procrastination is a muther fucker.

I return once again. I am procrastinating. I like it.
I don't have much to say. I had another restless and relatively sleepless night. I don't know what my problem is. I think I feel another existential crisis coming on. It could just be the stress of having to actually start writing my thesis. It's no problem. I have three months and it practically writes itself! I also have a paper due and these damn applications. it's funny writing these statements though. I kinda feel like I don't really care one way or another. I am so indifferent about school right now. This was a bad semester. I feel intellectually drained. I am sick of reading and writing. what the fuck happened? (you might be asking? both of you) Well I just don't know. I think I took on a bit too much. I averaged about 1500 pages or reading a week. is that a lot? it didn't seem like it at the time. Because this is me...all I do is read. I can't stand still for five minutes without reading something. It drives C crazy. Subway, cab stand, airport. if I have the time to spare I will read. I have even taken up reading and walking. Very dangerous but I have yet to smack into anything or anyone.
I think I am done with the Yale app. I don't care about this one. the guy who ran the grad program was a total douchbag to me. fuck em...

names...

all puffed up with vanity

So the end of December has arrived. I really didn't think I would survive this long. The month was brutal. Several very difficult papers and PhD applications had to be done. I actually have two to finish at this moment. I prefer to procrastinate and pay attention to my much neglected blog. I'd like to think that this is warming up. Perhaps it is?
After a week in Ohio at C's family I have returned to my usual spot in the Sloan library. I feel like I have created an ass groove for myself here. Two straight weeks of sitting here writing have had an effect I'm sure. I am still trying to recover from Ohio. I am getting more accustomed to being there for the holidays. It has been three years in a row at this point. However, C's mother still insists that we play the "roommates" game for his father. The poor man is old but he isn't stupid. You would think that after three years they would give up. I try to be the good doobie and play nice but it is a little frustrating. You would think my parents would have the issue since they are military. I guess there are some things that growing up in New England make more palatable. I keep forgetting that the mid-west is a whole 'nother world. To compensate for the weirdness C's mother goes on a shopping spree insisting on spending an equal amount on both C and I. This is something that I find very uncomfortable. I don't like people buying me things. If I want something I'll buy it. I don't do forced shopping. His mother made me search store after store until I found something I wanted. Like I said...weird. My parents will give us a x-mas card and that is pretty much it. Maybe we'll go out to dinner someplace nice in Newport but otherwise that is it. And I am fine with that.
C's mother did buy me the book "Traveling Music" by Neil Peart, the drummer from Rush. I read it in two days. Great fun, great memoir. I am now in the midst of a rush music surge which hasn't happened in quite a while. It awakened the music nerd in me. I recently moved all of my Rush to my iPod but I am missing a few albums so I might head to Newbury this evening and catch up.
Topher's top 5 lists have also made me realise that I don't own any led zeppelin. I might have to go and get the box set.

I should get back to my statements...
blech!

names out.

Existential crisis #301

It is December and I feel it in every bone in my body. I'm giving up the NYC travelog because far too much time has passed and too much has gone on since. C and I went to Naples, Florida over Thanksgiving. it was very odd and I spent some time sitting by the pool. We dranks a whole lot and basically just shopped. I hate shopping by the way. With C and his friend K (whom we were staying with) avid shoppers I had my patience tested. We came home only having to mail a couple of things. ugh!

I have spent this week avoiding and working on my PhD applications. I think I am really out of my fuckin mind with this. Do I really want to spend the rest of my life in school? No one is pushing me towards this. I just don't know what I am doing.
Its coming at the wrong moment. Right now I am really sick of being in school. I know this will fade. I am just burnt out but what if I'm not? Sometimes I wish my brain didn't work this hard...

names...

NYC part whatever

Okay, Saturday in NYC. C is arriving at 11 or so I thought. I am up at 8 or so. L is up and doing her stretches in the living room and I lie on her couch, hung-over, chatting while she does. She heads off to run in the park. Side note: she partner runs with blind people through the park, how cool is that?
C calls and tells me that he missed his train due to the T and is now taking the Accela. He'll arrive at 11:40 instead of 10:40. Thank god he missed his train cause I would have been hella late!
I get up and shower. Head out stopping to have the hung-over special (McD's b-fast) and start walking towards midtown. I have several hours so I figure I will walk it. I do a quick breeze through Macy's Herald Sq. my first time. I fuckin hate it. Too many people, too many of them tourists and even more of them Brits who don't have a fuckin clue other than their dollar is stronger than ours, bitches!
I end up in a Starbucks a block over from Grand central. I have homework so I sit and read. I have an hour or so. There is a guy sitting a few seats away from me. I am at the window bar looking out on 7th ave. A woman stops and strips off her coat to reveal a novelty T-shirt and whips out a statue of liberty foam hat. She proceeds to have her picture taken with a NYC cop. several actually. I don't get it. I understand it but I don't get it.
A few moments go by. A older woman comes and sits next to me. The seat next to her is occupied by this guy who is chatting with random people. Momentarily left alone he turns and asks me what I am reading. I tell him. He wants to know why and so I tell him (I am reading an essay on the early history of television). He proceeds to tell us (the woman has now sat and joined the conversation) about his life as a new professor of history at Fordham on the upper west side. His specialty is the history of coffee. We all laugh at the irony. He then makes this weird tangential twist towards his own history as being from Texas and now residing in NYC, then leaves. The woman and I proceed to talk a bit about how odd he seems. She turns out to be an actor, at which point I am trying to identify her. She is wearing a baseball cap and pretty non-descript clothing. But then that means nothing. NYC is now a city of the rich and the famous. You tend not to notice them because everyone else is so loud and annoying. Just when the conversation gets interesting C calls and wants to know why I am not outside GCStation as he is waiting and looking for me. For once Amtrak is on time! I say my goodbyes and regrets. I don't get her name but she was pretty cool.
C and I head uptown to L's apartment
We drop off our stuff and proceed to walk over to the east side to have lunch. I have to be at the Guggenheim at 3. Wander a bit, complain about the fuckin bridge and tunnel people and end up having lunch at this non-descript diner on 80th and Lex. C heads off the the Met and I am off to the Gugg.
I meet my classmates and have our class with Jennifer Blessing, the curator. We hang out and watch the performance (which I will not go into here, I had to write a paper about it). I stayed a couple of hours and then went to meet C and L for dinner. It was a huge debate about where we were going to go. We ended up staying on the upper west and went to Citrus. It was great, weird combination of sushi and Mexican. From there we went to Bin71, a little wine bar and drank some more.
Ended up at L's watching the Simpsons. L is a huge fan, almost as huge as KG. It was fun.

We crashed at 2:30.

names...

whoops

okay, so I got distracted and never completed my NYC tale.
After Weinstein we went to New Line Cinema. I really liked this company. They seemed to know what they are doing. They made buttloads of money from the Lord of the Rings series but haven't grown at all. They keep themselves small. The marketing guy still only had two assistants! Unfortunately the bean-counter guy did all the talking and I started to snooz!
Atari was after a quick lunch at some little place in Mid-town. I have never seen a company that had almost no clue what they were doing. It is really a shame to have that corporate legacy and to sit on it. Idiots.
Finally there was The independent Film Channel. This was fun. The CEO was a hoot. However, I asked several questions about the role of film festivals in their programming decisions and they said "none at all." Bullshit. What am I? A rube?
That was the day in a nutshell. Afterwards Ilya dragged me to the Toys-R-Us in times square at 5:30 in the evening on a Friday! It was fucking crazy! Apparently the Harry Potter kids and Lindsey Lohan were appearing on TRL so Times Sq. was packed with pre-pubes! arg! I could have killed him. I have never hated more people on the planet! We escaped to some pub on 10th Ave and grabbed dinner.
From there I jumped in a cab and headed to Chelsea for Bill Viola's opening. Once again I seemed to gravitate to a building that is determined to hold every single person in the city at one moment! I met up with William, his sig other, and ME, my old boss. Chatted for a bit and then headed over the Eyebeam to see a Christian Marclay performance. Hung out. Ran into this really messy curator that I had met at a luncheon in Boston. He was hammered at 8 in the evening. Not that there is anything wrong with that...But he is a curator for a major art collection owned by some extremely wealthy people. Perhaps that is all he has to do? Travel and drink...Wish I could do that shit!
Saw a couple of faculty, avoided them. Watched the performance which was pretty interesting. Left after the first one and headed to our Sloan reception at the Chelsea hotel bar.
Spent way too much money, hung out with my friend Tracy, ended up at some gay bar.
cadged the express back uptown, grabbed a slice of pizza and went back to L's place.
and that was Friday.

more later...

