The Yeti Revisited

Sketches

2007-03-31T11:53:00.000-04:00

Quick scans from the nude figure drawing session at amherst college on thursday eve. I want to go to more of these, they're great practice. (And free!)

The Climb, page two

2007-03-22T13:14:00.000-04:00

I finished this one a couple weeks ago, and just managed to scan it. I am pleased with how it turned out. There are a couple things I would do differently, but that's why each page is a learning experience.

Veronica Spunk character portraits

2007-03-09T13:17:00.000-05:00

Some character sketches based on a picture of a friend of mine. I used the character in a class project, which I have yet to scan. I'd like to do more with her, but I'm not sure what just yet.

She's an anachronistic 1940s style fighter pilot. All of my ideas for this character involve alternate history. Also, she has a robot friend named Klanky. The first picture is a better scan, but the proportions are weird and the ink was bleeding. Second one has much more 'tude, plus accessories.

Gay Robot Sex!

2007-02-21T23:47:00.000-05:00

So, this is my current project in Sequential Imagery. When I presented the unfinished pages to the class, the critiques were that I either needed to vary the line more, or find a way to add depth, such as tone or color. So I colored a bit, and I really like it so far. All four pages will inevitably find themselves here, but this little preview is all I have so far.

It was strange to be working in color, and on my Wacom again after almost two months of just getting back to "the basics" with pen and ink. I think I've grown since last time, and I know the limits of my own understanding of color and line a bit better.

Pope Fantastic, etc.

2007-02-21T23:39:00.000-05:00

Finally, after a half a year of hype, I present the first ever full page comic regarding Pope Fantastic and the Cardinals Amazing. I cannot take credit for the name, which was actually devised as a potential band name by a friend of a friend. This comic was a fun respite from course work where I could just goof off and not worry about making it good. Of course, I did end up thinking about some formal elements, such as how to use overblown Kirby-esque panel transitions to create humor. But of course that's a side note to the pure, unadulterated dumb that this comic let me revel in.

The Climb, part I

2007-02-06T14:04:00.000-05:00

This is the first page of four. It is based on a dream that was described to me by a friend. I quite like it so far, and I'm really proud of certain effects. I'll post more at length about this one later.

Well, well

2007-02-06T14:00:00.000-05:00

This is my first project for Sequential Imagery I. I wanted to play with the idea of panel-less transitions, what they do to a page, and what it takes to have it still be read in sequence rather than as one big picture. Also, I enjoy the sort of demented story that forms here.

Also, this is my first experimentation with a nib pen and india ink. It's quite smooth, and I enjoy the line variation on some of the nibs. Very fun.

Last of the Comics Workshop

2007-02-06T13:56:00.000-05:00

Here are the two full pages I did for the end of Comics Storytelling, with nice resolution. Everybody loved the couple in the first one and requested more of the story. The second page jumps ahead to the moment of their first argument and their first kiss.

The Saga of Spot the Snail

2007-01-23T14:49:00.000-05:00

In Making Comics, Scott McCloud identifies six basic panel transitions that are used to convey stories in comics. For our first assignment in our comics workshop we were to draw one example of each of these transitions in three panels each. The first one listed here was a random idea that then took over the rest of the panels (with the exception of the final one, which is more of an exercise in absurdity) to form a mini-story which I have titled The Saga of Spot the Snail. There's more information about the six transitions at Scott McCloud's web site.

These quick sketches were later hand inked when I first bought my pens and wanted to ink everything I could get my hands on. Nothin' special, just wanted to throw some black lines down so it would pick up better on the scan. The pages later got crinkled in the great room shift of last weekend. Hence weirdness.

Moment to Moment

Subject to Subject

Action to Action

Scene to Scene

Aspect to Aspect

Non Sequitur Transition

A Promise of Updates to Come

2007-01-21T11:47:00.000-05:00

Having just finished Bone by Jeff Smith (amaaaazing!) and Making Comics, by Scott McCloud, and with the approach of the end of the comics storytelling workshop coming up, I'll probably be working on (and posting) a lot of fun comics-related things soon. I have some exercises from earlier in the workshop that I want to post, so look for those soon.

Also, read Bone. In addition to being probably my favorite graphic novel to date, it's also now very high on the list of favorite books ever, comix or otherwise.

Stuff From Comix Workshop

2007-01-17T23:58:00.000-05:00

I am currently participating in a student-run workshop called Comics Storytelling, and I'm exploring lots of exciting ideas and improving my skills in fun ways. Also, I just recently bought my first pens specifically for inking (a Sakura Micron 08 and Sakura brush pen) and I've been experimenting a lot over the past couple of days with them. Thus we get this one-page comic, which was originally an exercise in expressive body language for our characters, which I then inked for the experience and attempted to create some nice background detail (a la Jeff Smith). I think I overdid it a bit with the small lines, but hey, this is a learning process. Beyond that, there are also a number of extraneous ink-lines that I would remove, but it didn't seem worth it at this juncture, so if you notice a flaw, good for you.

Also, this is a scan of a photocopy (the original was too big to fit on the current scanner being used, as it was made on 11x15 Bristol.) The 65% photocopy looked great. The scan of the photocopy looks a little less great, but you get the idea. I'm going to figure out a way to get it with much better quality sometime later.

The processes of stuff and such...

2006-12-12T09:59:00.000-05:00

This is a rough sketch of the first ever Geeks comic, a title that has a long and dorky history across various media (mostly digital video) with a couple of my friends from RI. This page is the introduction of Bruce (one of the main characters) to the series. I sketch it out in light blue first to form a base for the later (digital) inking. The entire process happens in the GIMP (a free photoshop analogue released under the GNU license) with a Wacom Intuos3.

When I sent a copy to Tom, who's writing the series, he complained about the blue being too light to see on his screen. So I darkened it for posterity and decided to throw it up here for your perusal. Enjoy. The final incarnation is hopefully coming soon!

Hangout

2006-12-09T15:11:00.000-05:00

Hasn't been much time for art these days. Here's a quick sketch I did this afternoon while taking a break from school work. It was intended as a series of sketches to allow me to get inside the setting I had imagined for a (hopefully) upcoming comics project. Expecting to fill the few remaining pages of a sketchbook with further images I crammed this one into half a page, hence the relative lack of detail and questionable scanning quality. Still, it was a good exploration, and I feel much more at home in this part of the world I've created now. And I definitely wouldn't mind spending time in this place, a "base" of sorts for the main characters. There's some proportion-weirdness, but I think it captures the mood. I envision the place with much more junk lying about, but junk is hard to draw without getting into full detail.

The Return on a Legend....

