Nina Holton, whose playfully wild germs of ideas are the genesis of her sculpture, is very firm about the importance of hard work: "Tell anybody you're a sculptor and they'll say, 'Oh, how exciting, how wonderful.' And I tend to say, 'What's so wonderful?' It's like being a mason, or a carpenter, half the time. But they don't wish to hear that because they really only imagine the first part, the exciting part. But, as Khrushchev once said, that doesn't fry pancakes, you see. That germ of an idea does not make a sculpture which stands up. It just sits there. So the next stage is the hard work. Can you really translate it into a piece of sculpture?"

Jacob Rabinow, an electrical engineer, uses an interesting mental technique to slow himself down when work on an invention requires more endurance than intuition: "When I have a job that takes a lot of effort, slowly, I pretend I'm in jail. If I'm in jail, time is of no consequence. In other words, if it takes a week to cut this, it'll take a week. What else have I got to do? I'm going to be here for twenty years. See? This is a kind of mental trick. Otherwise you say, 'My God, it's not working,' and then you make mistakes. My way, you say time is of absolutely no consequence."

18:27 Reading online makes me anxious

Because the minute I open a page, see something interesting, and click on the link, there's something else on the new page that's interesting.

and down the rabbit hole we go.

it's worse when one page yields multiple pages. it quickly spider-webs into way too many tabs to read in one sitting. and before you know it, I'm reaching for my inhaler to keep myself from hyperventilating.

welcome to the joys of the information age. when everything is at my fingertips, how do I keep myself from overdosing?

“Talent” is like having a nice ass or a rich father; it helps open doors, but the actual work on the other side of the door is all on you."

from 43Folders

“I don’t miss my old life in New York. I only miss the life in New York I know I never would have had.”
“Just remember that there are other places,” she says, “and other people live there, with perfectly happy lives.”

from New York Magazine

Reading this article from Portland. I've lived in Miami besides NYC. But visiting Portland feels like the first time I've been to any other city besides NYC. maybe it's the lack of family.

or how different it is. or the fact that up until a certain point, you only consider certain things in a certain light. meaning that I had never thought about the liveability of cities until recently. and any experience before those thoughts started happening don't count.

the article affects how I feel about the tentative future, since, like all future events, nothing has happened yet.

There's so much labeling in the marketplace with the word luxury. It's become one of the most over-leveraged terns in marketing. But, curiously, no one's taken the concept of information and packaged it in a way that says: to get information first is one of the biggest luxuries of all. I think that there's room to use both the newspaper platform and probably a radio platform to create a very powerful print and broadcast brand.

— Tyler Brûlé

Portland: Entry Point

Hello, World.

It's 7:19am over here in Portland. Oregon, not Maine. though I do wonder if Portland, Maine is ever jealous that Portland, Oregon gets all the fame.

Today will be the first day of soul searching. Of actively thinking about things and writing them down. 'cause having things on e-paper translates into accountability.

I'm writing from the living room now. on the couch. the view to my right, a multi-floor parking lot. the roof is like the one you see in Fargo. without the snow and the shooting and the driving off with red spots in the spots.

how many hours has it been? maybe I should start a counter. that'll be for today. to javascript a clock that count-downs. or up. a clock that counts. clocks are the hardest working people I know. they work, umm, 'round the clock. and no one can really beat that.

unless you go at it with a wooden bat. and smash splinters around.

clock-bashing. not unlike gay bashing. though clock activists seem to be less vocal about their opinions. mostly due to their recent switch away from analog into the digital realm.

it's surprisingly cold here in Porti-land. not cold. that's a bit too much. it's chilly. the nice kind of wake-up-in-the-morning-with-Folgers-in-your-cup-with-a-sweater-wrapped-around-you-smoke-drifting-out-of-the-cup-into-your-nostrils chilly.

bare-foot-cold-tile-floor chilly.

surprise número dós. (maybe I'm throwing toó many accents around, it Latinizes everything. same how the ümlaut Germanizes everything. say, a half-pipe).

the second surprise: how easy it is to get away from everything.

