I had two exams this semester. Well, one really since Environmental Systems doesn't really count. You fill out your name, tick some boxes and leave the room. Your H1 will be forwarded to you shortly. To the best of my recollection, one of the questions on my other exam paper last semester went a little like this.
There are three staff members, aka 'resources' who are rated for overall availability and work efficiency at three defined tasks. Two of them, one male and one female are white and the other is an Asian male. This is where every stereotype you can imagine kicks in. Predictably the Asian guy is available for longer and is generally more efficient at most tasks, in stark comparison to the local resources who rate at around 75%. The funniest part is probably where the woman is particularly inefficient at one task, running at about 40%. In one question, the lecturer has unintentionally (or perhaps not?) managed to create a racist and sexist exam question more controversial than a bucket of fried chicken. I suppose you could refuse to answer the question based on your individual moral outrage, or you might just not know how to answer it and made this bull up on the spot.
But as far as uni is concerned, laughing time is over for the time being. I'm doing a summer semester subject in a field I know next to nothing about so I really should start doing some of the readings to try and make some sense out of them before this subject comes around to kick my arse. Let's hope things go well in this subject, given my track record for decision making last year wasn't anything worth writing home about.
I'm looking forward to this year since it'll be my final year. The other day I was reminded that it's been more than six years since I left Box Hill and it's really surprising how time has passed. It certainly doesn't help looking at how the school's changed through YouTube videos of teachers being waxed for charity, or so they claim. While that certainly looks painful, I got distracted by seeing how the quad looks nothing like how I remember it. Still it'll be great not having to deal with the education system after this year, I just hope 25 years of education qualifies me for a position in office lackey work and acting barista for clients. Here's to 2010, if things don't work out I guess we still have 2012 to look forward to.
As the old saying goes, I'm not too old for this shit.
The offending photograph in question was taken at my favourite spot in 516, the computer in the far corner of the room next to the window. I like it because it has plenty of natural light and space I can stare out into, plus having one less computer next to me means there's one less opportunity that I'll be annoyed by the person next to me. I know that sounds harsh but deal with it. Aside from food there's a book I was reading at the time, "Atlas of Novel Tectonics" which I'm considering buying over the interwebs just because it has a really cool cover. As the lady judge on Iron Chef might say, "Oooh, the texture!" On top of the book are my iPod, painkillers and student access card which I keep face down for a very good reason - my evil alter ego lives there. It's not my fault the girl who took my photo in first year didn't give a shit, and because of her I'm stuck with it for the remainder of my uni career. Interestingly enough, the painkillers I've been taking are recommended for "Headaches, back pain, muscle pain and period pain". That'll learn me for watching that episode of Gossip Girl.
I've come to accept the terms of my workload. Time is some sort of luxury that I cannot afford, but that only applies during the final 24 hours before something is due. Though surprisingly for an assignment we managed to get it done the day before, which must've been some sort of minor miracle worthy of church and press coverage. Actually we finished it early because we got an extension for our other subject all thanks to classmates who were doing a vastly more difficult subject. Bless each and every one of them, I say.
The not so funny thing about that assignment was that two of my friends who could've easily worked together were instead working with other people just because they got asked first. In both cases, each respective partner seemingly did as little work as possible while my friends did all the heavy lifting. And these were the friends who had the insanely difficult subject too. In the end we agreed they should have fobbed their partners off and let them outcasts work together. At least that way it'd become a contest to see who could do the least work.
On the upside, I was meant to go into uni tomorrow to work on a group project but my partner bailed on me at the last second... so I get to stay home! When I was telling my sister I ended up doing some sort of weird dance where I kept on chanting "homehomehomehomehome!" several times over. The thing is, I really like being at home. It's not only where the heart is, all my stuff is here too. I really really like my stuff.
As I've become annoyed at beginning each other post with an apology for not posting more often, said apology wil now come at the end of every post. Forgiveness, please!
One of my goldfish died the other day. I know they're not meant to live all that long but it's weird all the same. As a family we grew pretty attached to it, possibly because we gave them all names and personalities. The fact my sister and I named most of them after cricketers is neither here nor there, we're still waiting for Whitey (also the name of one of my external hard drives...) to get back into the test squad. This one was named Bhaji after a certain foul tempered Indian spinner. He won my 'Fish of the Month' award several months running, though he could never comprehend the trophy presentation ceremony. We ended up burying him in the backyard under the lemon tree. I've been to friends' places where their considerably larger, more tangible pets have been buried in their backyards and the feeling is still similar for some reason. Lousy emotional attachment.
