November 2001

Thursday, November 29

Rock | Me | Hardplace

Until today, I hadn't realized the extent of the degree to which I want to graduate college on time as planned.

Dr. Simmons pulls me aside and informs me that I have four absences in his "Concepts & Layout" course, which according to the syllabus (who reads those things?) results in a drop of one letter grade for the course. If you've got an A, and have missed four classes, you've got a B. If you've got a B, with four absences, you've got a C. Since I've got a C, and there is basically to way to change it, ...and I have four absences, I've got a D. And if you're a Design major, a D, in a design course doesn't fly. The course must be taken again. D=F. While he's telling me these things and letting me know that I can still drop the course, I realize; that what he's really saying, even if he doesn't know it, (and if he did, it still wouldn't matter), ..is that with this D, I'll have to stay in school for another semester, maybe even a year, until this course is offered again, ...if I want to graduate with one of those diploma things.

So for the next thirty minutes I'm sitting in this class, working on the last assignment that has no chance of changing the outcome of my grade, speechless, panicked, shocked, unable to concentrate, swimming in this awful realization of where I am, versus where I thought I was this morning.

Things like this are hard to swallow. I, of all people, had been pleased with the assignments I'd turned in, (1, 2, 3) a little shocked later on to find out that they were all C's and D's, but still hanging on, knowing that things were bound to get better.

They didn’t. And they can't.

If I want to graduate, it's going to take another semester, to do this thing again; if I want a diploma.
Or, I could get my portfolio together and get a job, with the benefit of all this schooling, minus the degree. (Because in all actuality, a graphic design degree won’t get you a job, your portfolio gets you a job, with the degree usually giving you a little bit higher salary.) Then again I could sit here for another year, then again I really loathe that idea. Then again maybe there's a way around this predicament, probably not. But there might be. We’ll see.

So I go to the McDonalds in Caddo Valley and watch the disgruntled guy behind the burger bin, slaving away at work, and I try to remind myself that school is a neat place, and that when I leave school and begin working full-time, this, in one form or another is really all I'll be doing anyway, slaving away for this, that, and whoever wants extra mustard or no pickles; Taking cues from my boss, following orders and being a yes-man because they give me money. It won’t be horrible. Actually it’ll be halfway rewarding work and I’ll probably even enjoy it. But it will still be work. Nothing like here and now, where I have the liberty of doing things my way, at my own pace and leisure.

More than ever, Drew is aware of the fact that school, ain't so bad. What IS bad, what really makes me shiver, ..is the time that school consumes, the months and years spent becoming skilled and “educated”, the time spent on campus that allows room for little else of that which might even be more important, more meaningful and all the more fulfilling. Away time is what you wonder about; time that I could be spending somewhere else, maybe someplace better. And you wonder about the other things that a person could do and have if he wasn’t tied down with school, maybe a job and a mortgage and a car payment and a house and a life and a wife. I have sincere difficulty, mentally pushing those ideas further down the road.

So,..

you sit there as these thoughts fly through your head, eating your number 2 super sized value meal and staring out the window at the cold rain. You are wearing a wicked grin, afloat with ideas of how your life and your daily routine and your geographic location could massively change with one single decision.

Stupid absences.

Tuesday, November 27

It’s finally gotten cold. 11/27, and it’s finally gotten cold. Today was first time this “winter” that I’ve worn a big coat to school and kept it on. Tonight it’s going to be even colder. And raining.

Yesterday night around 11:30, the worst fight I’ve ever seen, took place on the deck. One of those fights that doesn’t limit itself to one location, instead traveling from the woodpile to right in front of the sliding glass door, then up on top of the deck, scuffling and screaming and clawing and biting up on the green fiberglass. The yellow cat put up a good fight, but the tail-less cat, being a polished pro, soon overpowered and out-bit yellow cat. And repeatedly stifled his efforts to escape. Yellow cat is learning though. Mom didn’t believe me when I told her some months ago that yellow cat would turn wild.

