"Art" Fair On A Stick

Ah, the Ann Arbor Art Fair. You've no doubt heard tell of it in song and legend. You have probably even gone so far as to doubt its existence.

Let me assure you that it is real.

Here's a quick rundown on the kind of stuff you would have seen this weekend at the Ann Arbor Art Fair:

1. Creepy Naked Art - There are just too many of these. And just because your photos are in black and white does not mean they are art. No matter how much photoshopping you do. Also, the guy with the tent next to the guy with the creepy water nymph paintings? You got troubles, dude. And don't think you are getting away either, Water Nymph man. I've got my eye on you.

2. Art-On-A-Stick - There are three things that can by found on stick at the Art Fair. The noble Corn Dog is of course present, as well as the "Chinese" creation 'Chicken-on-a-stick with fried noodles.' Though the later is substantially more delicious than the former, I still have no idea why it is on a stick. The last thing stick-bound is, oddly enough, art. Though this makes marginally more sense than the chicken, I still firmly believe that if its something clever on a stick and meant to go in your lawn then it is not art. I should also emphasize how much of this kind of crap there is at the art show. There is a lot.

3. Bad Fashion Decisions - Just because it might be warm out, and there are lots of people around does not mean you have to dress like that. Although I have to admit that the dude in the cargo man-skirt looked pretty cool.

4. 'Good' Art - See Below*

5. The Art Fair Dolls - Every year, someone or something places weirdly disfigured dolls in odd places around the art fair. Though they disappeared for a few years, a couple did show up in trees and secured to light-posts this year. Since this is a blog intended for mixed company, I will spare you the details and instead instruct you to imagine what a 7yr old boy with a soddering iron, a red marker, and a penchant for the grotesque could do with a Barbie doll. Whatever you are thinking of is probably very close to these horrible and wonderful little things.

6. Me - Yes, I was there. Every day. Part of working on the Diag Crew is having to cover Art Fair, and this lead me to walk around several times a day changing trash-bags and hauling away stuffed plastic sacks leaking fluid all over the place. After four ten-hour days of this, I finally lost it. Saturday was my worst day at work this summer. Despite having completed the wooden pirate-ship model we found some weeks earlier, I was otherwise mentally out to lunch. I am certain that nothing I said made any sense that day. To anyone who encountered me on Saturday (especially anyone who tried to talk to me on the phone that day), I feel I owe an apology.

Thankfully, Art Fair has passed. Today, my only day off this week, I woke late and spent the entire morning reading. After a quick trip down to the comic book store with Nate and his roommate Jane, pausing only briefly to play with iPhones, I decided to roost up on the fire escape. And here I have stayed.

Its wonderful. I've even lit some candles.
Tomorrow, I go back to work.
Today, nothing is allowed to bother me.

---

*This is very subjective, I know. While the Art Fair has lots of 'cool' things, there were only a very few that actually made me feel bad for not having any money to give them. Here they are, for your viewing pleasure:

Rex Benson: Specializes in wonderful ceramics with a bend toward the bizarre and fantastical. I am reminded of Don Bluth animations, and other late 70's cartoons. Im also reminded of the work done by my old neighbor, Jimmy Thompson.

Chrsitine C. Schub: Her intricate oil paintings could be many things. Perhaps a city seen from above? A skyline? An artistic understanding of a circuit board? Whatever the analogy her cramped and busy little paintings really fascinated me.

Nick Wroblewski: My personal favorite from last yuear enchanted me again. I told him straigh up that I wish I could buy some of his work. And if anyone wants to spend a substantial sum of money on me, they should get me this:




There were many others that caught my attention, and Im sure many other worthy artists could be found amongst the crap on sticks. But these were my big three.

Also, this is one of the few blog-posts I have taken the time to edit, and re-read. If you are in a masochistic mood, you can read the first draft here. Im leaving it in all its whiney, boring, overly-detailed glory.

Pandora in my ears tonight

I imagine my hordes of adoring readers see me as a simultaneously gruff and sophisticated free spirit. The kind of guy who fells a tree with his bare hands, then carves a chair out of the trunk with his teeth so that he can sit comfortably while reading high literature and sipping San Pellegrino.
Sadly, this is not the truth.

