it's done!

friday - 6 hours of sleep?
saturday - 2 hours of sleep
sunday - 0 hours of sleep

i turned in my scholarship portfolio today. i'm feeling a little jittery and weird right now. two cups of coffee last nite and made it thru the rest of the nite and day on my own, feeling the enormous pressue to get it done. i got about all that i wanted to do...well about 95% of it. i was pretty drowsy in my final modernism class. wa said that greg needs to take a nap! i'm glad that she doesn't get too sore about it. she's nice. i also had to complete that final paper for the class so that was probably about 4 hours yesterday. maybe 5?

i turned in about 11 projects in my portfolio. the majority of them i had to tweak or reprint out. some i did a lot of work on...like the spinoodle. it looks really amazing now. thanks dad for sending it down here per my request. i need to take a picture of it. i found the perfect spinoodle top at target. it's a gerber's baby fork. funky cool and matches my packaging. i was gonna figure out how to alter it with a handsaw...but couldn't get one that could cut thru the metal, so i figured out how to cheat it.

it's amazing how much work i got done in the past few days. it was pretty hard core cranking the past 12 hours. the portolio was due at 9am. j drove my car, since i felt too zonked to drive.

last nite i went to school to print out some stuff, the big format printer wasn't accessible, so i drove somewhere else, which was closed. i then went to kinko's which wasn't too bad, since i was using my laptop. i was able to get on to the net for free there too thru the ethernet hook-up. got my stuff printed. went home. realized i left my document holder with lots of stuff for my classes at kinko's. went back to kinko's to get it. went home. spray mounted my stuff. went to jen's to use her hairdryer on the shrinkwrap. (the day before when sunny came over, i had him bring his blowdryer to melt the shrinkwrap.)

i feel pretty positive about my portfolio. i can see lots of little blessing and inspiration points for little ways to improve it. i'm feeling that i put a pretty decent effort into it.

maybe i should finally shower and change into new clothes. after i take a nap, i'll probably give myself a haircut. wanna eat a good meal today. well...tasty good, probably a little unhealthy. maybe fatburger. probably something greasy. i don't think i've been eating all that much in the past few days,

yay, it's done! i'm over the peak for this term. tho a slightly smaller peak is coming up this next week tuesday. i need to finish my design I book. (still gotta start on it.) not gonna be too much of a fun thanksgiving. maybe i can get by without working on it on friday. i dunno.

okay...a break from my bloging break...

bear territory

cal beat stanfurd again at the big game today. go bears! 30:7. the last time cal beat stanfurd was 8 years ago in 98...back when i was a freshman. after the game that year i rushed the field and tore up part of the "cal" in the astroturf with my swiss army knife. i still have that really nice chunk in a plastic bag. that was the final year of the turf before the return to grass.

it was interesting driving by lots of fans of the rose bowl usc/ucla game. people decked out in somewhat similar college color palettes, but i think the scene at cal was probably more exciting and more to the extreme.

going hard core

ever feel like you want something so much that when you think about it you feel like it's burning inside of you? (not heart burn...or anxiety...something else in a semi-good way). just being around some of my classmates or around them is really pushing me on.

that's how i'm starting to feel with my work...pursuing excellence and that next level. i think contributing was how ingrained it was in me to understand the huge sacrifices that had to be made coming down here. i've got sooo much work to do until thanksgiving. i do feel like that i am going somewhere (slowly) in this swimming pool (or rather...ocean) of a school...better than just treading water or gasping for air.

i think part of what drives me is my competitive streak. maybe not necessarily to beat my classmates, but to really reach that standard or bar in whatever way that i need to.

i spent about 8 hours at school today, even though i didn't have any class. sat in on the friday letterform class revising my stuff and continuing to seek out approvals. i think i have something good now. i wonder what color i should make my "great oogly moogly t-shirt." definitely something vibrant. for our final project we need to get a decal place to transfer our final design onto our t-shirt. so much time was spent designing these wordes that i hope to get as much use out of it as possible.

do you ever feel so tired and exhausted that it feels like your heart is skipping a few beats now and then? that's how i felt a couple of days ago. i wonder if missing a few important circadian cycles affects some of your internal synchronizations. sleep was good last nite. ii don't feel that way now...but i always wondered.

ask someone who knows and get back to me!

(btw, i'm trying to do minimal posting the next couple of days to be productive. so there should probably be some intermitant black outs on this blog...til monday.

recharged for the next week

i just slept about under 8 hours. i feel pretty good now. hope my battery can keep this long charge and hold out thru thanksgiving.

the nite before i slept 2 or 3 hours. i'm not too sure. i took an nap on the floor at 3 in the am. my floor pillows are really comfortable. but when i'm out...i'm really out. j came in...saw me sleeping...and had a little fun with my s30. it was funny seeing the pictures later in the am while i was at school. he even used the flash and that didn't even wake me!

letterforms stealing my sleep

i was up putting together my personal style/mood boards for my letterform class. geez...it slightly crossed my mind that it was a slightly difficult assignment for the class. but since i had done it this particular way before...making a single board for each of the three attributes...i knew how to do it...so i thought. it took me a while to pick the right personal style attributes. and than took a while searching on google and the web for images. i also thought i had to fill 3 15" x 20" boards...so i had to create this big layouts in illustrator and tiled them on mat board. three times for three boards. but when i got to class i found out that you only had to do one board! agh...i could have had 2 more hours of sleep! oh well. people in the class were impressed by how much i worked. (needlessly though.)

we were all pretty wasted in class. the energy level for the class was much lower. some of my classmates got 1-2 hours of sleep...trying to do all of the work that she gave us for this week. i was slightly better...b/c i paced myself earlier. man...the work for this class surpassed design I's work this week. i spent so much time on this class working on my "great oogly moogly" letterforms, martian letterforms, style boards, and the personal logo thumbnails. it's nuts. i spent more time working just on that stuff than i did sleeping over the past 5 days!

i'm going into her friday class in an hour or so to see ab for the third time this week. i really wanna get my t-shirt phrase design done. i'm just about there. i'm going the extra distance to try to clear it off of my plate.

i better finish my work. i'll blog about my personaly style attributes later.

going home

it's set. i'm finally going home to have some chinese turkey! (or whatever bird it is that chinese seafood restaurants serve on thanksgiving.) gonna be flying up to be around for exactly 46 hours and 35 minutes. wow...how should i spend the time? probably two family meals...possibly one thanksgiving day movie...and the rest of the time spent working on my design I book? i dunno...we'll see.

hmm...if i keep up my sleep schedule in a week from now, i'll have 44 hours at my disposal to get back in touch with sf.

another long niter

two hours of sleep last nite. or was it three? i don't know. i napped for a little bit. then continued with my work. after effects on my machine was lagging big time. i spent the early morning doing those martian letterforms for ab tomorrow. hmm...i think i'll take a picture of my board when i'm done. my board better be the best lookin one for all the time i put into it. i had to insert backgrounds behind each of the 12 forms...so i activated the visualizer on my iTunes and took screen snapshots of the fractal images. (you privileged readers get to learn some of my design secrets.)

