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March 30, 2004
Comment Spam
This is something that completely baffles me. I've been getting a lot of comment spams recently, and it just doesn't seem like this is a worthwhile business move. I mean, sure, it's automated and therefore doesn't actually require human effort to spam blogs, but who buys [penis, hair, breast] growth pills from the internet? And if you're so low that you're actually going to buy these products from the internet, who in their right mind would but them from spam. And if you're willing to buy from spam, who on this planet would buy from a comment in a blog owned by some person they don't even know? Heck, we all get enough email ads for viagra and propecia and vaginia or whatever new nickname modern science has come up with (they all sound like Cirque du Soleil names to me) in our inboxes every day; who needs to leave the comfort of their email to go scouring blogs for viagra? Is this viagra somehow better? Do rednecks respect spammers who post in blogs because they don't trust the ones who email them directly? Who knows what people are thinking... oh well. Just a rant.
Posted by dminky at 01:02 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
One Month Left
It's so hard to believe I'm now in the last month of school. That also means one month until I go to Japan... I've got to do good cram session to refresh my memory of all the Japanese I've taught myself so I can learn worthwhile stuff while I'm there.
This Thursday I get to pick classes for next year. I'm pretty excited about finally drawing a good time to select classes. I'm looking at Small Business Management and Understanding the Art of Film to finish off my liberal arts requirements. Then I'll have the second semester of my senior year free for whatever I want. As for art classes, I'm required to take Advaned Illustration and Portfolio, so that makes 4 classes. For my 5th class I'm looking at Advanced Computer Illustration, Children's Book Illustration, or Advanced Figure Painting. Hopefully I'll get one of those, in which case I'll have an awesome schedule next year.
The worst thing about the end of the year being in sight is that it makes you realize how much work you actually have and how little time you have to do it. Work is piling up despite my best efforst to keep at it, and a lot of it is going to be really difficult. I'm pretty confident that I'll be able to finish on time, but if anything ends up suffering it will be my video project, which would be a shame because I love that class. Seeing as video is something I'm considering for a career, it would be a real shame if I didn't do as well as I possibly can in that class.
Posted by dminky at 12:55 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 25, 2004
New Pictures
Well I've been really busy lately so I know this is kind of overdue, but here are some of the new pictures I promised. I touched up a few paintings from last semester so they look better, and I've made much cleaner scans rather than the old digital photos I had of them. They look much better now, as you'll see. I've also added a bunch of new pictures from this semester. I have more coming, I just haven't gotten around to scanning them yet.
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Posted by dminky at 08:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 23, 2004
Naming Posts Isn't Always Easy
Man it feels good to be done with last week. I'll post some new images soon, since I scanned a lot on Friday. I'm still really busy, but nothing like like week. Today I'm going to go apply for my passport, repair my firewire drive, work what I didn't get to do last night due to the fact that my firewire drive was not working, plan my new shots that I need to do for my video, come up with an idea and thumbnails for a book cover/collage project that I need to start tomorrow, find textures to scan for that project, register to select classes for next year, get a refund of my room deposit, buy some illustration board, and begin work on my cows (3 ads for Ben & Jerry's).
The reason I am doing 3 illustrations this time is due to something I've discovered about my teacher. No, it's not that he's an idiot, I already knew that. It's that for him to like what I do, I have to do at least 3. If I only do one, he makes me redo it 3 times. If I do 3, he hates two and says that one of them is only "satifactory." See, he grades me differently than the rest of the class. If I paint a cartoon bus driving off a cartoon cliff with cartoon children in the back, he demands that I have a photo-realistic George Bush driving the bus. If someone else in the class draws a caricature, anything with hair and two eyes is acceptable. If I draw a black guy wearing a Russian hat to advertise "Black Russian" flavored ice cream, it's a stupid idea. Yet he praised how creative my classmate was when he showed him his excellent idea: a black guy wearing a Russian hat. If there was any doubt that he was treating me unfairly it vanished after that incident. I'm not all that unhappy at this. It's frustrating, sure, but I don't get half the guff from him that a lot of other students do. Everyone knows that he plays favorites and that he picks his favorites out of a baboon's ass. And even though he picks on my work a lot, the extra work is making me better and that's always a good thing. And while he picks on my work, he is not mean to me at all. Whether or not his criticisms are unfounded is a matter of opinion, but he's always been as nice to me as he is to people he likes. It's just part of the enigma that is Thiel, I guess.