2006-11-10T11:31:00.000-05:00

Preliminary doodles for a project between myself and my old and dear friend Tom Paquin. These are the two protagonists, which are pretty much ourselves in high school but with more interesting lives. That's why Matt looks considerably like Dan from /dev/random in a bowling shirt. The comic will be mostly story and character based, but will make its debut online. So keep an eye out for that in the coming months.

Art!

2006-11-03T13:50:00.000-05:00

I've decided to keep this thing running as an art blog of sorts where I can collect various ephemera that spew forth from my mind. The webcomic has been on hiatus for sometime due to my desire to explore my art further and get comfortable with myself and my skills before I continue. The storyline may be revived sometime in the future, but now is not that time. For now here are some things I sketched on my wacom today:

Onion-head spreads his arms, as if to say, "Why do I have an onion on my head? I have no idea."

A young denizen of Mount Olympus sports in the cosmos.

On Comic Books

2006-07-07T15:31:00.000-04:00

I feel proud of my geekhood when I scan down IGN's article Building the Ultimate Bookshelf, which is basically a really big list of must-read comics and graphic novels, and find that I know of most of the selections, and have read an average of at least one per page (at only 4 or 5 a page, this is pretty cool). In case anyone was still wondering, it turns out I am, indeed, an enormous dork. Now I just have to read all the comics on the list that sound really cool that I haven't gotten around to yet.

This is the blurb for Nevermen, which I'd never heard of:

Monkey butlers. This book has monkey butlers. Were that not enough, the two Nevermen trades combine sophisticated noir and sci-fi adventure with a dash of the esoteric. When Midnight City is threatened, the Nevermen assemble to battle the League of Crows. This is truly one of the most off-the-wall books you'll read. But it's grounded by phenomenal art and stellar writing. Also, it has monkey butlers.

I am totally enticed. Also, I find that I know a pleasurable mix of mainstream superhero comics, as well as the darker, more hipsters-read-me-to-show-off kinds of books. Soon, when I have read enough of both worlds, I will be able to outgeek any fan boy and smack hipsters upside their well-coiffed heads for only reading comics that make them sound deep.

Now in glorious Stereo-scopic Colorization!

2006-07-04T13:50:00.000-04:00

So I woke up around 8:30 today (a relic of my new work schedule) and lay in bed for a bit before getting up to work on /dev/random stuff. I was intending to just start drawing the next comic, but I thought I'd play around with today's post (which was already cleaned up and ready to go) to see if I could seperate the lines from the background, for future reference. Well, I ended up being able to figure it out, and added some test color just to see what it would look like. Well, long story short, I continued with the color, and three hours later I had a fully inked and colored comic ready to be shown. Gorgeous!

That's pretty much all I got currently. Now to work on Friday's post! (Oh lord, how I wish this was my full-time job).

Holy Popes! It's another /dev/random update!

2006-07-03T14:22:00.000-04:00

More updates here. This one was inked and colored exclusively in Photoshop on a sexy, sexy Wacom tablet. It's been a productive day at work.

If you want to know what the hell is going on with these guys, be sure to visit devrandom.mogunate.org and check out the Friends section.

/dev/random goodies!

2006-07-03T12:15:00.000-04:00

Here's two new, full-color versions of the character sketches. You can see them in their new home at devrandom.mogunate.org. More goodies later today!

Attention!

2006-07-01T15:16:00.000-04:00

My webcomic, /dev/random, has moved to a new home, and a new web address! So set your phasers (bookmarks) to http://devrandom.mogunate.org and blast up some fun (geek humor)!

I cannot believe I used that metaphor.

Yay!

2006-06-27T21:08:00.000-04:00

New /dev/random post!

Sidenote

2006-06-26T16:14:00.001-04:00

I've returned to LJ: vitruvian dan. I will now be simul-posting to both locations (here and there). To learn more about the revolutionary new technique known as "simul-posting" visit the simul-posting FAQ at en.wikipedia.org.

On the desire to ride my bicycle, and other musings...

2006-06-26T09:18:00.000-04:00

Making the decision to buy a new bike (my previous one was stolen) and ride it to and from work every day was one of the best ideas I've had lately. It was prompted by the threat of sudden removal of my automobile (my dad's broke down and he needed to get around RI). Rather than be frustrated or angry at this prospect, I decided to get really excited about breaking my dependence on the cute, Swedish, petroleum-fueled machine. I am, of course, talking about my Volvo, and not a sex toy. Well, to make a long story short (too late!) I ended up getting to keep the Volvo, and also acquire a beautiful new bicycle. The result being that not only does my brain get an all-natural injection of happy chemicals on the way to work each morning, but I also have time to muse and wax poetical on myriad philosophical concepts on the way. Or just zone out and enjoy the amazing view.

Today's philosophical musing began a long time ago when I was first discovering the amazing amount of homosexual interaction between various members of the animal kingdom. This was my first introduction to the fact that homosexuality was not exclusively a human behavior, and could not be considered unnatural by any stretch of the imagination. Recently, this internal dialogue has progressed to include thoughts about gender, for it has been my general feeling, as of late, that gender ranks up there with time on the list of less meaningful societal constructions.

This is one of those things that when people ask me how exactly my life has changed recently, I am unable to articulate. Now I'm finally able to put it into words. Recent discussions with Vikki, who just read a book considering gender in the animal kingdom from a scientific point of view, have led my mind to entirely new vistas of thought. These new ideas have been so effective in their persuasion that they managed to goad my mind into leaping off those high, high Bluffs of Prior Thought, and even convinced it that rather than splattering spectacularly on the rocks below in a mess of grey-matter-goo, it will, in fact, soar. And it has. So now I give you:

Dan's Soaring Mind
A Whole Bunch of Things That Many People Before Me Have Pondered, and Many People After Me Will Surely Ponder, But That Have Become Exciting In My Current Life For Whatever Reason or Another and Certainly Bear More Thought and Study to Follow

Cheif among these is the idea that binary gender is not biologically innate, something that I had always taken for granted up until very recently. This book, the title of which I will soon procure and pass along, discusses in detail that there are very few (if any) species in the world for whom a binary gender system adequately describes social or sexual interaction. Vikki cited examples to me of amphibians, such as certain species of frogs, to whom you would have to assign at least five genders (two "male" and three "female") in order to give an accurate representation of their natural behavior. So it is clear that a gender binary simply falls short of providing meaningful information about the lives of these animals.

