*Lion* and Lyft

In the morn I've got a test; I'll make this quick so I can rest.

Trying to rhyme isn't really helping my cause out. It just, I mean you really have to spend a lot of time, thinking about not just the ideas but the words as well... so, moving on.

Saw Lion today. What a story. Got no idea at all why it's PG-13; if the ratings system were up to me I'd hand it a G, but, like I've said before I have no clue what's good for kids or not. Great, beautiful message and everything. What the heck, show the kids, I don't know. Didn't even know why it's called Lion, until the end, when it was all- alright, it's not even a twist, but I daren't spoil it. Suffice it to say, it's one of those titles that make the movie better for it. Not like Brave, or Fried Green Tomatoes, where they just sort of shoehorn it in there- more like The Good Dinosaur, where the title actually gives you something deep and insightful about the characters. (Arlo is, just, objectively good. Objectively. The title of the film even agrees!)

I guess I could go over a basic plot- young Indian boy gets separated from his family and lost, picked up by an orphanage 1,200 km from home, adopted by an Australian couple, and twenty-odd years later finds home again using Google Earth. It's based on a true story, so we allow the use of product, to an extent, but the film's acceptance, 6 Oscar nominations and all, shows how much we're becoming willing to not dismiss something off the bat for using specific, branded technologies. These brands are our lives, so that's a good thing. We're not unaffected by these; they're pervasive, and they connect us in ways that can be deeper than we first think. Kneejerk we're suspicious of anything featuring product, but we have common social media apps we need specific technology to access, and don't bat eyes. Technology is marching swiftly, so being really specific with the way we showcase it dates our works, but we still need to have it, in order to be truthful to life. It's interesting.

This short animated film, June, shown to us in motion design class yesterday, is about a little old lady who connects to people using Lyft. And it's beautiful.

So it's like that.

Things I am and am Not Toast In

Meant to do a post about the TASK afterparty, where we made goop and it was good, while meanwhile I worked on my business plan as well, but, I got cut off by midnight again soon enough, but after I'd posted up three photos, enough, to say, I'll just probably add that stuff to yesterday's post. Meanwhile, though, guess I'll do a post at all here today, though I made a significant in Pretzelize Me Cap'n! which you should read, not only because it's important backstory but also because I think it's wrote pretty good. I am a krutaking wordsmith, I am.

Tl;dr is, I just started on project three in information design class, and like turns out that it was actually due this week. The whole thing.

You really should go read that post; it's good. And I'm assuming from now on that you have.

So Prof Frohn got back to me after I emailed him, and I'm not totally sunk, he says, because project 4 is just that huge, that it's worth so many stinking points, that my grade even after all this is totally salvageable. And I know that word's got some pretty specific maritime usage which doesn't mean at all what we use the word "salvage" to mean, but bleeuh.

It's just, better to have all the previous projects under belt, to use the skills gained there in this project, is all.

So turns out I'm not totally hosed in that class. Which is bad, actually, because being hosed over, that's what I'd been throwing my lifesaver behind; I mean, I've got stuff due in other classes, too, but I've been kind of neglecting that going nuts on information design. Wanna walk through them with me?

• Motion design- big project. Final project of the semester, I think. Due next week. Not sure how that works. I've, vaguely started on it?

• Business for the Professional Artist class- one of Dan Burr's off-the-cuff assignments, have 100 social media followers on your art account, and posting regularly using 25 (!) hashtags regularly, is due tomorrow. Haven't, um, well I've made sort of swishing motions with my arms, in the general direction of that.

• Mesoamerican art class- second quiz on Wednesday. I think I've got this; I had the first quiz handily, after all. But meanwhile in that class we're supposed to be writing papers and stuff. I haven't gotten any done since those first three, which I didn't even do the best on (the paragraphing was really weird, because I was trying to fit everything into one page apiece, is part of it.) You don't get penalized for a bad grade or anything, credit is additive in that class, but, alright I started a bunch of fiction books to do a report on maybe one of them, but none of them held my interest for that long.

• Other classes (Foundations of the Restoration; Art Seminar; Concentration (online class worth .5 credits I'm taking this half of the semester, so that I learn how to concentrate better and also because I needed .5 more credits for scholarship purposes))- I'm fine. So, there's those at least.

But I kind of, I don't know. I like the feeling of sinking; scrambling in Info Design kind of gave me an excuse to drag down those other classes too, but now that I know that the hole in the dinghy isn't really that bad, it's, eh. Now I have to somehow find 100 followers within the next 9 hours, when I should be sleeping. I mean, I should have somehow done that anyway, a couple of weeks ago. (Sound familiar?)

Whatever; I'll just sleep. Did that a lot today, in 2 out of 3 classes conking out. Another great thing about having so much stuff gradually piling on top of me in a Hollywood quicksand mire of taskage, is that it really forced me to be frugal with my time.

The Task Party Chronicles, pt IV

First off, I've been starting these usually with tangents about movies, so here's my avenue to say, the Oscars thing happened! Yay winning! Lion King was what I think inspired them to come out with Best Animated Film in the first place, wasn't it, so it never got that because it wasn't around yet, but it did win the 1994 Annie Award for best picture, as did Zootopia this year.

Anyway I guess I can think of no reason not to get to the TASK party itself by now. Thursdays hold Art Business in the mornings, and nothing else unless there's an Art Seminar in the evening which there was this time. There weren't clean checks last Thursday for some reason. There were this time, once again, so, in between homework (working on the business plan) there was also cleaning the apartment, and not much else I guess. That takes us through to the Art Seminar, where the guest lecturer was actually a museum curator talking about that; the seminar was apparently at the same time as the art gallery exhibit open house, Robert Daughters silkscreen prints, this time. The open house looked over by the time I swung by to catch any refreshments that may have been; it did mean there was no line but it also meant that the only food to speak of still left was the remnants of salsa and tortilla chips, with the less popular of the veggie platter offerings still up as well. Why am I telling you all this; I don't know. Moving on to the party now. I've got pictures.

What is it about foxes? The two or three examples of foxiness going on in the above photograph are all unrelated, and this photo still leaves out the other person who'd been bestowed fox ears (the woman here I also gave a tail; making her that outfit was the first task I was given. (That shiny tin in the foreground is where the slips with the tasks on are located.)) It also leaves out the Fantastic Mr Fox drawing that was auctioned off; Brother Keller won, though I bid $5, by bidding a $2 bill, which are apparently worth like $10 each nowadays. It wasn't until later that I had a Brazilian 10 centavo piece in my pocket...

