When everyday is the same, what is interesting?

I have been waiting for a check for a long time from client 1. I think, like anything, it takes a long time to get the first one out, and needing this money BAD, I am not going to give up on this. But man, waiting for money is hard, and even then, there is so much to do. I applied for unemployment today. relatively painless, and very fast. But I don't think I am going to be getting anything. The way that system is set up right now is not going to work in this current situation (shitty) that we are in now. Talk about all the options, I'm interviewing for unemployment at the same time I am applying for a job at Condé Nast. Good news is that I made $240 this weekend on a fashion show. I got some Plyboo laser cut. its really amazing how nice that stuff cuts.  I get the ply at www.bettencourtwood.com and I get things laser cut at www.nydesigns.org. ask for Mike.

The constellation is moving along, It looks like I might do the bulk of the soldering myself, I have to see if the numbers work out for making these things. I went to talk to the NYSBC in brooklyn on tues, and my man JM de Jesús gave me a lot of resources. the #1 on my list. the group of library sciences masters and PHD candidates up in albany who you can ask research questions. I fired of my first list today, its a full sheet of questions. I cannot understate how amped I am at having those types of people helping me, even if they are anonymous.

I think next week is going to be time to start asking for money, jsut a couple thousand here and there to keep me going. even in the downturn, there are people who have money, and this round its going to be the just to pay some expenses to keep me going.

What is a company overview?

How do you explain to other people that the company that you are starting is basically  physical manifestation of yourself? How do you tell your investors that you have been told for ever and ever that you are not supposed to litter, that salmon are dying because of you, and that driving your car around is something you should think about? Am I ahead of the curve? Are kids just starting to learn this now? Perhaps its because I got a paid education. But fuck that.

Ostensibly, you write a business plan because you want people to give you money, and in return, after a couple years, you are going to give them their money back. But are they giving you money because they are looking for a good investment? what is a "good" investment? Because I want them to get their money too, but that is not at the top of the list. That is probably third in a triple bottom line. 1. giving back to the communty, 2. Don't mess up the environment, 3. Make money.

How do you explain that to people? Perhaps the people who I am asking for money will have similar goals or perspectives. I think I need to search for those people...

Being in DC 1.18-1.21

Being in DC during this time, both MLK and Inauguration is pretty amazing. Like the Election itself, I think there will be some time tomorrow where I will just feel overwhelmed.

There is so much emphasis on his blackness but for me it is not his blackness as much as his upbringing, his community activism, his struggles with identity, and his struggle to fit in. These are the things that draw me closer and closer to his story. Of course I identify with many things in the black community - and the black community has suffered the most and the longest out of any of the colored communities -  but it is the sense that he has had to cobble together his own life, and community, from disparate and often far flung parts which really brings it together. It is a testament to his mother, that she was such an interesting person. You can tell when he talks about different things, or when I watch his choices, you can tell that each word that he speaks holds volumes of information behind it. A lifetime of nuaced observations inform him. He has spent a life trying to fit in, be in a group. He was lucky to grow up in Hawaii, where there is almost complete tolerance for people of all types. Perhaps it was on this small island where he was free to examine who exactly he wanted to identify with. Perhaps if he had gone to school in a big mainland city, he would have spent his whole childhood trying to decide between white or black, probably coming out oreo. (esp. with a white mom, shout out to Bryan.)

I get the same feeling about his cabinet, people all seem to think that he has set up his cabinet for failure, bringing all sorts of people together to work, who may but heads, but in the same way that he has had to cobble together his own life I think he expects his staff to work it out as well. I think most of these people will fall in line when they realize that they are expected to tough it out and perform.  That is, in a sense what forms the core of my personal connection to him. Observe, understand, synthesize, edit. This has been his whole life.

The strangeness of it all.

It strange starting a company, especially one where there the product is so expensive. On one hand, I am expecting to get a big check for the first order. On the other hand, I signed up for public assistance today. That's right, food stamps. How are these two things part of my life? how is it that I am seemingly riding high, and asking for handouts? I feel like there are a lot of people, and designers who could be in this place.