If this is something that is true of frogs, what must this mean for humans, who have so many different modes of sexual and social expression, and the will to choose between them! Humans, who, in addition to the animal attraction, explore the complex emotion of love, which can be universally applied and understood. So what keeps us from breaking down barriers and allowing ourselves to love and interact sexually with all humans, regardless of percieved gender? I am willing to say at this point, barring further evidence, that it is psychological conditioning and the bias of preference. I do experience this preference, even after attempting to rationally consider the issue at large, but I find that it is slowly dissolving, and I am now very comfortable with thoughts and feelings that may have weirded me out not a year ago.

Anyway, before I descend into cryptic pyscho-babbling about things that I don't yet fully understand, I will conclude. I mean to think about this more at length, and I plan to read that book as soon as possible. It sounds terribly exciting. One more thing before I go. I think it can be just as fantastic to celebrate gender as it is to fuck with it, and the two are often one and the same. I believe the realization that gender is primarily an illusion does not diminish its fun qualities any more than the fact that believing that time is a human construct will prevent me from staring at the clock, wishing I was at home, for most of this work day.

2006-06-20T07:28:00.000-04:00

As an addendum to yesterday's post (I did say much remained unsaid), to all my vegans out there. I love you, you're fantastic. I continue to respect and admire your food choices. All my other friends: same thing goes. I think you're all mature and intelligent enough to make your own choices about what to eat, and I think that's beautiful. Go spread some food love.

Thinking Globally, Eating Locally, or: A blog post long overdue.

2006-06-19T14:18:00.000-04:00

For a little over three weeks now I have not been eating strictly vegan. Am I ashamed? No. Did I give into temptation? No. Will I stop doing this stupid Q and A format and start explainging? Yes.

It all started about a month before the semester ended, when I spent the evenings scrubbing pots for Saga, and would ruminate and philosophize for hours as I scraped off the bits of food. One day I asked myself the question that usually comes up at least once a year. Why am I still vegan? Does it still feel like the right thing to do? Does it still feel important to me? For the first time in three years, all I came up with was: "I don't know." So I spent the rest of that shift, and most of the rest of the following shift, thinking about it. Really putting my mind to it, coming at it from every possible angle, to see if a vegan diet was still something I wanted for my life.

On a practical level, veganism was not fulfilling my needs. I was perfectly healthy and my mind was as sharp as ever, but the little activist inside me was starving, crying out meekly for some envigoration. I soon came to the source of this: I no longer felt like I was making an impact. When I was the only vegan in high school my dietary habits roused curiousity, interest, and, yes, insults. It provoked my peers out of their day to day habits long enough to consider something else. That something didn't have to be veganism or even vegetarianism, per se. But it was enough to get them wondering where their food came from, something of which every living person should be aware. I struggled to get by without making judgments about my meat-eating pals, and everything was swell.

When I arrived at Hampshire, I was no longer alone in my food-awareness. I soon formed solid friendships with two other amazing people who just happened to be vegan as well, and a whole lot of people who weren't. What I came to realize months later, up to my elbows in dish soap and dining hall leftovers, was that while my eating was still in line with my general "do no harm" philosophy, it didn't really cover much else. How could I think myself any better than others who supported factory farming of animals while eating food from Kraft, Nabisco, Coca-Cola, etc. Just because something mass-produced, processed, and pre-packaged is vegan, that doesn't mean everything is a-okay. This was a fact that I chose to shunt aside for most of my first year at college.

And then there were the philosophical changes I'd undergone. As I peeled caked-on lasagna and crusted-over gravy from pots and pans I thought about how I no longer felt as if I lived in a world of absolutes. I could no longer say for certain that some things were always bad and some things were always good. Rather than feeling lost and confused, I felt very comfortble with this view of the world. But I was still following a dietary pattern that proclaimed, "Thou shalt not kill." I came to realize that people don't interact with the world on one great moral scale. The world is just people making choices, some based on their own personal ethical compass, some with no guide at all. Good and evil? Empty words. The world is people making choices. Some choices cause pain, some cause comfort. I thought, "If I can avoid the choices that lead to suffering and choose the ones that cause joy, I can feel good about the choices I make from day to day."

As I waded through dining hall slop I allowed myself to imagine my life with less dietary restrictions. I thought of all the wonderful cultural food traditions in the world. I thought of the Italian harvester plucking the tomato from European dirt, the Dutch farmer milking his cows by hand and artfully aging his cheeses, and I thought of the Japanese with their carefully fed, groomed, and cared for Kobe beef. I realized that if I did end up doing all the traveling that I hoped to do, that I would not want to experience the world as a strict vegan. But what to do till then?

Then I thought of the brave New England farmer not a mile away from where I was standing, plowing and tilling the stony Amherst soil, treating his animals with care, refusing to use pesticides or herbicides, but still unable to pay the thousands required to become organic certified. And then I understood.

Eating local would not only allow me to experience animal products without guilt, but it would make a powerful statement, and a real difference here in my community. Now I drink non-homogenized, non-pasteurized whole milk from a farm mere miles from my front door, and I buy fresh eggs from a man who has the most amazing beard I have ever seen every week at the Amherst farmer's market. We buy fresh bread and vegetables when available at that same open-air market, and always get fruits and veggies in season.

The result? Eating in Amherst actually means something now, because I have a connection to the people who produce my food. I breathe the same air as their animals, walk the same earth that nourishes their grain, and delight in every new eating experience. So there you have it: my great confession. If you'd like to look at the past three years of my life and call me a hypocrite, there is nothing stopping you. But know this: I do not regret my food choices of the past. Being vegan was one of the best things I ever did. It was what first allowed me to examine what I was eating, and to give a damn. So yes, when I visit you now, I may eat some ice cream, or make you scrambled eggs on toast. But it's not because I'm admitting defeat, rather it's because this whole experience has led me to realize that I no longer feel that making a difference must mean adherence to strict diet, way of life, or way of thought. Everyone has the ability to make change in the world, from wherever they are, whatever they are.

Much remains unsaid, but this post is already long enough.

Snippets

2006-06-19T12:52:00.000-04:00

Scaled Norwottuck with Vikki and Theresa in the 90 degree heat that was yesterday afternoon. Dove into the reservoir completely devoid of clothes shortly thereafter. It was amazing.

Watched Restless (buffy episode) with Wendell last night. Was amazing, as usual.

Picking up my new bike today after work. Much excitement.

New /dev/random post tomorrow. To all folks who read /dev/random and like it, I want to hear your comments! It's the only way I can really get a sense of if people are reading/enjoying. Thanks.

Excited for Thursday (jon and deena) and Friday-Saturday (RI and everone else).

Pretty red things.