NYC, Sloanies and Me

Friday. The day of the CMS\Sloan Media trip. I was up at 7 watching L do her stretches on the living room floor. She is a marathon runner and is now in physical therapy for her knees. Shocking right? She is also a lawyer. Harvard undergrad/Harvard Law; hardcore New England liberal. A sassy broad. She kicks ass. We didn't get to hang out till Saturday night.
I got dressed, wore the suit pants but not the jacket. Too damn cold on Friday. Jumped on the 1 and headed to Chelsea. We were meeting at 8:15 at a Starbucks south of Houston. met up with Ilya and the gang. Our first stop was Weinstein Co. Formerly known as Miramax. Till Disney bought it and wouldn't let them take it. There is a message there. Met with the SVP of Finance and the head of marketing. Bullshitted and watched some trailers. They were a little stressed. Their fist big release was Friday and it wasn't getting very good reviews. Derailed, heard of it? I had but hadn't read anything about it. Have no real desire to see it. My friend T zapped them good during the Q&A. They kept going on about independent cinema, blah, blah, blah and she asks them if they are so independent how come they're aren't any black people in their films. They were kinda stumped and gave really bad answers like "we really rely on the foreign market and black films don't make money internationally" shit like that. The look on their face...priceless. They brought up their recent purchase of a tranny film as an example of diversity which of course got me started. I said that I was very eager to hear their strategy for that film! Nothing! I think they were glad we left.
oh and one big thing: There were several mentions about being late and how if you were going to be then don't come at all just meet at the next company. We actually gave a $100 deposit in case one of us fucked up. It would literally cost us. We had a very big window this morning. Meet at 8:15 and head to the company at 9, as a group. This one ass-clown calls the team leader at 9 while we are signing into security. He says "I'm almost there!" She tells him not to come and to meet us later.
So we are all sitting around a conference table on the 18th floor of this building. At 9:35 this guys opens the door and comes and sits at the table! We were all kinda flabbergasted. I would have gone and gotten breakfast and met up at the next location. The leader was pissed! She didn't say anything there but I am sure he got an earful later and lost a hundred bucks to boot.
idiot.
I want to work for Weinstein. They make cool movies and everyone in the office was wearing jeans.
to be cont...

n.

NYC pt2

had lunch with S. Saw her new fancy offices, pretty sweet although they had those low wall cubicals that seem to be all the rage in corporate land now. I don't get it. I guess it means don't pick your nose or look at porn at your desk!
had a great conversation with her. sometimes I think she is making my job much harder and sometimes much easier?? I don't get it. She's awesome.
From there I walked up fifth to the Guggenheim to spend the evening with performance art. I was once again pretty early so I spent some time at the Met. I wandered around the Renaissance rooms and checked out the Fra Angelico show. Crazy monk painter in the late medieval/early Renaissance. One real stand out painting is Jesus with red eyes sweating blood. some crazy shit. There hasn't been a large show dedicated to him in the US since 1959. If in NYC go and check it out. They were also in the early stages of setting up the big christmas room. Which I love! Big tree, gothic ornaments. crazy, creepy statues. good times.
Went on to watch Marina Abromowiz perform. She was recreating Vito Acconi's Seedbed piece from the early seventies. It was interesting until millions of people showed up and proceeded to block the view, take up space, talk and in general annoy the fuck out of me. I was very amused by all the young "art school" kids looking serious and writing in their journals. Oh I remember when that used to be me. The mismatched fashion, the distinct lack of bathing, the seriousness. oh wait, that's me now!
(I'll spend some time later discussing Marina. I had to return Sat night to watch another performance with my Harvard class.)
I took off and headed back to the west side. Crazy me. I walked from the Guggenheim at east 92nd and fifth ave to west 71st and amsterdam. My feet were fuckin crazy hurting! but that is the fun of NYC. walking everywhere and seeing some crazy ass people. I hit the big Barnes and Noble at Lincoln Center to hunt down the book I had to read by Saturday morning. No luck. In fact I went into about 5 bookstores in the city looking for this fuckin book (because I forgot to pack it! It was sitting on my dining table) and no one had it. its fuckin NYC and they still tell you to get it from Amazon. go figure.
I treated myself to some great sushi. I tend to do this when I am out and about alone as C isn't as big a fan of sushi as I am. I could eat that shit every damn day and night!
Went looking for my old gay bar hangout on the west side. Its gone. the west side is all yuppies and pottery barn now. it used to be great restaurants and bars. Now it is all families. The gays have gone bye-bye. I think that they may have moved farther north to Morningside Heights.
Went back to L's place and rested up for a very long Friday.

to be cont...

n.

Back from NYC

ah, back from the big city. so much to talk about. probably a little too much for one blog. I'll try and keep it succinct.
day one, part one: Accela to NYC. I am never taking the regional train again! the Accela is so much nicer. sure its forty bucks more but damn it was clean, comfortable and only took 3 1/2 hours. Dropped my bags off at my friends place on the upper west side and headed to MoMA for my meeting. I was having lunch with one of the thesis committee members who is a curator of film and media at MoMA. I was a bit early so I walked around the museum a bit. Crazy packed! I've never seen so many people there! It was amazing for a thursday afternoon! Checked out their new media space which was a bit disappointing. Two great artists Michael Snow and Sam Taylor Wood. Sam's work always involves hot guys. I should mention that she is a woman not a gay man as I initially thought when I first saw her work. she has that sensibility. The work was nice but the room sucked. One little room set aside for video seems a bit of a waste for an institution like this. I decided to leave the museum and head up fifth for a bit. Again, kind of a bad idea, the street was packed! I went into the Disney store, bad idea #3. It was a freakin zoo! I made a single loop and fled out to the street. It was about this point that I was ready to start smacking people!
Luckily I got a call that S was ready to meet with me.
I grabbed lunch for us and headed back to MoMA and her office.
to be cont...

n.

and baby makes three

So C and I have added a child to our household, an eight week old blue point siamese cat.Her name is Mame. She is very cute and a complete terror! I haven't had a kitten around in quite a while. I had forgotten what a handful they are. I hope to turn her into a fat lazy cat as soon as possible!
We drove out to Ohio to pick her up. Spent three long days in a car. One day out and two back. Stayed in a really crappy hotel off of I90 in Syracure. It was really nasty and the cat wouldn't shut up all night long. I believe that there were some nasty animal smells going on in that room that she really didn't care for. There were some that I didn't care for either! blech!
This begins my crazy travel month. I am off to NYC for our CMS/Sloan media trip on Thursday. I also have to be there for my Harvard class. We are meeting with the curator of the Guggenheim on Sat.
We had to pick which companies we'd prefer to meet with last week. The list was fairly short but had some good names. I got all of my first choices somehow...
I'll be meeting with Weinstein Co, New Line Cinema, Atari and the Independant Film Channel. I bought a suit just for this day. I believe I ranted about it some days ago. Turns out that we are to dress "business casual" damn it! I'm wearing my suit anyway. I'll just leave out the tie. I am so not doing the khaki thing! If I make people feel bad because I am somewhat dressed up then to god damn bad.

ugh! Mame is calling me.

later,

names...

my life or something like it

so I am taking this class on memoir. By the end of the semester we are supposed to have some sort of story written about our lives. I think I might have to use this blog as a test site. I'm not sure how this will play out. I feel secure knowing that only two people read this. and I trust them both completely. However, I always felt my history was rather complicated. Knowing my audience, I believe that all of our lives are complicated. Perhaps the illusion is that lives are simple? We move through them with the belief that our experiences are singular. but perhaps the very fact that we are human and grew up in a heavily mediated culture leaves a common mark upon us all?
I sit here at one in the morning listening to seventies music. Old school Michael Jackson is playing in the background. I remember being very small, I was always the shortest person around. I believe I was under five feet tall well into my teens, perhaps until I was 17? Stupid short French genes.
I guess I was 11 or so. I shared a room with my brother (much to his embarrassment I am sure). He is significantly older than me, about 8 years. The year is 1980. At the time I am a huge fan of both disco music and Star Wars. There is a guy in our neighborhood who dresses up as Darth Vader. he is my brothers age. he does not hang out with my brother, he wants to hang out with me. I thought that was really cool. We played Star Wars. I was Luke to his Darth. Sometimes he would dress up as Spiderman or Captain America and do store events. I thought this was normal, kinda cool in fact. My parents did not agree. I was really sick at the time. I had pretty chronic asthma. I believe that this is why (to this day) I don't smoke cigarettes. I would steal my father's Kools and pass them to my sister and her friends. I wasn't supposed to run or play outdoor games that might even require a fast pace. My parents kept a watchful eye on me. Any site of me running and I was dragged into the house kicking and screaming.
Anyway, the point being my parents vigilence with my behaviour. They finally forbade me from hanging out with this guy. They started to think that he might be a little creepy. I didn't get it. Creepy how? they wouldn't say.
Flash forward a few years. This guy is in jail. it started with him peering into people's windows, a little bit of peeping tom thang. Unfortunately it escalated into him being caught with young boys of the neighborhood.
I don't mean to conflate the whole costume thing with pedophilia, it seems in poor taste given that it is Halloween and all. but that is my story and I am sticking to it.
Annoyingly enough I seem to attract many of these "caring older folk" as I become a teenager. And they are caught being child molesters. Thank god I was unattractive and misanthropic from the start.


names...

