_________________
Sunday
28February99
7:19 pm
I can't believe it has been so long since I have written! I went to
the city both Friday and Saturday night to film for my documentary on
strippers. Friday night I was very chicken, which is unusual for
me, since I usually don't care about making a fool out of myself.
Anyway, we were there too late to do interviews. So we (Matthew and I) set out early yesterday, only
to discover that many streets were closed for the Chinese New Year parade.
It took over an hour to find parking. But I did manage to
film a door girl and two dancers, and I am very excited because the
footage is wonderful! Of course, making a three minute film for
class will be difficult, so Matthew says to think of it as a trailer for
the longer piece which I intend to make. One of the girls loved the
idea of making a day-in-the-life film about her, so if I wanted to make a
feature length film, I would know where to turn. I was absolutely
high last night, because there was such a high chance that I wouldn't get
to interview a single stripper and I got two!
8:53 pm
I had intended to work on my honors thesis this afternoon but I ended up
getting involved in making a journal / sketch book (on paper no less) for
my digital video class. I enjoyed making collages and looking up
useful links. I found a lot of video and broadcast glossaries,
which I will have to make a little page of links for...
I am always busy, even when I am relaxing. I cannot help but
make things all the time. Current projects include making a small
web movie of footage I shot inside of my camera obscura for my time class.
_________________
Friday
26February99
10:27 am
I finally managed to scan the portion of my entry for 3Feb99. I am at work in a facility I have not
worked in two semesters. I miss working with someone else; this is
nice. I am sleepy. My man had
two midterms yesterday, so the alarm went off at six so that he could study. Today we also woke up
early so that he could do his homework, which
is due today, that he didn't do because he was studying.
11:11 am
I am in dire need of a nap, because I will be going to the city tonight to film a
documentary I am doing about strippers. I am hopeful that I can get a stripper or two to
open up to me and answer some personal questions, but the real score will
be if I can get permission to film inside of a club. I have lots of
confidence that I can get most anyone to let me film them. The only
one who has turned me down is an old man who works in the parking lot next
to where I live. I asked him if I could make a documentary about
him and he said no, he tries to keep a low profile. Of course I
came up with dozens of reasons why he is creepy [did somebody say child
molester?] and therefore uncomfortable being on camera. But other
than him, it has been my experience that everybody wants to be a movie
star.
11:24 am
A guy named Justin came as a guest
lecturer to our Digital Storytelling class.
He was great -- really enthousiastic and a self-described spaz.
He was wearing electric blue pants, a yellow button down shirt and
a bright red blazer. The primary thing was totally working, but
then he had on bright orange shoes, and a 70's tie with several blues and
browns. Needless to say, it was quite the ensemble. I don't
read other people's diaries, but in hearing Justin talk about his writing,
I decided that as of today I would make more of an effort to play with the
format of my diary.
I just looked at the lost of online diaries registered with Open Pages and there are 751 to date. That
is a lot of people putting themselves out there, and I am sure each one
does it for their own reason.
11:45 am
So rather than just changing today's entry, I took this whole month out of
the table (which made it take forever to load anyway), and maybe I'll just
change the look every month. I have been making a lot of my
computer generated art lately, as well as sound clips, and I have to look
into printing and figure out how to best present my work. I love
having a cd burner!
12:30 pm
I was looking for the dancing Jesus page (which I still haven't found) and
I came across a
guy's site [he has to be a guy] with a ridiculously immature and
juvenile image of an iconographic guy peeing on Bill Gate's head.
It was really adolescent, but I found it to be so funny! I
also loved his link to J. Crow.
1:13 pm
I make things whenever I have nothing better to do. This collage is
the cover of one of my zip disks. All of the images are from Victoria's Secret. Matthew finds it odd that I like fragmenting
women so much. Perhaps I have been conditioned to do so by so many
years of film. When I think of
entering the corporate world, I always like the idea of working for
Victoria's Secret on their
webpages. I think I would enjoy the job, because the site has
such a strong visual component, but is centered around providing
information. I think in most cases, above all else, web pages
should be informational. The internet, of course, was provided to
give information...
_________________
Thursday
25February99
We had a guest lecturer in my Digital Storytelling
class, who I will write about tomorrow. For now I am going to
try to clean my room.