2006-06-17T15:01:00.000-04:00

A lot of nice things in my life right now are red (I realize as I look around my room.) A Feast For Crows is red, the issue of Mother Jones that I bought yesterday is red, my bass is red. Yes, I'm actually going to try to learn the bass (finally). This sort of arose from a discussion I had with Nick Chandler back at Hampshire before the semester ended. Nick is also a drummer and we got to talking about how fun it was to be in a band, and how we missed just jamming with people, playing covers, and being really silly. This prompted me to inform him that if I had the time and dedication that I'd try to pick up the bass over the summer (as we had one at home from a few years ago collecting dust). It's nothin' special, just a Squire P-Bass, but it's fun to mess around with.

I just spent a couple hours looking up tabs. My Name is Jonas by Weezer is really fun, and pretty easy, but what I really want to learn is El Scorcho. :P All the tabs I found though didn't really sound quite right, or maybe I'm playing them wrong. Museum of Idiots by They Might Be Giants is ludicrously fun, though hard.

I just had a thought: The Strokes. Fun music, good basslines. I should check that out. I'd really like to be able to take lessons and get into reading music again and actually playing. But I'm not really sure I have the time or money to find a teacher. And I don't know if I'm that serious about it. Maybe I can turn up some online manuals or books from BitTorrent. Much cheaper.

Commencement '84

2006-06-12T10:02:00.000-04:00

This is something I've been putting together on in my spare time at work. This poster has some of the most beautiful artwork I've come across in the Hampshire media that I've seen. I absolutely adore this illustration, and I'm going to ask my boss if I can have one of the spare copies of the poster that we have lying around.

I had to scan the picture in four sections and merge it in photoshop because it was so large. I had a hard time matching it up in places, but it worked out in the end. I regret that I cannot share the full-size image with you, but blogger will have none of it.

In other news, Vikki and I hiked up Mt. Norwottuck yesterday afternoon. It was a short pleasant hike (read: I am wildly out of shape and felt like my chest was going to explode multiple times) and a gorgeous view from the top. Altogether a fantastic experience. We resolved to do more outdoors things on a daily basis.

Also, I'm almost finished with Storm of Swords, and it is fucking brilliant.

I have a webcomic now, apparently.

2006-06-06T22:20:00.000-04:00

http://d3vr4nd0m.blogspot.com

Webcomic! Check it out.

w00t.

2006-05-31T10:03:00.000-04:00

So, I just remembered (while at work) to look up my course evaluations on The Hub. For non-Hampshirites: this is the closest thing I get to a grade for my classes, it is a detailed explanation of how the professor felt I met or did not meet the goals of the course and other such comments. Well, at any rate, I just finished reading my eval for Ordering the World, which was a challenging course with two fairly hard-to-please professors. It looks like I managed to impress at least one of them, because my evaluation was glowing. I suspect it was Jim Wald who did the actual typing of my eval, because he uses the personal pronoun "I" in the final sentence when he says "I look forward to having Dan in a history class next fall" (I am preregistered for one of Jim's courses). This is very exciting to me, particularly because I really admire him and am considering asking him to be on my Div II committee. I love Jeff too, but it was Jim that I was hoping to impress with my final paper---and it looks like I succeeded.

Therefore: w00t.

2006-05-26T08:12:00.000-04:00

This is from a pamphlet I found lying around the house (of no pants) and thought was really important and needed to be shared:

Gender is not sane.
It is not sane to call a rainbow black and white.
It is not sane to demand that we fit into one or the other only.
It is not sane that we classify people in order to oppress
them as women or glorify them as men.
Gender is not sane.

Gender is not safe.
If I change my gender, I'm at risk of homicide, suicide or
a life devoid of half my possibilities.
If I'm born with a body that gives mixed gender signals,
I'm at risk of being butchered--fixed, mutilated.
Gender is not safe.

And gender is not consensual.
We are born, a doctor assigns us a gender. It's documented
by the state, enforced by the legal profession, sanctified
by the church, and it's bought and sold in the media.
We have no say in our gender--we're not allowed to
question it, play with it, work it out with our friends,
lovers, or family.
Gender is not consensual.

Safe gender is being who we want to be, when we want to be that, with no threat of censure or violence. Safe gender is going as far in any direction as we wish, with no threat to our health, or to anyone else's. Safe gender is not being pressured into passing, not having to lie. Not having to hide.

There are two trans people living at The House, and I'm pretty sure this pamphlet is left over from their days at Hampshire. The pamphlet was written to address Hampshire's annual Drag Ball and the issues that it brings up. I'm not sure if Jordan and Wendell were involved in creating the pamphlet or not, but either way I would have felt a whole lot better about drag ball this year if something like this was circulating a couple of weeks beforehand. Another excerpt:

Crossing gender boundaries is fun and funny when it's one night of intoxicated revelry. But for those of us who cross those boundaries every day, and who live with the consequences and oppression that accompany that, it isn't quite as fun. In your gender play and performance, please be respectful of transgender students and remember that not everyone has the privilege of stepping back within the safety of those boundaries at the end of the night.

Tonight we question, satire, play, and fuck with gender. This is not a night to glorify the most violent or objectified aspects of strict gender binary.

That about sums it up.

Food, fun, and Photoshop

2006-05-22T17:59:00.000-04:00

Vikki and I are currently staying at The House of No Pants, having moved all our worldly possessions (with the exception of ourselves) from our dorms to our new apartment yesterday. We will be following on June 1st. I'm having a great time at The House. There's lots of amazing fresh food, tea, cozy places to sit, science fiction, and geek talk. Today feels like a little summer-preview, as it is a bit chilly, a bit overcast, and we don't really have our own place yet. It's a really great preview.

I started work at the publications office today. It was fantastic. A spent a couple hours in the morning familiarizing myself with Adobe InDesign through books and online tutorials. Then Melissa (boss) briefed me on issues she was having with some photos for a Civil Liberties and Public Policy brochure that we're designing. So, for the rest of the day I worked in Photoshop, removing undesired people and objects from pictures and working out brightness and contrast issues. I had a nice long lunchbreak in the middle, during which Kim (assistant boss) and I went to whole foods where I got some brown rice sushi.

Overall, work just feels like a great place to be. I'm treated as an equal, I get to do interesting and engaging work, my opinion is counted in discussions, and I get a certain amount of creative control over the copy that comes to my desk. I will also be in charge of designing and laying out next year's student planner/handbook, Non Satis Non Scire, which everyone gets in their mailbox. When I showed Kim my progress with the CLPP photos she seemed quite impressed with my (mad) photoshop skills (yo). She said she'd defer her photoshop projects to me, which is exciting.

And soon we are going to sit down to dinner of grilled marinated chicken, tempeh, portobello mushrooms and vegetable kebabs. I love these people.