I've been a geeky dude a long time. In fact, I can't remember a time when I wasn't lusting for gadgetry or wanting a spaceship. There are hints of this in the blog. Most notably when I write whole posts about a computer, or compare different blogging softwares. A keen reader will note that I seem to be more and more involved in internet-related projects. This blog is a prime example, my use of Twitter is another. I find the way these projects integrate people as participants and architects wonderful as well as intriguing.

Anyway, I started this whole post because I wanted to talk about Pandora. Nate put me onto this recently and, despite its foreboding name, I am really enjoying it.

--- INTERMISSION ---

(During this short intermission, we'd like to present a re-enactment of the scene in which NATE tells MAX about PANDORA)

Nate: You should check this out. Its this web-app called Pandora...

Max: Uh-uh! No way! No way am I going anywhere near, or having anything to do with this "PANDORA" of which you speak!

Nate: But it...

Max: Dude! I've seen movies! I know mythology! Anything with a name like that is BAD NEWS. Forget it, lets get a ham.

--- END OF INTERMISSION ---

Pandora is a web-based application, part of the Music Genome Project. It acts like an internet radio station that filters the output based on your selections. When starting a new "station" you're prompted to enter a band or song that you like. You'll then be fed a stream of songs, one after the other, that have something in common with the initial choice. These songs can be rated by the user, thats you, which changes the "content" of the "station." For instance, if you entered Frank Zappa as your initial favorite your ratings of the songs which followed could eventually have you listening to Rachmaninov or perhaps jazz quintets.

Its quite a fun little toy, and its letting me enjoy a wide variety of music that seems to be within the vein of things that I enjoy.

The whole thing is powered by the Music Genome Project, which seems to be an overly ambitious exercise in cross-indexing. But whatever, Pandora is fun and is giving me new tunes for free.

I Took A Pretty Good Picture

As many of you know, I like to take pictures. Im not a photographer, not in the least. I have only a rudimentary understanding of camera settings and very rarely am able to use them effectively (more often I just take the picture without monkeyin' with the camera).
If I ever get about $1k I could just throw at something, I'd probably purchase myself one of those nifty digital SLR cameras. They're all crazy with their manual zoom, manual focus, and no shutter delay. Basically, its a camera that makes all the pictures you take with it awesome. Its almost magical.

Here's one I took last night. I usually take about 12 at a time, and keep one or two that turn out well. Here's last night's good picture.




PS.
My computer worked for 12 hours last night, through jostling, heavy use and extreme heat. COULD ATOMSK BE HEALED (again)!?

A Confession, And A Bit More

Dear Lord,

Please forgive me for lying to the Mormons who accosted me on the street so as to avoid what I anticipated as being a frustrating and one-sided conversation on the nature of existence.

Amen.

I thought I would just drop a little something here since my computer is not co-operating. Atomsk is alive, I guess, but cannot seem to make it through booting without freezing and needing to be re-started.

Claire has requested that I clarify that she is NOT ON A HOPI EXCAVATION. She writes, "Not a Hopi excavation! Ancestral puebloan!"

Also, I am going to be working 4 ten hour shifts in two weeks, to cover the art-fair happenings in Ann Arbor. If anyone was going to pop by that week, I'm going to need some seriously advanced notice.

The weekend after that (July 27-29) cousin Phil will be dropping in for a little R&R in this scenic northern paradise.

Not too interesting, I know. Ah well, it is summer after all.

The Fact of the Matter

Been a long time since my last post. Didn't mean for it to be that long, but I did mean for it to stew for a while.

I have another, nearly completed and much longer post which answers many of the questions that I have been asked over the past few weeks. It'll still go up, but I woke up this morning with a lot of idealism so Im sidetracked on a few other things for a while.

Quick Update:

KRIS has moved into her new apartment and is getting wired for the internet today! She's started working for a real company, making real money and is eligible for real health benefits! Huzzah! She's even bought a cat, which terrifies her rats but is otherwise adorable.