_________________
Wednesday
24February99
2:15 pm
I am getting some work done before class from 3-6. I feel good
because I am growing this semester, and learning a lot...
_________________
Tuesday
23February99
I arranged for one of my professors
to meet my boyfriend today. In addition,
I had an oral presentation in my digital
storytelling class (which got moved to next week) and my art piece due.
I was stressed to the max, but now I have some time to breathe.
_________________
Monday
22February99
10:04 am
Today will be a busy one. I have a presentation for digital storytelling and my time art piece
due. There will be lots of running around, and I am also hoping
to have an opportunity to film some footage for a documentary...
_________________
Sunday
21February99
8:54 am
It has been an interesting weekend. I got in a huge fight with Him Friday night, got rather drunk, and went to
a bar (in that order). I flirted with a ton of people, and told
most everyone that I had just broken up with my boyfriend of a year and a
half [I think I was trying to convince myself, because I always knew we
could work things out]. I had a blast, mostly due to heavy
intoxication [it's nice to live one block from 3 bars]. Then I came
home and hear loud music in my neighbors' apartment, so I hung out there
for a while. When I had to go to the bathroom, and learned that
they didn't have any toilet paper [boys!], I decided to make the long haul
across the hall to my apartment.
I still didn't want to go to sleep, so I pointed the digital video camera
in my direction and managed to record a 15 minute monologue of me very
drunk, recounting the events of the evening. I love the rawness of
the footage, and I am thinking of presenting it in my time class as a
perfect moment, but I don't know if I can get over my profound
embarassment of some of the things I say. I have never experienced
myself that unmediated before.
7:15 pm
I know I used to direct when I was little. I was always making up
plays, and recruiting my brother's friends to be in them -- for which he
will probably never forgive me. My plays always had commercials, in
which I would advertise some household item that I could get my hands on.
But I never realized what a prevalent part of my life this was.
Reflecting now on my decision to become a film major -- which I had
decided on before I applied to college -- it seems so natural. I
tokk a several year break from making movies in highschool, but I never
could escape my childhood passion. A while ago, I was home on break
to LA and I whipped out the old home movies my dad took of my bro and I
when we were little. One depicted a trip to my aunt's house in
Oregon. At some point in the trip, I got ahold of the camera and
filmed a movie. Obviously, I had no access to editing equipment, so
the whole thing had to be shot in sequence. It was a story about a
man (played by my brother, who must have been 4 or 5 at the time) who
stole my purse. I called the police and had a conversation with
them. Now it has always bothered me that people have such
unrealistic conversations in movies, where they just repeat everything
they are supposed to be hearing and such. Usually, they don't take
the time to listen to the person who is supposed to be on the other end...
And here I am as an 8-year-old having a perfectly realistic
conversation with no one, but you wuld believe I was talking to the
police. I was blown away. So I told my parents this week
that I had been thining about this movie, etc. and they were commenting on
how I was always directing my brother and friends and creating something.
Filmmaking must be in my blood. The only part of my theft
movie that is unbelievable is that when I am describing the culprit to the
police I say that he has blond hair and was wearing a blue shirt, but I
fail to mention that he is four feet tall.
8:40 pm
The Berkeley Gateway just went down, which means that we can't get
webpages, telnet sessions, or access to any machines outside of the
Berkeley network. I don't even know if people outside of Berkeley
can access this page, or if I can receive e-mail from outside Berkeley...
_________________
Saturday
20February99
Stayed up till 4 am last night, so I am not up for writing now...
_________________
Friday
19February99
12:17 pm
I made some more of my funky art last night. I met with one of my
supervisors today to try to work out my scheduling problems. I am
glad to be getting over my illness. I am going to go check out a
digital video camera now and I will spend the afternoon installing my
firewire card. I have a lot to do this weekend.
9:34 pm
My boyfriend and I had a major fight tonight (in a restaurant, no less); I
think it was our fifth one so far. We fight so infrequently and so
differently. I have always fought to win -- to hurt the other
person. He fights to make things better, but underneath this
self-righteous guise, he is usually very nasty. He pulls out other
incidents and uses them to attack me; no sane person would think half the
things he says are productive. I always call him on it, and he
always squirms out of explaining himself. Tonight was especially
bad, because I saw a fight coming. I warned him, and he got angry
at the way I said it. My attempt to avoid a fight triggered a
fight.