Commencement

2006-05-20T13:49:00.000-04:00

I got up earlier than I generally like today and shambled over to the huge tent they have erected on the library lawn, found vikki and proceeded to comment with each passing speaker how much commencement at Hampshire sounds like a public television/radio program (in a really fantastic way). Following the ceremony, I met some people I do not know and I ate some yummy local food. And now, as the jazz and the celebration outside continues to float through the slit of my open window, I settle down to pack. And I reflect. And I begin to realize that this year has meant far too much to me to sum up in a few words. It feels like both a thousand lifetimes and the blink of an eye since I left home for the first time. Sometimes I feel I'm a world away from my former life, and sometimes it seems only the two hour drive that it actually is.

And I wonder at those people who can just drop it all and come back home. The people who return summer after summer to Rhode Island and resume thier lives as if nothing has changed. Don't get me wrong, I think that's beautiful---but it's something that I could never do now. For the short time that I was home, when I resumed old acquaintances it felt more like I was beginning a new friendship than renewing an old one. That the old me was shed like old snake skin, and something fresher but wiser, more vibrant and, yes, more cynical has wriggled up from underneath. But I realize that that is mostly internal---it's not something you're going to notice unless you squint your eyes and look hard, or listen carefully when I speak. I'm not even sure what it is that you're looking for, but I know it is there, because I can feel it down between my ribs, in my feet when I walk, my knees when I sit.

That is what this year has meant to me.

So, to the people at home: I love you. I always will. I am only me because you shaped me, and I wont forget it. But, please, I would love for you to come meet who I have become. Hell, I like him. I hope you do too.

To the people I have not yet met: It is time. Come and call, I will listen. I am waiting for you to show me the world and all the new things that I can be.

You know it...

2006-05-14T14:37:00.000-04:00

A little GIMP project I through together a while ago. I just found it again. I've been in a major classic Star Wars phase as this has been the week of the horror movies and I've had to put on A New Hope classic edition in order to fall asleep. Enjoy:

Nerd Alert

2006-04-28T13:04:00.000-04:00

All told, things are pretty good right now. Despite last night's strangeness and being forced to think about things that I'd much rather avoid, I woke up today in good spirits. With no immediate obligations I just lay in bed for a while to look at the way light filters through my curtains. I read a couple chapters in A Clash of Kings which helped to further keep my mind off those previously mentioned, best-avoided things. Afterwards I lay in bed some more, and, despite my best efforts, thought about the things--and was surprisingly unbothered by them. I felt...okay. Serene.

I then remembered that my bittorrent download consisting of a batch of DnD books was probably done and my geek instincts took over. So I was paging through the v3.5 Dungeon Master's Guide, still in my boxers, when my phone started buzzing. It was my interviewer, the head of publications, or, more accurately termed, my new boss. I got the job that I wanted. I'll be spending my days this summer in an upper room of an old farmhouse-turned-office on the big ol' field out in front of Hampshire, sitting at my little corner desk working in photoshop. Sounds pretty sweet to me. I really like the people I met when I went to interview there. Plus, I'll be set as far as money goes, and that's a nice feeling.

Vikki and I found an apartment that we're leasing from a nice UMass computer science grad student named Ting. Ting is leaving all his furniture with us, because he's moving back in in the fall. So that's another thing we don't have to worry about. We're a brief walk from downtown Amherst, an even briefer walk from a sweet little asian foods market (think super cheap bulk tofu) and a five to ten minute drive from Northampton (home to one of my favorite comic book shops). Amherst and Northampton both have famers markets once a week during the summer on conveniently evenly spaced days. Fresh fruits and veggies twice a week ain't too shabby. I'm living with one of the preeminent geeks of the Hampshire campus, my nights will be free for writing DnD and GURPS campaigns, painting Warhammmer models, coding, learning to be a hacker, (hopefully) writing books, reading books, watching hours upon hours of geeky television shows and movies, and lets not forget baking! And I'll finally have the money to keep up with my favorite comics. Also, we've got the Pioneer Valley as our backyard, so I'm sure there will be no lack of outdoor type activities at our disposal (many of which Vikki has experience with). Well, now that I think about it, this has the potential to be my best summer yet. It's safe to say that I'm more than a little excited.

Oh, also. It seems like I'm going to be babysit the bed of (at least) one friend over the summer, and we have I think two couches. What I'm getting at is lots of extra sleep space. I'm expecting visits! That means you!

Well we both know that our day will come
The revolution has begun
So raise your fists and take a stand
With your super cool...
Super cool wrist bands!
We broke out
And now we're running crazy
Down the middle of the boulevard
(Spaced out!)
There's a nerd alert
There's a nerd alert
And you'll never, ever
Never take us alive
Never take us alive
You'll never...!
We're fat, young and hungry
But we don't care
We got big old brains
Like Mexican candy
We got some complex flavor
Running up in here
So get stupid on your time
Get the bud bowl off the air
Diffuse the land mines
I'm alright
You're alright
We're alright

Things that cheered my day considerably:

2006-04-10T17:10:00.000-04:00

1. Ken Hoffman
2. iterated function systems and fractals
3. Going into Central Records to find Rory working the front desk, reading an old battered copy of I, Robot whose cover is resplendent in bad 70s sci-fi art, clad in a bright T-shirt with the statement: "Scotland is for me!" laid over a gaudy cartoon rainbow.
4. The Smiths

Excitement!

2006-04-05T16:44:00.000-04:00

So I was having a pretty average day until lunch. Then things started to get a little more interesting. I noticed a sign at Saga for some free shifts, so after eating I went to talk to the lady, I believe her name is Marcy, and I grabbed a free shift--the only one left actually. So I am no longer unemployed. I have a day per week, and possibly more depending on who calls me to sub for them. I plan to take a lot of those calls, cause I really need the money.

So that provided a welcome bit of security in my life. Spurred on by this development, I filled out some forms that I had to do (financial aid stuff) and generally got things in order. Then I went to my class, The Structure of Randomness, with one of my favorite professors so far in my relatively brief Hampshire career: Ken Hoffman. We had some wonderful tangents (from an already wonderful class topic) and ended up talking about current cosmological theories, including the idea that the universe is shaped like a Klein Bottle, or alternatively, that the universe is contained inside a massive black hole and that there are infinitely many others (with some leakage of information between them!) There was also some discussion of string theory, and how/why scientists have conjectured that there are 12 dimensions, of which we only experience three consciously. This brought us into unifield field theory and quantum menchanics. All very mind-bending-in-an-extremely-cool-way kind of stuff. The discussion ended up bleeding over into after class time when it was myself, the professor and two other students just kind of hanging around talking about the nature of the universe. I. love. my. life.

