11 posts tagged “summer”

In light of the sequential nature of my final art project, my friend Pidge gave me an epic-sized graphic narrative work by an artist named Zak Smith.  The title, *ahem* Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow (phew!), well enough explains the project.  The 760 illustrate pages of the book are rendered in parallel to each of the 760 pages of Thomas Pynchon's novel Gravity's Rainbow, a fascinating project on its own account. 

I briefly fingered through the first 40 out of 760 pages of illustrations, all strange and wonderful and at times so effortlessly fluctuating between the familiar and the abstract.  I had to, unfortunately, restrain myself.  I have not yet read Gravity's Rainbow,  and I sensed that it was important that I should read it  before I became to attached to the images in the book.  Before I put Smith's work to rest, I showed  the first 40 illustrations to Chico.  He marveled at them, and  immediately  thought of incorporating  them into some sort of  piece he could  hang in his house.  He determined he would buy a copy of Smith's work himself, and  this afternoon we headed to Barnes and Noble to  each pick up a copy of  Thomas Pynchon's work.

So now we are on a mission.  We're reading Gravity's Rainbow and then exploring Zach Smith's illustrations.  I think it'll change the pace of things around here.  More page flipping, less button pushing, or something to that extent.  But I'm looking forward to it.  Reading Adventures!  Horray!

The first month of summer can sometimes be a little wonky.  As one would expect after surrendering the life of a procrastinating second semester senior, the days get a little easier without finals, theses and whatnot to lazily avoid.  We make up for the dead space though with what we can; catching up on blogs, reading books we've been meaning to read, finding little projects we can invest in, and improving our personal hygiene.

This weekend Chico and I attempted to be as active as we could with all our free time.  On Thursday we went to Prospect Park to catch the end of the

free Neville Brother's concert that launched the Celebrate Brooklyn series of concerts this summer, which we attended with cappuccinos and desserts in hand.  Friday evening we were picked up by my friend Harrison and visited his lake house up near Monticello for the weekend, which was full of casual boating, food, fishing, and other fun 'weekend getaway' activities.  While it was thunder storming outside the house had a Guitar Hero competition.  It ended with Chico and I neck to neck playing Freebird on hard.  I came in first by a mere 150 points or something. (*raises the roof*)

What's in store for this week?  A ton of movie watching, bluegrass, haircuts and hair dying (yes, again, I think my color has faded so now its an awkward brownish blonde), Wii Tennis Tournament at Barcade, and cooking.  Oh, and hopefully I'll finish Jumping Flash!

While I was getting my most recent pair of disposable cameras developed, I walked around the neighborhood for an hour to get a grasp of what was surrounding me.  Many small deli's and fruit stands, a lot of banks, a lot of cellphone stores.  Moderately crowded streets around 6:15 PM.  Several dogs being walked between business folk and students.  The sun was still beating down as it was heading west, but the shadows of buildings stood long and thick across the sidewalks.

I meandered around for about an hour until I found a grocery store near-by.  At that point I still had about 25 minutes to kill, so I grazed the shopping aisles very slowly, trying to determine what I could easily carry back to the apartment with me, and what wouldn't melt.  I savored fruit, particularly peaches, but the peaches the grocery store had were too small, so I opted for cheap canned peaches instead. Not the same, I know, but canned peaches can be somewhat romantic for a broke graduate straight out of college, right?  I picked up my photos, head back to the roof of the apartment, and forked slices of syrupy peaches while flipping through my print outs.

It was a nostalgic dual set of photos from the last half of senior week.  Mostly photos of my house and living room, and the good folks getting sauced here and there.  Duane Reade will put white borders around your print outs for free, which left the oddly focused disposable camera shots somewhat artsy, if you can believe it.  I'm happy with what I paid for, and tossed around the idea of only using disposable cameras from now one.  But in the long run it'd be much cheaper to get a digital camera again.  I'll have to do some thinking.

Later in the night I started After Dark, ate more peaches, met another person who lives in the building. Wrote up my very first Beta-Tester report for a friend's game and tried with all of my might to beat Gamma Bros, but still couldn't get passed the third level.  It's a deliciously fun game though, so try it if you get a chance!

I have to admit, I've been a little sluggish getting back into the swing of doing anything productive since graduation.  While the internet used to resonate as a guilty pleasure for procrastination amidst my school work, it has to some degree lost its addictive magnetism now that I only have to do what I want to do.  But I do want to post on Vox, so never fear.  I'll be here.