The Task Party Chronicles, pt III: I almost get around to the actual party part

So I recently revisited all the major releases that are coming out this year, and I guess there's more than two movies still to come out I'm looking forward to? On average there's no single month with more than one film being released I'm anticipating, which is a major departure from last year of course where basically the only movie that didn't interest me was that Fantastic Beasts thing. I guess each month this year will be defined by one movie. Like the way years work in Infinite Jest, but different, because I said so.

1. January Monster Trucks
2. February Rock Dog
3. March Spider-Man 3 (yeah, nothing's coming out next month, but Spider-Man 3's an awesome movie)
4. April Spark
5. May Dead Men Tell No Tales
6. June The Mummy
7. July Spider-Man: Homecoming
8. August Spider-Man: Homecoming some more (I mean the first Nut Job was okay...)
9. September Ninjago I guess, just because WAG's track record is 3-for-3 in my eyes
10. October My Little Pony; also maybe the Cloverfield movie that's coming out just on principle
11. November actually has a few interesting-looking ones coming out, including Pixar's new thing Coco, a Kenneth Branagh-helmed Murder on the Orient Express film (!) and yeah speaking of Kenneth Branagh Thor Ragnarok which if I had to choose one film for November it'd be that (Kenneth Branagh directed the first Thor, of course, which is where I got that segue; this one's being directed by Taika Waititi (!), though to be honest I can't remember who directed the second one)
12. December The Last Jedi, probably. I have a deep-seated apathy toward it as of now, but that's how I felt about The Force Awakens till I saw that in theaters, so, yeah.

So, as you can see from my list, yes. Between the first two films on this list that have already come out, the Spider-Man 3 thing, and the Pirates of the Caribbean movie, we can already tell: the new DC movies are going to be awesome, the new Marvel films are all going to be terrible (except for Guardians 2 by dint of not being on my list), and the new Star Wars movie is going to be a disappointment. (Apparently my taste in movies is bad. If you need me to explain the joke.) (There, must've been, a memo, sent out telling everyone to dislike Monster Trucks?, which I'm pretty sure must've been sent out on opposite day or something, because, MONSTER TRUCKS how can you not think that's cool!?)

Can I just gush about Monster Trucks for a bit? It's, just, a great great masterpiece of celluloid. 100% pure awesome. It doesn't care how so many people think it's dumb. It's just all, shut up I'm Monster Trucks. Monster Trucks does what Monster Trucks wants. Because it's Monster Trucks. It knows it's cool. Not very many other films have that much self-confidence. Not very many other films are about underground sea monsters who have hive intelligence, bioluminescence, tentacles and cute whale faces, who've evolved to metabolise crude oil. I'm shortlisting it on my already short list of this year's films, to be one of the best of this year's films. I, just, I just love that movie. Greatest movie of the year, so far, and it won't be unthroned very easily. Godspeed you, Monster Trucks. Godspeed you.

And Spider-Man 3, can I gush about that now too? Not that it's as great a movie as Monster Trucks, of course, and maybe the critics actually have a point or two this time, like, maybe they could have saved Venom for Spider-Man 4, because three villains crammed in there is pretty bloated, but, the alien symbiote stuff, black suit Spider-Man, superfly Peter Parker jamming through the street high on self-confidence, that was way cool. Spider-Man 3 is way cool. Sam Raimi is a way cool way underrated, genius auteur.

...dang it, if the movies on my list are going to be bad, does that mean that the Transformers movie this year is actually going to be good? Despicable Me 3? How about the Emoji movie? Or maybe every movie this year is going to be terrible, and not being on my list won't spare you...

Anyway, I guess I'm continuing my story about Thursday now. Thursday was pretty crazy; there were like 5 things going on all at the same time.

1. The business plan due in Business for the Professional Artist class
2. Thursday apartment clean checks
3. Art seminar
4. Open house for the new Spori Gallery art exhibit
5. now, this thing, this Task Party.

All at the same time. Or, well, the Task Party, definitely scheduled after the art seminar, it being an, art thing, but other than that, all at the same time. The idea of checking out a Thursday preview for Rock Dog crossed my mind only briefly. 

Um, to be continued again I guess; I seem to have run out of time again. Get to the party next time, I promise. Meanwhile, know what's a good song? This:

The Task Party Chronicles, pt II: This is actually a review of Rock Dog, go see it

Rock Dog isn't a masterpiece or anything, but it might be as good as Sing, though in different areas. Both have their flaws, but both have areas of pure unfettered creativity as well, and music that's only occasionally mediocre, and is generally pretty good or great. The song "Glorious" was awesome. The score was really good. I can't remember any of the score for Sing, though I know there was one. Films about the power of good music kind of need to have good music, and, well maybe the songs I didn't like will grow on me upon relistens? The rock n' roll in this film is actually genuinely rock n' roll instead of just rock without the roll, which is, I mean, there's a character who's a robot but it's still tough to pin down the time period this film's supposed to take place in, you know?

It felt like, especially with some of the cornier gags like the sheep forgetting everything ('cause sheep are dumb) (conveniently allowing exposition to be delivered, with a stern "I've told you a thousand times, we've been over this" from J.K. Simmons,) it felt like a funny animal comic out of the '40s and '50s. It is based off of a comic, Tibetan Rock Dog, which I think I've heard of before but never actually read or anything of course, so maybe that comic was/is deliberately trying to channel that, and some of that made it to film? I don't know.

The wolves were great, especially in character design. Loved that. Solid character/creature designs all around, more consistent than Sing's, but the wolves were... well, it's not like I haven't seen wolf designs that look like that before, Robin Hood and Kung Fu Panda do similar things off the top of my head, but Rock Dog managed to make the triangle-head-wolf-with-pointy-nosey-overbite fresh somehow. Kenan voices one of them; Kel doesn't voice the other, unfortunately, otherwise we'd have a nice thing going on with those-two-bad-guys wolf voice actors played by comedy duos, between this and Storks with Key and Peele. I'm not sure how good the terms they're on with each other anymore; I think it's warmed up I mean they did do that Jimmy Fallon thing together...

