High Contrast Grey.

My new painting in progress. Thankfully this one is coming along quite quickly and will hopefully not take the months upon months that the last one took.. Last time I was in Seattle I finally wandered into the architecture/graphic design book store on 1st ave and saw a book on this section of Hong Kong that is comprised of huge apartment complexes shoved together where sunlight can’t get. I’ve been trying to find images of this since, as well as the book in general, but it’s just not happening..

http://assets.tumblr.com/swf/audio_player.swf?audio_file=http://www.tumblr.com/audio_file/551571908/tumblr_l1i5m7LMMo1qa6icr&color=FFFFFF Dandelion Junk Queens - O’Buddy. I was woken up the other night by Dan drunkenly arguing with his friend about stupid drunken stuff, but on the upside I found that from the Dandelion Junk Queen’s website it is possible to tediously download three of their albums for free. Can’t go wrong with junk punk from Bellingham, Washington.

New dumpster find. The entire first drawer is now filled with my teas. One of the local thrift stores doesn’t have a dumpster big enough to put furniture into so last night after picking up Stephanie from work we made a slight detour to pick up this dresser. I also got another metal gas cover while walking about (just on the sidewalk next to a door for an empty building, not stolen to leak gas…). Yesterday just seemed to be a good day for free things, and getting a lot done on my latest painting. I started to clean up my room a bit after putting in the new dresser, but got distracted with making squid ink noodles with red sauce for Stephanie and me, and then by FarScape, which I have found a good torrent for and have now, it appears, gotten Stephanie somewhat addicted to it as well. Australian sci-fi with the alien outfits being made by Jim Henson, how could one not get addicted?

The Key’s Knees playing at Spruce Street.

The Key’s Knees playing at Spruce Street. “Yiddick is an alien.”

House party at the Spruce Street house opening with Javier playing songs on the guitar, organ, and accordion as we all sat around on the floor gently rocking back and forth to the music. A cover of Nantes by Beirut.

14th and 42nd. Finally finished after months of working.

While hanging out with my father he showed me a picture he had taken of three trees clumped together. He told me that he had forgotten where he had taken it, but I remembered it was at some back road from Roundup. The back road was actually a hiking trail that transcended slowly down a cliff. Amazing sights of the things below, like a motocross track. As we went along I saw a tree that I felt a need to take a picture of. It looked somewhat like a Playmobile tree of something in the Amazon. Large with bright green shades of leaves to be painted in Rococo paintings. I hurried ahead to find that perfect angle in which to shoot it, but as my shot became more and more blocked I quickly found out that the hiking trail ended by going into someone’s house. Turns out that it was the house of someone I knew from back in my grade school days and I had been on fairly good acquaintances with his father. Somewhat of an awkward hello as I attempted to explain that I was trying to take a picture ...

We are doing gum printing in my alternative process photography class now, which is making me have /lots/ of free time in the alternative process room. Letting the image sit in a bath of water for an hour.. gives lots of time to thinking and playing DJ on the Zune. I’m kind of liking how the image is coming out, but I don’t know if it is something that I would do again.. Meh. I’m still a whore for the lith printing. Dirty and grimy.

Went to a house party the other night. A band from Mexico was touring through and their van broke down here so, being stuck they decided to have another show (and perhaps raise some money to fix up their van?) in the basement of a house. We spent a lot of our time sitting and starring into the fire. Small anecdotes of conversation to occur. Justin with a bottle of wine in his hands retelling his tales of the bizarre and strange. Thoughts into where the artist fits in the modern world. A modern world where communication and knowledge is shared faster than ever.

Cassandra and Mikey playing their accordions in their accordion band. We all sat in chairs arranged as though we were sitting on an airplane. No awkward indie kid shuffle here.

Sketchbook.

We lay on our backs, looking at the ceiling and wondering what God had wrought when He made life so sad. On The Road Jack Kerouac

The bus was 50 minutes late and I just walked the way home. By the time it came I had already reached the university and decided to just walk the rest of the way. I found a tagged no parking sign in the process. Water damaged and broken, soon to be decorating my wall. The city is always more beautiful at night.

Tea. Modern style.

Tea with friends in Seattle.

Things are always more beautiful at night. The way store windows light up the street. A glimpse into an alternate reality of color. A faux warmth.

Ballard Locks. I don’t know what it is but covered/hidden stairways get me excited..

One of the amazing things about Seattle is just how many options there are for food. Especially when coming from Montana. Here we enjoy some Vietnamese tucked away in Ballard. I went off on some tangent about how the French during their occupations of other places influenced food. Thus why I chose this ginormous crepe… so amazingly good.

Walking along with Mr. Ian. Going to look at mummies and two headed cows. One of the only people who actually lives in Seattle that I think can actually pull off walking around with an umbrella with a sense of suave and not looking like a jackass. Like most Seattle-ites with umbrellas.

Ballard as seen from Lauren’s balcony. Space Needle just popping up barely over the horizon. Beautiful and grey.

Olivia passed the fuck out and I went over to Lauren’s new place in Ballard. Just a few blocks over from where I used to live. Actually on my old jogging route.. I miss that girl. She made me some amazing espresso and cocktails with sugar on the rim and her dog Artoo-Detoo Princess of the Droids spent the evening trying to make out with me. I didn’t realize how tired I was even when I would fall asleep and then wake up again for unspecified amounts of time. Guess that’s what driving through the night does though.

Red eyed. Tired. Waiting for the vegetarian chef because Olivia didn’t like eggs. She was prepared a once-in-a-lifetime Beth’s meal of a fajita. She drew them a picture of Montana to say thank you. Colored it brown.

Spring Break! After our long drive to Seattle we wandered into Beth’s Café at about 6am. Red eyed and not quite still in touch with the reality of the world around us. Storming. Wet. And the heart falling for the city all over again..