down and out - on - murder mile

I really liked fucked-up books. Suicides, drug addictions, rape, death. Tragedies. Things too terrible to see in the light of day. That's why I love this book.

I was originally draw to this book because it is yellow. But, as I flipped through the pages, I was thrown into the story of a heroin addict and his junkie wife with a narrator's voice like this sound of the city. It's raw. Scary. Real. Honest. Beautiful. It discusses addiction, love, hate, beauty, fear, the façade of real life. 

It's a fast read.

Read it. 

iTunes - Tunes of i - senuTi

Something I learned today.

Preface: My iPod has been screwed up for about six months - after it's been fully charged, it loses power in about thirty seconds.

To fix my iPod, I've decided to restore it to the original settings. This means that I'll have to lose all of my songs, most of which are not on my computer, and all of my settings. However, as I valiantly tried to copy all of my media to iTunes, it simply wouldn't work.

But, I have figured it out. To copy your music from your iPod to iTunes, open up your iPod folder from My Computer. It should have a hidden folder called iPod_Control, which has all of your settings, music, cover art, etc. Right-click the folder and chose Properties, then un-check the Hidden box under Attributes. Click Okay.  Now, you are free to File, Add New Folder to Library in iTunes.

El fin.

Edited to add: Restoring my iPod did fix the battery problem, but not all of my music was stored, though I copied it to iTunes. Weird, but worth it.

sinfest - fest of sin - tsefnis

Sinfest has become one of my favorite comics ever. It covers just about everything - love, religion, good, evil, sex, rejection, indulgence, porn - with clever dialog and beautiful lineart. Multiple sets of stories (Slick and Monique, God and Devil, Pooch and Percy) flow together to create a comic that will make you laugh, make you cry, and make you say, "What the fuck did I just read."

Highly recommended. Brilliant.

wordstock 3 - wordstock three - wordstock tres

I know I'm the second-worst blogger ever (thanks for being first, Laura.)

However, I feel obligated to share this and this and this with you for my own bragging benefit. I am now officially published!

I now have eight copies of my book in my possession. I bought them at the Wordstock festival in Portland on the weekend of my birthday at the Franklin, Beedle & Associates Publishing booth. When my mom and I went to the cashier (Jim Leisy, who originally started the Short Fiction Competition) to buy our copies, he remarked, "Wow, you sure are buying a lot of these."

My mom replied, "Well, my daughter is a finalist."

The entire booth erupted. "This is Danya?!" "Danya, we think you have so much potential!" "I loved your story!"A judge from the competition was there and he told me that he received my story because another judge had put it through to him as the winner of ten stories he had read.

It was amazing, it was incredible, it was what I want to do for the rest of my life.

juno - juno - juno

i think that it's just about time to do a post about the movie "juno". obviously, the movie is entirely founded on clever dialouge ("that ain't no etch-a-sketch; this is one doodle that can't be undid, homeskillet.", "i figured you could never have enough of your favorite one-calorie breath mint.", etc.) and witty, random characters, but is overall a fucking awesome movie. this is my favorite scene and i think it gives you a pretty much solid look at what "juno"'s all about:

also, the soundtrack is a fantastic array of indie-rock. it's awesome. 

wordstock 2 - stock de mot - wortlager

after about two months of insanity, i have checked my email and received a letter from wordstock, the annual literary festival in portland, congratulating me on being one of the ten finalists! i already have secured a place in the wordstock 10, an anthology that will be available at the festival, by being a finalist, but i have to wait until november to hear the final word.

i am ecstatic. wish me luck!

stingrays - pastenagues - stechrochen

again. i am sorry for the hiatus, but i just finished the second week of school and am literally exhausted. i try to get over eight hours of sleep every night, but at the end of the day, i am always completely drained.

anyways, that's not your problem.

my dad sent me this awesome fowarded email of the golden stingray migration:

"Looking like giant leaves floating in the sea, thousands of Golden Rays are seen here gathering off the coast of Mexico .

The spectacular scene was captured as the magnificent creatures made one of their biannual mass migrations to more agreeable waters.

Gliding silently beneath the waves they turned vast areas of blue water to gold off the northern tip of the Yucatan Peninsula

Sandra Critelli, an amateur photographer, stumbled across the phenomenon while looking for whale sharks.

She said: 'It was an unreal image, very difficult to describe. The surface of the water was covered by warm

and different shades of gold and looked like a bed of autumn leaves gently moved by the wind.

It's hard to say exactly how many there were, but must range in the thousands.