got a lot of great reponses to my server for me words. lots of unexpected compliments too which i wasn't expecting. still gotta sort thru. can't waste time sharing about it just yet. must work. maybe i'll get 3 hours of sleep tonite. i can only hope. i don't have any more energy drinks. (i like the hanson ones...nice citrus flavor.) once my eyes got heavy this am, i took one at 5am and i was good.

after a long day and night of school stuff...more school stuff. i got home about 30 min ago. the cycle keeps building. knows it.

again my mom suggested i don't go home for thanksgiving. especially now that we're eating in a dang chinese restaurant! argh. i dunno. i'll see what my life looks like on monday.

hi-ho...hi-ho...it's off to work i go.

more and more work

i only slept for 2 or so hours last nite. was trying to do stuff for comm design last nite (taking about 150 pix of elaine's hair spiking thru a couple of torn up caps...she was a good sport). i also spent some time starting to animate "great oogly moogly" in after effects. i only got half-way thru "great." not good...also made a trip out at 2:15am to check out the leonid meteor shower. couldn't pass up something that's only once in a century. i finally went to sleep at around 5:30 am or so. i wasn't tired. j was up...but i figured i oughta get a little bit of sleep...even if i wasn't too tired.

comm design nightmare

the first hour of my sleep i had a terrible nightmare. i dreamt that i showed up to bc's class on the big day when our final design I book is due....and i didn't have it with me...b/c i didn't finish it! it was terrible. everyone was putting theirs up on the wall to display...and i had nothing. well...i did have my powerbook with me. i remember dreaming that maybe i can finish laying out the pages on my mac in the middle of class...and maybe he wouldn't notice. maybe i could possibly print it out or something. it was such a terrible feeling. it was right about then...that i decided to give up...and then i woke up.

i don't think i shared about the design I notebook yet. we have to make this book...layout the pages on a grid, incorporate correctly arranged color wheels (with the oh so lovely guache) and lots of other stuff. we also have to bind this book somewhere. this book is going to be the bane of my existence for the next two weeks. it's also worth 50% of our grade. good golly. i have so much to do in two weeks.

yeah...it's due the tuesday right after thanksgiving! i had design I this morning. the teacher bc gives us further instruction on the book...and tells us "happy thanksgiving." "you can all work while you're eating, right?" man oh man...the weight of it's starting to dawn on me...but i can't think about it too much...so much other stuff to do.

i'm planning on going home for thanksgiving. if i didn't have a powerbook to take work home with me...no friggin way. i think even if i go see a movie at home...i better have my computer with me at all times to continue to do some work. i'll probably be making it a slightly shorter weekend. i'll probably have to leave sat nite or early sunday to get back here to print out and bind the book. still need to find a printer. didn't do that today...my strictly regimented schedule is slipping. oh and it looks like our TA is gonna hold a design I notebook workshop. i really need to go to that.

i better not eat too much turkey at thanksgiving. lots of somatine you know. or else...i'm also gonna be pretty wired from caffeine this weekend. (hey dad, can you pick up some frappachinos and vanilla coke for me?)

the right perspective

i'm not gonna freak out too much about this all. after all it's only school and only a grade. and it's only first term...this thing won't be going into my portfolio to look for a job. it's sort of like the matrix and not buying into the hype (too much). i think i'll be kind to my body and try to sleep at least 2 hours each nite. health is important. i was thinking on my way driving to school today (running a little late), that it's not worth rushing too much to avoid getting a tardy. (i'm too old to worry about that.) also...gotta be safe on the road. it just so happens that pulling into school...i see that a car had gotten into an accident. sucks. it turns out when i get to class...that it's my friend mel. that really sucks. glad that she was ok tho.

i need to also remember not to get too sucked into school. (haven't had that problem so far.) my letterform teacher ab had to miss school two weeks ago because her brother unexpectedly passed away. she had to go home to the east coast for family matters after that. kinda sobering. she told us the following week to go home and hug our families. i guess it would be easy and not too bad for me to stay here for thanksgiving...but i do wanna go home and see all the family. (i'm also very glad to hear that thanksgiving dinner will not be at some chinese restaurant...but at po po's. i dislike going out to chinese restaurants on holidays when we could rather be in the home.)

bc warns us to be safe on the road. a lot of students aren't getting much sleep here on out...and there are always accidents. i'm going to avoid taking the freeway as long as i get under 3 hours of sleep. gotta be slow and careful too.

american idol wanna-bees

the first round american idol try-outs took place today at the rose bowl, just a few minutes away from AC. i read about it in the la times today so made my way there after class. i ended up there for about 90 minutes or so, absorbing the sun, checking out the scene, stealing a whole lotta pix of some potential future stars (but mostly people who won't make it).

it's been all over the news down here. people from all over the western states were coming to pasadena to get their shot at being the next american idol. kelly clarkson wanna-bees were lining up since thursday for a spot in line today. there were about 5,000 people. some came around 5am today and weren't seen until 3pm!

you had to be 17-24...so unfortunately i couldn't try out and rock the judges as the next american idol. oh well. i guess i'll just have to pursue design instead.

people waited in a line probably a half mile long to show their ticket (which they got earlier) to be herded to one of 5 smaller lines where they could sing a chorus and do their thing for some first round screeners. some people made the cut and were jumping for joy. some just took it mellow and walked over to get their wrist band. many didn't make it. some good judges would be helpful and tell them why. one judge would just say no. how sad.

some were hot looking in their outfits. some were not. lots were dressed up to show some personality or flair. i don't think it mattered too much from what i could tell...it was primarily how well they could sing and their range. some people around me speculated on what the judges were looking for (e.g. cleavage)...but they couldn't really tell accurately. singing loudly didn't necessarily help you all that much supposedly. (tho being able to project is good). what was really important was being able to have range, hit notes and sing well. some wanna-bees brought head shots, not that they needed it at all.

i never saw the show before...but was interested b/c of all the hype. if you did watch, you'd remember kirstin holt from texas, one of the finalists. (i had to look up that info on the net...since i had no clue. supposdely she had a lot of face time in the last season.) she was there conducting some intereviews of wanna-bees for the camera. i think she looked like a pop star...kinda like britney but slimmer (said my friend).

if they made the cut they go on to the second round at a hotel later on in the week. the needed to come back dressed up in their same outfits and perform for the next bunch of screeners.

i kinda wanna see the next season now. who knows? maybe i snapped a pic of the next american idol? you can see for yourself. click here to see some 47 pix from the los angeles american idol try-outs.

ok, i gotta work now!

what words am I?

please help me out for 30 seconds and answer this question for me...what adjectives describe Greg?

i知 working on a personal branded logo project (for a design class). right now, i知 trying to figure out three distinct words/ideas/traits that describe me (also including my personality, my style, work, my thinking, etc).

even if you don't know me too well (or just have some sort of impression of me from this blog), i'm still interested in your thoughts. i知 surveying a lot of different people, who know me in a variety of ways...so if you have any words come to mind when you think of me, it would be a big help!

any feedback by noon tomorrow is appreciated. (i値l be picking three words, create 3 presentation boards with visual collages for the adjectives), and have to do 50 logo thumbnails...all by thursday am.) feel free to comment below or else e-mail me.

oh and of course, i'll post the big list of words that people come up with. thanks!