Zootopia's still totally winning the recent spate of animal-city movies of course, but the other contenders are pretty strong.

Um so Task Party. Brother Keller gave me the address, Sister Jimison's house, and tried to describe what one is, but failed, and said, there's videos on YouTube explaining it, just look at that.

So I did.

The Task Party Chronicles, pt I: I would've had this all as one post if time didn't run out on me writing it halfway through, but There Are No Bugs, Only Features

I hate it when YouTube videos and webcomics and stuff (maybe hate is a strong word) apologize for a schedule slip, because I'm always reading/viewing those years after their first upload, so it doesn't really matter to me, but... haven't posted at all this week, up till now, so now you future blogreaders know, you future blogreaders, you. Has it been crazy, trying to catch up on late work and hopefully now be on the same level as everyone else in the class? Well, it probably should have been more crazy, I mean, there's always room for time usage to be more efficient, but, yeah, sure, crazy enough.

Now that I'm done-ish with (most of) the big stuff that was due this week, mostly the business plan that was due in the Business for the Professional Artist class (and I've shifted my art-business focus from graphic design for board games, to the serigraphy thing, which means that all that time tracking down the contact info for 100 different board game companies to have them in a potential client list was time spent in vain) I guess I can post here again for a bit but hey guess what: on a whim, Bro Burr gives us ANOTHER crazy assignment to have completed off the top of his head, track down and use, what was it, 25, 50 hashtags, to use in each art post, to attract more eyes to our stuff? See what works for others, and start using those. So yeah. Maybe I should be doing that instead of this.

But you want to know another thing I maybe should have been doing homework instead of doing (I actually got the business plan due by midnight, so it turned out to be okay)?

Heading home after BftPA class, cutting through the I-can-never-remember-which-dead-white-guy-this-one's-named-after building like I do sometimes (weather's been crazy today; snowed all night and though there was barely a trace of snow left on the ground yesterday today the whole planet seems thick with slippery powder) I found myself outside of Kody Keller's office, and, maybe I should flashback to something I realize I never told you about in the first place, though I have mentioned it in passing-ish on Facebook.

There was a design-an-acorn contest, acorn sculpture 3''x3'' to act as a sort of trophy of some faculty award, for students to compete in, this semester. 1st prize $100, so, yeah sure I like money, no skin off my nose if I fail. It'd been coming up for a few months, so I'd designed mine over Christmas, in my head, and sketched out some ideas in the car on the way back to school. Built it, got it turned in at the 11th hour (it's like I can't not operate like that; like the mighty koi fish, I expand to fit my temporal container. I'm a time koi, in other words. I'd had this analogy before, but the realization of how true that is was really codified in my mind this week, yesterday morning, when I had readings to do for religion class, and it looked like I had a solid half-hour more than I needed to turn it in, maybe I'll even get it in early this time, but the final very few verses of reading took me 20 minutes to complete somehow. I turned in the assignment at 8:59, with a 10:00 deadline, which seems like I did get it in early, until you realize that that left me only 1 minute to put on pants and shoes and get to my Mesoamerican art class at 9:00. So I missed the tip of the nose of that one; I'm not sure how that class did begin. And just now, turning in my business plan due on Thursday, it took until midnight local time (so, now Friday) to actually have the "send" button hit on the email. I'm like a koi that expands to fit its temporal container, true, but in a truer sense I actually expand just beyond my temporal container, sloshing out a bit, maybe even breaking the bowl. (And did I mention that the idea of having the business plan in on Thursday was to turn in a printout in class this morning, but emailing to him while still Thursday would still be technically acceptable?))

But! The acorn sculpture wasn't turned in that much at the 11th hour! There were still a solid 20 minutes left, to turn the acorn in to (and definitely not "into") Brother Keller. Brother Keller, I've mentioned before in passing, is the ceramics teacher who replaced the retired Brother Geddes. I had art readings class from Brother Keller, his first semester, and he's a rad dude. So, turning in my acorn, there were still 20 minutes where Brother Keller was still contractually obligated to stay in his office in case any students had their acorn to turn in, because the contest deadline said, turn your submission in to him in his office by this time and no later. Looks like my submission was the last one, but he still had to stick around, so he invited me to stick with him, and we chatted.

So passing by his room this morning, I had to stop in, not only to pick up my acorn now that the contest is over (they liked our stuff so much everybody won, $10 at least to everyone who submitted but that still doesn't answer whose design was chosen to be the acorn trophy) but to shoot the breeze.

And that's when he mentioned the Task Party going on after the art seminar, this evening...

(to be continued!)

2017 Backlog 15/15: Feeling Romantic

This is what's playing right now as I type. Last backlog. I'm feeling, relieved, like completing a marathon. Woot, woot.

2017 Backlog 14/15: New Year's Eve

Less than ten minutes till the new year now. We've just been, not doing much special. I guess we are staying up. Alex and I will be playing video games as soon as it's Monday, but it's just been a quiet Sabbath. Went to church. Read our patriarchal blessings. Played some games (first real boardgames at all, this vacation- we're home, but we haven't been playing board games that much for some reason. Probably video game related.) We'd thought that Overwatch and League couldn't be played at the same time, with the wifi here, but we did that yesterday a couple of times.

2017 Backlog 13/15: 2/20, and Ten Till Midnight

This is actually an interesting experiment, what's going on here with these backlogs. I uh don't have time to write this one though.

2017 Backlog 12/15-- The Four Page Zone

Just sitting here, posting, Hannah and us all watching Studio C playlists, waiting for that Snapchat video thing to finish compiling. Woo. These posts don't need to be long; Stacy just asked "Are you satisfied?" in the video, and, yes I guess I am.

Missing: Dino

Trying (but not very hard right now because there's other stuff to be doing) to make this blog look more professional, by adding some margin space between the edges of the post frame and the post body. I stumbled across my own blog almost as a stranger a couple of days ago, and so with fresh eyes I was able to see what's keeping this blog's design from being comfortable to read. Needs better margins. Feels kinda skeevy, at its current level of tightness. I'm sure I could find out what to adjust in the source code of the blog's appearance itself, but I haven't really found a place to change the margin width in any tools or settings easily available, not that I've tried terribly hard, or at all.

(20 Minute Later EDIT: okay, I found it, HTML line 376. See if that feels better, or if I need to adjust it further.)

Old latest layout of blog.

