| Saturday, 3-30-05. Overcast and cool | |||
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My apologies for the tardiness of the last few blog entries, including the last 3 in March. I've been constantly running out of time lately, as the end-of-semester projects are starting to pile up. My time management is becoming more unfocused with each passing day, as a result. To make my situation worse, I've been feeling unusually slothy and tired, regardless of how much sleep I get. I have, however, been having loads of obsessive-compulsive fun in Rapid Vis, sketching out scenes and conceptual drawings in regards to my long-shelved war/sci-fi epic. I've been having the most fun doing marker renderings, and yesterday I finally bought a set of warm grays to counter the cool grays I've been using for the last 6 months. Don't worry, I'll scan in some examples of my crap.. er work soon enough.
In other news, I performed another extensive scrubbing job on the shower the other night. Black chunks streamed out of the gutters for hours afterward, and no, I'm not joking. Black chunks... and they're still flowing out 2 days later. At least the shower is now getting close to being reasonably clean all-around. Early this afternoon, I hacked the f*ck out of the jungle of overgrown weeds, grass, and ivy in the upper terrace walkway of the back yard. The recent bout of sunny days has allowed some to double their size, and others were beginning to encroach upon my potted plants... which I could not stand for. The foul wannabe-licorice stink of the absurdly overgrown green stalk plants still lingers in my nose, even after showering. I became so entranzed by the sheer joy of hacking down the eight-foot-tall stalks of half-dead, torso-poking weeds that I didn't even notice a square inch of skin in the saddle of my left hand had worn off from the constant grinding of the trimmer grips in my palms. It's become quite apparent since I moved into this house that no one has really actively taken care of just about anything for at least several years. German word of the day: Spät - Late |
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| Monday, 4-11-05. Partly cloudy and warm | |||
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I have returned. The trip was great, but... long. I had to get up at ungodly o'clock to meet everyone at the van on Saturday morning. We made 2 food/bathroom stops on the drive down, and then hung out at Hearst Castle's boring-as-hell visitor's center until our scheduled tour began. The tour itself was very cool, though we only got to see about 1/4 of the whole complex, as there are 4 main tours of different sections. I unfortunately discovered, while unloading from the van at the visitor's center, that my long-suffering digital video camera's viewfinder is broken (for the second time, now), but the fold-out LCD screen luckily still works. This didn't make taking photos any easier however, as the LCD screen is impossible to see in anything brighter than a candle-lit room. That aside, I ended up taking over 80 photos before we hit the road and had dinner in San Luis Obispo.
Luckily, there was a mix-up with the hotel rooms and Victor, an aquaintance of mine, and myself were able to have our own room. This allowed us to sleep in our own bed, unlike just about everyone else. We saw two spanish-era missions, and tons of scenery on the drive back. The mission in San Luis Obispo was more like a tourist trap, complete with gift shop. The adjascent restored creek and layed stone walkways provided much more interest to most of us in the group. The mission in Carmel was in a much more classical, non-urban setting, and was much more interesting as a result. The city of Carmel, however, did not win the prize for friendliest community, as it seemed to have more cheesy upscale art galleries and ten-dollar-bagel cafes than some of the worst tourist meccas of my former stomping grounds up in the wine country. It was an excellent trip, but I'm glad to be home. I spent FAR too much on food, however, and since my student loans still haven't arrived, I'm getting a bit nervous. Anyone care to donate funds to a worthy architecture student? Eh? Eh? German word of the day: Fehlen - To be lacking |
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| Wednesday, 4-6-05. Partly cloudy and warm | |||
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Today, I feel a little more at home. When I stopped by Whole Foods on my way back from a bike ride on the Embarcadero, I discovered they now sell my hard-to-find Twinings Green Tea. I bought 2 boxes and giggled like a schoolgirl. I guess the product request form I handed in a couple months ago finally came through for me.
As I just mentioned, I recently discovered the joy of going for a bike ride down the wide, endless concrete sidewalk that spans the Embarcadero from SBC Park to Fisherman's Wharf. You have to dodge tourists and construction fences every once in a while, but it's worth it. Unlike my old favorite bike trails around Santa Rosa, there are no bugs to smack you in the face. There are however, random gusts of wind. Today I actually rode all the way out to the end of the Municipal Pier on the east side of Fort Mason, and was treated to a remarkable view of the golden gate and Sausalito. When I was downtown on yesterday's ride, I took photos. I wish I could be around to unpack more this weekend, but I will instead be going on an AIAS trip to tour Hearst Castle. I plan to take many-a-photo. German word of the day: Tätig - Active/busy |
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| Saturday, 4-1-05. Mostly sunny and Warm | |||
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The process of finding a tenant to take over my old apartment has become troublesome. There has been significant cause for one's spirit to be lifted lately, however. On Thursday, I re-posted my ad. Since then, I've had an unusually high amount of interest, which is more than excellent. Unfortunately, I had to cut short my recent trip to visit Justin in Davis as a result of having to make appointments to show my place. The trip was great, though.
My departure time was delayed beyond hope into the mid-afternoon yesterday, and by the time I completed the 120-mile drive, 3 hours had passed. That's an average speed of 40 mph, and yes, I hit quite a bit of rush-hour traffic. On the bright side, I met up with Justin and a group of folks: Kosaku, Hanna, Brett, and Joel, for a rousing game of Risk 2032 that lasted late into the evening. I lost by two points to Joel after taking over the moon, ate sh*tloads of cheap pizza, and talked comics and life with Hanna until about 2 am while Justin and Kosaku became engrossed in a philosophical debate. I slept on Justin's couch until around noon, then we nabbed a quick burrito and went to jam with his friend Tom for about 20 minutes. I unfortunately had to cut it short due to my aforementioned appointments. When I hit the freeway, I made excellent time, hitting my only parking lot just before the maze. On the drive back I found out pope John Paul II had died around the time I was wiping mucus from my eyes this morning. He lived a full life. The showings at my old apartment went so-so, as the first guy stood me up, the middle guy actually applied, and the last guy showed up 20 minutes late. Such is the russian roulette of BS in the renting world. German word of the day: Urlaub (m) - Vacation |
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