just tired

I've been busy.

I still haven't started my christmas shopping (and my wife knows it). Pretty much every night for the past week I've been running lights for that christmas play- which is cool. Once the show is over, I get home... and I'm just tired.

We started a puzzle on our coffee table.

Listened to old records.

Cleaned up the kitchen and watered the plants.

I want my own floating island.

cold

Cold morning. My car does not like the cold, and has a hard time shifting gears until every thing warms up. I'm not that excited for winter, I'll be honest. I hate scraping ice and frost off my windows, and my hands freeze to the steering wheel.

On top of that, the furnace at my office doesn't work. Right now the thermostat says it's 63 degrees in here. No matter how much I crank it up, the temperature stays the same. We have a furnace problem. So my hands are cold the entire day. Nothing makes me more miserable than having cold hands and feet.

dreams

3 weird dreams last night:

My first one was me walking through Home Depot. I wasn't looking for anything in particular, just browsing the plumbing supplies... light fixtures and tools... and then I left. It felt like I was in there for like 40 minutes just walking around Home Depot.

Then I dreamed I was Spiderman. I was swinging from building to building, shooting webs and stuff, probably fighting the Hulk or something. When I tried to explain my incredible powers to my sister, she didn't believe me. So I walked to my red car and drove away.

My last dream was quick, like I was being rushed into a building, being told I was late and I had to hurry. I ran into a room and pulled back a curtain and I was thrust in front of an old microphone and a guitar was thrown over my shoulder. The music started and the words that came out of my mouth was "I Saw Her Standing There" by the Beatles.

Weird.

records

Listening to vinyl.

Next up: Kansas - Leftoverture.

old comics

This is from The Academia Waltz, a comic by Berkeley Breathed from 1978-79. He later went on to draw other syndicated comic strips like Bloom County, Outland, and Opus. Even from these early strips, Breathed shows his interesting sense of humor.

Much of the material borrows from current events and the political interests of the 1980's.

late blog

Another one of those days. What's left of my soul was steadily crushed to a pulp during my shift in the salt mines. I spent most of my day trying to fix a mistake that I technically never made. Oh the humanity.

There is light at the end of the tunnel. While my employer implodes on itself, I can take heart because I finished school. I did it. For reals. Look out universe, I'm going to get out of here!!

On the way home I stopped at the grocery store and picked up some cheesy bagels and cream cheese.

Nat cooked me dinner.

I've decided to give Genealogy a shot. The past couple of nights have been spent searching and double checking leads on lost dead ancestors. I'm familiar with the routine: I did stuff like this all the time for presentations and papers in college (Remember the Northern Cheyenne census? That was awesome.) I've just never really cared who begat whom to get to me. One of my professors warned me that once you start looking at your genealogy, you get hooked really fast... "It's like crack." he said.

It turns out that my mom doesn't know much before her great-great-grandfather, a guy who came over from England and was a florist in Queens during the late 1800's. So I'm taking a different approach, starting over from scratch basically. I want to see how much information I can come up with on my own, just to see what I can find. I think there are clues out there just waiting to be discovered.

sunday doodles

Here's a couple of drawings while I was sitting around at church. I now have a small pile of tiny landscapes... mobs of townsfolk... people... and other things. The guy holding the flag is my favorite.

Which reminds me, I have an idea for a real art thing. Not a internet web thing, but a real, hold it in your hands kind of art thing. I'm not going to divulge any information until I can figure it out, but rest assured, it is something that I've been working on for a long time.

I cooked some eggs, bacon, and potatoes for dinner tonight. Remember that pie I baked? It surprisingly turned out ok. It was not your typical apple sugary cinnamon mess. It was a combination and mixture of complex flavor from the apples themselves. Was I proud? Probably. I think I'm going to eat a piece right now.

I think I want a record player now. I didn't before, but now I do. To listen to old music, and to appreciate the dead art form of album covers.

dreaming about imperium

Another sketch from the other day. Just me doodling on the computer, no trees were harmed in the making of this picture. Just a few ones and zeros.