The parents went out a couple of weeks later and bought a couple of new tiny fish since they reckoned the three remaining ones were starting to look sad or bored. One of them is the same sort of breed and the other is a sort of black and gold colour. We made an agreement that we wouldn't name them until they actually lived for more than a month or so, but I've started calling one of them Baby Bhaji... and so the cycle begins again.
It's almost the end of the month and I've been pretty quiet on the blogging front, what with the new semester and all. It took me until week three to truly feel like I'm in the second semester, such was the hangover of the first semester. All it took were a couple of near all nighters to get me started again, and thanks to first semester I no longer require what most people refer to as sleep (since it's so overrated) so I can work a lot more effectively. One of the unintended side effects of that semester is that I'm fairly used to putting a few more hours into work so I'm managing to keep on top of things for now. Of course I'm still as lazy as hell and I didn't help myself when I bought Civilisation for my iPod. So long productivity, greetings turn based strategy!
If you've bothered reading this far, thank you once again... I shall reward you with a random factoid that will only make sense to last semester's survivor group.
- The following words will hereby be excised from my vocabulary: compelling, dilemma.
- The following words will be given additional precedence: idle, hammer.
Something tells me I've missed a couple of words here and there.
And now for some more nonsensical photos, conveying jokes that perhaps aren't really jokes. On the tram to uni the other day, I came across a fairly ironic pair of posters.
As the Lee Harding (shudders) album title goes, what's wrong with this picture? And whatever happened to that guy, is he still "entertaining" troops in Iraq? As if post traumatic stress in a war torn area wasn't enough. Ouch, harsh.
Cool, apart from a somewhat buggered bonnet all seems well. And a nice poster for the new flick 'Drag Me To Hell'. And not even five metres away there are posters for...
Nickelback! Who says irony is dead. As the Queen might say, "One likes One's pants around One's feet". Huh?
I didn't think it'd be too difficult a task to find a photograph where all three judges were in the same shot. It really makes the other two look like shunners and Preston seem like the shunnee. I know, another made up word... I'm sorry. Secondly, seeing as Preston works for The Age I fail to see how they of all people could not manage to find a half decent shot of him that doesn't look like he's about to eat someone whole.
This shot in context seems fine enough without the cropping. It's still a little scary but his head doesn't take up the entire shot so it's not too bad. Or they could use that creepy photoshoot (which can be found on the Matt Preston fan page on Facebook) where he's biting down on a bunch of chilli peppers while trying to be seductive. Either way he's on the list of my new heroes.
Speaking of heroes, I came within half a metre of meeting one of them the other night. I went along with my sister to see Paul Dempsey at the Newtown Workers Club on Tuesday night. I had to apologise profusely for making her wait who knows how long since I was stuck at uni for a bit longer than I hoped and made up for it by buying her dinner and paying for tickets. Never say I don't care, because it just isn't true.
In any case we needn't have worried about getting there on time since there was easily enough space for everyone. We got a spot near the front though so I can't complain. I had no idea what to expect from the set, the only solo material I had heard so far were the two singles and they certainly sounded promising. I wasn't expecting him to play any Something For Kate material but he played 'The Astronaut' and 'Pinstripe' at Glen(n)'s repeated inebriated requests. The rest of the solo material was pretty solid even if I can't remember the majority of the song titles. Paul's live work is excellent, he often puts a different spin on album tracks to give them a new lease of life which makes seeing him or SFK always worthwhile.
As I said before I was came really close to meeting the man, but my idolism got in the way. Potentially meeting a personal hero means near instant paralysis and a shit eating grin on this face of mine, and this usually lasts until that person leaves the room or calls security. It's not really my fault, I'm just scared of saying something incredibly stupid.