Anyway.

If you are not down with Sir Peter Ustinov in yellowface then you have no soul.

Pretzadvice Wanted, pt Deux

Pretzels Prints is, man I don't want to call it either perfect or pretty [anything] (but pretty good especially) because excessive alliteration is devilcraft I'm pretty sure, but those are the words that are lending themselves to me right now: Pretzels Prints is perfect, or barring that, Pretzels Prints is pretty good. My logo is already a paw print, with a pretzel I mean look at the visual pun there, so even if I don't do prints (another one of my very favorite passions I never have time or resources to do) I think the name still holds up. Though it's totally pointing me in the direction of prints as my artistic output, and so there's an excuse to serigraph right there.

A couple of concerns though still: Prints when put that way comes across as a last name, which is fine but "Pretzels Prints" wouldn't in that case roll off the tongue as easily as maybe "Pretzel Prints" would, with the singular Pretzel?, which 1) strays back into the territory of that one guy, and anyway 2) it's (Pretzels's name's) definitely plural, and the other dude (Pretzel singular) removes the reason-that-wasn't-there-in-the-first-place to change it.

But there's an idea in that, in "Pretzel Prints." It, above "Pretzels Prints," makes me sound like the prince of pretzel, or something, while it just sounds possessive I guess the other way, removing ambiguity and thus covering up the presence of the delicious pun. Maybe swap the order of that, which makes retaining the plural still sound good: Prints Pretzels- which might work, but I'm not sure if it sounds like a name more than a title. Retaining some connection either way to my original, I mean real, I mean my name*: Eric spelled backwards is Cire, so, you know, "prince" there I guess. It's also already a practical near-anagram, Eric/Prince, outside of the meaning there behind the word sire.** Regardless of the placement of the word Prints, whether positionally or post-positionally to the word Pretzels, I like it being there, for, those three reasons I outlined.***

I thank everyone who didn't give me advice, because it probably maybe might have been bad. But, maybe I still need some. Also, this should (probably) have been completed yesterday, so. I just need one nudge one way or the other. If none come, I think I've got it either way.

Question Question/ Advice Solicitation

Alright, so, didn't get up a post yesterday (but Andrew got up a post (link!) so you can read that until I find time to get around posting. (Outbreak, it's got all my favorite mechanics,* AND hexes, AND hefty doses of theme!)) And suuuure let's say it's because I'm super busy this week, that I didn't find time to do the Valentine's-day-stuff-now-on-discount review that I'd meant to do.

Been, AAARRGGGHHH, is how I've been today. I thought that I had stuff to get on doing yesterday, but today was literally nutsoid (and by "literally" I of course mean definition 2 (is there any other kind?)) On the spur of the moment, in Business for the Professional Artist class, Brother Burr created for us a new assignment to have completed: create (a) Facebook and Instagram page(s?) exclusively for our arts, link them, post regularly like we're already supposed to be doing, net 100 followers by Tuesday, offer up our arts through an e-commerce site of our choosing, and, by the end of the semester, sell something through said e-commerce site. So today I had to, I mean, I, well today, well, yikes.

But let's walk through it.

I realized a couple of days ago, may have even been as late as yesterday, that I have no obligations to my own past. I have no obligations basically at all, as far as the future goes. I may love filmmaking, and my pet project may be a fictionalized surrealistic high school memoir/police procedural, but I don't have any obligations toward it. I mean really, I love making movies so much, but how frequently do I really get to try my hand at it? Besides this semester, where I've got a motion design/animation class? I don't have to rail or derail, one way or the other, my future just to get a USA (or whatever) original television show just because some of its episodes have pretty neat whodunnits at their core, or because already I have strong stylistic conceits for the project. That doesn't need to be my future, though all the way up to this point it's been the one I've been gunning for. I could begin making a new, entirely different future for myself right now. Maybe starting an Equestria Daily-style fansite for Zootopia. Maybe I throw myself behind writing full-time, and churn out all those novels that have the cranial drifts. Maybe I could- or should!- launch that webcomic I've been working on since before I had this blog. Maybe I could do all three and more! Right? The assignment to throw ourselves behind our art and start making a profit out of it doesn't behedge our ability to do anything else outside of the semester. But it is forcing our feet in that door, which is useful to have, especially considering that with so many interests and possible futures for me, I don't have much intrinsic motivation to pursue any paths at all, other than the ones that always get me into trouble which is no good.

Just keep all that in mind. None of these paths need be permanent. Not that they can't be.

So, create new art accounts/pages apart from the personal accounts, and link them together, on Facebook and Instagram. Step 1.

I've finally managed to get my Instagram to work. I mean, it worked, and you can view Instagram without an app, but if you want to post anything yourself it requires one, which I didn't have till now. It wasn't a problem with my mobile device not being the cellphone I used to sign up for Y! mail at all- that number's connected exclusively to my Yahoo! account, and my Facebook (and by extension Instagram) have no mobile number listed for me at all. Google Play doesn't support Kindles, is what it was, even though Kindles are Android devices, (probably) because Kindle is already covered by Amazon's services including the Kindle Appstore. Which appstore does not have Instagram on it, so I had to forego the mobile app thing altogether- I got the app by going through the Microsoft appstore and downloading the app onto my desktop which is apparently possible. So that's good.

I've never used my Instagram for anything but art, so far, so I think I'm clear there.

The thing I'm stuck on is the Facebook page thing. Am I soliciting advice right now? Let's say yes. I know the technical aspect of making a new Facebook page, that's all both well and fine; what I've got questions about, and want feedback on, is the branding.

I'm leaning toward furry art, as my artistic output. It's not the only kind of art I do, nor really some second thing, but there's a built-in audience for it which helps targeting and marketing and is financial gold especially if you manage to net repeat customers out of that built-in audience, but also because really heaven knows I've got a sizable enough corpus that it wouldn't be too hard to find something appropriate to market myself with.

Questch is, would that be then, marketing myself, or marketing my fursona? By which I mean, what's the name of the dadgummed page going to be, which is it going to be named after?

