• travel around the whole wide world
• find love
• breathe
• make art that resonates
• take photographs
• teach
• write
• learn how to, and then cook good food!
• work in an art magazine company and write and travel and hang out with famous people
• set up a bar
• make a movie
• fly in a plane
• fly on a hang-glider
• fly a really big awesome lovely kite

 
- what i wrote in new zealand // things i tend to forget


        &  build a castle on the edge of a cliff

just watched the imaginariam of dr parnassus with chris before she left today. it's a brilliant movie, all-star cast, surreal set concept and generally interesting story. it's funny how some things never get old.

had a really eventful weekend with fo, chris and general bumbling about the city. love you guys. now own a typewriter taking up a considerable amount of floorspace, but i guess it was a good buy considering how i would probably have had to spend that cash repairing the old one that can't fit papers as large as this one can anyway. it's just heavy as fuck and huge, but beautiful. i am turning into mr lim, am i not :| hopefully i inherit some measure of his awesomeness along with this garang guni complex. D:

now i have so much homework it's not even funny. time to haul ass and get something done. i no longer derive joy from being in my dorm, but i guess it's all my fault for saying anything in the first place. life goes on, though. it just gets slightly more trying.

we walked into class on tuesday, and dan asks us this. he fumbles over his choice of words, shaking his head vehemently to himself as he entertains his mental conversations. (he's strange like this, but we love him for it.) eventually he decides, yes, he wants to know our watchwords - the words we live by. he goes around the table, and as we speak our words he notes them down on the moleskine that he uses to plan his classes. freedom came up; so did impulse, and self (multiple times). someone mentioned fun, and another, serenity.

when it came to the last person, carly asked him what his watchword was. surprised by this unexpected question, dan looks up and says, "mine? ...oh!" then he quickly goes back to scribble his own name on the moleskine. he thinks for a moment, and then tells us that he guesses his would have to be serendipity. yes, serendipity.

it's monday and i'm not racing against the clock, staying up 'til three and printing, at last minute, my essay exercise for the class tomorrow. there's still more work to do but they can wait, and there's time to write a few words and actually stop to think. this is pretty wonderful; i'm glad.

today was equal parts suck and happyface, the first part comprising my waking up late and having to deal with a nasty photo place that advertises student discounts and then proceeds to ignore their student customers for 20 minutes because they asked for one. i don't deal well in these situations, and it ruined my day. then i lost the hundred+ $ receipt for my oil painting supplies, and almost lost the other one for my photography materials too. it must have fallen off my dresser and into the trash, and now i can't claim money from the ministry, at least, in part. well i suppose it's not that big a deal but having more money to spare is always a good thing.

i feel better now, after reading some of my class readings and getting my work done and watching ever after with some floormates. we got insomnia cookies; that helped too. i'm feeling strangely calm right now. i guess it's a good thing. i haven't spoken to the boy all day, and i suppose it's for the better this way. if i keep talking to him it'll just take all my energy to be as cheerful as i was before because this isn't going to be as real. i just don't want him to think i'm ignoring him. with luck we'll be fine. we are beautiful, are we not? we'll be fine.

i'm leaning against my wall right now, on my bed, surrounded by blankets and pillows. i have coloured my hair crimson and in the elevator (lift) this morning jessica, my almost-neighbour on the other side of the corridor, remarked that there are a million colours in there. i suppose that's what happens when you go from green to red. it's long enough for a ponytail, and that's how i'm wearing it right now. it's very quiet right now. my roommate has her earphones on and it's 12:38 on a sunday night. uncharacteristically, no one is talking outside, and there are hardly any cars on the road except for the odd one passing by. then you hear the zooming sound but it's gone in an instant.