I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to write in full the extent of what happened in my studio this first semester, so much happened and yet seemingly so little was produced. Without going into too much detail those who did not have prior bookings to go overseas pretty much stuck behind and worked on this thing on a daily basis with very little time for a break. Perhaps I'm lacking the correct 'attitude' in my approach to the entire thing but there weren't a lot of opportunities to catch up with friends over this past month. So when I caught up with a bunch of non-architecture friends last Saturday I seemed to appreciate the entire thing a lot more than usual.
The day was fairly intensive transport wise, being in transit for a lot of the day zipping from place to place. I had to stop by uni first in the morning (as was often the case over these holidays) to do some work and check on things and that meant jumping on a train at 9am on a Saturday in the middle of winter. On the platform at Heidelberg this crazy old man walked past me holding two bags of shopping, muttering under his breath while making a bold fashion statement by wearing shorts. Perhaps you don't need trousers when you've got a lifetime of bitterness to keep you warm, something I look forward to doing in later years.
After performing my duties at uni I rushed down to catch a train to Croydon just to play cards. I really shouldn't bother going such long distances just to do things like that but there are times when I absolutely need to be playing cards. This was one of those times. The trip from the city to Croydon takes about an hour so I passed the time sleeping or listening to music, my default public transport stance. Cards didn't go too bad, I came third overall and fun was had for all. Afterwards I hitched a lift to the station and jumped on the new bus back to Heidelberg, where the trusty Vengabus was waiting in the car park. I used to catch that bus every day to school, and having a new bus route replacing the bus where I spent many a morning and afternoon wasn't as odd as I first thought. I guess it is only a bus route after all.
For the sake of retaining dignity in the years to come I shouldn't put this into writing but my driving experience is limited at best, and I haven't had all that much night driving time under my belt. So it was probably fortunate that it was dark because I managed to flip one lever too many and ended up with the windscreen wipers on for the entire trip home. Any attempt to switch it off ended up making them just go faster or even worse the water nozzle would trigger, making it just as well the wipers were on. I did manage to get rid of them after I pulled into the garage after fiddling around for a couple more minutes though.
After gracing my family with my presence for a quick dinner I hitched another lift from a friend and went to what is probably our group's favourite restaurant, The Pancake Parlour in Doncaster. We refer to it as the Stoner Parlour since it never closes and those ads on the radio seem to think stoners are their primary market. I haven't seen many of these guys for the majority of the holidays and it was a bit annoying that uni kept me away from the remnants of my social life for so long. That stuff didn't matter much once we got there though, I regaled them with stories of my triumphant occasionally superior card playing skills over those noobs and they replied by doing parts of the Thriller dance. Seems apt really. Contrary to popular belief the Stoner Parlour is not full of stoners at 10pm, in fact it was full of normal looking folk that made us look like the weirdos, what with our bad singing and pretend zombie movements.
Looking for some time to burn we then went back to my place to watch The Ashes until 1 or so. Haddin produced bye after bye without fail and it was fun watching my friends predict byes with staggering accuracy. This was probably the first time in ages I let people come over to my place. I often have people drop me off but letting them into the House of Chiu is another matter entirely (I came up with that phrase during Year 12 camp while pouring water for friends at lunch). I once had a bunch of friends over my place back in Hong Kong and I had a ridiculous time trying to prevent them from breaking anything. Ever since then I have had this aversion to having anyone over, or at least in large groups I can tame with pepper spray, or a large trap door inhabited by an equally large trap door spider.
I was pretty buggered by the end of it but it was definitely worth it. In the seemingly never ending shitstorm that is my studio, this was the textbook definition of a perfect day.
Join me next time when I drag you to my definition of hell.
The other night I spoke to an old friend for the first time in more than eight years. Just talking about what we were doing with ourselves brought up a lot of things from the past and what could've been.
Online reunions of this sort are proof that Facebook is not a complete waste of time. No, it's only really 70 - 80% wastage. It was through the site I discovered my friend had already been married with a kid with another on the way, and he's a year younger than me. I saw his baby photos online and he's possibly the most adorable thing you've ever seen. He told me he was taking up further studies at night school, presumably to provide a better life for his new family. It's a lot of work but I love the feeling that he's preparing for such an exciting future. I think part of me is jealous that he seems to have found exactly what he wants in life at such a young age, I wish things would line up for me so easily. We used to be that close back in primary school, I guess he'd classify as a best friend during those simpler times. Goes to show you never know what time will do whilst you've been away.
