So far I've had a pretty fun and interesting summer. Some highlights:
Before she left for the summer Katie Danger and I went out to Fort Warren on George's Island in the Boston Harbor. We ran around exploring the caverns and passageways for a few hours.
One day Victoria and I went to the Boston Children's museum. We got badges certifying the fact that we were the creepy adults here without any kids... but other than some skeptical looks from parents, we had a great time. We climbed up this sweet suspension sculpture, put our whole body inside a bubble, made samurai helmets, rolled around in wheelchairs, learned about kinetic energy, construction, flight, camping, and chroma-key (green-screening). Plus we got in totally free. Way to go Victoria!
My first Walden visit of the season was foiled by the Lexington Police. We decided that the beach might be easier to pull off and drove to Nahant, only to be pulled over again. That cop was way cooler though and told us where to go that we wouldn't be caught. Unfortunately the ocean was absolutely arctic. And all of us were too wussy to go in. Oh wait, except for Katie Ball who walked straight in and went all the way under. We were all a little astounded at her nonchalant walk in-walk out. Also Katie and Bree had their "who's robot is better" dance off again and as-per-usual, Katie's was scary and Bree's was ridiculously bad.
Weekend before last I headed down to Washington DC for a Saturday morning freelance job at NPR National. I finished around 3 and headed back to my hotel in Northern Virginia and then went to dinner/goofed off with Katie Danger for a while in her home town. She kicked my butt in basketball and pool, though she won the latter mostly on account of my scratching the 8-Ball every time. Story of my life.
Sunday morning I drove down to Norfolk for my nephew's baptism. My sister's family was moving only a couple days later to Southern Utah, so it was good to spend a little time with my only family on the East coast before they left. Even though they were still a good 12 hours away from Boston, I'm gonna miss my sister and nieces/nephews. It was nice to have them out here.
It's been raining a lot more than it ought to during the summer so far, but expecting a little clearing last Saturday, we went to the beach. We were gonna head to horseneck, till we got delayed by moving David and by 1ish it wasn't worth driving 2 hours anymore, so Ben, Brian and I went to Nantasket. It was foggy and the tide was so high, the beach was just rocks. The wind coming off the water was cold, but the water itself was surprisingly nice. I went in for a half an hour or so to swim and boogie-board. Then we found a warmer spot with a little sand and played some frisbee. We stopped in Quincy for some Southshore beach-front food, and headed home. Ben and I then went to the studio to start recording our 8-song split together. It's a little weird, but I am glad I'm forcing myself to record my own music for once. I've owned a pro-recording system for 9-odd years now and this is the first time I've really done that. It's going pretty well. So far, I've played everything, including drums, and even Ben agrees it doesn't sound half-bad. Ben's stuff sounds great too.
The studio has been markedly more busy (with paid projects). I'm wrapping up Mike's EP (In which I became pretty heavily involved), and Ryan is working on a record with his friend Mandi. The biggest part of that though is a film project I've been working on for the last couple months, but I've also been working a lot less than I should. So now I'm playing catch up, having to finish several weeks worth of work on a much faster timetable. My procrastination skills have apparently not faded much since college. In college I could just b.s. my way through a test or essay though... The film will either sound good or sound not good.
This coming weekend will be my fourth Independence Day weekend in Boston. I love the 4th here. I'm convinced it's the best place in the world to be on America's birthday. K-Dub and Leah will be here too, which makes things even more awesome. And if that wasn't enough I'm going to the Red Sox game that afternoon. Having more fun than one should be able to on this schedule? Check.
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Saturday, June 06, 2009
I'm alive.
It's time for the obligatory...
"Hey, sorry I haven't blogged in like 8 months. I was just, you know living real life for a while and got sidetracked from what's really important... virtual life."
Followed by the...
"Let me try to give you a brief but informative summary of goings-on in my life during my prolonged blog absence."
1. My studio is sorta finished. (I'm convinced the "sorta" will always be there) But we record a lot more than we used to. People actually pay us, and drag our feet though we may, we finish people's projects. At the moment I'm (sound of feet dragging) finishing Mike's album and (sound-to-picture of feet dragging) doing foley on a feature film called Love on the Rocks. The first question people have when they hear you're working on a film is, "What kinda movie is it?" (a question filmmakers hate). I'd have to call it a dark-comedy. Meaning, in this case, that it starts really dark and ends really funny and it's kinda hard to tell where it changed over. It's a winner. It's being entered into Sundance, so hopefully it's a winner there too.