CLAIRE left for Arizona last week. She'll be working at a Hopi excavation until mid-July. Contrary to popular belief, not all of archaeology is done with a pin and toothbrush. These guys have been known to use shovels, and even back-hoes! Though their primary tools are trowels and petiches...uh, sorta lost the point of this midway.
Ah, right. CLAIRE, however, is not digging. Instead she is in charge of the LAB, where recovered samples are washed and then subjected to weird tests that resemble the Salem Witch trials. 'Floatation' for instance separates two kinds of matter...some of which is usable...and...um...really you should just ask her.
This paragraph isn't going so well.
THE POINT IS THAT CLAIRE IS DOING THE PART OF ARCHAEOLOGY THAT SHE LIKES. The part with all the analysis. She's also working with pottery, which she really enjoys.
Today, the dig-crew is going on a field trip to see a Hopi dance, the Petrified Forest (I've been there!), and then to a Hopi home for dinner.

NATE, whom I retrieved from the Great White North, is now in Ann Arbor for the season! He's working for NOAA as some kind of computer slave/data analyst. He's got some really nifty graphs that too me look like something produced by a Jefferson Airplace/Jackson Polluck joint art initiative. Did I mention that said graphs are covered in arrows? They have arrows too. Nate is doing some kind of crazy physics with those underwater currents that you hear about. I've learned my lesson from Claire's paragraph, so I am just going to skip trying to explain it (since I don't understand it) and go right to telling you all to just ask him yourselves.
Me and him have been hangin' around a bit. I've been showin' him the town and teaching him the fine art of buying all your food from the corner liquor store.
The other day we played the demo for an upcoming game called "OVERLORD," which casts you as a Sauron-type entity bent on conquering and destroying. Basically, the game gives you minions. Its simple, its stupid, and its dang fun.
Soon, Nate will be out in a boat on Lake Erie servicing and placing temperature sensors. It'll be a lot like Deadliest Catch, but without the startling human drama, or the Disocvery Channel.

PHIL is moving into a very nice house with his lady friend SUSAN way down in Indiana. You can read more about it, and Mank Rage here. You really should, too.
Good luck, you two.

MAX has been working for over a month now! Actually, at the moment, he's not working. Instead, he's eating a pecan log. Which, however delicious, is not 'work' nor is it 'healthy.' Anyway, he's on the Diag crew working for the University's Grounds and Waste management. This is, quite literally, his work-place. Last week he trimmed a hedge down a foot! He also planted an oak! Yesterday, he and the other temps got to drive the ToolCat around! Its a piece of equipment that costs 7 times what he will make from the University this year - and its the most fun ever!
Max is also planning for his imminent birthday - which should arrive any day now. He'd really like this, but understands that its expensive. He hopes that two or more people won't get that for him, because then he'll have to sell one for-profit on eBay. He also need to go to another Wilco concert so he can get this, which combines two things he love. Try to guess which two!
While things are good for Max, he often finds himself feeling restless and very uneasy. This is not unusual, and seems to be just part of spending a summer in Ann Arbor. Its also probably related to his sleep schedule. Things seem to be improving, however.
He also recently attended a wedding, and looked fabulous. On the way back to Michigan, Claire snapped this photo out the window:


Back soon, kiddies.

My Friend, Kris

Much belated, but just as heartfelt.

Kris has graduated and moved to the great state of Colorado. She's mere seconds away from launching her career as some kind of software engineer. I worked with her on the Gargoyle, where she was the art director for my first three years. An invaluable asset to the magazine, her art was key to moving the magazine forward out of the Dark Ages and into the light of the 20th century. She and I have been close friends for a good long while now. Through ups and downs, etc. She's left an indelible mark on my life, and I certainly hope that I haven't seen the last of her.
I don't really know what more I can say.

To my best friend Kris:
You'll be missed. Sorely.
Come visit soon. My door will always be open.

Visit her website, and buy her shirt.

Go Ahead and Shake Hands

Say hello to a pal of mine.



