the joker says what

Just got back from watching Batman in Pioneer Courthouse Square. Gee whiz was that cheesy! The Joker was great but yeesh, everything else is so dated! Thank God for Bale, but will Ledger be as good? He will be a different kind of good.

Well this orientation was good. Learned stuff, really met people and got a better idea of it all. Waking up early is a pain but I'll get used to it. Lindsay and I walked to school, a nice trot and the weather was mild so I wasn't oozing sweat like I normally do after that long of a walk. Ate some free Krispy Kreme and some OJ and things got quickly into the daily introductions. I ran into Israel again and asked if anyone has ever told him that he looked like Rich Hall before, and he said no. I get that I look like Kirsten Dunst...well I've only gotten it about four times but that's three times more than I've been told I look like Avril Lavigne and those are the only celebrities I've been told I look like. Well, upon Googleing Rich Hall I guess he doesn't look much like him...at all. Don't know what put that thought in my head. I think it might be the eyebrows? I hope he forgets and doesn't Google him or that he doesn't look me up on the PNCA homeroom and reads this, seeing as how I link this from that site.

The technology presentation guy was a little bit whacky. Before his presentation he played really intense operatic movement and sort of did a dance along with it, then his presentation about technology rules (and lots of Apple product placement)was overloaded with cute pictures of kittens, puppies and other adorable stock art. Then we did a group art project where we were sorted into tables and we each would draw a part of someone else on a paper and then change papers and draw a part from someone else. Rather fun, my features that were drawn was my flowery top and my hair swoop. Learned more names: Maryanna, Fiona, and Will.

After bonding over drawing we went to little overviews of the the different majors offered at PNCA. I ran into Karen and Sean at the illustration overview. The teacher was enthusiastic, but the room was really lifeless. A lot of the PNCA classrooms are dull looking and no frills. To be spiced up by the students I guess. I met Mallory and Garrett (Garett?) through our mutual interest in Grant Morrison and comics. Thus far those two are the only people who I've met who share this interest, sort of disappointing but I guess less genre competition? Mallory, Karen and I decided to check out painting. The nice guy there explained some of the international programs, which sound really cool. There are semester ones, month long, and weeks long programs all over the place. Would love to participate in one.

Next was glorious lunch. Ate my sandwich with Mallory, Karen, Mike, and three other people whose names escape me. I finished up early so I went and sorted out my stuff with registration and whatnot. Changed my address, paid for my portfolio starter package (which has so much stuff and is really heavy and will NOT be fun to lug around), and told the nice lady about my transcript being on its way. I won the raffle during lunch (actually I won yesterday as well, Kendra also won a second time today) and got a teeshirt, yesterday I got a gift certificate for Yo's cart.

The following talk was just about the need-to-know names and who you go to if you want anything. They went through it all so fast, I should have taken down notes. Oh well, I can always ask. PNCA has so many programs and it is set up so well. I can't wait to utilize all that it has to offer. Can't believe I start in four days (FOUR DAYS!!! AHHH!!!!) it is here all ready. Just seems like yesterday Marchetti was suggesting I'd just be doing art as a hobby in my future.

Then we were given a break and I played some pool. We all couldn't really play which was the fun. I did manage to get two balls into pockets within one turn, go me! Didn't get any in after that, but I still won because Heather accidentally pushed the Eight Ball in.

There was a reception for us at the Museum of Contemporary Craft so as a big group we meandered that way, stopping in at a few galleries. I couldn't wait to go home, my feet were killing me after being on them all day but I couldn't pass of free food so I went on the tour (a lot of people didn't). I managed to get back to PNCA to pick up my portfolio (they let us set them behind the front desk so we didn't have to carry it to the gallery) and get back to the streetcar just in time. It got well packed and I got off with some fellow PNCA peeps. The portfolio is HEAVY and HUGE, I hope I can figure out an easier way to lug it around. The strap hurts my shoulder, I don't know how I'll deal with it if I bike, and it is so unmanageable. But that was just due to it being stuffed with goodies, once I thin it out it should be better.

