waiting for October

Early Autumn is my favorite time of year. I always forget how quickly the weather turns chilly, but once I've got that first cold behind me (mine was this past weekend), I completely embrace the cooler weather, and all of the things it allows for: sweaters, hot drinks, and the smell of pumpkin pie (from a candle or otherwise.)

Last week was fairly uneventful... the highlight was finding an amazing fabric pattern at Target when I went there with Ben and Liz. The thing was, it was a shower curtain... but I knew I had to have it. I was thinking I would just fold it over and make it a tablecloth, but then I realized that the pattern would make awesome window valances. I did some measurements, and realized that I could cut them in half vertically, fold over the cut edge, and sew it against the back, making a channel for the curtain rod. I went back to Target the next day, bought four more, and with the help of Margrit and Julie (two ladies at my work) I was able to make an entire house's worth of valances. We finished them Thursday, and I hung them up as soon as I got home from work. That night, my neighbor Carey, along with other people with October birthdays, were celebrating at the Rock Lobster night at Sakana. Ben and Liz's roommate Dan joined me, and after hanging out for a few hours, we met up with Liz who was celebrating her friend's bachelorette party. We met up with them at Blackfinn, a place I'd never been to before. I'd heard a lot of things about Blackfinn, and I'm happy to say that having been there I felt totally out of place. So, after a short while I said my goodbyes to everyone and went home.

As I mentioned, I ended up catching a cold. It wasn't the best way to spend my day off, but I did get my car door fixed and had a great lunch at Toast. With nothing else to do, I drove out to my parent's early. That night I was feeling like total crap but ended up sleeping for a good eleven hours and Saturday I felt much better. Saturday night my grandparents took everyone on my mom's side of the family to dinner at Lone Star Steakhouse (kind of the ritual place.) That night was the Butthole Surfers/Built To Spill concert in Royal Oak. I knew a bunch of my friends would be out at the bar, and though I was still feeling under the weather, I figured one drink and an hour out wouldn't be too bad, so I headed up to the Loving Touch around 11:30. The concert hadn't finished yet, but there were still a lot of people there. I ran into my friends Andi and Melanie who were hanging out with their friend Sarah. They let me sit with them, and after talking with Sarah for a bit I felt like we were hitting it off. Eventually everyone moved up to the bar, and my friend Ritchie was DJing in the seating area. I sat down next to Sarah, and we talked for a while before I got the courage to ask if she was seeing anyone and if she'd like to go on a date sometime. We exchanged numbers, and made a date for the coming week. Sunday I spent the majority of the day cleaning up around the house and baking two pumpkin pies - one for myself, and another to thank Margrit and Julie. That night I went and saw Pandorum and Zombieland with Ben and Liz. Pandorum wasn't great, but Zombieland was fantastic - my favorite movie of the year so far.

Monday I worked with Mat and had my grandparents over for dinner. I cooked them a chicken stir-fry and we had some of the pumpkin pie for dessert. Tuesday I worked with Mat again, and after work met up with Sarah at the Bean and Leaf cafe in Royal Oak. We talked for a nice long time, and though she might be having some friends over this weekend, if not I invited her to the Friendly Foes/Javelins show at the Berkley Front. Wednesday I assisted Byron, and today I've been going back and forth helping Chris and Byron. It's been a busy week around the company, but at least it makes the time fly. I did wake up feeling like my cold was coming back, and the air conditioning around here doesn't help. Tomorrow after work I'm going to spend the night at my parent's and Saturday I'm meeting Nicole from Sloe Gin Fizz to pick up a specially made three-foot print.

Planning for the Eat So They Can potluck is going well. I'm expecting a nice assortment of friends, family, and co-workers. If you haven't heard about it yet... it will be on Saturday the 17th at 2:00. Around the world people are hosting dinner parties to raise money to fight child poverty in Africa. Last year my friends Julie and Laura hosted a potluck at our house on Ardmore and they won a trip to Africa to help with the effort. This year I am hosting one, and all you need to bring is a dish to pass... and a friend if you can!

time flies when...

October is going to be a ridiculously busy month for me!

As if the past week hasn't been busy...