I like Pretzels. As a name. Pretzels are delicious, and Pretzels sounds like Perazzo, and it's just solid all around. I got the name, honestly, from a dude who was seriously given that name (or at least I assume it's a dude, maybe it's a chick I dunno) but that was the person's actual name, and their entire name too by the looks of it. However long ago they lived, it's on FamilySearch, and is on the "names that make us go 'hmm...'" wall/ whiteboard/ corkboard at Data Quality. And I'm allowed to say that because they never had me sign the non-disclosure agreement.** And also because it's non-sensitive information of a deceased individual, and thus publicly available anyway. Seeing that name made me realize I think how much I like it, but it is- was- a real person's name at one point, unless hijinx are going on with that.

But I think Pretzels is a pretty good handle for me. It seems to go over well on WordPress, and all, and all. But there are one or two things that keep me from, as yet, throwing myself behind this (not counting the ever-present, keep that gross furry crap to yourself, part of me.)

Searching through WikiFur's exhaustive database of basically every furry ever, there's already a dude out there who goes by Pretzel, singular, already, though that's not the only name he goes by. People have similar/the same names all the time, so that's alright I guess, especially seeing that that's not his only handle. The Thing Is Though, it's a name similar enough, and looking at the dude's page he mostly does work of a, let's call it, a majority-age nature. Fairly tame, as far as that kind of thing goes, from what I've seen, and it's just this random dude, but, well, maybe it wouldn't represent a problem if there weren't this second concern I had:

Pretzels, it's a short name. The idea is I'm trying to name my Facebook page, and, Pretzels as a Facebook page name doesn't do much for me (other than maybe one for a page that designates actual literal pretzels? (Oh, yeah, I guess there is a first definition of the word "literal.")) So, what, "Pretzels artist" or something, then? Kind of a lame concern, but this deals with the name of the page itself, over, whether I'd actually be going by Pretzels online. I can't call the page just Pretzels, one; but, two, I don't want to limit the medium I do by calling the page like Pretzels Prints or anything (though that does have a nice ring to it.) Pretzels T Fox, or something, makes the name longer and all, though gosh that makes my skin crawl, and actually he's a skunk anyway, and actually he's a raccoon anyway, just with the body of a skunk (I couldn't decide, and have a marked distaste for hybrids. Shut up.)***

But then I've got another thought, engendered by the discussion of possible futures for myself, up above. As I mentioned in footnote b of this post, made 2 years 10 days ago (2 years 9 days ago in terms of this blog's timezone, but it's past midnight here,) and keeping in with the idea that ah am dang bad at intrinsic motivators for myself, I'd decided some time ago apparently that I'd start Other//half (and this is actually the first I've mentioned O/h since the post I just linked to) by the deadline of the Justice League movie's release. The JLA film seemed such an abstract concept back then, but the joke's getting less and less funny now... Release date this year, 10 months away exactly (once again going from my current time zone and not yours,) and remember I wanted to get a go on it before the movie comes out...

So here's an alternate idea: the Facebook page isn't from me as "Pretzels" at all, but I use this opportunity to force myself into getting started on something I've been wanting to do for donkey ears but have held myself back from in the name of percolation; the Facebook page is for Other//half.

But I don't know. Even if nobody replies with any advice (and I need to decide soon because like I said, I need 100 followers by Tuesday,) talking through it has given me a few ideas, and I think I know the direction I want to take.

2017 Backlog 9/15: Yup This is Backlog

Okay so backlogging right now, trying to make it both not-boring but also not, um, necessary? So that you can miss out on it and it'd be fine to? Which I guess is why I like posting up links and stuff as my backlogs. Wow. I just learned that about myself.

Eleven Thousand Fifty Fifty

Checking across all of my bank accounts and the receipts I saved, I can prove definitely that I have spent $7,486.48 on my education so far, meaning here rent, tuition, and school supplies, and actually it's probably a couple thousand more than that as well, but there appears to be a small but crucial lacuna in the form of my bank statement of january of last year, the last of my physical paper bank statements before switching over to digital. This is the month where I paid my first semester's tuition, and so there's more than $3000 that disappears from my checking account there in that gap that I can't track. $1500.48 of that goes into my savings, which leaves $1,668.10 to go to tuition, before I received reimbursement in the form of Pell Grant (the first thing that I have happening to me in my February bank statement,) which retroactively becomes what paid that cost.

The problem lies in my uncertainty whether tuition is the only thing that that money got spent on: $39.06 is the total price for preordering BARSK: THE ELEPHANTS' GRAVEYARD in both digital and hardcover when it first came out, so we'll say that first semester's tuition cost $1,629.04, meaning actually my total amount of money spent on college so far is about $9,115.52, or slightly less depending on whether I made any other purchases between when my statement provenance drops off and when it picks up again. Like I said, $7,486.48 is all that I can prove (the accessible part of the school's archive of your finances only goes back exactly 12 months so I can't look up the exact tuition fee, but the baseline seems to be higher than the $1,629.04 that had to have gone somewhere, so yeah it's all a very big mystery.) We can double-guess ourselves blind, though, so we'll just take that figure as being unmodified and thus accurate. $9,115.52.

$11,050.50 actually, if you round down (maybe using the exactly two cents I got for change one week ago) and count the $1,935 tuition for Spring semester of last year, which the Pell Grant automatically covered for me the way it's supposed to every time but only did the once for some reason. I guess we should be counting that too, even though that's not money which I ever touched? The $952 extra from that dole of the Pell Grant drifted past and glided to me like clockwork not long after. Which brings me to my second half: if I've spent $11,050.50 scholastically so far, how much have I received, and is there any excess money I've got, that would or would not be tied up into the legal obligation behind the execution of those funds?

No. There is not. There is no excess money. Even without calculating the tithes I should not have paid (I'm going to get on that later; it's easy enough to calculate how much tithing I spent, but harder to work out where that money actually came from if not scholarships,) $11,050.50 is more money than I received from grants and scholarships. Which is actually a good thing: 100% of the fundage I was legally obligated to spend on school, was spent on school, alongside a chunk of my personal cash (exactly how large that chunk is depends on whether we're counting non-official (i.e. parental) financial aid- without the latter, the chunk would be approximately the size of, my entire wages summer of '15, after tax rebate.)

So I'm out of scholarship money. I don't have to worry about what pile of economic slush I'm taking the money from when I make a purchase. I can still keep track of which of my expenditures are for school, so that I may retroactively use future scholarship money thus upon receipt, but my conscience can be clear regarding my obligation to spend scholarship and grant money exclusively scholastically.

