Friday, December 25, 2009

Christmas Fun

So for Christmas I made portraits for mi familia as their presents. It was lots of fun and lots of work. I'm glad I got to work early on them, but even with that extra early start, I was scrambling at the last minute. I'm glad to know I still procrastinate, even though I'm out of school.

Derek

Josie

Sunshine

Gma and Gpa

Mom and Dad

Zac, Penny and Henry

Kerry and I

Aaaaand finally, Matt. (We call him uncle Fester)

Monday, December 07, 2009

December?

How is it December already? I've been absent recently because of a film that I was working on called MOOZ-lum. It was a lot of work but a lot of fun. I had no life, but now I do. The other day I went to the Shadow Art Fair and one of the booths was a guy doing portraits of people and it was a 'name your own price' kind of thing. I got him to agree to exchanging a portrait for a portrait, so I did his portrait.

It's pretty silly. I love it.

Friday, October 16, 2009

Drawrings

Here are a couple of drawings that I did recently.


Obviously I'm caught up in the 'Where the Wild Things Are' craze. I'm going to go see the movie sometime this weekend. I'll get back to you whether it's as good as the trailer makes it look.

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

London

The end of May rolled around and since my Irish work visa was only for 5 months, I had to leave the country by the 30th and come back in to the country as a tourist. Complicated as it was, it was the perfect opportunity for me to take a fun little romp through another country. I decided to go to London because I found tickets through Ryan Air for only 2 euro. How could I pass that up? So I started out my little excursion in London. I went to the British Museum, which is awesome by the way, then met up with a friend, took a tour of Westminster Abbey, walked on the Thames, and went to the Tate Modern. I had a really great time, very different from the last time that I was in London, for one, I actually went INSIDE buildings.

Oustide the British Museum


In the British Museum's Hall of Knowledge. So many cool things.


The Rosetta Stone


This is a clock


I met up with a friend and he took me to Brixton, where apparently 'Electric Avenue' is. The song is based on this area of London.


It's hard not to find an Irish pub. This was about a 5 minute walk from my hostel. Right near Kings Cross Station (yes Harry Potter).


This is the 24 hour diner that Briana and I stayed in two years ago waiting for the train station to open. We didn't have a place to stay that night, obviously.


The London Eye


This is like the Viking tour of Dublin that Allison and I took when she came to visit. It's an amphibious vehicle from WWII.


Big Ben, double decker bus, pretty buildings, it must be London.


Walking down the Thames I found this statue that had a plaque saying that the holes along the wall and statues were from a bomb exploding on the street nearby in WWI.


The British sure do love to steal from other cultures. An Egyptian obelisk? Really?


The Thames


Inside the Tate Modern


The Globe Theater where the Royal Shakespeare Company's housed

You Know You've Thought It

Random thoughts from the minds of... well, everyone. You know you've thought about some of these at some point in your life.

-I wish Google Maps had an "Avoid Ghetto" routing option.

-More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can't wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that's not only better, but also more directly involves me.

-Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.

-I don't understand the purpose of the line, "I don't need to drink to have fun." Great, no one does. But why start a fire with flint and sticks when they've invented the lighter?

-Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you're going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

-That's enough, Nickelback.

-I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

-Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the "people you may know" feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

-Do you remember when you were a kid, playing Nintendo and it wouldn't work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically fix the problem. Every kid in America did that, but how did we all know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards or FAQ's. We just figured it out. Today's kids are soft.

-There is a great need for sarcasm font.

-Sometimes, I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realize I had no idea what the f was going on when I first saw it.

-I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I'm still the only one who really, really gets it.

-How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

-I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

- I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

-The only time I look forward to a red light is when I'm trying to finish a text.

- A recent study has shown that playing beer pong contributes to the spread of mono and the flu. Yeah, if you suck at it.

- LOL has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say".

- I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

- Answering the same letter three times or more in a row on a Scantron test is absolutely petrifying.

- Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart", all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

- How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

- I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up to prevent a dick from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

- Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in' examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies"

-What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

- While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it...thanks Mario Kart.

- MapQuest really needs to start their directions on #5. Pretty sure I know how to get out of my neighborhood.

- Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

- I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

-Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

-I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

- Bad decisions make good stories

-Whenever I'm Facebook stalking someone and I find out that their profile is public I feel like a kid on Christmas morning who just got the Red Ryder BB gun that I always wanted. 546 pictures? Don't mind if I do!

- Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

-If Carmen San Diego and Waldo ever got together, their offspring would probably just be completely invisible.

-Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be a problem....

-You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

-Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don't want to have to restart my collection.

