floordiving

Saw this video over on JustPassingThru. If I can make facial expressions like the guy in this video...sign me the hell up

pondering

things just aren't made the same anymore
when things were made the same, were they still not made the same anymore?

NYC updated

these grainy, epileptic pictures tell the tale of a night of cheap chinese food, sapporo beer, and manhattan

browning out next to the tracks at 3am

little known fact: I shot the cover of slumdog millionaire months after the movie was released. producers came forward in time to get it.

six floor drop to trains

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this conversation did not end well

430 feet above sea level alongside the hudson river

harlem

shaolin where the guns go pop

so many bridges

this tree has a big secret

we drove through part of connecticut that got so boring it lost color....crazy

there was an F-2 tornado 20 miles from my house on saturday afternoon

global warming is apparently horseshit

insignificant

think redwoods are big? think again. There's a fungus in oregon that covers more than 1500 acres. Of course you can't see this fungus as it is mostly subterranean, but it does send up small called honey mushrooms. The fungus was discovered after Mycologists were sent to the area to investigate an abnormally large number of pine tree deaths. In order to figure out what it was, they sampled the DNA extracted from the honey mushrooms from all over the area affected by the fungi. When the results came back they were astonished to find the dna to be identical, revealing that over six million square meters of pine trees were being killed by a single organism. Armillaria ostoyae kills trees by sending out tendril-like rhizomorphs which enter the roots and vascular system of trees, depriving them of water and nutrients.

Did I mention that it came from a single spore germinated over a thousand years ago?

think about it

guess what

it would be impossible to know the meaning of only one word.

superpowers!

That's a picture of the mock air force one that flew over nyc the other day scaring the shit out of anyone and everyone. Big Brother apparently just wanted to see how air force one would look flying through the canyons of the big apple. This is reminiscent of something, but I just can't put my finger on it. Oh yeah...

try this...

ok, sweet trick to try right before you fall asleep. get a cell phone, be in a dark room. As you probably know, when you see something bright in the darkness, it leaves a trail on your vision. with that in mind, write yourself a message with light from your cell, or even better, a penlight. Then close your eyes as fast as possible. 

do it, you won't

this goes out to you

that's right, congratulations is in order to the bystander, the most recent recipient of my hatred. The bystander has no home, requires no food. The foibles of other people provide the only sustenance necessary. The bystander is a bastard that's always there when you fuck up. He is always armed to the teeth with witty retorts. The bystander appears seconds before a stack of papers is dropped, or in my case: someone hits a large stone on their skateboard. While he shows no signs of being competent in the subject which he is making fun of, the Bystander is always ready to offer painfully obvious advice like, "hey man, there's a rock there!" OH! THATS what that was?!?! thank you mr. bystander, for if I was not privy to your acute sense of sight I probably never would have noticed the rock that stopped my skateboard! 

The bystander is a tricky bitch. He appears in many different disguises, but most frequently he appears as an innocent child walking home from school. The disguise is very transparent however, and most of the time you can tell that the poor kid is possessed by the Bystander when he demonstrates the wit of a standup comedian coupled with the timing and delivery of a doctor delivering a christmas-day baby. Both of these qualities are clearly not representative of the child exhibiting them.

But let's take a closer look at the Bystander and truly shed some light on this curious creature.

Despite the image the bystander projects, he is actually quite weak, and very unskilled. His sole purpose is to trick others into thinking he is an authority on everything, and as such an authority, is licensed to dole out helpful hints and tips to seemingly lesser skilled individuals. But all of this is a sham. The Bystander puts this up as a front to cover up a severe lack of skills of any kind. Here's a few helpful hints to deal with the bystander:

1: Have a strong middle finger. You should exercise it frequently and rely on it as your go-to- defense.

2: Ask the bystander nicely to demonstrate the proper technique for whatever the situation is. If you dropped a stack of papers, kindly prompt the bystander to show you the correct way to carry papers. Now you're just wasting the bystander's time, something he most likely wasn't counting on when he decided to offer his worthy opinion. If he tries to dodge the responsibility, explain how you've been having problems with carrying paper lately, and 

since he offered his advice from a distance, you would like a much more detailed demonstration of the proper method.

3: Speak gibberish to the Bystander. Act a fool, go fucking crazy, pretend to be an escapee from a methadone clinic. Depending on how your theatrics pan out, the Bystander may think twice before adding his two cents the next time he's in particularly advisory mood for a short time. 