I've decided that I want to bake something tomorrow... mostly because I have the time, and I want to eat pie. So I'm going to make an apple pie. I found a few recipes, and I'm going to give it a shot. It's been like... four years since I've made a pie? Pies have a way of striking fear inside the inner depths of my soul. There's so much at stake, and so many places were things can go terribly terribly wrong. Usually the final product is edible, regardless how it looks. My problem was that I never really mastered the subtle technique of the flaky crust. It would be too dry, too wet, be too cold, fall apart... There are really 2000 ways to destroy a perfectly good pie.

So I'm excited.


Went to the They Might Be Giants show the other night. Awesome. They played their album Flood in it's entirety, so it was fun. I haven't been to a concert in a long time so I'm glad that I picked a good one to go to. I saw TMBG a few years ago, and they didn't disappoint this time either. Awesome.

New AP.

can't sleep

Man I'm tired.

edit: I listened to the album "Fragile" by Yes like 5 times yesterday. Thank you Venture Brothers.

friday

I defended my thesis this morning.

Afterward I went out and finally picked up a Halloween costume. I've been to the costume place like four or five times... and every time I couldn't make up my mind. I was sooo close to picking up that Captain America costume, but decided to save some money and come up with something else. So I bought some stuff and... I will be a racial stereotype.


New AP. I'm still trying to figure out the Wacom graphic tablet I got the other day. I thought that I would save some time with it, but it turns out that I just want to do every thing in greater detail. Anyway... Today's strip was the one I was working on when I spilled my bottle of ink. Finally finished!!

music binge

I was sick yesterday.

So I spent most of the day doing things you do when you are sick: sleep. watch tv. catch up on some recorded shows. A few video games... Then I got bored around 12 o'clock.

I cleaned up my iPod of a ton of music that I never really listened to, and some movies and stuff that were just taking up space. Lately I've been looking through the internets for new music and bands that I've ignored. Here are just a few of the new records I've been listening to the past week.

Animal Collective: "Merriweather Post Pravilion"
I keep hearing about this band. And when I found out that they were elctronic-ish... I decided to give their latest album a listen. I think it's hard to describe their sound. The album itself is kind of a dreamy thing.. with guitars and electronics and stuff going all around. I listened to most of it while I was sick... so that might influence what I think about it. Who listens to music like this? I'd like to see them play live.

Danger Mouse + Sparklehorse: "Dark Night of the Soul"
I really like this. You can only get it off the internet. There's guest vocalists on every track, which makes it sound fresh every time I listen to it. Guests include the Flaming Lips, that one guy from the Shins, Frank Black, that guy from the Strokes, Iggy Pop, and others. I'm not sure what DM and Sparklehorse were trying to do with this record- I have not been able to find much on the limited edition book by David Lynch that was printed with it. The book provides a visual for the songs on the record. With how popular Danger Mouse is these days... I think he'll be in cahoots with every musician for years to come. Good find.

David Byrne + Brian Eno: "Everything that Happens Will Happen Today"
I liked the Talking Heads, and I think some of the art/music stuff that David Byrne has done since then has been pretty cool. Brian Eno has had his filthy little hands in producing everyone's albums for the last almost 40 years. Another Byrne and Eno teamup seemed like a good thing: it had electronic stuff, and weird lyrics, interesting song structures... I need to listen to this one some more, but I like what I hear. I'm not sure who I would recommend this to though.

Innerpartysystem: "Innerpartysystem"
I finally got around to getting this album. I liked their song "Don't Stop", and figured I could use a dose of hard-electronic-almost-industrial-glitchy-music. I was really surprised to find that it sounded more like Depeche Mode than anything else. Some of the song's loops and sounds show a strong influence from 90's synthpop and dance music. I think it works, for me anyway. I wonder how they translate to a live show. I'm going to have to check out some of their remixes as well.

Moby: "Wait for Me"
I fell asleep to this. That isn't a bad thing, the whole album is full of synphonics strings, and ambient moods, with cool samples and all the other typical Moby stuff that he packs into a record. It just made me really sleepy after a few tracks... I tried to keep my eyes open... but I couldn't... I'm certain one or more of his songs will be on a commercial or in a movie preview soon. I'm not sure how long the appeal will last, because Moby songs get annoying after hearing them infinity times everywhere.

guh.

Went to Cedar City over the weekend. Hung out with my bro and sis. Ate from the candy trough. Drove back. Kinda wish I had gone to school at SUU. I would have liked a normal university experience.

Don't know what's going around, but people are getting sick. Wash your freaking hands dangit. I feel less than 100%, but that's probably because I haven't slept well the past few days.

Wasn't really able to draw over the weekend. I usually get most of the drawing and inking done by now... but since I went to cedar, and was playing Guitar Hero until late... I didn't have time.

On the bright side: I ordered a Wacom graphic tablet to help speed up the drawing process. I've never really tried one before, but I've always wanted one. I'd like to draw more digitally anyway. We'll see how it goes.

weekends?

I spent most of the weekend inking some new comics for this coming week. And while my skill as an artist continues on it's steady decline, I've decided that I enjoy inking my drawings with the crow tip pen. Until I dumped half the bottle of ink on my carpet... Yeeeoouch. Nat was none too pleased, but the panels I was working on came out pretty good (after I had cleaned up the carpet a few times). The only way to get better is to just continue forward.

I check on the daily updates of many webcomics and syndicated comics everyday. If there was one thing that I remember from my childhood, was grabbing the newspaper before anyone else and turning right to the comics page.

More Angry Peasants MWF.

in good hands

New AP.

two saints converse while a demon waits patiently to torment them both.

sheeps!

New Angry Peasants is up. I need to get a graphic tablet. Seriously. If anyone would like to donate one to me, that would be awesome. New peasants every MWF?

Today I taught Nat's class about Columbus Day. Of course I had to begin my presentation with the Vikings, Vinland and Leif Eriksson, and how they discovered America waaaaay before Columbus. I got some blank stares at first, but when I showed them the evidence they were cool with it. The Viking Sagas provide a very interesting and unique picture to how vikings and Native Americans interacted. It's a topic that I would like to study some more.

a page from the magic notebook.

AP

More angry peasants today. Still trying to figure out formatting with a learn-as-you-go approach to this. I'm still working out the bugs. More to come on Monday.

sunday demons

sketch

serfs

click on angry peasants to the left.

I'm going to try and make this a regular thing.

Looking forward to my next art project: tiny landscapes.

freak

Still can't find my @*%&$ cord for my scanner. I want to scan in some of my sketches. Still looking... My office is a disaster area. Can't find anything... ugh.

In the middle of this disaster is a pile of unfinished ideas and projects that I never have time to get to. I'm reading three? books right now, and each time I pick one of them up it takes a few pages before my brain remembers all the details. My road bike has become a tie rack in the meantime, because I just don't feel like replacing the headset right now. I need to reconnect all the cables to my mobile music workstation, which was unplugged while looking for the cord, and from when I moved my amp around. I just need to do it. Art blog in the works.

I've been drawing what seems to be caricatures of orthodox saints. They have cool beards, and serious expressions.

same

Haven't been motivated to blog.

I'm working on an art blog- if I could find the cord that connects my scanner to my computer. If I find it, I'll probably post something. Fixed my computer by the way.

Working on other things.

The situation remains the same.

hum

poor neglected blog.

I'm going to try and bike more often to work. I've been able to ride at least a couple times each week, but it can be a challenge. I've got too many things to do after work which makes it hard to schedule in a longer ride if I have to be somewhere. That sucks.

The old bikes I've salvaged are falling apart too. Things are coming loose and falling apart, or are dirty and inefficient. It requires constant maintenance. I've switched back to my mountain bike, which runs like a champ, but the brakes need some adjustment. I think the only real solution would be to get a modern road bike. I think I'm just sick of having to fix things over and over.

I'm tired. I'm getting sick of these 11 hour days. I need more time to work on my "projects".

Nat and I just got back from a super anniversary weekend. It was awesome.

hrmph

Watching Star Trek: TNG. So futuristic... and yet, so 1990's.

slimes

bushes

blue

nb

hover science jector horse

20 years

rhg vs. whb

paint

Fun with MS Paint. 

whb

whb

WHB!

crossfire

Here's a game I haven't played in a long long time. Crossfire was made by Sierra-Online in 1981. Probably the first video game I ever played (on an IBM PCjr). A simple game where you have to just kill guys over and over, trying to get points without running out of ammo. Games like this never end, you just play until you run out of lives... There's probably 256 levels, but I've never been able to find out. I found a remake called Gridfire for windows. My highscore is 19500-ish... I was alot better at this when I was 7 years old. 

The Grail

I'm on an epic quest. To find a square tie!

I know they exist!

paint

I've finished two painting in the spirit of Piet Mondrian. I admire his use of lines and geometric shapes to convey emotion. His later work focused on lines and the way they intersected the canvas, and while I'm no art expert, I'd like to think that that relationship can be emulated. 

My two paintings ignore the lines alltogether, and focus on the shapes themselves, seperated by space. I used the same bold primary colors, though now that I think about it, I could have used any color. So I painted a couple of pictures because I have some leftover canvas lying around, and Nat bought me some paints. 

Hopefully it turns out ok. 

This painting was recently sold at Sotheby's for $9.2 million. 

chair

I wish I had this chair.

gah

I'm getting sick of rain and bad weather weekends.

Back off!! shrink gun!

If I wasn't killed in a terrible shark attack feeding frenzy, I would rather be shrunk down and killed by a domesticated animal. Have you ever watched a cat play with a mouse? Yeah... I want to be flung in the air and crushed in gaping jaws of death. Hopefully the G-forces would knock my mini self unconscious, so I would be unable to feel the teeth crunching up my small bones.

Macie is getting pretty shaggy. She's getting a haircut on Saturday. I guess if I was shrunk down miniature size she would probably maul me to death. And then barf me out because I taste bad.

There's a Marvel superhero that reminds me of this situation: Ant-Man. One of the founding members of the Avengers, Ant-man was able to shrink to small size while retaining his strength. He developed a helmet that would allow him to communicate with ants. Probably one of the most unappreciated superheroes in the Marvel Universe, I guess because his powers were... weird. I guess if you needed a superhero on the micro level... that would work. I wonder if he had a fight with any domesicated animals?

nottblock

NOTTBLOCK episode 3 is out!!

youtube.com/nottblock


watch and enjoy!!

Colorado there and back

I went out to Colorado on Friday night. My dad was running a 50 mile race in Fruita, and I just wanted to get out of town for a while. My brother and I brought our bikes and crammed them into my dad's car. After a sickening ride up Spanish Fork Canyon, we were on our way to the middle of nowhere: eastern utah/colorado. Lots of road and empty space. We got there and spent the night at a hotel. 

Early the next day we dropped my dad off for the 6:30 start. Runners are freaking gross. I don't think I can ever be a long distance runner. No thanks. 

We went back to the hotel and slept. My brother and I murdered a continental breakfast and went back the the race. My dad had finished his first 25 miles loop by 11:00 ish and we cheered/hassled him as he forced nasty race food into his system and then ran off for the second loop.

So after that we got out our bikes and rode around. There were tons of trails and roads around the race route so we just went all over the place. We then went down to one of the far aid stations to meet my dad on the last stage of the race. He eventually showed up but by that time we were tired. On the ride back my illiterate brother's tire went flat so he ended up walking the last 3 miles back to the car. I rode ahead to get a pump but when I came back he over inflated his tire... and it popped. Looking down the road, we saw my dad running up to finish the last mile of the race. Hilarious. 

Here's a shot of my dad after finishing. He was out of it. We were all tired and burnt out. My brother and I rode close to 20 miles. I was sunburned and tired. After my dad cleaned up we started to drive back. 

It was a quick trip. We had some fun, and it was good to get out of town for a little while. 

awesome

Beto's

Imagine a hot and tasty burrito on a cold day like this... That would be awesome.

finished

The final part I needed to fix the Peugeot bike frame came last week. I salvaged the frame from underneath a mountain of washing machines on the side of the road last year. Since then, I had stripped the frame down of non-essential parts, and cleaned it up a little. The freewheel I ordered fit and after measuring out the right length of bicycle chain, I took it for a spin this morning. Fast bike. I'm going to try and build my endurance for some of the summer bike tours I've been planning. The big one is:

Tour de Utah Lake. 95 miles of awesome. 

