Pieces of October

Text goes here.

Nah, I should really throw a quick something to go with the images.

I put a stop to the whole “condensation” series because I no longer had to catch up. Only took me four posts and fifty-five photos to tell all that’s happened since the end of July and until the end of September. I hope I don’t lose track again, or at least not two months’ worth of track.

As is usual with the world, the Christmas ads came early. Not as early as July, as I think has been the case in the past, but starting this current month. October 31st is yet another day for us, as things such as Halloween and Samhain are generally not observed here, so all businesses go straight for the December holiday offers.

My nephew started school yesterday (Tuesday). Well, pre-school. Not sure what level he might fall into, as he is just one year of age. The point is that, with his being at that place for most of the day, not as many schedule adjustments are required in order to take care of him, and I get a bit more alone time, which is good. It’s good because it’s only when I’m alone that I feel like cleaning up (which I did the Sunday before last) or doing a bit of work and I’ll be able to do some things until college starts up again.

Speaking of college, it seems as though I just have to assume that my monograph request will be accepted and I’ll only be informed of anything if there’s something wrong with the request. I was told last month that I should call to check the status of my request and they said that they were still getting those and had not yet begun going through them. At the bottom of the form I had to fill, it says that a list of accepted requests will be published on the web site, so I’m checking it almost every day.

What else goes here … okay. To save me a bit of time, I’ve added most of the web sites that I check every day into Google Reader. I only had a handful of those before but, now that they’re all there and that I can see the number of unread articles, I realize how much time I wasted by visiting them separately, even when there was nothing new. Serious waste.

As I mentioned before, I cleaned up a bit. I was alone in the apartment, and my brother had organized his side of the closet (yeah, we share the room), so I decided to do my part and tidy up my site of the bookshelf. My mother came home as soon as I was about to start, so I gave up on it. She had brought this iced coffee thing that I hadn’t tried before and, besides being incredibly delicious (Droopy liked it, too), it seemed to have given me enough energy and motivation to clean up … one quarter of my side of the bookshelf. Surprisingly, that’s all it took to fill up that huge garbage bag. It was so full of old college work –drawings, paintings, illustrations, even old notebooks that I had recycled from school– that I had no use for that I couldn’t even tie it closed.

In addition to that, I’ve also begun deleting things from the computer’s hard drive. Not random things, because I’ve not gone crazy (yet), but I’m getting rid of things I’ve downloaded over the years and are just gathering digital dust. It’s surprising how much unnecessary junk has accumulated without me caring much, and how I don’t miss them once they’re gone (since I didn’t notice them much, anyway). One can never have enough free hard drive space, and …

Wait, I said I would write a quick something. How little do I know about the “quick somethings” that I write, after more than a hundred posts.

Here are some photographic highlights of my October.

That’s the end of October’s posts, I think, and it also happens to be the end of my photo folder, as that last image is also the newest one worth showing.

I don’t expect much else to happen for the remainder of the month, so I decided to publish this now and continue to sleep through what’s left of it.

Perhaps November will bring along something interesting …

Condensation, part one

I let a week go by.

More than a week. And the potential entries in this journal of mine just kept piling up. In an attempt to relieve this issue, I’ll just throw everything in a few posts, and I’ll keep things brief. This is the condensed version of the last two months or so.

Be ready, reader(s). El muchos blogos postos here … probably.

So, flash back to Thursday, July 30th (imagine the screen going blurry and everything turning black and white).

I got back from that short visit and just in time for class. Before that visit was made (or paid), I had printed some work for the “degree seminar” class. Every week, the teacher would explain to us what we should bring the following one, and it would all add up to a thesis. In this case, not a full thesis, but the point is that we learn how such a thing is done, and we prove that we can do one by ourselves by providing him with an almost-finished thesis.

For this particular class … I have no idea what I brought. I know that the teacher wasn’t there yet and that, despite the rainless trip I had just taken part in, it had rained a little. One of my classmates kept asking why I was snapping pictures of the railing. I recall answering something to the effect of “because I like it”. I showed her the result of that railing, covered with water drops from the short-lived rainfall, and she answered “Ooooookay” with that you’re-a-strange-person tone. I didn’t mind at this point, and kept pressing the shutter to make some good images for you people of my last few weeks of actual college class-taking.