yesterday i went with my stream to chelsea where all the galleries are, and we visited a few of them. saw some eggleston and arbus, and other random people. i like visiting galleries. we had a good lunch, too. best whipped cream i've ever tasted on a hot chocolate - you'd think that the whipped cream was not what you ordered the hot chocolate for but that was so beautiful. i also had a linguine with smoked salmon, and to my surprise, it didn't come alfredo, but it suited me fine. that way i could finish more of it (i always gag halfway through my alfredo or marinara, too gelat) and it was healthier. it was really good, too. alix said that my lunch was a sophisticated choice, that she had toast, and that was, to me, a rather interesting comment. linguine and salmon, sophisticated? well, well, america. who knew? anyway, i don't remember the name of the diner but it had hearts all over its windowpanes, garish, and zebra tablecloths. i must go back there some time. the lunch was free; it was on the stream, and that made it all the better. -happyface-

in the evening i went with julio to the damien hirst show opening at the gagosian. there was a good sampling of his works there - spot paintings, butterfly radial paintings, diamonds, diamonds, diamonds and a formaldehyde piece. i keep thinking how much i would love to see all of his formaldehyde pieces concentrated in one space, the new museum maybe, with its industrial aesthetic - the whitewashed walls and corrugated iron. wouldn't that be something. but the gagosian was pleasant enough, pity he wasn't there, and that our subway ride up and downtown was probably longer than the amount of time we spent in the gallery itself. all in a day's work.

BLAH STUPID BOY GET OUT OF MY HEAD OK

do you know what it's like to open your heart and offer it to someone, only to have it politely returned? well, i can't deny that it fucking hurts and it leaves you feeling more vulnerable than you'd like to be for quite a while. other than that, i'm trying to be a normal human being so that we can actually still be friends. it's so difficult to be in the hallway these days when he's there talking to my thousand other female floormates, they're beautiful people and i love them but this irrational jealousy will be the death of me if i stay out there too long.

so instead i'm holing up, i'm hiding in, i'm closing in on myself a little too much for comfort. i don't want to be melodramatic, but yes it does hurt a little, and i wonder if it is time to give up on any delusions that there is someone out there for me, and if i could give up hope at all.

in other news i have been coffee-free for two weeks, a rather admirable feat if i might say so myself. guzzling a lot of hot chocolate and earl grey in the meantime. classes are fast and furious, printing is a nightmare when under time constraints, sculpture is a bitch, writing class is cool so far though the work is immense. all in all a typical college education. i just wish i had more will and strength.

first day of class.

colour film photography is going to be such a blast, from what i've seen today. the teacher is this really quirky guy who says the darnest things (see above). other snippets include, "the virtual is the enemy" and "photography is an energy map". he's really adorable! liz says he's got asperger's because he's so awkward but i think he's really cute because of it. he keeps asking us permission to do things in class, like a little kid, like "ohohoh, can i do my history of photography presentation now? :D" or "omg yeah we can compare manual photography to buckets. except um it might not work. but it might! can we try it out?" i am probably smiling like a crazy idiot in class.

the only thing is that he wants to give us all Cs and he was asking us, again, if it was alright for him to give at least a person a C+ and no, definitely not any As. of course my face went like this -> D: and i suppose it's impossible to try and keep up my 3.86 gpa next semester but this is going to be awesome anyway once i get over stupid grades. (i suppose it was because of the poster that i'd had on my wall for years that said "my grades validate me" that i'm the way i am now, or something...) i'm going to learn so much more this semester than the last, where digital bored the fuck out of me. i could feel myself growing old in that class, but this one, this is going to be so hard but so fulfilling.

and expensive, though. but we'll see how that goes. maybe the ministry will pay for me. i am their bitch after all, right? 35mm and the nikon fm2 - back where i started, not too long ago really, two years ago, the first time i really picked up a camera seriously. it's going to be like coming home. and then, if it's not too daunting, maybe i'll try medium and large format, because this is the time to do it, and the cage (they call their room where you loan stuff out the cage lol) seems to have a good number of old cameras to play with. i'm really excited about this and i hope it pans out (:

oil painting class is also going to be good leg of this journey because i've never done it before and i'm going to be learning so much. we have to keep this sketchbook for this class now, and we'll be assigned to go to galleries and shows and make notes in thumbnails and stuff. the first assignment is a choice between tim burton and monet, i'll go to both again and i know it'll be awesome because the last time i went to see tim burton i felt really inspired but didn't really make use of those feelings. this time i'm going to be armed with my sketchbook and the markers that i made mom make dad specially bring to geraldine's place to then bring to me, just because i'd seen tim burton and wanted to try markers the way he used markers, ahahahah yesssss.