AC bloggers out there

hey, i just did a google search for "@r# center" and "blog"...and it's really interesting reading some of the blogs that come up. i know i'm not alone out there. found some blogs of other majors and actually came across those belonging to two classmates. this is why i don't include the name of my school in my blog...it's just too searchable. (i also put a little snippet of code which i think will block google and other bots...dunno if it works. maybe.)

remember how i shared that in my design I class for my first project, i was ranked 21st out of 24? well i found the blog of the guy who was #22 right behind me. so funny.

i guess i'll tell em i found em.

la life weekly

only 27 pix this week to offer. click to view. lots of work and guache. less fun with groups. but i did play pictionary with the AC fellowship. (it blows me away that no one except for j and me knew that the universal sign for change is the triangle. unbelievable. i don't think any of them remembered from high school science...since they don't have to take chem or physics in college.)

working sunday man

i stayed up working on my letterform "great oogly moogly" t-shirt design til 5 am til i was brain dead. i must have spent 5 or 6 hours on that stuff last nite. it's coming along pretty nicely. but i didn't get to complete all that i wanted to last nite.

the exodus

didn't plan on going to church this morning, which makes it feel like a non-sunday. instead i went over to mel's place to do some more painting and arranging of guache chips. it's very nice to not have to endure that work by yourself. i really need to work more with my classmates. worked for about 4 hours there.

checked out "the exodus" at 5pm in el monte. it's the youth/young adult service at efc-la. sarah came along too. the service felt really weird...since they're wrapping it up to move the church service to the westside. after the service was over after about 45 or 50 minutes. the church service (somewhat similar to late late at scbc....but much much smaller today and even less organized). i was told to expect that.

the guy (not really a pastor, but a rotating speaker who went to fuller) spoke about the history of exodus then shared about the story from ezra. (somewhat improvising, since he just thought about ezra on the way to church today.) it was interesting...and made me think about rereading ezra...but it was funny to me that he didn't really quote the bible directly at all. i guess he's more of a fellowship type sharer, rather than a sermon speaker. after he shared about the church, where it's been, where it's going, and analogies to ezra...the service came to an aburpt end and they said see you next week. after a few moments of sitting in the audience a little awkwardly...he came back up and mentioned about how they give offering and that the buckets were there in the back. again...kinda odd.

i chatted with my friend stephen a bit afterwards, and he gave us a little more context for the church service. he admited that it was an off nite...because of the transition. it usually used to have about 60 people, more closer to my age...but in recent weeks/months it was somewhat dispursing and people were going to other churches, or the morning service for efc-la.

i got to talking with the guy who spoke afterwards too. he's working in addition to serving at the church. it was interesting. i agree a lot with things on the core group's heart and where everything seems to be going...how they're going to west los angeles to try and meet a need for people who are our peers (20-somethings)...how the service is named exodus because they see our christian lives as a journey...also a lot of stuff about being changed.

over the next few months their going to be meeting casually to plan and pray for where god's leading them. they don't really know have a set schedule for when they're going to meet during this interim phase, but everyone's invited. if i wanted to be invested in the group...that would really bug me...probably b/c i'm usually on top of stuff administratively. but it's good to be flexible and open to leading (to a degree). it'll be interesting to see how this ministry grows over the next year. if things get to running smoothly, maybe i'll check it out again...but it probably wouldn't work out for me to regularly worship with them. it's probably not what i'm looking for too. i'm guessing that once it's going...it would feel somewhat like lumps would be like on a sunday nite. (i really don't see any difference at all actually...which is interesting b/c i know how much more there is to church than what lumps offered.) i think in a church i'm looking for something that will resonate with my heart, challenge and spur me on, and also offer depth and solidarity to the body.

it's sorta funny...but this was the similar impression that i got from other efc's from my firsthand experience visiting in berkeley back years ago and also hearing second hand about different branches interim periods while searching for pastors.

altho this church hopping period for me is somewhat scattershot...it's an interesting journey. something i need to try to pray thru and seek direction in.

sleepless in so-cal

sigh...i just ended up showing my entry portfolio to someone and it again hit me how much work i need to do this week. back to my minimized sleep and social schedule.

i'm not the only one who keeps late hours. the other day my boss was at work til 5am and only got two hours of sleep. on friday another guy at work had to beat a deadline on a project so he was planning to work til 11. (he ended up taking it home.) this guy only sleeps about 4 hours a night regularly. so does the third guy in the office...who i haven't seen for a few weeks since he's busy on a project for disney.

i'm glad that they're not working me like that at work...but it looks like that's what my life could be like further down the road.

looking for december play pals

i'm really looking forward to the end of my semester, on december 12th. i'll be stickin around here til the 21st i think to work, relax, and explore. if anyone's down here and free or wants to come with peeps for an la road trip...please let me know. plenty of room here, since i'll be on my own. i'll also be looking for a shotgun to drive back up with me on the 21st...but my return date is flexible give or take a day.

been feeling the itch to explore la la. check out the west side and get out of the valley. need to find people to go with me to check out versailles in santa monica and all of the other places that were recommended to me. will probably also be looking to absorb more of the la culture.

one cool event around that time is the AC senior show. it's going on friday december 13th. a mighty impressive exhibition of all of the graduation seniors work. j and i checked it out last april or may. maybe some of my relatives might wanna come down and see it.

i'm dying to check out new movies. maybe i'll have time to see one movie during thanksgiving...but i doubt i can afford any more time than that. (seeing a movie on thanksgiving is a long standing tradition with my family....i'm very into traditions.) i'll probably be into mega movie buff mode come the end of the term. wanna see punch drunk love still, probably harry potter, james bond of course (maybe that will be a post turkey flick), treasure planet (maybe at disney's el capitan), solaris (if it doesn't get bad reviews), star trek: nemesis, lord of the rings: the two towers, gangs of new york, and catch me if you can
(if it gets good reviews)...those are all movies due out by the end of the year. (anything good you think i missed?)

it's been warm here. 92 degrees. it's crazy. went back to my summer clothes. maybe some sf people will wanna get out of the grey cold.

been reading in the paper how the famous broadway lion king musical down here is on its way out to chicago. j told me that all of the weekend show seats are sold out already. maybe i'll be able to go midweek my last week here.

so if you can come out to play...lemme know.

housekeeping

i didn't get a whole lot of work done last nite, since i ended up talking on the phone. but i did manage to clean up and sort my many papers while i was on the phone. i also managed to get 8 hours of sleep thur nite and fri nite.

yesterday we did our weekly housecleaning. living room and kitchen can get pretty messy in just a few days, esp when we're focusing on our projects. j set-up our balcony now to be very habitable and comfortable. it's like we gained a whole nother room, since we have curtains up, my silver ikea chairs, and a donated rug out there.

it seems the like harder i'm intending to push myself...i end up counter reacting to that. i ended up going shopping for the first time in a very long time at old town. was browsing around for hats for my comm design ad project and was just visually collecting some ideas.

