so if there're dwarfs in the bay and hobbits, a tellytubby (and a reluctant one at that), i've been dubbed a treant "because when he starts work, he never moves". 

you dont need ecstacy if you've got a heart of glass

plausibe book covers

belly flops: the retarded cousins of jelly beans

today was a good day, i say with an air of defiance

and his sin was to believe the hype. we must create it, we must sell it, but we must not buy into it - for the people but not of the people, perhaps.

"...the search for a quiet connection with beauty in a metropolis of strangers"

new year new resolutions lets take a hop and a skip back but remember what you passed on the way*

ho hum merry christmas says i through spiteful tugs at the whiskey bottle. this isn't really happening, mind you, but i liked the phrase spiteful tug so the rest had to follow.

to mexico tomorrow adios amigos though i am ill prepared at what to expect but i expect to be floored. lady man boys on parade i say.

its a mild brute to ride, a bronco without any yee-har tearing down the dotted lines.

a million daydreams to everyone,

, and bruce, why not give Rand another go?

its confirmed, beyond a doubt - Rabbit, veal and pork with white wine is the most divine sausage. To paraphrase, its "like sucking on the phallus of a god". I took liberties with that mind you. 

And at Goodwill, several gems of a find. Cassette tapes, finally, to go with my ancient car stereo. At 99cents a pop, we found Sonic Youth, The Cure, Ella Fitzgerald and some classic Baroque. Pacabel on the highway at 90. Who can protest?

Two new books on the bookshelf, 2nd hand, the first one being Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities, which read in unison with the Fountainhead has made the winter reading chronologically manhattenesque with a sharp eye on society. It also spares me having to watch Tom Hanks and Melanie Griffith because the lazy side of me would probably reach for the more passive form of consumption. Throw in Mad Men and its the rise of the bourgeoisie and their petty icarus games.

And finally, Pride and Prejudice, a dogeared yellowing book underlined to death by its previous owner which makes it a treat. Reading it would also entail reading into the thoughts of whoever read it before me. It has a history, which i think is appealingly quaint, and that makes me smile. 

Could the airport be the happiest place on earth?

A stream of people- couples in love, parents in waiting, families hoping - continuous, seperated for prolonged periods - long enough to numb the bad memories and sepia tint the good ones. A thousand hugs and hellos and how are yous at any given moment, the collective goodwill before they go into the cars and up comes in the air like the aircon blast the anonymity after all the old stories and rehearsed schticks get played out.

And on the beach, the most beautiful boy. elfin like, skin a powder white but not without scratches and imperfections. The deadlocked hair in a peacock's display of blue, red and pink tendrils. His eyes, glass-like, almost transparent with a hair's pin iris that pierces through. A moments perfection as he played the sitar, slouched against the white cracked paint of the sidewalks of Venice Beach.

Kiss the air and make a wish - Seahorses on patrol, alert to your needs.

It's a thick fog, almost as if one were looking through a delicate lace curtain draped over the city. An almost tangible shroud - the perfect backdrop to Adore on cassette and cold midnight air blowing in through the open car window. Here is now is Home.

im bored and restless because i feel there could be something else or something more. this cant be it... can it?

i dont know what i want but i know what i dont and this aint it! 

“What a useful thing a pocket-map is!” I remarked.

“That’s another thing we’ve learned from your Nation,” said Mein Herr, “map-making. But we’ve carried it much further than you. What do you consider the largest map that would be really useful?”

“About six inches to the mile.”

“Only six inches!” exclaimed Mein Herr. “we very soon got to six yards to the mile. Then we tried a hundred yards to the mile. And then came the grandest idea of all! We actually made a map of the country, on the scale of a mile to the mile!”

“Have you used it much?” I enquired.

“It has never been spread out, yet,” said Mein Herr: “The farmers object: they said it would cover the whole country, and shut out the sunlight! So we now use the country itself, as its own map, and I assure you it does nearly as well. Now let me as you another question. What is the smallest world you would care to inhabit…?”

things i've learnt:

1. dont skip breakfast
2. one good meal a week is good for the spirits
3. alcoholic spirits are good for the soul
   
4. soul refuelling: once a week. that includes church
   
5. relax with design - its like a souffle. it'll come soon enough
6. when stuck, just do something. floor plans static? do a section. section immobile? do a massing. massing boring? look at the site.
7. oscillate on the matter people. always.
   

thing i miss at the moment:

1. poptart nights with the boys. shrug and a sigh, cest la vie. hearts on fire, kisses for everyone.

Take care of the short term the long run'll run itself.

oh yeah, yeah yeah yeah.

we all go in chest thumping with hearts on fire fearless of the after burn because its carpe diem we're men after all lets seize the day. and the fall out is like a nuclear bomb, the hiroshima of the heart. what can we do we were men reduced to boys and then we'll wallow for a while before we suck it up and move on with a shrug and a sigh - "cest la vie".

no one told us to expect to feel this way. maybe its not so much the pain but the shock of it that gets to us. a catch 22 because if you do expect it then why bother in the first place my brother.

the truth is more complex in a dumb way that can only make sense to you, so my wish to you is that you'll dig that out soon.

i heart you, you know i do.

and they all ride like Valkyries galloping to the rising roar, a guttural vibration that clears the throat to hock out all expectations - a loogie.

like racehorses, you see, the hands of Horowitz

its like that surreal feeling with your brain floating in amniotic fluid. to draw a parallel perhaps its how Krang feels, a separation between mind and body.

"architecture is a discourse of knowledge.
I project what I imagine people could desire -
I have a delirious vision on what this might be,
I don't design for myself - I don't follow my own needs."

woot.

it gets dark early nowadays. a condusive cocoon to work and everything else.

i love how from afar the los angeles sprawl looks like a carpet chandelier and the lights from the staples center spray spotlights into the sky pathetically try to mimic starlight. sparkle, points, mesmerize.

its important for me to theorize but i think its even more important to speculate.

neither engineers nor artists. we're speculators. imagineering is my job. "what if?" is the big words, "what will be?" the million dollar gamble.

i am bored/terrified with the design. maybe its the generic nature of it or the finality of it. theory and speculation end in design. design ends in the build object. maybe thats the test of the initial validity of the question and the strength of one's answer.