2. My church burned down. There's been a lot written about it online, but I've never really gotten to the point of recounting it in writing yet. It turned out to be an emotionally and physically exhausting experience for me, but it also helped me draw myself back toward the church more. Logistically it's actually given me a bit of a break. I'm a ward clerk, which usually occupies a huge amount of my time, but we've been waiting for a replacement computer for a while, so I haven't been quite as busy as usual. That honeymoon will so be over when we get one and have to count like 5 weeks of tithing and do a few months worth of membership work on one Sunday. The last couple of weeks we met at the First Church in Cambridge Congregational. They have been very warm and friendly to us and very kind to share their beautiful sanctuary. We just signed a lease at the Harvard Divinity School to use their chapel and adjoining facilities for a year while the Longfellow Park building is reconstructed. It will be immensely nice to get back to some kind of normalcy.
3. Work is work. I've had good weeks, I've had bad weeks, I've had weeks from hell. The lack of predictability in my shift is simply maddening sometimes. Fail to assert yourself and you'll be totally abused. I might have some NPR freelance coming up in DC which is always nice for a change.
4. I've been dating a lot of different people. Mostly just getting to know a lot of different girls out here I didn't know. There's one person I'd really like to be dating, but sometimes that just doesn't pan out (maybe it's a non-phase coherent stereo source). Stupid engineer's joke for Jason. Other than that I'm kinda crush-less at the moment. And increasingly ok with that.
5. Music is an increasing part of my life again. Well, the writing/making of it, that is. Having the studio has facilitated my creativity and I'm getting ready to officially record some of my own music for the first time. I have recorded myself before but it's never gotten past scratch tracking before I decide to scratch the idea completely. We'll see how it goes this time. My roommate Ben is gonna do it as a split with me 4 songs each, so that might help motivate me to finish it. As you might imagine, this increase of musicliness makes me happy, even though I write depressing music.
6. I realized my purpose in life is to love people. I'm good at it. And people's love is sometimes the only thing in this world that gets me by. I've been staving off my depression for weeks and feeling very close to being overwhelmed by it. I keep it at bay, in part, by loving people. My head was made for reasoning with people, my ears were made to listen to people, and my arms were made for hugging people. Pure and simple, I need people to care for. I'm glad to have that...
Geez, I need a girlfriend, huh?
"Hey, sorry I haven't blogged in like 8 months. I was just, you know living real life for a while and got sidetracked from what's really important... virtual life."
Followed by the...
"Let me try to give you a brief but informative summary of goings-on in my life during my prolonged blog absence."
1. My studio is sorta finished. (I'm convinced the "sorta" will always be there) But we record a lot more than we used to. People actually pay us, and drag our feet though we may, we finish people's projects. At the moment I'm (sound of feet dragging) finishing Mike's album and (sound-to-picture of feet dragging) doing foley on a feature film called Love on the Rocks. The first question people have when they hear you're working on a film is, "What kinda movie is it?" (a question filmmakers hate). I'd have to call it a dark-comedy. Meaning, in this case, that it starts really dark and ends really funny and it's kinda hard to tell where it changed over. It's a winner. It's being entered into Sundance, so hopefully it's a winner there too.
2. My church burned down. There's been a lot written about it online, but I've never really gotten to the point of recounting it in writing yet. It turned out to be an emotionally and physically exhausting experience for me, but it also helped me draw myself back toward the church more. Logistically it's actually given me a bit of a break. I'm a ward clerk, which usually occupies a huge amount of my time, but we've been waiting for a replacement computer for a while, so I haven't been quite as busy as usual. That honeymoon will so be over when we get one and have to count like 5 weeks of tithing and do a few months worth of membership work on one Sunday. The last couple of weeks we met at the First Church in Cambridge Congregational. They have been very warm and friendly to us and very kind to share their beautiful sanctuary. We just signed a lease at the Harvard Divinity School to use their chapel and adjoining facilities for a year while the Longfellow Park building is reconstructed. It will be immensely nice to get back to some kind of normalcy.
3. Work is work. I've had good weeks, I've had bad weeks, I've had weeks from hell. The lack of predictability in my shift is simply maddening sometimes. Fail to assert yourself and you'll be totally abused. I might have some NPR freelance coming up in DC which is always nice for a change.
