

we just had our third wave of overniters from sf. cl, lh, lk, and wc made the trek down to hang out. that was nice. i tried to be anti-social for part of sat trying to redo that assignment and was semi-productive. have to balance work and play ya know...priorities. lots of fun at the computer lab on a sunny saturday afternoon. hope it's my last...once i finish getting set up with programs on my computer. anyhoo...met up with ppl later. we had a big group. in addition to the sf peeps, pretty much all of the LA lumps (and then some) joined us to hang out together. shelia, suz, erica (and kesha), ting, andy, and cat. lots o peeps. plus a friend and her friend, suzanna and dave. it got tricky planning and navigating for the group...but oh well. it seems like i'm really learning my way around la.

we met up to hang out around farmer's market and to browse around the grove. (i was hoping that the store organized living was there...but it wasn't. at least not yet. i went there in san mateo, and i thought that it was a really cool store. i think i could pick up a few good things from there for the apt. but oh well. maybe i'll have to go there during the holidays.) we validated parking at the movie theater. and ate at farmers market. we ate at different stalls. i got fried aligator filet (yes, it's real), which was good...a little chewy. another guy got the cajun stuff and couldn't really handle the slight spicy taste.

afterwards we tried to figure out what to do. that took a while. then we all used the bathroom in barnes and noble. just cuz we had time. then off we went to sunset to scope out the la scene. we went to the standard hotel. (the newer one). it's a pretty swank place, with a retro jetsons like interior. they always have an asian girl in a glass case in a wall. this time the girl was taking a nap. later on we saw her listening to music and singing to herself...then later talking on her cell. we hung out around the pool area. very relaxing and chill. got crowded.

later on we tried to go to the skybar, but were denied b/c we had no reservations. poops. i guess i'll have to go back another time. suzanna sorta led us to the fenix hotel/club. at first they wanted to charge us $5 each....then $20 for all 14 of us. (then the bouncer or something wouldn't let us). whatever. so we walked away. she said that she would never come back again. then we walked about 15 feet...and the guy who was on the sidewalk trying to recruit our group yelled after us again and we all got in for free. it was kinda cool there, mixed crowd. ranged slightly older. stuck around for about an hour and kicked it. quickly hurried back to the cars afterwards. we all did the local la thing and used the virgin megastore parking validation. twice. hee hee.

mosaic

sunday am went to mosaic for church in san gabriel. this has got to be the most progressive and culturally relevant church that i've ever been to. very artsy and creative. mixed group. filled up a school auditorium. someone was painting on the side during the message.

worship was rockin. reminded me of the rock in sf or cornerstone in the mission. incorporated drama and other stuff into the program.

mcmanus the pastor was starting a new series of messages called "seizing your divine moment," which coincided with the book that he just put out. so he was doing some monologues and speaking from that material. pretty dynamic speaker who can capture your attention.

i haven't found too many people who can speak as well down here. but he didn't really plunge into the word, like pastor j does. i was wondering if at all he was gonna dig into a passage at all...and he finally did later. very relevant and insightful. but i wonder how different or intriguing the next 6 of the messages will be.

the basic premise is that the most spiritual thing you can do isn't really to pray...to worship...etc, but to make choices (like right before doing those things...and during other times). often times we get paralyzed by fear or complacency and don't reach for the dream or the calling. there was a drama sketch about a guy afraid to go mountain climbing. he was afraid to really live. often times were stuck in these moments. then mcmanus segues to U2's "stuck in a moment" and plays the song, showing the lyrics. later on there's a clip of the matrix shown. you know which one. red pill, blue pill. he goes on to talk about how many different pills we have...more than just two. has a jar of jelly beans and also notes about the really bad licorice black pill. haha. he puts it down on the table and the synchronized video camera zooms in on it. i was very impressed by that. they really planned ahead and have a lot of stuff synched up together for each sunday message. good integration. i've never seen it done so well at any other sunday service. on a creative level, i can appreciate how well everything comes together conceptually.

side note: they have very nice collateral materials. glossy color, well-designed postcards to communicate different ministries, events, and the church. i picked up a free audio tape with the pastor answering frequently asked questions about the church. that's pretty darn cool. they definitely have the creative communication well applied all around.

the sunday am service is called "metro mosaic." i think i wanna hear the next couple of messages too...but might also wanna check out other churches if possible. (depending on my schedule). at nite in la, held at a club location, there's "urban mosaic." maybe i'll check it out next week.

