While I get my skills back up to par, I beg you enjoy this ever-subtle creation of mine.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Respite
I've been getting ready for school and crossing things off of the Girlfriend and I's St. Louis bucket list, and so have had little patience for fighting with my new Adobe Illustrator program. Sure, it beats the hell out of Inkscape, but its learning curve is so staggeringly steep that the drawing I did for today took me twice as long as it would've in Inkscape.
While I get my skills back up to par, I beg you enjoy this ever-subtle creation of mine.
While I get my skills back up to par, I beg you enjoy this ever-subtle creation of mine.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Pointed Exclamation
My last post on getting inspired got me pumped before I even finished writing it. I cranked this comic out as soon as I finished it. It came from the jumble of !'s that were near the screaming speaker in the Inspiration Mobile post.
I'm quickly developing a habit of anthropomorphizing everything I come into contact with.
Monday, August 16, 2010
The Inspiration Mobile
I didn't stop to smell the roses until I was about 17 years old. And by 'stop to smell the roses' I mean realize how fucking beautiful random things are. I remember the moment in its fullest detail, primarily because I wasn't looking at a rose bush, and I found the coincidence comical. I was looking at a shrub.
It was an ugly shrub, too. But the way the light was bending off of all of its leaves made me stop moving, and look. The trees in front, the sky, and even the sidewalk looked amazing. And then I realized that everything on the planet probably looked this awesome. Except maybe for that ugly couple who happened to be walking by.
From that day forth my sight changed. I now frequently get halted in my waltz through parking lots by a piece of trash or a sign that has not had any eyes pay it attention in some time. It seems, in desperation for attention, these neglected objects throw their light whorishly into my eyeballs.
One such object was a Target sign, in the parking lot, which indicated the place to put one's shopping cart.
I started laughing as soon as I paid it attention. I took a picture of it on my phone and immediately sent it to my girlfriend, and told her to turn the photo upside down.
I began seeing faces on everything. I started laughing at 80% of the machines I came into contact with because, despite their metallic hides, they were all emitting emotions.
Now, not only is everything gorgeous, but everything has a goddamn face. Even when I sat down to write this post with the above pictures already drawn, I realized that my speakers have faces.
Getting inspired is not difficult. Sometimes you just have to stop, smell the roses, and realize that every single one of those bastards is having the most awesome day ever.
It was an ugly shrub, too. But the way the light was bending off of all of its leaves made me stop moving, and look. The trees in front, the sky, and even the sidewalk looked amazing. And then I realized that everything on the planet probably looked this awesome. Except maybe for that ugly couple who happened to be walking by.
From that day forth my sight changed. I now frequently get halted in my waltz through parking lots by a piece of trash or a sign that has not had any eyes pay it attention in some time. It seems, in desperation for attention, these neglected objects throw their light whorishly into my eyeballs.
One such object was a Target sign, in the parking lot, which indicated the place to put one's shopping cart.
I started laughing as soon as I paid it attention. I took a picture of it on my phone and immediately sent it to my girlfriend, and told her to turn the photo upside down.
I began seeing faces on everything. I started laughing at 80% of the machines I came into contact with because, despite their metallic hides, they were all emitting emotions.
Now, not only is everything gorgeous, but everything has a goddamn face. Even when I sat down to write this post with the above pictures already drawn, I realized that my speakers have faces.
Getting inspired is not difficult. Sometimes you just have to stop, smell the roses, and realize that every single one of those bastards is having the most awesome day ever.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
The Rave Light
The girlfriend and I recently moved into an apartment near campus. It's spacious, shaped like a giant rectangle, and has air conditioning. It's basically everything we could ask for, minus the occasional bajillion legged insect.
We've made minor repairs to things here and there, acting like we own the place as opposed to rent it. We put up curtains, posters, moved shelves, and dressed it up to our heart's content. However, there was one problem.
The lights in the bedroom are on a track system in the middle of the ceiling. There are three of them. The outer two turned on without fail, but the middle one appeared to be burnt out. We noticed this early on, and I pondered how we'd go about solving this problem.
And then I forgot. My memory only responds to interrogative prodding, not attempted recall. I quickly became busy with the state of my desk and left the light to its dim fate.
A few weeks later, the girlfriend commented on the darkness of the bedroom. I heard her shouting from the other side of the rectangle, and came to find her checking out the light. I am convinced, now, that had either of us any sense we would've realized what was happening.