So after class I called my mother to tell her the good news about a job, and we discussed my summer plans, which went over suprisingly well. I'm staying in Amherst, getting an apartment, and hopefully a summer job on campus. There's all sorts of stuff that needs to be done at Hamphsire in the summer, so hopefully I can get in somewhere. If not, there's plenty of restaurants in Amherst and Northampton, and while I'd rather not be washing dishes or bussing tables, if it means living on my own, I'm totally there. I'm excited about finally getting the opportunity to really cultivate a life of my own, outside of any specific group or institution. I've been delighted with my things so far, but there comes a point when you have to learn to stand on your own--and I'm not frightened of it, because it'll be something that is truly mine.

Now, to begin the summer job hunt. I'm going to systematically call or e-mail any office that has any job that sounds interesting to me. Here goes!

This is how life is _supposed_ to feel.

2006-04-03T21:09:00.000-04:00

Oh my (nonexistent) God I feel good!

I've been developing a new story idea recently that I'm really souped about, and I've even found time to write about it quite a bit in the past few days, but, even so, I felt really shitty today. After class all I really wanted to do was curl up in a ball and sleep or read Clash of Kings. I forced myself to go to T'ai Chi, which was a good move. I love how it relaxes and sweeps worries away with simple body movements, but also encourages alertness and mindfulness. It's a good feeling. At any rate, when that was over I talked to Sam (a boy in my class) and we decided we should meet and do T'ai Chi in the morning on weekends. So we set up a 8 o'clock time slot for Saturday and Sunday to meet out by the cornfields and practice. It's going to be amazing. It's getting warmer, and it's going to be at a really nice spot. Fields laid out ahead with mountains on the horizon. :)

So after discussing that, I wandered over to check out what was happening on the gym floor and lo and behold I see Phil meeting with Hampshire's small (but spirited!) fencing club. He calls me down and I go meet Jeff, the coach, (who was not present the only other time I've fenced at Hampshire) and they invite me to join practice. So I run back to my room to grab my stuff and change into my knickers and I run back over to get suited up. Phil and I fenced hard for about 45 minutes. It was great. Phil is a fantastic opponent--challenging, but with a great attitude. It was just a whole lot of fun. I got a lot of really solid advice from Jeff about my fencing. Incidentally, he kind of reminds me of Potter in the way he asks questions and phrase sentences, so that was comforting. Jeff had to go around quarter of nine so phil and I wrapped it up, then we chatted and watched two of our saber fencers goin' at it. Then we said goodbye for the night, and now I'm back here.

I'm planning to attend fencing now on Mondays and Thursdays, and besides that I'll have T'ai Chi on Mondays, a bit of practice with Linnea on Wednesday and Saturday evenings, and also on Saturday and Sunday mornings with Sam, Linnea, Zahra, and whoever else we get to show up. Also, capping it off with whatever spontaneously physical activities I embark on with Vikki (42 David Tennants!) it looks like I'll be pretty active, which excites me very much. I always forget how good it makes me feel to use my body. Let this post stand in testament to that fact.

*cue dramatic music* As the earth turns and warmth flows back into New England, I embark on a new form of quest--a quest of health and renewal, my body active, my mind calm, my whole being in harmony.

And fade dramatic music. Wash to white. End.

You know you're a *nix geek when...

2006-04-02T13:34:00.000-04:00

...you don't think that the phrase "really bad-ass text editor" is an oxymoron. I'm considering trying out emacs. It's supposed to be really versatile and generally pretty cool. Plus it was written by Richard Stallman, who is the definition of badass (despite the complete lack of singing abilities: http://www.gnu.org/music/free-software-song.html).

In other news, Penny Arcade continues to be one of the best things ever.

They're discussing an RPG called Kingdom Hearts which is an adventure spanning all the fantasy worlds in the Disney universe and brings in a lot of characters that you wouldn't really expect to see in a game that serious geeks are obsessed with. The whole concept amuses me, but the punchline in this strip is just fucking brillaint. The guys at PA just never fail to deliver.

2006-04-01T17:37:00.000-05:00

It got weird when I wanted to add more than two photos...so this is last post continued...

It's Buttons! This picture was so adorable, I just had to do something with it.

Made this one for jon and his roommates. Not only did I remove james from one of my favorite photos of them, but I made them a poster for the TV show that is their lives.

A very special photo for jess. I figured she could use it on facebook or some such.

These last two are photos I edited for my facebook profile.

and my personal favorite...

And there you have it. One of the many quirky things I do in my spare time...

2006-04-01T17:28:00.000-05:00

I've been tooling around in the GIMP (the Gnu Image Manipulation Program) the open-source alternative to Adobe Photoshop that comes with most distros of linux. It's a really powerful program, packed with all the juicy little functions of photoshop, and it's extremely well documented. Anyway...here are some projects I've done as of late.

This one was done in about two minutes flat. Just a composite of two sepearate wallpapers I found to make one.

This is Alice in the moon. I wanted to play around with transparency and color.

I don't understand.

2006-03-26T13:06:00.000-05:00

Why does reading my livejournal friends page make me feel like shit? I don't get this feeling. It's always sort of been there though. Maybe its the combined complain-y energy of the livejournal posts getting to me, or the fact that I always wait long periods of time between reading so I have to catch up with a lot and I feel like I'm missing large portions of my friends' lives. At any rate, it's strange and I don't like it.

In other news, today has begun the ridiculously geeky and startingly obsessive They Might Be Giants marathon in which Dan listens to the entire TMBG discography without putting anything else on in the middle. So any time I'm at my computer or in my room, John and John will be on, and it will be glorious. This may take several days. :)

What's the Buzz?

2006-03-25T20:47:00.000-05:00

So, after a rather wacky day, night, and subsequent day I find myself sitting in Vikki's room, listening to Jesus Christ Superstar and singing along with Vikki and Stephen, updating my blog on her old clunky laptop (which, I will note with amusement, may bluescreen if you touch or move the pcmcia wireless card). I will now attempt to explain how it is I came to be here.

No, there is too much. I will sum up.

So, last night, after my first full day back at Hampshire, Vikki came over and we decided to watch some Doctor Who episodes that I had missed out on and drink delicious hot cocoa. We watched The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances, which were both fantastic episodes (the first appearance of Captain Jack!). They also turned out to be surprisingly creepy and during my subsequent discussion time with Vikki I kept getting flashes of images of zombie-like children in gas masks and other such unsavory visuals. After a very excited discussion that ranged from queer issues to open source ideals (two subjects that come up a lot with us), I checked my clock to find that it was 4:30 in the morning. I then decided that I might as well wait until sunrise to assuage my fears and allow me to sleep. So we had some adventures in linux consisting of me procuring a really badass music player called ncmpc that uses the Music Player Daemon, which runs from the command line. It was very exciting, and I was somewhat delirious due to lack of sleep.

