ok ok POSTING already

Yeah... popular demand. Out of fear for life and limb. From sheer boredom, maybe.
This month's post is actually a rant in disguise. Not a very good disguise mind you... bit like one of those blokes you see wearing groucho glasses and a pink nose lurking in corners at halloween parties. You know you got to stop staring but can't and then you're trapped in lame conversation about potatoes and their impact on our existance...
Ok. Wrong rant. Here's the right one:
Why Do Uneducated People Bitch About Kiddie Stuff???
Visit this link and you'll get some of my irritation. I mean there are people out there who watch kids tv with the sole intention of tearing into it. Does this not seem pointless to them? I mean who cares if there is a purple dino singing songs? Or a grown guy in a green rugby shirt acting like an ass to make a bunch of kids laugh? Welcome to the joys of The Remote Control! Change the stupid channel you brain dead progeny of a one eyed ptarmigan! Who's forcing you to watch television aimed at and designed for 3 year olds?
And it ticks me off more when these same bright sparks claim Calvin as their icon. Come on you dolts! Calvin will watch ANYTHING! The oatmeal offering to the idiot box ring any bells? Yeesh. Get some fresh air. Read a book once in a while. Oh, and watch some BBC or MTV or something. Four important letters to blokes who spend their afternoons in front of NickJr... ESPN!
Don't get me wrong... You want baby stuff and sing along cos you have a cold and are miserable? Sure, watch some kiddie cartoon. There are really well made ones. Good production. Good animation.
But then don't crib.
It's like eating Farex and complaining its not crunchy and spicy. Or wearing diapers instead of boxers.
Or maybe that's exactly what they do...

Then again, the early worm gets eaten....

Actual conversation overheard from the cubicle next door:

Girl (who has been talking movies non-stop): "...so she totally rocked. Who was that woman in "Passion of Christ?"
Guy1 : "Mary"
Guy2 : "VIRGIN Mary, mother f***er"

Love that last sentence....
I love working here!
Should remember that at 7:30am when it's pouring outside....

P.S.

Just incase any of you haven't seen this before... It's a short film of an alien singing from the portfolio of Victor Navone. He' now a senior animator at Pixar, but this was his early stuff. Once again I lust after the software... Sigh! :)

Where are your ears? ------------ [Johnny Storm to the Thing]

Right...
So finally watched it! Laughed myself silly! Totally madcap version that is as true to the comics that any superhero movie can be. I confess to always having a slight thing for the Human Torch. (Yes, yes, the peanut gallery are having a field day with the pun-ability of THAT statement.) And I think that the casting was actually really good. Very nice timepass after having spent another saturday at office. The effects were really really good. Invisible woman is so cleanly CGId... What I would give to spend a day playing with that kind of software.

Once a Month

Yep. That's my blogging average. Why try to hide the fact that I am not a journal person? Also I always end up with a lot to say until I actually get my fingers on the keyboard... I then experience this sudden blankness of the mind. Sorta Zen actually. Maybe I should meditate in front of the screen radiation while listening to the CPU's soothing white noise. Add coffee and ministry of sound on i-tunes. Aaaaaah. Bliss.
There are people who comfort eat. And those who go on crying jags. I comfort listen. Music is a mood thing with me. That's why when people ask me, "what do you listen to?" I never have an answer. It's not that neat. So I say vague things like, "bit of rock, jazz, trance, house, some country, some classical stuff..." and watch as their eyes glaze over and they write me off as a flake or a fake.
It's the same with books. Reading is reflex. A habit like gravity or breathing. How does one package that neatly and tie a pretty bow on top?
Not that I don't have dislikes... Sidney Sheldon, Dean Koontz, Korn, A.C., Danielle Steele... All stuff that I will not willingly spend time on. There are authors/artists that I do not take to.
So lets say varied taste rather than lack of discrimination and leave it at that.
And if that whole thing sounded bitter put it down to being fed up of making polite to a bunch of foriegn models for two weeks and lets forget it happened, ok? The cloud side of an art director's silver lined life...

These boots are made for RUNNING!