For the following week, I had a ton of work to do. An exaggeration, of course, but to a lazy person like me, any amount of work is a ton. I didn’t touch the camera at all during the week, and there’s little to illustrate (so the images you see are from that Thursday). All I can remember is that I actually cared a little about the work I had to do. For the final budget class, I had to create the launch the career of a musician. Not an actual musician, but one of my classmates, who didn’t mind the teacher using him as the subject of our final project.

I wrote a quick description of what his music styles would be, created four tables spread over the same amount of pages, where I detailed advertising budgets for radio and television, as well as banners, T.V. show appearances and small concerts. I sort of … came up with the prices for everything, based on what I had seen all throughout my college career. In the end, I only used about 75% of the budget the teacher had given us, but I think it’s for the best to not leave the artist completely broke. All this work was quickly printed and delivered on a Tuesday (at this point, it’s finally August). There was only a handful of students left at the end of the term, whereas it had been a full classroom, and the largest group the teacher had had so far, on the first day. Numbers kill, I guess, but this was such an easy class that I should blame the mass withdrawal on scheduling issues and not on difficulty.

That was it. I was done with one class, out of three. I had printed what would be the final thesis on that same day, also before the class … or was it after? The point is, I printed it. It had to be printed as early as possible, so I could inform the other two in the group about how much it cost. I had paid most of the prints throughout the term, but I just didn’t care and remained fair in splitting the cost for the final print. One of the two others in the group was in the budget class, so told her how much she had to bring after doing some math. The other, I was able to contact online.

Wednesday came and went, and I did little for the design class. After Thursday, I would have a whole week to do all that was left. One thing, though, is that the teacher told us that the final work had to be hardbound like a fancy yearbook. Only a few of us were told of this, and just as we left the classroom.

Then … there was Thursday. The teacher wasn’t there when I got to the classroom, and my group was incomplete. The teacher had said that we would have to present and defend our work as we would with a real thesis, but that’s not how it turned out. He approached each group, flipped through the pages and gave some comments. When my group was finally complete, we agreed to be the last ones, as we weren’t in a rush.

Some people weren’t able to print their work on time, and the teacher had to look at the work in a laptop. “How irresponsible”, I thought. When our turn came, the classroom was very empty. He looked through our work, commented on a few things that would have to be changed if it were a real thesis, and proceeded to grade it …

85.

Eighty-five. Ninety points or higher would’ve meant an A. But that’s not how it ends. As for most of the other groups, the teacher gave us a chance to correct things, which would bring the grade to 90. I was extremely tired, but my group-mates stared at me for a few seconds when the teacher said it. I had no choice but to say “Yeah, sure, we could do that”. Thankfully, I wouldn’t have to print it all over again, and I would only have to deliver it in a CD, before the following Thursday.

As I don’t have the best luck, I knew it would be bad to wait until Wednesday to deliver the revised form of this semi-thesis. So, I completely forgot about graphic design and spent the better part of the weekend fixing things, here and there. I did get plenty of rest on Friday and most of Saturday. Otherwise, I’d have passed out just from staring at the word processor.

I burned the revised work on two CDs,  in case my bad luck should strike, and printed a quick label with our names on it, and our subject (acceptance of graphic design in politics, etc.). I didn’t have class on Mondays, but I wanted to deliver the stuff as early as humanly possible. This was the third class that I had taken with the same teacher (the first being in 2006) and, while the guy is nice, I didn’t want there to be a fourth time.

Knowing that it would be one of the last chances of being in college during the day, at least for a while, I took my camera, batteries well-charged. After heading straight for the where Social Studies department was, and leaving the CD (where it was placed with some others, apparently for the same teacher), I headed for the exit … and turned back not long after. I was there, and I had the camera. Why not?

So, I went to the little round plaza with stone benches that was nearby and began my photo-day. At one point, I noticed a girl who I had known from school. She didn’t recognize me this time, but her friend pointed at me in a way that meant “Look at that guy … what is he doing?”. Once again, I didn’t mind, and continued to walk around, my right index finger always on the shutter button.

I went to where the Coffee Store once was, and were people I know (somewhat) usually hang out. There hasn’t been a Coffee Store in a long while (now it’s an Orange cell phone thing, and people have to get their caffeine fix at the cafeteria), but it’s comfortable to sit at the tables that have been placed there, under the shade of the trees. It’s not so comfortable when it rains, though.

Few people were left when I was there. This was the final week, and only the least fortunate had to attend. I photographed my surroundings, including a bird’s nest at the top of a tree trunk, right at the point where it splits into branches. Despite taking a couple dozen pictures of it, none of them are good for showing. Too bad.