My greatest feeling right now is the profound shock that I feel like I
could break up with him relatively easily. When we had been dating
for several months, we had our first fight, and I told Cindy [my roommate] that I thought I could
walk away from Him without looking back.
Now that we have been dating for nearly a year and a half, I still
have that feeling. I am open to the notion that this feeling is a
defense mechanism, or that I am being dishonest with myself, or deluding
myself. But the sensation persists. Perhaps I have been
preparing myself to leave him this summer too well... I do not know
how to describe the feeling of freedom this notion of a clean break gives
me. Am I a nasty person for having a feeling of independence when I
know I should be trying to work things out? It would be nice to be
single... [She bites her lip and thinks of going to a bar for the first
time as a free woman.]
_________________
Thursday
18February99
12:28 am
Ok, now I am up past my bedtime. The daqueri leftovers in the
blender are going to be a pain to deal with tommorow, but I cannot
motivate to go to the kitchen. My bed is calling...
3:59 pm
I will be so happy when this day is done. I have been running
around being a super-forgetful lady all day.
_________________
Wednesday
17February99
6:18 pm
I had one of those crazy run around days. My video-8 camera died on
me, so that I couldn't transfer my tape to VHS. I was going a bit
mad, and trying to film my digital video project at the same time...
I will be happy to go home and sit on my butt.
11:55 pm
I sat around and made myself a strawberry banana daqueri (although I am
sure I am missing some of the ingredients) and made some computer
generated art. Digital
paint is a powerful tool, and I had fun with it. Here are some
of my creations:
click here for full size image
click here for full size image
click here for full size image
_________________
Tuesday
16February99
Names that I have for my boyfriend
- Medium Rare
- Medium
- Meaty
- Meatzer
- Meatzer Steak Boy
- Stink Bomb
- Stinkweed
- Spaz Boy
- Spazarina
- Groucherina
- Grouchasaurus
- Tukas Toucher
- Tushy Monster
- Adjuster Boy
- Pizza
- Pizzaria
- Pizza Pie
- Peach Pie
- Peach
- Pie
_________________
Monday
15February99
President's Day
12:58 pm
Happy VD! Valentine's Day came and went with little ado. I
am enjoying the lazy weekend, fresh made bruccetta and home cooked French
onion soup. I am making a camera obscura.
_________________
Friday
12February99
11:30 am
I feel funny. I am on cold medicine, and it makes my perception of
everything a little slow. A girl asked me to take her sub, and now
it's not posted, and I am not sure if someone took it or she cancelled it,
thinking I wasn't going to do what I said. I really don't
understand how people think sometimes.
_________________
Thursday
11February99
12:08 pm
I have been very sick. This made me upset, and I finally figured
out why. People who don't get sick very often learn to feel
invested in their health. I beleieve I am healthy so often because
I take such good care of myself. Thus, getting sick means that I
messed up, and is thus upsetting. I think I got sick because I
allowed myself to get stressed out. I am happy to be on the road to
recovery.
_________________
Sunday
7February99
6:20 pm
One of my co-workers sent e-mail to the staff saying he was leaving the
facilities (as it is customary to do), and referred to his webpage, which is a plain
account of his long term depression. His need to explain himself
publicly, via the web, is much like my need to keep a diary.
Nothing is as bad if it is shared. Of course, now my life is great,
and so my diary is boring, but I much prefer this to the other way around.
I really enjoy everyday that I spend with my boyfriend (which is
everyday). He referred to me as his girlfriend on the phone to
someone today, and I later remarked that it still sounded funny to hear
him say that (he almost never calls me that). He said the term was
innadequate -- I am his life. He meant it. We exercise our
minds together, debating wheater or not one can accidentally lie and
imagining surfing or waterskiing in a river. I wanted my diary to
be a place where I would record all of my bizarre thoughts for the day,
but I share so many of them with him, and then don't think them again.
[Such as, why did we decided to adjust time acording to region
(such that day is light and night is dark) but not the months according to
the seasons (such that December would always fall in winter). We
would then have month zones in addition to time zones.]
_________________
Saturday
6February99
12:14 am
I just saw Elizabeth and it was spectacular. There is
something so refreshing about a good movie.
