Thought I’d write a little before I head into work this evening…

I had the morning and the afternoon off. So I stayed in bed for a while, until about 1:00. It felt really good to snooze and just relax. It was also quiet (all loud, rude neighbors being at work) and it was nice to take advantage of that peaceful time.

I finally got up, made some coffee, surfed and here I am. I know, exciting, right?!

I went to ivan.com which is in the exact same state as the last time I went there, about fourteen years ago. Most of the links there go to Geocities (remember that?) or 404 broken link pages. I hope he’s not paying monthly to host that account. It’s a good example of what web design (if you can call it that) was back then.

persimmon
orchid
cerulean
sunflower
seafoam
elephant
grass
dandelion
arctic
kelly
pumpkin
storm
pink

I bought this CD at Record Rack on my first return visit to Houston, back in 1996 or so. Bruce, the owner, recommended it to me and it laid the groundwork for much of my musical influences of the late 90s. This CD single-handedly pointed my musical tastes towards electronic and drum & bass and away from ambient and Britpop.

It introduced me to Fluke, Future Sound of London, Photek, Chemical Brothers, Underworld and Daft Punk. Daft Punk’s Musique was the first I had ever heard from (or of) them and it would be a full two years before their debut album dropped. And another nine years before they would become the darling of the middle school set with Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger. Fluke’s Atom Bomb was featured and introduced me to their following (and fourth album) Risotto with its beautiful track Kitten Moon.

Sadly, none of these tracks ever made it into my iTunes library until today.

1. We Have Explosive The Future Sound of London 6:14
2. Atom Bomb Fluke 7:57
3. Loops of Fury The Chemical Brothers 4:41
4. Tin There Underworld 5:00
5. The Third Sequence Photek 4:48
6. Leave Home (Underworld Mix 1) The Chemical Brothers 5:14
7. We Have Explosive (Herd Killing) The Future Sound of London 5:42
8. Firestarter (Instrumental) The Prodigy 4:39
9. V Six Fluke 5:19
10. Musique Daft Punk 6:51
11. 2097 Source Direct 5:35
12. Titan Photek 5:58
13. P.E.T.R.O.L. Orbital 5:49
14. Afro Ride Leftfield 4:24

iTunes Match matched tracks 1, 3, 8 & 10; the others were uploaded.

Fantastic sleeve design printed in what appears to be a 6/6 print run (CMYK + 2 Metallic spot) by The Designers Republic.

Here are some posts that, because of my mobile WordPress not working properly, I wasn’t able to upload at the time they were written. They’re from the vaults of two months ago.

Nov 28, 2010 1:50 PM

Sometimes it’s funny how much/little time & space actually change. For instance, I’m sitting here in Mr. Henry’s Victorian Pub in 2010, alone, inputing this copy on an iPad, whereas 25 years ago I was here with a table full of friends, drinking and smoking up a storm, listening to the 45s in the jukebox. Today the Internet jukebox is silent, smoking has been banned but I’m still having a cocktail. Because for me that’s what Henry’s is about: cocktails. Well, cocktails and good times with friends. I’m here at an unusual time ( 3:30 on a Wednesday) but the friends will show up later.

Fast forward four days…

Now I’m sitting in my new favorite coffee shop, First Cup Cafe. A random stop that I found here, and they just infirm me they’ll be closing in half an hour, so let’s see how much writing I can get in. First Cup is located across the street from where I looked to move (into Mira’s apt) a few years ago but didn’t make it past the screening process. So it could have been my neighborhood coffee shop but for now it’s one that I happened to drop into for coffee and a place to kill time.

Why am I killing time, you ask? For a number of reasons, actually. The first is that today is (another) Open House day at 1526 so, on my day off, I have to get out and do something. Luckily, Jim Darling was participating in an iPhone-only photography exhibit so I went and saw that since he was going to be at the gallery today. The gallery is Fathom Creative’s and there’s way too many personal references to go into right now about Fathom. Let’s just say I always wanted to work there.

After the exhibit I wandered down to the National Archives to do some genealogy research for my Dad. Since I’m seeing him in a few days I figured I should get this down since he asked me to do it several months ago. I find out they’re closed on Sundays so I will again be playing the role of FailureSon this year for Thanksgiving. Sigh.

I’m meeting with friends later and due to public transportation and needing to be out of the house, it doesn’t make sense to go home, hence the killing time wandering around, it feels like 1995 all over again, when I would wander around DC as a new transplant, maybe it’s time to listen to some Blur.

Now I’ve walked the few blocks to Logan Circle which is nothing like the Logan Circle I used to know. Boughie! And nary a homeless person in sight!

Dupont Circle. Now *this* place has definitely changed in the last 20 years.