No one asked why I was photographing things. They hadn’t seen me doing this before, but it seemed like something normal to them. A guy taking pictures of his shoe, of a bird’s nest and empty tables? Completely normal. Right. I even let one of the guys use the camera for a bit. This isn’t school, so I didn’t have to worry about people breaking things they borrow from me. Or, at least, not as much as back then.

After a while, and after a quick walk to the parking area to get the photo I forgot to make that one time (I had to take advantage of it being empty, and I think it turned out well), I figured it was time for me to go. At this point, my friend Johan was there, finishing a photography thing. I’ve known him for ten years now, since sixth grade, but it’s only when high school kicked in that I was able to befriend him and others. He’s at the beginning stage of the graphic design career, after deciding that computer science (or whatever it was) wasn’t for him. I always brag about being farther ahead and he’ll always jokingly say something like “Damn you!” or “Shut up!”. Fun times.

Anyway, he had that photography thing to finish. He was participating in an exhibit of photographic work, and he had to scan some negatives. I had never seen a negative scanner in action, and had seldom been to the remodeled photography studio/classroom (my luck at work), so I joined him. The remodeled studio is twice as big as the original one, after being merged with the classroom next to it. This took place while I was taking the last two of the three photography classes, and so I never got to make use of this new space, or sit at the fancy classroom with the projector. Instead, I only got to see the old, smelly dark room, which is gone now (it became my Graphic Design 8 classroom).

The film scanner was a flatbed one, but at much higher resolution than the one we’ve got at home. The girl who was working the scanner couldn’t find the right settings so the scanned result wouldn’t look so bright and faded. Shortly after, the scanner began to behave … strangely. The result was had dark stripes that went across it in a Beetlejuice sort of way. We began joking that Johan’s negatives had broken the scanner and he would have to buy a new one.

Because the scanner didn’t work, Johan had to go somewhere else to get his negatives scanned. As that “somewhere else” was on my way home, we walked up until that evil corner where many cars have crashed. I was walking at a fast pace, because it was very cloudy and I didn’t want to be in a literal under-the-weather situation because of my photo-making. Besides, I had a ton of work to do for the graphic design class, and there was no little time to waste. So, I said goodbye and tried not to get hit by oncoming traffic as I crossed. Traffic lights? No one pays attention to that these days.

I got home and … this post is almost past the two-thousand-word mark. Pretty much an essay. I guess I was right in putting a warning at the beginning, reader(s). If you made all the way to here, congratulations. A winner is you.

I guess I should cut this short right about … now. Just crossed the mark.

A long day

While my mind is still partially occupied with the subject of the previous post (I can blame all the news and music sites/channels for it, can’t I?), I’m barely close to the halfway point of this five-day weekend. Yep. Another one. So, here’s the first half, or maybe one third, of the photos from June 5th’s awesome great long, annoying blackout.

The power went out around 9:30 in the morning. As I generally don’t wake up at such an hour, especially on an off day (no college on Fridays!), those first few hours didn’t bother me much. As our backup power doesn’t last very long unless we turn everything off, I couldn’t do much of anything. So, I grabbed the old camera. After a few shots of my bedroom window, and having nothing else to do, I got bored and went up to the roof to capture the view.

After making several photos of the view and things I found interesting on the top of this old building, I went downstairs again and photographed the patio (again). I was so very bored that day.

Once I got enough photos, I sat in the living room, waiting patiently for the power to come back, as I did the last time. The power company was supposedly fixing some things ever since the morning (“fixing something” is usually their excuse for the longer outages) and they said the power would be back by 5:30 or so, but at that time, something went wrong. Very wrong.

Slowly, the day turned into night.

Things done during a power outage

So, entering the actual month of June … this is why I should (never again) allow for journaling material to pile up. I’ve figured out a way to tell it all rather quickly. And it’s for the best interest of both this blog and my patience that I be hasty with this, seeing as this month didn’t start as well as it could have, given how May was nice … in comparison.

June 1st brings about the beginning of the Atlantic hurricane season, but it also brought along a string of power outages, and a couple of significant blackouts. And the month isn’t over yet, so, while a 27-hour blackout may be hard to top, I consider that the power company is up to the challenge of leaving us two whole days without electricity. This post isn’t about that blackout in particular (which happened on the 5th), but a power outage that took place on the 1st, and one that is very short in comparison.