It wasn't long relaxing before it was time to group up and go see Batman. I brought my banana bread and Beth, Kendra, Alisa, Matt, Mike, Chris, M, and I got there with plenty of light and nabbed a pretty good spot. They gave out free popcorn (massive amounts of free popcorn) and tossed glowy cups (Alisa got one)into the crowd. Lindsay met us there and we all had a jolly good time with the kitsch.

My banana bread went over pretty well, I think I'll make another loaf for the pot luck tomorrow. There are talks of going to the art museum but it is pretty early so I think I'll give it a pass for now (probably will go for school anyway). Tomorrow, I think I will get sneakers.

dull dull dull

Man the second orientation was just a longer and more boring version of the first. Blah blah this is your time, blah blah make of it what you will, blah blah you guys are the biggest group EVER (190!). I hope tomorrow is better, or else I'll feel I just wasted that time. Did win a gift certificate for Yo's cart and got a free tote and some ice cream at the end, but it wasn't worth it.

Met a guy named Israel who looks like Rich Hall and a girl who had nerdy parents liked mine but named her Leia instead. People had props for their student ID cards. One person had a fake knitted beard that she wore, that was pretty cool.

Saw Karen, a friend from Bremerton. We took driver's ed together and years later we were in ballroom dancing together. She dyed her hair a nice dark color and looks fabulous! She has an apartment, would be cool if she was in the dorms but no such luck as they are full.

So I guess meeting Karen was a cool thing. Also ran into Liam, who I met last year (he hasn't changed a bit) and joked around abit about thinking Daniel Duford as Mark Wahlberg to be less intimidated by him. Speaking of professors, I met Kurt D. Holloman, who looks a little grayer up top but remembered me with gusto, which was awesome. He remarked about his drawing of me in his sketchbook (less the creepy than it sounds: we were open air drawing and I sat down in the middle of his scene so I ended up being included) and later I remembered that I was wearing the same shirt as I was the day of the drawing so that probably helped jog his memory a little. Hanna from last summer is attending PNCA, along with Joey. Only got to chat her up a little but that was pretty cool. Nice to see familiar faces. Sort of boggling my mind that in a months time I have no idea what my relationship with any of these people could evolve into.

But uhg, orientation was lame. One more to go to, yaaay. A warm up for waking up way too early.

Went to Safeway to get ingredients to make Banana Bread because I felt like baking and using my new (second hand) Betty Crocker. $20 dollars of ingredients to make one loaf! Yaay! Well had to buy a bunch because I'm building up my cabinets from scratch. If it is tasty (haven't tried it yet) might make a second for the Pot Luck on Saturday.

Batman tomorrow! Whoo! So exciting.

rarr! manly!

Just got back from a very manly night of watching 300. Just sort of hung out with Matt, Chris, Kendra, Rob and for a shorter time Sean and Bryan (formally Brian, found out I was spelling his name wrong. Oops.) They put their couch onto their porch/balcony/walkway (on the first floor, all the rooms have sliding glass doors opening into a walkway which doubles as a semi-porch) and we sat about. Most people were tired, last few days to stay up and sleep in and this was the first day where we were expected to be somewhere. Course they switched the orientation around so we were starting at noon, so that isn't a big expectation for someone.

The orientation was a sort of bummer. I walked there with Rebeccah (Rebekka? Rebecah? I dunno), Allison, and Grace. Not such a bad walk, you can walk to PNCA in less time than it takes to drive to OC. It was hot, very hot. It brings back memories from last summer of working in the 3D building with no A/C. Brutal but brilliant. I got there right on time, they handed out some pamphlets and talked about generic stuff that I could have all ready figured out from all the information they have given us before. We all introduced ourselves, said where we are from, and recommended a movie. I suggested Jean-Pierre Jeunet's Delicatessen, which got a "yeah!" from Jax. There's easily 10 people from Washington, and two girls from Silverdale. No other state seemed to represent as much as Washington. Then they had us talk to our roommates over this pamphlet we filled out, mine wasn't there (working) so I talked to Mollie from Alaska and the Silverdale chickas.

