cue every memory at half speed.

1. What did you do in 2004 that you'd never done before?
Ran someone else's campaign, drank legally, wrote a final hung over, worked three jobs at once, bought pinstriped pants.

2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Yes, and no.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Clearly not, because I can't remember any.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Yeah.

5. What countries did you visit?
The US.

6. What would you like to have in 2005 that you lacked in 2004?
To move out.

7. What dates from 2004 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
January 24; the end of the Spencer Crusade.
February 16; the slate meeting
April 8; ACF 13.
April 14; 19th birthday.
April 24; E7A Awards Night.
June 28; My first federal election.
September 7; school starts again.
October 1-3; AUS Whistler.
December 12; The Arcade Fire.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Four jobs, two months, sanity maintained.

9. What was your biggest failure?
The first chunk of summer.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Just the opposite; the back is getting better.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Gear for making tshirts.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
They know who they are.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
They know who they are, too.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Tuition. The clothes, food, booze, etc.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Work.

16. What song will always remind you of 2004?
Winter: Blur - No Distance Left To Run
Spring: Squarepusher - Tetra-sync
Summer: The Plastic Constellations - No Complaints
Fall: ...trail of dead - Heart in the Hand of the Matter
Winter: The Arcade Fire - Crown of Love

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? Happier.
b) thinner or fatter? Maybe a few pounds thinner.
c) richer or poorer? Richer.

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Gym time, studying.

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Commute.

20. How will you be spending Christmas?
At home.

21. Did you fall in love in 2004?
Yes. No. I'm confused.
Hold me?

22. How many one-night stands?
None.

23. What was your favourite TV program?
24.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I have better things to do.

25. What was the best book you read?
Both comics, again. Invincible, or maybe 100 Bullets sneaking in just under the gun.

26. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Annie.

27. What did you want and get?
Material stuff, jobs.

28. What did you want and not get?
Material stuff, jobs.

29. What was your favourite film of this year?
Napoleon Dynamite.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
19. Met some friends at the Wolf and Hound, then went to see Squarepusher.

31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Less stupid people.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2004?
I like pants.

33. What kept you sane?
Certain people.

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Fancy? Not really any of them.
Kiefer Sutherland continues to be awesome, though.

35. What political issue stirred you the most?
The spoon vs whisk debacle.

36. Who did you miss?
Mostly Jill; everyone else I see fairly frequently.

37. Who was the best new person you met?
Neil.

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2004:
People are idiots.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
what's the plan? what's the plan?
is it a dream? is it a lie?
I think I'll let you decide.

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shopping with Rob today:

"So, wait. Do you guys hang out in business casual all the time?"
"Yeah, pretty much. This is about as dressed down as we get."
"Oh."
- salesperson in the Gap, as Rob tries to figure out how often we'd match if he bought these pants.

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do you ever get halfway through a post, realize you're not making the point you want to, scrap the whole thing and then close the posting window?

because I just did that.

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Christmas used to be a production over here; lights, tree, togetherness, all of it. Since we've moved, it's basically been canned. Despite the endless media bombardment and everyone else's LJ posts, it could be any day in November right now and I wouldn't notice.

I did get what I wanted; the coat was an absurdly early gift, mostly because I called my mom on it and she agreed that it was bloody cold out now (December 5) and there was no real point in making me wait. My brother, on the other hand, forwent any thought and bought a TV, claimed that it was his gift to us all, and promptly monopolized it at any opportunity. It's 4 and a half feet across, and although it's nice, it makes the whole place seem a lot smaller; the bizarre layout of this place means I can now watch TV in the bathroom mirror if the door is open.

There isn't really a point to this; just a quick vent before I go back to designing shirts and doing campaign stuff. Hope yours was better than mine.

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things

will eventually do the year-in-review meme.

not for a while, though; I just rented the first four episodes of 24 and will probably be picking up the others with great rapidity.
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campaigns are odd creatures.
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Tuesday tours are mine next term! woo!
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Am putting some thought into running for Senate now; I'm considering doing it in March, and it might be easier to do it when there's five spots open instead of just one.
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Also considering these pants. Thoughts? Opinions?
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Have figured out my schedule and that I can fit the gym/pool in three days a week; I'm all excited to go back.
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I'm a little torn on the redesign. On one hand, I've been using this one since mid-June, which is pretty much unheard of. On the other, it works.