cheap city crusing

i was driving on my way to salvation army when i noticed a very cool arts and food festival in the park. so i stopped off there and checked out the local scene. it was pretty cool. not as crowded as the street festivals in sf, which i miss going to. there was some latino-mexican dancing. the emcee was talking about apprecitating culture and how god created us all differently...and how we should embrace it. true true.

i hit up the thrift and cheap stores today. bought a couple of hats at salvation army for a few bucks. i got an embroidered mickey mouse hat for under $3. another hat was for a friend at home who i just had to get this hat for. i wonder if he'll wear it. (hey you, i'll give it to you when i get back in december.)

went into the just 99 cents store down here. it's a big chain. everything really is just 99 cents...not like those fake 99 cent stores in sf where there are some things over a buck. it's amazing how much stuff there is there. i think we should probably be shopping there more and stretch out our student budgets.

i randomly went into a few stores. one was this oriental book store. man...that shopkeeper is a jerk. i walked in...he asked if i was looking for anything in particular. i said i was just walking by and stopping in. he said..."sorry this isn't the type of look-around store." gee whiz. i wonder how this old guy does business. it's not like he has any precious commodities. what i saw were aisles of random books on the "orient." maybe i should have told him that the word orient is an offensive, eurocentric term. instead i just said, "oh, ok" and left. i also should have asked him how the heck he does business. maybe he hawks his stuff on ebay. i don't know how else that store can survive. maybe it's a front for some other business. i don't know....anyways...the shop is on colorado close to PCC if anyone wants to check it out.

i went into goodwill. couldn't find any good hats there.

stopped off at ross on the way home. found a good fitted light blue nike hat to buy there. (which i will be soon ripping up and burning for my ad concept.) just $5.

i think if i'm productive today, i just might be able to plan to have 5-6 hours of sleep a night for the next week. can't get my hopes up too high yet tho.

the sleeper side note

i think i've been dreaming more. some of my random dreams are about school or random people from school. i think i get deeper dream-state sleeps when i use the blinder mask to snooze. i can fall asleep ok anywhere anyplace...even when i don't want to. but the mask helps my light sensitivity to keep me in a deeper sleep. any of you insomniacs ought to try it. it just means that i get startled by my alarm in the morning a lot more.

4 hours is enough?

man...time is whizzing by. got to make the most of opportunities and time while i can. might mean less and less sleep. this past week, if you've been keeping track of my sleep sharing...i think i've been averaging 4 hours of sleep per day. i think the last time i got a good amount of sleep was last week monday possibly. i don't remember the last time i ghad so long of a streak of minimized sleep days.

last nite i slept 2 hours b/c i was finishing up my form and letterform stuff. it was well worth it. i think i'm in a pretty good position with my 3 current projects in that class.

actually back in college (the first time around that is...compared to now), i tried to adapt my body to do well with 4 hours of sleep. i had read in a magazine that listening continuously to music in a particular low range (e.g. gregorian monk chants) could help your body decrease the amount of sleep it needs. a bunch of people were able to do well with 4 hours. didn't think that it really worked for me...but who knows? maybe it slowly took effect./

i talk to some people and they say that 4 hours is average for them here. (i overheard one guy who was at the lab on tue at 3:30 am, talk to someone else about his neighbor's incredible work ethic. she's a product major. anyways. he was saying how he normally gets by on 4 hours of sleep...and can't really get more than that. but his neighbor is pretty hard core. he would leave the lab late and go in the morning. his neighbor would be there when he left and there again when he got there in the am. i want a strong work ethic like that.

N8 just told me tonite to be careful not too get too much sleep after a week long of getting 4 hours, cuz then i'll get sick. supposedly my body has to adjust back to the system...very strange theory to me. anyways...i'm planning my sleep and wake schedule to get 4-5 hours of sleep for the next 10 days or so.

i'm doing pretty well health-wise besides the sleep debt now and then. haven't been sick yet since i moved down here. maybe cuz it's slightly warmer? it's a little cool now tho.

i definitely need more than 4 hours a nite...but i can usually survive ok. was very sleepy in class today during the logotype lecture (i knew it all already)....and it was noticed...but not that big of a deal. some people are skipping out on some classes b/c they're getting a little overwhelmed and don't have work done to show. but i don't thnk that's the wise thing to do. and that's not what you should do at AC either. it's a professional school.

man i am so pooped. i'm going to sleep.

time indulgence

left the computer lab just before midnight tonite. got home. talked to j. deliberating on whether or not to come home for thanksgiving...and how to balance the workload.

today was long. woke up early at 8:15 to work on stuff for comm design and rl. managed about 5 hours of work like i hoped. looks like i made some progress. maybe i don't completely suck. we shall see. quotables from class...

* risk is equal to connection to your guts.
* be infinitely open for solutions
* get out of your brain and go fight for the gut.
* the dumber you make things the more refreshing it becomes.
* type should be placed where it should not be.
* this is pressure made in hell.
* if you don't put anything up [on the crit wall], you don't play. it's the law of the jungle school.

success for the week

on tuesday i turned in that final guache composition. it took me about 9 or 10 hours. i lost track. i finished most of it. laser cutting took some time to prep but saved a lot of time painting the pieces and was really great for neat craftsmanship. i lost one of the triangluar pieces for about 45 minutes in my room, but found it again. fell asleep by accident on my bed for a couple of hours (after i was mostly done), then woke up...put on the final touches...then slept for about 90 minutes before class. it was all worth it. bc was really impressed. i got a 10/10...practically unheard of from him, particularly for the guache pieces. he said that i should be applauded and the class clapped for me. that was nice.

so for that design I class, my grades kept improving the past three pieces. makes up for the bad grade i got early on...when my piece was ranked 20th out of 24 people mostly for sloppy craftsmanship. guess i am learning a thing or two here. it's nice getting it. maybe putting a little more time into it (like up to 10-11 hours)...but getting it right so that i don't have to redo the guache painting. some of my classmates have redone some single pieces three times! what a time suck.

time nazi

pressure's really on the next week a half. i try not to waste time online. blogging is my one brief time indulgence i'll allow to relax. but even for a briefer amount of time now. if you see me on IM, it's probably b/c i need to transfer a file to j. if you see online for a bit...please go ahead and "warn" me to get off! (altho with iChat for os x...i don't really see a warning level anymore.)

i try to disconnect my powerbook from the net, for needless distractions. pleasure is evil and meaningless...at least while in crunch time at AC. i think i cut down my e-mail checking by 60-70%...and only try to reply to mail once at night.

better shower and wash up now. it's easy to let that go if i get too consumed with work and suddenly realizing that if you wash up it cuts into a huge portion of your meager potential sleep time left. that's happened a few times before. need to be on the ball now. i'm trying to eat all my meals in under 30 minutes (including prep, driving, buying, and/or clean up). maybe i'll give myself 45 minutes if i'm eating with someone else (other than j).