We were surrounded by them without seeing the edge of the school and we could see many under the water surface too.

'I feel very fortunate I was there in the right place at the right time to experienced nature at his best.'

Measuring up to 7ft (2.1 meters) from wing-tip to wing-tip, Golden rays are also more prosaically known as cow nose rays.

They have long, pointed pectoral fins that separate into two lobes in front of their high-domed heads and give them a cow-like appearance.

Despite having poisonous stingers they are known to be shy and non-threatening when in large schools.

The population in the Gulf of Mexico migrates, in schools of as many as 10,000, clockwise, from western Florida to the Yucatan."

infidel - infidèle - ungläubiger

 

i read "infidel" by ayaan hirsi ali in less than 48 hours, which is good for me, considering it was a memoir. it was absolutely fantastic - to be thrust into the extremism of tradition muslim culture is astounding. it is an amazing capture of life and survival. recommended. on the scale of one to ten, this one goes to eleven. 

plan - avenir - zukunft

so, i was going to post another drawing today, but then i kind of fucked up the picture, so i have to restart it/move on to a new picture. anyways, i thought that i would do a post about colleges, because it's the weekend before school starts and i'll be writing my college applications this fall. that's crazy scary.

anyways, i have six colleges i want to apply to:
(ranked in order of desirability)
1. goucher college
2. colorado college
3. hampshire college
4. reed college
5. pitzer college
6. bard college
7. university of nebraska (go corn huskers!)

no, wait. just kidding about that last one...

so, yeah. i've narrowed it down and am scared out of my mind because it's coming up so fast. i mean, i'm taking a couple really tough courses this year that i hadn't been planning on taking (ap statistics, for one), but i'm also going to go all out on my academics this year to make up for last year.

i'm also planning on starting an art appreciation and experience club at pchs with two of my friends (the finer things club - american office reference) and an underground zine with another friend (the bullsheet). also planning on learning how to dive (maybe).

so, yeah. that's my bare-bones plan for this year.

boycott - israel - video

again, sorry for the hiatus. i've been working my ass off to get ready for school (which starts in exactly a week!). anyways, i received this video from my good friend bonnie and found it funny and extremely depressing at the same time. enjoy.

0 - the fool - attempt

so... this is my first attempt at actually drawing. the inspiration was of the zero tarot card: the fool. sketched with a 2h faber-castelle pencil, inked with faber-castelle pigment liners (black), and colored in with 7 prismacolors (three of them skin colors). i think that this came out well - the pose is a little awkward and the anatomy isn't all there, but i think that the colors and techniques are good, for the most part.

critique, or not, but i just wanted to share this first step into the world of markers and "real" art.

(sorry for the shitty image, but it was the best i could do - the colors are brighter in real life and the lines are crisper)

goucher - college - future

(i couldn't get the video embedded correctly, so go here.)

i have found a college. i know this may come as a surprise to all of you, seeing that i've been extremely undecided about what i'm going to do after my high school graduation, but i have (officially) found my 'perfect' college.

it's a small school (under 2000 students) that has independent study and required study abroad. i could see myself going to goucher and will do my best to get in.

billboard - wwf - awesome

this awesome billboard built by wwf. innovative and pretty much one of the best billboards that i've ever seen.

sorry for the extremely short post, but i have work to do. excuse me...

markers - prismacolors - excuses

first of all, please excuse the little hiatus. i'm really trying to update this blog regularly, but sometimes i can't think of a post idea/i don't have the time/i'm not in the mood/the sun is in my eyes/insert some lame-ass excuse here.

also, sorry about the lack of picture, but, don't worry - there will be more soon.

i got prismacolors! and faber-castell pigment liners! and cool bleed-proof paper! it's very exciting. i've been wanting to do more with markers after seeing camille's inspirational marker work, but all i had was my brother's old dried-up primsacolors (the fine tips were unusable and the colors were dull). so, i finally shelled out $30 and got five markers and a pack of pigment liners and quality paper!

i love markers. i've been messing around with colored pencils but, damn. it takes a really long time to color in something all smooth-like. markers are quick, convenient, and really fun.

craziness - folie - wahnsinn

it takes thirty seconds to figure out what craziness really is.

trip abroad - voyage à l'étranger - reise auswärts

 

seeing that i've denied that i can't go to the lion park in johannesburg for a volunteer trip abroad for a number of years, this morning i searched for another trip i can take during my year off after high school: working with horses in the african bush. 

the minimum age is seventeen (unlike the eighteen of the lion park trip), so i'd go in the spring after my birthday. working with horses and conservation is split 40%-40% on the trip, with "other activities" being the other 20%. it sounds fun and it's a feasible trip abroad for the year after graduation.

awesome.