and also i love erika because she grades on effort, and that makes me want to work hard on painting class because it's such a safe zone. all the other classes are so demanding on an intellectual level but in this one i know that as long as i keep doing what i'm doing i'll be fine. and i feel like not having any pressure allows me to work at my own pace, without the negative repercussions, which is awesome.

i wound up getting an A- on writing the essay last semester, which is very mind-boggling because i'd always been a B+. this upsets all the plans of taking it pass/fail, which is a very wussy thing to do but i didn't want to have to spend like more than half my time on essay work and the grotesque amounts of agony like last semester again. now i know i can get As on it, i feel tempted to take it graded, but we'll see, i have five weeks to decide. might just take it pass/fail anyway because god i am an art student i want to focus my energies on not being a doofus at sculpture class, and also photography is going to take so much time running from place to place, getting things processed and developed and hiding in the dark room. we'll see!

now i am awake at 3.23am because i'd slept from 7 to 12. came back from class at 6.30 with a migraine and wanted to die - hadn't had any coffee the whole day. am wondering if i should just give in and deal with a coffee a day, a nap a day, and this irregular sleeping pattern because it's just so easy to fall into this rhythm... but i don't want to wind up being an adult who cannot start the day without a coffee because it's a dependency, not an enjoyment, oh no. also chia po linn where is my panadol come down now pls. ._.

i've been sleeping like a dormouse lately, possibly stocking up the hours before term time and the mad rush, again. this term i'll be taking oil painting, colour film photography, sculpture II, art and contemporary culture II and writing the essay. the first two classes are going to take out a huge chunk of my wallet, if the last visit to utrecht (122 usd) was anything to go by. i'm a little afraid, especially after the europe trip that i blew like 3000usd on. still not sure if parents are going to send me money like they said (i mean, they said to tell them when my account dips below 5000 but apparently that didn't necessarily mean that they would do anything about it) and whether the ministry will pay for my art materials, so i guess i'm getting a bit scared.

which leads me to think about something that i guess i've been wanting to do for some time but never did - open an etsy shop. i've always thought about selling prints and sketches but never really got down to it because my artistic output is so dismal. now that there is a real reason to do it, i'm seriously considering it. i'm just not too sure - if i open an etsy to sell stuff that i make, would you guys buy stuff/ dya think people would want to buy stuff? don't be kind, please be honest.

i guess it would be pretty fun and also useful to start being actually productive as an "artist" (problematic though the word is). i'm a bit tentative about this but it might work out. i don't know. what do you think?

back in london!

things got better the day after my post with the z's because it was personal private time (ppt, yes, tautology, no, i didn't name it) day so i went to belvedere palace to see the klimts and shieles and palace grounds. the exhibition itself was a little underwhelming for a place that boasted the largest collection of the artists' works, but i loved being on my own and not being rushed to take pictures of the place. that was really nice.

in the evening we had a viennese dinner and then a concert. i'm not one for classical music, but from what i heard it was pretty impressive. i liked it. the ballet duo was also pretty polished and the girl was such a babydoll, i liked that they used their facial expressions and dance to create narratives because it was entertaining enough to keep me from falling asleep. yes, mish is a philistine when it comes to classical music but when she can stay awake she likes it.