Maybe these shouldnt' be online. I'm on text edit right now. way underrated program. but that's enough 'bout text-edit.

back to getting away from it all. for two hundred forty dollars, I started a new life for three weeks.

that means a back-pack, a suitcase, a ticket, and five hours later, I have a new life.

but only for three weeks.

and the flight wasn't even half bad. I know this might turn into an indirect JetBlue promotion, but that maybe that doesn't matter. maybe they earned their name-dropping today. or maybe that in itself should be a separate blog.

back to my point: five hours and I'm across the country. as far away as I can be from responsibility without crossing Canada and touching any other country. maybe California is farther, but that's not the point.

this all sounded so well thought out when I was writing it in bed. in my head.

if I can just pack up and leave for 3 weeks. how hard is it to pack up and leave for 3 years? 6 years? I found myself saying pretty damn easy. I just did it in two days. and theoretically, some people could do it within hours.

where does that leave us? anywhere we want to go. there's really no holding back.

given that I already had a place to stay and knew people. so maybe that's a big part of the equation.

what does it say about me when I feel that there's not much in NYC to keep me there? not my mom. nor my sis. 'cause they'll be fine with or without me. (sidebar: make a list of clichés to avoid, sidebar within sidebar: what kind of word is 'cliché'? french?)

and same with friends. I don't have a girlfriend whose arms I can run into when I land at JFK. friends come and go. you always make new friends. so where is the attachment? my metaphorical ball-n-chain? my anchor? and sundry heavy objects that weight things down?

maybe the only thing that can keep me in NYC is the repulsion of other cities.

or maybe the only thing that can keep us from moving are the reasons we make up. the attachments we have. maybe I don't feel attached to NYC. it's only been three years.

maybe my biological clock is saying get out of there.

maybe I like to say maybe all the time. maybe 'cause it makes me sound logical and considerate of alternative opinions to my own. open to be wrong.

what's in store for today? 7:46am

I want to write three times a day. write more than I eat. make room for new thoughts. actively look for it. something.

the sun is up.

7:51am

cars are driving by. it's that time of the day.

maybe I'll just have small writing times. five, six times a day. once every five, six hours. wake up in the middle of the night. with my eyes closed. and ghost typing in the air. sleep walking my thoughts into the keyboard.

and when all my dreams are done, bam, slump back into bed.

and start cooking. sorry. didn't mean to throw that out there at you like that. without warning. uninstigated (though that's not the word I'm looking for).

yes. me. cooking. let's just leave it for now and see how it develops.

it's nice that there's a tree right next to the parking lot. though taller, I'm sure it'll lose in a fight with the parking lot. there's just so much more concrete.

8am: maybe I'm done spilling my guts out.

10:58am

It's so beautiful out. Skin cancer almost seems worth it.

4:58am

I'll be okay tomorrow.

Right now, everything is fine. It is. Nothing is wrong. no cancer. no hunger. maybe a bit sleepy.

but nothing that can't be satisfied within an arms reach. if you know what I mean.

nothing is absolutely wrong. but there is.

of all the things that are good right now, I need a conversation.

not someone to talk to. you can talk to anyone. but someone beyond that superficial talk.

maybe that takes time. maybe I'm missing my friends. old school, nostalgic memories that haven't repeated themselves recently.

not sure what it is.

I think I know. maybe.

so that's it. all I need at the moment. everything else comes after.

'night.

5:10

Beijing Olympics

Inside the opening ceremonies as seen on TV and via the NYTimes




As seen on Vice TV

Admittedly, Vice does feels like they sensationalize it a tad too much. a pinch. but still somewhat good to see another side of the China. This is what the games feel like: let's go party while you watch us on TV from your mud-shack. assuming you have a TV.

self-loathing online

This blog needs a facelift. in a non-superficial way.

and still working on the book. nothing new to report. been reading and not writing.

but you can see that from the dates on this blog.

end.

! Flickr

Trying to figure out what to do with my Flickr account. post photos. why not just facebook? I don't know. trying something new.

let's see where this gets us.

bam.

0:14am On Trampolines

I want my babies to be born on a trampoline.

That's all there is to it.

If everyone could be tossed into the air once in their lifetime, there'd be less domestic abuse.

The rate of incidence for violent crimes in Philly would half by the year 2013. And that'd the beginning of a new era in crime deterrence.

trampolines in schools. the gym wouldn't be the same again. ESPN2 would broadcast game from the PTL—the professional trampolines league.

there'd be a minor leagues, too.

it's an intense sport. like a cage match. in the air.

so it was ridiculous fun jumping on that thing. that's what she said.

and tiring. she said that, too.

today shall be that day I first got on a trampoline. forget pools. those are lame. trampolines are it. gimme.

1:06am

1:38am Delaying the inevitable.

Feels like that's all I do now.

I keep holding off until the last possible minute. The minute arrives and I have to give in. no more holding on. no more excuses. it's head on. and all this time. agony has set in. hasn't made itself comfortable, because all it knows is a state of being without comfort.