Meanwhile, today marks the 20th anniversary of the release of the That Darn Cat remake. How auspicious!

Late

Was it a week ago? I think it was, yes. Yes, I actually talked about it then, so, the date is correct. Last Monday there was a test in Mesoamerican art class. I did well. Remember that. Just remember that. (Was it really only a Monday ago? It feels so much longer than that...)

This is what I had to write today, in posting up my project for Info Design class (due at 11:00 local time, but turned in 24 minutes after that):

My schedule is a total steaming mess right now, my punctuality in shambles around my ankles. I have this thing. It is last week's assignment. Or a part of it.

https://pretzelizemecapn.wordpress.com/2017/02/14/module-5-projects-2-and-3/

Maybe I shall continue pressing forward, until I catch up. Or maybe I shall abandon it entirely, give up, rejoice in my freedom, and fail the course.

How far are we into the semester? A quarter? A third? Halfway? I have lost all track of time, in this netherworld of constantly being behind. I have forgotten my own name. Am I Tantalus, always seeming to catch up to the assignment only for it to slip away again? Or am I Sisyphus, condemned to live endlessly repeating creating a module, only for the week to reset right as I apparently reach the cusp of the module's completion?

It's probably past the 11:00 due date as I write these words. Like anybody's going to read them anyway.

Oh crap, yeah, it's well past 11:00, I'm way late. Like that's anything new...
15 minutes behind, man I'm 3 weeks behind, or will be if I manage to catch up next week. I mean, I won't be 3 weeks behind by the time I've caught up if I do do that, but I mean, I've got three weeks' worth of work to do if I want to do that. I probably could've gotten a large chunk done catching up just using all the time I've spent rambling here and in my blog post... I am so so so so so so so so so sick of shoes by this point, though. I may vomit. 100 shoes! That's only 50 pairs, but, the way I chose to visualize them, tracking down data pair by pair, only to discover in some instances that no data exist for some shoes. All that just for one of my three methods of visualization; I shudder to begin the other two, even though they're by all accounts easier and by all accounts I do have all the data I collected for those visualizations already. But, like I said. I'm sick of shoes.

I know my true name now at least. I am Icarus, son of Daedalus, and I grew too ambitious in my visualization project. Here I am, drowning in the sea. And the expensive delicate ship has somewhere to go, and sails calmly on.

Hadn't

So I'm taking down 100 board game companies as contacts/clients to art at, for my artbiz class (tracking them, tracking them down, so sorry. Though I suppose that "taking down" could refer to recording their information, and yes it is a list, so either way I guess.) I'm at 75 right now. We're actually supposed to call one of our potential clients as well, which  sound scary but it's just talking to folks who are human beings and all. Still, I don't think I'd be able to track down Colby Dauch's personal phone number or anything, even if I thought I were worthy at all to work alongside Fernando Suarez, John Ariosa et al...

I have managed to locate a couple awesome candidates to approach though. I'd tell you about them here. Oh well.

Moneys!

I've also archived an Excel file of my monetary transactions from my bank account end. Looking at it now, I'm not entirely sure how this gets me any closer to untangling the gordito knot (it is small and fat and distinctly non-sliceable) that is my, straightening out was the term I used, of my financial aid vs. my don't-have-to-use-for-school funds. But it seemed important all up till now, so I will trust my past self's judgement.

Meanwhile for Dan Burr's "Business for the Professional Artist" class (and apparently he's the same Dan Burr who's illustrated all those glurge-y Mormon (as distinguished from "LDS") books like the one about the testimony glove and the one about young Tommy Monson setting the field on fire, which books I've never really paid much attention to because they're, what they are) (and also apparently my "Motion (Linear)" teacher Tim Howe was roommates and coworkers with my Information Design teacher Will Frohn, and is the guy who did the motion design for the Reese's peanut butter cup commercials where the bite gets taken out) we need to come up with a business plan, which means coming up with a list of 100 potential clients, and I was all, how am I going to do that, before I realized today, board game companies, yo.

And that is all.

Monopromo

That crappy little "in jail" guy drawing is so iconic by now. It's a bad little scribble, but they're never going to change it.

Monopoly promo season is here again, at participating, you know, locations. Went to Albertsons after seeing LEGO Batman yesterday, and have a tidy pile of board spaces stacked up. Didn't complete any monopolies, but I am entitled to a free pound of banana.

So yeah I guess I'm telling you all this to mention that I'm eating healthier now.

Always Be Yourself, Unless You Can Be Batman

The audience in my theater laughed heartily at all the jokes, even the ones that were only... well, I don't want to say, only pretty funny, because every single joke hits it out of the park, the entire first 15 minutes are just a solid wall of hilarity, and none of the jokes you think are going to get old actually go on long enough for them to get old... but, I mean, not all the jokes are, hearty laugh funny. Audiences are weird, I guess. I think I'm the only one who laughed at some of the jokes that others, must've missed I guess; it happened a couple of times but the one I can remember for sure was at the beginning where these guards were loading their stun guns and were all, "non-lethal!" (I think the other joke had something to do with some obscure bit of batcanon they slipped a subtle gag in about.)

The way the plot is laid out is pretty amazing- when the stuff happens, and then the other stuff, I was like, this is moving too quickly, the resolution is going to turn out to be really unsatisfying, but I didn't foresee the part with the stuff, and then the other stuff happening. Um, sorry, spoilers (there are about a grazillion plot points not in any of the trailers, so I'm just alluding very very very vaguely to them.) The first LEGO movie I also had a moment of doubt like that too, where it was all, is this story actually going anywhere but it turns out it was, so let me just compare what I'm talking about to the Cloud Cuckooland scene in the LEGO movie, combined with how Enchantress and Incubus take over Midway City just way too easily in Suicide Squad, only with the LEGO Movie resolution that makes the overtaking of the city perfectly paced instead of the Suicide Squad resolution that reveals that the plotting really is a mess (I still kinda liked that movie, but, yeah, I don't think anyone can disagree, the pacing was totally schizoid.)

This movie does just as good a job at deconstructing the idea of Batman that the first LEGO movie did deconstructing the idea of LEGO. It's a pretty weird concept for a movie, if you think about it. Like, if you had no idea what either LEGO or Batman are, this film would be, just, I mean you'd have zero context to put anything into... it's a memorable, imaginative movie, but it'd be even moreso if it made no sense.