When the sun finally rose I collapsed into bed and the last thing I remember is worrying that I wouldn't be able to get to sleep. I woke up at around 11:50, threw on some pajama pants and proceeded to tool around with settings on my shiny new music player which then prompted me to start reorganizing my music folders, which was definitely a good thing. Eventually, after lots of random screwing around (changing my background and generally customizing UI options) I drank some Earl Grey to calm down and actually got some work done, which was undoubtedly a good thing.

I also established a daily They Might Be Giants delivery service with Marie, which consists of me sending her one TMBG song per day until she has the entire discography. I figured this was a good way to get her addicted to Giants. For some reason, TMBG, more than any other band I know, while not appealing to all listeners, does seem to form a ridiculously devoted fanbase of rabid, slobbering geek accolytes examples of which include: myself, my dear friend Vikki, and Emily Fogarty. I'm hoping to welcome Marie into the fold sometime soon. I was also very pleased with the daily delivery service idea because it reminds me of something that TMBG would actually do. It seems to be very much in the vein of dial-a-song, which is sadly no longer in operation.

At any rate, after a couple more hours of listening to music, playing WoW, reading A Clash of Kings, and eating various foodstuffs, I realized that I had not yet been outside my room for any extended period of time and this was around 7:30. So I ate some food and made arrangements to escape. I visited with Alice and looked at her costume designs then came to Vikki's room. Then began the silliness with Jesus Christ Superstar and blogging. And that has been my weekend. I'm excited for Kempy visiting tomorrow. I will now leave you with some quotes from peter in relation to his Elder Scrolls experiences today:

"It's a corrupt world where everyone's got a price--and it's usually around nine gold."
"I've been playing Oblivion all day, I don't have time. I got a house and a horse!"

2006-03-24T23:42:00.000-05:00

"Magnetotactic bacteria are a class of bacteria discovered in the 1970s...that build miniature magnets inside themselves and use them to determine their orientation relative to the Earth's magnetic field." (Wikipedia)

This world is a strange and beautiful place.

Iron and Wine...and fires, and kitties, and A Game of Thrones, and a comfy couch.

2006-03-19T11:28:00.000-05:00

So it is spring break, and the posse is hunkered down in Buttons' house, waiting to go to P-town! We're having a delightful time. There's been lots of lounging around, eating lots and lots of fruit, and shopping like the little domestic family that we are (I asked Cindy if she wanted to touch my melons during our visit to the produce section). We also watched parts of The Patriot on TV and laughed about Lucius Malfoy being in the British Army.

Also, there are cats. I've been bonding with Barnaby, in particular. I think he just really enjoys the couch (where I slept) but I'd like to think it's me. When I woke up in the night, he was tucked in the crook between my arm and my chest, and then when I woke up in the morning he was lounging on my stomach. He's laying by my knees as I type this on Gabe (Lauren's laptop). And now Lauren is making little kissy faces at him. I really miss having cats around.

Today we're going to head into nearby Salem for a while. We dicscovered that the Peabody Essex Museum is, indeed, open, so I'm very excited. Tomorrow we're leaving for Provincetown, where we will be staying for three days. Then back to Hampshire by Friday. Should be good.

That's all I got.

3.1415926535...

2006-03-14T15:39:00.000-05:00

I'd just like to wish everyone a very happy pi day! Go celebrate the circle!

On the solving of mysteries and the pondering of the Medieval...

2006-03-08T16:30:00.000-05:00

So...I woke up today and read some of the T'ai Chi classics--the poetic history and Taoist philosophy behind the martial art before practicing a bit of my own. I then settled down to a long bout of customizing my computing experience (which is a delightfully free-form process in Fluxboxx: my GUI of choice). I set the background to a picture of the millenium falcon on front of the classic Star Wars titles (in all their stroked yellow glory). I skinned XMMS (audio player) in a nice brushed metal to fit the theme. I then set the font on my terminal emulator (which is partially transparent) to yellow on black to match the text on the background (believe me, it's sexy.) Then I went through a bunch of firefox skins until I foud one that is suitably aesthetically pleasing and vaguely futuristic. Yum. But all of this is beside the point.

So, the really interesting bits of my day starting happening when Cindy IMed me to ask about this girl that she met at the newly formed vegan society meeting, because she had noticed that said girl was on my facebook friend's list. Now...this girl has been on my friends list since last summer when neither of us were actually at hampshire yet and I had not actually seen her anywhere on campus--or so I thought! So, it turns out that said-unnamed-girl who shall now be codenamed Tycho (I've been reading a lot of penny arcade, okay!) was, in point of fact, the same girl that Buttons and I happened to pass by in Saga one day maybe two weeks back and both agreed was really attractive (something indescribably hot about her attire and hair style). At any rate, now knowing the identity of the mysterious facebook friend, Tycho, filled a small whole in my psyche and lifted my spirits considerably. (I love when mysteries come together.)

So...after all the excitement, I decided that I needed lunch. So I get my coat on and go to Saga my mind sort of wandering, thinking a bit about Tycho and the now-no-longer-mysterious mystery, chat it up with Roberta a bit about the ASL lunch (don't ask me why--does anyone really know why Roberta brings things up?) and I head down the small flight of stairs towards the food (vegan sloppy joes today!) and who do I see standing directly in front of me in line but Tycho! Ah, delicious irony. So that is the story about today's interesting little coincidence, which I promptly related to Cindy at the lunch table right after I got my food. I am currently looking forward to vegan cutlet at dinner (this is a good saga day!) and possibly more coincidences.

The second interesting thing of the day came after my math class when I was sitting in central records waiting for a secretary to return from somewhere so I could ask her about paperwork. I was absentmindedly browsing through Smith's course catalog, checking out my options for French, which I intend to continue next semester, when my eyes alight on the Medieval Studies major and all the required courses therein. I read down the list and they all seemed extremely intriguing, particularly the epic poems and mythology. So that got me thinking about my Div II, which is indeed coming up and what I might be studying. I think now it might be something along the lines of: Blacksmthing and the Sword in Medieval Mythology and History. At least, that sounded really cool when I was working it over in my head walking back to my room. We'll see.

Brilliant.

