page turn.

I've only been in Baltimore for two weeks and it feels like it has been a freakin' month. Seriously, a million and one things have ebbed and flowed and smashed like a tsunami into my life. And they are all a foamy blur. Off in the distance, rushing out to sea, that's the life I had two weeks ago. And, you know what, I'm totally okay with that.

In two weeks there has been a million and one good things! Classes started and I am more then super pumped for the semester. This round it's all about the books! And when I say all about the books, I mean four of my five classes are either about reading, writing, illustrating, or constructing books. The last class is the required Illustration II, which I'm sure is bound to include book-y things. So there, all about them book things. It goes something like this:
Monday - Book Illustration
Tuesday - Writing for Children's Picture Books (and my professor graduated from Harvard, jus' sayin')
Wednesday - Historic Paper Making and Book Structure
Thursday - Illustration II
Friday - What Men Live By: Russian Literature of the 19th and 20th century

I don't think I have ever read as much as I have read this weekend. Eighteen children books (one of which was 545 pages, titled The Invention of Hugo Cabret, and it seriously made me drool with how beautiful the design format was, oh. dear. lord.), twenty five pages of the Archeology of Medieval Bookbinding by J. A. Szirmai (albeit interesting, a boring read as compared to children books, I mean, common), Leo Tolstoy's What Men Live By and Part II of Nicholas Roerich's Altai-Himalaya: A Travel Diary. Up to my eyeballs in reading. But, honestly, I adore it. I spent five of my Saturday's hours in a local place called City Cafe, which is a dandy place to get work done. I've come to realize that I cannot be in my own apartment and get work done. It's too comfy, too cozy and too nap inducing. Besides, I have Baltimore at my disposal, why not see it and get stuffs done all at once! The only downfall is that to work in a coffeehouse means to spend the $2.65 on a mug of coffee. It may be bottomless, but, really, funds are low.

And by low, I mean there's about $50 in my bank account and maybe $8 in my wallet. Seriously, playa has lost as sore as Baltimore's downtown, what with the Raven's stupendously atrocious loss to the Steelers on the 16th (the city lost $25,000,000 in revenue, as the final game would have been played at the M&T Bank Center, bringing flocks of fans into restaurants and gas stations and beer distributors and the like).

Since I've been here in Baltimore I've been on the search for jobs. But I'm picky after having so many (which is stupid, considering how broke I am) mindless jobs, so I've been handing out my resume (which is beautiful and baller all in one) to my favorite restaurants in the hopes that I can charm them with my charisma and serving abilities. But, to no avail. I'm still supa broke and work study's pay doesn't arrive until next Friday. And I have to buy cat food.

This whole growing up thing, yeah, it's here and stuff.

And I feel like that is not what this blog should be for. Why mindlessly type about things that are not so important, things that my friends really already kinda know because I talk about it with them all the time. Why not offer something to the bloggersphere that I don't offer anywhere else?

I've decided to utilize this blog as a day's recap of my classes. My hope is that to come home after a hard day's class I can sit back and summarize it, unlocking all that I may have missed while in class. I feel like this is the best way to get my money's worth because it will force me to really think about what it is I am doing, from point a (being the beginning of the semester) to point b (being the end). Then, I can look back and say, 'Oh, yeah, I did learn that,' or 'Oh, wow, that was such bullshit!'

Also, I think it will be neat for my friends not at MICA to get a peak into what art school is like. And I know, I know, that makes me sound super pretentious and stuff. But, really, it's different. And I want to break down the pretentious wall. Because art school may be pretentious, but I am not, and so I can talk about it (hopefully) in a way that will make it seem conducive to real things and not just, 'Oh, you go to art school, what are you going to do with that? Paint pretty things?'

So, there. That's it. Get excited and stuff for tomorrow's summation of Book Illustration. It should be pretty wonderful.