Then we had the option of getting our ID cards early, instead of waiting in longer lines over the next two days. They did it in Photobooth on a mac and let us choose our own photos. My hair has a cute flip to it in my photo. As I was signing it, my pen slipped so my signature is sort of fudged. Looking at my ID photo makes me think, "Golly, when did I get mature?" Everyone was tired so a consensus formed that it was nap time. I picked up a bulletin board and a white board and caught the streetcar.

Chatted with roomie, watched the last of Series Three of Doctor Who, ate some hot dogs and meandered my way down to Chris and Matt's for the evening hang-out. Oh shoot I left my vegetable oil in their room. Oh well I'll pick it up tomorrow.

CSI: Goose Hollow

I woke up this morning to find this on my bathroom counter:

Mine just wanted to be alone with Crest. The pair of them are hoping Curler can keep her mouth shut.

joey!

At Kendra's dinner party-esque shindig I came face to face with Joey as he walked through the door. Joey! From last summer at PNCA. San Fransisco Joey. It was pretty "holy cow! you!"

Since the nicer camera came from the parents today I went out and snapped photos. I showed up at Mike & Brian's at 1pm and Brian was just rolling out of bed. He gave it a pass and Mike, Sean (who came a knocking on the door), and I went out to take pictures of the city. We started off on a search for Portlandia. We went the wrong way for a while, but looped back easily enough. Sort of odd how anyone could miss a huge crouching woman like that. There was a rumbly in our tumblies and we found our way to Pioneer Courthouse Square where there are lots of foodcarts. We opted for the Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich Guy, who was fun to talk to even though he hated mayonnaise. The sandwiches took a while (made fresh) but were worth it. The Cheesesteak Guy told us that they were playing Batman in the Square at dusk on Friday, so we are totally going to see that, not sure who "we" is yet but plenty of people seem up for it. Sean had to pick up his GI bill from PNCA so we headed off.

PNCA is in the middle of cleaning/setting up. There is some art around, nothing huge. Walking around the halls once more, so familiar but I have the feeling I will be sick of it in a few years. All the more reason to study abroad.

Sean split to deposit his paycheck, so we headed back to hang out and draw. We didn't get to drawing right away as Mike played Matthew Barney's Cremaster 3 on his laptop. I got to sketching and inked about half of a lady floating about with tubing. I just finished inking it a few minutes ago.

At 7:15 we headed up to Kendra's place in the tower for a shindig for all the PNCA people we've met thus far. I wore my wig for some daft reason, I guess to make an impression? Maybe I should have waited to break out the wig. Oh well. It was itchy and I took it off and then Mike put it on. Then took it off. I mingled and chatted, put the effort into learning names of people that don't even go to PNCA. Saw Joey, and the two I met in the elevator the day before. All in all I'd say there was 18-22 people, thankfully we live in dorms that can handle that. I left about 10:30, even though things were still going.

Like I said earlier I stayed up and inked the image and now it is time for beddy-bye. Orientations start tomorrow. Huzzah!

the coffin is moving!

Went to the movies with Sean. We saw Death at a Funeral. I was really surprised, I found it very funny. I haven't heard much buzz about it so I was worried it was an unfunny flop. Well cast, well acted, well set up. I'd like to see it again, with mum and Celia who I bet would get a kick out of it. Most of the R rating for the movie comes from Alan Tudyk's bum. Lots of good trailers for Focus features, and now that I am living in a city I will actually be able to see them.

I took it easy yesterday, I'm still aching. Got both of my care packages from home so now I can eat candy, charge batteries, take photos with a camera that doesn't shut off after one photo, and straighten my hair while knowing the days of the week.

Finally, finally, got to the episodes with the Master in Doctor Who. Here come the drums!!

legs

Whoo! Ice skating! My ankles hurt, my knees hurt, and I am generally sore. But I feel GREAT! Fun to try new things, fun to meet new people. And that is what I have been doing. New PNCA people popping up all over the place.