the next day i went shopping in the streets near the museumsquartier, in search of homegrown austrian labels and designers. to my disappointment most stores were closed -i later learnt that the viennese celebrate new year's until the 6th so most people were on holiday- so all i could do was peek into windows while standing in the cold grey outside, but there were a few gems. i particularly loved this little shop full of cloth and ribbons and buttons... in very cute, folksy patterns. i bought some ribbons and buttons, and am looking quite forward to making another toy when i get back to ny and my sewing kit... which i made mom pack and geraldine bring over from singapore haha. it's been a while!

and my last stop was this place set up by two young austrian women, a business and graphic designer duo, who took their inspiration from toys and monsters, those that people who have too much money and space collect to display on their shelves. (i mean, they're really cute lah but what to do with them?) anyway, i love that place! bought a 75euro sweater and a bunch of random shit, just because. couldn't afford anything more but i love what i bought! the person manning the store happened to be one half of the duo and she was really nice and friendly, and she invited me to email her anytime. that was a nice touch. i guess in that long time i took browsing everything in that store (and telling her how i thought they were awesome) we struck up a small friendship.

then i rushed back to the hotel and made it in time because i hate being a liability and late and needing to borrow stuff from people etc because it makes me pissy. so yep vienna got better and now i am back in london after the journey from hell. basically, plane landed in bristol because gatwick was closed due to snow, we paid 200 pounds for a cab to london, driver refused to drive us to doorstep without further payment so we got off elsewhere to rain/slush (and even then we paid extra 20pounds for him to release luggage, that dishonest bastard) and spent an hour trekking in the rain and before reaching suhui's apartment. i brought my duffel bag instead of my luggage with the wheels so i was dragging that heavy piece of shit the whole time. and somewhere along the way i got the flu so that episode made it worse...

oh well! what a journey. okay i guess i better sleep now if i don't want to spend more money buying tissue :|

so it's been ridiculously long since i last posted anything of substance, anything that says i'm alive (and at this point i give up moving mz fingers to the strange place that 'y' is at because this viennese computer is intent on reading mz 'y' as a 'z', it's not that i don't love zou enough but i am tired and so allowed to do so).

i've alive though rather hungrz and this holidaz doesn't seem to be verz relaxing, plagued a little bz mz inner demons, i guess. all these little insecurities. but it's been good for most part, nice dinners with mz neighbour when everzone else on the floor was home for winter, geraldine coming to visit, bringing what little sense of home to the dorm, and opening mz ezes in new cities. visited the leopold museum todaz, finallz face to face with edvard munch's works after so manz zears of re-enacting the scream and seeing it on threadless shirts and the internet, but never in person. well, i guess i still haven't seen it in person because thez onlz had the lithograph of it, but it's good enough for now because the visit led me unexpectedlz to a rather large collection of surrealist/surrealist-influenced works, the kind of fantastical pictures i have loved since i was thirteen, and then some. i took some pictures and some names, and hopefullz i'll remember to return to them somedaz, and find fuel for art. also got to know exactlz what mz classmates/teacher meant bz egon shiele, and am glad for it because he is prettz awesome. i'm surprised, and this tells me i should reallz be putting in more effort towards learning about art but i guess sometimes i reallz can't give a shit. also everztime i go to a museum or gallerz i am pleasantlz surprised to find that i actuallz enjoz the experience - zet it alwazs takes so much effort to drag mzself to the next one. i guess i'm still coming to terms with the fact that one daz i will be an artist, or an art teacher, or both.

what i reallz want is to own a castle.

we went to the schönbrunn palace zesterdaz. it wasn't reallz a castle. in fact, it was a rather understated building from the outside. the rooms were something altogether though. all of vienna is peppered with statues and random architectural fluorishes that i just love. i am taking notes for mz own castle construction. this has to happen. so anzwaz i was eating a muffin and i lost mz train of thought. let me trz to get back on track because i know that if i don't trz to dispel this i will continue mz next nine dazs of touring in vague unease, and there is no worse feeling than this vague unease.