The light was left off for a reason. The previous owner had realized the satanic powers that rested inside that metallic canister of hedonism and had defused its intentions at the source. I left the room for a moment, and I'm now certain that while I was away the light implanted directives in the girlfriend's brain.
She grabbed a bulb and asked me to put the light in. Being foolish and naive, I obeyed. I perched on the edge of the bed; I could feel the canister writhing with anxious joy. I screwed in the light, and the girlfriend flipped the switch.
But then everything was fine. The terror I had felt washed away and the room was normal, bathed in a new vibrant light.
This peace lasted a few short minutes. The light quickly reached full strength and began to strobe like mad. Out of the deepest rings of hell came an UHNTZ that reverberated around our bedroom like the explosion of Krakatoa. Within seconds ravers poured in from the windows and we found ourselves awash in a dance party.
Though we've been raving upon entry into the bedroom for months, we have yet to extinguish the life in that satanic device. While its hypnotizing attempts at starting dance parties are tiresome, I've found it gives us a solid reason to save electricty. The environment is of little concern to me when a rave demon is UHNTZing his soul out in our bedroom.
Wherever he goes when we extinguish him, I hope he's happy.
We've made minor repairs to things here and there, acting like we own the place as opposed to rent it. We put up curtains, posters, moved shelves, and dressed it up to our heart's content. However, there was one problem.
The lights in the bedroom are on a track system in the middle of the ceiling. There are three of them. The outer two turned on without fail, but the middle one appeared to be burnt out. We noticed this early on, and I pondered how we'd go about solving this problem.
And then I forgot. My memory only responds to interrogative prodding, not attempted recall. I quickly became busy with the state of my desk and left the light to its dim fate.
A few weeks later, the girlfriend commented on the darkness of the bedroom. I heard her shouting from the other side of the rectangle, and came to find her checking out the light. I am convinced, now, that had either of us any sense we would've realized what was happening.
The light was left off for a reason. The previous owner had realized the satanic powers that rested inside that metallic canister of hedonism and had defused its intentions at the source. I left the room for a moment, and I'm now certain that while I was away the light implanted directives in the girlfriend's brain.
She grabbed a bulb and asked me to put the light in. Being foolish and naive, I obeyed. I perched on the edge of the bed; I could feel the canister writhing with anxious joy. I screwed in the light, and the girlfriend flipped the switch.
But then everything was fine. The terror I had felt washed away and the room was normal, bathed in a new vibrant light.
This peace lasted a few short minutes. The light quickly reached full strength and began to strobe like mad. Out of the deepest rings of hell came an UHNTZ that reverberated around our bedroom like the explosion of Krakatoa. Within seconds ravers poured in from the windows and we found ourselves awash in a dance party.
Though we've been raving upon entry into the bedroom for months, we have yet to extinguish the life in that satanic device. While its hypnotizing attempts at starting dance parties are tiresome, I've found it gives us a solid reason to save electricty. The environment is of little concern to me when a rave demon is UHNTZing his soul out in our bedroom.
Wherever he goes when we extinguish him, I hope he's happy.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Walking on Eggshells
We've all been there. The time comes to stride gracefully over a sea of broken traditions and unfamiliar cultural norms, and the most we can do is shake violently and weep internally.
My girlfriend is Puerto Rican. She speaks 3 languages fluently and Portuguese moderately. I classify Portuguese as something else because any language that sounds like an opera singer hopped up on three Epinephrine pens is not a language to me.
When it came time to meet her entire extended family I was semi-terrified. We had only been dating for 4 weeks when I flew down to the island to meet everyone. The only Spanish skills I possessed came from my high school, a remote fortress buried in the prairie's of Iowa. We didn't have much for cultural immersion.
I can elaborate to wit's end on the number of pets I have, or where my toes are, or how my father is doing at the moment. But ask me about how many pets I had, or plan to have, and I will respond by screaming about where my pants have gone.
When I have nothing to say, I feel naked. The only adequate response is to ask you, the harbinger of this silence, where the hell you put my pants.
The meeting of the family went well. I met both her mother and sister while I was in my underwear, which always bodes for a solid, communicative relationship. I made omelets with her mother, killed zombies with her brothers, and broke a family ornament. All in all, it was a productive trip.
Except for one small incident.
At the New Year's celebration I met her 'uncle.' He quickly threatened to murder me, and told me he could get away with it because he was the lawyer of the Puerto Rican mafia.
