balloons are the only thing big enough to fill it up

The guy next to me woke me up with sounds of WHOOO and YEAAAH. That is mostly what I hear from him.

Gabe talked about this fritata he made that had a full pound of bacon and five eggs. It had a lot of the cheese in it as well but I forget what kind and how much.

It was a loafing around the apartment morning and afternoon. I worked on homework while watching Aliens. Then I cleaned up my apartment as best as I could. Well not the best but I emptied out the trash and wiped down the surfaces and shoved things under my bed. The usual.

I just ate a large portion of penne and garlic tomato sauce. Ohhh. So much garlic.

I have about 14 character facial designs. They are ending up pretty varied without pandering. I might throw in a couple that are similar, to give myself more of a challenge. This comic will be mostly character driven so the designs have to be solid. It causes a little bit of weakness to each one having to purge pages of design but through tweaking... I am not even to scripts or panels yet.

More YEAAHing from next door. I think the neighbor is 18, 17 last semester.

Dad called to thank me for the thank you card. All the ones I sent out are silk screened. I hope they all arrive, I sent out six.

I'm blogging early because yet again I have to head out to the train station. I did this routine two weeks ago. Another little mini visit from Llyw. I have a three day weekend all semester, perfect for visits from my Northern friends and family.

grubby little hands

Had a lovely breakfast of tea and pop tart and salad. Played Professor Layton while watching Alien. Good movie. Awesome on the projector. I love how my schedule doesn't start at 8am any day so when the weekend comes around I am not wiped out.

At around 4:30 I left to get the paper to print. I didn't dress that warm but the ride was quick. I ran into Junko at Utrect. I bought four sheets of overpriced paper. 16 bucks just for one crummy little edition. Outrageous! At least I don't have to pay for the ink and tools. The class was still hogging the space in the print studio so I chilled in the library for a while.

I grabbed a spot at the glass table in the Center Studio. Rainbow was there. I inquired a few riddles. Robin and Karen started doing some screen printing as well. I rolled up the ink, I prepared my station, and little by little I got advice on what I was doing wrong. Robin advised me about the ink spreading. Rainbow about the roller. Karen, well I forget what Karen advised maybe she didn't say anything. Both Rainbow and Robin encouraged me to use more pressure. Oh wait, Karen did as well. Robin also went, "ahh!!" and surprised me as I was laying the paper onto my block to print it. It was a frustrating time. Some of the prints came out really well actually. The block looks nice. It was a lot better once I switched to the press. The blacks were much more black. I like my print but I felt self conscious doing it around all the other more experienced printers.

My hands have the crud of ink on them. Whoo!

I swung by Trader Joe's to stock up on breadstuffs, pasta stuffs, and chili stuffs. Cheap food that could spread out a lot easier. I got some raisin cinnamon bread especially for the use of toasting.

Katie was making something for Dinner but I didn't have a share of it. I just had beef chili with bread. Then 9pm rolled around and it was time for Munchkin!

Poppy, Robin's sister, was over so we were teaching her how to play. The table was crowded with tea cups. We played Munchkin Impossible and only to 6 levels so Poppy could get a quick understanding. Adam won because he was fighting something that gave him 2 levels and we didn't notice. During the second game Karen and Diana left to do rounds. A couple of us snuck some extra levels because they were gone so long and we figured they wouldn't notice. Karen only caught on to Phil's mysterious nine levels. Adam was sitting back in his chair and I touched his arm and he fell over. It was funny. Adam has a bruise from being kicked in the head at his Ninja Fight Club that he goes to. I brought over my lollipop vase and shared the wealth. Karen won the second game by a lovely majority.

Phil was going to come over to watch Pan's Labyrinth after but hes allergic to cats and Katie was sleeping so we decided to call it a night.


The new hair looks great. The layers really bring out the curly nature of my hair. It is a wonderful update.

new 'do

Math was mathy. We had more probability stuff. More things about the birthday problem and adding probability of multiple things within set groups. Or whatever. I would take notes but I've found I loose track of what is being said when I try to write it all down.

Afterwards, Robin and I chilled in the South Studio and worked on our printing projects. A few members of the other class sat at our table and we talked about movies. Japanese movies. Korean movies. I finished my block up and had intention to print it after Digital Tools. I was forgetting something though...