I really hope I can get my firewire drive to work on the Macs again without having to reformat it. I could lose 45 gigs of stuff and, well, that would just bite. And I really need to get it to work again soon because I have a ton of work to do. Most people are making videos that are 30 seconds to 2 minutes long. Mine will probably be 6 to 10 minutes long... :-\
Posted by dminky at 01:01 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 18, 2004
Stressed
Man I have so much work to do... I've broken out in hives... maybe due to stress, maybe due to some allergy, but it's driving me crazy. Must... not... scratch!!!
Today I have to complete my concept art project for Computer Illustration. It's probably gonna look like crap, but oh well. I just can't imagine finishing it well in the short amount of time I have... I have to finish it between 11 (when I get off work) and 2 am (when the labs close). Oi. So after my critique tomorrow, I have to make a portfolio for tomorrow night. That's *really* pushing it close. Agh agh... You can bet that something will go wrong and screw it up. Then, this weekend... beautiful beautiful sleep. I can't wait for sleep. I feel so crummy. I can't even think of a way to end this post, so I'll just stop it right here. Cheers.
Edit: On a side note, it feels really good to be back here in the ARC. I've been gone for 2 weeks, as last week was Spring Break, and the previous week was... well... the Taxco Incident. The music here on iTunes is great, and it's just reminding me of the great TV series I finished last night -- Long Vacation. So at least that's helping my mood a bit. Anyway, back to work...
Posted by dminky at 06:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 16, 2004
Is this Suck Week?
It's not really that bad I guess, but nobody likes returning to school after Spring Break, especially if they did nothing but work all break long. Anyway, a few of the highlights of Suck Week so far: no matter what I do, my Illustration teacher doesn't like it; I have to make a portfolio by the end of the week; I have to finish a barely started project by the end of the week; I have to have thumbnails for my new project and repaint my old project again by tomorrow; I need to get my passport really soon; I got screwed out of a *lot* of money by a guy on eBay... well that's all I feel like writing for now. It would only be a normal busy and frustrating week if it wasn't for other sucky things that have been happening to people around me, so thats why I dub this week Suck Week. Now I am going to go get some work done, then do laundry and grocery shopping right after I get off work so I can spend the rest of today working my butt off and hopefully catching up so I'll hav everything done on time...
Posted by dminky at 12:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 13, 2004
The Passion o' the Christ
So I finally saw The Passion of the Christ last night. I was pretty impressed. It didn't meet any of my negative expectations. It wasn't anti-Jewish (though I can see a chance for lots of morons getting riled up against the Jews after seeing things movie) and the concerns about Pontius Pilate being too soft were silly. He is presented just as he is in the Bible. In fact, all of the movie seemed very accurate compared to what I remember of the Bible, and I didn't notice anything that went against anything I learned in Sunday School or Confirmation. There's still a lot of historical inaccuracies in the movie, which I won't list here because they're so easily found online, but they didn't bother me because I was just glad that the movie did not feel anti-Semitic in the least.
I was watching the movie with two people who violently hate Christianity. I pretty much forced them to watch it with me (keep in mind that I was not trying to convert them, as I'm also not Christian). Anyway I ended up having to defend Jesus most of the time while they were complaining about how stupid Christianity is and how hypocritical it is. Blah blah blah. Sorry if you read this guys, but you're being pretty hypocritical yourselves if you can respect other religions but not Christianity. I found nothing evangelical about the movie -- it was just a very vivid telling of Jesus' death and I saw no strings attached to it.
Anyway I just wanted to post that my honest opinion about this movie is a positive one; that I think it delivered its message without improperly distorting anything that was written in the Bible (whether or not what is written in the Bible is true is another argument that I will leave for some other time). That is my honest opinion as a logical human being and as a non-Christian. If you haven't seen it yet, go see it (if for nothing else than the opportunity to see a story that has been critical in shaping the course of History for the past two millenia).