so i spent the last minutes of the old zear getting lost in london, and welcomed the new zear fearing for mz life (i am not joking) because i was getting squashed amongst the crowds near waterloo bridge. i was trzing to hail a cab to get to elephant and castle in time to see the fireworks, because suhui was at a friend's house partz there. needless to saz, it is impossible to flag a cab when the streets are closed and everzone has a bottle or wine glass in their hand, and walking in the opposite direction from zou. the funnz part is that when the countdown ended there was nothing in the skz, and onlz a vague murmur in the air - nothing explosive, or loud, nothing bright and shinz to saz, "come on, new zear, give me zour best shot". i was there in mz red coat and just a short, short dress, newlz procured from the camden lock market hours earlier, and a (reallz heavz) duffel bag in mz hand. oh, and mz camera in mz handbag and a bottle of smirnoff that i was supposed to bring to the partz. basicallz, not in verz good shape to survive a horde of drunk londoners on new zear's eve. there was a lot of pushing and some fainting and an ambulance... then i decided that i have had enough of this nonsense. what do i do? i fork out ten pounds to hire a rickshaw to drive me through these hordes to somewhere where i can continue mz journez at decent pace and at minimal cost to mz alreadz fragile state of mind.

(zes, i know it is hard to take mz melancholic ramblings seriouslz when all these stupid 'z's are interfering, but trz, okaz?)

what i am trzing to saz is that i miss all mz fucking friends, zou people who know me as i am and take me as i am. what the fuck does the new zear mean anzwaz, when there is nobodz i love to spend it with? i have never been one for festivals, or rituals, but i guess it would still have been nice to do things properlz and talk to people i actuallz know. not know, zou're-mz-friend-on-facebook know, but know like i've-seen-zou-fucked-up-and-i-still-love-zou know. how did this never occur to me when i decided not to come home for the holidazs? well it's done now and zou and i are half a world apart and we're not even talking. it's mz fault i guess, i should skzpe more or write more or call or something. sometimes it's a little too hard to cope with wanting to do everzthing. i hate that i'm not superhuman.

alright, it's too late. time to sleep otherwise tomorrow will be rather crappz.

but i'm depressed.

what?

maybe i'm just really tired, but i'm feeling extremely crummy right now. going to try and sleep it off. ):

meh.

i dreamt that i was running through a field of twisted spikes. someone - was it fo? - and i were running away from a hostile beggar and i couldn't stop taking pictures of the landscape even though i knew i had no time to stop to focus and compose and she said, stop that and go! and when we thought we ran far enough away we crouched down below the spikes to set something up. it involved yellowy candles. not in any particular arrangement such as one would do when conducting an exorcism, but rather, haphazardly like children during mid-autumn festival. we took out our knives and laid them at our sides, just in case something or someone snuck up upon us.

then this beautiful girl appeared and obviously never trust beautiful people, right? but of course that's what we did. we put away our knives and entered an elevator, candles forgotten, and i somehow became a incorporeal entity because all i could do was watch as that girl attempt to murder fo, but they were both using knives so she didn't manage to stab fo, but then i had to wake up, so i don't know what happens next...

clearly the homeless in nyc have crept into my subconscious.

i'm sitting in my bed doing absolutely nothing at all but i went to sephora and spent a fuckload and now i have shiny pink and purple nails and green hair and i'm feeling very pleased with myself even though i can feel myself slowly slipping into brokeness. in winter after geraldine comes and goes i'll be going to london and vienna and that should be pretty damn awesome. yesterday i went to max brennar's with julio for brunch, and then hung out with fo and nezzy at columbia watching hilarious british men try not to get killed while driving across amerika with their junk cars, and had our own version of thanksgiving dinner. what the fuck is thanksgiving anyway? well we had stuffing and sausages and mushrooms and eggnog and apple pie with key lime gelato and vanilla bean ice cream and kahlua and it was brill (refer to facebook for illustration). the day before, ended class early and felt a puzzling sense of loss - the notion of free time, what is this thing they call free time? i almost broke down contemplating that concept, but instead i bounced around and helped lizzy pack her shit into her mom's car, and then coloured my hair. all! on! mah! owhn! for all of ten minutes i was blonde and had no one to share it with, but the next time i colour my hair i will be wiser. in the evening julio and i hunted down some sushi at st mark's place, and it was crazily cheap and good, huh how is that possible in new york city huh? and i so need to get out more, who knew, who knew just behind my art building, the building i go to every single fucking day of my school life, was this awesome street full of restaurants and jappy things and a comic bookstore and did you know, that absolute death is out? i had to turn around and walk quickly out the door before i spent money i couldn't afford to spend.