Now, yellow cat doesn’t like to be touched, maybe its just cuz he’s so soar all the time. Yellow cat can be compared to the likes of Cool Hand Luke, repeatedly outmatched in every category minus determination, coming back for more, and more. This thing ain’t over.

It’s funny though. They’re obviously not fighting over food. Those cats eat better than anybody else at this house. The source of strife then? They’re fighting over something even more frivolous and pointless.

There is a place between love and hate, a place where you’re incapable of smiling, yet still not feeling enough disgust to spit and turn and walk away.

A place where you can’t let it go.

Here there is nothing at all. No logic, no clear explanation, only the knowledge of vast distance between back there, here, and some other place far ahead. Ideas of things down the road don’t enthrall a person who is standing still, in this place where you can’t muster the will to move in any direction.

I’ve been laughing a lot lately at school though. Semester-end pressure is insane, but I’ve been through a whole lot with these same graphic arts people for the better part of four years. A close nit group of five or six who’ve stuck it out while countless others have come eager and abandoned frustrated. It’s possible to literally fall out of your chair laughing, 3 times in one week. Weird stupid oddly funny things. College will soon be over, and perhaps I will even graduate and work somewhere nice, with money for food. Coming together, it all is.

You won’t be able to stop watching this over and over. And nobody has arrived with an explanation as to why.

Ok maybe you don’t find it so funny, but for people who spend a lot of time discussing and experimenting on the subject of why certain styles of media and design appeal to people and why they don’t, it’s beautifully-pathetic on SO many levels.

And it would be fun to go and see this, and perhaps even play, using “law” to shamefully shock my opponent with repeated, predictable, yet unstoppable moves. Yeah right. I’d probably end up having to play a “genetically-superior at-video-games Korean chick, and come home fuming like a burnt marsh mellow. It really is eye-opening though, too see where video "games" are headed.

Monday, November 26

"The doctor grafted skin from the chest onto the plaintiff's palm, and the chest skin grew hair leaving the plaintiff with an unsightly hairy hand. The doctor had, in fact, never performed a skin graft before, although he had observed such operations as an army doctor. George's hairy hand was a constant inconvenience and a source of considerable embarassment and unhappiness. It also greatly reduced his job prospects as he did have full use of his hand (he could not type, for example), and the unsightliness of the hand made him less desirable to prospective employers."

.....................................................................

We went to see Nanna today at Carol n Ab’s place in Little Rock. She’s been living in a room with a tall ceiling, brightly painted yellow walls and a nice sunny window, complete with soft bed and TV/VCR.

People bring her food.

I think this is less of a “being sick” thing and more of a two week “Bed and Breakfast for one” thing.

It’s been a long time since I’ve “planned” on catching a TV show. … Don’t know why, but I seem to be watching a whole lot less TV lately anyway. But, “Alias” is pretty good. I’ve never been a huge fan of movies based around similar subject matter like Mission Impossible or James Bond. Sure, they were good movies, but you don’t expect to see something as good or better on network television. This is. I happened by chance to catch the first and second episodes of Alias, and as for the last three, well, I’m sitting there waiting for them to come on. Quite pathetic, I might add, but good TV is, well, ..good TV. And then after Alias is that other show, The Practice, it’s ok too.

If I hear one more canned music Christmas song on the radio, I am going to go crazy, puke, pull my hair out. Those month and a half ahead of time TV commercials are stupid and pathetic as well. This is insulting. Why am I sitting here watching? I’m tired of being told:

“Love = gifts and presents. Come to our mega store and buy our stuff.”

“Help the country out by being a good consumer” they say. What they’re finally indirectly admitting, is that our whole culture is hinged on the hope that people will keep spending money on stylish new toaster ovens. There are people starving in Asia and we have weight control cat food.

Saturday, November 24

Photos that mean more to me than any I've ever taken. umm, .. because I didn't.

Thursday, November 22

Busying yourself for multiple hours at a time, day after day, in a secular vocation that requires no thinking whatsoever, ..gives you time to do just that, ..think. I think about my life and the way I operate, function, maneuver, manage, exchange, communicate, express, etc.. And I think about the distance between how things really are, and the way I want them to be. The way they would be if I was totally at peace with all of my past and present doings, and all of my actions and reactions, and all of my dealings with other people. But there is a vast distance, between reality and desired reality.

