High Contrast Grey.

Paris on my 24th birthday. We got a gateaux des rois for my birthday cake and I got to wear the crown. My surprise on the inside of the cake was a little green porcelaine cat with brown spots. We followed this up with some apple cidre. Nothing too extravagant, but a lot of fun. I think this is going to be a good age.

Hanging out in my tiny apartment in France. This tickle in the back of my throat seems to be getting worse. But the motivation to go to the Carrefour and get soups and whatnot is not exactly there.. Thankfully I am done with classes until Monday.

I like black and white stripes and I like noodles. It has been too long since I have made my renowned noodles with red sauce..

With the weather being the way that it has been lately I haven’t been wanting to leave the apartment much. I have been trying my best to keep myself busy without spending all my time on my computer. I really doubt that I will get all that I would like to get done this break, but I will at least try to do some things. This short thanksgiving break began rather horribly with first realizing that because of this snowstorm that has hit the northwest that my hopes of traveling to Seattle for a thanksgiving with my friends out there became rather impossible. This was then followed by the phone call from my family that the dog that my family has had since I was 8 had to be put down due to cancer. We saw it coming for a while now, but even still it is hard to realize that now when I go home he won’t be there. When ever I would leave my folk’s place to go back to school I would spend a little extra time with him knowing that it could be the last time I would see him. Since the weather h...

I went out and found a new warmer scarf today since the weather has been turning and the beginning of snow has started to show up, although thankfully it has yet to stick or not melt immediately upon contact with the ground. I was looking for something that was a solid dark grey but was not having any luck, but then I found this scarf that is a combination of black and a dark tan that I thought paired the brown leather cap that I wear all the time very well. Read all of this as further procrastination. I have three assignments due tomorrow and I really just want to not do them and crawl into bed with a French film. Read this further as I need to brew a pot of black tea and just get to work, because it would seem that my sleep schedule is just not going to be anywhere near normal as we get closer and closer to the end of the semester.

The morning can only be infinitely better when begun with a cup of tea. This morning I am having a cup of Earl la creme that I bought from a tea shop that my friends took me to one of the last times I made a trip over to Seattle. It has been too long since I have made it back home to Seattle. Less than a month now till Thanksgiving though, so if Snoqualmie pass isn’t being a bitch I hope to see it soon.

Vive l’anarchie. With a dopey look upon my face hanging out in my living room. I really wish I could paint my walls, but until then I guess I will just keep covering them up. I wonder what kind of housing I will get when I go to study abroad. I’m hoping for an old apartment building with beautiful molding up a few stories with an amazing view of the street below and the buildings around. Hoping.

Well, it is Halloween. I went to a party at Spruce St. on Friday and ended up winning a costume contest that I didn’t realize they were having. The prize was a bag of chips from the kitchen. I left it there because I didn’t really need any more chips. With a mustache like the one I have going on I was short on ideas for costumes. Of course there is always the Dali fall back, which seemed rather esoteric to many and my wide-eyed stare did nothing to try and explain the outfit. I was really surprised that the contacts that I hadn’t worn since my visit to Billings this past summer were still any good. They at least lasted the night until I caught the last drunk bus of the night back to my housing complex. And the other amazing thing was that as the paper flowers from my mustache fell multiple times in the mosh pit (dancing area? The influence of the hippie culture in Missoula is quite apparent when looking at the dancing at music shows) but I still somehow time and time again wa...

It seems that I keep taking more and more photos of me messing around with my accordion while in my living room. Now if only I would actually work on practicing my accordion at the same time instead of getting distracted with making beautiful somber noises. This time I did it for a reference for my steamroller print for the upcoming Day of the Dead (which I should have gone to work on today, but instead stayed home and worked on architecture and study abroad instead… These next two days are /really/ going to suck for me). It seems be be coming along nicely and I will probably just need to spend a few more hours and get a hold of the drill that I have heard about to finish it up. Sometimes I think that I romanticize the bohemian era too much, as I take sips of a mixed absinthe drink from the flask in my vest pocket. On a lighter note.. Halloween costumes and how I have yet to really think about that at all. With the mustache back, perhaps Dali? Time to fall asleep as I att...