of course that's a rather moot point since i spent almost exactly that amount today on nail polish and my face, oh foundation but such a beautiful box of face. because, really, who walks around with green hair and no shocking pink eyeshadow? not i, said the mish. i know exactly what i should be doing now, in a minute i will do it, but right now, all this free time is driving me insane, i don't think i've been so clear-headed for a while now, what a euphoric moment! anyway if you haven't watched amadeus you totally should, i thought it was going to be some stuffy old movie about some stuffy old composer but it blew my mind. all these crazy geniuses, must you be crazy to be a genius? i don't think so but why do i keep feeling as if i'm turning into her. oh well. and next wednesday i'll be watching imogen heap and tim exile at webster hall, what fun, what 66 dollars, what a life. today we was going to go to the moma to see the tim burton exhibition but julio fell sick in the morning, the poor melodramatic boi lol, so we didn't go. instead, i finally had a taste of au bon pain, the french bakery on the corner, and uploaded my photos from forever ago and yesterday, and walked around the christmas street market on union square, it's lovely, i must go again, and raced the xiao long bao six blocks to see who gets cold first. i miss ding tai fung and crystal jade too damn fucking much.

tomorrow i shall take an nyc bus for the first time to staten island and go shopping again, i can't get enough of this shit. okay i could go on forever but i probably shouldn't. i love all of you at home. which is why i still can't understand why i'm not coming back this christmas, but well. see you in fucking may.

the days got better, mostly because i'm finally sitting down for long periods of time and getting work done. working on my essay exercises feels like chipping at stone, it requires so much focus and i'm so slow, but strangely enough it's not too painful (yet). this time round i'm reading a collection of essays by orwell, and it feels like i'm making friends with him or something. it's a little bizarre, and i'm actually having fun, or as much fun as one could possibly have, at writing, and i guess that's a start.

this weekend i spent so much time just working, it feels so weird when people ask me, how was my day, and i can only reply with a word: homework. how do i convey the strange sense of satisfaction that i feel at getting something done, getting something done to my liking? but mom says, it's okay to have normal weekends too, so yes, i'm having a normal weekend and that's fine.

last week we worked with the chop saws for the first time. i was fucking terrified. the high-pitched buzzing sound fills the room and it feels like my ear drums are getting spliced in half as i watch the blade cut through the wood. i was terrified at first, and i thought i was going to have to like, coerce someone into doing my woodworking assignment for me because it's just too damn scary but i think i've gotten over it now. i'll never get used to it, i don't think i'll ever get used to sculpture and the intensity of crit it involves, but i think i'll be able to get through the class at least.

this may be why i may never be a good artist. i'm nowhere smart nor bold enough to put my thoughts on the line because i'm just too scared to be shot down. but this is what college is for, i suppose. four years to grow a skin. i could do that. it's just difficult, but hey, maybe i could do that. last night i wrote a crit of a solo exhibition i've recently been to, and it clarified how i felt about my own work because the dude's work runs along the same vein as my own. so i think i have a direction now, and all i have to do is work towards it.

so this week hasn't been all that great.