I have to do things I've been putting off for reasons that are beyond my reasoning. I don't know why. I have inklings as to why. but I'd rather not dig 'em out.

a house of cards. and the fans are blowing. the A/C's not on. it rained outside tonight. as opposed to raining inside.

what I'm trying to say is that at this moment, I'm miserable. agonizing over things that I should do and get over with. because they're not that big of a deal. and I'm dramatizing things and making a big deal out of free samples. spare change? are those the most insignificant things in our lives? lint? that's pretty innocuous, isn't it?

One down. two more to go.

'night

1:48am

On HBO and TruBlood

Seems like the show could be interesting. I trust HBO, though I really haven't seen most of the shows.

While watching some of the promo videos, I thought about X-Men. Same set up. mutants living among you. the parallel here is people you think are different. minorities.

I'm not a big fan of all this branded entertainment, though it sometimes seems kind of cool. at times.

remember seeing the ads for TruBlood. double take on the posters and see the fine print HBO logo. didn't really like it, until I realized it's a bigger campaign. but still not a big fan of it. maybe 'cause I'm too lazy to go searching through the internet for the bits and pieces of clues. the TruBlood delivery truck does seem cool.

no final decision yet. I'll sit on this and edit it as thoughts come up.


NY Times Article on TruBlood

via Agency Spy on TruBlood

Campfire

Life lessons from Google

The gist: keep on learning.

very simple idea, but the hard parts are discipline and prioritizing what to learn first. you can learn anything. anything. but what?

I want to learn everything. but something needs to come first. giving another shot to chinese. let's see what happens.




P.S. I love PSFK. I mean. like a lot. enjoy reading. yes. love.

Read it > Google Blog

via PSFK

The Onion on Branded Content

Home Depot Honors Fallen Soldiers With Great Prices On Tools


It's done pretty well, with the sidebars coming out, the picture in picture, how they try to work in the products during the interview. but then it gets too over the top to be funny. they should've pulled back on the jokes a bit more and it would've been classic.

love the mom's acting, though.

But about branded content. This is what brands probably shouldn't do. stick their face where it doesn't belong and force themselves into the dialogue.

Via: PSFK

The Economist on the Social Networking

Everywhere and Nowhere

This article came out in March 2008. Which means it was probably written/contemplated about before then, and I'm only reading it now. Tisk tisk.

Interesting points, that social networks like Facebook and MySpace, while popular, aren't really business models. Their ad revenue doesn't generate much. It's annoying, and maybe they're better off creating branded applications to keep us engaged rather than have sidebar ads.

Then the analogy of old internet service providers into web portals. Closed to open. Same now for these communities. They're closed to each other, it's annoying to have to log in separately into each site. The solution? Email. It already has all of our contacts, calendar events, and keeps track of how often we talk to who.

Makes total sense to me what the article is saying. So the question then is who's going to be first? When is it going to happen? And how are people going to sustain it as a business model? What happens after the original founder sell out?

Nothing will happen if it's open source, right? What if the whole open source project becomes funded by some tech company?

Interesting times we live in.

On Video Game Advertising

Instead of placing ads inside the video game worlds where it might be out of context, roll the 30 sec. spots while the game is loading.

This is sweet if you keep the option to choose if you want to see the spot or not.

Once you take away the option of choosing between seeing the spot or paying for the game yourself, then it goes back to shoving ads down your throat model. Which isn't fun for the gamer, and that means resentment to the game, the brand, and everyone involved holding him down while the game loads.

Business Models: Dentsu and Anomaly

4:28am WTF. I'm up for no apparent reason.

And why would i need any reason to be up?

it's nice to be up and awake. it's quite during this time of the night.

tomorrow's another day.

I don't want today to end.

the day is over when I lay down and shut my eyes. erase today. archive it into my subconscious.

and it won't surface until it's needed. not when I want it to be here.

just 'cause I'm not writing doesn't mean things aren't happening.

it's usually too busy for that.

but there's work tomorrow. eeek.

monday off. sweet.

no more. I have ideas for a new website. but not sure how to work it out yet. how to make it pretty and functional to the way I need it to be. I have a feeling as to what it should be.

just a feeling. no rational thoughts.

and now I'm sleepy. running out of memory space. anything that happens after this doesn't get recorded.

birds are singing.

I was going to write about how birds don't "sing" per say. we say that they sing. but they're just talking. they sing to our ears. but they're not really trying to "sing" is just sounds like they're singing.

a label. that's what it does. or it's the inverse. where the feeling of the bird's talk feels soothing, so we call it muzak.

maybe I've written about this. but reiteration never fails to un-impress. the undoing of an impression. a depression, if you will.

sleep time is here. baseball batting the back of my neck. and cracking bones with splinters.

ka-plunk is my head on the stove. out cold.

4:37am