.18.

I'm so exhausted from this apartment hunting.

I think the biggest problem is just that we do not appear ready. Tim isn't in NY yet and he doesn't have a job that pushes our combined salaries into $40,000+/yr. And I'm doing this alone and by having to email him stuff, despite the fact that I have neither a scanner nor a real form of fax machine to send it in.

Stress much?

I'm almost contemplating trying to set us up with some sort of a sublet for a couple months until he gets himself settled financially here. It's just frustrating because I feel like I've taken a gamble on an August 1st apartment and am losing out all the time. I should've stuck with the plan, I suppose...

Add the impending anxieties about GenCon and my not having a portfolio that is good enough nor enough promotional items nor (insert item here) that the stress is starting to kill me. I want to relax, take an eighth of vacation, drink a handle of anti-reality potion. Something, anything. And I feel like everyone around me is either too responsible for what I'm going through or not responsible enough for it to be a good idea.

I think I just really need him here with me, by my side, helping me get through this.

I have an apartment to look at tomorrow, a realty office to call and maybe get my dreams shattered by and more forms to fax in.

I want someone to just hand me a damn apartment already.

.17.

I've spent the past two days going through the contents of my parents' house, boxing things up and unboxing things...

It's so weird going through all these old memories. A lot of it I want to destroy, but more of it I want to hold onto. But I'm going to someplace where I should be limiting how much stuff I carry with me. And holding onto these things isn't healthy...

I can't even look at my college's year book yet. I peeked in and... it hurt. Looking at faces that I know that aren't friends anymore or close to me. I don't understand why I can't let these people go even when they don't deserve my time or energy.

Le suck.

.16.

And so the apartment search starts.

I visited my first apartment today, which sounded like a good deal, but wasn't what I was hoping for and as well had a lot of people interested in it. I was hoping that maybe I'd be alright with the college kid competition, but it does seem like things might be a tad difficult. But, after talking it over with Tim, he trusts my judgement to start an application process for an apartment he hasn't seen yet.

After August starts, I think things will be easier as far as things being more definite and being able to move forward better. It's still too early to be able to put down payments on anything for security's sake. I'm so terrible when things are up in the air and I feel useless and unable to make something happen.

Of course, I also have things that need doing before I get caught up in the shitstorm that is the moving process. Perhaps that is what I should be focusing now instead of worrying myself to death...

But it's what I do best.

.15.

I'm terribly disoriented it would seem...

I didn't explain the "technological deaths" like I thought I had in entries before. Y'see kids, my wonderful Powerbook "The Crushinator" died a few weeks back. I'd been stuck using my roommate's computer while trying to figure out how the hell I could afford a new battery. Of course, the problem was worse than that. I snooped around some Apple forums and found out that it was a power port issue and, well, that was the end of my hope.

So my mother drove into the city to deliver me her old PC laptop to use in the interim while I waited to move to my next apartment and set up either my old iMac or buy a new computer. Of course, not 15 minutes after turning it on, the thing started acting wonky. I tried to reinstall the OS, only to have it crash and burn. Literally. The internal fan was broken so it was heating up and shutting itself off in hopes of saving the motherboard from melting. Not even setting the entire thing on a rig of ice cube trays saved it.

So, that's that story.

My old iMac, the Tallgoose has been puttering along beautifully and I'm quite happy to be reunited with my old speakers, that still work amazingly.

In more recent news, I had my very first art show the other day! Tres exciting. I was part of a group show at a restaurant here in Little Italy, hooked up by a friend of a friend who is apparently the biggest hookup in all of NYC, so she seems... Amazing girl, I aspire to be like that. So anyways, apparently I showed with a comic book artist/industry illustrator who I've been admiring for quite some time. It was surreal to share a show with someone I feel is so much... further in the world than me. Or something. And to get to see his stuff blown up to very very large dimensions was a blast. The whole thing was excellent and we had beers and pizza and a whole lot of cigarettes. I apparently had what was referred to as "an entourage" and we were forced to take part in this long poem re-writing. I'm terrible at being funny...

It is far too hot and I have too much crap on my floor to continue writing right now.

.14.

So... wow, this whole thing is so weird.

I've pretty much landed on my feet after this week of technological deaths. I'm getting my brother's old phone since he was due for an upgrade on his own, which I should hopefully receive by Monday or Tuesday at the latest. I'm back to my good ol' trusty iMac, who even after a year of neglect apparently forgives me and we're like best of friends once more and I should be in a show come Monday as my first group art show.

Being on the old computer is so weird though. It hasn't been updated since May of last year and so it's still filled with old logs from the time, old playlists that my lost friends made on it, old artwork... The whole thing kind of tears open wounds like my ear was earlier when Brian cut through the scab to return the 6 gauge plug into it. I don't like living in the past, especially when I think of how sick I used to be when I lived my life through it and the way that I see others living through it as well. I'm starting to view this as a necessary catalyst for change, but I'm not sure where to build things up from here.

I hope to start at least by cleaning up my room and organizing it before I disappear for a few days and getting to work touching up my old paintings. From there, I will go to Massachusettes to see my boyfriend, meet his friends out there and hopefully have him help me set up some references and sketches to start doing paintings for my boss. There's still so many loose ends to tie off before I move forward, I just don't want to be consumed by them.

I think staying in tonight will also be good. I just need a break from the Thursday crowds, both the group I've been in and my own close friends. Just to reevaluate some things, since a lot of hurt has been going on from both groups to me and perhaps I'll get to work through it better when I'm sober.

Being drunk so much reminds me of a year ago as well, although at least this time I'm not trying to drown the pain away. But I'm still running from my responsibilities and that's never a good thing. I wish I could get this alcohol thing down, but really, I'm terribly irresponsible with it. Even if people view me as being a higher functioning alcoholic to the point of not deserving that title at all. But that's like people who think I'm mentally balanced when really it's a daily struggle to not fall into it too deeply.