P.I.M.P.

okay, I let another month go by. It has been rather busy and stressful. One good thing. I am now the proud owner of a suit. the first I have owned since I was eighteen. And the first that cost more than a months rent. actually it was about three months. but I look damn sharp. and I will never, ever shop for another suit if I can help it. it has to have been one of the most excrutiatiing experiences of my life. It ranks up there with the GRE's. First stop was Brooks Brothers, where else does one go for suits? Sucked! the salesman was maybe 20, 24? completely unhelpful. assclowns! I wasn't about to give them my money.
On a whim we went into Ralph Lauren. I tried on one suit that was extremely sweet. the price was more than three times what I wanted to pay but I couldn't believe the way it fitted. it was fuckin amazing. that shit had my name on it. I put it on hold and said I would be back.
from there we went to Saks. I was waited on by an extremely messy woman. think older, overweight Jewish grandma with blue eyeshadow. I couldn't believe she was selling suits! who the fuck hired this woman? it was horrible! and the suit were so bad! I remember a year or so ago I would go into Saks and drool over the Prada suits. beautiful! Now it is fuggly Dolce and Gabbana suits made for raps stars or euro-trash. Closest I came was an Armani but it made me look like a pimp in a boxy kinda way. blech!
So, two days later I am back at RL meeting my salesman, James, and I buy a suit that cost more than all of my clothes combined! All in the name of corporate America. On Nov 11th my department and a bunch of Sloanies head to NYC and have out day long Media Corporation meet-a-thon. Over the course of the day we will be meeting with the recruiting for Sony, Bertlesmann, Viacom/MTV, Virgin, Atari, Nintendo etc. My suit will be put to work.
I went and picked up the suit today. I was talked into a tie to accent it. Not really talked into it because I know that once I put it on, I would buy it. The first tie I have ever bought and it cost me a hundred bucks. I'll be wearing this muther fucker to the grave.
In other news, I went down and visited Yale this week. It was open house for the Art History department. My meetings started at 9, thank you very much. I was up at 4:30 and on the train at 6. I get in at 8:45, grab a coffee and cab it over. I met with the interum grad director. one word: douchebag. it is nine in the morning and I have been up for 4 hours already (coffee on the train, reading, didn't sleep) and I have to deal with this guy who is actively trying to discourage me from applying. Dude! Fuck you!
At lunch with a grad student I learned that that is this guys modus operandi. he is basically there to weed out people. scare them away. I'm sorry but I was really insulted.
And then there is the campus of Yale. I took major photos which I will post when I can find the time.
It reminded me of Disneyland. It was fake and real at the same time. It was like a dream version of a college campus. Like what you would build if you have the money and the inclination. I think it was in comparison to MIT. MIT is completely utilitarian. there is no time for fancy, gothic architecture. The library (at Yale) looked right out of the fourteenth century, but clearly it couldn't be! it was so weird! no wonder people who go there are so fucking trapped in a WASP illusion. so, next day I am walking across my own campus and I see an woman with a hardcore, sixties flip that refuses to move in the gale force winds that go streaming across the quad followed by a bald man with a long ass beard riding a uni-cycle and chatting on his cell phone. I am a long fuckin way from New Haven and Yale. thats a good thing people. MIT may be full of socially awkward freaks but at least it isn't some weird, wanna-be American Oxford full of Abercrombie zombies that I want to destroy with a blow to the head.
long story short. I will apply and it will be an extremely long shot, seriously. I just don't think I am Yale material.
thank fuckin god for that!

ah, I got nothin else.

names out...

I got nothing

oh my, what a day. I was up at 6 to be at Saks by 8. a catered event for breast cancer. Ms. Elisabeth Hurley was in attendance along with 200 messy, messy Boston socialites. Yowza! no matter how many times I work a party at Saks I will always be astounded by bad bad outfits and plastic surgery! Where are all the attractive rich people? do they not live in Boston? Are they too busy to be at this event? perhaps they don't even exist in person? beauty is the ultimate fabrication. it can't be contained only chased. Certainly there were many gay men working at Saks helping messy rich women look for it! I tried to flirt in the vain attempt to get a discount on that Prada suit that I really, really need!.
Oh well. I left as everyone sat for lunch and hopped in a cab to make it to class in time. Very weird, one minute messy rich women the next I am hoofing it across Harvard Yard to talk about seventies performance art. How fucked up is my life?
then I spent the evening at the grad colloquium where they discussed the virtues of LOST vs. Buffy? Dude, I swear I haven't smoked pot in weeks. but at the moment it would help me make sense of my life.
instead I went home and cooked dinner and downed a bottle of wine.

Music of the moment is: Sting (stupid fuckin VH1 Classic)

names...

Comments about Bali

okay. I feel like I have to comment on this shit because I don't think Americans realise how fucked up these bombings are. Like many others growing up in Australia, Bali was this shit! The only American equivalent is probably Jamaica or Cancun. But not really because Indonesia is a much more complicated place.
So please picture this: you are hanging out in a beautiful tropical setting, cocktail in hand. Maybe a little buzzed, smoked a bit a grass. Then someone goes and blows shit up. Now, I am more than willing to admit that all those bitches on Girls Gone Wild Cancun should probably be blown the fuck up, and if I was a hyper religious person I would be extremely offended that they were hanging out on my land but god damn, blowing people up is some evil shit. Especially people on vacation. You know they saved up money, worked lots of hours at some shitty job so they could spend a week high in a tropical paradise. You want to make some change through explosions, then blow up the mother fuckers in charge. People staying at a Holiday Inn Bali are not deciding Australian Foreign Policy. Thats for damn sure.
I don't think this event is being given the exposure it deserves on US television. its really offensive.
Just wait. It will happen in Cancun, it will happen where we least expect it.

off to bed

names...

just another mutha fuckin day

so Tuesday doesn't turn out as bad as it could have. I did blow off the gym. I haven't gone since Friday and am feeling extremely fat at the moment. Don't care. I am cutting red meat out of my diet and am substituting beer. its working so far. I am sticking to chicken and fish and beer. We'll see what happens. I am about 15 pounds overweight. I try to convince myself that I am simply getting heavier as I get older due to heavier bones. I don't think that shit flies unless I am growing bones in my gut. its doubly annoying as I am surrounded by anorexic nerds. young twink ass muther fuckers.
Slowly gathering data on grad schools. Was to have a meeting with a prof at Stanford today. fucked up the time translation. For some reason I read it inverse and so did she. She accepted the blame due to jet lag. I let her as she actually confirmed the time with me via email. I still felt like a retard. Nice to know that she did too. She gets points for that. Actually at this point Stanford is kinda tops. I like the work she does and they give full funding. You can't top that shit. I am not too sure about Palo Alto though. I hope to make a trip out in November and get a face to face. C has been there and said the campus is amazing. I just don't know. I am heading down to Yale in a couple weeks. Princeton is still an unknown but word on the street is they are spending a whole lot of money on their art department and faculty. As much as I hate to say it I wish there was a program at MIT. Despite the fact that my experience has been kinda annoying I DO get to do what I want. that is pretty big.