"i was kidnapped by lesbian pirates from outer space"

sorry - this is two reviews in a row, but i feel as if i need to share this comic with the (very few!) readers of this blog. this insanely witty comic is the story about a susan bell, a normal girl kidnapped by lesbian pirates from outer space to travel throughout the galaxy while outwitting male man, sally speed, and, of course, the notorious gay ninjas from mars. fantastic artwork, clever dialog, and absolutely hilarious characters.

go check it out. highly recommended.

the dark knight

i have now seen "the dark knight" twice. i am not ashamed to admit this fact. in fact, i would consider seeing it another time, it's that good.



 this movie is unlike any other superhero movie i've ever seen. i think this is partly because batman is not necessarily a hero; he does not always do what would be considered the right thing to do. also, heath ledger completely revolutionized the concept of the joker. obviously, jack nicholson's portrayal was much more like the comic book joker, while ledger made the joker so much more tangible:

ledger's interpretation of the joker was much more psychotic, instead of simply being bizarre. he made every scene he was in incredibly profound (in a sick and twisted way). from imdb: "In "The Dark Knight", the late Heath Ledger portrayed The Joker as a completely psychotic and demonic killer. Any humor that the character shows is sardonic and cruel. Ledger's Joker was a personification of anarchy and chaos. His primary goal seems to be to prove that people, in dire situations, are just as sick and horrible as he is. This Joker's most frightening and dangerous asset is his intelligence. He says late in the film, "If I were to kill a gangbanger or blow up a tank full of soldiers, no one would mind because it's all.....part of the plan." Thus, The Joker's plan is to not have one and show that there doesn't have to be a reason to everything: chaos."

i have not stopped thinking about this movie since i saw it. i would definitely recommend it to anyone and everyone.

piano - klavier - piano

for the first time in my life, i'm actually interested in playing piano. unfortunately, i can't read music, nor do i have the desire to do so, but my mom is gradually teaching me a classical song. also, my mom can only remember the song by playing it and, consequently, it's difficult to learn the notes when she's figuring it out herself, but, i like this method because it allows me to learn in chunks of notes and, because the "lessons" are irregular, i have time to work on basic playing skills.

it's fun.

it's a way for me to procrastinate on doing something productive without spending massive amounts of time in front of a screen. which is always good.

picture credited to lateralus2112 on deviantart.

family guy - gars de famille - familienkerl

 

in a cruel, twisted turn of fate, i am now proving to myself and to my family that i will not watch "family guy" for a full four weeks starting today. it's pretty much the only show i watch regularly (although, i think i've seen even episode at least twice), but i enjoy it so much because of its awkward and bizarre humor that normal people find repulsive. but, i've been meaning to free myself from the neon glow of the television for a while anyways, so it's good for me.

it will be tough to not use "family guy" as an excuse for procrastinating on doing something productive, but i believe that i will prevail.

wordstock - stock de mot - wortlager

even with my frenzied pace on completing my online courses, annotating "extremely loud and incredibly close", and my computer going "kablooie" (yes, i have been reading "calvin and hobbes" as of late) every nine and a half minutes, i've managed to find the time to make one of my stories compatible with the wordstock (portland's annual book festival) contest requirements without wrecking it, and so i'm sending it in.

seeing that it's pretty unlikely that some publisher will see my work in my high school's literary magazine and immediately give me a book contract, i've been taking my writing and its chance to be published much more seriously. therefore, i'm sending in my best piece.

wish me luck!

alice - storytelling alice

alice is a free educational programming software from cmu. it teaches computer programming in a 3d world that you build. from the website: "Alice is an innovative 3D programming environment that makes it easy to create an animation for telling a story, playing an interactive game, or a video to share on the web. Alice is a freely available teaching tool designed to be a student's first exposure to object-oriented programming."

i've been messing around with storytelling alice, which seemed like an easier, more story-based program. its intuitive format has introduced me to a world of combining story-telling with computer programming and would suggest it to anyone who's ever been interested in computer animation.

willkommen - bienvenue - welcome

this blog is probably worthless in the eyes of the general public, but (fortunately or unfortunately) that's how i roll. it's my way to focus, inspire others and myself, celebrate life, show off my work, and empty my mind.

enjoy.