ok, time to work on more form and letterform for tomorrow morning. (just a mere 7 hours and 15 minutes away.) it was good to blog all of this, cuz now i'll feel that i gotta stick to the schedule even more so.

end of the day

it's 3:30 am and i finally get to leave the computer lab at school! i spent the last 4 hours animating a batmobile in after effects. my wrist hurts a little. now i get to go home and sleep for 4 hours. i hope i don't oversleep. i need to do my stuff for ry's class tomorrow. gulp. hope to get 5 hours of work in on that stuff.

gross!

i just cleaned out the fridge. ugh. cleared out the watermelon and the chili.

getting heavy

life will be messy and hectic for the rest of the month. in addition to be growing workload, i'm trying to get about a half dozen of projects ready for a portfolio review the monday before thanksgiving. i'm feeling the stress. i want to do my best. gotta push myself now so that i don't crash and burn too more than necessary at the end of the month.

gonna have to try my darndest to be disciplined for the next 2-3 weeks.

the LA life weekly

38 pix of my life from the past seven days. isn't this a really great picture? some of you might know the egg server. (can anyone tell just from the image?)

the OC trek

went down to visit new song for church today because someone from nor cal was visiting OC for the weekend. new song was good. to me it sorta feels between ebcla and mosaic. if i was closer i'd probably consider going there for church. i think it took me 40 minutes to get there. a little too far.

it's amazing how big it is. they have a church banquet event coming up and there are special gifts offerred to the first 2000 who sign up. first 2000!?!

i was thinking that it could be really easy to feel lost in a church that big too. that's why community groups are so important. something like lumps probably wouldn't work with a church that big...especially when the average age seems to be around 20-something. altho...i hear that the community groups range up to about 30 people.

ate at inka grill, vickie's recommendation. peruvian food. not too bad. tony and i shared some sorta fried seafood platter thing for two. i also lucked out and got a runny egg yolk on a piece of bread, since someone only eats eggs done well.

it was fun catching up with people. that's one reason why i don't mind church hopping...since it's also like a social outlet for me. (a secondary reason of course.) finally saw annie who i haven't seen since i came down in sept.

afterwards i stopped by the art supply warehouse in westminster. i keep getting the name of that city mixed up with westchester.

i think i'm going out to eat dinner with someone else in a bit. i kinda don't want to and i kinda want to. when i have work hanging over my head i lose my appetite...or i eat just scraps or something really late. i suppose i can spare 45 minutes to eat. too bad i don't really have any random stuff to eat in the kitchen. i think i'm getting tired of peanut butter and jam sandwiches...and besides...i just ran out of jam.

the man without fear

the daredevil movie trailer is out. i think this could be a better movie than spider-man.

seeds of life

today i went to a day seeds of life bible conference held at ebcla. the three speakers were from ebcsgv...kim, kyle, and cory. the theme was about the sufficiency alone of the word. each speaker spoke on rev 3. nothing that i heard was too new or earth shattering for me...but it was a really good reminder and strengthening time for what i need to be seeking out personally. i picked one of the 4 seminars with the same theme...sufficency of the word. didn't learn a lot new. material is what i've learned at scbc at various times. (i continue to use scbc as the measuring stick of what i've learned, since i've learned so much there, also b/c it has such fundamental bible-centric teaching.)

the average age of the crowd at seeds of life seemed to be a little younger than me. or maybe it's just that the really young people stood out to me, and people my age (who looked like me) just blended in. that could be it. but there were a lot of younger people.

how old is my crowd?

this crowd age observation somehow started a train of thought thinking about how i fit in with people around me, particularly as i'm growing up/older. at home it was really great in that i think it seems that about 1/2 of my friends were the same age as me...most even the same exact year as me. down here it's all mixed up...

* some of my classmates are 8 years my junior. (i connect more to the older ones.) i'm in the same place as them yet also in a different place than them.

* i work with a few guys in their early 30s to mid 40s...all married. it's cool that i can see where life potentiallyt leads...personally, professionally, and with the church.

* fellowship wise...i feel too old and too young. maybe i'm stuck in an age-snob mentality where i'm looking for people my exact age that i want to connect to. i visited or heard about some places where i'd be among the youngest. one ebcla sedaqah group is really close age-wise. was invited to check out the sgv college group...but i'm pretty sure that the age difference is too much. (tho culture-wise and personal maturity-wise, it probably wouldn't be much of a gap to some of them.) at the school fellowship, i'd probably be among the oldest. it's sorta not a big deal...yet it sorta is too...thinking about how i used to be a counselor a year ago to kids ~7+ years younger than me.

* some of my peers (or former peers) are now married and even in the midst of motherhood. i don't feel pressure there at all...nope. but it's just another age pull thing to some who are on the faster track to the next stage of life. (or if you were to talk to my parents...exactly the same spot where they were at my age.)

* maybe one factor is that i haven't met too many new guys that i talk to or connect with. it seems like i continue meeting girls around my age, which is cool...but i dunno, it's sorta different than hanging out with guys all the time. i know i can always call people at home...but i know that when i get on the phone too much it kinda derails my productivity for the nite. (like tonite with different calls)...it was really nice tonite to get the random and unexpected "we thought of you" phone call when the sf izuzu crowd heard the mango song, "drop baby drop."

* when i do meet people my age, it tends to be social hanging out with friends of friends who are outside of the school world...but when as school gets busier there's less time for that.

i think it's really great to have a friend and a roommate my age and in the same boat with the same background. i know that i would be doing just fine meeting new people without him (probably even motivating me to meet even more people), but it's great to have someone to talk to with the same perspective on things.

where is home?

tonite, when i got to thinking about this more when i was alone in the kitchen heating up my leftover portuguese sausage fried rice from ono grill from lunch today...(i went there today with andy, erica, and her friend lena during the lunch break from the conference. the food wasn't too great there. most of the bowl and rice dishes don't come with vegetables. you have to pay an extra $1 for it. they gave me a lot of oily stir-fried cabbage. however they did give me a lot for my particular dish, which ended up being my lunch and dinner. i think mako bowl near my place is such a better deal. i wonder what spike's teriyaki bowl is like.)

anyways...i got to thinking about where i'd consider home right now. especially as i'm thinking about sf for the holidays. i think i'm living comfortably down here...even better than i did in sf with an apartment of my own. it seems like i quickly assembled a relational network down here and there are people that i can ask for help if i need anything. my life down here is probably better than when i was living in berkeley too in a lot of ways. the independence is really great to be able to see people socially or have people drop by, something which feels normal for me but was missing since the cal apt days...but there are also components missing with family, a regular church, and kick back time hanging out with the guys. i've also barely had time to watch any movies which is kinda weird.

another thing which is sorta interesting to note is that in the past two months, i've gotten about 7 evites for birthdays up in sf...but just had one down here. (i just looked it up in my evite account...didja know that they just redesigned the site?)

i always think that celebrating or acknowleding birthdays is important, and a sign of connectedness to a community. (i remember how it felt really weird and awkward it felt in lumps when we didn't really acknowledge birthdays as a group. i hope that's not the case now.)

so where's home? here and there. i dunno. i wonder what it'll feel like getting in touch with the other "home" again for the holidays.