-There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

-I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

- "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means I will never wash this ever.

-I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't watching this. It's only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

-I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone and run away?

- I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

-When I meet a new girl, I'm terrified of mentioning something she hasn't already told me but that I have learned from some light internet stalking.

-I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it's on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

-Why is a school zone 20 mph? That seems like the optimal cruising speed for pedophiles...

- As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

-Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

-It should probably be called Unplanned Parenthood.

-I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

-Even if I knew your social security number, I wouldn't know what do to with it.

-Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey - but I'd bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time...

-My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day "Dad what would happen if you ran over a ninja?" How the hell do I respond to that?

-It really pisses me off when I want to read a story on CNN.com and the link takes me to a video instead of text.

-I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

-I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

-I disagree with Kay Jewelers. I would bet on any given Friday or Saturday night more kisses begin with Miller Lites than Kay.

Friday, August 07, 2009

Wild

I swear I'll get around to posting more photos from the rest of my trip on here soon. But for now...

Wednesday, July 01, 2009

.Best.Thing.Ever.


Thank you to Meesh for showing me this excellent video. HILARIOUS!

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

The Burren Adventure

So I know I got really bad at posting on here while I was in Ireland, but now that I'm home and not doing anything, I figured I had the time to finally do it.

There was one week where Danny, Meg and I decided to rent a car and head out west to the Burren for a quiet vacation from Howth. It was getting a bit stressful with everything at work and our house so it was much needed. We went to relax with Danny's family and take a few short road trips around the Burren. Including to Ballyvaughan, Monks, Fanore (so I could get some sand from a beach that I had promised my sister), and to the Burren Perfumery. Now I had never been to the perfumery before, but had experienced some of the delightful scents from some of the shops around Ballyvaughan. It is a really gorgeous place, and smells great as well. It's also extremely peaceful. I wish I could go back right now. Anyways, I do have some photos from the trip.

Meg, Danny and me in the Burren on a soft day.


My favorite sign in Ballyvaughan.


I love the skies in the West.


Joe and Danny in the pub.


Danny in front of our cute little rental car. We stopped on the side of the road to take fun photos. Just because.


The view of the Burren from Danny's parents' house. It's so pretty with the sun.


Jump!


JUMP!


Mmmm yummy Burren pizza.


The Perfumery
During the slide show we decided to play. This is Meg and I attempting to capture the badger.


There was a cute, but ironically very stinky dog in the perfumery... with all the shampoos, and good smelling things.


Danny and Meg in the gardens. Very cute.


Meg and I in the gardens.


I love these shoes. I want some.

I really miss the Burren. And Ireland. And Dublin. And everything, I'm ready to go back please and thank you.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

A Nice Little Holiday

Another visit from a friend from home. Allison, someone I used to work with back at Telefund, came to visit me as my last visitor. I probably did the best showing her around town and Ireland of all the visits (even my parents). It probably has something to do with the fact that I had a lot of practice with Jamie and then my parents. She got in on a Saturday, left on the next Friday and we did enough things to fit into three weeks. We did all the typical things like the Guinness Storehouse, the Hop On Hop Off bus tour around the city, and ate fish and chips with a bit of Guinness on the side. Duh, things you HAVE to do if you come to Dublin.

In addition to those fun adventures we took a trip out west. We booked a hostel for one night in Galway City and took a day trip to the Aran Islands. For how many times I've been to Galway, I never stayed over night. So it was fun and new for me as well as Allison. We went for a walk around the city when we first got there and then at night we went out to a local pub that had traditional Irish music. Galway, and the west for that matter, is known for the music. The weather was in our favor as well, surprisingly enough. That never happens on the west coast because you're right on the Atlantic so the winds bring bad weather quickly, but just as quickly take them away again. We saw a few rainbows (no leprechauns or pots of gold though). On our second day there we took the ferry out to Inis Mór which is the largest of the Aran Islands. Again this was something that I had never done so it was new for both me and Allison. We were only there for a few hours and did a short little bus tour and a bit of a hike up to see an old stone fort. It was excellent weather again and we had a great time. I can't even explain how pretty it was, but I do have some photos (obviously).

The River Corrib.


Allison walking down Quay Street.


Allison jumping under the Spanish Arch.


Me jumping in Eyre Square.


A fun shop front.


Allison and I in front of the River Corrib.


The name of the stone for that we hiked up to on Inis Mór.


Me and Allison in front of the fort.


The cliffs on the Island.


I laid down on the edge of the cliff and looked down. This is what I saw.


I'm so glad Allison was able to visit. I think she had a great time, I know I did.