I was just going through some of my old photos so that I could update one of my facebook albums and I found these two I took of Keith in Venice:


Hehe

A very scary thing....

Russell with an M-16. I'm keeping this just in case I need to blackmail him at some point.

Windgate Application

I submitted my fellowship application about five hours ago. It was kind of anticlimactic, but it is done now and I am really glad that I can stop thinking about it. Now all that's left is for me to worry for the next two weeks.

I took this picture for my application. It's so....dramatic.

Probably Charleston

Hey guys! Update time! Where has Michael been? What is he Doing? He hasn't called me in a while... Does he not like me any more? Maybe he's sick...He said he had work to do, was he lying to me? All these questions and more will be answered in this post...

Ha! Cheesy intro. Anyway, back to the point... My week:
Lets start with Wednesday. Actually, lets start with the night before so I can complain about staying up until 2:30 working on my grant application. It sucked! Now back to Wednesday: I got up at 8:00 to go to My Hurricane Katrine Seminar. I'm taking this coarse mostly because they do a service trip and I want to go. The class seems like it'll be good it's just that a three hour lecture that early in the morning might be a little hard to take. (Kiani's in it which will help.)

I then grabbed a bite at home and went to the studio. I had missed the first half of class, so I went into the office to catch up with Ron. It was a lot of info considering it was the first meeting of the semester. He also broke the news that he didn't have the time to go over Windgate stuff with me, something which I was silently upset about considering my late night.

I had to leave Sculpture early that afternoon so that I could meet with one of my professors Pier Marton who teaches Moving Images and Sound. I had been e-mailing him repeatedly over the previous few days trying to see if there was any way I could miss the second half of his class so I could go to see Jill's opening that night. This show was her solo exhibition in Charleston Illinois which I wanted to see considering I helped her build it. The problem was that Charleston is a two and a half hour drive from Saint Louis and Pier's class was in the way. Pier wasn't thrilled about the idea, but told me to meet him at 3:00 so that he could at least go over some stuff with me that I would miss.

I got to the Film and Media Studies office at 2:55 and had to wait for Pier to get out of a meeting. By that point it was 3:30 and in that extra 35 minutes I had decided I would drop the class. I was too stressed and it was only the first day of classes. I went into his office, which for some reason was filled with cacti (I guess he likes succulents,) and I explained to him that I desperately wanted to take his class but didn't think I could devote enough time to it. He agreed and, like that, I was free of one less task.

I called Russell after the meeting and asked him if he wanted to drive to Charleston with me. To my surprise he said "yeah sure" without hesitation. (I guess after the whole Earth City incident he felt he owed it to me.) This made me glad, because I really didn't want to dive it alone, I would have, but I didn't want to.

Russell couldn't meet me until 5:45 so I ran some errands in the meantime. I got my tank filled up, and got some much needed supplies for the Varsity Art Show which was today (I'll get to that later.)

Russell arrived a bit late, but not too bad, so we hit the road. It was already dark by that point. I was resourceful though, and packed my Mag-lite, then Russell proceeded to shine it in my eyes while I was driving.

We got to EIU in almost exactly two and a half hours. By that time we had made up a funny song about the university. Actually it was really just Old MacDonald, but instead of EIEIO we said EIEIU. (After being in the car for that long you would have found it funny too.)We found the gallery without any problems and headed in. There were maybe six people inside and all of them were putting their coats on. I spotted Jill who was doing the same and sneaked up on her. She didn't know I was coming and man did she look confused, happy, but confused.



As she started to process it a bit she got really excited, took off her coat and showed me the installation. It looked amazing. I was really proud of it, and happy for her. After we had talked for a while and take a few pictures, Jill invited us to join her and a few of her friends for a celebratory drink. You never turn down a chance to drink with a professor.



We went to this restaurant/bar which was pretty bland, but you can't really expect much from Charleston, IL. All I could think about was what if we had gotten there 10 minutes later. We would have driven 5 hours for nothing. We had a round and then headed out. By that point I was starved and a little tipsy because of my lack of food on top of beer. We hit up Wendy's and then made the long drive back. I think we got back right at midnight.

Okay, now Thursday: (I'll try and keep it brief)

I first had a meeting at the writing center to go over my application. This woman that "helped" me was horrible. I could have been more productive editing it on my own than working with her. I left really disappointed.

Next I went down to the Art/Arch cart an visited Doris. Best hot dogs on campus! The reason I was in that neck of the woods was because I'm taking an Architecture class called A Tale of Two Cities. It is about the history of urban development in Saint Louis and Chicago. The class started at 1:00 and it sounds like it is going to be a really good one. Also, we get to take a field trip to Chicago late in the semester.

Later that day I ran over to Art Saint Louis to install my work for the show. It actually looked like it was going to shape up nice. I guess I will eat my words from an old post, sorry about that curator of the show, Dion Dion (Funny name.) I decided after that to actually invite my friends.

FRIDAY!

