I guess I didn’t mention this: I graduated yesterday.

Congratulations to all of my classmates, and to everyone back from NJ who is graduating this year too.

My house is now so empty that it doesn’t feel like my home anymore… I’ve taken all the posters off the walls, dismantled my shelves, and other good things like that. There is a huge mountain of things in my living room that (supposedly) will have to fit into my tiny car, though I’m beginning to seriously doubt that it will be possible. I may have to make a trip to UPS beforehand (I still hate you, UPS… don’t think I’ve forgiven you).

I plan to go home Monday night so I should arrive in NJ by Tuesday evening. Ugh… the drive from Hell. At least it’s the last time I’ll have to do it.

And when I arrive home, summer begins! I’ll be building a game room in my basement for a little while, then starting up a new D&D game (maybe I’ll try to keep up a web journal like I did in the past). I’ll also be illustrating more game-y stuff, like I used to do in high school, and hopefully I’ll be able to get a few jobs from gaming companies. I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself for now… but that’s the plan.

Strangely, though my parents were all happy about sending me to art school when I was in high school, they’ve finally hit that mark where they suddenly decide it was a bad idea after all. I guess my parents are finally getting old. (Have they forgotten they went to music school?) It was a real bummer at graduation because it seemed like they were not proud at all… and I keep hearing the “when are you going to get a real job” line. My mom has some bizarre plan for me that there is no way I will do… so I expect there to be a lot of fighting this summer.

I guess it’s a sign of the times… I just got out of my car where I was listening to the oldies station (playing 70’s and 80’s songs) and unloaded my purchase of Pepsi and Pringles. I looked at the box for Pepsi’s current promotion: Call Upon Yoda! Then I was saddened to see the entry requirements: 1) find your game piece in the box, 2) register online at some website, 3) text message the number provided to see if Yoda responds.

Look how complex those instructions are! What happened to the age where you could open a box and find out if you won? How come now to enter any contest we have to subject ourselves to endless spam by registering online, and then spend money on a sending a text message? Doubly saddenning is not only knowing that I would never be willing to complete such uneven requirements, but knowing that countless millions will.

And as for the disturbing trend of foods now to be covered in “low carb” labels and forgetting the whole “low fat” phase, will our children grow up teasing their classmates with names like “carby-warby” instead of “fatty-watty?” If I ever become fat enough to warrant a nickname, there goes my title!

…On the other hand, if your name is Barb, I feel sorry for you.

It’s happened to all of us; you wake up only to discover that your neck is out of kilter. You slept on it wrong, or twisted it in your sleep, or whatever.

That’s what I’m like today, only it’s the most pain I’ve ever had in my neck. I woke up feeling like someone was twisting a knife around in my spine, and it’s not gotten any better since. I tried taking a hot shower to relax the muscles, I took 600 mg of ibuprofin… nothing… I can barely move without feeling crippling pain shoot through my body. It hurts so bad I feel nauseus…

I hope this clears up before graduation, cause theres no way I can go if it still hurts like this.

My senior show was last Thursday. I forgot to bring a camera then, so I came back later and took a picture of the setup.

Senior Show

As you can see, Frances is visiting me. That explains why I haven’t updated this site in over a week. She was here for 10 days, and it was the best vacation I could have from all the work this semester. We went to Busch Gardens last Saturday and had a great time… this week was actually the first time I really enjoyed being in Florida, and even though I could write up a long list of reasons why I don’t like this state, I think finally after 4 years of living here I’m finally able to appreciate Florida. That said, I’m really looking forward to returning to New Jersey. I will miss the nice weather down here, beautiful plants and birds, and the nice sea breeze… but I’ll be glad to get away from the most inefficiently managed place I’ve lived in, with some of the stupidest people I’ve ever lived near. I promised myself I wouldn’t turn this post into a rant about Florida, so I’ll leave it at that.

Now that Frances is gone I’ve got some emails to catch up on, some cleaning to do, and some packing to do. I also want to run down to school and scan some of the work I did in the fall semester, since I haven’t been able to do that yet.

I’ve spent so much time this week around tame birds that I’ve decided I want to try to train Igor to be more comfortable being handled.

At last! Here are the paintings I did for my senior thesis. I present to you:

Chickens Throughout History (…history, history, history…)

I’ve suddenly come across a slight roadblock in my efforts to finish up this semester: Stronghold came out yesterday. I bought it immediately after I got out of work, and alternated between my thesis and playing every so often. It’s a very fun game, much more complex than the original. I was really getting antsy for a new video game, so I’m glad to finally have one worth buying.

Oh yea, and you may notice that I’m playing around more with the site layout. What do you think?

So today I had my thesis presentation. I don’t know what the hell was wrong with my, but I forgot to dress up for the presentation. Worse, I forgot to spit my gum out during my presentation. Oy! How stupid can I be? Well, that’s that and despite those blunders I think I did a good job. My classmates didn’t seem to mind my foolishness (I can’t believe how rude it was of me though… I felt awful afterwards). Thank goodness for that.

I thought the stress would melt away after my presentation, but if anything it’s intensified tenfold! My next step is to trim my paintings to fit my frames (and I already messed up on one of them). After that I need to paint the edges and frame them, write an artist statement, shoot some slides of the pieces, and write up a category page for the school’s records. I also have about 6 book reviews to write, and a term paper on China/Taiwan relations due pretty soon. Aside from my schoolwork, I have to burn some DVD’s for a friend, create a few different portfolios for different types of clients, visit some of the campus recruiters (now that I supposedly have the time), and begin working on a professional website… all of this before I graduate and start the job hunt! It’s quite a feat to accomplish. So much for some R&R before “the real world” starts.

Thinking about getting a job stresses me out so much. Not so much fear of getting rejected at this point; for now it’s the fear that I am absolutely 100% unprepared to go job hunting. My portfolio needs serious fixing up, my website has no online portfolio, I have no self-promotional materials yet, no business card, and my body of work is not diverse enough for the different types of jobs I want to apply to. Once I solve all of those problems, then the fear of rejection can begin it’s toll… Oh how I wish that was the only thing plaguing me. I’ve also got a bad case of cynicism towards starting out with any new venture (of which there are plenty) because I was ripped off by three companies that I’ve done work for. And both of those were found through my school’s career services, so it’s not like they didn’t appear to be reliable sources. It really sucks to do a bunch of work only to have your employer run away without contacting you, without paying you, and very likely illegally using your work somewhere else. Grrr…

I also want to write letters to my host family and friends from Japan, and some serious Thank You letters to my relatives who helped pay for my education.

You can see that I tend to ramble more when I’m under stress.

I just want to get that stuff done so I’m in a good place when I get home for the summer. Then I can spend the summer looking for a job, working like crazy on broadening my portfolio, and playing D&D (for which I have been dying for a fix).