So I think about these “me” things, and I think about the way other people “are” as well, how all other people have those assorted little quirks or seemingly undesirable or anti-pleasant aspects of their lives as well. And how everybody is really weird in one way or another, in ways that would shock and astound. And how everybody is bizarre in these little ways, in part because the world is a weird messed-up place, and nobody’s gonna handle every single aspect of their lives amongst this current environment in a grand triumphant fashion. We’re all really pathetic in one facet of life or another. Nobody’s got it all together. Show me somebody who does, and I’ll eat 43 cockroaches. Do it.

And thinking about these things, I’m repeatedly arriving at the conclusion that focus is the key, not focusing on ourselves and our misgivings and weirdness, and not other peoples abnormalities, but on the more important things, those loving unselfish things that we should be striving after, those things that give a person purpose and aim, and in the process, everything else falling into place behind them, because those stupid little knickknacks of life really weren’t such a big deal. They were less important derivatives of something else, details, following a thing with greater meaning and weight.

But I’m weird. And other people are weird too. This week I’ve spent a lot of time at my grandmother’s house with her being so sick, and spent hours upon hours paging through stacks and stacks of old photo albums of my dad’s side of the family, and of my grandmother, I’m really at a loss for words. She used to be such a beautiful dashing stylish girl, from the looks of these photos a seemingly take-charge, curious, logical lady; now she’s one of those old people getting scammed by Publishers Clearinghouse. It’s strange. I can’t begin to understand it.

Maybe she just comes from a time when things were simpler, closer to the way they should be.

I look at her right now, and at her weird responses to situations in this present environment that are so easy for me to handle, and I start to think of how hard it would be for all of us “normal people” on the flip side of the coin, to be tossed back to the place where she grew up, in a place that she would consider normal and logical. We’d be out of touch and weird too.

Continuing the subject of weird, going to Wal-Mart at 1:00 am is like nothing else. Tonight I saw three people I knew from school working there at this Wal-Mart in Hot Springs. One guy I remember fairly well who always screwed me over in Algebra II by making the curve so high, was seen crouched over in an isle, wearing a pathetic little apron, complete with the standard gay wal-mart smiley button attached to it. Stocking tampons, this guy was. So you try not to make eye contact. Let him retain whatever pride he has left by pretending not to recognize him, for I would wish the same, if he were I.

Checking out, we see a poorly dressed man, requiring the assistance of two employees in his efforts to purchase and take home a huge Phillips projection screen TV. From the looks of it, I’d predict that the TV costs more than the house he’s going to airlift it into. But a god among men he will be, for today’s Arkansas football game; a god among men. And then there was the guy behind us in line, purchasing two items: one 50lb bag of Ol’ Roy dog food, and one trailer hitch ball. This man is obviously preparing for leaving his neighborhood and his annoying wife for a week or so, and entering the woods, where good buddies and endless beer await.

As for me, I’ll be sleeping in. And watching various things on my ‘small’ TV, and later today going over to Jason and Gingers house to eat among other things, the pork n beans we purchased the night before.

Tuesday, November 20

Answer: 48 cans (two cases) of StarKist Chunk-Lite Tuna; two 24-packs of Little Debbie Fudge Rounds; nothing else.

Question: What did corey and collin purchase at Krogers when mom gave them grocery money for work lunches?

Sunday, November 18

Saturday morning. I wake up on a mattress, situated on the wooden floor of a “cabin” porch that has only recently been converted to a many-windowed sunroom. I wake up with Chris Kremer’s foot lodged in my ribs accompanied by the words: “Hey Drew, get on up. Everybody else is ready.” And I do stand. And I walk around, and see that the words “everybody else” is a stretch of the truth, and I shave, and I brush my teeth, and I dress myself, which only involves putting my shoes on because I slept in the clothes I planned wearing for that day, …and then I wake up.