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new heights of genius

made the heart/headphones/high fidelity shirt (well, the heart/headphones bit; the quote goes on later), and I PUT THE HEART ON THE RIGHT. the hell was I thinking?!

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that was an interesting night.

I'll never look at Hunan the same way.

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fuck you, osborne g!

really.

why is it so far away?

in any case, I'm done exams. still have 3 distance ed assignments to do, and then I can relax, by which I mean make t-shirts, redesign, and play videogames all day.

[edit: and run other people's campaigns. damn you, spencer and gavin!]

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I enjoyed this.

you might, too.

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with my lightnin' bolts a-glowin'

My introduction to the Arcade Fire came through a webcomic called Questionable Content; the author put up a comic about how, at their live shows, one of their members' entire function was to bang a large drum, dance around, and rock out at appropriate moments.

His name is Will. He did exactly that, and he did it very well.
Also there was Richard, who looked like a bit like Napoleon Dynamite, had bells attached to one leg and played all sorts of instruments.
The two of them fed off the crowd, the music, and each other to produce spontaneous displays of energy and emotion, sometimes with one wrapping the other in a towel while the one being wrapped plays a guitar, sometimes playfighting between songs, or dancing with Sarah the guest violinist.
During Neighbourhood #2 (Laika), they donned motorcycle helmets, grabbed drumsticks, and made noise off of any hard surface, including the plastic cow taped to the kick drum, the proscenium, the motorcycle helmets, each other, the glockenspiel on stage, and ending with Richard perched atop a chair drumming his sticks off each other while Will looked around, then tackled Richard, crashing down to the floor, where they wrestled for a bit before slumping, drained from the exertions and the emotional content of their performance. Moments afterward, they rose, embraced, and prepared to launch into the next piece.

And this was the second song.

They followed it up with a pair from their ealier EP, before leading into a new song and then the mostly-French Haiti. The band infused their songs with life, both by virtue of simply being there and pure musicianship, and despite their claims to have "never really toured before", the band knew how to get and keep a crowd moving. Une Annee Sans Lumiere provided a breather before Neighbourhood #3 (Power Out) segued into Rebellion (Lies), and the normally stonefooted Vancouver hipster crowd became a sea of bobbing heads and twisting bodies, abandoning themselves to the emotionally charged music and mirroring the actions of the band, who, despite looking like they were going to pass out at any moment, powered through, taking a well deserved rest before Neighbourhood #4 (7 Kettles).

The show closed with the energetic Crown of Love and Neighbourhood #1 (Tunnels) which featured the crowd singing to the band, and Will wrapping Richard's head in a towel before simply collapsing.

Hampered by a midnight curfew, the encore almost didn't happen; luckily, the band waited patiently for the filler music to stop, dancing to it while they waited, before surprising us all with a cover of the Talking Heads' Naive Melody. Another round of applause and trepidation went by before the band assumed their positions for In The Backseat, the last song on the album and a fitting, cathartic closer to an emotional show.

After the concert I walked out of the Commodore; sweaty, hoarse, exhausted and wearing a ridiculous grin. I wasn't alone in doing so.

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paging dr. freud

everyone else has bizarre flying dreams.

I had one last night about beef; specifically, some sort of psychedelic steak that was the centerpiece of a seriously weird dream.


...I blame Hinduism.

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some hiatus that was.

Stolen from Collins:

A) First, recommend to me:
1. a movie:
2. a book:
3. a musical artist, song, or album:

(B) I want everyone who reads this to ask me three questions, no more, no less. Ask me anything you want.

(C) Then I want you to go to your journal, copy and paste this allowing your friends to ask you anything & say that you stole it from me.
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I'm not writing for a while!
I swear!

PS. Wolf!

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something of a hiatus

ambient/downbeat playlist? check.
books and notes? check.
diet coke in fridge? check.

won't be writing things here for a while; probably won't see anybody until after the 16th (unless it's at the Arcade Fire show).

might have a redesign up for 2005. no promises.

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I don't know why I bothered coming home.

