Synecdoche, NY

OK, well I made the 4pm showing at Lakemark guild 45th. Let me say that this movie I wasn't really expecting to enjoy. For some reason I thought I was in for some extremely low budget film that would resemble one of our super slow films to test my ability of boredom. I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of the in depth story and saw time was measured in our time of living. Charlie's life was one that was running out, so all his dreams and fears of life were contracting quickly. Death and how we all cope with it I feel is the message of the movie. How nobody wants to die, because we are so interested in building our lives. But this movie makes you remember your only one person with your interests of life and in the movie you see numerous life stories that you relate to, and realize their interests too. The older you get the quicker time goes by, and all the little things add up like the divorce and losing his child. The building of the film. Death is a funny thing because were all different, when death presents itself then deep reflection becomes relevant. Time is the one resource that we'll never control in the long-run. Overall great film, more than I wanted to pay, but great.

Graffit on Graffiti

The first project,

Well I found this project to be a very interesting idea and if not for the blue tape issue it would have been a great success. The planning process I don't believed called for complete disrespect of the schools rules, just a lack of cooridnating with the school. It did convey the point though of how enforcement of the system plays into graffiti. So good job for showing the authority of the school exist, and even through Joe.
Did the concept of graffiti on graffiti change much in my perception of the overload of ads that surround me? I think the idea of noticing ads was nothing knew, in fact if you take a marketing class it's sometime talks about how to create an ad so it will be stuck in as many peoples heads as possible. So, nothing new in that regard, but I like the idea of expressing the frustration of this overload brought to bear upon everybody. It's the voice of STOP! In order to make this point it involves more ads, but through graffiti. Thus by creating more ads to be introduced into our everyday lives to remind us about all the ads.
Overall the video was great, the game was, well, it could use some extra time to perfect. I'm all about the critical thinking in college and problem solving, which was taking place as the team notice their plan wasn't being well received by the audience. It would have been a little better on their part if they created the rules themselves and not been directed by Joe. In the end I believe the New York innovators would be happy to have seen their idea was played out here at the UW.

Project Freeze

The stop and freeze project, well what can I say other than BRAVO! I really enjoyed the video and the class exercise. I did feel a bit strange during the actual 2min freeze. I was in mid-step in the computer ail and the gentleman at the computer was feeling a little uncomfortable. He turned and looked at me twice and I felt like smiling and saying "don't worry I'm not spying on you I'm participating in a class project", but I didn't I just starred at a fire alarm fixture on the wall without even a smirk. How would I have felt actually being a participant on this project at Pike St? I think the little pressure I felt was nothing that they went through with people taking photo's of them and larger variety of variable that could have happened. I do however believe that I would have enjoyed doing it and that the experience to participate in that I would have taken with me. Maybe one day I'll find a way to justify organizing a freeze and do one myself.

Group Project

Group 3,

I thought I would share a bit upon Graffiti goup2 planning, expections, and thoughts of our Graffiti project. I'm conducting an individual video, which means I'm not really doing an assessment of the project, so I'll blog about it. The overall success in my opinion was the team aspect of everyone attempting to do something they have never done before, such as: a media video, a set-up of and a execution of a mock graffiti demonstration, be a game show host, and leader of a class discussion where the end result was unknown. The planning of this project was large considering all the activities that where taking place that day. However at the end of the day I thought all of it went very smooth considering all the possible variables that could have happened. Unfortunately the real surprise of construction to graffiti didn't end up happening during the video has planned, but it was still a surprise during the tour. Did the meaning of what we were trying to get across about the graffiti cultural and the conflict it creates in our everyday lives? I would believe the answer is yes, as seen during the class discussion. The class discussion was really the least planned for piece, but I believe was the most valuable piece. Instead of being directed "this is how one should view graffiti" and not express a difference in opinion, we actually created an environment to challenge and discuss the differences view in how we engage graffiti in our everyday lives.

Group 3 website

Obedience

Is there a correlation between the everyday perspectives and an obedience factor that drives us to comply with authority? The Milgram experiment has always made me wonder about what authority figures are telling me to accomplish their will. I'm open to ideas about if we are just naturally oblivious to the everyday or are we told indirectly that the everyday is just not important enough to spend time thinking about, so we generally don't.

Milgram Experiment

The everyday noise that I barely notice but unknowingly adjust my voice too is my furnace heater. I'm never aware of it when its running, I'm completely oblivious to this noise. I typically recognize that its on because my cat likes to sit on it, but I don't really consider the actual sound.

Time

Jump out of a plane at 10,000 feet.

Close your eyes and smile.

Think of your first childhood memory.

What's the Right policies?

With the right policies and incentives we can steer economic growth in a low-carbon direction. With the right policies and the right incentives, we can be sure that developed and developing countries alike contribute to the cause of fighting global warming, without compromising every nation's right to the economic well-being of its citizens.

Source: Harold Tribune

Today at 116th and 48th two motorcycle riders found love at the intersection. The rider in the far left lane showed her affection by revealing her upper torso for all to see. They both left immediately after, but left many traffic viewers a rememberable drive home today.

Source: Ft. Lewis Ranger

Home?

"This is a really hard blow," the 44-year-old said. She was certain they would lose their home and everything in it.

Source: Seattle Times

Health is Law

A second Proposal, the Menu Education and Labeling Act, is supported by health advocates and more closely mirrors New York's law. It would not pre-empt more stringent local laws.