After food stamps, three offices in two seperate locations, I went to see Wilsey Wolf over at Greenhouse over on Atlantic. She was super excited to get one and show it. She says that business has been good, and the word has been getting out. So I feel like its a good Brooklyn home for the Constellation.

I went to a thing at DWR last night. It was called Product placement. We saw some interesting work in textiles, and wall coverings. Some times I don't really know how the people presenting get chosen, but they are interesting, and the come from a range of experience and experiences, and I ran into my friend Scully who I have been half heartly working to get in touch with. I am going to apply for the next one, "Sustainable."

Finally, I talked to my Dad for about 30 min today. He's helping with bookkeeping for S1k, and he had a lot of good things to say about dealing with money.

I'm still looking for a job, but S1k is riding high today.

Test post, this is how I email the world.

I find that Gmail is taking over my world.
If I can text my calender to remind me of things to do, or email this
blog to post, so there can be a record of what I am looking for. Does
another person need to spill their guts online?

When you write, you write about yourself.

Don't tell me that I don't get introspective. I introspect all the fucking time. Perhaps I only talk about it when I am depressed. Maybe I journal, diary, only when I want to see my depression on the page. Hey, its better then Luis, he takes pictures of himself when he is really sad. I want to see those pictures, they sound like they would be really fun to look at, if I wasn't sad.

I also don't have a good memory. What kinds of shit do I need to remember? I remember my birthday, I remember what I have to do tomorrow, mostly. But what draws people to write about things? Who fucking knows. But if reading this, you will hear about how depressed I am right now, and if I only write when I feel depressed, Then this is going to be one sad ass blog, and not sad in not updated, and measly, and anemic, but sad like: shoot me, please.

How do you know when you are a good writer? when other people tell you that you are a good writer? Most of the people who know if you are a good writer are being flooded with requests from people that need to get told they are a good writer. and want to get paid.

I want to get paid.

But here, I just want to write about things that happen to me, specifically things that make me depressed. Being a positive person, I think I feel like I never want to dwell on things that make me depressed, but where are those stories when you need them? How do I get myself to remember what stories I have, which I can tell to the people reading this nonsense, which will spark interest in a way that I find interesting, which makes some sort of interest loop?

I think the best writers are people who sensationalize everyday life. Its easy to go to the ends of the earth, and then talk about things that your friends have never seen, but what about all the things that people see all the time, and make those things interesting? Let's try. Here are the things that were interesting in my day today:

Waking up early, is starting to be something I lust after. I want to be able to, have to wake up early and go to work. I want to be able to pay bills on time. This morning I did both by waking up early and writing an invoice. later they told me that I had charged them too much, and now they weren't gonna pay me after this one. I understand. They are the ones asking for all the research.

I went to work, I forgot my red ruler. its nice because it has a center measure. its also long and makes people get out of the way because I walk around with a huge red ruler, which says, "hey, I'm a big ruler which will hurt when I jam into your nuts, or crotch or whatever."

I wore my new patagonia hat today, I love this thing, but it makes my ears hurt. The plum trim makes the whole thing worth it.

People are continuing to get depressed about the economy. I figure I need to be making things for Walmart at this point. Maybe I should sell lights at Walmart, maybe I should have taken that job over at that boring place, but man that place was not sexy.

Things that are interesting to me today...
I saw this girl in black leggings and black glasses, sexy.
I like the construction lifts at the place we were working.
I wish my computer would start working again.
I got my Tizio lamp back, found on the street, $80 of repair.
Made some new lampshades, when you are depressed, making things is a good way to feel successful.
Fried chicken soup didnt really fill me up.


Goodnight.

Back, japan, drunk

Someone told me before I left, that coming back to NYC from Tokyo, was like coming back to a third world country. So true. There is a certain, unavoidable comparison that happens when you travel between cities of comparable size or spectre. There is also a bizarre acclimatization that can happen. For instance, NYC to Hong Kong. Crazy, but not that crazy. Chinese city to Tokyo? You can only stand in amazement at the difference a couple hundred miles can make.