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hellfuck!

losing a shift in the computer lab job next term. the pay raise offsets it, but I was looking forward to what would have been an extra $50 a week.
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it appears that when brenda says she'll put you into the pool for the CRO position*, she won't. they approved committee staff yesterday at council, which means that hiring went on a while ago.
I shouldn't be surprised, but I am disappointed.

*and if she wasn't in charge of hiring for the position, then a note letting me know of this would also have been appreciated.

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shadows jumping all over the walls

I hate how the anesthetic used by the dentist tends to migrate around my face before fading away; at the moment my left ear, a portion of my nostril, half of my tongue and a little of my jawline are numb and the feeling is most disconcerting.
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School's ending for a little while, which is nice; I'm looking forward to next term's classes but I also think that I may be stretching myself a bit thin; 5 classes, 2 jobs, working ACF and then the commute will be taking their toll on me. I do have Thursdays off, still, so I might be using it to get as much stuff out of the way as possible.
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I have actual work parties to attend; there's bowling with Campus Tours tomorrow, and then possibly ISIT Wine and Cheese on Friday (which conflicts with MASS Anniversary, hence possibly). Bowling's going to be fun, but I'm mildly worried about the combination of geeks + alcohol + coworkers. And there's another ISIT party during the break. Decisions, decisions...
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Two new items on the wishlist, bringing me up to a round ten.
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Had a dream last night where I moved out, and apart from my parents being all mopey about it, things went smashingly. It appears I'm trying to tell myself something.
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Also last night I had the strangest feeling I was sleeping next to someone else, when nobody was there. Very weird.
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Have gained mass, but lost volume. I still need to start swimming again, though; diet changes alone aren't cutting it.

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if it feels like it works, then it works.

I broke these up into two posts so you guys could comment on things that didn't involve the wishlist thing.

GWAR was fantastic.
I'm glad Gavin came, because it's always fun to have company, and the AMS meeting looked soul-crushing. And there's a phone interview soon!!

Wednesday was also a day of adventuring; I ended up hanging out with Spencer, while he attempted to get some stuff from the City Archives and then went shopping.
The best part about shopping with Spencer is that I don't have to pull punches; I can call him a douchebag, or whatever else comes to mind, (usually due to a particular clothing item more than actual faults with him) in public and not worry. It's freeing, and sort of fun to watch the poor salespeople try to convince him otherwise. Coming in a close second are his surprisingly concise fashion tips, like "The entire purpose of pants is to make your ass look fantastic."

I had to make a separate trip downtown after work, just before nine, to make an emergency buying of white t-shirts because I'd forgotten to do that on my first trip. Luckily, the Bay was still open, and due to the diligent efforts of one of their retail monkeys, I was able to pick up a reasonably priced shirt in time for GWAR.

GWAR was, as mentioned before, a fantastic show; I won't go into specifics because it'll be in my Discorder review, which I might put up later.

Got home from GWAR, showered, and collapsed in bed.

Thursday, I did a psych experiment. I almost fell asleep during it; whether it was due to the subject material or because I was that tired is beyond me. Then I gave a tour. It went reasonably well; about 2/3rds of the group showed up, which was more than we were expecting. After that, it was working time in the Buchanan B-Labs for a couple hours, before doing a little leadership training back in Recruitment. I picked up some useful tour stuff, and it was good to see the people I hadn't seen since the first day of training way back when.

Today's been another work/school/work day; I gave a school group tour today where we ran into B. Sull, and when he rushed through the crowd, I explained who he was, at which point he stopped, realized it was a tour, mentioned that they were in good hands because I was one of the campus' student leaders, and then rushed into the department of Asian Studies' Office (we were in the Asian Centre).

I don't think he knows who I am.

After that, I told the Asian Centre story (ask me sometime, it's bizarre), and continued on the tour, which ran smoothly after that point. Except that the kids stopped paying attention after we looked into a classroom in Angus (3/4ths point), which made the parts about the SUB (and the ones I feel most relevant to new students, because it's about clubs and services and getting involved in the community) sort of pointless.

I've been in the Buchanan B-Labs since 1, and at 4 I'll head over to the makeshift lab in BuTo to supervise the 15 iBooks corraled in the little fishbowl to make sure that nobody defaces the pristine, snowy machines.

I really, really want one.

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somewhere, a clock is ticking.