Went out with Brian and Mike to the ice rink at Lloyd Center, we tried rounding up more people but they weren't up for it. Walked to the free zone for the Max and we got there just in time, no waiting. I was worried that the rink might be occupied by classes and what-not, you know little kids flailing about and falling, but it was open for everyone. The lady behind the counter sort of pestered Mike, saying, "you aren't going to pay for her?" Hee hee. We got our skates and put our shoes into locker number 42. We all were stuck with figure skates, something Mike wasn't familiar with. Well I wasn't stuck with them, seeing as how the last time I skated was in Scotland and I have a faint memory of me screaming and dad forcing me out on the ice, in the way that dads to. Happily, I only fell about four, five times. The first time was when I scratched up my knee, the times after that were to avoid people who suddenly decided it would be a good idea to stop. The scratches weren't so bad, they only started dripping blood when they got wet from another fall. I came to a sudden stop against the wall and this lady laughed at me and later on when I got off the rink to tend to the dripping blood from my knee the same lady apologized for laughing at me.

We stopped skating for the Zamboni to do its work, and had one last skate and then we trekked up to the food court. My trek was wobbly, my ankles hurt so bad. I really do not know how to skate upright. Mike and I had Steamers, Brian had a lemonade from the humiliating Hot Dog on a Stick. We decided to return to Goose Hollow, and again we just caught the max. A man ranted about Mexicans not even speaking their own language.

Mike had heard/read/telepathically picked up that there was free, open life drawing at PNCA at 6:30 and I tagged along. We walked the 20+ blocks to PNCA only to find out that the school closes down at 6:00pm on Sunday, so no life drawing. The trip wasn't a total loss, I introduced Mike to the wonder that is Tea Zone and we sat and sipped matching Purple Mountain's Majesty iced teas while waiting for the streetcar to arrive. Easy, quick trip back.

Running into Brian when we got to the dorms, he said that a few of the other PNCA people were going to the Italian festival going on in the Pioneer Courthouse Square and so we joined them. Keeping with the theme that nothing happens late night on Sunday (see: figure drawing) we got there and the Italian festival was shutting down. Bummer. So we decided to just hang out for the rest of the night in the dorms.

It was a fun day and I was exhausted as I finally got into bed. So great down here. Eight days till school starts.

chugga chugga chugga chugga CHOO CHOO

At about 10pm there was a knock on my door and there was a PNCA person standing outside it. He introduced himself as Daniel and said there was a group of us going about trying to find other PNCA people, so I joined the PNCA train of people and met a ton more people who were all friendly and nice and we roamed Goose Hollow chatting till about 2am. Well not so much roam as move to one place to not be loud near the doors, to moving outside because we were hot due to the stuffy corridors, to moving to one persons room because we were cold to moving to another room that was in the Tower (most of the PNCA rooms are in the Plaza section of Goose Hollow) and there we stayed until we all were well tuckered out.

Earlier, between my delicious buffalo burger and my stick of corn, the RA knocked on Sean's door. So we paused Zodiac and chatted, shes really friendly like. She said that there are 80 people from PNCA staying in Goose Hollow, and there is a waiting list for people wanting to stay here.

I'm meeting new people, and trying so hard to remember their names. I attach their name to something useless taking up my brain. My RA is Jennifer, so I attached her name to Jennifer Saunders, there's Brian who shares the same name as another friend of mine who was in Stargate SG-1, Mike who shares his name with my last bossman, Chris and Matt I met as a pair so I remember them as "Chris and Matt", Amina because I once drew a character by the name of Mina. Eirin, whose named is pronounced the same as a certain Martha Stewart employee I know. But that's as far as I got. There's a Beth I know that much but I don't know which of the remaining two girls I hung out with was Beth.

I had a dream that Matthew Barney and Maya Lin were giving a slide show to PNCA and me, my mom, and auntie Celia were the only people that showed up.