Christmas

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E: MERRY CHRISTMASS !
S: im not christian so that's technically pretty offensive
S: it should just be "happy holidays"

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.23rd - Upon the merry 23rd of the lonely month of Decemeber, a bunch of kids (I included) decided to run along with a bag full of munchies and five dollars to attend the rehearsals of the traditional annual "Carols by Candlelight" held every Christmas Eve. I think.

In the gates we went to the sounds of a terrible rendition of Ave Maria, blasting out of the Myer Musical Bowl. But the sky was blue with not a cloud in sight. The sun was shining and everyone seemed to be infused with the Christmas Spirit. One couldn't help but smile.

These were the rehearsals, so they did redo, and redo certain songs and acts over and over again, all of which didn't get far too annoying. Which in mainly because each rendition were separated by lack of carols and music all together. It was overall generally uneventful, and sometimes we (who love music at our ears) cringed in pain as the little choir boy's voices seemed to conjure a cheese grater, and as the sounds wafted over the hill, the grater began it's journey up and down the side of your face.

Ok, it wasn't THAT bad. I just found it annoying.

An indiscriminate amount of time passed, then suddenly there was great a upheaval, and the cocky hosted announced that there was going to be a special surprise appearance from Hi-5! I hate them, I really do. I was hoping that they would invite the Wiggles, because they ARE generally better in every way, shape form. Sadly, they didn't appear in their big red car. Humphrey the bear turned up though.

B: Why doesn't Humphrey ever talk?
E: Because they cut out his vocal cords when they chained him as a dancing bear.
W: That's horrible.

And now the terrible atrocity! Humphrey with his muffled sound, indicated that there was a giant present sneaking it's way onto the stage. The silly Hi-5 members enthusiastically ran towards the box. The suspense was great. Mother lead their little children closer to the stage. "We have a special visitor" the crew exclaimed! Then, with the full attention of the audience, the giant box opened, and out came Santa! Or at least that's what the Hi-5 crew exclaimed. What everybody else saw, was a little different.

It's pictured below.

Seriously. Why would you do that?
Fair enough it wasn't a dress rehearsals, but if you're letting the public in, many who have brought along little toddlers and children, you could at least keep the great lie a secret to their young minds!

The day moved onto night. Glow sticks were broken out, Candles were lit. I spent the rest of the night flirting with fire. Thus the header.

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.nativity - About two weeks ago, a friend of mine approached me and asked if I could help with the nativity scene a church. Whole heartedly I agreed. I was given a brief, an example, a style to folloand a deadline. I had a week to do it. And because of it, I was forced to cancel a nice would of been trip to Chadstone to bowl. Pity.

The concept that I was given was terrific. I thought it was brilliant. There were two illustrations that were to be done. One side, was a nativity scene of the modern day world, homeless gathering for a Christmas party around a fire. The other was of the traditional nativity scene. Now, these two scenes, were to be stuck against each other, back to back. The modern side faces on audiences, and the traditional side faces away. Behind this illustration, is a mirror.

Another friend, Alan, was given the job of illustrating the modern scene; I was given the ancient nativity scene:
The concept was intended to illustrate the love and joy of Christmas. The meaning of the Christmas tradition in the modern do world. What we see first is the homeless gathering at the shelter with a couple of dogs. But if we look closer, into the reflection, we see ourselves standing amongst those present at the ancient nativity scene. Although obviously, this concept all sounds better in writing, in practice, not so much.

This was how it turned out:

The little angles at the top were done by the children in our parish with colour pencils and markers.

my work, in ze refleztionz
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MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Trios (ix)

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I kept flicking through all 26 channels of programmable static. There was nothing but trashy sit-com's, sports and recycled news on the moving picture box. I kept flick through the channels, click click click.
"Who are they?" Ice cubes tinkled in the bourbon glass as it was brought up to the owners lips.
"Who?" I didn't even bother to look around, I knew Smuck had decided to pay me another visit. I continued to stare into the endless rhapsody of television static.
"Those monster's banging on the window" he replied. His voice quivered near the end.
I sighed and turned my head around to look at him in his clever suit. I followed his out stretched pointing hand.
"Just some old ghosts." I grunted.
"They look angry"
"I'm not at all surprised"

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funny, that looks like Alana's house.