And here’s another archive:

Dec 1, 2010 sometime in the afternoon

Today is another kicked-out-of-the-house-due-to-realtors day. Which really sucks because I’ve got an ad that’s due and I’d really like to be working on it right now. Sigh. Another hour to go.

I walked down to Jacob’s to get some coffee but they were too crowded and it was way too warm in there. So I journeyed on down to Sova, on H, and it’s pretty nice in here, sofas and chairs to lounge on but no free WiFi. But that’s fine, I’m using signal from the Biergarten next door.

Here are some of the pieces I designed for Tiki 6. The Memorial Day Tiki party is hosted by friends Chris & Jeff at their beachhouse in Rehoboth. This year’s numbers of 6-6-6 almost took on a demonic theme before it was scaled back to “Are you a good tiki or a bad tiki?” The 6-6-6 comes from the sixth party, six is their house number and six o’clock was the party’s starting time.

The pieces are, clockwise from top left: back of t-shirt, cocktail labels, elevator sign (yes, the beachhouse has an elevator), front of t-shirt, back of invitation, front of invitation, “bad tiki” sticker sheet, “good tiki” sticker sheet. All work is original and created in Illustrator. Printing was done through Vista Print, with the exception of the elevator sign and cocktail signs which were printed using a home printer.

Have you ever met someone, someone who said  ”I know you, you’re ____ ______” and you started dating seeing each other more often and the best date you’ve ever had in your life was his idea to come over to your house & order pizza & play MYST and you thought the was the absolute most romantic thing ever and then all of a sudden you’re not talking and you send packages to him that are returned with the USPS-issued stamp of UNCLAIMED all over it and you try to pretend everything is okay and then you travel to his new city to see his art show and even though you know it’s over you come home feeling like an idiot and crying the entire flight and then you call him on his birthday the next year and unload everything you’ve been feeling and five years later you’re vacationing in the new town he lives in and you agree to meet him and you dress like a total idiot because you’re so nervous and meet him at a pub and pretend like everything’s okay, which it is, but you still find yourself looking at his Twitter feed ten years after that last trip and understanding how obvious it was that someone like him could never end up with someone like you because you’re the one doing a late night google search and that you are, without a doubt, the last thing on his mind, and you also realize that people like him will never, ever, end up with people like you because (according to the exhaustive search) he’s ended up with someone that has drive, interests and a steady career and who is someone that is stable and has no destructive habits and is open and honest and accepts his partner’s faults and admits his own while at the same time allows his partners interests to flourish and all the while you, in the existence you’ve created for yourself is on a slow steady track of decline and it seems that regardless how hard you try you’re never going to be as fruitful as you were two, five or ten years ago and you wonder what your future will be like as this person you occasionally think of buys a house, obtains more pets and sharpens more skills, and all your future is going to consisting of is a 30% paycut in a tedious job that you’ll hate from day one and be forced to stay in for the next twenty years because who is going to hire a middle-aged man skilled in a dying profession and what is there to look forward in that?

I have.

One year and six days ago I spent my “birthday work lunch” making and serving grilled cheese sandwiches for the homeless families at Carpenter’s Shelter. I’d estimate I made about 30 of them. Me and other coworkers were volunteering for the lunch shift. It was a good thing to do, the staff and temporary residents all seemed pretty thankful and it felt really good to do it too. And it was fun. I had also taken the following two days off of work, a Thursday and Friday, to have a long extended birthday weekend. I had days to use up before the end of the year anyway. So my birthday last year was technically the last day I was in the studio as an employee.

One year and five days ago I caught a flu bug and was pretty much laid up in bed for those two days I had taken off work and the weekend, too.

One year and one day ago was Monday and I was scheduled to be back at work but since I was still not feeling 100% and we were dreadfully slow I decided to take a sick day and have another day of recovering.

One year ago I walked into work and, before my strict 8:30 morning meeting, was ambushed in my office and told that I had been laid off along with five other employees.

So it’s been 365 days of unemployment. Which means filing a lot of actual paperwork and digital paperwork. My food stamps will expire this month so that’s $200 less money from my unemployment checks, in a sense, that I’ll be getting.

Have you ever tried to find a 2nd-tier creative job in an uncreative town? It’s not easy. Most of the local ads I’m finding are skimming the bottom of the barrel: “do this logo for $50 and there’s no way it should take you more than two hours”… or freelance jobs that are paying $15 an hour. When I moved here fourteen years ago I was making $30/hour on freelance jobs.

So now what? Reinvention? Easier than it sounds. Relocate? Most employers aren’t going to hire someone who is not local. Go and work at somewhere that’s three levels beneath my education & experience? That seems the only option now. Suggestions?