4:34 pm
I am enjoying one of the more boring shifts of my career as a computer
consultant. I have tried to divert myself, but now I am full of
ennui. I hate feeling unispired, because that makes me feel
helpless...
4:39 pm
I like the graphic I made for Thursday's entry. I love doing
graphic design, and thus I should be doing it more often, but something
about spicing up a diary with graphics seems a little hokey to me.
I have to be really sure everything is in good taste.
4:43 pm
My boyfirend is such a cute peach pie. He went out in the rain and
got me food because we were hungry, and I can't leave while I'm on shift.
I am looking forward to Valentine's Day because I am a cheesy
romantic at heart.
_________________
Friday
5February99
8:22 am
Once again I was not able to sleep in. This is starting to piss me
off. I need to get more rest!
11:43 am
I had lost my voice when I woke up this morning, but I kept on using it
and now it is almost back to normal. My prof e-mailed me that I
could do my honors thesis with her, which is very exciting, but also
scares me quite a bit. My man came over this morning with tears in
his eyes. he had slept through his alarm and thus was unable to get
his homework done. I was happy to be able to comfort him, but I
hope doing homework at the last minute is not a recurring action, so that
problems like this can be avoided. I hate to see someone I care
about sad; in fact, I hate to see anyone upset.
_________________
Thursday
4February99
|
11:37 am
My teacher is out sick, so both of my classes today are cancelled.
I just met another cousin online, though this one if on my mom's side of
the family. I will be doing genealogical research and work work (as
opposed to school work) all day.
4:19 pm
I went to a Digital Storytelling
class and think I am going to join, although that puts me at 5
classes. And I am supposed to be slacking this semester.
9:09 pm
I am probably silly for thinking so, and even sillier for admitting to it,
but I find the speech-to-text software on Macintoshes to be fascinating.
I spent a small portion of the evening playing with it, after
having installed OS 8.5.1 on my machine. I hope to incorportate it
into one of my digital videos for the semester.
|
|
_________________
Wednesday
3February99
9:17 am
What I find amusing about my genealogical research is that my family is
not especially supportive of the idea, and some people are downright
unhelpful, but everyone is interested if the information is regarding
their specific parents or grandparents. One relative said she had
no information for me, and then asked for me to send her all the
information about her parents, even though I know she has some information
she could share with me. E-mail has been a wonderful medium for
sharing info, and I have been sending letters all over the country, but I
really want to drive around the states meeting people and sitting down
face-to-face with them to get information.
I had a long talk with my Aunt Martha yesterday. I was
explaining to her how uncomfortable I was feeling about my grandfather
planning to die, and she said this was a good thing, and when people
wanted to stop being here they should. I understood, but at 21,
life is everything.
I have an assignment due tomorrow for my digital filmmaking class in
which I have to storyboard an alternative outcome to an event in my life.
I cannot think of anything I would like to change.
Everything had to happen just as it was so that I could be here now.
4:44 pm
I am very excited because I came up with an idea for my digi video class.
I know what event I want to have an alternate outcome. Now I
have to storyboard it, and I am not a very good artist without digital
aids. This will be interesting! I am excited...
_________________
Tuesday
2February99
12:19 pm
My grandfather is doing that cleaning-out-the-house-before-he-dies thing.
It is really hard for me, and I don't know how to deal with it.
He sent me all sorts of obituaries, and documents that I wanted for
my family tree research. He even sent me his driver's license from
1937, printed on cloth (it cost him a quarter). Kids have a hard
time when their parents and grandparents want to plan wills and such -- at
least I know my brother and I do.
_________________
Monday
1February99
10:32 am
I took a sub so that I could work a few more hours this week. I
have been thinking about quitting this job and focusing on my other,
which pays more. I enjoy working, but I really would like to have a
good chunk of free time this semester, seeing as how this is my last
semester of my undergraduate career. i was having an e-mail
conversation with my friend Adam in LA on Saturday. He was talking
about missing the college lifestyle: staying up till 3 am and then
skipping classes the next day. I'm too anal to skip classes, and I
already have two jobs, so I don't think going to the working world will be
such a big change for me. I work hard and I play hard, and I have
recently realized that I have little tolerance for people who only do one
or the other.
10:50 am
I just came across a fantastic page. I selected for the page to be
displayed in English, and the resulting page said: "Sorry, this Web prezentation of English is
remake. See you later."