The D.I.Y. Street Fair was amazing! Friday I stayed out way too late but enjoyed performances by my friends in Serenity Court as well as Patrick Davy. Saturday I spent the entire afternoon shopping. My absolute favorite artist was Sloe Gin Fizz: whimsical drawings by my new friend Nicole Ray. Every one of her works touched me, and I purchased a print of "Sub(tract) Housing" and talked to her about specially making me a three-foot tall print - both of which I intend to build frames for. I also bought a fridge magnet by one of my favorite artists: Kill Taupe, and a Decemberists poster by my friends Chris and Ed in Silent Giants.

Sunday I hung out with my friend Ben and we watched Mother Whale, Sisters Lucas, Champions of Breakfast, Friendly Foes, and when Liz got off work she joined us and we played a little bit of pool at the Loving Touch before turning in.

The work week after that was interesting. I stayed until midnight Monday night, and then Tuesday we had to work all through the night... I didn't leave until 7:30 in the morning. I went home, got a couple hours of sleep, and came back in at noon to wrap things up before our client's 4:00 meeting. That totally threw my schedule out of whack, and it took me 'til Friday to get back to routine. Friday night Ben and Liz came over and we watched Evil Dead II.

Saturday I drove out to my parent's to watch the Michigan game, and to help paint the hallway and living room. When they took a break for lunch I went to Wasem's to get cider and doughnuts, and after we finished painting we all went to dinner at Red Robin.

Sunday I decided to go to a yoga class at Namaste, and I felt really out of practice. Afterward I met up with Ben and we picked up a suit that he bought at Men's Warehouse, and met up with Liz and had dinner at Fuji. Liz had to go back to work for a meeting, so Ben and I went to Cass Cafe for the 23rd Cass Collective. There were some really interesting noise performances and the night was capped off by an awesome performance by Mother Whale.

This morning my alarm didn't go off, but even though I had gone to sleep after 2:00, I managed to wake up and get to work before 9:00. Tonight I'm going to hang out with Ben and Liz again before Ben drives back to East Lansing.

Looking ahead... this Friday I am taking the day off work to get my car door fixed (it doesn't open from the outside) and take my ritual Fall walk around town for the afternoon. I put extra effort into making an amazing mix for the month of October - it is one of my best accomplishments in setting a mood and blending genres. Friday night I'm going to go to my parents again for pizza night and to watch the Michigan vs. Michigan State game on Saturday. Saturday night my grandparent's are taking the family out to eat before they move to Florida for the winter.

October 17th I'm hosting an Eat So They Can fundraiser potluck at my house. I'm hoping for a big turnout... I've invited all of my friends, relatives, and coworkers. October 24th is the Harvest Beer Festival in Eastern Market, that I'll probably go to with Ben, Alex, and possibly Britney. I'm also throwing a Devil's Night party. I started a checklist of all the things I need to get... let's just say it's lengthy. I did make an awesome flyer:



It'll be Christmas before I know it!

There have been so many great albums released this year! Here's the rundown of my favorites so far (that I'm aware of):

Apostle of Hustle - Eats Darkness
Asobi Seksu - Hush
Black Moth Super Rainbow - Eating Us
Engineers - Three Fact Fader
Halloween, Alaska - Champagne Downtown
Junior Boys - Begone Dull Care
Röyksopp - Junior
Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
Wilco - Wilco (the Album)

that doesn't even include releases by A.C. Newman, Animal Collective, Andrew Bird, Doves, and Grizzly Bear which could always make a greater impression on me.

Last Wednesday I had dinner with Britney. She talked about hosting a pizza and movie night sometime in October, and I invited her to join Alex, Ben and I to the Harvest (Beer) Festival at Eastern Market. I also decided to have a Halloween party (on the 30th) so, if you're reading this and are looking for a place to party... you're invited.

Last weekend was excellent. Saturday my parents came over in the morning to help me rehang the blinds that had to be taken down when I had windows put in, and after they left I played soccer for a couple of hours with a group who gets together regularly through meetup.com. After that, I drove up to East Lansing to celebrate Ben's birthday. We spent hours just talking about this and that, and it was such a great feeling. That day felt like the perfect day.

This week started off surprisingly - with a 14 hour day. The next couple days passed quickly with just a little bit of work. For the past week or so I've been teaching myself Adobe After Effects, and today I made a short type animation that Chris might use in a promotional video he's working on.