Ah, Friday. Nothing really special about Friday, but I did get to sleep in. The Sculpture Department was going to Government Surplus again and I didn't want to go, so I slept. I really don't need any more useless crap clogging up my studio anyhow. I got up at the crack of 1:15 and headed over to the Lewis Center. There I spent the afternoon correcting my application. That carried over into the evening and then at 9:30 Ben, Mylinh, and I went to see Capote which I was glad to find was still playing.

Ugh...Long Blog. This is why I hate to neglect it for so long.

Today:



Today was crazy. It all started at the beer festival. (Now that is how to start a story!) Erin found out that Schlafly, a local Saint Louis brewery, was holding their annual Winter Beer Festival at the City Museum. I went because, I mean what type a person turns down a beer festival. (A person I would not want to meet, that's who) When you entered they gave you a glass which you then used to sample 18 different types of beer. On top of all that you were allowed to enter the museum.



So we drank:



And drank:



And then climbed on shit:






Really fun!

At 6:00 after sobering up and getting a beef on bun from Mama's Coal Pot, It was time to head over to the Varsity Arts Show. I have to admit by the time it had gotten around to it I was pretty excited. It was a big show and the artwork was actually pretty good.



We set up and very quickly the place filled up. I guess when there are that many artists in one show, word spreads quick. A lot of my friends showed up including: Michelle, Kevin, Sam, Erin, Tomoko, Justin, Josh, Chris, and Erin. I think a couple of them were still a little drunk, but that just made it more fun.

The most interesting part of the evening came at the end. I was showing my magazines in the exhibition and had one binder clipped open on a stand and two others behind it so that people could pick them up and read them. I go back into the storage room to grab my jacket and when I come back out a guy is standing against the back wall of the gallery. He is holding one of my magazines. This is nowhere near the pedestal on which it was displayed. My interest is peaked so I keep an eye on him. The next thing I know he looks left, then right and nonchalantly walks towards the door. He goes clean past the pedestal curls up the magazine in his hand and opens the door. I I bolt through the gallery and get right up behind him. As he is about to let go of the door to leave I say bluntly, "Excuse me." "Yeah?" He turns around and faces me. I point at the curled magazine in his hand. "Oh" he says, "Can I have this?" "No" I respond. "I liked it..." "Thanks," I reply sarcastically snatching it back.

I was dumb struck, and felt almost as if I needed to guard them until everyone else left. I decided in the end to take two of them back with me and leave the clipped one there. I spoke with Dion and she was fine with it. It's not that the magazines have tremendous value or anything, it's just that I felt taken advantage of and was shocked that a person could commit such a blatant theft.

Conan vs. Bear

Why, what...huh?

So I'm back in Saint Louis now after driving across three states. Along the way I got a souvenir tumble weed from Colorado and made my own postcard when I was in Kansas:

Print one off and send it to a friend!

Snowmass, the Perma-Asshole, and a Love for Explosives

It's been a little while since my last skiing update so here goes... Keith left last Monday, we had a huge dump on Tuesday and since then it has been nothing but sun up to today. On Wednesday Emilie Lytton, a friend from Danforth 3, called me. I had seen her at the D-Court Christmas party and she said that she would be out in Aspen over break. We met on Thursday at the base of Ajax and skied together for the rest of the the day. Also, Tim and some of my other friends from high school had shown up in Snowmass. Emilie and I headed over to Tim's place that night and hung out, and played an intense game of Presidents and Assholes. I as usual was the perma-asshole. I really have no luck with that game.

On Friday I skied Snowmass for the first time this season. I met up with Tim and briefly skied with Emilie and Chris Allen. I had a terrific fall that day too. I was careening down a steep run and hit a ridge over which I had no idea what was on the other side. I got massive air and landed in a mogul field. I almost stuck it until I hit a big bump which sent my skies in opposite directions. I lost my right ski and slammed my head against the ground. All I can say is thank god for helmets. Tim said he came over the ridge and all he could see was a giant puff of powder.

Today was Tim's last day here so we all went over to Snowmass. It was by far the coldest day, plus the snow started to come down really heavy. I only got to ski for about three hours before my hands we in so much pain that I couldn't stay out any longer. To give you some idea of how hard it was coming down, the parking lot on the drive in was exposed asphalt, on our way out I was able to ski up to the car.

When we got back to Aspen, after driving at about 15 miles per hour through the blizzard, I grabbed a meatloaf sandwich and walked around town snapping some pictures. Here are a few of 'em:

This man's message must be shared with the world. Check it out: www.garyspivey.com

More Aspen Pictures and a New Monkey to Bring in the New Year

Happy New Year everybody! And of course for the new year I've posted a new monkey of the month. I know that you all have been waiting tirelessly all of December to see the next monkey. On the skiing front we got another big dump last night. So far there hasn't been a single day that we haven't gotten at least a couple inches. This has made for a ton of powder. I mean deep powder. At the same time the visibility has been really bad, which makes for some cool pictures, but makes seeing the bumps a bit of a challenge. It's still tons of fun though.