Unproductivity

I just discovered that my writing tablet (or perhaps the stylus) has stopped working, so I had to haul out pen and paper for my annual drawing post. Then I discovered that I don't have any blank paper so I had to make do with cardboard, and then I discovered that I don't have any decent pens. At least it's still better than those very first MS Paint moments of my comic? Somewhat?

literally verbatim (one of those words is probably redundant)

Actually, I've been living in a slum of broken down electronics for quite some time, so it wasn't much of a surprise about the tablet. More of a gd... why is everything I own crap moment.

Despite being the legitimately best thing I've ever owned, my computer is very dated at this point and chugs away like a steam engine winding down its speed for an upcoming station stop. Add to that my "high speed lite"—which I honestly think my ISP is making liter day by day—and it's either impossible or frustrating to try to do any of my computer-related hobbies these days. It's like the old days of dial-up, but without the beautifully moving song of the handshake (no sarcasm. I'm nostalgic like that).

Most distressingly, my Zoom H4N spontaneously and thoroughly died due to a known bug death (you could call it a "feature") when I ejected it from my computer a couple months ago. I'm not sure it's worth sending it to the company to fix, which is apparently the only option. This means I can't do any more YouTubing until I get new equipment, which I was planning to do anyway because I've been wanting to do some vocals as well. But then I've also been stuck in the middle of a couple transcriptions for about a year, lacking the motivation to move forward in them. And what's the point of posting them anyway?

So then I had an ubi sunt moment. You know what I'm talking about: that how did it come to this kind of feeling. (Btw, if you didn't know, ubi sunt is a poetic device that basically communicates "where did the golden past go, and why is everything ruined forever?" Théoden knows how it's done.) Maybe studying elegiac Anglo Saxon poetry laid that tragic foundation in me. More likely it was a long process of myriad contributing factors. None of it makes particularly good drawing fodder, but if it ever does, I promise I'll start posting more.

drawings only nominally from the library

I finally got around to uploading a new batch of drawings, but I also created a Facebook page (cmon, be a fan!) that now has all recent drawings (recent = starting February 2007). For the archives, you still have to trawl through the drawings website.

The whole MA essay thing is shaping itself up rather nicely, and things are no longer in the hypothetical, will-think-about-looking-into-it stage. So, I'm now working through all kinds of books on virtuality and animality. Pretty slow going, since I've always hidden from theory. I'm sure it must be possible to write theory books in an accessible manner... the point almost seems to thoroughly muddify an already obfuscated concept. I'm a bit at a loss about how to start searching for serious work on digital animals; delicious.com is pretty much my hero.

No summer should really go by without some sort of birthday rant. In addition to New Year's Resolutions Hypotheticals every year, I usually make a sort of Birthday Resolutions. Things that I hope to have accomplished by the time I'm 25, or 26, or whatever. Things like, you know, it would be nice to not be in the exact same spot come next year. This past birthday cycle turned out to not yield any accomplishments whatsoever X( Oh yeah, something about someone's birthday, somewhat recently. My birthday has historically been a lowpoint in my year, like the time I didn't see or hear a single human during the whole day. Or the time I turned 18 while sleeping on a metal slab in a pig barn with a bunch of Frenchmen in Quebec (only days before I was abandoned at the airport after my plane had already departed). Or the time I turned 21 on the last day of counselling at camp (during which time a teenager inadvertently stomped on my ribs and I couldn't stand up straight for a month afterward) and the liquor stores weren't open so we got me a handful of Red Bulls for the staff party, and then I had to keep pulling over on the way home to nap because they made me so drowsy. Great birthday memories... Anyway, Birthday Resolutions 2009 include a good deal of composing, as well as finally becoming Master of Arts (I will of course refer to myself as Magister Artium).