While our conversation was a welcome respite from the happenings of uni life, I lay in bed for what felt like an eternity lost in thought. Regular readers will notice I have a fairly vivid and weird imagination, and that night I found myself dreaming up scenarios where I'm living an entirely different life based on my memories. It's sad enough when you have to move away from what you know and all the people you have come to love. I've been doing that for a lot of my early years and truth be told I never fully got used to it. I always picture each significant move not just as a separate part of my life, but an entirely new life altogether where people and places are left behind for a new incarnation to take hold.
And what else do we leave behind? Besides these things, in my mind the greatest thing left behind is possibility. Because I left Hong Kong to come here to Australia I dropped out of contact with so many people. And I am often left wondering how I would've turned out if I had never left. My nagging suspicion tells me I may have turned out like some of my nastier relatives (being in a place like HK does things to you after a while) but the personal relationships end up feeling like loose ends without a satisfying conclusion.
Yet despite all these things, I do not wish that this path never occurred. While I certainly regret doing certain things I suppose there's no point dwelling on them all day long. The other day I was chatting away with some of my fellow studio detainees and some of them suggested that taking it was the worst decision of their lives. While I admit the workload has been ridiculously high for such an invisible outcome and a lot of stress has come out of being at uni almost every day from the beginning of semester up until now, in my mind I still feel that the silver lining makes some of it worthwhile. In this studio I have met many wonderful people (and some not so) who I may not have met otherwise.
Having this conversation was pretty good for me though. It's making me think I should head back there again some time soon. I definitely need a break from uni, especially given I haven't had much of a winter break to speak of. At the start of the year a friend floated the idea of flying up to visit my other best friend from my former high school life who now lives in Singapore. That now seems like a very good idea indeed, now to get some money and make it happen...
In case I forget down the track, the title of this post comes from the Kurt Vonnegut novel Slaughterhouse-Five. It's the first real book I've had the chance to read in what seems like forever and it's a great read. The main character becomes 'unstuck' in time, causing him to randomly leap back and forwards through his life. In this way even though he experiences his own birth and death several times over, he does not really die because he can see the entirety of his existence. It's definitely worth reading and I'll be looking for a copy of my own some time down the track.
In yet more evidence that I should take care in what I say online, I made a comment about the closure of the Jeans West outlet in the basement of the Union House building. Didn't know it was there? I'm not sure they did either.
The main difference is that I made my comments on my Twitter feed, where I test out moronic potential Facebook status updates in 140 characters or less.
And of course, being a trendy clothing retail entity they have their own Twitter account. So imagine my surprise when I check my feed for updates and find this:
It's nice to see the guy or girl operating their account chose to overlook my attempts at sarcasm. Such great sports. Now to get myself some sort of sponsorship.
I'll try for a real update next time, maybe some pictures of the Vengabus or something.
I'm still busy typing away at stuff until Friday, but until then I think it's important that I keep in touch so people won't think I'm dead and start to fight over things I've lent them.
Let's see, I had my design presentation on Saturday. Before then, I was busy finishing off my A1 boards and my A5 design journal and subsquently I was up for about 48 hours straight, save a couple of micronaps while other people were presenting. I didn't feel like sleeping much until sometime in the afternoon when all the caffeine I had consumed was starting to wear off, but I recovered in time to present.
Afterwards I believe my sleeping schedule was something along the lines of:
- Saturday night, 8.30 - 12.30
- Sunday morning, 1.30 - 5.10
- Sunday morning, 5.20 - 2.00pm
- Sunday afternoon, 5.00 - 7.00
By the end of it I wasn't completely sure what day it was. Every day seemed like Sunday to me. Unfortunately I compared notes with other people in my class and someone had beaten me by sleeping a full 24 hours straight, her parents thought she had lapsed into some sort of coma.
I think that's all the time I have for the now, will update in the not too distant future with a proper match report. In the meantime let me dazzle you with the random stuff I've been doing these past few weeks.
And now for yet another in this anti homework series of procrastinatory based posts.
Is my sense of irony reading too much into the fact that the official NRL song for this year happens to contain lyrics about the protagonist having a one night stand with a mysterious woman who he "never saw again, but that was alright"? The moral of the story is that I should never listen to pop song lyrics ever again, lest it rot my brains.