This weekend is one I've been looking forward to for a long time... the Ferndale D.I.Y. Street Fair! (I've completely forgotten that the "Funky Ferndale Art Fair" is also this weekend). I am going to be spending practically all of Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday enjoying the festivities.

keep your eyes on right, keep your eyes on right ahead

So, Gina moved to Boston to go back to school. I understood from the moment - about a month ago - that she decided that was what she needed to do that it would mean the end of our relationship. She gave me so much inspiration and motivation over the past several months that we spent together, I don't know how I could ever thank her.

I am going to have a five-day weekend starting Thursday. Sometime in the morning I am going to have ten new windows installed throughout the main floor of my house, which hopefully won't take up too much of the day. After they are finished, I am thinking of going to see District 9. I have heard very little about the movie, other than it's really good (and that not knowing anything will only make it better.) Friday is Alex's birthday, and him and I are driving together to Ben's house. Sometime over the rest of the weekend my parents are going to come over and I'm going to cook them a Labor Day dinner.

I don't particularly mind the colder weather we've been having, I just hope that it doesn't get colder than usual in late Autumn. The way the weather is now would be perfect until Thanksgiving. I was reflecting recently on what my favorite season is: when it's winter I want it to be spring, and when it's spring I want it to be summer. I've come to appreciate the summer more, but with the fall approaching, my usual sense of excitement is returning. The fact remains that when it's autumn, I want it to be autumn. I would say that I wish it could be autumn all year round, but I am a firm believer in the notion that nothing good can last forever. If the best things in life were constant, we would take them for granted. I've consequently gotten better at living in the moment - not concerning myself with the past which is unchangeable, or the future which is unpredictable, but to just be conscious of the life I am actually living,

past is past

So, as with any time where I wait a month between entries, a lot has been going on. I am still dating Gina. I am still slowly making progress on sprucing up my house. I am still spending the majority of my time at work, and the majority of my free time watching TV.

With only four other Assistant Editors, whenever all of our Online edit rooms are booked, I end up getting tapped to help out. Chris and I haven't had a constant flow of work though, yet there is talk of some bigger jobs later this month. Some people might be happy to be in air conditioning, but with the tundra-like temperatures this room always seems to be at, I would much rather be outside in the heat.

My dad built me a bookcase for my living room that is absolutely enormous. It really is intimidating the first time you walk into the room with it. I've gotten used to it now, and love it for being able to hold all of my books, movies, and assorted knick knacks. My dad also helped me lay down some dirt along the north side of the house - I needed to adjust the pitch of the ground because it was angling in towards the house. My next big improvement will be new windows throughout the main floor; I'm having them installed September 3rd.

A couple weekends ago the Ferndale Bike Club had a joint garage sale at Carey's house (she lives across the street from me) so I helped Gina clean a lot of the clutter out of her apartment which was sold or donated, and I got rid of a couple old CDs, DVDs, and more importantly my entire Magic collection (I did hold onto a handful of the best cards which I'm selling on eBay.) I also finally listed the pink stove that came with the house on Craigslist.

I'm thinking of planning another house party for sometime in early September. Anyone interested?

as summer surrounds us

Bullet-point entry time.:

- Had my official "housewarming(s)". My grandparents and some of my aunts and uncles came over on the 20th. We went to lunch at Pete's Place and after they left Gina and I went to one of her childhood friends's wedding. The following weekend I had an Open House for friends and neighbors. Vodka punch + basement dance party.

- Gina and I are officially dating now. It's been awhile since either of us was in a relationship, but that's allowing us to settle slowly into it.

- Since my last entry I've read God Bless You, Mr, Rosewater, Me Talk Pretty One Day, and The Catcher in the Rye. I just started re-reading Ender's Game. I've been picking up tons of used books from garage sales and book stores. My dad is building me a bookcase that should be done this weekend. I am going to fill it up with knick knacks and, of course, books.

- I realize something that's been missing from my life since shortly before, during, and after the move... video games! I've neglected playing Guitar Hero in a long time, and until yesterday I hadn't even hooked up my N64. I love old Nintendo platforms... I have a SNES and an NES with a ton of games, but right now I've been itching to play a handful of games that I picked up from a garage sale at a STEAL: Super Mario 64, Mario Kart, and Mario Party 1, 2, and 3... for five bucks!

- Last weekend while I was staying at my parents for the holiday I hung out with Alex, Kenny, and Kyle. I realized that I've really missed being able to see them all the time. It's just difficult living so far away... and then whenever I'm in town I'm always wanting to make a point to see them because it's so rare that I can.