4. I've been dating a lot of different people. Mostly just getting to know a lot of different girls out here I didn't know. There's one person I'd really like to be dating, but sometimes that just doesn't pan out (maybe it's a non-phase coherent stereo source). Stupid engineer's joke for Jason. Other than that I'm kinda crush-less at the moment. And increasingly ok with that.
5. Music is an increasing part of my life again. Well, the writing/making of it, that is. Having the studio has facilitated my creativity and I'm getting ready to officially record some of my own music for the first time. I have recorded myself before but it's never gotten past scratch tracking before I decide to scratch the idea completely. We'll see how it goes this time. My roommate Ben is gonna do it as a split with me 4 songs each, so that might help motivate me to finish it. As you might imagine, this increase of musicliness makes me happy, even though I write depressing music.
6. I realized my purpose in life is to love people. I'm good at it. And people's love is sometimes the only thing in this world that gets me by. I've been staving off my depression for weeks and feeling very close to being overwhelmed by it. I keep it at bay, in part, by loving people. My head was made for reasoning with people, my ears were made to listen to people, and my arms were made for hugging people. Pure and simple, I need people to care for. I'm glad to have that...
Geez, I need a girlfriend, huh?
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Monday, May 04, 2009
I know I'm already celibate and all, but...
I really have to wonder how facebook ads decided this was a winner for my page, especially cause the other ad was a dating site.I always thought becoming a Catholic would let me sin more freely, cause you know, you just confess after every date and you'll be ok. (I am aware of the contradiction in that line of thought) But then becoming a monk just negates the only motivation I've ever had to become Catholic.
This is why St. Francis of Assisi is rolling over in his grave.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Boston Spring.
I'm sure pretty much every Bostonian who reads this will have had as fantastic a Saturday as I. The weather was perfect and this city bursting into bloom is ridiculously beautiful. I woke up early to help out in cultivating and planting the beds for the church garden. It was fun. I came home and slept a bit, then I went out to the esplanade (a series of parks along the bank of the Charles River) with my guitar and played for a few hours. Everybody in Boston seemed to be out jogging, riding bikes, rowing, sailing, walking dogs, or sunbathing. It was a good time. I walked down to the hatch shell and actually just grabbed a loose chair on stage and started playing music. Some people stopped to listen. Most just kept walking. Eveyone looked happy. It's amazing what the sun does to people after a New England winter. I actually think I appreciate the summer more now that I live in Boston, because we go through all the seasons.
It makes you appreciate new life. There's so much new life in my life these days.
After the esplanade I stopped by the studio, but it was too nice to stay and work, so when David called to invite me to a bbq at Christina Sullivan's I shut down ProTools and headed to Waltham. I ate tons of delicious food and then we played some fiercely competitive wiffle ball and watched Snakes on a Plane. It's every bit as lame as imagined. Also the Red Sox beat the Yankees in game 2 of the current 3 game series. If we shut em out, we'll be up 6 games. Now we just have to catch up Toronto.
It makes you appreciate new life. There's so much new life in my life these days.
After the esplanade I stopped by the studio, but it was too nice to stay and work, so when David called to invite me to a bbq at Christina Sullivan's I shut down ProTools and headed to Waltham. I ate tons of delicious food and then we played some fiercely competitive wiffle ball and watched Snakes on a Plane. It's every bit as lame as imagined. Also the Red Sox beat the Yankees in game 2 of the current 3 game series. If we shut em out, we'll be up 6 games. Now we just have to catch up Toronto.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
Autopilot to hell.
Hahahahahaha, THIS is gonna make for some good times. I love when Google decides to bring unasked for convenience into our lives... I predict this bombs within months.
I love the remark that, "Two Gmail accounts can happily converse with each other for up to three messages each. Beyond that, our experiments have shown a significant decline in the quality ranking of Autopilot's responses and further messages may commit you to dinner parties or baby namings in which you have no interest."
I'm not kidding, I'm turning this thing on right away!
I love the remark that, "Two Gmail accounts can happily converse with each other for up to three messages each. Beyond that, our experiments have shown a significant decline in the quality ranking of Autopilot's responses and further messages may commit you to dinner parties or baby namings in which you have no interest."
I'm not kidding, I'm turning this thing on right away!
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