It was a Monday, so I didn’t have to go to class or do anything at all. Our backup power (inverter and batteries) runs out rather quickly, so there’s not much I can do at home during an outage. Wanting to take advantage of the fact that I really, truly had nothing else to do, I grabbed the camera and began snapping away. I’ve been having some problems with it, as it’s not always metering as well as it used to, resulting in overexposed (too bright!) or underexposed (too dark!) photos. It doesn’t always happen, but I have yet to figure out what’s wrong with it.

While Leoni took care of my nephew, I was going back and forth between the living room and the patio, and everything in between. After some photos, I got tired and decided to capture something different. I went out through the back exit to the area behind the main stairwell and the stairwell that leads to the roof, and pointed up at the visible sky. Some good shots were made, but aren’t shown here (that will be on a later post). I eventually got tired, having fulfilled my daily quota of photography, and sat down on the couch.

The power finally came back at around 6:00 p.m., and that was the end of … that. Little did I know that something of the same nature, but much worse, was going to happen just later in the week. Check back later for that one.

Rust, dust and pancakes

So, my camera didn’t die, after all.

Is it completely fixed? I just don’t know. My father had the bright idea (no sarcasm) of putting the camera in the oven and presto!, even the flash works again. It’s overexposing some photos with it, so it’s a good thing that I avoid it.

Now, college … while the What Goes Up poster thing has brought me joy, college adds far more weight to the other side of the scale.

Three classes a week. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. I can’t decide which of the three classes is the least exciting, and I don’t know how well I’m doing in any of them, as I have done so little since this term began that it seems I’m just going there to wait until it’s time to come home. The lack of excitement in college scares me a little, because I might be getting a sample of what might be the rest of my life if I don’t work hard for what I really want.

The finish line. Graduation. Diploma. They’re so very close, calendar-wise, but the days are endless. The weekends are supposedly long, but they seem to fly by without me doing anything. That Blender idea I had earlier in the week has faded away. Not completely, but I’ve only got a vague image of what I originally wanted to do. That’s what I get for not sketching last Saturday, when I woke up early thinking about it, and spent the better part of the day picturing the final render.

I don’t know whether to go for a thesis next term, or wait until January to do a monograph (which is apparently much easier, but I’d have to wait). We’re being taught how to make a thesis in that seminar class, sure, but it seems there’s quite a lot of research and formality involved. And research, in this country where so much of it is forgotten or seemingly thrown away, doesn’t really spark my interest. I wonder if one does a thesis for a degree in animation? That’s gotta be fun.

Anyway, weekend has finally come for me. I was given the assignment of designing the signage for the Plaza del Conservatorio. Yes, that place. It was I who picked it, actually, because this assignment is for next week and other choices were much farther than I’d like to go. I probably won’t have to go anywhere, though, as I know the place well, and I’ve got more than enough photos to create a virtual tour of the place (hopefully that won’t be an assignment).

While college has been rather disappointing thus far since the term began, and while I’ve been thinking that I haven’t actually done anything worth any points, I hope to finish this one with decent grades. I just want to be done with it! I also have to do a couple of additional courses elsewhere, in order to complete sixty hours of “professional aptitude” needed for graduation. I’ve got about twenty of them covered by that encounter from last year and some free talks that I’ve attended. I was hoping I’d cover the remaining hours doing free stuff, but they’re too few and far between. Older students (those who entered before the 2004 changes) don’t have to do this, so it’s relatively new annoyance.

Again, the weekend is ahead of me. It should be better than the last one, given that I kickstarted it with a nice pancake dinner. I also made pancakes a couple of nights ago, but I had to use honey instead of syrup (thinking that it had been thrown away), but it didn’t taste bad. I reminded me a bit of honey biscuits. Just a while later, my brother found an unopened bottle of syrup that I had been searching for. Argh!

So, I gave pancakes another try. Now, the I Can’t Believe It’s Not Maple syrup may have expired in 2008 (that’s why I thought they threw it away), but I didn’t mind. Being unopened and all, and being full of preservatives, it doesn’t seem to be affected by time. It could probably stay “fresh” for much longer. I should buy a bottle and throw it in a time capsule to see how long it will last.

Okay, enough randomness from me. I’ve got a weekend to sleep through of work to think about. Enjoy some virtual pancakes:

And enjoy your weekend, whenever it may start for you.