This is the first time I have really thought about the possibilites of living in a different city. There is something that is now so familiar about the NYC way of life. The way you order a bagel at the deli, the endless restaurants which offer a skirt steak, a roast chicken, a fish, a pasta, 4 salads, and some brucetta.

Japan is an island of painful exactitudes. I don't really know where all of the precision came from, there must be some sort of paradigm set in the momoyama, or asaksa, or edo period or one of those, when they started to just be more accurate than anyone else in the world. Its pretty ridiculous. I got these two earthenware cups from my mom. By my standards, they are about the same size, and are a set in my mind. They came in individual boxes, which were about 5mm different in width.

When I walked around in Japan, from Tokyo to the smallest town, I kinda walked around awestruck. Especially as someone who has spent the last couple years learning about how things go together, how they are made, and what it takes to make an object. Its not even that they have this intense pride for what they do, or make or what ever. It's not even a question. Electrical lines are strung with a huge amount of parts, there are fittings for sliding doors, manholes, street cars, just seem to make more sense.

One of the weirdest things to me, and I tried to explain this to some people, who were not in design, and they looked at me funny. But especially after studying Taxis, convincing the public to do things in a certain way is impressive.

Anyway, here goes. In every city I have been in before that has a subway, the subway has stairs. The subway stairs are divided for rush hour, into the up lane and the down lane. The stairs are generally 50% up, and 50 down. These percentages, I assume, come from wanting equal amounts of space for people to move. In Tokyo, its %30 down, 70 up. Someone watching people go up and down these stairs, realized that people going down the stairs go way faster. So in fact, the same number of people are going in both directions. People going up the stairs need more time and space.

I'm not sure why this is so genius to me, except to say that no stone is left unexamined. It reminds me a lot of Denmark, or vice versa in the sense that the planning is so well done, that there is no reason to buck the system.

Opposite to this carefully measured stairway is the Chinese roadway, where there is no center line at all. There are almost no road markings on a Chinese road, no crosswalks, no signs, in larger cities there are traffic lights, but in small towns, people are lucky when there is a curb. There are people walking, bicycles tricycles, battery powered tricycles, electric scooters, scooters, minibuses, buses, tour buses, taxis, scooter taxis, tractors (articulated engine exposed), trucks of all sizes, and everyone drives slow enough that you just pass people when you need to, you drive where there is space, and crossing this street is a very tricky proposition, especially at night. There is this level of common sense that pervades the people and the culture that encourages them to do what works in the absence of higher authority. There has been much scholarship, which I have not read, but a lot of discussion on why the Chinese accept communism as a government, and one of the conclusions is that the Chinese government has always been very big and bureaucratic.

There is a level of tenacity which the Chinese have, that the Japanese seem to have lost. Perhaps it is in some part due to the scarcity that is China.

This survival instinct that pervades China, has been replaced in Japan by what seems to be an endless childhood. Ola thought that the warning signs departments in Japan were either a room full of 1st graders, or aimed at 1st graders. From high voltage warnings, to dog poo signs, to drowning warnings, they all seem to be signs which are ready to be animated into the next pokémon movie. When you look at them, you start to understand better, what Murakami is talking about. You might even think that he designed all of them. This cuteness is perhaps what has infantilized the whole country.

I have to say that I drank a lot of whisky in Japan, and I spent a lot of time looking at the ice they put in my drink. In a certain way, This ice, is one of the ways I characterize Japan. You have never seen ice cubes, so large, irregular, and so PERFECTLY clear in your life. its like a small water clear iceberg was dropped into your glass. If I drank whisky 7 night in ten nights of Japan, I spent 7 nights trying to get a good picture of this ice. I don't know how they do it, but I went to have some nice cocktails with Silvia last night, and while the drinks were nice, the ice was incomparable. This is why Japan will always be at the forefront of aesthetic things in this world. They take the time to figure out how to make something as pedestrian as ice, PERFECT.

Just remember, in Japan, the sound of trickling water makes silence more silent.