As for real news, doomsday is fast approaching and I only have a shonky umbrella for cover. My design is rapidly coming to a close, but not nearly rapidly enough. I'm going to start studying for my exam tomorrow in the hopes that I can at least get a pass. I went out and borrowed a few more books to help with my essay but I really don't know how well I can make it all gel together in a week and a bit. Yea, I'm downgrading my expectations for my other subjects which isn't really the best thing to do. Design had better be bloody worth it.
Lastly, the University has released yet another revised grading system. My only question is: in this age of the Internet infiltrating both popular and unpopular culture, when will we see an "Epic Fail" grade where your results are delivered by the Twitter Fail Whale? I might be needing one of those soon...
Hey look, the semester's over? Unfortunately I didn't really have as much free time as I thought I did, so I've been putting off this post for quite some time now. I wrote this around a month ago, perhaps I was waiting for something else to add to it but I'm not sure what. There's plenty more to say but I'll save that for another time...
(In best Jack Bauer voice) The following takes place between the 25th and 26th of April, 2009.
Hey look, free time! Where'd that come from?
In the time since my last locker status update, conditions have take a turn for the worst. Crappy uncompleted models lying around not being able to fulfill their destiny due to a lack of time. Indeed time is a luxury no one in my class has at the moment.
We've been trying to create a mockup of our proposed atrium archway model and it's fair to say it's been nothing short of a nightmare for everyone involved. To try and get things done I spent an all nighter sitting in the labs churning out panel after panel of work that the other guys had been working so hard to produce.
I'm pretty sure that's more masking tape than I've used in my entire life, but all that tape was consumed quickly in one night, taping freshly cut pieces of toxic MDF. Yay for us!
I started around one in the afternoon or so and kept on trucking until about eight the following morning, when I had to go out and play cards, followed by a quick nap at home and accompanying my sister to see Eagles of Death Metal at eight Sunday evening. Two bottles of Lemon V can take you that far but eventually it all catches up with you. I get pretty emo when something that happens so I should really apologise if you were the unintended target of my misguided rage.
I have a lot of trouble trying to explain exactly what kind of music the Eagles of Death Metal play. The name itself is so misleading that no one really cares for my explanations and frankly there probably isn't much point unless I pull out my iPod and play some of their stuff. I believe my sister would've had a similar problem as I only went along because she couldn't find anyone else to go with her. That's obscurity for you but then we can't all be fans of Miley Cyrus.
The really disappointing part was that the support acts took their sweet time (on the upside Kram was great) and by the time the main act started I could only stick around for the first few songs before I had to pop back into uni to update myself on what was going on. This studio has a lot to answer for. Fortunately my sister was able to use our camera to tape the encore which had my personal favourite from EoDM, "Speaking in Tongues" which comes complete with an interlude where the lead breaks into well, his take on speaking in tongues. Great song from a band that doesn't take itself too seriously, just don't let the video scare you off.
Getting back to the reason my life is a living hell, the annoying part is that the computer generated parametric model on which my all nighter was based was ditched in favour of a modified scheme. For something on this scale, design development is just another term for massive waste of time, materials and effort. So many futile exercises and for what, I don't really know. All I know is that I'm the proud owner of a box full of MDF diamonds and damnit, I'm going to use them for something.
Yea I don't really know if that's a word but it's got a lot more of a chance at being real, unlike Nathan Buckley's wholesale slaughter of the English language in his use of the newly discovered verb 'evolutionise'. It just goes to show that footballers should not be allowed anywhere near a word processor. They just end up disabling spell check with their ego based reality distortion fields and ruin everything. On the other hand, for some reason I don't mind Robert Murphy's column too much even if it really has next to nothing to do with football. It's certainly less objectionable than say, Grant Thomas' stint at The Age a couple of years back. Reading his column you'd never know he had a chip on his shoulder the entire time...