Everybody has seen someone trip on the stairs, or crash into a curb on a bicycle. It's almost impossible to avoid a passerby in these situations. But be strong and do not allow the Bystander to possess you...

two amazing songs

Boredoms
Listening to these songs is sort of a time investment but as is(was) the truth with any investment, you get a full return. I just found this band called Boredoms, they're a noise rock collab from Japan. House of Sun is just a cool song to have going on in the background as it's not the most dynamic of songs. Seadrum on the other hand is 20 minutes of power. I was listening to this last night while I was VERY high and I literally sat back for the duration of the song with my eyes closed and just grooved on it.

this is what music videos looked like in 1967

holy HELL

my friend anna made this for her graphic design class, and i think it looks pretty cool. I did the graphic for the skis I'm wearing-the skis were originally all black. The "wave", the board I've been drawing on, is looking NUTS but alas I keep forgetting to cop batteries for my camera so it'll have to wait. I woke up at 4am a few nights ago and just attacked the board with markers. I wasn't even drawing anything in particular, it just flowed from my brain to the deck. That means the board is probably never going to see the action it was meant for, but I can live with that. stay tuned for some pictures of THAT. anyway, shout out to anna benedetto for a nifty little edit:

weekend

Got out of class on friday, decided to head to Ithaca for some fun. Hit the road at about 6:30, got in around 8. First stop was the local Taco Bell for a quick dinner. Despite the fact that the inside of the Bell was closed, we were still admitted and fed a nourishing and delicious meal, complete with some baked apple treats compliments of the staff of Taco Bell. Left Taco bell, everyone but myself, being the driver, took some warm-up shots of whisky. All of a sudden an ambulance comes roaring into the parking lot, lights ablaze, sheriff in tow. He proceeds to pull right up to my car, pause for about 20 seconds, then drive about 20 feet away, unload the stretcher and hoof it into the Bell. Strange events indeed.
Picked up good friend Juliana from Cornell and headed to a house on the outskirts of I-town. Party takes place in sick house, with lots of people painting upstairs, and others banging on various musical/nonmusical instruments downstairs. The crown jewel of the whole shebang however, was the balloon room. The balloonroom was simply what it promised, a room of balloons.

The balloons provided limitless entertainment, especially the yellow one. But after a while the balloon room took it's toll and we moved upstairs to do some painting. In all the excitement, I had been hitting Senor whisky a bit hard and didn't come up with anything too deep. Juliana came up with a sweet little number that now adorns the wall of the house.
Soon after, a congregation of people joined an impromptu jam session using anything from a saxophone, to bongo drums, to regular old pots and pans from the kitchen. I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty impressive and definitely one of the coolest things i've ever witnessed. Night gets foggy from that point on, as I had at this point become fairly plastered.
I never know how to end blog posts by the way, it's always a torrent of thoughts coming out of my mind followed by silence. But check this out, I've been working on building a short drop down skateboard and it's coming along nicely, I just more or less finished the graphics I want for the bottom. 10-4, Over and out...
PS-Juliana has a blog too, and it's a much better place to waste some time than mine.

I have decided to become a vegetarian

well it's now the month of april, and i feel like doing something new. you'll just have to figure out on your own what it is. In the mean time: here is the story of my day told in two pictures (there may be some extra words in there for extra clarification)

pH determination via Acid-Base titration

extra points will be awarded for telling me 

the pH of that there solution.

favorite part of the library: the drug/gang/

mafia/ crime literature section

buy my soul, support a cause

So I've got this friend named Erich, and he's pretty skilled at photography. It just so happens that he enjoys taking pictures of me while I'm skiing among other things. On a related note, Armada team member Travis Steeger tragically passed away a little over a month ago in his native British Columbia. Erich and I decided to take a picture paying tribute to a sick shot of Travis. Now, Erich is taking things one step further by making the picture into a poster, and donating any profits from poster sales to the Steeger fambly. Take a look at the shots he has to offer, they're the perfect way to turn your lame dorm room into a radical hanging pad. Erich's got some sick stuff to offer so check it out, and if you buy the poster on the front page, proceeds will go to a family in their time of need. Hit ze link:

POSTERS!

assorted pictures of various things

symphonic clouds, hot pursuits, looming bridges, fiery computers....all in a day's work for Me

Saturday

Lazy Saturdays are the best. I skied for a few hours this morning, but it wasn't worth doing all day. Came home and relished in the hours of afternoon looming ahead of me. Red curry rice noodles and a grilled cheese was the first lunch I've eaten at home in months.

Vitamin Water

What if vitamin water didn't have a narrative about the name on the back. Suppose it was sold in a rusty tin can. Would it taste as delicious?