Chico's been busy working as a production assistant for the Fi Fi awards, a three day gig that he has to work from 5pm and 5am.  Meanwhile, the house cat Kitten keeps me company, and I've managed to make my way out to the world on my own now that I have my own set of apartment keys.  Last night I attended a preview screening of a documentary about Blipfest with my friend Analog Pigin, followed with a tasty dinner at La Esquina and a few beers at a bar where I coincidentally ran into four Vassar friends.  Ian gave me two graduation gifts; Haruki Murakami's new book After Dark, and the Pupshaw and Pushpaw Vinyl figurines that I've been longing to own for a year or so now ever since I read The Frank Book.

Today? Some reading, catching up on internets.  Archiving animated .gif's I've started to collect.  Cleaning.  Maybe groceries.  Beta testing a super secret game! Toys 'r' Us is only a few blocks away and I'm tempted to walk on by and pick myself up a new DS game.  Any suggestions?  Pokemon perhaps?

yesterday morning at 10:40 am I had my final critique with the art department.  a solo, one vs. five affair that lasted a clean 20 minutes.  they had no band things to say about my senior project (yes!) and were captivated by these tiny collages I made in addition to my cnn drawings (swell!).  that is all taken care of.  one paper and one final left until freedom (so close).

the rest of the day was spent waiting in a stand-still line for 3 hours to get tickets for the various events during senior week and catching up on lost sleep from the night before.  There was a heady heat outside of AC territory, and at times it felt like northern new york had suddenly become kansas.

Our school has this tradition called 'Primal Scream' that happens at midnight the night before finals start.  It happens both semesters; students collect around the central quad between all of the dorms, and when midnight strikes everyone explodes in a collective, cathartic scream.  If you came upon the scene with no understanding of what was going on, it would probably appear to resemble a campus-wide sacrifice.  Not to mention, following all the screaming a herd of naked seniors come running around the dorms.  A good handful of my friends decided last minute to participate in the nekkid bits, but I decided to keep it on the down low and just watched them run around instead.

 It was a surreal night, followed by a heavy, solid, duration of sleep.  I'll be done in a week.  Is that scary or what?

I have made it to the east and it is wet.  It has been pouring all day long as the entire student body moves on to campus.  Only after I have moved everything into the kitchen, picked up my keys, had an official 'back to campus' party evening, and recieved three backed up issues of Wired from my school mailbox do I have time to post. The desk is set, the speakers at moderate blast, my keychain is full but my room is empty, and this is only the beginning.  There is much left to do.

Leaving  home was a bit more difficult than I had imagined.  Everyone from work gave me a tremendously warm goodbye, and I still wish that I didn't have to clear my desk and run so quickly back home on the 5:30 train that evening.  Immediatly after, I drove to have my last family dinner at a favorite Chinese restaurant Chef Chu's.   Both of my siblings then left the house for the evening before I left; my brother was in socal for his freshman year orientation and my sister was at her first highschool's dance.  Packing to leave a vacant house is somewhat unsettling, so I took the opportunity that evening to get a few snapshots of the dying hours of sunlight that hung over my backyard all summer. 

Its always hard to follow up an incredible summer with a window view of soggy lawns and dripping street lamps.  I'm not entirely in my element yet, but I know I will have to get on the boat and start racing before I can  get my senses together.  I've only been here two days and I already have four meetings set up for thursday and friday.  It's going to be a long semester but its going to go quick.

In two weeks, the summer will be officially over and I will be flying away to the East to finish off my last year in college.  As was expected, summer will finish before it barely begun.  I'm pleased that I chose to come back home for the summer.  I read more books on my own than I ever have before, had amazing opportunities, and remembered what it felt like to be in California again

I had time to think and rest, something I desperately needed before I start my senior year.  As soon as I get back to the east coast I'm going to be living in a house with four incredible guys, taking three courses, working on my senior art project, working a part time job, and working an internship in the city two days a week.  I'm excited to get back in the busy swing of things, but I'm scared of everything flying by too quickly.  I always get nervous before I go back to school, but this time (unless, I go to graduate school at some point) will be the last summer before school starts, so I'm a little more anxious than usuall.  It'll be exciting and wonderful, but I really don't want to grow up yet. 

So I have two weeks to get my ultimate rest on.  Two more weeks to maybe read a couple more books, hang out with my sibbies, say goodbye to a few more friends, and maybe do a few paintings.  So its the final countdown, but just to make things fun, this is too: