Sometimes certain pictures just make me want to lay type all over them. This is one.

Sometimes I just want to wander back to the coast of Washington and spend the day there wrapped in a wool blanket thinking "isn't this nice?".

Listen to the title track of Disco Inferno's latest, it's refreshing.

So I successfully made cannolis at work tonight. I deep-fried a flower taco shell (wrapped around a metal handle), let it cool, then put a dab of white chocolate and caramel inside and continued to fill it with whipped cream. Afterwards I sprinkled cinnamon on top to give it that fancy French pastry look. And you know what? They were good. Real good. I made one for everyone who was working and even a few for people who weren't. I have too much fun at work sometimes.

A few small things you need to change the world:

+ Coffee
+ A Sharpie on your person at all times
+ An Inquisitive nature
+ An understandable authority over/resistance to "No Trespassing" signs
+ An attitude which allows you to say yes more often than no.
+ An understanding of human nature in general.
+ $20 cash
+ A friend or two.

I'm listening to Alphaville's "Forever Young" on repeat. It's played through about 5 times now. Believe it or not I find it to be a decent song, especially if you take it for face value and leave behind any preconceived thoughts about it.

School has started, obviously. Things have been a little hectic but still relatively manageable, which is nice. A lot of things have been going on recently, I'll go ahead and list a few of them:

+Creating a new logo for the STAND event flagler.
+Designing a flier for the Flagler literary review.
+Designing poster/mail out for Flagler's BFA program. commissioned heyyyyyy.
+Art show at Needful Thingz on October 2nd.
+Trying to create and sumbit a poster for this.
+President of AIGA Flagler Chapter.
+And the slew of other trivial things that compose the rest of every day life.

I've been feeling pretty creative recently, I've been creating a lot whenever I find myself with access to paper and writing utensils.

I've been contemplating a tattoo recently. I think I'll wait a few months and see if I still find the idea appealing. It would be the word "NOW." on just before the bend on my left forearm, in bold rockwell typeface. The idea behind the tattoo (I guess I could write a manifesto), is that the only thing that really matters is now. Right now. The idea of living in the moment with an element of urgency. Say you're waiting to approach someone or debating whether or not to do something. The ideology is to just do it. There's no better time than right now, and all the time you spend debating whether or not to do something is void in the long run (there are exceptions, of course). So many times I have told myself "Okay, I'm counting down from 10 and when I reach zero I'm going to _________". The blank could be approach a professor, walk into a doctors office, or tell someone something of significant importance. Why is that necessary, why swim in an ocean of doubt and postpone doing something you're nervous to do when you could just do it? There's no better time than the present, the immediate present.

Twenty-two years ago, in a previous millennium, a glowing entity drifted into the world from the eternal abyss. This entity was blinding, erasing every hint of a shadow on that early morning. This being, as it were, had a reputation that preceded its existence, a history of no history, folk lore and anecdotes which materialized from the mere excitement and anticipation of it's formation and embodiment. And when this blinding light reached it's apex in the Sunday sky, when at last the towns people stood transfixed and in awe of this brilliant oracle, it's creator stepped forward and exclaimed with a voice inescapable from all the cosmos the name of his wondrous creation: HILLER GIVENS GOODSPEED.

Why exactly is the handicapped logo used here? I mean, a little audio speaker is understandable, most everyone understands that, but the wheelchair man? What?

I never posted these links, I was on a real blog once!

Appearance #1

Appearance #2

I should post more pictures. People tend to read small paragraphs when they're attached to pictures. To be honest, if I came across my own blog I probably wouldn't read anything because their are no pictures. I hope you enjoyed looking at this pretty thing, c/o the internet. Thanks, internet! I now better understand the need for pictures, there will me more pictures in future posts.

I know there are dozens of you whom check this god-forsaken "blog" daily, perhaps even twice a day (or three), to only be filled with raging disappointment after discovering that it has once again not changed since the last time you checked it. Well hark! Rejoice! I am here to update! Summer is coming to an end, and while it hasn't been the most productive summer it's my last conventional one and therefore deserves some kind of recognition.

Most of the time I was in St. Augustine, interning for Hugh Holborn and riding bikes and frequenting bars with friends. I started dating a Lovely young woman, Beca Grimm, in early June and spent a good amount of time in Jacksonville before leaving on a month long expedition to the four corners of the America. On this trip I visited Seattle, Vancouver (BC), Portland, Arizona, and parts of Utah with my mother and sisters.
After catching my breath in Magic City for a couple days I ventured to New York City, Boston, Martha's Vineyard, and back to NYC. On this trip I saw and visited such comrades and Caitlin Goodspeed! Allison Pariani! Erin Barnett! Shane Morris! G-PA and G-Spice! Becky Ryan, Sarah, and Erin Ryan! And the ever-enchanting May Oskan! This trip proved to be exciting, mind-opening, and fruitful in more ways than one.
After returning to the south east I raced to North Florida and am presently, at this very moment, seated at Carmelo's in St. Augustine. In the store's little lounge, where I've been for nearly four hours, is one of the only relatively free/cozy/almost always empty lounges in St. Augustine and definitely one of the best places to hide from August.
Overall it's been a good summer. As I said before, I personally didn't get too much done and definitely spent a lot of time wasting time, but given the context of the town I live in and taking into consideration the unexplainable increase in gravity during summer months, it was as magical as it could have been.


Things will be back in full swing soon and I'm excited to be busy with personal and obligatory matters again. I may have a gallery space for November's art walk at Needful Things, I'm bringing things in soon to see if they'll give me dem thumbs up. I'll keep you posted.*

The sky is clearing up, I may return to the real world soon.


*While the pun in this sentence was recognized before it was typed, the author asks that the reader excuse him for including it.

Sweet and Low tastes like chemicals and will ruin whatever you put it in.

My relationship with the pool vacuum can only be described as a tireless battle with an alien constrictor.

Last night I had a dream I was traveling to Tallahassee. Jessica Sage came up to me and asked how I was getting there, after I told her I really wasn't sure she said "HOW ABOUT TAKING A MOORISH CASTLE?" As it turns out one was being transported (like older houses sometimes are) across the state (instead of a few miles). I was all for it and suggested we ride in the turrets. So we rode this giant moving castle across Florida. It was really one of the best dreams I've ever had.

The only thing worse than having money taken from your bedroom is having to suspect someone that you know and trust of having taken money from your bedroom. And since people don't usually admit thievery, I, in turn, get to somewhat more cynical of everyone that comes into my apartment. I mean, there's nowhere to directly place the blame so what choice to I have but to heighten my awareness and divide the trust I would have lost for one person into tiny fractions amoungst several?

I saw Animal Collective last night. Some pros and cons:

Cons:
-The sound quality was significantly low. This may have been due to the fact that we were in the loft, but still, venues should have control of this.
-Besides "Fireworks" and "Comfy in Nautica" (a Panda Bear song), only songs from their latest album were played. This isn't to say I don't enjoy the new album, I listen to it all the time, but I wanted to hear the songs that made me fall in love with them. Their repertoire of music is so vast and diverse that virtually playing only one album doesn't make sense. I know they're promoting what's new, but let's hear some Sung Tongs.
-Crowded as fuck. So many people, one of the most uncomfortably crowded shows I've seen. Firestone needs to re-evaluate their capacity, at least for concerts.

Pros:
-I spent the evening in the company of choice people and got to see my favie band preform live.


Okay, so maybe I just wanted to throw those cons out there more than anything else, but I don't mean to sound like I didn't have a good time. The show was great, they played well and with so much energy. I enjoyed watching them and what they played I received with upmost gratification. Aside from the rather unsurprising setlist and a couple venue conditions, it was a completely worthwhile night.

I'd be lying if I said that every time someone mentions Cape Town I didn't envision a city where everyone wears capes. All the time.

I'm pretty sure the rat, which I thought had left my apartment, is still living there. I began to think this when I saw it JUMP OUT THE WINDOW AND RUN ACROSS MY LAP.

The past week or so Amadeus and I have been spotting a small animal in and around our kitchen. We decided it was a mouse after one night it ran by Sarah and she told us it was definitely probably a mouse. At this point I "constructed" a trap which consisted of a rather large jar, a post-it note with peanut butter it on the bottom, and a cutting board ramp. I thought the mouse might climb up the cutting board, try to get at the PB, would falling and be waiting for me nonchalantly so I could take it outside and let it go. Apparently the mouse was too smart for that, he didn't even TRY to eat the peanut butter.

The next day, while preparing to make a sandwich, I discovered the mouse had started nibbling at our bread supply. There were only a few slices left, so it wasn't a big deal, but that creature ruined my lunch. At this point I started to invest a little more time into capturing the mouse.

Anyway, I went out and bought some small glue traps for it. I figured those were more humane and it wouldn't leave me with a mutilated body. I opted for the smaller mouse traps because they were cheaper and honestly I thought they were large enough. They weren't. I woke up the next morning and the trap AND the animal were missing. This means the trap kind of worked but kind of didn't work and left me feeling a little anxious because if the animal could have walked away with he trap attached to itself it means it's probably a rat.

So I spent about a good amount of time yesterday looking for a time capsule I buried in my back yard when I was 11 years old. Before I continue, I'll let you know it wasn't found. It's still in the ground somewhere. There were a couple things that made the search a little difficult, I'll list them in this list right here.

1. It could have been located anywhere within a 10 foot radius of the point from where I started digging. I only remembered the general location.
2. I forgot how deep I buried it.
3. The yard was burning my feet.
4. It was hot. Real hot.
3. DIGGING HOLES IS HARD. Have you ever tried to dig a big hole? Not fun. Even little holes can be difficult.

Maybe I'll muster up the energy to try again when it's cool out, but until then that time capsule can go fuck itself.

#5

A couple years ago I learned that my great grandmother died from burn wounds after her Mexican sun dress caught fire on a stove when she was cooking. Now and then I catch myself daydreaming, trying to imagine what it would have been like to have been in that kitchen. Half the time I create this memory which is kind of black and white with splotches of color and hazy (as memories (even if fabricated) often are). Everything moves in slow motion and has some kind of mesmerizing atheistic. Like a foreign film. And then the dream snaps to what it actually probably looked like, which must have been absolutely horrifying. Anyway, these romanticized and realistic versions both coexist stimutaneously in my mind and switch back and forth as if someone were flipping a switch in my brain. I don't really know what to think of it, but for the most part it gives me this sense of peace and tranquility which is odd considering I'm thinking of someone burning alive.