Zootopia watch? Jenny "Bellwether" Slate as Harley Quinn. The word "jazzed" (as in, "the Mammal Inclusion Initiative is really starting to pay off; Mayor Lionheart is going to be so jazzed") gets used several times, with a lantern hung on it each scene it happens. Dick at one point briefly says "o-m-gosh," as in Clawhauser's exclamation "o-m-goodness."

WAG the (oh my) Dog

Write what you know. Alright. What I know is, Marvel's LEGION premiered tonight on FX, and I have no idea what the deal with it is, but I'm kind of angry(?) at it because it means that any TV series made of Brandon Sanderson's Legion books are going to have to be renamed*. I also know I'm totally going to go see the LEGO Batman Movie Thursday previews tomorrow. And that's it. Those are the two things I know.

I've already mentioned my undying love for WAG, so no need to burden you with that regalia again (regalia=that which is regaled, right??). The LEGO Batman Movie's really the only movie I'm looking forward to this year, barring the My Little Pony movie and a couple others I've also brought up in previous posts (though, rule of thumb, if there are any movies that make you think, hmm, that seems right up Eric's alley**: yes, yes they are.***)

I'm no great fan of Spinjitzu, but even the Ninjago movie's going to be awesome, and apparently also coming out this year. The trailer dropped today/yesterday, and I've seen it several times already. And so should you.

Crazy story, though! That scene there, starting 1:36 into it, where they're all exclaiming "Garmadon" as Garmadon appears? At first I misheard it as being, a very very weird gag: the pretzel lady goes, ermahgerd, the guy with the hot dog guy says, oh my dog, the lady with the baby says, oh my gosh, with the actual OMG going to the baby! Kinda like that mime from the Angry Birds movie, I guess, but, with a baby instead, and with a different setup.

Weeeird joke.

BYU-Pathway Worldwide Announcement

Maybe today I did so much stupid stuff I regret that it strains credulity that this day even happened. Even the good stuff is hard to believe: I went to the store with exactly one $20 bill in my pocket and none else, and my bill came out to $19.98.

So Elder Dallin H Oaks gave the devotional today. I never go to the BYU-I devotionals on Tuesdays, because nothing ever happens during them and most semesters my Tuesdays are the perfect level of busy that I need to skip them. But I made it this time- along with (almost) the entirety of the rest of the school. I mean, member of the 12, doing this and showing up almost out of nowhere, to give the devo and all that; Elder Oaks is my favorite but I'm so used to being near the church's General Authorities because we were swimming in them on my mission, so I went really based on principle more than any other thing.

Turns out, 10:00 this morning, they (the, they, you know, them, the folk who'd do that) made the announcement, the BYU online programs are radically expanding their scope and mission, now being called Pathway Worldwide, its own thing, like the old Pathway but bigger by measures. With that, the current president of BYU-I, President Gilbert, is, going to leave and do that; I'm trying to figure out a more clear less redundant way of saying that but I can't find any. We're getting, and I think actually it became effective about as soon as it was announced, so, we got, a new university president, formerly the vice president, Henry J Eyring.

Meant to get pictures of the historic event, but, well, out of today's regrets it's pretty low on the list. I'm done talking about it.

Glad Monday's Over Now

Mondays can be a hassle, not in the Garfield-hates-'em sort of way but in the fact that like they're the only day when I've got things due, basically. And today I had a test in my Mesoamerican art class, which was fun, and there was also my religion class (which normally goes like this, I get the readings and writings done by 9:00 class for its 10:00 due time, I think I've told you once) and maybe one day I'll actually do the scripture readings on the sabbath beforehand instead of having to force myself awake to get it done the morning of... now that I've relocated my Kindle (it was under the couch cushions!) I can get myself to wake up easier, but anyway.

So Heads Up, I'm Probably Racist in This Post

I've also tracked down(?) the first issue of Animal Comics (featuring Walt Kelly's Pogo) at digitalcomicmuseum.com here or at comicbookplus.com here.

I've been reading way, way too many, public domain comic books from the 1940s, using online tools such as these, and I can say with certainty:

• Japanese people are bad news, alright man, I mean they look and talk different from us and their favorite hobby is apparently sabotage, so, just, like, stay away
• Buy war bonds and stamps!
• The Jitterbug will never die
• I'm also suspicious of black people come to think of it

...It strayed into "dude, not funny" territory somewhere there. Sorry. (And would it be alright to make a joke about how it started getting offensive at the mention of the Jitterbug? I'm really not sure if that crosses the line again, or makes the actual linecrossing alright due to some mysterious confluence of comedic forces.)

If you find such lack of self-awareness funny, the cheerfully offensive racial stereotypes are really some of the funniest parts of these funny books. Probably more than partially because their taste of humor back then was so corny that you can't help but feel that you're reading just a parody of 1940s comic books rather than the real deal, of course... but on the other hand, you'd figure they'd be more racist if they really were parodies of 1940s comic books- the apparent racism in them generally just sticks to character design. You saw Bumbazine, right? Protagonist, well-written as a person, but I don't think anyone would be able to get away with a character quite so full-lipped or anything anymore outside of parody. 

I remember reading (and reading about) some of the more blatant, un-self-aware casual racism at Comics Should be Good at CBR, but CBR's like updated their site and whole layout since last I've been, which makes navigating through their old blogs remarkably confusing. They've got the old version on the Wayback Machine, of course, which was crucial into my rediscovery of some Japanese horror comics I discovered on CSBG a while back, so I could try there, but right now just going from memory?: there was something like, fun fact black people don't actually have whiter teeth, they've just got darker skin which makes their teeth appear whiter!

See, what did I tell you, that's just so cheerfully un-self-aware that it's funny.

So if you follow my pretzelizemecapn.wordpress.com blog you'd know, or actually just read Monday's entry on this blog, but I'm trying to track down shoes made in each state, and I'm having a honey of a go at it because it looks like, not every state has at least one shoe manufacturing company. 

But at least Alabama has this pair of shoes written about here:

http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/14910

I have not the time to summarize that article, so just click on it. It's the most amazing thing I've read all day, including the, public domain comic books and everything.