New shoes, new shoes, yeah yeah! I just went to the nasty mall with the parents... Hate malls, hate shopping, hate shopping on Saturdays and hate shopping with parents! But today was worth the noise and crowds and irritation because I got New Shoes! At last... Silver Pumas... The silver linings on my day! Excellent Muaha, excellent muhahaha!
Was at work all morning and in hell (ie Garuda Mall) all afternoon so the pent up need for a life is spilling into cyber space via keyboard and blog.
Seen new Jessica Simpson video and also Paris Hilton ad... Why all these women think that washing cars is sexy is beyond me. All the fellas in the house, feel free to explain.
Actually life exists if I choose to seize it. I have semi plans for party tonight although don't know if I will go. New shoes to wear... hmmm.

Let me OFF!

I'm taking a sanity break from work...
It's past 12 midnight and I still got a kiosk, two posters and a bunch of packaging designs to complete. My life is currently non-existant!
But I truly hope it's a temporary thing as I don't know how long I can hang on to this super fast spinning world with these short nails.
I wonder if that is why high power exec type women always have those long talons that they paint to match costumes. All the better to hold onto my dear!
The bad news: I'm going to be here a looong time. The good news: I got good music to listen to.
Ah the beauty of silver lining searches!
That said I guess I better get back to the design thing. This short break had better end while 'short' is still applicable.
Consider this an "I'm Alive" post. Even if the truth is "just barely".

hmmm... Great voice, this Alex Band.

The important thing about adventures, thought Mr Bunnsy,
was that they shouldn't be so long as to make you miss mealtimes.
-- (Terry Pratchett, The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodent


Pretending to work while listening to music and browsing the net.... Ah life in the high powered ad world!
All of life is an adventure if you want it to be. And since good adventures revolve around mealtimes and sleep anyway, it's nice to have them. It's so weird when I think of all those people out there who get "Bored". I never seem to be bored. If I have no work, I have places to go things to see, or even places to just sit still and listen to nothing and everything. Birds, cars, breeze in the street. Or the snatches of conversation that drift past.
It's so interesting to watch strangers walk down the street. What are they thinking? What are their dreams? What did they have for lunch? Or I could just watch the trees. Or the cars. Interesting patterns...
Desperate Housewives is going to be airing soon. And I can't really connect. I feel compassion for that level of soul sucking boredom and ennui, but I don't truly understand it. Like depression. The kind of slit-your-own-wrist trigger pulling depression that teens are supposed to be prey to was never something I touched. I'm doomed to be eternally content. And that sounds so fat cat...

Sporadic

What on earth does 'deepest blue' indicate? I mean it sounds really evocative and arty but then so does 'shallow violet'... and how come so many people name songs after colours?
Coldplay - Yellow,
Deepest Blue - Deepest Blue,
Savage Garden - Violet,
U2 - Lemon,
The Echos - Baby Blue,
REM - Electron Blue,
Aerosmith - Pink,
Led Zeppelin - Tangerine
Prince (the artist formerly known as Prince, who is currently known as Prince.) - Cream
The stranglers - Golden Brown....
And these are just the titles that I remember that don't have any quantitative explanation for the colour... Lady in Red, Paint it Black, Purple Rain, Behind Blue Eyes.... So many more.
The connect between what you see and what you hear.
I wonder whether it is an intentional trick...
"I never hide my thoughts from you, You're my deepest blue"
Aaah, the un-communicatable depth of feeling...


P.S. Added some wallpapers. :)

