For his silly emails, goofy cat language, ridiculous impersonations, and love of odd words that just “sound cool,” how could you not laugh in his presence? Introverted, but polite, accomodating, and genuinely interested in our lives, even if unspoken. He read our blogs, looked at our pictures, and even listened to my stupid songs! I love that I got to jam on the harmonica while he played the piano at Christmas, especially since he was so damn good (though very modest).

A great man, great father, great husband, great friend. There will be an emptiness, and he will never be forgotten. On top of being a great man, he was also a great designer, so I thought I would share some of his logos below. I’ll miss you Mark.

1. Since I was 16 I have been playing the harmonica, which I started out listening to John Popper of Blues Traveller (playing it really loud in my room made it ’sound better’) but still play to this day, and have gigged in NYC every now and then with friends.

2. I did become an official Lego Maniac back in the 80s, You had to sign up and got a newsletter, pretty darn sahweet! Still a Lego Maniac.

3. I’m a pretty avid dancer, and though I love dancing to lots of techno and industrial these days, it all pretty much started when I was 10 years old at an uncle’s wedding. I wouldn’t stop! I also loved to dance and sing to NIN back in HS in my room, it let off quite a bit of steam. I hated HS.

4. As a kid I had a tendency to break things when I was mad. Usually joysticks. The last thing I remember destroying was my stereo in college, just kinda dropped it off my desk (like a cat batting things of to test gravity). My friend Josh was there, we were roommates, and were playing Unreal Tournament with others in our Apartment. I blame it on loud KMFDM (or Rammstein, one of those). It still worked, for a little more time. Don’t worry, I’ve seeked help on that since.

5. Since M talked about meeting someone famous, I met Jimmy Fallon when I worked the US Open. It was pretty cool, since we actually were formulating what commentators said during commercial breaks (at the game they stil showed them waiting). I always wondered if he would have Tina Fey or someone write a skit like that. Guess not. Oh well.

6. I did 5 years of college, first year was at Hartford for Computer Engineering, then I went upstate to ACC for ‘Art’, and transferred back to Hartford (Art School) for Design. I was a bit of the odd-ball out, being a Freshman/Sophomore my first semester back, but really a Junior. Needless to say, I didn’t have it in with the art kids. Cool guy smokin hipsters.

Hmmm, who should I tag? I don’t know any cool bloggers.

I also dealt with a hard dive death last week on my laptop, not fun. Fortunately I didn’t lose a ton since backing up not too long ago, but still frustrating. Alas.

This past weekend we went to the Ron Mueck exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum, and I must say WOW. What amazing work, so large, so small, so perfect to every detail. A true realist in his own rite. Check it out if you get a chance, still up until the 29th. Ok, I felt like I needed to write something, but I’m too tired right now for any details. Margaux wrote a great post about Ron, so read it when you get a chance!

TOLERANCE should be the Christain way, ever think that telling people they are going to hell because they don’t believe in Jesus isn’t a tad hipocritical to your own beliefs? I’m not very religious, but I believe in some kind of power, perhaps the Force (It may seem like pure geekery, but George Lucas bases his thoughts on all religions, a beautiful way to reveal the world to other religions and cultures without casting them to eternal damnation for having different beliefs). Seems apropriate for this to happen around Christmas, but it’s an ever increasing problem that causes more hate than love. The thing is, if you’re preachings are forced upon others, I have a feeling I may just see you in Hell as well. Silly fools.

This American Life can be downloaded here
Get the latest this week, I think you have to pay for older podcasts.

Anyway, I coined this ‘Triptophandwich’ term today, speaking about the wonderful leftovers of Thanksgiving, with stuffing, cranberry sauce, and turkey. Ah tasty! Happy Thanksgiving! For kicks I’m including a pic of the model plane I’m building. I’ll put new ones up once it’s completed. Enjoy!

Let’s see, a few things we’ve done lately:

1. Went to see Hell House, a theater production in DUMBO, quite interesting, could’ve been better.
2. My Sarah & Byron came over last night for dinner and Lost! Fun!
3. Bought new shoes! YAY! (About time)
4. Been working out, M’s been kickboxing with Sarah. All of us are feeling really good about it.
5. Bought the new Beck album, diggin it so far. Still have to watch the videos.
6. Been cranking on some freelance, geeze! Non-stop working lately.
7. Hoping to play a show with Lawrence (if we get in rehearsal this weekend). Costume party, yay!
8. Went upstate a few weekends ago for Emma’s b-day, a Lake George camping adventure with M, and apple picking!
9. Saw Mark play the other night, sad as always, but great show. BTW, I sold him my old Powerbook, sad to see it go, but worth it for both of us.
10. Went ot a comedy club with Sarah, Byron, Alex, and of course Margaux. That was quite funny! Hmm, that was also like a month ago.
11. Saw Regina Spektor play at Town Hall! That girl can sing, her lyrics, her playing, her humor… M and I had a great time.