I went to get some lunch and ran into Phil and we chatted about Mad Men. Karen showed up and we decided to go get haircuts! We both had a coupon for Bishop's so we went to the one in The Pearl. It only had one lady in there and Donna did both of our hair. Karen had some of the dead hair cut out but kept the same style. The lady styled it in a wavy way and it was a little too wavy for Karen. It added some volume but I think it was quite a surprise for her. Once she smoothed it out later in the day, it looked really nice. I had some of the poofy lower volume removed but it still has the length. The front layers cut back a little. The stylist flat ironed my hair so it looks different than it normally would. I think it will look good once it has my natural texture. It is nice and hip. Go me!

Karen and I strutted it back to PNCA and grabbed some JoJos. Then we chilled in the computer room and worked on our projects before class. I listened to my Pandora station using my awesome new headphones. They are massive and amazing. I got a few oooohs and ahhhs at them.

The first chunk of time was spent going over our first mini projects. The clock wasn't so good but in general I liked the piece. Next we moved on to a digital version of a painting project that some of us did in Farel's class. We took some screenshots and were repainting the color schemes. Mine, thus far, as really rough and all over the place. They look cool but I'm not sure what he wants from them. Still, when he saw what I was working on he gave some approval. During break I stuffed my face with Macaroni and Cheese. Sooo good. I need to get into the lunch making habit again though. Bagels! Creme Cheese! I need you!

I had neglected to buy paper to print on so I couldn't print after class. I loitered a little bit with Karen while she started work on a letterpress assignment and then I went home.

I have been playing Professor Layton and the Curious Village on Katie's DS. It is a puzzle and riddle game centered around this mysterious village. Some of the riddles are really ridiculously hard. I needed help on about four of them. It was suggested to me by Katie as a source of inspiration for the comic I am about to undertake. I'm not wasting time, I swear!

Karen stopped by for more House. Luna cuddled with her during the episodes. Tomorrow I shall print. I have a lot of stuff that needs to get done early in the weekend.

upgraded

My comic idea has to do with puzzles and riddles and job interviews. Or something. I'm still fleshing it out. It was well received by the intensive people. I got a few good suggestions for just how I could take it (I'm just scratching the surface). August is still crazy but in all good ways. Lacey has some nice shorts in store and Maddison is doing something about Lucifer. Before the class I canvased the school with some fliers encouraging people to Vote Trillian.

Karen gave me her wood cutting tools to borrow. Class was mostly a long lecture about carving, cleaning, inking, and all that. We went over our designs. My heron was mostly sketched out on the board while others were tightening up their designs. I was carving while Yoshi was talking (I payed attention as well). Tomorrow, during the break, I plan to finish carving and start printing. I only have to do 3 of each method (hand rubbing and the press). I'm pretty thrilled by the design and I think it will print well. Whoo!!

Comic Club was during lunch. It was mostly the usual faces talking about nerdy things and the high hopes we have and the odds of anything actually happening. There was pizza! I ate a lot of it! I volunteered to do the posters for next meeting. Now I need an idea.

There was, in theory, yoga tonight. I couldn't locate them though so I went home to pick up a mysterious package the Goose was holding for me. What was in the box was so awesome: new headphones! A belated birthday gift from Llyw. They are boss (my old ones started having cord problems a few weeks ago).

Seriously awesome headphones. Every song I listen to just sounds better. They are massive monsters and very distinctive. Katie says I look like a robot with them. This was probably, as a whole, my most awesome birthday. It was golden.

Robin and Karen came over for a few House episodes. We watched the one with the Romani who swallowed a toothpick, the one where house debates reason with a patient, and the one with the CIPA patient who has a tapeworm (my favorite episode). It was fun, but now it is late and I have to get up in eight hours.

Oh, I also did my laundry.

Miss Clock with Color (work in progress)

Work in progress, about 2 hours worth of time spent.

Ink brush line art with digital color.

red bump rising

Snow! More snow! It was snowing when I got up. And it had even stuck a little. To be safe, I opted out of biking to school and walked with Karen. There was no word of cancellation so we trudged on in many many layers.

I got a couple problems wrong with the math work but that was mostly in the tally sections where I included some of the probable outcomes twice. He threw more probability at us, such as the probability of drawing this AND that and with or without replacement. Robin was very sarcastic and the teacher called her out a little. In a silly way. That girl, ooohh.