Northern Arkansas is a different place. Hill people and hill towns seem better. I like it here. All four of us walk down the steps through the cold early morning fog and pile into the car, and they drink their coffee in silence as we pull onto the highway heading toward the hall construction site. It takes awhile, before the the windsheild and windows are clear, and then I stare out my window for a minute or two while nobody is saying anything, looking out at the lake as we drive over it’s bridge, and try to remember the last time a.m. felt this fresh and new. Chris interrupts the silence: “For the record I want it to be known, ..that I was up before the alarm clock this morning."

Later in the drive, with the topic of conversation centering around a certain map that contained faulty directions to one of the old quick builds in Memphis, Chris throws out another interesting nugget of truth: ”Memphis is not a good place to get lost, because you can often find yourself in a place not conducive to life.”.

A lot of this weekend was spent with friends, running around the town of Mountain Home involved in various adolescent activities, eating pizza, bowling, sneaking food into a movie, (Monsters Inc. ain’t that bad.) etc.. Oh and yeah, then there was that other construction stuff during the day. Everything went smooth and solid.

And the ratio of cell phones per family member in no way determines the amount of communication, or in this case confusion, which will exist.

Now more than ever I’m even more so determined, to never pay for a cell phone of my own. Everybody could go get one, or we could all just make solid plans and not change our minds every fifteen minutes. Plans don’t have roaming fees, and plans don’t lose signal behind large hills. And when was the last time you ever had your plans in your pocket but forgot to turn them on, or left them in the car?

Stupid phones.

Thursday, November 15

Hmm. Whatd'ya think? Maybe I'll switch everything over to this style. Maybe perhaps might should I? Maybe perhaps might you not care the slightest? Maybe perhaps.

Dad left yesterday afternoon for the quick build in Mountain Home, and today me and mom are going to head that direction whenever I get home from this, hugely boring as of late place, that I call school. Dad called and said he scored some cabins for everybody to stay at in small place called Gamaliel, on lake Norfork. So that should be great. And it'll also be nice to be around everybody again because I didn't go to the last one; Attic-boy grunt is a swell way to spend a weekend.

The past month or so has been really "out there", so I'm looking forward to getting out of here for awhile and doing something I've always enjoyed.

Wednesday, November 14

Me and Collin ...washed dishes tonight. I feel so, ...violated.

This afternoon at school while I should've been working on something else, I read the coolest article that National Geographic Adventure has ever put out. And they've put out some good ones. But this one: better ...best.

I've always been a big fan of nonfictional survival accounts; people getting lost or shipwrecked or abandoned in wild remote areas of wilderness, be it the ocean or desert or mountains or jungle, ..spending weeks upon weeks ..lost; doing nothing but struggling to keep it together mentally and physically in hopes of walking out alive, or simply staying alive until they are rescued.

In this month's issue, the cover article deals with just that subject, and contains a gold mine of information, packed around gripping first hand accounts of people who were lost with no conceivable prospect of coming out alive; how they did; and why. It took me around an hour and a half to read through the article in the library, stopping every couple of minutes, looking up, thinking: "this is so cool".

I'm gonna buy that magazine tomorrow. I would recommend to anybody else the same.

Jinna is leaving for Hawaii on Thursday with her parents. I'm sure it'll be a blast. I've been mulling over the thought of planning out some type of excursion, depending on when and where my internship will happen. Perhaps even by myself. I've always wanted to go back to the Grand Tetons. We didn't spend near enough time there when we last went. So many people have said so many good things about hiking in that area. So I'm thinking some form of walkabout involving mega hiking, mountains, my camera, and stepping out of the house with one backpack, and one plane ticket. …Spending a week fighting off bears, getting mauled by squirrels, not brushing my teeth, and coming home bruised, weary, refreshed, and wearing the same pair of underwear.