The Pogo-Gos

I found this, awhile ago, but hadn't posted it up till now, but hey, it's the first appearance of Walt Kelly's "Pogo" on Archive.org! It's... it's kind of different; I mean, the whole thing, changes a lot from its inception here to the comic strip appearances. The art style gemps up, the kid goes away, "gemps" becomes a real word and not some typo I just made for "gets bumped," etc.

I mean good glory look at that.

And here we have the latest video from remix person Nick "Pogo" Bertke. Yay awesome things!

UPDATE 2 days later: also Pogo is apparently the name of a children's television network in India; teacher showed us this on Motionographer as an example of excellence in motion design in my intro to linear motion design class: http://motionographer.com/quickie/pogo-rebrand/ and of course now we're assigned to do something similar, at least with the way that the letterform motion is handled.

Three Reviews of Maya-Related Things I Wrote Last Night

Cracking the Maya Code is a 2008 one-hour PBS NOVA episode about the history through the 19^th and 20^th centuries of reading the hieroglyphic writing system the Maya used. Based on the 1992 book “Breaking the Maya Code” by Michael D. Coe (who is one of the interviewees in the documentary,) it’s also interesting enough that I want to track down the original book, and the two-hour-length documentary some time, to get more detail. This documentary is interesting in that it traces the history of our modern understanding of Maya civilization, rather than the history of ancient Maya civilization itself. “History” more or less means “that which is written,” so it makes sense that the story of what we know about the Maya is tied to what we know about their writing: we had these hieroglyphs we couldn’t decode, so we had no history of this civilization until we figured out how to read the writing, or indeed realize that there was anything interesting to be read there beyond astronomical observances.

Deciphering these glyphs was 100% the obstacle between us and understanding this ancient culture, but the ironic thing is that when we (Europeans) got to America, all this history was still intact, but then we were the ones who wiped it all (or mostly) out. In the name of religion, too, which makes it even more frustrating. It’s fascinating that that’s not the only time politics has delayed/set back our advancement in understanding of the Maya code; how much faster would these hieroglyphs been cracked if Knorozov’s “Soviet” advancements hadn’t been discredited, or if Thompson hadn’t had half the ideas that he did? I think that ancient and modern history reflect each other in interesting ways. Ancient history isn’t the only epoch with its intrigues and its dynasties rising and falling, and we can see that here in modern times as well (with some flexibility in using the word “dynasty.”) It’s the work of many people who carry the work forward, some doing a lot of work by themselves but nobody able to advance alone. David Stuart wouldn’t have been able to make his breakthrough without the work of Yuri Knorozov, and he wouldn’t have been able to make his advancements without those before him, including even Thompson and de Landa, so nobody’s a total villain, and everybody did what they thought was right, even if they were mostly or just partly wrong. So that’s interesting too.

...

Tikal is a Spiel des Jahres-winning game with mechanics of worker placement, area control, and action point allowance, designed by Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer and first published in 1999 (forgive me if I get kind of technical with the description of board game mechanics; my family are pretty heavy board gamers.) In it, you play the roles of archeologists, searching for glory through the discovery of artifacts and the control of temple spaces. There's only two ways of scoring in Tikal: when the volcano tile is drawn and the scoring round begins, you get points for treasures owned (with bonus points for having multiples/a complete set) and you get points for having the most workers at a temple site. But majority is a slippery thing, and treasures can also swap hands, and you need to consider carefully what you'll be doing with your 10 action points allowed, especially on scoring rounds. I’m used to games with more ways of scoring, so I wasn't really prepared for how intense a game it actually turned out to be. I took photos as we went along, and you can just tell, the expression on everyone's faces just grows more and more and more serious as the documentation goes along. I played it with my brother Ryan (who’s a roommate of mine,) his friend, and her fiancé. You can also play it with three or two people, and I hear that it scales down well, but I wanted to play with more people. Ryan won, but you can pretend I won if it makes you think higher of me (I did come in second.)

Did I learn anything about Maya culture from it? I wasn’t sure about the theme being about archeology at first; I was expecting more about ancient culture itself, but there are also novels and movies we can review for points that are about archeology, and archeology is how we find out about these civilizations, how we interface with them, so it’s important. As far as thematic accuracy goes, there’s three of each treasure and I’m not sure how much sense that makes- maybe if you pretend that they’re three similar pieces, the museums and collectors would go gaga over a set like that, so they’re worth more points, but the game art has the pieces all identical, not that you can blame them. I don’t recognize any of the individual artifacts, but I wouldn’t doubt them to be based on real finds. Also, there aren’t any volcanoes in Guatemala as far north as Tikal is, or in Mexico as far east, but there are Mesoamerican volcanoes.

...

I watched the 2006 History Channel documentary “The Maya: Death Empire,” from the “Engineering an Empire” series. It uses modern Maya people to reenact ancient Maya, sometimes on location (though that is pretty weird because those are clearly ruins,) and it’s hosted by Peter Weller, who is one of my top underrated actors and apparently a history major at Syracuse University, so that’s neat.

The documentary moves through the history of the Maya civilization pretty quickly, with focus divided between the history of the empire and the engineering behind some of its greatest monuments- presumably all episodes of this show are like that, giving a blitz overview of the history of the empire they’re discussing, before going into something more specific where they can talk about engineering. In this case, it spends a few minutes on a few hundred years of the history of Tikal, though it dedicates more time to Palenque and the reign of Pacal the great (who commissioned a lot of buildings with a lot of engineering, and the documentary loves him for it), and Pacal’s son as well, before moving onto some of the engineering at Chichen Itza at the end.

The engineering details they provide are a little basic, upon a re-watch, and I wish they’d gone into more science on that, but their history sections go into detail about political maneuvering and the shifting alliances between warring states, so that was good/neat. They just go over that stuff so fast, though. It’s an oddly paced documentary all told, in other words. I’m already well-versed in the exploration of the temple of inscriptions and discovery of Pakal’s tomb, so their spending so much time on that was kind of bothersome when they could have been talking about more ancient history- still, it is a pretty good story, so I can’t blame them for being dramatic about it.  Another qualm I have about the documentary that I can’t really blame them for is that they’re a little misleading about the order of events dealing with our knowledge of Pakal, subtly implying that he was already a well-known figure by the time his tomb was discovered, even though we knew next to nothing about any historical details when the temple of the inscriptions was being explored. They did that to introduce him as a historical figure, and that’s only the vibe I got from it, so maybe that wasn’t the case.

Greatest Song of All Time

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