Thats right, folks. We all thought he was gone but ATOMSK LIVES.

...

Sort of...

On Craig's advice I pried this sucker open (which took the better part of two days and ruined a new set of screw-drivers) and carefully applied some magical fluid (distilled water) to the nasty looking parts of the motherboard. A good dry and a few prayers, and POOF Atomsk is running again!

He's still a little jittery. Im concerned about some cooling issues, and some odd smells but its pretty likely that these are all in my head. He's still a little weird with booting, too. After a few tries, he's at least booting when the battery is in. I also feel like he's running slow, and the screen has for sure taken some minor damage.

But all in all, he's running again! Once again, I delay the purchase of a new computer.

A few related thoughts to this whole ordeal:

1. I walked to the Ace Hardware on Stadium (about 3mi) to buy the screw-drivers and the water. When I asked them if they had a "Spudger," a non-static pry-tool used on electronics, they looked at me like I said something dirty.

2. While checking out, I was accused of having brought the gallon of water in from another store. "Where did you get that?" the saleswoman asked.
"Aisle 11?" I suggested.
"Hm. We don't carry that water here..."
"Uh, its in Aisle 11...lots of it."
"Hmmmm."She was not amused with me. I'll bet she was glad when I scampered out of there.

3. While walking back from ACE, resplendent in my straw hat, Blues Brothers sunglasses and hawaiian shirt, I spied some young lads approaching rapidly by bicycle. When they got close the lead child called me a very rude name involving avian of the family Phasiandidae. The name-caller was about 10 or 11, short hair, skinny, and biked without an helmet in a bright yellow T-Shirt. His accomplice was pudgier, about the same age, and wore a plain white T-Shirt and a purple helmet. A reward is available for any information that leads to their capture.

4. When I called Craig and Julie in triumph, Julie asked if I was disappointed. I'll say maybe, maybe just a bit.

[EDIT: I also changed the Twitter thing. Does that work better for everyone?]

Last Ditch

In a last-ditch effort, im opening Atomsk's pretty alu-minium shell and will swab his gentle innards with water soaked Q-Tips.

I have purchased all the necessary equipment and with the aide of this guide I'll be playing computer doctor.

Farewell, Atomsk

Atomsk, my dearly beloved laptop purchased such a short while ago in large part from my loving parents, is (effectively) dead. When taken to the Apple Store, he was declared to be at DAMAGE TIER LEVEL 4. That's apparently bad. As in, DEFCON 4 THE SOVIETS HAVE GONE TO CONDITION RED bad. The man at the desk tells me it will run at least 1300 to repair him.

Though his data is still intact, I figure it is too late for him. I am exploring some options, but Im not too hopeful.

Right now, Im preparing for the worst.

The king is dead. We must prepare for succession.

THE MACBOOK
A solid choice. Small, cute, cheap and high-powered. However, it lacks any kind of decent graphics card and has an admitably small screen. Since I use my computer as a kind of entertainment center, this could be problematic.

THE MACBOOK PRO
Highpowered and wide (not thick), this is the heavy hitter of Apple's portables. A faster chip, larger screen and a nifty graphics card are its highpoints. But its price tag brushes past the WAY WAY TOO MUCH level.

THE IMAC
Best of both worlds, but stuck to the ground. A huge screen, a graphics card with more RAM and a hard drive the size of greate Milwaukee are just some of its dandy features which come at an equally dandy price. But its not exactly going to fit into my backpack.

PS.
I become E-FAMOUS! Try to find me on this page!

PPS.
As you can tell from these pictures, all the other bands were not nearly rocking hard enough. You ain't got time for gentle melodies if you rock so hard you have to wear a tamborine on your head! Go buy Mason Proper's album, or better yet see them live.

PPPS.
Also, get the new Wilco album. And see them live too.

Double Battered and Deep Deep Fried

Bonus points if you can identify the origin of this post's title!

So, I was going to update you with lots of super fun happy information that I have been saving for the past two weeks. I was going to tell you all about my new grounds job, about Claire staying with me, about my best friend Kris moving out west, about Spiderman 3, Shrek 3 and Inland Empire.