Vito Acconi was on campus today doing a presentation. He is famous for buiding a fake floor in a gallery and lying under it masterbating as people walked around the gallery. He was miked so they could hear everything. Straight men do it in a gallery and it is art. Gay men do it in a public restroom and get arrested. what the fuck? He has a crazy stutter and so do his assistants. it would be funny if it wasn't sad. I am meeting all these "seminal" artists from the seventies and they all look about ninety years old. I'm sure the sixties and seventies were great but god damn! You pay for that lifestyle shit. In the immortal words of Rick James "cocaine is a hell of a drug."
On a side note Marina Abramovic is recreating some famous performance pieces at the Guggenheim in November. One of them will be Vito's piece noted above, the title is "Seedbed." Gross
I'll be there. To continue this side note, my Harvard class HAS to attend this performance series. Since it is a requirement of the class Harvard will pay for one night of hotel in NYC. I said "Harvard will pay for one night stay in a hotel in NYC!" Can you believe that shit? That is out of control! I am totally taking advantage of it, of course but still! god damn! pay for my hotel bitches! I'll spend that money drinking at Cock!
Now the question is: where will I be staying? I think that the fuckin Hudson is in order. I love that hotel!

okay, enough for now.

names out...

beer is food

ugh, Tuesday. it's back. It feels like it was only yesterday that I was bitching about it. Thankfully it is a Jewish holiday so one of my classes is cancelled and I am not going to the other one. So there is less to bitch about today.
It is probably a good thing though. I had a shitload of reading to do (please, who assigns 500 pages to read in a week?) which I never got around to doing. C and I spent the week in an alcoholic haze. We started Friday evening at Flash's with friends where I began my drinking journey with a Maker's Mark Manhatten. I stopped drinking these for a while as I began to dislike the taste. but absence seems to reinvigorate the tastebuds. hmmmmm good. Since I am a lightweight I had two then switched to beers for the rest of the night. Its why God invented cabs. we drank for several hours then went out to dinner where we drank more. It was Grif's birthday. thats all we needed to know. Let the drinking commence! We were booted out of the restaurant by the staff. I was ready to keep drinking but everyone wussed out. We ended up walking home. I tried to convince C that we should stop by the Grad bar as we just happened to be walking past it. Alas, we went home and crashed. Well, C crashed, I had another beer and put the Simpsons season 5 on.

Saturday I worked cater-waiter, or the gay national guard as C calls it. I believe he stole that from Will&Grace. Neighbors had a party. I arrived shortly after midnight and proceeded to drink until 4 when I stumbled back to our place. There was a couple at the party that needed to be talked about so I had to hang out until they left. It was one of those unfortunate gay man/girlfriend couples. I just assumed they were the typical best friend relationship but no! girlfriend and gay boyfriend. Too bad. Perhaps he was simply the effeminate heterosexual? they do exist, somewhere. But he was WAY gay. poor girl. I'm sure she knows. How can she not? I chock it up to the fact that people make relationship choices that suit them pyschologically. Its best not to even go there. Sad thing is that someday they'll be married and he'll be cheating on her in some restroom or maybe at the gym.
Who knows? I tried to be extra gay to inspire him that it would be for the best if he just came out. I live to serve.
Sunday was way hung. I got dragged to Target by C and in retaliation I dragged him to the B-Side. Guinness is the only cure for a hangover. Stayed too long, went home and cooked dinner at 10. felt like big city folk.
tried catching up on my reading yesterday. did quite a bit. then we went back to the B-side. I just had to.
Now it is Tuesday, god damn it!
Perhaps a visit to the B-side tonight?

names...

Dude! I made the seventh level of hell! kick ass!

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Seventh Level of Hell!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Very Low
Level 2 (Lustful)	Very High
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	High
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Very High
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Very High
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Very High
Level 7 (Violent)	Extreme
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	Very High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	High

Take the Dante Inferno Hell Test

and I am horrified to discover that he is a nerd!

crap, it's October already. I don't know if I can deal with that fact.
So the two week period of corporate schmoozing is over. I have applied for an associates position at McKinsey. We'll see if anything comes of it. I have absolutly no idea whether or not it will. Honestly I don't even care. At this point I am starting the process of applying to Phd programs. I have limited it to 5. I only really want to apply to 3 but C is giving me a hard time about it. I am just being lazy. Five applications? that is a total pain in the ass. For Masters I only applied to two! and that was annoying enough.
whatever. I am off to Yale in a week or so to take a look at their program. I ran into a friend of mine who just finished his MFA there and he gave me the scoop. There is only one person there who is worth studying contemporary art with. Pretty much everyone else in the art history department is pretty entrenched in their own little world. Don't even mention the words contemporary or post-moderism in their presence. Their philosophy department is pretty old world as well. Nothing exciting going on. Plus, it is New Haven. nuff said.
I am speaking with a professor at Stanford on Tuesday. I am actually taking a class at Harvard with a former student of hers. She seems cool. But I don't know about Palo Alto. It does seem like MIT on the west coast but I am not so sure that that is a good thing. MIT hasn't exactly been ringing my bells lately. Speaking of MIT here is the story in this weeks Tech about my run in with anti gay slogans on campus.
Then there is Princeton. I don't know if I could handle Princeton. I get the feeling that the students would be more annoying that Harvard undergrads. There is only so much self centered elitism I can handle. I'd constantly have the urge to smack people. Of course that happens on a daily basis at MIT but for different reasons. Sometimes I just can't handle nerds. Sorry to say. I reallise that I am one, however there is only so much I can take.

more later,

names out...

Damn memory palaces

Tuesdays are a pain in the ass. The day seems interminable. 10 am to 10 pm. Ugh...
Ran my ass all over Cambridge as well. Perhaps it makes up for not going to the gym today?
Spent practically the entire day talking and thinking about memory. Sherry's class was about Winnicott's transitional objects. Winnicott was a child psychologist/psychoanalyst during the fifties. Transitional objects are those that children use to replace the breast once they are removed from the mother. It is an object that is separate from the child yet makes the child feel whole. We were discussing whether or not a technological device can be this object. I personally feel that those whose psyche is positioned a certain way, perhaps an unresolved oral stage? (thanks Freud) will use technology to return to this state of completeness. We had to write about a personal object from out childhood and then read it out to the class. So far we have had to do this every week. Its starting to get annoying. I took the stereotypical route and said I had a blanky that became a stuffed animal. It made her happy and she left me alone. I refuse to let on how much I have read in terms of psychoanalysis. I want to see how she teaches it. My friend kestrell keeps trying to get me to engage in a conversation about it with her. No thanks! Not to say that she isn't nice but I am a little skeptical of her pedagogical style. I think she is using us to work out issues in her book. Not that that is a bad thing but it gives me reason to be a bit cautious. I asked her about Melanie Klein and she said "great question, we'll go over it in a bit." never happened.

tonight's class was all about memory palaces. I hated the readings with a passion. I won't go into it. If you are curious google that shit. Halfway though class the stupid one asked about differentiating between media and medium. The conversation took a turn for the worse. It reminded me of my first year in art school where we were asked to define "fine art" and "craft." One of the most absurd conversation I have been spectator to in quite a while. Finally I told them that they were rehashing the tedious arguments of structuralism and how attempting to define media was a conversation for the fifties. Aren't we past that shit now? What about post-structuralism, post-modernism, post-post-modernism. These issues have been discussed ad nausium in the art world and it is only just now that media studies is trying to figure this shit out? Christ, catch up people.
People just want nice, neat little boxes in which to line up all of their ideas. It is easier that way. God forbid you actually use your brain and realise that the world doesn't work that way.

UPDATE: There will be an article in the student newspaper "the Tech" on the anti-gay writings on blackboards around campus and the fact that no one is dealing with it. I am stirring up shit now! Ignore me will you? I'll go to the media!
I might have to forward the story to friends at Planetout.

going to try and sleep now. Insomnia beware!

names...

insomnia & performance art

insomnia. it is four in the morning. I wake up when C goes to the bathroom. I begin thinking about how much I have to do today. Forget it. There is no going back to sleep for me. I have a paper due at 2 this afternoon. I meant to tackle it today to give myself time tomorrow for a rewrite. Never happened. I spent the day at the MFA shooting video for a performance by Zhang Huan. It was amazing and a great opportunity however I should have made time for writing. whatever.
In the hour and a half that I had free I went wandering around the museum. It was nice. its been a while since I have done that. When I worked there I used to spend time every week or so just wandering and looking around. It tended to be very soothing. If my day was going crazy and people wouldn't leave me alone I could disappear into the galleries. As my days get more and more full of things I need to accomplish NOW, quiet time has become extremely rare. Granted I have been spending time working (job not schoolwork) and when not working I am hanging out with C. I kinda want the weather to get shitty so that I will lock myself in the library. When it is nice out I am not so inclined to do work. funny how that is...