Monday, November 12

So we're working with lightwave today. This could get addictive. Sky = the limit, but I guess free time would play a small part in there somewhere. Security features for Lightwave are pretty rock solid. You'd expect nothing less for a piece of software that costs $2495.00 per copy. So at the start of each class, the lab lockbox is opened, and the USB dongle keys are handed out. Without them, the sofware won't run. And as always, the warning is uttered: "at the end of class before you leave, either hand in your dongles or hand over four hundred dollars, cause that's how much you'll owe if it's lost." If I'm not mistaken, you can use this thing to deploy a surface to air missle, if your commanding officer used his dongle to confirm the launch sequence ..or something.

And speaking of neat USB do-dads; 8 megabytes on a keychain, for 25 bucks! how cool is that!

Sunday, November 11

This is nice. New Friends:

Sheri from Minnesota
Chris from Vegas
Gabe from Ontario

Cool!

Over the next few days, we're gonna keep updating the info page. Cause the old one sucked, and I can't believe I allowed it so be so pathetic for so long. It's weird that I actually approved of it's contents two years ago. What a moron.
I guess you already knew that though.

Friday, November 9

Photos from Little Sahara State Park

And we're heading in the direction of separating the "almost good", from the "horribly crappy," ..so also check out the:
Little Sahara "Uncensored" version.

I love how easy it was this time. Those late night code-tweaking binges of a month ago are paying off now, in the form of: ""Less work now" Less work is good. There are other things to do.

Tonight was hectic. First off you've gotta get "sound" all set up. Then you've got announcements, and the name of Sunday's speaker from Little Rock is: Micro Johnson. I swear. How hard it was not to laugh, ..I have no words to describe. And then playing the role of "good son" in the "preparing for meetings" part. All went well. Which is good.

I'd been wondering what else I could do next month while we've got those nice Tommy Hillfiger tuxedos. Then rental fee in fact, IS for three days. And josh's wedding only spans 1/3 of an actual day. But no ideas until tonight. Myself and justin have plans for the following sunday: Riding dirtbikes out at the new trails, ..whilst fancily tuxed. Oh yes, It shall be done. For it is an opportunity which cannot be denied.

Thursday, November 8

I can't ever remember being this down, about anything.
Girls suck.

Tuesday, November 6

In no particular order:

Grinning today, observing one of my professors wandering around the art department parking lot, thinking her car was stolen, only to remember that she'd parked elsewhere on campus.
I am not the only one.

It's not very shocking to observe airport security at an all time high. But Corey and Collin left alone all day, crawling around the ceilings of the Hot Springs Airport Facility installing heating ducts, ...that's shocking. If they only knew....

An interesting quote, overheard on NPR today: "The news media doesn't necessarily tell us what to think, but the media tells us what to think ..about."
I don't think the two are very far apart.

And last but not least, one of the guys in Kelly's Yahoo fantasy football league goes by the screen name: "Vigorous, Ill Tempered Seabass".

Saturday, November 3

Freezing Eskimos Have 47 Words for "This Sucks"

Matt could use a subscription to the new magazine. And If you order today through our special Saturday offer, you'll also recieve a special $20 gift certificate from Candle World.

And people, this image in no way relates to me or reflects my attitude. I just thought it was funny mmkay? mmkay.
..Although I must admit. I do have the type of personality that could lead to my being domininated by such a woman. Let us pray, that such a day never arrives. "But what if...."

Ok, since you ask: Permission to smack me in the back of the head with a 2x4 if you ever find me in such a pathetic whipped condition; granted.

Cause it very well could happen; you just never know. Us guys gotta look out for each other. Just look at corey and collin, ..all tied up in relationships and waiting by the phone. "Hey Collin!" .."Yes dear? ..."Drink the rest of my wine and then go wash the dishes." .."Already on it dear."

Friday, November 2

File: Quit

I wonder how much different we would all be if we weren't "plugged in" all the time. And I'm considering the possibility of going completely cold turkey for a matter of weeks or months. I love listening to the radio. I love watching good tv. I love pouring through all of the e-mails that my lady friends around the world send me (umm ..yeah) , and I love reading things on the internet. But I'm slouched here in this chair, mentally rehashing my activities over the last two days and thinking about media-overload.