Instead Im going to tell you that I am an idiot. I am an idiot because I spilled black current and apple juice on the keyboard of my laptop. I lept into action trying to save him, but Im pretty sure it blew before I could get it turned off.

Right now, sweet sweet Atomsk is drying out in my room. I'll try to turn him on tomorrow, but Im pretty certain theres no hope. At least he went out in fiery battle - like a true viking.

More on the computer situation, as it develops.

Back to you, Phrank.

Rolled Up And Eaten In A Pasty

Remember how I said that I'd check and see if there was some kind of deeper meaning to my trip the Upper Peninsula? Yeah, there isn't one.

I drove for a really, really long time. I counted mile markers. I pulled over for gas when my gauge went below 3/4 of a tank remaining - I was very paranoid. I saw huge windmills. I crossed a huge bridge. I got scared when outside of Munising, because there were ice flows in the lake. It was at that exact moment that I realized I was very, very far away from home and that I might be in trouble.

In Houghton, land of trees, I hung with Nate and his roomate Stu. Nice guy, Stu. Reminds me of someone - but Im not sure who. At some point while hanging around I noticed how well me and Nate work off of each other - we were just going back and forth with stories, commentaries, theories and general blather with machine gun speed. A good time, for sure. I have great friends, Im surely quite lucky.

We chitty-chatted late into the night. Very late. I didn't have much sleep in my system while caravanning back from the frozen north, but I did fine. Im told that the distance I traveled north is the same distance midway into Tennessee if applied southward. And to think I did it twice! It was remarkable to see the trees get greener and greener the farther south I went. Since most of the time anyplace you looked at up there seemed to come out of an ecology calendar, the drive was a lot like flipping through a Safari Club publication very quickly.

Im still pretty worn out from the whole thing. But by gum, I enjoyed myself. I take it back, there's some meaning in there somewhere. I'll write a book, and then let the students figure it out.

Here's some pictures:

The Great Northern Transport

Massive Michigan (word for trip beginning with "M")

Im back in Troy, at the Eddy Team Base, preparing for the single longest car trip I have ever endured.

Such a thing is, by definition, unprecedented.

The story begins many years ago in High School where I met a kid named Nate, in band class. He played sax in the campus band and I played clarinet, but somehow we met up. Fate? Naw. Its like sifting river gravel, which makes all the sediments of like mass move to the same area - drawing all the emeralds together. Did you like that? Did you see what I did there? Its a metaphor, describing how I feel about my serendipitous meeting with a dude who has continued to be a very close friend and creating a comparison between my homies and precious gems.

Anyway, we went on to have many misadventures through our highschool days, and since our graduation he's been making his home in the great white north, at Michigan Tech. Tomorrow morning, I will rise and get into my car. I'll turn on the newly installed stereo deck and rock out hardcore for 9.75 hours until I reach his pad.

I just checked, and I don't think there's any deeper metaphorical edge to this trip. Although I guess I won't really know until I get back.

See: map of amazing trip.

See Also:

Pictures of me and Claire at the Zoo!

He Returns From The Brink!

Hello all, its very good to be back.
The last few weeks were pretty trying, and I am surprised that I made it through in one piece. First, there were the papers. Then, there was the Flu. After that, there were the Extensions - where I worked with the tenacity of an Army Ant colony to get everything done.

And now, here I am. At the end of it all - and I even have all my grades in! Dig it:

ENG 370 : Medieval Poetics and what not : B+
ENG 407 : Computers in Literature : A-
ENG 417 : Graphic Narrative : A-
SCAND 442 : Icelandic Sagas! : A

GPA: 3.650
Cumulative GPA: 3.590

DO YOU SEE THIS, AMERICA? THIS IS ME BRAGGING.

I'd very much like to post these papers. Not because they are particularly good, but because I want to have something to show for all the time I put into writing them. But at the same time, Im worried that if non-university types see them, they'll think Im just wasting my time (because the papers are lousy). Im probably just paranoid.
Im also worried because I don't want my work being passed off as someone else's paper. That would make me sad.