All the good artists were fucked up on something anyways. Beer goggles can be good for something, sometimes.

I have my to-do list for the evening. Let's hope my "nap" doesn't turn into full on sleep that leaves me with a ton of stress come Monday.

.13.

Ok, so I don't remember much from log 12 but I'll try not to repeat myself too badly...

A few weeks back my laptop would start being fickle about charging the battery. I was annoyed but had no money to get it checked out and hoped it was just a minor thing. Of course, a few days after that, the thing refuses to charge at all anymore. I try other a/c adaptors thinking that it was just my luck to spend $80 on a new adaptor last April and having to replace it already. But no, none of my roommates' adaptors would work either.

So I got a replacement PC that died on me in a few minutes. My friend took it apart and discovered that the fan wasn't working anywhere near what it needed to and the computer was just overheating. This was a Compaq on loan from my mother. Die Compaq, die.

So after all this running around, being at work and generally ignoring that I ever knew of this thing called "the internet", my mother took me and my sick computer to the Apple store. The resident "genius" there told me that the power port was called a Tier 2 type of damage that would cost around $600 to replace. Then, because he saw soda on the frame, he said that probably caused damage to the logic board, which is a Tier 4 type of damage and would pretty much cost me about $1200 to fix. He also didn't listen to my warnings when I said not to plug a charger in to test out if it REALLY won't accept a charge and to try and tell me that if the charger isn't sitting perfectly flush (my frame is warped a bit around the port but it was never really a problem except for keeping ethernet cables in) then it wouldn't charge. So for this, the Crushinator destroyed the adaptor he tried to plug in. He seemed embarassed by this, but hey, I told him not to do such.

My friend/DM/A+ certified technician is going to take my baby and try to pull her apart and solder her back together. If he can't get the power port to work, he'll at least look into converting the harddrive into an external so I can salvage my 300+ hours and 5gb of downloaded high res reference images and movies. I expect the whole thing to be fucked though.

Lame.

Otherwise, I've been going out a whole lot, meeting some new people, trying to get the last moments in with others who will become obsolete come September and getting my heart broken and pieced back together at record cycling speed. Summer is such a weird time... I'm hoping that once my life is settled I'll be able to regain my discipline for working rather than partying all the damn time. I don't do anything but go out and drink these days and it's great and fun but it's like a vacation from what I want to do. A lot of people seem to be dropping out of the illustration field who haven't started producing things before they graduated, which is disappointing alot. And when I look at their work, I remember being jealous but now they are softening with summer and too much freedom to be sloppy or do uninteresting projects that it's almost sad.

I do plan on going to a Dr. Sketchy's meet though. And a friend of mine is arranging an artists' salon so we can critique each others' work and keep our knives sharp and fresh. I have no desire to become dull and fade away before I ever had a chance to shine.

.12.

Holy disappearance batman!

Where have I been... Oh yea, my laptop got fried. The power port crapped out on me so when the battery discharged, there was no coming back. I've been bouncing from roommate's computer to another roommate's computer for the past two weeks now I believe.

There is more to come from that span of time, but for now, I'm back to my original baby iMac the Tallgoose (if you get the reference, I <3 you) and my friend/DM Sam is going to aid me in a lovely experimentation called "Tearing apart your Powerbook". He's going to take it to pieces to see if he can fix it because to have Apple service it will cost me the same as a brand new laptop (or at least a refurbished one of the same old model). So I'm back to the desktop life, which is an ironic statement on how I'm trying to settle down my life and become more grounded.

Computers reflect their owners, apparently.

Let's see if I can go a couple months without spilling food onto this keyboard now.

Time to make myself some sandwiches to take to work and head on out.

.11.

Oh man, so the past few nights have been some kind of craziness.

I ended up bouncing around bars and even a cluc with Dieselboy playing on Thursday. I love a scene that's just all about the wild dancing... I stayed out far too late but my friend Chino let me crash at his place, which let me sleep in until 9:45a and still make it to my work relativly on time. I adore people with Manhattan housing. And he had two cats that looked almost exactly alike and were decently friendly.

Friday night involved going to my friend Becky's gallery opening. She had the best photo there. I wish she'd been able to get her second print in, but her model flaked on her... There, I got to talk to some really neat people but the social anxiety plus the bad vibes of people too cool to chill out really kept me closed mouth. Ah well. They left to Barcade to celebrate two peoples' birthdays and I got stuck there for an hour or more, but not 20 seconds after they left, two guys introduced themselves to me. Apparently, they were artists who also did music and were working in a studio a few floors below. I checked out the place: they were working on paintings in exchange for the studio time and had been spending the past week living in the studio making music and creating art. It was fuckin' brilliant! I love the barter system, it produces so much more amazing things than the exchange of money ever could.

I hung out and talked to one of them in particular who was this great silkscreener who knows all the people whose work I admire. So strange, but it's true that the people you meet in college generally end up being your greatest connections and will be some of the best in the industry. I hope that someday someone can be that proud of knowing me and my work...

I then wandered down to my friend Tracey's place and helped her and her boyfriend and my old DM move things in and around the apartment. My task is to instil order and convince them to part with objects and items that are just taking up space. We worked long into the night on steady cups of margaritas and got the job accomplished enough that they didn't have a nervous breakdown during the process or by all the stuff still around this morning.

Today is ending up just being a day of anxiety from not doing anything, but being too exhausted to want to clean up a mess that isn't my own doing. After my shower I'll see what's mine and what I can clean up at least to take a fraction out of the equation of mess.

I feel dull right now compared to the excitement of the past few days. Ah, to take up the torch of responsibility once more!