illagain

debby called me and told me about this asian hip hop group illagain that was playing in pasadena old town. so i went there to meet her. it took me darn near forever to find the old towne pub where they were playing (with 2 other bands). i walked up and down the block a few times trying to find the address. (it was one of those funky addresses set off from the street.)

while i was hiking up and down fair oaks in the slight rain, i ran into jason l who i knew from cal. so weird running into him and another young aacf kid, danny, down here.

so i finally found the pub. paid the cover...went in...didn't see her. someone else looked vaguely familiar but it didn't register. this girl asked me later if i went to lhs. i immediately placed her. i had freshman bio with this girl carolyn n. i was really suprised that she rememebered me...let alone could recognize me...now that i have short hair. we remenisced about bio briefly...i couldn't really remember too much tho i sat next to her. turns out she's working in bio now. how funny. mr mak was a really hard teacher. sorta mean too. (yet nothing close to what you experience at AC.) he wasn't too inspirational either.

i met her friend's fiance. it turns out that this guy knew debby. he also went to ucla and knew the band guys too. small world.

later on deb came by with friends. chatted a little about the job hunt. that's where i would be if i had stayed with the ad school...tho i wouldn't be learning nearly as much as i do here.

illasian was pretty good. got the crowd going. some covers and lyrical adaptation. it's hip hop with a little jazz and other stuff thrown in to the mix. i took some .avi videos. i'll post em up for you to check em out later.

we took a bunch of interesting and stealth pix at the pub.

at the very end i got a free t-shirt. even if i didn't get it...i'd be content with just the music, but now i got a shirt. so i'm satisfied. it was thrown out and just landed in my arms. yay dumb luck!

this place was sorta interesting visually. a much different environment than where i usually check out. made me reflect on how easy and comfortable it is to live a boring, bland life. especially now that i've identified my creative weaknesses...i need to soak up new types of stimulation. not that i need to drink there...but there were just a lot of very interesting things around. even on the floors. debby laughed when she saw the empty tapioca cup sitting on the floor of the bar. i took a picture of it which wasn't too great. we also played with the stealth mode of my camera, too.

random brain wanderings

* i see that my old fellowship lumps is doing romans now. that's what our first study was...way way back in 99 i believe. what's old becomes new. there's probably only a handful of people who were involved in that study who are in it again. i wonder how the content of the study will be different this time around. last time we got really into the nitty gritty and meat of it. good times.

* did you know that bmwfilms is back? john woo did the first installment. (you know...until know i always thought that the hk director did not spell his first name with an "h.") anyways check it out. it's way sway cool.

* thinking about producing some t-shirts. i had requests for a heart t-shirt for girls (using the lulapalooza mark i made). maybe i'll get that out of the way in the coming weeks.

* j helped me use the laser cutter for my third guache composition. had to cut up some illustration board but itleft some burn marks. hopefully it s too i need to do it right once! ugh.

bad road weather

man the roads were bad this morning. had to make an airport run at dang 6 am. i hate slippery roads.

i was going to go to school at 7 right afterwards to do some work...but i was so pooped that i just parked in the lot and slept in the car til 9:30.

venturing to the west side

last nite we tried to see a gallery opening (by edward tufte) at the ucla hammer...but we got caught up with laser cutting at school and then watching the extended friends episode with the manny (which btw, is a real term). after trying (missed a show time) then deciding not to watch punch drunk love (i'm not going to pay full price on an impulse when i can see it cheap since it's been out for so long), we ventured to find some food at 10:30 pm. we made our way to west hollywood...and found this decent place called skewers since it was listed in frommers. i got a nocoise salad which really hit the ruffage and veggie craving which i was feeling after a lot of fast food and mexican grub. later on i got the feeling that this area was a little like the castro, b/c of a crowd vibe at a pretty cool place across the street. tony said that i was right.

it took us like 90 minutes to get home...b/c of the rain...one missed turn-off...one wrong direction given...and one or two accidents on the road. i don't really like driving on unfamiliar freeways at nite. i really hate driving on unfamiliar freeways
at nite with rainy weather conditions...avoiding that as much as possible.

if it's raining during thanksgiving weekend...i'm definitely staying down here. already my parents want me to stay down here to do my work. i dunno. we'll see what the workload is like and what the weather's like. what also makes it hard is that i get out of class at 10pm wed nite. wonder what it's like driving thanksgiving morning.

the chinese restaurant sign maker

today for work i finished up making a sign for GL restaurant in alhambra. it's going to go on the outside of the building...4 feet tall...and is gonna have neon. if all goes as it should it's gonna be made in the next two weeks. hope it turns out ok.

at home

home alone tonite. was waiting for a call from my friend to check out her friends' band playing in pasadena...but i dunno what's happening with that now. oh well...i should probably just do more letterform work and guache painting. sigh...

week 9 reflections

* two of my classes were cancelled this week. history of letterform on tuesday. form and letterform on thursday. hmm...sounds kinda funny. i was able to get considerably more sleep because those two classes were cancelled. i think i slept for 8 hours last night! i probably would have only gotten 2 hours if i still had that 8am class today.

* my letterform teacher, ab really does seem to hate our 8am thursday class. everyone in our class agrees so. she's practically said so. last week she said that the bunch of scripts we put up on the wall was the worst she's seen in 12 years. she loves the friday class. she's said so. i met someone in the computer lab from that class and she's said that too. i don't know...seems that there's some communication thing or something. was talking to this girl in the lab, and i guess they were told a few different things for their assignments...ab has the reputation of being pretty hard and strict...but i guess it fits the personality of good typographers. everythings about precision. i think i'm doing ok in the class...knowing how to draw helps a lot...but i could be putting more time into it. i'm determined to give it 150% now...actually...well, maybe just 115%. i think i could get some pretty good work to show for if i do it right. it'll mean having to visit her outside of normal class times. she holds an open logotype workshop on tuesdays...but i went to visit her there, but she wasn't there. maybe i'll try and stop by early tomorrow...at around 8:30 or so. it seems that i have to take someone to the airport at 7:30.

* strike that about 7:30. that someone just walked in my room and told me that i have to get him to the airport at 5:30. good gosh. grumble grumble grumble. i better stop now and go to sleep.

doing crappy in comm design

i got rocked in my comm design class. didn't really expect it, but i can see the truth in the crit of the ad concepts and layouts which i put up.

this is what ry said about me..."greg works his @$$ off, but all his stuff is crappy." (he says that about a lot of work in the class.) but besides being crappy...he can see that my work is still uptight and conservative. sigh...someone told me that they feel for me later on in the class...ry wants me to go ridiculous. he also told the class that after 8 terms, he wants me to accept my diploma naked. probably not (at least right now). i have a lot to grow and change over the next couple of years. kinda intersting since i'm wearing shirt right now that says "changing."

other quotables from ry today...

*how much are you so curious about solving problems? to be a designer you must be insane b/c no one else is going to do it.

* advertising is a belief system. tell the truth.

* the jungle is out there, and i bring it in here.

* i am not ry, i am AC. get it? our job is to scare the sh!# out of you so you don't enter into this profession.