shakas: japanese hawaiian in monterey park

at mosaic i chatted with eric, a dude i was introduced to at bobaworld just 10 days before. he told us to go eat at shakas. good japanese hawaiian food. i thnk it's in monterey park, on garfield. not too expensive. lots of food. i had a 442nd combo with sesame chicken and khuala pig. this place is much like hawaiian drive-in in the bay area. (what you haven't been there? what are you waiting for?) with one exception...this place has monster sized good shaved ice. too bad they were all out of the watermelon and mango syrup. had to settle for lime and orange. i got a large to share...but we still couldn't finish it.

randomly bumped into a couple of people at shakas. ran into jason, who lk grew up with, and who i just met on friday during work. he came with some ebcla people. also ran into stan and his wife, who also came from there too. i sorta saw him last week but didn't get a chance to talk to him. that was kinda funny bumping into them.

the well

at nite i drove over to ccac in northridge. that was my first time in the valley i think. they were kicking off this monthly evening young adult service. felt a lot like how late late was kickin off. really good worship. the message here was just ok tho. i think i was tired. basic message about faith...and a wellspring to rejuvenate us. (hmmm...i think i had suggested the name "wellspring" for our late late service.) also refreshments afterwards. met up with erica, her friend angela, andy, and my good college bud rayna there. also saw stan and his wife there...again. that was really funny, got to talking to him some more and swapped info.

i must say, that the nametags were pretty good for being so simple. silver pen on dark blue paper placed inside a plastic holder with an elastic band. yeah...i notice and nitpick at these little things. the bulletin was just ok. could be better designed. (hmm...i wonder what the late late programs look like now.)

the logo for the well was terrible. all they did was flip the "e" around...and for what purpose? nothing that i could see. i dunno. and then a little water drop next to the l. with inconsistent placement. not good. hey...this is an AC graphic design guy talking. oh well...i guess this is normal for the smaller churches.

stocking up

thanks so much for the absolutely neato ice cream scooper, serving spoon, and cheese grater. ya know who you are. now i need to get some non-chocolate ice cream. it's getting hot again.

i'm pretty tired...but i figure that i oughta get this blog post in...cuz lots of new stuff will be happening this weekend...

spirited away

last nite we hung out with a large group organized by edwin and jeannie to watch the japanese anime movie spirited away at disney's el capitan theater in hollywood. if you get a group of 20 or more...you can get discounted tix for $6 rather than the normal $10. what a great deal. had a pretty good time. i enjoyed the movie. fantasy like. commentary on mankind and it's impact on nature. human truths. over two hours long. i was nervous that i would fall asleep in the movie, since i have a very poor track record with subtitled movies, particularly when i haven't been getting that much sleep...but i was enraptured and engrossed by the movie. pretty good. ending shot seemed to end on a short note...but i enjoyed it. downstairs they had an art exhibit about the making of the movie.

back to pink's

afterward we hung out with most of the group and got a late dinner at pink's. mmm...good stuff. someone introduced me to the place a year and a half ago...and been meaning to go back. really famous for chilli dogs. at whatever time of day or nite...there's a 30 min line to get your food. i got the "harry potter" which was a polish sausage with cheese, onions, and mushrooms. split the chili fries with j. i was really full.

it was cool meeting more new people last nite. these people would be considered three degrees removed from me...or friends of friends of a friend. stephen went to AC studying graphics and minoring in environmental (my exact study interests) then later on worked at RS down here. i know a couple of RS sf people, who were pretty influential on me and my current career path/interest. met lucy and alex who are at PCC right now trying to prep their portfolios to get into AC. all of these people used to grow up together in church...but now go to different places. my circle of church contacts is widening even more. that was fun hanging out. very glad that we got to chill and chat with people later.

my day as a p.a.

so i started my work at my intern-sorta position today for a small cross media design firm (which may hereafter be occasionally referred to as MP). today was a video shoot...so i had to be in downtown LA at 6am. the day lasted until 4pm...and I was pretty much on my feet doing stuff most of the time. kinda tiring. we were trying to record about 2 min of video at this japanese senior citizens home. very well known down here. supposedly anyone that i'd talk to who is japanese-american down here has had a family member who's gone thru this NFP (not for profit) organization.

we had to get there about 4 hours ahead of the shoot time to set up the lighting and equipment. it wasn't at all a kick-back job, mulling around...but it was full of hard labor. had to wear work gloves too. i laid down and connected hundreds of feet of power cables. i was watering rocks with a hose to get rid of hot spots in the camera. moved a lot of "c-stands" and equipment back and forth. today shouldn't be a regular thing...i think.