Well I've been so busy lately I haven't even had time to update my poor old blog, what with its multiple obscure references to Toto and the Backstreet Boys. I have to make an apology to my blog at this moment in time due to the fact that I, like all inconsiderate partners, have forgotten its birthday. As of last Monday, Say Something turned two years old and is now crawling along nicely while spewing all over my fine china and shattering my carpet into a thousand pieces. During this time I have covered a lot of ground, from work to uni and a hundred random YouTube videos in between. Hopefully I'll be able to keep doing so for a long time to come. I've come to treat this blog as an odd combination of a personal journal and poorly thought out joke depository, waiting for the day when I can look back at the old posts and wonder what the hell I was on and use some of said bad jokes for a sketch show starring Tandy as a break dancing Asian cricketer with an awful secret. I don't know what that secret is yet but that's how they write shows like 'Lost' or 'Today Tonight' - just make it up as you go along.
Too late to make a thoughtless gift for my beloved blog? I'd rather not bring down the mood on this post by talking about my stupid time consuming, life sapping studio so I'm going to give you something else. If you pay enough attention to this blog then well done, restraining orders will be in the post in the coming weeks. Otherwise you'd know I'm currently working on a paper on the architecture of virtual space, in particular computer games. It's a great way of combining the things that I love most and it certainly keeps me motivated enough to make me want to see it through. Have a read in your spare time, it's about 2000 words so it'll easily take a few moments of your time. Suggestions are more than welcome.
For some insane reason Google Docs won't allow me to publish PDFs via the web. Someone really needs to pay attention over there. So for now here's the text only version , I'm afraid you'll have to imagine the pretty pictures all by yourselves. Join me next time when I wander the premises after dark.
Still no time to write anything overly substantial, not that said quality was ever really present to begin with. Still, it's 2am and thanks to my everlasting commitments to uni I don't feel like sleeping just yet. I don't know how regular people pull it off really.
Here's a nice photo I took early on in the semester where I didn't actually have all that much to store. Can't say there's too much time to actually play now, though I did manage to have a quick hit out the other day. Made a rotten effort of it really... I'm either blaming the fading afternoon sunlight or I've completely forgotten how to read a ball.
This is partially what I do with my waking hours now. assembling computer generated, laser cut models that don't actually work because the material is so lousy at doing anything. Unfortunately the alternative is MDF, a product widely promoted as the next asbestos. In fact I'm pretty certain I had some MDF for dinner in class tonight, fun times.
If we really can be helped we'd probably go to Nando's or KFC for some refreshing chicken grease. They make the best products to ever come out of mashing a chicken into little pieces for our nourishment. Given the chance though, I'd try and get some red meat instead... unless you want Sam Neill coming after you dressed like his character in Event Horizon, sans eyes claiming that we were meant to eat red meat while tearing chunks of flesh off you and dancing some sort of jig. What a nice thought to finish on...
Doesn't that sound really dirty in an uncool kind of way? This following video was brought to you by a white man named Sanjay Jones. Almost everything about this video is ridiculous. From the initial concept to the hammy acting and the little details about our future lives, if there's one thing about the future we can look forward to, it'd be the porn cloud!
In other news, I need to find more time to write. I'm currently attempting to write a 4000 word paper comparing real world and video game architecture, which is kinda fun. At least it gives me a work related excuse to play Max Payne 2 and UT again, so perhaps I'll update the blog with details later on. Now if you'll excuse me I have to do some "research"...
Time to begin yet another year at uni, which has so far been my life's true Neverending Story. No flying talking giant dogs but that's probably a good thing anyway. Where would you park him, with rates in the inner suburbs being exorbitantly high without even contemplating how many spaces a giant dog would need in the first place.
This really seemingly dream timetable would treat all weekends as long weekends. My inner lazy person was pretty tempted to take this one in spite of the seven hour learning marathon on Wednesdays, but that rational speaking dude sent him to watch some TV and I think I'll end up shifting my clash subject to something more manageable. It won't be on either of those days but then I'll be able to spend more time at uni with my 'peeps' and all my stalkers, you know who you are.
Oh well, it was nice to think about for a while. The timetable that is, not the stalkers.
Not too much to say today, just relieved that things turned out alright in the end, especially when anything could've happened. Waiting around for an entire day not knowing what to do when in all probability anything you do won't help at all. You know things are probably alright but the helplessness and lack of information makes things difficult at best.
I've had people suddenly depart from my life before and not all have returned, each person had their own problems that were completely out of my hands. From experience, not every case has a happy ending. Thankfully this one of the good times.