That’s it for now, been a lot of other things we’ve done lately, but that’s good enough!

We went into the city to see the new flick Flyboys, which I was really quite excited to see since I heard about it over a month ago. The short of it: it’s about the Escadrille in WW1 when American volunteers went to France to fly against the Germans. In the movie, the story follows some of these young soon-to-be pilots throughout, including the typical “woah is me, my father made me do it”, “I lost everything, so I came here”, “I fought the law, and then ran”, etc. etc. The one I thought was quite authentic was the French boxer, who happened to be the only black pilot, which is a little more true to life (there was in fact only one). Anyway, amongst all of this of course there was a love story, blah blah blah.

Really, the movie was about the dogfighting! These scenes kicked some ass! They modeled Neuports and Fokker DR.1s, plus some bombers and Zeppelins! The realism of the planes was well done, though I doubt the Fokkers were all painted red, and I’m sure there were other fighter planes used. For dramatic effect and to make sure those who don’t know much about this war weren’t confused, some of these liberties were taken. I’ll live. What I loved was the angles they could get since most was CG, a lot of these types of filming just wasn’t possible, even in the movie I compare this to: Memphis Belle.

Unlike Memphis Belle, however, this movie overplayed its epic-ness. The music was out of control! A gripe of both M and I. The storyline was just too cliché, and just really not that interesting. I think the writing could have been quite a bit better, which the definitely had Star-Wars-itis… great effects, bad story. Alas. That’s all right though, I still had fun

I can’t complain right? When should I come home ‘tired,’ relax in front of the computer or boob-tube, and think to myself “this is great!”? I start to feel guilty in some way. So now it’s September. Perfect time to kick it up. It stopped being hot, I started running with M again, and I’m planning to work on that damned website of mine finally (or M’s site? or both?). I also think I’m gonna take the bull by the proverbial horns and kick it up at work, hopefully I’ll pick up some interesting and challenging work. If not, well, there is that website of mine to change

Funny how happiness is such a balance. Stress, distance, companionship, work, sleep, love, and stars need to be perfectly aligned in order to really feel the joys of happiness. Like my dad says “without bad luck, there’d be no luck at all.” Same applies with happiness. So I’m about 80% there, hell, how could I have any problems with such a wonderful girlfriend, nice apartment to come home to, etc. etc. Just a few glitches to take care of. Ok, enough gushing my world, go read someone else’s blog now!

On saturday, Margaux was meeting up with Kate in the city, but since the L train decided not to run this weekend, I drove her into Union Square, dropped her off, and went to do a bit o’ shopping. I first hit up Other Music, great place for obscure stuff. I picked up 3 new albums: Vex’d “Degenerate”, Motor “Klunk”, and Herbert “Bodily Functions.” so far so good, Vex’d play some awesome dark dub/industrial stuff. Motor is a mash-up of Kraftwerk and straight 4/4 industrial, with some vocals thrown in. Herbert is all over the place, from Massive Attack to Stereolab to St. Germain. Very exciting new stuff to listen to. I then proceeded to go to Blick’s on Bond St. That store is huge and awesome! I picked up some pads, pastels, charcoal, a black sheet of paper for a poster mat, and a piece of Arches for another design I created of M and I. Yet again very excited to get all of that, it was the final pieces needed to put up a Modest Mouse poster I bought almost a year ago (a very cool concert print sold for $20, sold here: Modest Mouse- Vancouver Tour Poster).

As I was framing and printing these posters, I was listening to Vex’d. Zack, our new neighbor, knocked on the door telling me that he listens to quite a bit of dub including Vex’d, and I’m not sure but he may be a DJ too? Anyway, he has many comps for me to check out, hooray! Nice to have a friendly neighbor!

Margaux was indeed pleased with the posters, and we celebrated (not really) with some tacos, burritos, and a movie “Inside Man,” which we enjoyed. I was saying to her at one point how funny it is that there have been so many grand bank robbery movies over the years, but the last really robberies haven’t seemed to happened in a long time! Just love em anyway I guess. This one broke the norm a bit with its witty humor, semi-surprising ending (ok, done and done, but still fun), and overall entertainment.

Today, M and I checked out the MoMA! Finally got a chance to go to a museum together, and we had a lot of fun, despite being quite tired after going to bed at like 3AM. It was M’s first opp to see the “newly renovated” MoMA, which I have a seen a couple times, but never saw it before the renovation. They had the Dada exhibit there, which wa our main reason to go today. The exhibit was wonderful, really touching upon the history and importance of the movement. As a designer I thought about how influential this movement was for design and typography, really using type as forms of expression and art on their own and often times out of context, honing in on the letterforms themselves. Funny how sexy typography is in my eyes, part of a universal communication and mini-artforms in themselves individually. I also found the Dada movement very motivating in its expression of protesting WWI, the rise of machines, and the traditions of art. Worthwhile exhibit to see. Well, that’s about it. Have to get back to some small freelance duties, and then perhaps some music-making, or video game playing