Rollin'

I totally got a thumbs-up from a car passenger this afternoon on my way home from the architecture building.

The Daily News

I have a trash can heaped full of newspaper strips left over from a project last fall. Today I spent the afternoon sewing these strips together. A seamstress I am not, but I like the imprecision that can go into this kind of sewing. I don't have to worry that the corners aren't lining up, or even if all of the strips are even getting touched by the thread. I don't really know what I'll do with the final product, but I like where it's headed.

We Were Somewhere in the Midwest

My favorite conversation from our field trip on Friday:

(At the visitor's center after a walking tour of downtown Columbus, Indiana)

-Indiana, we're in Columbus, Indiana?!
-Yeah.
-I thought we were in Ohio.
-But it only took us two hours to get here, what did you think the bus was just going really fast?
-I wasn't sure.
-Well, there is a Columbus, Ohio if it makes you feel better.

...

It never fails, whenever I wear Andrew's thesis shirt I run into David.

To Touch the Mystery of Death Without Dying

So the cute, drooly baby is Christian, the son of some friends. His mom had a dentist appointment and I kept him for the hour she was there. Even though the hour wore me out we pretty much did what I usually do in the afternoon. We read a book about bikes, we took some pictures, watched some videos, and spent some time looking at ourselves in the mirror. And he is a charmer, smiley, and cute the entire time he was here.

Apparently I'm amassing 1960s office equipment. Aside from the typewriter I've bought a slide projector and then the next day found one by the side of the road. I've also acquired a 1980s Panasonic boom box, for all those times I don't want to hear what others are telling me.

Over the past couple of weeks I've seen four woodchucks. The first was hissing at me from under a late model Passat and I wondered what it might mean. And according to animal-speak and totem analysis I'm about to "get deep within an area of interest" or I'm going to start studying something new that will take two years of "intensive study, digging, and building." All which sounds pretty great to me.

Luckily I've started a few new projects this summer. One deals with mapping trash and the other is taking 10 Polaroids on the 10th of every month. I'm also supposed to be writing my thesis, Part II of the project, but I haven't been feeling that as much.

I'm about to shell out some money to get the road bike rolling. On the other hand, is it okay to spend over a hundred dollars on brake levers (only the levers not the actual part that stops the tires) if the whole bike didn't cost more than a hundred dollars?

Lazy Afternoon

I was watching R.E.M. videos and he was watching the camera.