I think I'll try and write some of that paper now.

names...

ooh

ohhh today is the big day, the CAREER FAIR. (I felt it deserved caps) Just whom shall I pursue today? I am compiling the list of companies that I plan on visiting. I don't really know how this shit works, I'm just winging it really. We don't need to carry resumes around because if you posted it to the website by the end of last week the school has compiled them on a CD that they give to all the companies attending. Pretty sweet eh? I am going to print a bunch up anyway cause I am anal like that.
I am catering this evening. Some big shin-dig at Saks. I can hardly wait to see all the tight skin and bleached hair of the women who shop there. I jibe but it is purely jealousy. There isn't much I can afford there, but then again is there much I would want to buy there? I don't wear a suit, fancy clothes, etc...come to think of it there isn't much I would be jealous of. I actually find it kind of aggregious to spend that kind of money on clothes.
which is not to say I don't like nice clothes, I do. however, that kind of spending is a little much.
oh and a foot note for TK about the woman getting shot mentioned in a previous entry. She worked for my mother at the time. Her husband was in the military and off in Korea or someplace at the time. She survived the shooting and ended up staying at our house for weeks! Doing nothing but lying around in a bathrobe watching TV. My mother was ready to strangle her by the time her husband showed up. She was a total freak and drove my parents crazy! My mother kept saying she wished she had been shot in the mouth so she wouldn't have been able to talk. pretty funny.

off to clean up for the fair.

names...

the suckiest bunch of sucks who ever sucked

so it is career week and there are no classes? I get up (relatively) early and chug coffee preparing to go to my Sloan class. Check the online syllabus and realise that there are no classes this week! Now granted I am only a listener on this class. It is a Financial Theory class. I was talked into it by a classmate only to have him never go to it! It is interesting so far but seems to me to be common sense stuff. who knows?
Maybe it gets harder? Best part about it is watching all the uptight Sloan MBAs who are paying three times the tuition I am, stressing out. MBAs are total freaks! At least these are. I am sure they are all very nice people. Perhaps it is this school that does it to them?
who knows? I ain't got class today. I'm off to the gym.

names...

career week

So it is career week. Last night I went to a food and drink fest hosted by a fancy consulting company to sell themselves to LGB people. I leave out the T because there is no mention of it on their literature. I considered mentioning it to them but as I was drinking on their tab I thought it might be inappropriate. I'll be sure to bring it up on Thursday when I visit their booth at the career fair. "What about the transgendered? don't you care about them?" That sad part is that most LGB organisations don't. The trans community still complicates things for people who can't wrap their mind around the endless possibilites of gender identitfication. Who cares how you view yourself as long as you aren't hurting anyone? Why can't people just accept?
Well being the bitter muther fucker that I am, I know why. Because thinking that way is complicated and people don't like to think complicated thoughts because it is hard. There are things in life that are hard and we spend an inordinate amount of time avoiding them.
Case in point. I am taking a class with Sherry Turkle, a rather famous person who has written quite a bit about personalities and technologies. You should google her. Anyway, she is also a trained (and formerly practicing) psychoanalyst. The last two classes have consisted of us writing and reading out loud stories about our childhood. the toys we played with and the spaces we interacted with that most affected who we are today. Needless to say I hated every moment of it. I don't like thinking about my childhood. Not that it was terrible, I wasn't beat or abused. but my childhood consisted of distant parents and constant moving as most military children can probably attest to. I did happen to have traumatic things happen around me which I have supressed. There is something about having a person shot on the far side of the wall surrounding your house that can lead one to certain anxieties. I'm sure we were better off having them not enter our house but still its pretty fucked up.
Then there is the moment when we were having a picnic at the beach and people started shooting. A woman standing next to me was shot in the side and turned to look at me as she fell to the ground. She was a co-worker of my mothers who decided on a whim to come with us. Shitty move on her part I must say.
But then the class is about memoir. How it is written and how technology plays a part in that story. Since technology is a huge part of my life it seems that the class might actually come to some good. we'll see.
Back to career week. I am tired of being poor. It is all well and good being a starving artist when one has a trust fund however when one has looming student loans it is not quite so romantic. is it wrong of me to want to get a job that pays a hundred grand to start?
I feel like I am selling out.

names...

career week

So it is career week. Last night I went to a food and drink fest hosted by a fancy consulting company to sell themselves to LGB people. I leave out the T because there is no mention of it on their literature. I considered mentioning it to them but as I was drinking on their tab I thought it might be inappropriate. I'll be sure to bring it up on Thursday when I visit their booth at the career fair. "What about the transgendered? don't you care about them?" That sad part is that most LGB organisations don't. The trans community still complicates things for people who can't wrap their mind around the endless possibilites of gender identitfication. Who cares how you view yourself as long as you aren't hurting anyone? Why can't people just accept?
Well being the bitter muther fucker that I am, I know why. Because thinking that way is complicated and people don't like to think complicated thoughts because it is hard. There are things in life that are hard and we spend an inordinate amount of time avoiding them.
Case in point. I am taking a class with Sherry Turkle, a rather famous person who has written quite a bit about personalities and technologies. You should google her. Anyway, she is also a trained (and formerly practicing) psychoanalyst. The last two classes have consisted of us writing and reading out loud stories about our childhood. the toys we played with and the spaces we interacted with that most affected who we are today. Needless to say I hated every moment of it. I don't like thinking about my childhood. Not that it was terrible, I wasn't beat or abused. but my childhood consisted of distant parents and constant moving as most military children can probably attest to. I did happen to have traumatic things happen around me which I have supressed. There is something about having a person shot on the far side of the wall surrounding your house that can lead one to certain anxieties. I'm sure we were better off having them not enter our house but still its pretty fucked up.
Then there is the moment when we were having a picnic at the beach and people started shooting. A woman standing next to me was shot in the side and turned to look at me as she fell to the ground. She was a co-worker of my mothers who decided on a whim to come with us. Shitty move on her part I must say.
But then the class is about memoir. How it is written and how technology plays a part in that story. Since technology is a huge part of my life it seems that the class might actually come to some good. we'll see.
Back to career week. I am tired of being poor. It is all well and good being a starving artist when one has a trust fund however when one has looming student loans it is not quite so romantic. is it wrong of me to want to get a job that pays a hundred grand to start?
I feel like I am selling out.

names...

careful what you wish for...

oh it has been one of those weeks. Funding is still up in the air, my student loans have finally gone through but for some reason it will be several days before I see a check and I walk the earth with a dollar to my name. its kinda funny, no matter how far I go being broke will always be a state of mind. I have no money and I don't seem to want anything. Besides a beer of course and C is kind enough to support my habit. I imagine that is survival on his part, when I'm down and I ain't got beer to keep me sane, mutha fuckas watch out.
On that note today seemed to be the day for free drinking. there were three events on campus that promised free beers for grad students. I'd say that I qualify! hmmmm free buzz.
Anyway things are getting kooky. Spent the free beverage events talking to the newbies. they are awfully enthusiastic. I don't trust enthusiasum. Bitterness I understand and trust but enthusiasum? no, not at all. give it time. they will come to see that this institution sees them as fodder. it took me ten minutes but then I am smarter than most or is it bitter-er?
I had an incident this week that makes me expecially bitter towards the school. C and I met for drinks at the grad bar. Now the grad bar is in this monolithic building that holds the radio station and numerous student groups one of which is the LGBT group room. Down the hall from the LGBT center is the men's bathroom. For some reason that probably made sense in the early 20th century when the building was built, there is a rather large blackboard above the urinals. Now these are old school urinals that run about 5 ft. high to the floor along one side of the wall and above it is the blackboard. So I go to take a piss and realise that there are all kinds of anti-gay slogans and derisive language all over it. big, small various types of handwriting. and I start to get pissed. because I know that someone is just being a douchebag here. They see the LGBT center and for some reason that threatens their fragile sense of self and they need to get their frustrations out for all the world to see. The main thing is that it isn't easy to write on this board, you have to REALLY want to write something cause that shit is high and you have to either stand or get a chair or some shit to avoid standing in a fuckin urinal!
So I head back to the grad bar and pour myself another beer (land of the six dollar pitcher of beer!) open my laptop and pen a letter to all the LGBT committee members I know, in addition to the dean of grad students and the head of student life.
What do I hear back? I get a reply from another LGBT committee member telling me that this has been going on for a while and they are "documenting it" and they know that it is one particular student who is doing it.
and I hear nothing else! no one even saw fit to email me back and say damn that sucks or anything! Douchebags!
because you know if someone had written a racial slur every mutha fucker in the city would be there protesting and making a big fuckin stink. C keeps bugging me to take it farther and make a big deal about it. But you know what? I realised coming to MIT that there are a lot of people who are closeted here. There are those people who have shuttered themselves up in a life of science to the disavowal of their sense of self. It is a world of the mind and not the body. These are people who are extremely uncomfortable in their bodies. They exist in the intellectual.
its really disheartening.

names...