Speaking of wanting things, I've come across this semi-meme(sememe? pseudomeme?) over on Jon F and Christina's livejournals (people who used to also write for Another 48 Hours, and whose writings I regularly read, despite having met them once in passing, and having Jon once entirely not recognize me because I'd lost weight over the summer.) and I'm giving it a spin.

Step One

• Make a post (public, friendslocked, filtered...whatever you're comfortable with) to your LJ. The post should contain your list of 10 holiday wishes. The wishes can be anything at all, from simple and random ("I'd love a Snape/Hermione icon that's just for me") to medium ("I wish for _____ on DVD") to really big ("All I want for Christmas is a new car/computer/house/TV.") The important thing is, make sure these wishes are things you really, truly want.
  
• If you wish for real life things (not pics or icons), make sure you include some sort of contact info in your post, whether it's your address or just your email address where Santa (or one of his elves) could get in touch with you.
  
• Also, make sure you post some version of these guidelines in your journal so that the holiday joy will spread.

Step Two

• Surf around your friendslist (or friendsfriends, or just random journals) to see who has posted their list. And now here's the important part:
  
• If you see a wish you can grant, and it's in your heart to do so, make someone's wish come true. Sometimes someone's trash is another's treasure, and if you have a leather jacket you don't want or a gift certificate you won't use--or even know where you could get someone's dream purebred Basset Hound for free--do it.
  
• You needn't spend money on these wishes unless you want to. The point isn't to put people out, it's to provide everyone a chance to be someone else's holiday elf--to spread the joy. Gifts can be made anonymously or not--it's your call.

There are no rules with this project, no guarantees, and no strings attached. Just...wish, and it might come true. Give, and you might receive. And you'll have the joy of knowing you made someone's holiday special.
my list:

1. to get five people to sign up and complete the freeipods thing.
   
2. hugs.
   
3. to go for coffee with people I don't see. Jon F, Kav and Christina, I'm looking at you three specifically.
   
4. an afternoon to go thrift shopping.
   
5. a scarf, somewhere in the region of six feet long, preferably in a darker color. knit, bought, whatever.
   
6. mix CDs. They're always fun. In fact, I like making them, so maybe we could trade.
   
7. recommendations for things to do, try, see, and listen to.
   
8. for everyone who reads this to leave a comment; especially whoever happens to be reading this in Lithuania. I'm just curious, is all.
   
9. dress shirts with french cuffs.
   
10. dark chocolate.

Contact info is in the comments box so it's not indexed by google and that searching for my name will continue to not bring you here.
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incidentally, it took me 40 minutes of my "workday" to actually write this post, which means I'll have been paid to blog. Fantastic.

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i know what my heart is for

• looking for a new scarf is harder than I thought it'd be.
  
• am currently owed: 3 paycheques, totalling something near $600.
  
• GWAR cancelled their interview.
  
• my dental plan doesn't cover anesthetic.
  
• apparently, elections committee interviews are wednesday. I wasn't contacted, so I guess the "we'll put you in for CRO" thing fell through.

this isn't looking like a good day.
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in happier news, I made another mix. (crossposted at indiemixtape)

1. Björk - Who Is It (4:09)
   
2. Mogwai - Hunted by a Freak (4:15)
   
3. Secret Machines - Nowhere Again (4:13)
   
4. Hope of the States - The Red the White the Black the Blue (3:39)
   
5. The Arcade Fire - Wake Up (5:35)
   
6. Dungen - Du Är För Fin För Mig (8:28)
   
7. Death From Above 1979 - Sexy Results (5:53)
   
8. The Notwist - This Room (4:45)
   
9. Ellen Allien - Wish (4:49)
   
10. Autechre - Leterel (7:08)
    
11. Air - Alone in Kyoto (4:47)
    
12. Squarepusher - Iambic 5 Poetry(5:30)
    
13. Interpol - Specialist (6:40)
    
14. Snow Patrol - Somewhere a Clock Is Ticking (4:32)
    
15. The Futureheads - Carnival Kids (2:44)

there's timestamps because I used Winamp's "Generate HTML Playlist" feature.
I was surprised at the how well Squarepusher leads into Interpol, and also that I managed to work Autechre in at all.

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because it can't hurt:

should you be in the US and not already signed up:
http://www.freeiPods.com/?r=12017944

ps. yay jill!

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