Ramblings

It's weird how long you can know somebody without knowing important things about them... Today my Granddad told us a story. Like all his stories it started as a random disconnect; a red herring that led somewhere totally different. He told us about how a ship exploded in the Bombay docks in 1944. And how his friend, a second officer in the merchant navy took a vessel, with only one other officer on board, out of the docks between the first and the second explosions. He described the destruction and then he delivered the kicker. There were gold bricks on board. And some of them flew a mile or more, driven by the power of the explosions.
Essentially, in April 1944, the ship "Fort Stikine" was unloading a cargo of dried fish and cotton bales (highly inflammable), timber, gun powder, ammunition (yeeesh!), and gold bars from London (gold, to stabilize the Indian Rupee, which was in trouble due to the Second World War and fear of invasion from Japan. This ofcourse took my Granddad a further ten minutes to explain...). The gold bullion was valued at approx. two million Pounds Sterling at that time. Nobody knows how the fire started but the two explosions which followed were so loud that windows shattered 8 miles away in Dadar. The destruction in the docks and surrounding area was immense and several hundred dock workers were killed. Gold bars were found in about a mile radius at sporadic intervals as late as 1976! And I had never ever heard this story before... The basic one, yeah, as history of Bombay. But the friend? Or the flying gold? Never before.
He does this my Granddad. Suddenly tells us something that hasn't occured to him in 23 years.
Like the time he told us why he doesn't eat ice cream...
It was my Mom's birthday. My grandfather has never eaten icecream but we always offer it to him anyway. Just incase. And that day he said yes. And told us the history of his dislike. And then had a second helping.
My grandfather has an engineering degree. After his stint in the army during WW2, he worked for the Scindia Steam Navigation Company. He has been on and set men to repair most of India's early battle ships. And he has had other curious assignments...
One day an oven blew up in the Brittania biscuit factory. It had to be replaced and the problem had to be figured out and fixed. It took my grandfather and his crew nearly a week. 5 days spent during the height of Bombay's summer in a poky room that reeked of vanilla. He never could stand the smell again. It took him nearly 50 years to be able to look at any icecream again becuse to him they all smelled of vanilla!

"For the safety of puppies and Christmas..."

- Spike, season 5 BTVS

Hello readers! Or lack thereof...
I'm heroically sitting indoors and working....
It's raining outside. Huge brilliant drops that make fantastic impact patterns on the tar and concrete. The red brake lights of cars are reflected a million times over, creating a glow that lingers on the edge of your vision. It all looks like a fantastic picture from a photography magazine... Light and shadow, watery reflections playing catch with each other.
But I miss the trees. Miss the fill-your-lungs smell of wet mud. Miss the rustling sound that leaves make as rain hits them. Miss the squelch of grass under my feet.
Nearly five years of being mainly a city girl, but I'll never shake the craving for a high rock to stand on and feel the wind in my face...
City rain is a poor substitute. The Elvis impersonator. All the glitter and shine, but none of the charm.

Wallpaper Much?

So... Posting an new link... Anybody wants to see my wallpaper of the day? Check out the new link... I guess I'll update it when I change it every morning. They're designed depending on mood and are therefore varied in both content and seriousness. And actually that is is my one truly laid back design time. Early morning sipping coffee and waiting for the day's joblist. And I now find that there is a small section of co-workers who come check out my screen everyday. I'll get somebody loafing up saying "show me your screen" anywhere after 11am or so... Odd considering that this is the one thing I do all day that is for me and me alone. No client. No servicing. And no "hey, I'm sorry, but could you make the logo bigger."

23 things I want to do before I die...

Go snorkeling.
Watch the entire Lord of the Rings Trilogy at a single sitting.
Stand at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
Learn to cook Wasabe.
Die my hair blue.
Learn to juggle.
Lose 4 kilos.
Buy myself a Lava Lamp.
Write something that I actually want someone to read.
Paraglide.
Drive a Porche.
Make a perfect bowl of popcorn.
Paint stars on the ceiling.
Clean my room and keep it that way for more than two days.
Own all the Granny Weatherwax Pratchetts.
Adopt.
Visit Delphi.
Learn to read character from handwriting.
Not send a single SMS for 24 hours.
Read an entire Fantasy series in chronological order without discovering half way through book 7 that there is no way that I can keep the plot in order anymore.
Swim in the Pacific.
Make smores.
Make that 6 kilos....

We have take off...

Right, so this is the first. And since today is already nearly half way through I can no longer remember why this seemed like such a dire necessity at seven this morning. That early deep blue gloom now resides with all things unremembered and unmissed. Three cups of coffee and a roll of mint have fantastic curative powers! Some vague feeling of existential angst triggered a need to be heard that mere individual email could not assuage. Hence the mail to the universe all set out in cyber space... Look at me: Here I am, a scintilla of humanity tossed around by fate... into a shower by eight am and in front of a computer screen by 9:30. Bland white eMac, why do I love you so much?