top o' the heap

Christ! its been a month already! okay, school has started again so I should have the time to waste on this site.
Its been a busy month. I went from having a decent income to being completely broke. Its amazing how bitter that makes me. As I sit here doing the paper chase with my student loan company (tomorrow AM will bring about the THIRD attempt at faxing them a rather significant document that they seem to keep losing) I am ready to punch someone in the face. The problem is that the companies tend to hire overly cheerful people to answer their customer complaints so while I am pretty pissed off, I would feel bad yelling at someone who is being pleasant to me. Ultimately they are only doing their jobs, and probably getting paid pretty shitty wages. while I hate people, I really don't want to be a douchebag despite the fact that I have twenty bucks to live on...forever!
Drama moment over. I am living on twenty bucks but Big C has gotten a promotion that comes with a rather large raise so I can live off of him for a week or so but still. I was planning on going to London this week but that is out the window...I suppose I could have bought the tickets this summer when I had a job and money to burn but I am such a tightass that I kept waiting for the tickets to get cheaper! oh well...wasn't meant to be.
And so back to school. I just had class with the very woman who brought me to MIT. Sherry Turkle. Pretty amazing and quite forthright. If she wants to put some of your work in her book, she will. She will do us the courtesy of asking us but who in their right mind would say no? She is fuckin Sherry Turkle!! There was an undergrad in the class who complained about how it required too much reading. hello! this is MIT you fuckhead...sorry to make you WORK! Go back to mechanical engineering loser. She actually asked him to stay afterwards so she could convince him to stay in the class! I'm sure he'll stay. She will tell him that he doesn't have to do any reading or something. She is probably looking to psychoanalyse him. Make him a test subject.
Anyway. I might be off to SF soon to take a look at a major video collection. The collectors came here and we all had a very fancy lunch (the head of the Architecture department, the director of the art center, the curator of said art center and quite a few others.) I took the liberty of inviting myself out to look at their house and their collection. I had to flirt a little bit with their curator which was fine as he was kinda cute in an art nerdy kinda way.

oh and here is the list of the 10 songs that have floated to the top of my iPod. Better late than never, right boys?

Air "Alone in Kyoto." My current favorite faggy french art music. this is from the Lost in Translation soundtrack but is on a very good album called Talkie Walkie.

Angie Stone "Just a Pimp." Angie Stone is fabulous. LOVE HER! and this is about her man who just happens to be a pimp. Very 70's R&B, Roberta Flack-esque. kick ass.

Atreyu "Bleeding Mascara." Nouveau metal and they are named after the kid in Neverending Story! need I say more?

Jill Scott "Golden." one of my few happy moment songs. I love jill scott! great voice, amazing lyrical narrative. good times.

Kyuss "50 Million Year Trip." one stoned groove. All I can think is that it must be a lot of fun to play. Fire up the bong, turn out the lights and go.

Lacuna Coil "Heaven's a Lie." Italilan neo-metal. female singer who only dresses in Gucci. heavy, black, dark and very dramatic music. Come on, they're Italian!

Nightwish "I wish I had an Angel." Same as above only they're from Norway. Dark, dramatic, Scandinavian...

Scissor Sisters "Take Your Mama." New favorite band. Love this album. not as big a fan of their reworking of Comfortably Numb (sorry Mike) a close runner up is the Tits on the Radio.

Spice Girls "Say You'll be There." big gay moment, Spice Girls! Who doesn't love them? A moment in history that will never be back...ah girl power where are you when I need you?

Missy Elliott "Pussycat." the top of my heap! "pussy don't fail me now!" It is sheer poetry. Missy is the shit!


that is all...

names out.

oy vey

so, I sit here at 1:30 in the morning. I just got back from La Prov and the opening night of the film fest. I am exhausted and a little drunk. upon boarding the return train I was informed by the conductor that I had the wrong ticket. The silly broad at South Station sold me the wrong ticket. She charged me the correct price, of course, but gave me the wrong ticket. Luckily I kept my receipt. plus I think the conductor didn't really give a shit but I had enough paper for him to leave me alone. He tried to charge me $2.50 more but I convinced him otherwise.
Oh Prov. I have such a love hate relationship with that town. The ex is still there living right above one of my best friends K. I can't spend the night there in the event he spots me. It wouldn't be good. He has a bit of a stalker tendency. its been 7 years and he still loves me. or so I am told. he hasn't actually told me but I know second hand that I am still a topic of discussion. I don't think I even want to open that door. I still have the emotional and physical scars of that relationship. I am a far saner man away from him. What is it with the self destructive nature of relationships? Do we outgrow it? Is there a point where we all realise that what we want from a relationship is really not what we want? Does one adjust and accept? I am beginning to feel that my crisis is stemming from a personal isolation. I'm not going into detail here and I probably shouldn't mention it here at all as that seems rather...inappropriate.
moving on. RIIFF
not bad, opening movies were very dark, which was hella funny because the programmer had this dumb ass teen country star, who is trying to make a comeback out of the darkness of puberty, show up at the end with his new "making of" videos. It would have been hysterical if I didn't think it incredible insulting. His songs were written by Orin Hatch. your friend and mine. The Orin Hatch, hatemonger. So while 90 minutes of incredibly dark short films are playing, young country boy is out in the lobby with his family. Dressed to the nines in country finery. Looking extremely...how should I say this? ...fey? with hordes of teeny bopper fans. Amusing? yes indeed!
I grabbed K out of the theatre and we headed to the afterparty early, to kick start our drinking. and lo, the party sucks. No free booze! I planned two parties for this fest and both of mine either have free food or free booze. I'm not fucking stupid. I plan a party that I might want to attend! this event had shitty wine, shitty food and trashy people. If I ever need a reminder to not move back to Prov, I will think back to all those outfits I had to witness at this party. K and I ran out of cash and headed to the bar that is hosting tomorrow nights party. had a nice glass of wine and headed to the train.
which brings me full circle.
I love it when a ramble comes together. tomorrow night is my Rosa Von Praunheim tribure with the Goethe Institute.
Love it! gay nazis! drag queens and a party that will have free food that is actually edible! go figure...but after tonight I haven't committed. maybe I'll stay home...

names

My whole life is a dark room, one big, dark room

I feel like I need to spend some time thinking and writing about my current malaise. I am finding it quite inexplicable. Why depression? is it a depression? It doesn't feel like one of those stay in bed, curtains closed, shut out the world kinda moments. It's more like a dissatisfaction that can't be explained away, drunk away or distracted from. Maybe its the fact that I feel there is something wrong or missing with my life that I can't pinpoint. Am I on the crux of a life changing moment that leaves me confused and cautious? But then again it doesn't manifest itself as confusion. It is closer to an exhaustion. Maybe I just need a vacation? Perhaps I need to travel(by travel I mean on an airplane)? I haven't gone anywhere in over a year. I am planning on going to London in Sept. maybe that will shake me out of my slump?
Reaching back I realise that the feeling was sparked by a visit to my parents. This, of course, seems like an obvious "trauma" event that could have sparked my current state of mind. But visiting them wasn't traumatising. What is was was a moment where I realised that my life is going to be very different from my parents. Thanks to grad school I have an entirely different trajectory that will take me far away from anything I ever would have considered possible. We sat at Castle Hill, watching the sailboats go by and having cocktails. There was no conversation. My parents didn't say a word. My father walked away and wandered the lawn. It was weird. I did't know what to make of it.

back to work, more later.

monday, monday

ahhhh mondays. They arrive far too quickly. Its amazing how quickly I tired of the real world. I have one more month before I return to the security of campus. and of course, a much more pleasant schedule. I am currently registered for 4 classes. I think I will have to change that. I'm not sure about a whole year of German. Sure, it sounds great but do I really want to learn another language?
This weekend is finally over. I believe I will chock this one up to a continuation of my existential crisis which began sometime last week. Went down to my parents in Newport. I did this with the intention of getting my tattoo worked on. How was I to know that they would be booked up for the entire weekend? who makes reservations at at tattoo parlour? OK, I did but I know better having been screwed like this before. But I couldn't even get an appointment! jerks! And so I spent Friday night and Sat with my parents. C came down on the bus Sat morning. Which was pretty amusing. He is not a bus person and was quite traumatized by the 90 minute trip. we played tourist all day, right down to paying for parking. This was mostly to shut my father up as he began bitching almost immediately about the traffic, people, parking etc...
We had lunch at the Black Pearl which used to be a nice place (or maybe I imagined it) but it was pretty lame now. Paid way too much for rather mediocre food. Well my mother did which made me feel guilty as it kinda sucked! She wanted lobster and had to settle for a lobster salad sandwich. It would seem that their new chef is quite fond of mayo as EVERYTHING came with it!
We had a much better experience at Castle Hill. We drove around Ocean Drive and I had my dad take us to Castle Hill. We were all in need of a cocktail (well C and I were.) Much better. Sitting on a porch with a drink in hand watching the sail boats go by. The house sits high upon a hill with a lawn that slopes down to the ocean. there was a wedding setup down by the water line. Addirondack chairs dotted the lawn with cocktail service! We chose to sit up at the bar as it was too sunny and I try to avoid the sun as much as possible. we watched the wedding and then headed out to take the bus home.
to be cont...