Passing Time

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Time is made for it

It's been a while since I last blogged. I have to say I haven't done much with myself. There were many days spent sitting in front of the computer, running away to strange enchanting worlds with the sole purpose of making the sun rise and fall quickly. There were only a few days which were spent around friends. They were merry; brief, but recharging.

.interviews - These were supposed to be much more important to me than my exam results; for whether or not I get into my course of choice: industrial design, is compeltely based upon . So armed with my little arsenal consisting of two folios from two subjects and a scaled display model (right) placed in a rather large orange fruit box, I confronted my first opponent: Swinburne.

Dearly old sWINburne in Kew and allocated the interview at 4:30pm. I rocked up in a nice dark suit, grey and light blue 3mm striped black dress shirt, with no tie and pointed shoes. Went up the escalator to the interview room, and examined the competition. What can I say? I was happy, nicely overdressed and throwing adding an extra hit of fear into my neighbours. Overall the interview went smoothly. The people seemed impressed with my work, we spoke overtime, and I was leaving, the man (who introduced himself as the faculty head) said, "I think this course is perfectly suited for you, hope to see you next year". I was over the moon; pity swinburne is numbered 6 on my perference list.

Next up in line was Monash University. This is the most exclusive univesity, as they only take in a small class of about 20, in comparison to RMIT's 90 or Swinburne's 60. I also like them more, because they're facilities seem more professional, cleaner, more organised, and the work their students design seem more mature (in my opinion). Anyway, dressed in the same suit, with the same arsenal, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. This interview was set at an early time at 11:20. But they were late, and ended up coming to invite me into their office at 11:35. So i was sitting there alone in a rather bleak office, with a Mac book pro sitting on the desk, and some scattered stationary. The rest of the room of blank. It was a rather interesting conversation, as we did speak overtime, but not only did I speak of the course, my work, but we side tracked onto discussing literature, especially on Roald Dahl's wonderful stories of turning the trivial and ordinary into a twisted wonderful gripping work of art. I thought it went rather well, I left with the last words from the faculty head saying, "It's obvious that you've put a lot of work in this." Which I presume is a positive thing. The terrible thing that happened was that I completely forgot to show him all the awards and certificates I got during school. GRRR!

Unlucky last was RMIT. They placed me at a very silly time of 5:30. You know, nap time. What they also did, was pull their interview of 200+ kids over two days straight. I happened to be the last applicant, on the last day. Everyone was anxious to leave and go home. So i was sitting there waiting in line in the interview room. Two of the five interviewing couples stretch and left, voicing their joy of finally completing their mammoth task. "Are we finished? Oh, one more," I head one of them groan. So I sat down and presented my things, folio and such and answered the obsecure questions that they asked. For example, "What can you say about design, given the example that in 1980's a man married his television?" Since they were looking tired, uninterested and wanted to finish quickly, I gave a silly answer: "I can't really say, there's a hospital for people like that; it is quite perverse afterall." They chuckled, and I gave them a serious answer. Overall the interview was short, the man merely glanced and quickly flicked through my folio. I walked out feeling crap.

.results - I came out with is very content; but i was more surprised, and humbled at my successful interviews! For all three universities! It's a nice position to be in.

.passing time - So now that everything's out of the way, I'm left sitting around twiddling my thumbs until the first-round offers for my course comes out (on the 20th of Jan). I must find something to do. So I've been passing my time watching a bunch of films that I've been planning to watch, slowly plotting through a list of reading material, and exploring the deranged perverse jungle on the interwebs.

I find myself ridiculously enjoying myself in the company of my friends. I find we don't usually end up doing anything, but loiter. It's terrific.