I didn't know Puerto Ricans shared so much culture with Italians. This revelation is what caused the surprised expression on my face. I wasn't so worried about being dismembered and fed to sharks. For those of you who have seen Snatch, you know that messing with pig farmers is the worst idea. My grand parents own a huge number of pigs. I feel secure behind their blanket of bacony goodness.
After a few minutes of comical threatening banter, the girlfriend told him that I could speak a little bit of Spanish. I wanted to make my woman proud and so, from the deepest bowels of my mind, I summoned up three words.
And with that I told a man who had just threatened to murder me that I liked myself. I realized it too late to pull the words back through the air, down my windpipe, and back into my lungs, where their abominable reign began.
I stood, pantless, yet unable to scream my safety phrase. DONDE ESTA MI PANTALONEEEEEEEEES!!!!111one!eleven!!!
My girlfriend is Puerto Rican. She speaks 3 languages fluently and Portuguese moderately. I classify Portuguese as something else because any language that sounds like an opera singer hopped up on three Epinephrine pens is not a language to me.
When it came time to meet her entire extended family I was semi-terrified. We had only been dating for 4 weeks when I flew down to the island to meet everyone. The only Spanish skills I possessed came from my high school, a remote fortress buried in the prairie's of Iowa. We didn't have much for cultural immersion.
I can elaborate to wit's end on the number of pets I have, or where my toes are, or how my father is doing at the moment. But ask me about how many pets I had, or plan to have, and I will respond by screaming about where my pants have gone.
When I have nothing to say, I feel naked. The only adequate response is to ask you, the harbinger of this silence, where the hell you put my pants.
The meeting of the family went well. I met both her mother and sister while I was in my underwear, which always bodes for a solid, communicative relationship. I made omelets with her mother, killed zombies with her brothers, and broke a family ornament. All in all, it was a productive trip.
Except for one small incident.
At the New Year's celebration I met her 'uncle.' He quickly threatened to murder me, and told me he could get away with it because he was the lawyer of the Puerto Rican mafia.
I didn't know Puerto Ricans shared so much culture with Italians. This revelation is what caused the surprised expression on my face. I wasn't so worried about being dismembered and fed to sharks. For those of you who have seen Snatch, you know that messing with pig farmers is the worst idea. My grand parents own a huge number of pigs. I feel secure behind their blanket of bacony goodness.
After a few minutes of comical threatening banter, the girlfriend told him that I could speak a little bit of Spanish. I wanted to make my woman proud and so, from the deepest bowels of my mind, I summoned up three words.
And with that I told a man who had just threatened to murder me that I liked myself. I realized it too late to pull the words back through the air, down my windpipe, and back into my lungs, where their abominable reign began.
I stood, pantless, yet unable to scream my safety phrase. DONDE ESTA MI PANTALONEEEEEEEEES!!!!111one!eleven!!!
Sunday, August 8, 2010
WHALE WRECKIN'
I do dishes. I do laundry. And when I'm feeling sassy, I sweep things. I act like I'm Harry Potter playing against God on the Quidditch field. I broom around the house, blowing shit up.
Because I'm a man.
Which brings me to today's story.
When I first came to college, I threw myself into new friendships like a great white throws itself into seals. No friend cliques had yet formed and so creating pockets of friends was incredibly easy to do.
We were shepherded around for hours every day until classes began. Once such shepherding brought us to the athletic complex where we were to have our Freshman Convocation. This was a ceremony where everyone went "YAY WE'RE IN COLLEGE WOOO" and the University gave us glowsticks. It was nothing short of stellar.
One of my voraciously acquired companions sat next to me on the bleachers of the gym. After a few minutes of good, semi-deep talking, he looked up, across the sea of people and said:
"I WOULD TOTALLY WRECK THAT CHICK."
He looked to me for some sort of response. I tried to laugh it off. We talked for another few minutes and then, again, without warning, he repeated it. This time while gesturing to some gimpy whale who was trying to make her way down an aisle but was being thwarted by the pull of her gravitational field.
He turned toward me again, eyes asking for me to join in. I laughed awkwardly, let out a big "HEEEENEEHWAAAYS..." and restarted the conversation. He did this many more times over the course of the evening, selecting a wide spectrum of women. After that night, I rarely spoke with him.
I thought this was a Freshman thing, some sort of 'LOOK HOW MAN I AM' macho game that 18 year olds played with one another.