Source: NYT

Amazon

"Last Clean Shirt"

Finding common denominators in this movie was challenging, and finding meaning to the song "The last clean Shirt" was even more challenging. The movie played three times each time with different focus points. The first time was just the ride, followed with the text of the female, and finally with the male thoughts. The song played on cue each and every time without any variation. The lyrics to the song were fast but the central theme to the last clean shirt is the shirt one wears when passing to the next world. The visual of the movie reflected everyness with typical traffic inside an urban area. The camera angle stead fixed in the back scene and did which toward the end of each scene. The duration of the drive was approximately ten minutes giving a sense of time and was deliberately done so. The question as to why film two people driving three times in the city while playing this song can lead to a few thoughts. The thought that I believe the songs were introduced for is to relay a message of life spent in our cars. The everydayness that takes place in the car in always overlooked and many people just go into auto pilot. The actors never really acknowledged one anther they were only releasing thoughts. One was verbal the other just thinking. The time spent wasn't meaningful to either, but was time spent driving. The time spent was meaningful to me because I had to study the time. I looked for the common denominators to attempt to find reason to the everyday that surrounded the two that were just moving about their day. The music of the last clean shirt filter in at the end of each segment. Was this by design? The end representing the end of the movie and the end of life. The time captured showed the everyday not observed by the actors, but due the movie observed by me. Maybe the author's point. I'm ultimately unsure why the last clean shirt, but I think part of the reasoning my exist in my wondering thoughts.

Wednesday's writing assignment

The photo above shows the internal relationship between two young boys, who during their adventures of the day have founds rewards of turtles, these turtles are the currency that they later seek in the adventure of life in the market, they unknowingly are enjoying their life in the most simplest form, but still doing what is expected of them in their adult future, fun and rewards. The times have surely changed for these two unknown lads, and the bare feet are now covered in working boots, or tennis shoes, the friendship fades and this memory that stands in black and white is what is left of this day. The day has with it an everlasting testimony to the fun filled days of hunting and finding treasures, in this case turtles, along with the companionship that we seek, the adventure seeking life that only a young boy has complete freedom of enjoying, before the world tells him not to find turtles any longer, but to do something productive that will benefit yourself and society.

"games" How I love them

The game that I turn to is Age of Empires. I consider this game to be dangerous. I have my wife hide this game from me at the beginning of every quarter, so I won't waste my time.

The game itself is one of our country's past. At least I imagine it to be that way. The game starts with colonies of any of the old world's empires (UK, Dutch, French...). In addition to the colonial forces that start with almost nothing, there is Native Americans tribes and trade post to be established. Native Americans help by providing additional troops, much like how history was written (French and Indian War). The trade post bring in food, wood, coin, or colonial points. The game goes through a series of ages which one is trying to achieve. Time and resources must be used wisely here in order not to be attacked by another colony. In total there are five ages bring settlers from the dark age to the imperial age. The game is independent and survival of the fittest. One must understand how to properly defend and grow a society with the given conditions to be victorious.

The game to me is a mixture of time management skills, a bit of historical value, and a ton of military tactics. This miniature world allows one to become a commander of a world with all the control over one's people, and ultimately responsible for the success or failure of one's own strategy. This game mirrors life in a small respect in how our decisions will dictate our life's and people around us, but without destroying other colonies.

Part IV

Part III

Part II

Part I

Continue...

I've been studying trying to keep track of all my tasking, but I drift into the nothing. Odd. Just a few days ago I found it hard to contain myself from doing nothing, but when I'm busy and time is short my mind drifts to things deemed less important than the task at hand. Why do we want to stay busy, but can't? Why when we try not to do anything, is it so difficult? I guess this is why I'm studying.

Scrutiny of the Everyday

"Recongnizing that 'quotidiennete dissolves (into statistics, properties, data) when the everyday is made an object of scrutiny' he proposes that what connects the most redolent and suggestive attempts to acknowledge the everyday is the project-like status." by Johnstone (page20), who is paraphrasing Michael Sheringham.


Reading this sentence seems to clog up my blood flow in my brain. The everyday object of scrutiny I find to be interesting and kinda true. The idea of finding the everyday as something more then nothing is hard to wrap your mind around. Creating categories of data on the random everyday object seems impossible and unimportant, which may give a status not worthy of study. However, their is literature that shows something is at stake. The project-like status seems to grow onto the projects of attention, who Sheringham is interested in.



The trend that I'm seeing is the terming of the "everyday". Everyday is turning into a status that is beginning the process of being recognized as something worthy of scholarly study. I believe that learning about how we ignore our everyday, teaches us about ourselves. So, by scrutiny of the everyday we find why it matters.

My earth vacation

but I couldn't

This assignment is for me to observe 20mins of doing nothing.

(((((((((20mins go by))))))))))

Noises lost in the backdrop came forward. My desktop seems to be in a continuous rhythm of processing data and inviting me to play, but I couldn't. My stomach juices are talking to me, and telling me to eat, but I couldn't. Old documents posted on my bulletin board stared at me telling me to remove them, but I couldn't.

The clock slowed down during this twenty minutes of nothingness. The ideas and urges to do something with the object around me slowly passed until I was in autopilot, then the alarm clock snapped me back into action.