thursday:
hung out with sarah again, for the second time in ages since we said thursday would be our day. that was hilarious because things kept cropping up but we finally did! bought a pair of 40$ boots that i hope will last me through winter and rain because people have been telling me that there are more effective ways of shopping than just buying the first (expensive) thing that comes to mind. this had better not backfire... they're quite lovely. and we went to a diner where they whipped up a coffee milkshake for me even though it was off the menu, because i really wanted one. they put coffee with vanilla ice cream! it was lovely. i'm glad i asked. (: we're going to colour our hair this thursday. finally, no more wimpy green hair, i'm going for the real thing now.

came back and killed myself over essay writing. you would think that a sane person would get work done first, then shop, but i don't know. i'm not very sane ):

friday:
went for the appointment with my writing teacher, for which i killed myself over essay. in a very sophisticated way, she told me my essay was crap. i totally sympathised. total rewrite involved a lot of mornings in starbucks for the next few days, the only place i could get any essaying work done. it requires too much focus, i can't do it very well. pain. :|

went to the post office for the first time to mail a package to family. a hole in the wallet and a lot of fun with tape and paper. there are so many pockets of time that i lost just because i have become so good at dallying around. why???? also, coffee is no longer giving me the instant wake-up. here i am, mid-morning, typing, drinking coffee, still lethargic. i don't know what i can do to fix this and i'm starting to get scared. getting scared means getting stressed, not helping anything at all.

saturday:
got an itsy bit of work done in starbucks in the morning. then everything went to hell. looked for rice paper for sculpture class, fucking expensive i'm not going to spend 100$+ on a sculpture assignment, argh how? ;_; and a book for essay class. wandered into comic store, it began to rain. etc. it was a terrible day and i got no work done thereafter and someone slammed a door at me, dorm politics are like 10-year-old fights, i hate how this demeans me, but i am working on being a better person. it's all pretty hilarious though! so i realized i can't work in the hallway, and that when i'm getting all emo about boi there is no way my mind can stay on the page. sigh. i need to put up a sign on the room to remind myself not to be such a retard.

so my roommate rosie was teaching my floormate azzure how to put on a condom in the hallway as i was working. she borrowed my banana to do it. it was weird. but i guess it was educational. -.- i'm quite traumatised right now, though. i think sex scares me. maybe i really am just ten years old. :|

sunday:
got my period. i knew that was why i was being so cranky on saturday. spent most of the day working as well. this weekend was a lot of work, sadfaces (mine) and general rolling around on the bed in pain. stayed up until 5 doing absolutely nothing, pretending to work. some of my floormates blew condom balloons and made static so they would stick to the ceiling, and brought their comforters and pillows to the hallway. we had a faux-sleepover in the hallway and they were drunk without being drunk. the mornings are the greatest times. what the fuck happened? it was so bizarre, but i guess that's what happens when you put a bowl of condoms in the hallway, and your friend's mother sends her a fuckload of string cheese. i had string cheese for the first time, i think it is the love of my life.

monday:
sculpture class is beginning to terrify me. i'm speaking up less, my head is cloudy, i have no more thoughts. what the fuck?

we began playing assassins in our dorm. it was fucking fun. i killed five people in two days and then someone sabotaged me and now i am dead. some dorm drama went on and that was hilariously stupid, but i guess it makes life interesting in a really sardonic way. it would have been nice to last till sunday, the idea of immortality, of becoming a god, i can see why people get drunk on it. the sign outside: kill a man, and you are an assassin. kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. kill everyone, and you are a god. i wasn't playing for the prize, i was playing for that promise. i am so strange, i am in love with ideas.

tuesday:
for drawing class we went gallery-hopping in chelsea. some of them were so atrociously curated that i think i would be capable of tearing them down in writing. i might do that tonight, well i guess i'd have to, it's an assignment. i'm not in a nice mood. sometimes i think that in order to be an artist you have to be painfully imperfect, painfully human, to have strong emotions about everything. you can't just try to be nice, you have to have charged opinions. not to shock or awe, but to gain respect. i'm not sure if that's what i want to do, or can do. and if i do that, am i not just faking it? bobby, my classmate, says that i am astute when i am grumpy - no, maybe not. i think it is simply that when i am grumpy, i am honest. does this mean that all my trying to be nice to everything all the time is just faking it?