And then it happened, again, just the other day. I'm now half way through my college years and some guys are still trying to make friends with me by pointing out which females they want to have sex with.
I will take this time to make a brief public service announcement to all the male readership I have:
Stop screaming about which females you'd have sex with. It's highly unlikely that they would allow you to, given your level of douchebaggery. If you take a more metered approach, perhaps by saying things you could say straight to a woman, you may be surprised with the change in the female population's reaction to you.
It does not make you look manly. It only inspires the kind of 'bro' relationship involving jack johnson, game cube, and oversized sex toys.
Thank you for your time.
Because I'm a man.
Which brings me to today's story.
When I first came to college, I threw myself into new friendships like a great white throws itself into seals. No friend cliques had yet formed and so creating pockets of friends was incredibly easy to do.
We were shepherded around for hours every day until classes began. Once such shepherding brought us to the athletic complex where we were to have our Freshman Convocation. This was a ceremony where everyone went "YAY WE'RE IN COLLEGE WOOO" and the University gave us glowsticks. It was nothing short of stellar.
One of my voraciously acquired companions sat next to me on the bleachers of the gym. After a few minutes of good, semi-deep talking, he looked up, across the sea of people and said:
"I WOULD TOTALLY WRECK THAT CHICK."
He looked to me for some sort of response. I tried to laugh it off. We talked for another few minutes and then, again, without warning, he repeated it. This time while gesturing to some gimpy whale who was trying to make her way down an aisle but was being thwarted by the pull of her gravitational field.
He turned toward me again, eyes asking for me to join in. I laughed awkwardly, let out a big "HEEEENEEHWAAAYS..." and restarted the conversation. He did this many more times over the course of the evening, selecting a wide spectrum of women. After that night, I rarely spoke with him.
I thought this was a Freshman thing, some sort of 'LOOK HOW MAN I AM' macho game that 18 year olds played with one another.
And then it happened, again, just the other day. I'm now half way through my college years and some guys are still trying to make friends with me by pointing out which females they want to have sex with.
I will take this time to make a brief public service announcement to all the male readership I have:
Stop screaming about which females you'd have sex with. It's highly unlikely that they would allow you to, given your level of douchebaggery. If you take a more metered approach, perhaps by saying things you could say straight to a woman, you may be surprised with the change in the female population's reaction to you.
It does not make you look manly. It only inspires the kind of 'bro' relationship involving jack johnson, game cube, and oversized sex toys.
Thank you for your time.
Indie Game: Loved
Video games have recently emerged as an interactive art form. Leading this movement is a creative force of developers known as Indies. If a she-wolf and a minotaur mated, had a baby, and that baby copulated with a unicorn, they'd produce indies.
These guys blow the innovation-pants off of major publishers, despite their lack of resources. Some of them run their own studios, but the largest percentage of the indie population work during their evenings, bringing the insane content of their dreams to everyone else's finger tips.
The video game industry is approaching a fork in the road. With the rise of ease-of-use development tools like Game Maker, Unity, and Shiva, game creation is becoming the realm of the everyman. This crossover will, in my opinion, parallel the rise of film and legitimize video games as a form of interactive art.
I recently played a game called Loved over at Kongregate. It's a 2d platformer that masks a well of screaming, philosophical rage. You have to choose between obeying the 'master' and not. If you obey, the world gets more detailed. If you disobey, it becomes filled with gorgeous colors. The game has a lot to say about life, if you feel like digging. If you don't, it's still creepy and entertaining.
Even if your hands are flippers you should be able to burn through it in under 15 minutes. Let Loved in.
These guys blow the innovation-pants off of major publishers, despite their lack of resources. Some of them run their own studios, but the largest percentage of the indie population work during their evenings, bringing the insane content of their dreams to everyone else's finger tips.
The video game industry is approaching a fork in the road. With the rise of ease-of-use development tools like Game Maker, Unity, and Shiva, game creation is becoming the realm of the everyman. This crossover will, in my opinion, parallel the rise of film and legitimize video games as a form of interactive art.
I recently played a game called Loved over at Kongregate. It's a 2d platformer that masks a well of screaming, philosophical rage. You have to choose between obeying the 'master' and not. If you obey, the world gets more detailed. If you disobey, it becomes filled with gorgeous colors. The game has a lot to say about life, if you feel like digging. If you don't, it's still creepy and entertaining.
Even if your hands are flippers you should be able to burn through it in under 15 minutes. Let Loved in.
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