I'll write more later, time to get ready for work.

names.

sticking it to the man

ah, blogging at work. is there anything finer? So confession time. I was supposed to go to this meeting in RI. I got on the train, it was running really. late painfully late you might say. By the time I got to Providence I was about 45 minutes late and I needed a drink stat! K and I went for cocktails, moved on to dinner, more cocktails and needless to say, I did not attend the meeting. Thank god! no A/V and rambling people for 3+ hours. I don't think so! I called and told them my train was having issues and after sitting for some time on the tracks we were offloaded and I ended up taking the train back to Boston. Screw that meeting! I didn't want to go in the first place.
Anyway, some idiots left a bag sitting at South Station and now they have frozen all trains into SS and evacuated the place! Excitement she wrote! Those kookie terrorists have their sight set on SS and Boston. Numerous thoughts are running through my head at this moment, most of them in extreme bad taste.
It was not a fun train ride in this morning. I was ready to smack some people who had no idea how to navigate the T. Tourists can cram it!

rant for the day (cont)
my co-worker loves to listen to "lite" classic rock. I am currently being subjected to Uncle Kracker. since when is he classic? idiotic perhaps but certainly not my idea of classic rock! Normally my day is full of Journey, BTO, War etc which I can handle. Until the Strawberry Alarm Clock makes an appearance and then it is all over!

okay back to work...maybe

names

maintaining forward momentum

nice being here. Virtual space has come to be comforting. The real world has been far too intrusive lately. I am hitting the point where I feel like all I do is work, and not in a good way. Catering, PI, film festival. Its really getting to be a bit much. Maybe I am finally realising that I don't have to keep moving? Sometimes sitting still can be a good thing. Did I just say that? I must be getting old. I have started backing out of committments. I was supposed to help produce a radio show at school for the trans community. The host kept giving me a hard time because I had to miss meetings to work, so I proceded to back out and told her that I am sure there are plenty of other people who can take my place...see ya!
I am in the midst of three books. new Potter, the World is Flat, and the Diamond Age. One I can't put down, one I can't wait to finish and probably won't and the other i just don't know about.
thats all I got.
music of the moment: Doobie Bothers (insert weed related joke here)

names.

Been a long time since them days

ah, it has been ages. I can't even remember the last time I wrote here. That certainly means I should be focusing. Things have been hello crazy. I don't know how it happened but I find myself overbooked in the middle of summer! I have spent most weekends catering. when not catering I am sucked in to fix the apartment. Not that I mind that, I love my apartment. It looks sweet and I have the hyper anal nature of big C to thank for that. However, when I am working 6 days a week, it is not so fun!
Music of the moment: Iron Maiden: flight of icarus. momentary sidebar. I am 13, I am living in Guam, going to a Catholic school that happens to be in the middle of the jungle with chickens and pigs running around it (I kid you not) and I am am introduced to Maiden. truly transformative. It is any wonder that I have a sense of the surreal? MTV is kind enough to ruin this moment by following up with the Vinnie Vincent Invasion theme song to a Freddie Kruger film. Reminds me of my high school girlfriend...hello extremely gay moment! she was head of the girls basketball team!
anyway. I was asked to sign a confidentiality agreement at work today. It turns out that the only way I can get access to the database that I need, because I am covering for someone who quit!, is to sign this form. Whatever. I was wondering when it would happen. In my new position I am hearing way too much financial gossip. gotta write that shit down. In case you haven't guessed I have been moved from my rather tedious position to one that requires I pay attention!! fuckers!
On top of all this, the Rhode Island International FIlm Festival program is finally finished. I am sooo over that mother fucker.
this all brings me back to the fact that I am over booked! I finally emailed some people that I had agreed to help and said, "you know what, I don't think so!" fuck em, I am extremely over that shit! the summer is going to be over and my ass will have spent it schlepping for bitches! hell no.
god damn it! now they are playing fuckin Starship! Hey, I love Mannequin as much as anyone. Meshach Taylor represents the gay man in all of us but seriously. Someone had to stop them from playing music.

okay, this is over. my night is ruined. to bed and Harry Potter!


keep quiet you sickos!

names

working at the PI

I have figured out that I can spend downtime at work adding to my blog. There will probably be more posting going on! Till I get busted by the man. But I figure as the temp I shouldn't be expected to work that hard. seriously.
I am currently shlogging my way through Marx's Capital. By way of contrast, I am also re-reading the Potter series in anticipation of the new book and the next film. I'm kinda regretting not submitting a paper for the Harry Potter conference that will be at Salem this fall. I was going to write something about queer harry potter. All those closets and dual worlds. Seemed appropriate. but the deadline fell around the same time as all of my other deadlines and that one just didn't seem important. oh well. The head of my department is giving the keynote speech. I'll post the URL when I think of it. I kinda forgot.
but back to Marx. I am thinking about the fetishisation of art. For Marx, the commodity is a fetish, something that culture has created a desire for. William Pietz, whose "Fetishism and Materialism" I am currently reading on the train, reads Marx as believing that capital is a species of fetish: a factory machine, a wheat field, a pension fund which are viewed as "capital" by accountants and political economists are fetishes. I really enjoy this bit considering where I am working!

Now on to a personal fetish, Pink Floyd is reuniting for SIR Bob and his magical concerts for self promotion. I had the pleasure of seeing Pink Floyd (the new slimmed down version sans Roger) in the late eighties and it was one of the most spectacular experiences of my young life. Lets hope a tour arises out of this.
On a side note, Bob is being sued by the other members of the boomtown rats for back royalties. I guess he has been a bit busy.

okay, back to the corporate grind.

names.

bad, bad, bad gay films

oh dear. spent the evening wading through some submissions for the film festival. Once again, I can't believe how bad gay films can be. On an up note the Ethan Green film was cute. A little miscast a times. One character who was supposed to be the hot young twink was certainly not. I don't think even drunk, creepy old guys at the Eagle would have thought so. I also discovered a group of local filmmakers who are making queer horror films! Excitement she wrote! They certainly aren't great films, in fact they can be placed in the same realm as the soft-core films on skin-a-max. but there is a certain campy amusement in watching muscle queens try to act and pretend to be dead. I saw many a fluttering eye on a "dead" person. I am tempted to contact them and join them in their bad filmmaking!
More gay films to follow this evening!
On a side note Batman opens this evening, or should I say tomorrow morning? Speaking of gay films! hunky hunky Christian Bale!! it can't be any worse than Joel Schumacher's disastrously queer Batman films. not that I minded seeing Chris O'Donnell wrapped in leather with big fake nipples, not at all!
On a decidedly more intellectual note I have begun the rather arduous process of applying for overseas scholarships. Good times are ahead!!

later,

names.

yow! time flies!

okay...so time has flown. It is literally a month since my last post. So much has happened that I wonder if it is worth the trouble bringing those out there up to date.
It is now post Star Wars, but pre Batman Returns. post end of the semester but pre-fall (a very good thing) and I am working, earning an almost livable wage.
I feel like I should take a moment and reflect upon the Deleuze conference. Perhaps the greatest thing I walked with was a sense of my own strength in navigating Deleuze. I understood about 60% of what was said. believe me, that is quite an accomplishment. Not to toot my own horn, I owe it all to the fabulous D.N.R. He is teaching an early cinema and philosophy class in the fall that I am quite psyched about. Although there is some paranoia about my final paper. I think it might have sucked. I did say that about my last paper for him and I got an A. however, this is different. I really didn't spend the amount of time I should have on it. very rushed. It was an analysis of Alain Resnais "Providence" which I really enjoyed. It was actually too much to write about. If you haven't seen that film, go and see it!
I have notes from the conference for who wish further elaboration. On the very same weekend I was a panel moderator for the Media in Transition conference. I moderated the discussion on music and subcultures which in retrospect seems rather a misnomer. I gather that the "subculture" title refers to the fact that each paper referred to either a queer male genre, an African-American genre, or musicals in general. Which is not to say that the papers didn't warrant discussion but rather the framing device did them a disservice. We had a decent turnout for 10:30 on a chilly Sunday morning.
The following Monday we all gave out thesis presentations. I spent most of the day fine tuning my powerpoint presentation. Half listened to the other people giving their schpiels. Most were surprisingly interesting. But I really didn't pay attention. I changed my topic in the last two weeks and so was racing my ass towards the finish line of 6:30pm. I needn't have worried. I actually had enough material to spend an hour talking. The best crit I got from the department head said "I have no idea what you are talking about, almost no interest in the subject, but am totally fascinated!" so there you go. whoopi-de-do!
I'm trying not to be bitter but god damn it, I am. I plan on writing most of this fucker this summer and finish a semester early. deciding not to listen to anyone in my department was the smartest thing I have done so far. I got really tired of being the square peg attempting to fit myself into their round hole.
I really had fun writing my thesis proposal. It was interested to me, engaging. Isn't that the way it should work?
Flash forward a couple of weeks. I am temping at Putnam Investments. I have a great schedule despite the fact that it doesn't leave me much time to go to the gym. and my supervisor said I could work on my thesis when there isn't other work to do!
I spent this afternoon printing out material for a post-graduate program abroad. If luck is with me I will be spending next year at Oxford. with someone else paying!!

oh man, enough for tonight.

names.