So after class, Karen showed me how to screen print! She showed me how to apply the emulsion, how to clean the screens, how to expose, how to set up an image to expose, and all that. We did it in two parts, separated by digital painting. It is pretty easy. I should get a screen, whoo! Have screen printing Tuesdays or something.

A guy came in and talked to us about our opinion of the school. He was looking to apply and wanted some student opinions so we gave him ours.

I am going to run for Student Clubs Coordinator. I will be a little chunk of change at the end of the semester. I will help sort out the clubs and all that. I'm up against Jeremy and Melissa (not a Melissa I know, actually I am not even sure if that is her name err). I think I have a good chance. I'm running my campaign with "Accept whatever brings us together". Like, silly clubs are okay as long as people show up. That is the point after all. I have a poster ready to photocopy and post tomorrow. I might do a larger version as well. Get right on it! Yeah!

Digital Painting was super fun. We mostly played around with sketches in photoshop. Played around with layer blending and brushes and the massive Wacom tablets. Mine is so junior compared to these puppies. I am working on a picture of Miss Clock. It is mostly two color shading with minimal fancy techniques. I'll play with it some more on Thursday. For a late snack, Karen and I split some JoeJoes from Safeway. Mmm, warm potato wedges.

After class, Karen showed me how to print. The two MFA's were in there as well. They were doing this quite massive prints. The one I was doing was very tiny. It worked out FABULOUS! I still need to master the application of smooth color but I will get there. I pulled some quality, single color prints. Go me! We missed the streetcar by a couple minutes so we walked back. Our return home became a musical as we sang our thoughts and feelings and ideas in a lovely, tone deaf manner.

I worked on my campaign poster and my woodblock design. The poster, which is more of a flier, is done. The woodblock is readyish. I feel like it needs something...well I'll find out.

I sent out thank you cards tonight. Well I put them in the box drop so they will go out tomorrow.

Miss Clock - Rejected Sketch

A character sketch I did for my comic concept last night. The body shape became overworked so I scrapped it.

taxman

Illustration Studio! Whoo! I'm always excited for my core classes because well, that is what I am here for. The class has a large number of familiar faces (minus, sadly, Bekka and Madeline who are in the Friday class). Dominic, Robin, April, Kevin, Janessa and her boy, Jon W, Chelsey, and Marilyn are all there. The teachers switched and we have Joe instead of Daniela (same Joe that teaches Digital Painting). It looks to be a fun class. He has an awesome background and is very varied and hip and "with it". We started out with doing some doodles and exchanging them and making the doodles into something. Mine became a person recoiling, I thought it worked pretty cool. We were doing this thing while he sorted out the projector. The introduction was similar to the other class but I didn't stutter through mine as much. I mentioned liking Tony Moore and Joe mentioned knowing him. Everyone knows everybody.

We took an early lunch and I grabbed some soup from Yo's. He raised his prices sadly but damn that soup is good and filling. I sat at a table in the library by myself but then Mel and Melissa joined me, and then J (formally known as Jen), and then Madeline. It was a nice lovely feeling to have so many people around me. The early lunch ended short of an hour so I had to head back prematurely.

We did a drawing exercise and talked about the syllabus. We will be doing a steady amount of life drawing homework. Sounds great, I have a good rhythm for that type of thing. The last hour of class was spent pretending the classroom was a coffee shop and drawing one another. It was fun. I have high hopes for this class.

Got all my tax info in. Now to do it. Also got my shiny new license. Yay! No more wielding my passport around.

Finished rewriting my math homework in the proper form. Finished a drawing for some extra project. Wrote out most of the riddles for my comic. It was productive.

The girls came over for a few episodes of House. Robin really doesn't like his character, what with him being a jerk and all. A little House goes a long way. I worked on my work, they worked on theirs, and it was a nice little night.

day and a fourth

The metal bleachers hurt my bum. Stupid, affordable seating. I dressed too lightly for the kind of weather that was happening, namely snow. Bloody snow! Nothing worth sticking but still snow. I met Jason and Joe on the Max. They were on the blue and we coordinated so they wouldn't have to get off and meet me. Jason had about four layers on, I had three and no scarf and thin jeans. It wasn't so bad but it wasn't that great either. We switched to the Yellow and rode it all the way to the last stop. I've only gone to the last stop on the Red before (for the airport). The Expo Center is huge! There were like, three events going on. It took us a while to find the Rose City Rollers. Well not a while but when we found them, it was fairly obvious.