2006-03-08T00:08:00.000-05:00

I just finished watching L'Auberge Espagnole for the second time. This time with the lesbian posse. I forgot how much I really enjoyed that movie. There are so many subtle things that are done so well, and they don't really push anything. It's refreshing.

It's also the kind of movie that reminds me of how exciting the future is, of not knowing what is in store. Even where I am in life, my first year of college, it's easy to get into a routine and feel like this is what life will be forever. That you'll graduate, get a job and a house and settle down and live. That little things will change but the grit and gristle, the day to day, the meat of your life will be pretty much as it is now. This movie reminds me how much I have yet to discover, to do, to experience, to be. That though changes seem to come few and far between, they can sometimes be drastic and sudden--and that's beautiful!

It reminds me that there are so many places, cities--countries--that I haven't set foot in yet, haven't lived in yet, haven't gotten to know it's people or its food or its bizarre quirks and customs. It makes me want to go travel, live in a country, meet people, learn new languages the way the native speakers speak them. And it reminds me that I can still do all this. That these are not ridiculous dreams, they're not out of the question. And that makes me happy.

I feel like the subtle relationships between Xavier and the people that he lives with are portrayed really well. I think that in general the movie sums up the process of moving to a new place and meeting all new people, having new hangouts, basically taking on a wholew new life and then trying to reconcile it with your past experiences. And then not knowing where to begin when people ask about it because you are a totally different person now and you could not even try to explain because you would never do it justice. And then smiling inside because it really doesn't matter. All that matters is that you've had experiences that you will never, now, be able to forget.

I love the ending of the movie. I love that he runs out on his first day of work, even if it's irresponsible and childish. I love that he chooses to be a writer even though he knows that he's choosing a future with no prospects, because that you know he'll be so much happier. I love that in the end, he values the beautiful over the practical--that he refuses to bow to mediocrity because it would be easier, because it would pay more.

In short, I love this movie's values.

Dan's List of Now (I stole this format from bonnie, but I like it):

2006-02-07T10:59:00.000-05:00

reading:
A Game of Thrones, George R.R. Martin
The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams (yes, I'm still working my way through it.)
The Confusion, Neal Stephenson

recently finished:
Sabriel, Garth Nix

coming up:
The Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson
Good Omens, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

nonfiction that likes to hang out in the background:
Rebel Code: Inside Linux and the Open Source Revolution, Glyn Moody
Cryptography Decrypted, H.X. Mel and Doris Baker
The Complete Idiot's Guide to C++

recent music:
The Polyphonic Spree
8 Bit Peoples
Iron and Wine
Weezer
Rilo Kiley
Nick Drake
Aquabats

BBC Miniseries (These have taken the place of movies as of late):
Queer as Folk
Casanova
Tipping the Velvet

TV (on DVD or on my computer):
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Angel
Doctor Who
Hellsing
Gundam Wing

games:
Dungeons and Dragons: Eberron campaign setting
A Buffy the Vampire Slayer GURPS game (of my own devising)
(there's been a recent shift towards pen and paper games almost exclusively)
Fluxx (and EcoFluxx)
Give Me The Brain!
Cthulu 500

general obsessions:
Joss Whedon
Russel T. Davies
(these two are somewhat self-referencing)
Slackware Linux

News from the forge...

2006-01-24T16:55:00.000-05:00

Just got back from another ass-kicking day of blacksmithing. Before I launch into a vibrant description of my new project I'd like to relate my observations on an interesting phenomenon that affects the Hampshire community. Whenever it snows more than about a foot (which happened Sunday night into Monday morning) the entire campus turns into five-year-olds. Very creative five-year-olds.

By the time I got up everyone was out and about having snowball fights and making snowmen. It was amazing. A bunch of students built up the walls of the smoking gazebo with snow so now when I look out my window I see a little igloo sitting on the quad where the gazebo usually resides.

Now that that's out of the way...

For my final project for JanTerm course, which is now going to become a continuing project spanning probably my entire independent study in blacksmithing this semester, I'm designing and forging a hilt for a swept hilt rapier. I spent the first half of class today drawing my own design using a number of references, historical and reproduced. The next step entailed deciding where to split the design into pieces to be forged seperately and welded together later. I'd like to forge weld them, the way the original smiths did, but that depends on if I can get the coal forge set up and learn how to use it. (We learned on a modern propane forge because its easier to use. You just turn on the propane to a certain pressure and you get a good heat. Coal forges are more traditional but are harder to use by orders of magnitude because the temperature has to be monitored more closely. This is because it can get hot enough to vaporize your entire piece if you aren't careful with the bellows.) So I may have to look into other welding methods to put it all together.

I'm going to construct a mock-up for the grip and the blade in wood in order to have something to mount the finished hilt on. If all goes well this will be replaced with a hand-forged blade sometime later in my Hampshire career. The idea of having a hand-forged rapier by the time I graduate excites me almost beyond belief. I have a feeling this is going to be a long, over-arching project, with little projects in between. I'm going to need to practice smaller blades before I forge the rapier blade, because bladesmithing is a long and grueling process. So I'm thinking daggers and such. Perhaps even a main gauche to match the rapier.

So that's the plan. Oh yes, also copious amounts of study in history and metallurgy and perhaps theatrical fight choreography for stage and film. And there's those pesky urges to write and draw...Well, this is what Hampshire is for, right?

Changes...

2006-01-22T14:45:00.000-05:00

It's a sunday and there's a sense of regaining, reorganizing and refocusing my life. There are generally a lot of 'r's. Which tends to happen on sundays, or days that I clean my room (which are generally sundays.)

I've gone through quite a bit of change since December. The New Year was really a new year for me. It's the first time that's ever really happened. I'm using slackware linux exclusively now, I'm considering concentrating in blacksmithing, with emphasis on bladesmithing (swords), I've gained quite a few new friends since returning to school, and Massachusetts very unequivocally feels like home now. These may seem like small things, but my perspective has shifted in slight but powerful ways. In certain things there's a sense of growing up, in others a sense of regressing. But through it all there is a progression, a feeling of being drawn forward by some elusive power. All this without a loss of control. I feel good.

Quite a bit of work lies ahead. I have a final project for blacksmithing, new classes starting in early february, and have just found out that I am not off the hook on a paper I should have completed last semester. It seems like a setback, but I think there will be a feeling of power in completing it. Also, I'm going to have to start talking to people and setting up my Division II work, which will be even more key if I plan on pursuing sword smithing (which, I do). But all of this feels like real work, adult work, and despite the difficulties, it is empowering.

I'm also going to find a job so I can start saving money, because I want options this summer--options that aren't Hope Valley.

Welcome.

2006-01-21T04:56:00.000-05:00

The virgin post.

More to come.