I know I’m slackin on the writing here, it’s been a demanding couple weeks and as you can see I’m on a new platform for my site and blog. I’m pretty happy about it so far, gotta do more tweaks, and start adding content, but it’s getting there. As for life, well, let’s just say M and I have been BUUUUUUUUSY!
Let’s see, a few things we’ve done lately:
- Went to see Hell House, a theater production in DUMBO, quite interesting, could’ve been better.
- My Sarah & Byron came over last night for dinner and Lost! Fun!
- Bought new shoes! YAY! (About time)
- Been working out, M’s been kickboxing with Sarah. All of us are feeling really good about it.
- Bought the new Beck album, diggin it so far. Still have to watch the videos.
- Been cranking on some freelance, geeze! Non-stop working lately.
- Hoping to play a show with Lawrence (if we get in rehearsal this weekend). Costume party, yay!
- Went upstate a few weekends ago for Emma’s b-day, a Lake George camping adventure with M, and apple picking!
- 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.
- 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.
- 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!
October 26th, 2006
Last weekend Margaux and I had a date night! We went out to eat at Aqua Santa in Williamsburg, which was a very pleasant little Italian restaurant. Took our chances sitting outside, despite a little wind. The food was great, I had a Carbonara, and Margaux had the special which I think was Penné a la Vodka. We were in a bit of a rush to catch a movie however, and it took a little too long for us, but on any normal night it wouldn’t have mattered.
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 
September 28th, 2006
I spend my days working, sitting in front of computers, eating lunch, and being distracted by semi-boring things on the internet just because. Ok sometimes I find some cool stuff to talk about or read, but it seems that lately I’ve just fallen in the ‘whatever’ category of life, and just kinda scrape by looking forward to spending time with M or play with the cats or watch a movie. This isn’t such a bad thing, but I also feel like I’m getting a bit stuck in just ‘being.’ M works hard, deals with many stresses of working hard, and has done so for a while. I’ve been doing that as well, but then something interesting happened, all of a sudden I was finally recognized for all the hard work, given a promo, and now work on a channel that well, isn’t all that challenging.
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!
September 6th, 2006
Despite the rainy weekend as I mentioned in my other post below, it was a fun one! Friday afternoon was dedicated to freelance, until later that evening, but after that and a couple hamburgers cooked on our mini burner since the stove isn’t operating currently, M and I decided to walk to the Blue Lounge in Billburg and have a drink. Then we were pretty darned tired, so back home we went!
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
August 27th, 2006
It rained this weekend, and I have not flown the plane since after fixing it a while back. However, when I fixed it up, I reinforced the fuselage structure around the wing area where it cracked in two, and I readjusted the elevator so it wasn’t crooked. I also added a bit more weight to the front to balance it properly. M and I took it to the park and tried it out, and wouldn’t ya know it, it flew nice and straight! The first couple takes were ok, but once we moved to another part of the park, I launched it, and the thing flew a good 60 feet or more straight on! Since then I haven’t had any other chances to fly it, perhaps this week.
August 27th, 2006
OK OK, I’m late and totally slacking on the blog! Well, sorry to say, but things have been a bit nuts lately. So, I will make a list of things I need to talk about.
1. The plane, its crashes, repairs, and new flights.
2. The dead guy. Actually, Margaux does a great post on that, so go check that one out (Midge’s Mind).
3. Bloc Party at McCarren Pool! Good show, kinda. Fun place to see a show, sound was a bit whack, and the singer in Bloc Party kinda screwed up too many times for my taste.
4. Upstate trip. Wanted to camp, got rain again. Oh well, we ate a load of food, enjoyed company with M’s parents, and mine as well for the first time with both of our parents for dinner. A very enjoyable vacation, despite the rain.
5. Back to the grind. All hell seemed to have broken loose since taking a couple days off. Alas. Margaux is cramming to finish her jewelry, I’m working on a Halloween feature for Cityguide in Flash, and have taken up some freelance web maintenance work, which has taken my free time.
6. Broken stove. Ugh. We had an issue with our gas yesterday, which was just because of new meters, however it ruptured into a gas leak in the stove, and now needs to be replaced.
Ok, back to work!
August 24th, 2006
That’s right, we spent the lovely weekend trippin it to Ikea, picking up some great new furniture, curtains, mirrors, etc., to spruce up the happy home. Our bedroom needed a lot of work, and I think we may have hit it just right! A new tall bookcase to fit all our books and open the space up much better, and a new ‘headboard’ for the bed, which consists of a Teal curtain behind the bed and two shear curtains coming out the sides. This meant hanging up all this, for which that took us a good few hours to complete. However, even though it may be a bit more ‘feminine,’ I would have to say it looks quite nice, and balances the room out vertically vs. horizontally. ANd what the hell, Margaux’s quite excited about it
In other news, we also fancied a couple new restaurants on Friday (at least for us). One ove on Macdougal, which is that old Caffé Reggio, not that great, but nice atmosphere. The other was Queen’s Hideaway in northern Greenpoint, quite tasty and a wonderful outside atmosphere (though could use some new chairs). It’s nice to be at a place like that, it removes you from NYC just enough, and gives you a feeling of calmness. Overall enjoyable.
ALso had the opp to hang out with Marky Mark on Sat night, and a couple of his friends. We had fun, despite the DJ blasting music constantly reminding us how deaf we really are, and how useless bars with loud music can be. Whatever happened to being able to socialize at a bar without screaming constantly or straining your ears to hear a few words? Alas.
August 14th, 2006
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