Anyway, Im back. So expect a slew of updates over the next few days.

50% Complete

I have two really big papers left to write. One 10-15 page essay for Graphic Narrative and another 10-15 page paper for Icelandic Sagas. These are the rough ones. My paper for the Computers and Literature course is much shorter and is not due until Tuesday.

I guess what I am saying is that I am going to be pretty busy for a while.

I'll be back soon!

I Haven't Missed The Flu

Hello, Max-fans!

Once again, I find myself apologizing for my lack of appearances as of late. I assure you that I still love you, each and every one of you.
The past few weeks have been very busy, as the last month of the school year often is. I have been assigned six papers in four classes (two of which are now complete!), and also took a quick trip to Indiana along the way.

But the big news is, of course, how sick I have been as of late. On wednesday night I came down with something, though I wasn't sure what. After valiantly going to class Thursday morning, it was clear that the flu was here to stay. I was barely aware that Friday was happening, and subsequently did not get to class. As of today, I am doing much better. I have a few extensions and the papers are getting written (sort of).
For anyone interested my highest temperature was 102.4º. I also had an embarrassing dream involving a hobo and another dream in which my friend Cathy was given a love note via guitar. That is to say, that in my dream a man named "Johann" walked up to Cathy with a guitar, a hand came out of said guitar and delivered said note.

But the real story is that my girlfriend is awesome. Claire came by frequently to feed me, take my temperature and keep my company. She braved the flu and the cold weather to make sure I didn't expire quietly in my room, unbeknownst to anyone. And today, she made me cookies.

AWESOME.

A special thanks to everyone who called, emailed, and otherwise wished me well during my illness. Especially Justin, who drove me to the clinic after having stayed awake for the better part of two days.
And also an apology to many of you (especially my staff, my parents and my good friend Kris). Because of being sick I wasn't able to meet/hang/bond with you.
Im better now, so lets fix that.

Alright, back to the grind.

PS.
I am totally enamored with some of these google tools. EXPECT SOME AWESOME AND TOTALLY USELESS ADDITIONS TO THE BLOG IN THE VERY NEAR FUTURE.

PPS.
I have no leads for employment this summer. HELP!

Massive Links Follow-Up Post

I covered a lot of ground in the last post.
Well, not really. But I do realize that there's a lot that I left out. Like, for example, the Chris Ware animation itself!

Do enjoy. I spent a lot of time on it.

Webs of Chance

I recently had a series of incredibly serendipitous moments.
Let me lay this out for you.

I got up late Sunday morning because its the Sabbath and thats what you do. Also because me, Kris, and a collection of assorted roomates hit the Fleetwood at around 2 am. As I write this I am suffering the direct results of eggs and hashbrowns with black coffee at that hour of the morning.
By 9am I was jerked awake after a particularly troubling dream centered in suburbia where I found myself equipped with a floating cellphone that I gripped from below which I used to avoid huge spiders in floating, complicated, three-dimensional orb-webs.
I couldn't float very high with the cellphone - I attribute this to the fact that my phone hasn't been working lately - and I hit one of these balloon webs. When I hit the web an asian grandmother-type figure appeared and took the hit for me. 'Ah! It pinches my butt!' She cried, and I was awake.
I always find it best to rejoin reality after particularly deep sleep by way of internet. I had unfolded my laptop and propped myself up in bed for about an hour or so, pointing and clicking my way to useful consciousness. By 10am I was set up at my desk, using all of my eSkill and iAwesomeness to find and use anything to avoid having to work on my final papers, which are many and manifest. This of course lead me to my podcasts.
As much as I am loathe to admit my participation in something as Trendy.com as PodCasting, I have to accept that you are reading this on (one of) my blog(s) so there is obviously little hope for me. It's too late. Don't cry for me, I'm already dead.
I do listen to a few podcasts, though. Only one now, though. The first ever was Ze Frank's the now concluded 'The Show.' His talent has been expressed in several other more frequented and lucrative forums than this, so we'll move ahead. The second is the weekly podcast of NPR's This American Life.¹ I love this show, and have for some time. The almost droning monotone of Ira Glass is so zen, so buddhist monk, and the stories successfully stretch me across an unbelievable expanse of temporal, geographical, and emotional locales that I can't help but love it.³
I listened to a show.
It was great.
It was the end of one of their live shows I had started listening to a few days earlier called "What I learned from Television."⁴ Awesome. Completely awesome. Sheer bliss. There I am, surfing the internet looking for wonderful little April Fools being left by site managers while listening to This American Life. I am so happy with listening that when the show ends I let it just roll into another one. Great! Huzzah! "The Allure of the Mean Friend!"⁵
At some point, during this procrastanotory NPR love-fest, Ira mentions that the This American Life website has been redone and revamped, likely a tie-in with their new TV show⁶ which I am too poor to afford to watch. I meandered, or as well as one can "meander" on the internet, on over now listening to the end of another episode which I had started weeks earlier⁷. The website is really something, with great colors and cool curvey things and Im just having a ball clicking around. Then my eyes fell upon something familiar and I stop.
What I see is a panel from Chris Ware's graphic novel Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth. It's being used as part of the blurb about the show I was just listening to.
Normally, I wouldn't have stopped. But, if you can recall, this whole thing is about serendipity and something cool is about to happen. It's going to happen right here: because just this past thursday I was discussing that very book in my Graphic Narrative⁸ course at the Univeristy.
I'll give you all a second to inhale dramatically for me.