I don't like this.

I can remember going to Little Sahara and spending 3 days without a computer and three days with alot less tv and radio. It felt good. From around 3-5 years old, we didn't have a tv in the house. I can remember alot more about that part of my childhood than any other time. All kind'sa stuff.

What I'm saying, ..is that I feel like a drone, with the attention span of a tree monkey in heat. ..or wait a minute, that'd be a female, ..so just a tree monkey.

But, ...So....,things could be better. Things needn't be like this. I'm curious as to how I would be, what type of person I would be, if I wasn't tuned in all day, if my brain didn't go to mush with the radio everyday on the drive home from school, and if I didn't get right out of the truck and into the house to eat in front of Oprah or Rosie or that awful awful new show. And if I didn't just sit there and watch the national news like I do 1/3 of the time when there's nothin else to do, and If i didn't retreat to my room for hours on end to try and fix some stupid coding problem on this website, and if I didn't fall asleep in bed to the same old radio or cd, and if I didn't wake up the next morning to the sound of my screeching alarm clock buzzer, and if I didn't numb my brain with the radio again on the way to school, and if I didn't pass the time between classes surfing and writing here.
What type of person would I be? I'm thinking I'd actually BE a person, instead of a tree monkey.

I don't like who I am and what it seems like all of this is turning me in to. I have fun and do real things with real people all the time, but I sit here and there and do this and watch this and listen to that and this and that, and fifteen minutes later, I can't remember most of it because it wasn't important and it wasn't real and it wasn't valued. And there is a sense of lost time, and lost opportunity, and wasted youth.

It's time for a change. And cold-turkey comes to mind. 2-3 weeks or a month even. No radio, no tv, no internet. Screw the idea of "phasing out". This'll be fun and harsh and interesting. And I'll probably quickly arrive at the conclusion that outside of being "plugged in", there isn't really a whole lot of substance in my life.

We're gonna keep thinking about it for perhaps a day or two, and devise a plan of action. Any ideas or feedback would be helpful as well.
Really. I'm really gonna do it. Really. I'll spit in your eye if you tell me I won't.

What makes you so darned great?

Tom: Television

What makes you so darned great?

Nando: The fact that I've ridiculously memorized the entire dialogue of the movie "Office Space."

What makes you so darned great?

Jemma: Um ... wait ... what?

What makes you so darned great?

Melvin: I have a juicer.

Thursday, November 1

It is the decision of this court, to mandate the updation the "music" section.
Two albums in particular, ..one of which should've been included all along, and as for the other there is no question in my mind, that it's one of the most meaningful pieces of music that I own.

Other albums that've been spinning a whole lot lately:

Siamese Dream by the Smashing Pumpkins still seems fresh and new. I never really took the time to find out that there were other great songs on the album besides "Today" and "Disarm." Tracks 4 and 9 are really new and great, and have been in the back of my head for the last week or so.

Gladys Knight & the Pips "If I Were Your Woman", "Neither One of Us", and "Midnight Train to Georgia"... this stuff is classic and soulfully hard hitting; the best 4 bucks you can ever spend at Wal-Mart.

Lemmon Parade by Tonic

Willie Nelson's Red Headed Stranger

The Best of Jackson Browne ..amazing, deep & poetic.

Elton John's Greatest Hits ..I know, ..how pathetic. But these songs are SO addictive. The other day I came across mom's old vinyl record of the exact same album. Weird.

Neil Young - Harvest ..How, may I ask how, can you get any better than "Out On The Weekend"? You can't. Not a real big fan of half the songs on this cd, but the rest, ..oh yes the rest.

As far as the music section though, the two new additions coulda shoulda been there for awhile already. That Tom Petty album has got to be the greatest, greatest hits collection ever, and The Bends album really hits hard. "High and Dry", and "Fake Plastic Trees" carry more meaning than just about any songs that I can think of. And that should mean alot, coming from a guy who's forced to spend way too much time at school attached to a computer with overpriced headphones. Repeat after me: Gnutella is our friend.