Observations of the weird things that don't matter

—Neatly layered rice cakes in a dog bowl (for the dog to eat) made me wonder, “Is this cruel? Or is this healthy?” At least it was Zen-like and ordered, unlike the slop of horsemeat that comes out of a can. The dog ate some rice cakes and buried the remainder. I thought for a second that I might have stumbled on some new form of environmental art, but then I realized I was being stupid.

—While picking up wood for my wood-burning stove, I found sparkling criss-crossing tracks of slug slime that were frozen on the underside of the loosened bark. The slugs in summertime at my place are HUGE and I had a random thought, “Does slug slime freeze at a lower or higher temperature? They die when you pour salt on them, so obviously they don’t have a high slimy salinity measure, and therefore the creatures would probably turn to popsicles before anything else.” I’m still looking for evidence.

—I was looking down at all of the pink and blue chalk signs outside of the English building, but I didn’t really stop to see what they said until I saw Spanish swear words, and I thought the Spanish words for penis and vagina were in the correct corresponding colors of blue for penis (boy), and pink for vagina (girl). “These people are more clever than I thought,” I thought.

—Somebody carved out the word “sex” in a mirror pattern in one of their sneaker soles. I know this because there were tracks in the soft dirt after the last rain, and one of the two sneaker treads had a crude “sex” raised up in the mud every second step. I thought it was juvenile but cool. And then I thought that the person who did this was probably the only one who liked walking in firm mud. So if you see someone deliberately not walking on the concrete paths after a rain, check the right shoe by saying something clever like, “Hey, I think your right shoe just stepped in some gum. Let me look.”

—All of the cigarette butts surrounding the ash tray outside one of the campus buildings looks like a scatter chart in statistics; one that would probably be used to plot laziness and idiocy.

—There is a girl in my creative nonfiction class that wears mismatched shoes. Today she had little cheap deck shoes. One was black with Technicolor flowers; the other was also black and had white cats with long curling tails. She never speaks, but sometimes I think her shoes say more than any words that I speak in class.

—There are these weird little boxes inside the men’s restrooms around campus (like in the English building, and at Burrill Hall). They look like those single-serve boxes of ready-made Jell-o that kids in junior high eat. I always wondered why the BSWs (janitors) never threw them away. Today I realized that they’re scent boxes with a gelatin that disappears after time as it dissipates some industrial fragrance into the air to cover whatever horrible smells that come from men with bad diets. What an irresponsible design!

—Although my truck is almost never parked under trees (I ride the bus and bike, and there are no large trees looming where it sits), I constantly find bird crap on my windows. Like today. I won’t describe the crap, which was pretty foul, even for a bird, and there was no pretty pattern or cosmic golden ratio. All I could think about is how my windows kept getting soiled even though about 2% of their mass is visible from above, and the entire roof of my pickup cab was clean. I mean this bird nailed my driver’s side window, which is next to a tall fence, which meant the bird has better aim than a smart bomb. Note to self: keep windows rolled up, even when there is no chance for rain.

—The previous owner of the house I live in used to think his backyard was some sort of dumping ground. And he had some big dogs that would chew to shreds anything they were given. Given that background, I was walking through the yard today, looking to pick the last of my habaneros and bell peppers before the cold killed them, and something became stuck in my shoe like a pebble when it gets lodged in the neato sport patterns that companies like Nike and Reebok make (note: they don’t put “sex” in their treads, I looked that one up). I stopped to check my shoe, and there was an arm of a GI Joe figure stuck laterally across the middle of my sole. It looked like it was saluting. If I were drunk, I would have probably saluted back.

—While I was looking up some politicians on the news server for a political segment some peers were putting together, I noticed something really interesting: the past presidents of the United States, as well as the current contenders McCain/Palin, and Obama/Biden have hair that stays exactly the same. Every day. All day. McCain never seems to say “I think I’ll part my gray whispys this way today.” Palin must take valuable time tending to her bulbous bouffant—time that could be used to learn the names of important people. Biden’s hair is plaster. Obama’s hair hasn’t changed a micron since he started politics. Why is this? Why did I never notice this before? If George W. Bush buzzed his head, would the world’s economies change on account that they think he’s in mourning, or perhaps they think he finally lost it? Or is the buzzed head image a prelude to a militaristic and fatalistic line of thinking? Why does presidential hair matter so much that the style never changes?

Answers from Ede a la Justin

1) What have been some successes and failures of co-authorship in the past for you? What difficulties/successes have you had with the video project so far in this aspect?