you'd think that after nineteen years i'd have grown a thicker skin, but still i think that if i am nice other people will be nice back, about my art. it's nothing personal, but still. it's so hard to separate the idea of someone critiquing your thoughts, and someone criticising you. huh. GET OVER IT MISH! lol.

anyway, i'm really glad we went gallery hopping because i was supposed to do that since i got here but never got around to it. i should try to go once every two weeks, at least.



so all in all, i aced all my art classes: drawing, sculpture, photography, art & contemporary culture, and got a b+ on writing. that should be good enough, but the imperfection annoys me. it would have been nice to turn in a neat line of As on my transcripts. i know that the mid-terms mean nothing though, and now i'm so fucking scared that i'm burning out before finals even come around. i have always been this obsessed with grades, haven't i? eight months have not separated me from this obsession, and now it's back. i need help. i can't live like this for too long.

got back a handful of grades, As for drawing and sculpture were really sweet but the B/B+ for writing bugs me because i'm not sure if it's something that can be remedied just by putting in more effort. oh well! in other news, i got little tipsy on halloween but it was on good stuff so that's not too bad. visiting upenn was interesting but i guess new york is still more of my kind of thing. thanks rach for putting me and my hilarity up 8DD i'm much better now, i don't know what came over me then. i got lost in the west village when i came back, i still don't know how that happened. i got out of the subway station and the west 8th street sign had disappeared. following my instincts (which are, by the way, always wrong) i picked a road and began walking in circles. around me policemen have blocked off the roads for the parade, and every cab i passed by was occupied. it began drizzling. names of familiar streets, waverly place, christopher street... kept teasing me into thinking i might possibly be getting closer to campus. i refused to take out the nft guide buried in my bag. after a while i got really tired of being the sole person in a jacket and a huge bag amidst a crowd of costumed people, though. it was fascinating at first, getting lost in the city, but after a while i decided i was ready to go home. then i fished my guide out and walked some more. i took a nice shower and watched xmen with katie, lauren and charles after we went out for some pizza. the next day i had brunch with julio, my neighbour, and did some work. i like getting work done because it rarely happens efficiently. :| then we went out for dinner and i bought some chicken wire which ended up useless anyway, so what a waste of money. 

this week julio is in mexico for his sister's wedding and i miss him :| but life goes on! on thursday my floor watched v for vendetta as a post-midterm event (lol i can has no midterms) and on friday tony (another neighbour) and i walked to the east river for a photo shoot for my photo class. we found a lovely pile of leaves. i love fall. (on wednesday night jesse and lizzie and i went walkabout and shooting as well, on the west side, and we kidnapped a lawn chair and that was nice too. it reminds me of the time mag and i were at the beach and found a trolley just sitting there like it was waiting for us.) then lauren&katie&charles&i went to try for the wicked lottery again but we didn't win so we tried for the next to normal lottery and won! we watched that, front row, and it was awesome. now i have a shirt that says "valium is my favourite colour", but i guess you need to have watched it to understand. yesterday i met up with louise, whom i made friends with at orientation and never saw again. we tried to go to max brennar but it was crowded as fuck so we went to a nice dim sum place tucked away in another street, and then to an organic tea cafe/restaurant for dessert. i am so glad we hung out! must make this a more regular thing.

today i did a little shopping and am still debating on whether to spend 100+ on a pair of ed hardy boots. they are knee high, dark green, and are quite elegant for ed hardy (yes i am anticipating some derision) but they won't keep me too warm even though they have a lining of fur inside. if i buy that i'll still have to get some uggs to survive winter. how? :|

good luck to all the juniors taking a levels, it won't be long before it's over <333 & love all of you guys even though i don't talk to you too often... lol@23hr/week schedule. D8

i feel like i'm on the verge of doing something i may regret.