Previously on 'Say Something':
Steve is out of action fighting a mystery illness. He suspects big-game nerves have got the better of him and eats more of Nicola’s lasagne hoping it might settle his stomach. However, the lasagne is the culprit and part of Nicola’s crazy idea to secure her place in Miranda’s life. Will Nicola’s drastic plan put Steve's life in danger?
... actually that zany plot is from Neighbours, the longest running medical action comedy in Australian history. With plots like those it seems almost as formulaic as an episode of House. I'm sure this kind of stuff happens to real people all the time though.
In relative seriousness, here's the other result of my ridiculously long semester. The subject is called Digital Design Applications and teaches different methods in which architectural form can be created with the assistance of algorithms. This has the distinct advantage of being able to execute complex repetitive modules as many times as you need it to, saving on both time and effort.
After a lot of tinkering and procrastinating during the first half of semester I settled on the exploration of boundary creation through the use of sinusoidal spirals. These 'spirals' change shape as the value of the n constant increases and transforms from parabolic curves to circles and infinitely complex loops as seen below.
The next step was to compose an algorithm that was capable of generating this diverse range of shapes and turn it into something semi-meaningful. I seriously doubt you would want to read my script in fine detail but if you want your mind to be boggled beyond relief here it is. The code was written in RhinoScript - part of Rhino, a powerful 3D modelling program used in various industries including industrial and marine design.
Above are a couple of examples of what profiles can be generated with my script. At this point, what I need to do is select a range of n values that will generate a diverse number of shapes, as well smoothing out a couple of problems such as the points which as seen above, initially seem a bit random. This is due to the fewer number of points being plotted around the radius which leads to essential points being skipped. Eventually after a long round of fine tuning I was ready to turn this in at the new laser cutter in the Archi building. Expensive model making toys are nice to have, that's all I'll say.
The laser cutter can create some really detailed pieces of work and can cut to different depths so that it can do both cuts and etches. The above shows each frame of my structure and the detail within each one.
Initially I attempted to string everything up according to how it would actually be set up. This did not go too well because it was extremely difficult to string up each frame to a level of tautness that was sufficient to look authentic. Extra slack in the supporting strings would also lead to inaccuracy in the overall structure, making things more difficult when stringing between each frame.
Here's a shot of my model mid construction. You can really get a feel of how big it is by looking at the objects around it.
Nearing the end of our photo journey I began to document what the model would look like from the ground level. At this stage I changed the supporting material to perspex to further assist in the visualisation of the frames and threads.
And here it is in all its glory. This was taken at the end of year exhibition where among other things, every piece of work from our class was put on display for all to see. Check out the slideshow below to see what else the other guys created.
Fancy stuff, eh?
So much to do, so little time. Not unless that said amount of time stretches far past the semester's end and into swotvac of course, in which case you never really leave. A lot of final reviews for architecture are taken after the official end of semester but that is by no means to be taken as an extension of time. Instead, it becomes a period for extra work that stretches out for some time. Strangely I'm looking forward to sitting my one exam for the semester, a reaction to all this coursework I imagine.
My first subject was due during swotvac. I won't give an overly long explanation for it like in the past, partially because this project has been fairly drawn out and I'm sick of doing transport hubs (especially after last semester). For those who haven't seen me up at Union working on it all semester, the brief was for a redevelopment of Station Pier in Port Melbourne. I took on an environmental aspect in particular regard to the marine life in Port Phillip Bay and the regeneration of the habitat post dredging.
My proposal was to establish the pier as a base point to a network of underwater observation towers (it makes little sense until you see the video below) which act as a support to assist and monitor the recovery of the local marine wildlife. This has the added benefit of allowing further education of marine biodiversity of our local wildlife. Below is an a quick animation I did for the presentation, quick being defined as picking cameras and paths then waiting for the computer to render every frame from the hours of 10pm to 6 the following morning. With the help of architecture, sleep is an inefficiency I no longer need to kowtow to.
Another key idea was to reevaluate the norms we consider behind how we view aquatic life for educational and conservational purposes. For comparison I went to the Melbourne Aquarium and observed how captive species were displayed and housed. I found that the vast majority of exhibits to be overly confined, disallowing the creatures from truly being able to live comfortably. Of course that's an objective point of view, but you won't exactly get an answer out of them and everyone else will think you're unhinged talking to the fishes. So in my solution, the idea was to invert the aquarium and expand the part which works best, the main tank.