Alright, I'll be the first to admit that finding that, in and of itself is only moderately cool. A 2.3 on the Cool Vibrations scale.
But trust me, it gets better.
It is at this point that I must reveal that I was in fact looking at many websites at the same time, thanks to the magical gnome rats-in-hats of the internet. You see, there's not a lot of things I can do while listening to This Life. Im pretty much limited to playing video games (the most complex of which cannot exceed Zelda: Oracle of Seasons), and light reading material. It just so happens that I had Wikipedia'd⁹ Ira Glass right before this amazing moment of recognition with Jimmy Corrigan. I do this from time to time with celebrities that I enjoy or particularly admire. I like to chart my progress against them, and then judge my life accordingly.¹⁰
I hope you're all very ready for another cool thing, because it's about to slam you in the face when I tell you that at the very bottom of Ira's wikipedia page, there is a note that he dated popular cartoonist Lynda Barry¹¹ and that details of this relationship are chronicled in her graphic work One! Hundred! Demons!
You should all inhale sharply again because this is another book off the curriculum for my Graphic Narrative course! (Now at a Cool Vibration of 3.8!)

Meanwhile, in WebBrowser window number 8, my search for more information regarding the new This American Life television program (namely where I can watch it without paying for it) yields another reference to Chris Ware. Apparently he animated a brief section of a This American Life TV show. I was very excited at finding this. Chris Ware has a Cool Vibrations rating of at least 8.8 (which is actually so high on the Cool Vibrations scale that I should report it in Von Hugenstein's Awesomeness unit: The Viking), or 5.4vks. At this point, my searching was reaching a fevered pitch. The link at slate.com isn't working!¹² Oh no! Quick: cut to YouTube.
YouTube must have it - they have everything!

It doesn't take long to watch, and thoroughly enjoy, the short piece. The animation is smooth, and looks like it was done in Flash. But that doesn't matter, because it lends itself so well to Ware's style. I watch it at least twice.
After that, Im ready to finish up the episode of This Life that I was listening to way back when this whole thing started. You know, the one about "my brilliant plan?" Its about three or five billion lines of text above this exact spot, so go back, take a look and buy me a smoothie if you're lost.
I flipped iTunes back into drive and, again, get puzzled and have to stop what I am doing. I pause the show, and re-start the animation. And then I run both at the same time.

They have exactly the same theme music playing.