I finally got around to taking another family portrait. In the aspect of not having a roommate this semester I wonder if I helped scare of that kid’s parents with Marie standing in the corner in panties and a garter.. I keep forgetting to try and find my skirt when I am at my folk’s. The only class that didn’t assign homework for this weekend was yoga.. I don’t think that I will be having a care free weekend at the Butterfly working on my personal art. Although Cassie did tell me that she was going to be in town this Saturday with one of her new friends from Bozeman. With that coming tomorrow I at least got my room cleaned, next just need to do a few dishes and I will feel like a little bit less of a slob. I think I will round off this week with a glass of absinthe and a film to fall asleep by. Maybe some French comics too. I’ve been downloading some French comics that have emphasis on architecture and actually ended up downloading the random French comic I bought Charlotte...

Still no new roommate. Nice quiet dinners made in the dark and dancing to all those hidden songs of the falling rain. I have been putting of a big grocery trip to restock because of the possibility of heading to Seattle this evening for the weekend with some random girl who added me on the facebooks. I haven’t heard from her since Saturday though, so who knows if this is actually going to happen. I’m even debating packing now, but then again it won’t take me long at all to pack if I do hear from her sometime today… I sure do miss all of the dinner parties in Seattle, although if I don’t make it to Seattle this weekend Robert told me that Spruce Street house is having a Mexican dinner party this evening. I’m still hoping to hear from the cute girl but it would be on par with the way life is that those plans have just fallen through.

I’m still in the short lull before I start having assignments left and right, and of course that is when I get over my little block of ideas for new paintings. I would like it if I could get a cheap stereo that I could hook up my mp3 player to because putting my computer speakers in my doorway is just really not cutting it..

Found another pair of vintage bloomers when visiting my parents again. I’m still trying to find a way to wear them practically in some kind of outfit. Since they poof out too much to wear under any of my pants without getting an awkward all around bulge I thought of trying the drooping pants worn below the ass. I only wish that my rubber braces were a bit longer so that they would help hold up my shorts.

I found a new mirror for cheap over at the goodwill here. A few scratches of age and character. It seems that the longer that I live on my own the more that I just give up in caring about holidays. I had been debating going over to Seattle for the 4th to see friends, but I wasn’t sure about what else I would do there. Feeling trapped but not sure where to go.

Slowly but surely I am turning my apartment into a French bordello. I bought some really cheap green latex house paint to paint some stripes down the newspaper, but Stephanie made me remember that newspaper isn’t very thick and it would probably end up getting onto the wall behind. I’m already covering the walls in little holes that I am going to have to plaster up, I don’t think that housing will like me too much if I then put some green paint onto the walls. But really, fuck these white boring walls. It’s becoming easier and easier to start working on art in the living room now. Nothing like nesting.

I just spent about the last two weeks hanging out at my parent’s place in Billings. It always seems hard to find things to do there. But at least this time I didn’t get called faggot from passing cars every time I decided to go for a walk. Then again I didn’t really walk much this time visiting. I finally got to see my sister play her clarinet at some school concert. When I moved out she had just got her clarinet so I would be hearing squeaks and squawks from her bedroom and this was quite the change. The first song she played was “Hitler has only got one ball” and I muttered along with the lyrics, or at least the first two lines that I could remember since when I hear it in pop culture it usually doesn’t make it past the first two lines. I asked Taryn when she was done if her band teacher also taught her the lyrics to that song and she just looked at me bewildered. Since my roommate moved back home for the summer (and potentially moving out all together meaning university ho...

I don’t like flash very much, but I think that if I develop this as a lithograph that it will help counteract. I think that I will compile some of my already compiled pictures of accordions and bohemian kids for developing. Perhaps Cassandra on the porch can be put into a Nat Sherman fag box as an old pocket photo box. Meh, I really just need to get this done and over with and stop trying to over think the assignment.

I can’t seem to think up ideas for the upcoming final for my alternative process photography class. So, self portrait with my old mustache drawn back on it seems it may be (while listening to Doctor Who radio shows).. Then again that might just be me finishing off two bottles of white wine from the salmon and French lentil dinner that I made Stephanie and myself last night.. Time to probably throw in my accordion, and perhaps my new pipe I got cheap yesterday from the antique store just down the way from Stephanie’s place.

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.

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.