It was great to see such a turn out. There were 8 bleachers around a flat, temporary rink (it was some sort of large, constructed rubber mat). They all filled up. We sat on the high part so we could get a good view of the whole thing. Our little trio was there about 45 minutes early. The show started with an awesome drum line and then two annoying announcers came out and gabbed. The teams were introduced and each member went out and posed. There was The Guns N' Rollas, the Heartless Heathers, The High Rollers, and the Break Neck Betties. I was rooting for the Heartless Heathers because their outfits were not showy and they looked serious. Roller Derby is where girls on skates go in circles and one person gets points by overtaking the other teams skaters after getting ahead of them and getting back around. There is a lot of shoving and pushing and falling and about 6 referees are needed. All the girls had pretty amazing toned legs and a few had awesome outfits. A fun thing about Derby is that all the girls come up with puns for their names. My favorites were Wreck Deckard and J.K. Rolling. The first bout was between The Break Neck Betties and Guns N' Rollas. It was close but GNR came out on top. They had a really good strategy. The points can get racked up fairly quick in Roller Derby. Heartless Heathers beat the High Rollers by nearly double in their bout. They were near 100 by the end of the half hour period.

Halftime had a not really all that good musical act. I was too busy waiting in line for the bathroom to pay much attention. A lady came by and directed the line to a secret ladies room father down the hall. No waiting! Hurrah! After that, Jason and I shared a lemonade slushie that had almost too much sugar for me. Chilly drink, chilly hall, chilly Trill, oh well!

The next two bouts were first the losers vs the losers and then the winners vs the winners. Break Neck Betties lost to the High Rollers by a larger margin. Near the end you could really tell how exhausted the players were. They just were not going as fast or being able to overtake one another. The Heartless Heathers won again by almost double again. They really slayed GNR. I rooted for them and they did it. Whoo! Roller Derby is fun but my attention would drift. It didn't change up enough that it was gripping for all two hours of it. At 9:30, we numbly staggered towards the yellow line. It was waiting there for us and we grabbed some seats. It became really crowded as its departure time loomed. We rode it to Pioneer Place and switched to the other train. A quick hug and a peck on the cheek was exchanged and I waved goodbye to Jason and Joe as they scooted off to Beaverton.

Katie and her friend Patty were watching Santa's Slay. I huddled up in my room doing other things for a while but I cam out when they put on The Hunger, a sort of Vampire movie from the 80's which stars David Bowie. It had nice direction but I was so tired that it went right over my head. Still, I watched it all and then went to bed.

Today I slept in! Big surprise!

I put on Dead Ringers and worked on the initial layout sketches for my first woodblock. It is going to be one of those pieces that several things collect together to make another shape. I am having several animals form to make a face. My face as it is for a self portrait assignment. Now I need to collect references and do a proper version. I also wrote out some ideas for my comic. Dead Ringers was WEIRD. It was good and it was a good psychological thriller but it left me feeling very disturbed. Jeremy Irons plays twin genius infertility doctors and their lives fall apart and they both go crazy. It was weird but well constructed. The madness descent was very balanced.

I finally finished watching A Very Long Engagement. Jean-Pierre Jeunet rocks.

I ate a gigantic dinner and then went over to Robin and Diana's for Munchkin and then I found out that they were preparing a dinner for all of us. I had a small little taco but that was all I could really manage. I was so totally stuffed. Beyond that really. But it is good to eat eat eat because some days I don't eat as much as I should. We played Munchkin Bites at first and it was fun but then we started exchanging riddles and word games and things and it fell apart. I left earlier than others. I wasn't feeling too good. Might have been the excess of food.

Tomorrow is the first day of my new Illustration Studio. New teacher. I heard that the class might be technique focused. Hmmn.

Initial thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Spencer. Thank you for the wonderful card, I promise I did not spend my birthday money all at once (I think I have some left even). Averie also sent me a card, that was awesome. Dad's fine wooden bowl is containing balloons right now and I am wearing the awesome Singapore shirt.