* do you want to climb the california foothills or climb mount everest?

* do you know that you suck?

* face the demon that's called your heroin.

* i'm known as "the buck stops here r." if you can't get thru me, you can't get thru AC.

* AC is sick. it's not for everybody...go to cal arts...but you know what? i teach at cal arts. i teach at otis. i teach everywhere...i am your conscience.

* come out and play hard. are you intense or mildly interested?

* change means torture. pain. stubbornness. screaming.

* i have an urgent message. everything has a kind of urgency about it, b/c in an hour you might be dead. do your thing like it's the last breath you're gonna have. if you don't pay attention, other things start to be the priority.

sigh...a lot of changing ahead. time to go hard core.

personal peetering productivity

man...after a long productive day...my focus just gets shot. i didn't do much in the last 3 hours. i really need to pace myself for the last 6 weeks.

bc my design 1 teacher, who self-admits his reputation for being a hard@$$ says that for the next 5 weeks...we can forget sleep (which i've been losing), forget parties(i don't really), forget going out (i think i'm going to stop), and forget girlfriends (i'm clean). instead, we have him. and all of our other teachers. we have to whip up a book in the final weeks.

i know i don't have it as bad as some other people. was comparing notes on my letterform class with m, and she spends 8-10 hours on the work, whereas i'd only spend 4-5...and i still get better grades in that class. i guess i do have a leg up since i can draw. man...if i had the focus to spend the amount of time in my work that she does...my work would probably be really great...but i'd also be brain-fried, stressed out, and very cranky. i think very few people have ever seen me cranky. (maybe just the family.)

i seem to pack it all in a lot...getting not too much sleep...finding creative outlets...exploring a bit here and there...getting my work done...church hopping...fellowship checking out...work on fridays...household maintenance...and am doing ok...but i need to be doing the best. i'll be looking to modify some patterns this month.

i wonder if it's a mistake to plan to drive back for thanksgiving. it'd be really great to see people...but i don't feel too comfortable going back with everything that will be coming up. like i was talking to lyla...a lot of people don't go home...it's AC. really good thing that i have a powerbook. i can pretty much bring all of my work with me. i don't think i could let myself go if i had to be stuck in front of my immobile desktop.

trying to figure out my december plans. i think i'll stay down here for a week or so after classes are over. it'll be a time to decompress...clean up...sleep up...and earn money by working. it'll also be a really great time to really explore LA, and catch up with people. that should be nice. looking forward to it already. i like christmas time too. everything will be pretty...especially in my hood. i'll also be happy to have any friends over then too. i hope to be able to see some LA people from the bay area...but i bet my schedule will just have me just missing them when i go up.

ok time to get my laundry and then do some sketching and illustrator work.

finally found a good one

since my afternoon class was cancelled, i had time to get some lunch. i decided to drive around, just knowing that i wanted to try a brand-new (to me) local place...somewhere i haven't been before. ended up wandering around a little...finding a new route to drive. a mexican fast food place (small dive place operating out of an old little house) caught my eye. maritza's fast food on fair oaks and orange grove. i don't know if it's really fast food...since i had to wait a little bit for them to cook it. i think that's just what they call burrito and taco joints down here.

the asada jumbo burrito was the best that i've had in la so far. it fit my all of my basic criteria...
* gives you everything included (i.e. guacamole, sour cream, cheese) for under $5.
* large sized
* grilled tortilla.

it was pretty good. i've had tastier asada tho. will definitely go back and try the tacos or other meats.

i got my food to go. i decided to spontaneously find a new scenic place to eat and relax. so i hopped in my car and drove back and forth and aroudn the rose bowl. finally i meandered on up close to school on a small residential street. very picturesque with the green folliage reddening. took some interesting pix. also happened to notice the house across the street that had a gateway formed by an old tree trained to grow in an arch. very unusual. got some good pix of that. the water meter person probably thought i was a little strange...snapping away at the house. it was fun. explored usage of the manual features of my digital camera. i need to shoot around for fun alot more.

fading fast...

i'm in the school computer lab now. got here at about 10:30. energy is waning. i guess that's what 2 1/2 hours of sleep the nite before and a day without caffeine can do to you.

i'm trying to get to know adobe after effects right now for the first time. it's kinda tough. not coming along too fast. but at least lyla is here in the lab and can give me the occasional pointers.

i think tonite's drive home won't be on the freeway.

resonating to the relevant

a new daily read for me has been relevant magazine...all about god. life. progressive culture.

just came across two articles that resonates with where i'm at today...

* the search for a college church

* church. take it or leave it?

now that i'm about 95% done with my guache painting...a blogging break for a little more procrastination. i resisted pretty well so far...

the church hop

we went back to metro mosaic today. this time we introduced a friend (erica) and a friend of a friend (sarah) to it. it's so nuts how many people we meet who are on or starting their church hop. another of our sf friends might be introducing us to someone he knows down here who may be starting to go to church again. looks like we continue to find more and more church hopping buddies. if any of your la friends are lookin for a church or looking to get back to church in general...might as well point em to us now so that they can go along for the ride... by my estimation, it will be til the end of the year.

mosaic and the pastor was good as usual. continuing to regularly challenge me and think about life and passionate living. today was all about "influence"...jonathan and his armor bearer in I sam. lots of application to living today. it's easy to live comfortably in the middle, focusing on yourself...thinking about god and me me me...but that's not what it's all about. it's also really easy to be influenced by passionate people, both good and bad. how easy it is to follow someone who is driven and pursuing a goal. made me think about influences in my life at different points...in my burgeoning creative career and also in my college fellowship walk. the pastor showed a clip of lord of the rings, showing how frodo was the one to have influence and be the one to bring together the fellowship of the rings. it wasn't the strongest or most powerful one to do it (they were all fighting amongst themselves), but it was the one who was most trustworthy. my mind also briefly jumped to all of these peanuts-like distant friends of mine...people's different personalities and ways of interacting. also how the peanuts gang interplay with each other...it's funny how my mind is synthesizing all of these disparate, random things together.

afterwards we went to the mosaic lunch in the park for newcomers. sandwhich, soda and chips. learned a little bit more about the church. i wonder how much i'll resonate with the direction of the church after this particular series is over. we met a few people in the church at the lunch. it was a really nice atmosphere, to welcome people. they had to call up some more regular people to come over to chat with us newbies...i think i want to give the other hospitality meals at other churches a chance to explore the different bodies more.

it seems that i'm meeting fewer people nowadays b/c school is getting busy. when before i was having significant meetings and conversations with 10+ new people a week, i think that number is now under 5. i wonder what it will be like to be at home home for a few weeks in december. i'll probably be meeting new people who cropped up when i was gone. that's gonna be interesting. it seems that some stories are spreading about me, now that the spider-man dvd came out....i picked up my pre-ordered dvd from blockbuster by our house. i sure hope that i win the life-size spidey for my apartment.

the sunday weekly LA life album

click on our shiny brain shields or here to see 60 pix from the past seven days. now you can place images to the past week of posts.

sleep is bad

ugh. i slept for 2-3 hours this afternoon. it was originally going to be a 20 min nap...then a 40 min nap. i should have just drank coffee.

but i know i was tired. i was falling asleep doing my painting. one bad goof and all the work has to be trashed.

i already goofed once. i masked a geometric area wrong and painted it too big. to save it i have to remask it, and try to wipe away/clean off the yellow guache. i did that and the water bled too much...going into the adjacent white guache space. crud. now i have to try to chip away and wipe away some of the yellowy white...then repaint the white area.

my oh my...this shall be a long nite. i also need to rewrite my not up to par modernism paper for tomorrow.

i'm pretty sure this is a really old character survey, but what the heck...