Posted by dminky at 02:59 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 10, 2004
Spring Break Update
Break is going well... though it's really less of a break since I'm doing just as much work as I do in a normal week, only without the classes. I've had a little bit more free time which I am using to download movies for this Friday night. I've got The Passion of the Christ and I look forward to seeing it. I've already downloaded the soundtrack and if the movie is half as good as the music, I will be satisfied. John Debney really did a good job on this one, it's even better than Cutthroat Island.
The nicest thing about Spring Break is that with only half the students here on campus (and all the weasly freshmen out of their dorms) the internet connection here has skyrocketted. I can actually download things at realistic speeds. I had a few going last night at close to 100 kbps each. That's insane compared to my usual 5 kbps tops when the weasels are here.
I've discovered that movie soundtracks are even better than classic rock for getting work done.
I really can't wait for D&D this Saturday... it's going to be fun and I've had a long enough break from that.
Posted by dminky at 10:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 08, 2004
Spring Break
Ah what a lovely day! It really is... I don't have school for another week! I had a good weekend filled with horror movies (Dark Water, The Eye, Uzumaki, Nightwatch, and The Woman in Black) and computer games. Dark Water was really creepy, and The Eye and Nightwatch were both really cool, but still nothing compared to Ju-on or A Tale of Two Sisters. I wish I could take this whole week off and go to the beach and relax, but I have a lot of stuff to do. If I pace myself and work like it was a normal school week, I should be fine... but that just sucks to think I have to do work. At least I made a list of things to do so I can't forget, but it's an entire sheet of paper long and I really just want to relax a bit. Anyway, I guess I should get started...
Posted by dminky at 12:23 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 04, 2004
What You Pay For Is What You Get
This morning I woke up to a sad discovery: there was not enough milk left for cereal! So I had to eat one of my Taxco burritos and a Carnation Instand Breakfast with water... yuck. For those of you who don't know, Taxco is a brand of burrito cheaper than even Patio (the brand that says its own name on the way out). Taxco is 33 cents a burrito. If there is one piece of advice I can give you, it is to follow my example and never, ever, ever spend less than 50 cents on an item of food.
I have painting class on Thursday mornings, so after finishing my burrito, I grabbed my pallete, canvas, and paints and headed off to class. Halway through class I began to get awful awful stomach cramps. Debilitating cramps. I was afraid I had a nuclear poo coming on, so I quickly put my stuff down and went to the studio's bathroom. Nothing. Nothing at first... then as I was getting ready to shrug it all off as Ghost Poop, the mother of all gastric cramps hit me. If I wasn't so sure I was about the paint the walls with breakfast I would have guessed that a CO2 cartridge had just exploded in my small intestine.
At that point, I knew something was going to come out. Something had to come out, or a hole would have ripped through my abdomen. However, it was anybody's guess which end would blow first, so there I sat on the toilet, resting my head in the wastebasket which I had pulled over from under the sink. I sat there and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
It was horrible. Just horrible. I wanted to call out in pain, but that would be impossible to explain to the deathly-quiet studio just beyond the restroom door. So I hoped that whatever was going to happen could happen quickly, and quietly.
Soon I gave up that hope, and just wanted something to happen. Anything. I began to throw up (into the toilet, phew!). I lost count, but it was the painful kind that just gets worse, not the relieving kind. Finally I thought I was done, so I went outside and attempted to continue painting, hoping I could finish the class. Just then, the worst thing happened: the teacher called on me for a portfolio review.
For those of you who don't know Mr. Johnson, he is a great guy, but he really has the tendency to ramble in situations like this. I remember feeling the cramps coming back, feeling the excessive saliva building up in my mouth as my tongue slid backwards to avoid the torrent that wanted to boil up from my Taxco-tainted stomach.
Just in time he let me go. I made my way to the bathroom again as quickly as possible, without obviously running -- you know the little tip-toe dance you do when you're trying to get to the bathroom discreetly. I made it there and prepared once again for the either-end-eruption. The pain was so great that I seriously did not know what was going on. I was sweating like a pig from the pain and it felt like my temperature shot up to 106 degrees. Then the feeling subsided again. I realized that I needed to get home, because this wasn't going to go away.