all the guys there go to ebcla, including the cinematographer...about 2 years older than me. that was sorta interesting seeing him do his craft and talk about his work. how he'd have to do something for john woo here...work on the first rage against the machine music video...and shoot old dirty bastard. i'm slowly meeting more people down here who are somehow connected to the entertainment industry...doing stuff with film or doing stuff with disney.

califonia livin

i can now sorta see glimpses of what my future life may look like if i were to stay or get a job in la. i dunno. i still tell people that i wanna go back to sf. i still think that there's no place like home. i just chatted with a friend who asked me if i prefer la to sf. i think i'm really enjoying my personal experience and life down here...but if i had to compare the cities...not really my personal situation (school, living arrangement, communities, etc), then it's still sf. but i know it's hard to isolate it just like that. i'm really enjoying meeting new people right now and see how people are just seeming to fall into my path with similar interests.

(random side note: i just put "califonia lovin" by tupac in my car cd player tonite.)

some people find it really amazing how many people i seem to have met or known already. some also find it interesting how it seems like i know a bunch of girls down here. it's not like i'm trying to at all. it's just people who i come across. maybe b/c starting off i knew more girls than guys down here.

i wonder what new people i'll meet this weekend. more in 24.

starting to feel it

the work load's starting to get heavier. i think i have about 80% more work to do next week than i had for this past week...
* i think part of it is due to my friggin flash files getting corrupted from last nite. the dang .mov file and the .fla files just won't open. that's about four hours tuesday night down the drain. hopefully i can get it done in 2-3 hours...since i have an idea of what to do (and how to do it a little faster.) so now, i have to do that and this week's new assignment, which just might take me faboo.
* starting my part-time design thing on friday. looking forward to that. a whole new environment. it should be a little relaxing i think...having it at the end of the week.
* need to do a logo project for comm design (good thing i'm an expert at that stuff), as well as take my france poster to the next level. ry told me to go to a store out in santa monica to research corsets. looks like i need to push the envelope beyond my comfort levels. that oughta be interesting. i really need my digital camera back fast!
* going to need to spend a couple of hours in the library doing research for design I. ugh.
* i hope my form and letterform doesn't hammer me too much. class is in 4 hours! i better sleep.

having people over this weekend, but i'm gonna have to really get some work done...better than my past few weekends. but it should be ok...i don't think there's an obligation on me to play host.

one month here

it's been officially a month now that i made the trek down. things are finally starting to feel homey in our pad. but we still have a little ways to go, especially before having our first weekend visitors in a few days.

haves and have nots:
* some cheapy utensils, but no good serving spoons.
* a vacuum cleaner, but no broom.
* a nice ikea dining table, but no dining chairs.
* a block of cheese, but no cheese grater.
* a potato masher, but no potatoes.
* lots of chocolate ice cream, but no ice cream scooper

new living patterns

i haven't figured out yet if i'm more or less productive, having a roommate now.

everythings pretty chill and easy going living together. we go to most of the same places together. see the same people. music and tv choices are ok. (well...the only show we try watching is smallville.) we're also independent too. usually carpool (saving a lot of gas), tho a lot of times we go separately due to a slight variation in schedules or a need for 30 more minutes of sleep due to a late work nite. it's often easy to be up just b/c the roommate is up.

it's easy to sometimes get distracted and talk or whatever...when i should be hard at work or catching up on needed sleep. on the other hand, talking and hanging out some makes it so i don't feel a big need to connect to other people...by phone or chatting. something i'd probably be tempted to do a lot more if i was living by myself. i'm still idling on aim at times when i shouldn't be tho.

now that pat fixed j's router (by pushing a button), it's easier for me to hang out in my room and do my own thing...or work. before i'd be sorta tied to the short ethernet cable hooking up my laptop to the living room connection.

i need to find some local cafes around here (other than starbucks)...to be able to go out, get some caffeine and do some busy concepting work. sf had plenty of those places. i haven't observed too many of those here. altho, they do have a bunch of nearby hk and boba cafes...which are open pretty late (til midnight or so)...and which are usually alive with activity. usually i can't get too much focused concepting work done at home.

i think i'm now adjusted to getting 4-5 hours of sleep...and waking up early for class or to do some work.

the week's half over now. looking forward to checking out spirited away at the el capitan on thur and to do some real work on friday.