Deleuze, Media In Transition, Beer

oh the monday after a long crazy weekend. Its pretty amazing when Monday becomes recovery day!
So this weekend entailed two conferences, two bars, Star Wars tickets, and the Clone Wars. not bad for a simple Fri, Sat, Sun.
Friday...
Day one of both conferences. I started at the Media In Transition (MIT4) registering with K, then lunch and a meeting concerning my thesis project. the meeting went well but was a little overwhelming. I think I might be in for some work. maybe a whole lot of work. Terrifying. the good part is that everytime I sit and work on it I get excited. not a bad thing. much better then my previous topic which was simply a chore.
Then headed out to H for the other conference.
The first speaker started off fascinating but he had one of those monotone voices that induces sleep. I dozed several times. Could have been the numerous references to Kierkegaard and Pascal. snooooozzzzzzzz! Which is too bad because he made several interesting mentions of Bersonism in relation to Kierkegaard. One of those, "let me read your paper and stop reading it to me" moments.

oh crap. I have to run. today is thesis proposal presentation day. I am nowhere near being finished.

later,

whatever happened to Jody Watley?

ahhh coffee in the morning and Jody Watley cranking on the TV. Can a morning get any better? She really was a hottie. Doing male drag and shit! and this was what, 1990?
God! Vh1 followed Jody with Wet, Wet, Wet! what the fuck was this band thinking? English people create some fucked up bands. Does anyone remember Bros? with the twin albino-looking brothers? They rode the initial Kyle Minogue pop wave. maybe they didn't get to America. They certainly subjected Australia to their crap-pop.
Anyway. yesterday was spent making strides on my thesis proposal. that and doing laundry, going to the gym and ending at the B-side for treats. A reward for creating something out of nothing!
I have the feeling I am writing a book not a "masters thesis." It is growing and growing beyond my initial idea.
hilarious website of the day:
http://www.superdickery.com/dick/1.html
Sorry I haven't figured out how to do a hotlink on this thing so just copy and paste people.
Its not that hard.

more later. off to spend the day with Deleuze. half in french, half in english. should be interesting. I don't understand french.
Cartman quote of the day, "French people piss me off."

later.

repeats

okay, I wrote this late last night. I attempted to post it twice! now is seems that things are posting. hurrah!
I am tempted to re-write but I like the fact that I am "re-animating" a frame of mind from several hours past.

cheers!

back again. its been a while. not an easy couple of weeks. To call it an existential crisis would be an understatement.
Things seem to have worked themselves out for the time being at least.
Several issues had to be dealt with over the past several days.
1. Thesis proposal due (and I have changed subjects several times)
2. Finish up the detail crap from the conference 2 weeks ago
3. Lame job which sorely needed to be quit and so it was
4. General anger at humanity
5. sick (stupid allergies)
6. FUNDING for next semester!
#6 was the doosy. the stress and aggravation won't get much coverage here. I have vowed not to make this site one of vitriol and ranting. I promised.

A thesis subject has been decided upon. I gave my 10 minute pitch before the co-director of the program. Made me feel quite confident. Of course he could have been simply nodding just to get my crazy ass out of his office. I'll take this opportunity to be optomistic...for a change! Anything to survive the next two weeks.
Having dinner and drinks with W, who happens to be a major component in my thesis theory helped quite a bit as well.
On top of that a subject for the final Deleuze paper has been almost reached. I am toying with the idea of investigating his theory of the flashback in film with relation to Bergson's notions of the way in which memory works. Focusing primarily on Alain Resnais film "Providence."
Had a guest speaker in today's final class. Felice Frankel. She is a science photographer. Her work was beautiful. yet she kept reiterating the fact that she didn't see herself as an artist. I found it to be rather confusing. Perhaps she feels she has to take the stance of a "documentor" of a factual science practice and is not actively creating something? Check out her site below.
http://web.mit.edu/felicef/

Still struggling with the idea of memory and film. well not so much with film in particular but the notion of memory in general and how film chooses to represent it.
C came by this evening. thankfully bringing treats! up late. Felt guilty about not blogging. In the face of C, how could I not? He spends quite a bit of time on his. And lo...here I am again.
goodnight.

is this thing on?

One more thing

oh there was something I wanted to add. something clever.
crap.
perhaps that was it? memory...Bergson offers up the perpetual ever-present present. it flashes before us and is gone. the image/sense/feeling evaporates and enters our mind, settling into the trough of our brain. Deleuze refers to them as sheets. Sheets of memory that are present and dissipate. I like the imagery. I can feel each moment emanating from me in waves as time passes. The very in-capturability of time. I remember my first experiences with video. I would let the camera run, capturing everything. Time passed without notice. ah, but watching the tape play back! that was the key. Then you felt every second tick by. Time was very present. Nothing happened. it was simply Time with a capital "T"
By the way, if you ever have a chance to see a film titled "Je T'aime, Je T'aime" by Resnais go and see it. It has never been released on video and is rarely screened in this country. pretty amazing.
read about it on IMDB and go see it.

that is all.

That Deleuze is a kick in the pants

my day, what a day. early rising to meet K at the T. we walk and talk and run into C whom K had never met. Interesting. I watched two very different spheres of my life collide and it was okay. chatted a moment and moved on. Today was the day that the second years gave their thesis presentations to the department and anyone who wanted to kill a day in a classroom filled with free food. I only had the time to watch one and a half before I headed to a meeting. ugh!
meetings! If I had known that I would be spending many waking hours at meetings upon grad school I am not sure I would have accepted.
But it was all good. I am to design a video installation as part of a performance by one of my professors. He was actually rated as one of the "best of the new" creators in Boston by the Globe. see here:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2005/03/13/best_of_the_new_ideas?pg=full

from there I headed to H. Sq. and the film class that is currently the source of all my brain strain.
I would complain but there I am sitting in the home of the James clan, right off of the Yard discussing philosophy and life seems good. I spend some time before class sitting in the Yard, reading, drinking coffee and thinking about how far I have traveled in the past ten years. If someone had told me that I would be at here back then, I would have identified that person as one of my crack addled roommates. I have the same feelings occasionally when I am wandering the halls of the school I actually attend. I look around at the innocent geeks and wonder how the hell I got here?
weird.
and so the first rule I established about my blog has gone out the window. I am sitting here at 1:30 in the morning, drinking beers to cure my insomnia and add drivel to this page.
I take some satisfaction in watching Two Towers on HBO.
when am I going to find the time to rewatch this film? why at 1 in the morning thats when!

good night Gracie.

In the beginning

and society said, "let there be blog" and lo there was blog. It begins.
I have resisted for many months. People around me have started harrassing me about my "lack". I started one on another site. lost interest and moved on. The question is, how to make it interesting without creating a site for pure, unadulterated misanthropic behaviour? The key would seem to be to only blog when I am sober! Well, we shall see how long I keep that rule up.
I have recently made more time in my life to dedicate to writing. As of yesterday I became newly unemployed thereby freeing up a significant amount of time. Yes, my time at the CCF has come to an end. I simply neglected to show up at the appointed time and moved on with my life. Am I sad? Will I miss the sheer joy of waiting on the simpler folk of Cambridge? The personal interaction that comes with bringing people food and drink? perhaps... but then I think of the irrepresible Paul Lynde and what he had to say about serving people, "it sucks! people are jerks!" and I feel better about my decision.

I can now focus on the finer things in life. Like my thesis proposal which is due in two weeks! I have no clue what I am going to spend the next year writing about. Seriously, what am I going to write about?
It will come to me. I need to spend some time in the library soaking in the vibes of knowledge contained.
A quick note to those out there: the libraries at my school are extremely lame. There are very few power outlets for those of us with laptops and almost no comfy chairs! When in need of some serious library comfort I head down Mass Ave to the other college with the really fancy library. Now they know how to buy furniture that makes reading fun!
It really is the simple things in life that make it worth living.