- I've been getting really into designing and repurposing. All of the decorating of my house got me started, and I've since handmade a CD case for a mix I made Gina, a box for all of my loose tea bags that I decorated with a black and white map of detroit, and a collage of a bunch of stickers/cut outs/memorable items that has become a sort of evolving poster that I hung in my kitchen. I've turned a bunch of old, glass kombucha bottles into containers for coffee beans, tea leaves, popcorn, and eventually other things (as I think of what to put in them). I also designed a kitchen storage shelf that will hold them as well as spices, towels, and oven mitts. I want to turn my one room upstairs into a 'studio'. I've put down this plain paper photography background over the floor and put my desk in the center of the room, but I've yet to really use that space for its purpose. I also have an idea or two for a t-shirt design. I think I'd like to try hand-screen printing, but I was using photoshop at work for the design, and the past couple weeks I've been working with Ron and have been busy every day. It's nice to be absorbed in daily work again.

- Last Friday I had my "vacation" day for the 4th of July. I drove out to my second favorite Indian restaurant, right across from the Ikea in Canton: Ashoka, and saw Public Enemies at my favorite movie theather: the Goodrich Canton 7. I had really high hopes for Public Enemies, which is probably why my reviews of it want to point out the negatives. For one, the filming they did in high-definition digital - especially the dark scenes and the interior scenes - looked bad, enough that they were distracting. I think I was expecting (read: hoping for) a visual style like Road to Perdition. Also, whereas I think Johnny Depp is a great at embodying characters to the extent that you forget that it's a regular person, in this movie I felt it was more like just Johnny Depp acting as himself being called "John Dillinger." As with anything based on actual events, I'm picky about how factual the details are. I won't give anything away, but it felt like some liberties were taken for the sake of the story.

- The new Wilco album is really great, as is the new Apostle of Hustle. Even though it's no "National Anthem of Nowhere", the concept is what really makes it. From AoH's MySpace:

"The very title "apostle of hustle eats darkness" mocks the omnipresent and utterly common advertising slogan. Do this! Be more desirable! Make others like you!? If they were selling anything, it'd be "eat darkness - you'll feel better". Not exactly, but there is an alchemical process at work here. Transformation does have its costs. You can't expect to feel better about life right away, can you? Why eating darkness? How is that supposed to help? Lets go back to the old idea of the shaman; the one who cures by ingesting the poison itself; he is the one who has been the sickest and thus has the skills to know how to travel back and forth between states. He suggests, eating darkness will be the cure of your darkness. Its very traditional. William Blake: "The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom". Swallowing poison usually leads to death, but not if the patient knows the art of transformation, not if they can "stomach" the bullshit & hell that is surrounding and tormenting them. This then is the process - one eats darkness & somehow is able to excrete out pure light!"

- All in all, things have been going great for me recently. I've been finding that little things that would normally really upset me with worry I've been able to shrug off or take in stride. Could just be the nice weather. Whatever the case, I'm not complaining.

odessey & oracle

I met this girl, Gina. We really like each other.

We met at a barbecue last weekend and talked until 2:00 in the morning. We exchanged numbers and met up for coffee on Tuesday. Turns out we have a lot in common. It's been a long time since I dated anyone, but she makes me comfortable enough to just be myself.

Alex and Ben came over to see my house on Saturday. It was the first time Ben saw it, and the first time for Alex since we painted a couple weeks ago. We had dinner at Bastone in Royal Oak, and came back and bar hopped around Ferndale for the night. We slept 'til past noon and had a very late breakfast at the Fly Trap before they went home on Sunday. I then went over to James' to help him pack. I gave him my May mix CD, as well as all of my mixes from 2008 to listen to on the long drive across the country. After that I called Gina and she came over and we watched the movie of Slaughter-House Five.

Today I feel overwhelmed with things to do. James ended up giving me his lawn mower, and even though I wanted to put together and use the reel mower that I bought (I had started to put it together before I helped him pack Sunday), I'm thinking I might be better off taking it back and getting the money. I spent so much this past month on stuff for the house, I'm practically broke for the first time in a while. Obama needs to hurry up and mail me my First-Time Home Buyer's Credit check. I guess with it being rainy today I don't have to worry about mowing the lawn, but when it does get nice out again, I should really do some yardwork. I'm planning to have Julie and Laura over to see my house now that Julie is back from Africa, and Nick and I are hopefully going to go out for a drink sometime this week.