A) In film school I did extremely well by myself when doing flash films with no sound. I hated collaborating. But as we progressed into the senior final film projects, it was essential that we worked in groups of at least 12-20 people. It was very hard to manage everyone, but because of the magnitude and scope of the films, collaboration was imperative. Ultimately the experience was positive, but I wanted to choke some people on some days.

Questions from Ede

1. Do you think it's more important to collaborate or to compete in the realm of the arts?

2. Nancy Mitford's best-seller, The High Cost of Death, was coauthored
with her lawyer husband; however, her publisher said that
two authors would mean fewer sales, and only her name appears
on the title page.-Alleen Pace Nilsen, "Men and Women: Working
Together in Changing Times"

--Why do you think more than one author means fewer sales?

3. Did anybody else think this reading was odd?

A letter from the blue states

Dear Red States…

We’ve decided we’re leaving. We intend to form our own country, and
we’re taking the other Blue States with us.

In case you aren’t aware, that includes Hawaii, Oregon, Washington,
Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. We
believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to
the people of the new country of New California .

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states.

We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get Elliot Spitzer.
You get Ken Lay. We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. We
get Intel and Microsoft. You get WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole’
Miss.

We get 85 percent of America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs. You
get Alabama.

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states
pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian
Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of
single moms.

Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war,
and we’re going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you
need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they’re
apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they
don’t care if you don’t show pictures of their children’s caskets
coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs
turn up, but we’re not willing to spend our resources in Bush’s
Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent
of the country’s fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and
lettuce, 92 percent of the nation’s fresh fruit, 95 percent of
America’s quality wines (you can serve French wines at state dinners),
90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of
the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors,
all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools, plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal
Tech and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88
percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs),
92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes,
90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists,
virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones
University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.

We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah was
actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred unless
we’re discussing the death penalty, 44 percent say that evolution is
only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61
percent of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals
then we lefties.

By the way, we’re taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt
weed they grow in Mexico .

Peace out,

Blue States

Responses to Hampe a la Justin

1) Hampe says 'editing is at the heart of documentary.' Since editing is obvious done post-shooting, how does this separation take away from a actual depiction of reality? Or could this editing enhance it?

Great question, Justin. Thanks for being vague so I have a chance at sounding like I know what's going on... :)

Editing is by far an enhancer, in my opinion. Without it, life would be drearily realistic, and video production is a means to interpret our perception. Without editing, where would we be? Probably in some state of philosophical denial of self-nature. Editing can be wielded improperly, like taking a person's quotes out of context, and can become a powerful too. So it's important to engage the editing process with a set guideline of ethics and purpose.

The actual depiction of reality is meant to be manipulated and conformed to art.

Hampe questions

1. On interviewing: Hampe makes a case for, in one instance, PBS relying too heavily on interviews. Why do you think an interview-laden documentary would have a negative or limited effect overall?

2. When interviewing a subject, when do you think it's better to have previously crafted questions? What about asking questions when 'shooting from the hip?'

Abu-What?

George W. Bushism "Abu-What?"

It's all about the timing

The road:

I've rarely used Garageband, and although I have access to recording equipment, I decided to put myself through the Garageband process to learn more about the program. I hope to utilize it to generate Podcasts in the future. Additionally, I have already familiarized myself with Audacity, as it comes with M-Powered Pro Tools.

In my previous broadcasting experience, I have focused on other people, only inserting my voice to keep content flowing; to change direction when the audio clips of those interviewed are lacking "connective" dialogue. I also used my voice to explain certain situations or to define something in particular. But in all I find it's much better to let the sources do the talking. They're much more credible. And I feel like I sound pretentious in an unambiguous sort of way when I try to do all of the narrating.

In this line of thinking, I went ahead and tried new areas that I'm absolutely not used to: Garageband, personal storytelling, humor, comedic soundtracks, and timing—all on a story on the misadventures of bad timing.

I had originally hoped to make an excerpt out of a creative nonfiction piece that I'm writing to sell on the market, but after a few short scripting attempts, I found that I couldn't get the dialogue down below eight minutes. I then decided that since I had to work on my timing, I'd decide to do a personal narrative on one of two incidents I've experienced that involved a fast sequence of events where everything went wrong.

The challenges: since I used a script, I basically only used it for cues in order to keep my voice in a storytelling mode, but even after a few attempts at certain sections, it's obvious that I'm reading during some point. I tend not to use scripts when doing audio journalism, but I certainly see the benefits. And even after getting my recording down, and knowing where I was going to break up the monotony of the storytelling with music, I had to meticulously go second-by-second on my monologue to remove short pauses without making any odd transitional effects apparent. In all I made 71 cuts to my voice pauses.