My design gives the fish as much space as they need, with minimal human interference. Creatures are lured to this artificial reef by populating the surroundings with concrete habitats with precast hollows for fish to hide. The extent of human observation is maximised by placing viewing pods and portals around gaps in the tower where fish can populate, bringing them as close to the spectator as possible. Tunnels run under the seabed to fishbowl style viewing domes placed at different parts of the reef to observe wildlife remote from the main hub.
The review went alright, with the main criticism being the underdevelopment of the link to the pier and the overly imaginative parts of the tower itself. Some of it depends on the crit panel you get, some like crazy and others not so much. Unfortunately I am cursed with a fairly vivid imagination, though I perhaps pushed the underlying ideals a bit further than was absolutely necessary. Anchoring back into a slight degree of reality might be handy next time.
Stay tuned for Part Two of my neverending semester soon enough, looks like I went into a bit too much detail again... There'll be more pretty pictures!
Tonight on the platform after class, I had yet another encounter with one of those super religious Latter Day Churchers. Normally I wouldn't complain but this is the 3rd one I've spoken to in the last four years, and more worryingly the last two were only a few months apart. I must really be their type. I imagine it has to do with the fact that I try to stand clear of most other people on the platform making me easier to single out and harass. If I want to act like a loner, why not leave me be? Their particular version of Jesus can't possibly be that better than the others, can it? Perhaps this version offers eternal afterlife and an Xbox 360 to boot. No games included though, that's where they get you.
The stations put a lot of good stuff up late, stuff people with 'mainstream' tastes tend to miss, such as 30 Rock, Boston Legal, Good Game and Newstopia. However, they also put on a lot of crap at this time too. If you can't get enough of Mariah Carey this moment they're showing Glitter, not to be confused with Holiday in Cambodia: The Gary Glitter Story. Seems like her life is so real it hurts, though if you're having a film made about your life why bother hiring someone to do it for you when you can do it yourself? I suppose that makes sense in theory, acting ability and expression notwithstanding.
Unfortunately I haven't been able to bombard your computer monitors with my imitable brand of crapping on as of late, there are far too many assignments due for uni and never enough time. Semester just seems to fly by quicker and quicker each year, must be that age thing going on again. Falling into routine never seemed so dangerous really. Before you know it several items are due at once and you wish you had a Time Vault combo to sort things out. I have been preparing in a strange kind of way though, I've been going to bed later so I become fully acclimatised once the all nighters kick in the next week or two. That's partially why I'm typing this at what is currently half past one in the morning. As long as I'm not conscripted into flying a plane for Qantas or assassinate the members of PCD, what could possibly go wrong?
This semester I've taken to dedicating Thursdays working on my design projects up at Union House, aka Onion House to some. It really hurts that my studio that day is on at 6pm, and the fact I have no other classes that day drives the stake in just that little bit further. But I manage to make the most of it by doing my work in the company of friends who drop in and out over the course of the day. On days like these I spend practically the entire day in Union, planting my arse on my seat of choice right next to the power socket. That's right, I have a favourite power point. Its' name is Howard.
How very profoundly saddening.
Okay, so I made that bit up but the change of location away from the Home Building known as Archi is an invigorating one so to speak. I could easily spend the entire day in the Archi labs and indeed I have gone through long stretches cooped up hammering out a project without distractions. But in that case I wouldn't be able to have 'Party All The Time' YouTube parties or scar myself for life by watching that cursed Marky Mark video. I wouldn't be able to speculate on what kind of pornographic material could be stored on the old school HDDs totalling a whopping 5MB of memory. (The answer according to X is ASCII porn. Hilariously stupid, yet strangely sensical.) So although I may seem to be there all day long (cos I am) sitting there at my laptop until I lose all feeling in my legs and arse working on some neverending project, it seems worth it.
Speaking of cryptic titles, Mel Gibson reportedly turned down an opportunity to star in Lethal Weapon 5. After fighting apartheid South Africans and Chinese triads, would the next logical step be to fight overzealous drunken folk with an irrational grudge against Jewish people? Oh wait, never mind.