Which Peanuts Character Are You Quiz

drive me crazy

we went to the resfest at the egyptian tonite. if you don't know, it's a digital film festival that goes nationwide. it's based and kicks off in sf. (so you bay area peeps missed your chance.) we went and saw "drive me crazy" a program of shorts with the common theme of road trips. there were some really great ones. the one i liked the most was called "guerilla public service." i could appreciate it even more since i'm down here now. even if i wasn't, i think it would still be really great. here's the film fest description.

GUERRILLA PUBLIC SERVICE
US | 2002
DIRECTOR / PRODUCER / EDITOR: Richard Ankrom

Los Angeles-based artist Richard Ankrom was tired of missing the on-ramp for the 5 South freeway in LA, and did something about it. Guerrilla Public Service traces his helpful response, from development and research to a new haircut and hardhat.

it's amazing seeing him go thru the process of researching and creating a 5 north freeway sign. actually, j and i could probably do the same thing with all the stuff that we're learning at AC. watch out bay area freeways when we return. ha ha.

dos dia los muertos and taquitos

afterwards we drove over to olvera street to try to check out the last of the day of the dead festival in this mexican neighborhood. i think i was first exposed to this mexican holiday back in 7th grade when i had to read ray bradbury's the halloween tree. in my research the past couple weeks online of interesting la stuff, i saw the celebrations listed for this huge mexican holiday. (think what chinese new year is to most of you.) when we got there, most of the stuff was closed down. there were a few people in skeleton costumes. it was interesting seeing the dia los muertos altars. i know that these displays are incredibly creative and often inspirational to designers. it's a real interesting way of tangible cultural expression. took a bunch of pix. i'm sure i can use it for visual inspiration sooner or later. i'm glad that j is the adventurous type to explore (or just doesn't care too much to object), otherwise i woulda just gone by myself.

i was thinking...i don't know if anyone else i know at home would have gone with me. don't know very many people so open to embrace new cultural experiences like this. (if you are, lemme know.) i could possibly have tried to get one of my classmates to go. was talking to another designer who was commenting on how few people there were to hold creative dialogue with. i'm glad i'm down here to really seek that out and also push me even further away from past limitations.

i was thinking later that there is so much in la to explore. too bad i don't have the time right now. as part of my creative journey and growth, it's important to draw upon the real world and as many different influences as possible. that's why i knew that it would be important to go to the resfest, even tho i probably could have spent the time doing a project. but i'll probably be passing on more resfest tomorrow in order to get my stuff done.

hey, if anyone wants to come down and really explore LA for sometime in mid-dec lemme know. i can give you a ride back up the bay area.(i think the lion king musical will still be showing then too before it ends.) i might stay here a little longer after the semester to work and to also explore stuff that i haven't been able to b/c of school. if you think that i've explored a lot already, i'm sure that i'm just scratching at the surface.

today was a good day. it got to a good start after having around 7 hours of straight sleep in my bed. yay.

dinner in little tokyo

after work today, we planned to go to this freewaves experiemental media festival in chinatown. (real chinatown in la...not monterey park/alhambra.) it looked really cool to go to. too bad we missed it. we ended up eating in little tokyo with a last minute get together of j's college friends. this was the first time down here i sat down with a big bunch of his old friends...with me being the outsider. reversed of most other times. food was good. good amount for an ok price. it's right by shisheido. sorry...no name and no picture. was in a rush to get to long beach...

queen mary shipwreck

we met up with elaine and tina to go to the queen mary. i can't believe that no one else wanted to go with us! i asked a bunch of others. some said it was too scary. oh well. around october, the queen mary is a huge haunted halloween attraction. i think the queen mary is the original ghost ship, like the movie. there are also some stories of it being haunted too. anyhoo...for a few weeks it has 7 mazes to scare you and a boiler room club. the average mazes took 15-20 minutes. it's scarier when you're in front of your group and there aren't other people in front of you (to take the brunt of the surprise scares.) i think it was definitely worth going to. we had a lot of fun.

there was one maze that gives you 3D glasses to wear. you have a sense of vertigo when you try to cross a bridge with the room spinning. really nuts. the best scary mazes were the ones on the ship. tight passageways. maybe a little like exploring the titanic, with monsters hiding around bends, and people waiting to scare you. it's definitely a lot more fun going with girls. it wouldn't have been so scary if it was just j and me. sometimes you react b/c of your scared company. the monsters also capitalize on that fact and go after the girls more. your company also distracts you from keeping your guard completely up. this place was worth what we shelled out i think. the club was just ok. it was weird with a lot of random people dancing. it felt young like college and with even some high schoolers.

a lot of my branded environments analysis came back to me. well designed spaces. (this was a big reason why i wanted to check this thing out.) sometimes they lead you through tight spaces to immediately open up into larger spaces. twisty corners and nooks. sometimes you go through dark corridors with everything pitch black. you literally can't see three inches in front of your face. we were brainstorming ways that things could have been scarier. they could have had more people on the other side of the railing and places where you would not expect people to be...to go up and scare you. monsters don't really physically touch you much (taps here and there), no violent grabs. i don't think. it would be very effective if they used mists or sprays of water in our faces to shock and suprise us. i think it would also be incredibly interesting if they used smells and temperatures to heighten the immersiveness of the environments. perhaps at the butcher scenes there could have been the smells of rotten meat. or extreme heat or cold could be applied appropriately to different thematic experiences. it would have also been really scary if there were live arms popping out of the walls. didn't see any of that.

it's pretty fun if you can go fast through the haunted mazes. you don't have the time to overanalyze and expect where they're going to come up out at you.

wish i could have taken sneaky pix...but no way that i could get away with that. there was a security wanded check at the entrance. i did actually manage to sneak my camera in (i held the dark case in my left outstretched hand with my keys). hee hee. the he didn't wand my hands. it did go off on me...but only at my belt buckle. i'm just too sneaky i guess. but i didn't wanna run the risk of my camera being taken away from me. we did snap some pix outside at the end tho.

if anyone doesn't have plans tomorrow...it's still open. if anyone wants to go next year...i got a $5 off coupon for you. it's a pretty cool experience. we spent about 2 hours there.

candy kisses or ribs to go

our brains were well protected from the telepathic aliens tonight. we were scoping out the scene at castle green. the AC graphic design dept party. huge interesting space. too bad it was kinda empty.

one thought that we were hershey's kisses. another asked if we were food to go from claimjumper.