The other difficulty stemmed from the music soundtrack. I abhor sound effects in the setting that I chose, and I didn't want to have only one soundtrack. So I went to the library and found a bunch of CDs, brought them back, and went through them one-by-one to find the right ones for the job. At the beginning, when introducing the power businesswoman, I inserted "Trouble Blues," an upbeat blues song by Johnny Lee Hooker that does a little storytelling on the trouble with women. The lyrics are barely discernible, save a couple of spots, but anyone who enjoys the music, and plays the song by itself, should delight in the irony. The second song, "Rollin' and Tumblin'" by Muddy Waters is an oldie, but is also upbeat, keeping the frenetic pace of the story going. Again, the lyrics aren't discernible, but the music is inserted at a point where all is going wrong, and people are falling down and 'rollin' and tumblin'.' Finally, the last song is "Fox Musette" by Les Primitifs du Futur, who were featured on "All Songs Considered," and I thought the song not only made a fun, classic radio closing, but it paid homage to This American Life.

Utilizing "Trouble Blues," I wanted to time the music a little better, and since it had a repetitive blues beat, I did a little cutting and pasting to lengthen the opening blues riffs to time the singing to happen just as I was making a pause for a shift in storytelling. Did you hear the transitions? I hope not, because I tried really hard to blend the cuts.

And (insert sigh), yes, I did go over by almost a minute. But it had to be done for the sake of the story. I cut the story down to its basic elements, and I eliminated the personal pauses to keep the story going, and to keep the pace up. But I had to make a few musical pauses and dramatic stops just to try to make this silly story work. It really was pretty funny when it happened, but to try and retell it is pretty difficult.

I hope you enjoy/ed listening to my project even a fraction as much as I had making it.



Aaron Geiger's audio disease "It's all about the timing"

An Event Apart, Chicago 2008 || Part the first

(Pictured above: Curt Cloninger; friend Kacey Nelson takes a break at "An Event Apart" in Chicago; Kacey talks design and comics with Welshman design honcho Andy Clarke; the Godfather of CSS – Eric Meyer – sits down for an interview)

This past Monday and Tuesday I Amtrak'd my caboose to Chicago to attend a web and multimedia design conference (An Event Apart) for my job. On back-to-back days two friends and I were immersed in about 13-14 seminars that featured graphic design and artistic icons like Curt Cloninger, the comic enthusiast Welshman Andy Clarke, the Godfather of CSS Eric Meyer, and many other top professionals in their fields.

Each guest speaker contributed a unique perspective on the realm of interactive media and design: there were lectures on history, art aesthetics, business models, coding, group collaboration, critique, etc.

I could write a novel if I tried to encapsulate the watershed of information, but I found a couple of neat-o things that were directly applicable to Monsieur Stone's informatics and media mad dash.

First, for an overload of Korean flash animation, check this site out: Xiiin. I selected "Idol" to give you an example of what the top industry gurus think is one of the best sites they've ever seen. You don't have to understand Korean to appreciate the animation.

Second, for those who are unfamiliar with Curt Cloninger, he's an Informatics icon. Just by going to his site, lab404, you can see the amazing array of topics that he brings up, like Web geeks spontaneously creating art using Flickr.

Note on the opening page of lab404 you'll see a boldly patterned background. This is for a reason, and if you explore his work, he'll tell you why. Cloninger preaches that we should merge the macrocosmic with the microcosmic. "I had to consider chiefly the following things: the paper, the form of the type, the relative spacing of the letters, the words, and the lines; and lastly the position of the printed matter on the page," said Cloninger.

Oh yeah, and Cloninger is apparently a performance artist, too, exemplified in this video.

Linkage exercise

This is the test link to the WAM Syllabus. Click on the link below:

link

Ira Glass dies (spoof)

Shipka response/answer

3. both students created a pamphlet to go along with their 'cd'; do you think this took away from the point of creating a 'sound experience'?

It's hard to say. When altering the direct methods of art by using other forms of communication, there is definitely a 'loss' of purism and, in this case, a 'sound experience.' But when purism is not the intent, rather communication, then the pamphlet, again in this case, is used, it can actually enhance an experience. Other factors can be keyed in as well, such as financial gain, or future endeavors.

The Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator

You can find your name, if you were born to Sarah Palin, here.