What? What's that?
No gasp? Nothing? Hold on just a second. The animation that I am watching on YouTube, that I found by chance surfing around killing time, has the exact same music in the background music as the show (which I had started listening to 9 weeks ago) I am listening to as I find the animation and you don't think that is completely amazing?!
Don't you see what just happened? I just wandered through a whole network of connections and coincidences, and got hit in the face by it. I just rode my low-flying cellphone right into the complex 3D structure of life's coincidences, while at the same time subtly drawing a comparison between the connection of people and things in life and the way things are connected and expressed on the internet, while simultaneously demonstrating how circular narratives carry a sense of completion which is greater than most!

It's a perfect 5.0 on the Cool Vibes meter.


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1². A few days ago I, along with the entire class, received a stern 'talking to' about the correct expression things like books (My Special Hemroid), Poems ('The Last Of The Great Goiters'), quotes ("The road turned and I didn't." (period inside the quotation marks)), and the like. I have no idea how a radio show is meant to be presented. I am also to lazy to look it up. Look, people. Look upon this blog and despair: the internet is degrading our beloved conventions. Tremble, mortals, at the misuse of the italics! The semi-colon! The hyphen!

2. Another strike against Journler - it has not built in superscript function. I had to use the 'Special Characters Palette' where, interestingly, "⁵" is located on line 2710 and "¹" is located on line 230.

3. The other great thing about it is that I can let them collect on my computer and, well, you all know about me and collecting things.

4. Episode 328. I likely used the incorrect expression, or citation or whatever. I'll see you in hell, MLA.

5. Episode 245, rerun.

6. On Showtime, apparently all the time.

7. Episode 324, "My Brilliant Plan." If one was willing, one could actually go through and plot exactly how much time I spent on all this through the subtle clues hidden throughout.

8. English 417, professored by the amazing E. S. Rabkin

9. "Photoshopped" and "Googled" are now acceptable terms, so it's only a matter of time.

10. This is, in fact, a very healthy activity. If you knew what some of your favorite personalities had to do when they were young to get where they are, it makes you think twice about your predicament. A friend of mine was recently struggling with some problems related to his band. He quit school very close to graduating to start taking music seriously. I told him to read the Wikipedia entry on Beck Hansen's early career. If you ever feel troubled about your life artistically, read the Beck entry.

11. I just wiki'd her and I feel pretty bad. She has a whole section, about 25-33%, of her bio dedicated to her relationship to Ira Glass. Truly, a measurement of someone's popularity.

12. What is slate.com, anyway? I hear them referenced constantly on NPR nowadays.

13. BONUS FOOTNOTE: This reminds me a lot of the Hypertexts that we are looking at in my Eng 407 class. Totally wiggy.

Behold! The Winner!

The Blog is not dead.
It was hibernating. It was hibernating because School was just too much for me to deal with. I've spent the past month hiding in the first floor Men's Room of Angell Hall - in the Handicapped Stall, aka. the best stall.

There's much to talk about! But since this is my first day back I don't want to pull a muscle so I'll keep it simple.
Over my spring break - many moons ago now, Phillip Eddy received his prize for winning the DESIGN MAX'S GIRLFRIEND contest.

See pictures over at the Picasa thing

Now many of you out there have stuff coming to you. Be patient, and you shall be rewarded!

It sure is good to be back on the internet.

An Update For the Future

We were going pretty strong with the blog thing, and then I got back from Break and had to deal with school again. 'Ts a bad time, these past few days. Way too busy. The Gargoyle budget needs to be finished up, and I have a board meeting to go to on Monday. Not to mention all the papers in my immediate future.

Bear with me, I'll be back soon.

In the meantime, here's Bob Dyaln singing the words to popular Dr. Suess books. Not really, but they sound awfully convincing. Dig it.

Free Wilco Trak!

For all those Wilco fans out there, the band is offering a free track off it's upcoming album Sky Blue Sky.

Dig it here.

The track listing for the album is also available in the 'NEWS' section of the site. Sadly, it looks like the amazing song 'Lets Not Get Carried Away,' didn't make the cut. That's really too bad, because there's nothing better than listening to Jeff Tweedy declare his intention to, "rock myself - today."

In other news, I have reached a new level of decadence. This morning I awoke and breakfasted on Orange Juice with Fillet MinJon(sic).