The entire ride has a few hundred feet of gain/loss, and the second half is relatively flat, following the east coast of the lake. I'm hoping to try this in June. 

KITH French Fur Trappers

twitter

Everyone within the sound of my blog must join Twitter.

Follow me @whitehairboy

!!!


do it!

hey

I went to the store and bought raisin bread. 

blog

It is wednesday. I hope it rains today.

whoa

Crazy shooting in my hometown of Binghamton, NY today.

What a useless thing to do. I hate crazy people with guns.

heh.

Last night for April Fool's Jimmy Fallon had a Japanese stand-in do his monologue. I'm sure I wasn't the only one that thought he was actually funnier than Jimmy. Hmmm... is the show better in another language, in english subtitles? Yes. 

the update

Nottblock episode 2 is awesome.
(www.youtube.com/nottblock)

I'm at a good spot with all of my papers that I need to have finished soon. Sort of. Everything will be ok.

Some setbacks to the bass guitar project: The last coat of epoxy to the neck did not cure properly, and while it looked good I must have mixed in too much resin because it remained sticky to the touch (even after a week). so I'm going to sand it off and restart.
The paints used for the body are incompatible with each other... causing some funky reactions. I sprayed a layer of primer, and then a few coats of black, and then a coat of red. The red paint and the black did not like each other. The last coat finally dried, and now the body is red. It looks good. I'll need a different black to finish the thing. Then I'll clear coat it. Right now it's snowing again, and it will probably rain next week so I won't be able to paint for a long time. Humidity is bad. I'm frustrated with the neck issue, so I don't know when I'll finish this thing.

The weather has been up and down the last few weeks. It was getting warmer outside, so I started working on that Peugeot bike frame I found last fall. I stole some parts off of another bike and everything looks like it will work out. I just need the weather to get better.

I've been up late the past few nights. I haven't been sleeping that well. Last night I was up late making a history presentation for Nat's class...

ha no.

So I went running with Bob this morning. It was a good run/jog/walk/limp for me. I'll be honest: I thought I was going to die. I felt like that one guy on The Temple of Doom after he had his heart ripped out and was staring face down at his inevitable death in the swirling lava. My legs feel tired- but we'll see where this goes. I haven't ran or run anything in about... 4 years? Seriously?

People like to run, I get it. My dad gets a kick out of it. But I don't think that running has ever appealed to me. Why would anyone like to run, unless they were being chased by a bear or something? I'm open to it though. We're going to run three days a week, and in time I'm sure I'll be ready for a 2k or a 3k race.

I'm not sure what else is going on.


To do list:

1. Finish Final Draft of Senior Thesis.
2. Finish Obsidian Archeology paper
3. Finish Palestinian Refugee paper
4. Finish Book Review of John Hershey's Hiroshima
5. Start Iranian Revolution or Persian Gulf War? paper (topic is subject to change)

I've got enough on my plate right now.

Bass update #8

Bass Update #8

New tuners came in the mail today (pictured above in fuzzy cellphone photo). I was 99.9% sure they would fit the old tuner holes in the headstock... but I was wrong. I should have measured the diameter beforehand. eh. I'll have to widen the tuning peg holes by 1/8-1/16th an inch. No big deal, but it just goes to show how every step of the process can present unforeseen challenges. Sweet black tuners though. They match the ones on my 5 string bass, and they turn nice and slow... which is way better than the older tuners.

I wet sanded and shaped the epoxy on the neck which had cured. I probably could have left it as is, but I saw a few uneven spots around fret 18 or 19 along the edges. So I gave it a third and final thin coat... I'm wondering how thick this is getting. I'm going to have to shim the nut for sure.... and wait another 3 days for the epoxy to cure. Looks great though, clear as glass and the fretboard itself looks awesome underneath. I complained about the fretline color, but after applying the epoxy the color seems to match the maple just fine. 

I haven't done anything to the body yet. It's just sitting there. I'm going to sand it down or strip off the terrible stain. This thing could be playable by next week! 

Final Checklist:

1. Refinish the body
2. Reattach the neck
3. Install the bridge and remaining hardware
4. Rewire the electronics
5. Install strings

breakfast

I ate a banana and a poptart for breakfast.