I left the bathroom and started to make my way to my things to gather them up. But the buffalo in my stomach started to dance again and forced me to retreat back into my cave. There I sat, dizzy, wishing to throw up or crap or anything that could make me feel better, but nothing happened. It was like every nerve was so tied up with pain that no other brain signals could be recieved.
Finally, after one last vomit, I got out of there and grabbed my things as fast as I could, and went home once again as quickly and discreetly as possible. By the time I got to my door I could feel it coming back; the bad-tasting saliva, the curling of my tongue, the blurring vision. I fumbled with my keys, got inside, threw my stuff on the floor in my room and ran into the bathroom, sweating so much that I just stripped naked and waited for whatever was going to happen. I wanted to cry from the pain, but there was no water left in my body from the sweat and vomit.
That's when I knew that I wouldn't get anything done that I had planned to do today, which sets me back quite a bit, as Thursday is my big work day. I wanted to go to the grocery store so I wouldnt have to eat the rest of my Taxco burritos, but I wasn't going anywhere.
The entire afternoon was a blur, rotating from my bed to the bathroom in and out of consciousness.
Around 6 I felt well enough to get just a bit of groceries. I've changed my diet... it will be more expensive to buy fresh fruits and vegetables than it was to buy frozen breaded shit, but I just can't go through that again.
I think I still have a fever as I write this... and please, PLEASE, follow my advice to never ever spend less than 50 cents on food. It's just not worth it. You really do get what you pay for.
Posted by dminky at 11:01 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
March 01, 2004
Buy High Speed Internet
I can't believe I forgot to post this! I scanned it the other week, but forgot that I did and kept trying to remember to bring it to the labs and scan. To my surprise, it was there on my harddrive waiting to be uploaded. So here you go, enjoy my scary old man (an advertisement for broadband internet).
Posted by dminky at 09:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Meyer's Law of Female Thermodynamics
The Law:
T(w) = 1/[M(c)]
The temperature that a woman feels is inversely proportional to the amount of clothing she wears. In other words, the more clothing a girl wears the colder she will feel, whereas the less clothing a girl wears the more comfortable she will feel. Women do not feel heat; a woman knows only two temperatures: freezing cold, and OK.
The Proof:
Just look around you. If you are a guy, compare the clothes you are wearing to the clothes the girls around you are wearing. If you're a girl, compare your clothes to the men that you see.
Here in Florida, it is a very comfortable 76 degrees Farenheit. I wear shorts and a short sleeved t-shirt. Every man at this school is wearing a short sleeved shirt of some kind and either shorts or long pants. Comfortable clothing for this kind of weather. The women, however, are practically wearing snowsuits. 95% of the girls here are wearing sweaters over shirts and long pants. 50% are wearing coats over that. 10% are wearing wool scarves.
AND EVERY LAST ONE IS FREEZING HER ASS OFF!
I don't understand this. For some reason, girls can put on thicker layers of clothing than a walrus' pelt and still whine about the cold weather even on the sunniest days of the year, while on these same days the same girls could go to the beach and sunbathe wearing nothing but dental floss attached to fabric samples and whine about how there are no cute guys around. Today I was in painting class wearing my shorts and t-shirt. The air-conditioning must have been broken because it was boiling hot in thre. So hot that I actually began to sweat, and believe you me, it takes a LOT of heat to make me sweat. Still, every girl in that class had a sweater or a wool jacket on and would not take it off. All this, and the nude model didn't have a problem with the heat. She was comfortably lying in the buff, not a goosebump on her body, and when the teacher asked if she wanted a heater, she said that she was plenty warm. Later at lunch, I swear all the girls in the cafeteria were dressed to go cross-country skiing and all the guys were dressed for 76 degree weather.
I'm sorry if this paints an unfair picture of women. I have nothing but respect for you. But Jesus-Tap-Dancing-Christ, you have the same skin as the other half of the human population, why are you always so damn cold?
Look, I know that it gets colder in the morning and in the night so there is a need to dress warmly or bring a jacket. All I'm saying is that from 10 am to sunset it gets pretty hot and there is no need to walk around and announce how freezing cold you are when it's one of the most beautiful days of the year.
Ladies, take off the jacket and sweater and actually feel the air with your skin. You might be pleasantly surprised.
Posted by dminky at 01:20 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack