the gross, the hopeful and the adorable.

the gross.
yesterday, in my infinite wisdom, i managed to give myself minor food poisoning. so that wasn't fun. turns out, that pumpkin soup i made from scratch a little while back didn't keep as well as, well, anything. and this all had to happen about twenty minutes before i had to head out the door. so then i was just a mess of running around getting things ready so that i could leave and also running to the bathroom so i could throw up (with small breaks in between of standing/sitting/lying really still to see if i could calm my stomach down enough to leave. i finally got out and walked to andy's to borrow shaniqua to drive myself to the dchs for my volunteer orientation. for the first hour (of a three hour class), it was not good. i was very much regretting hauling myself out for it and wanted to bail. but after that, my stomach seemed to settle for the rest of the class. until i got back to andy's. on the walk back, my stomach decided to get a little more aggressive. then, when i got home, realized i'd puked up my only meal of the day and decided to try some light chicken noodle soup. apparently, bad idea. stomach got angry. i spent the rest of the evening lying on the couch miserable until i passed out into a gross-feeling nap. and then it was bedtime.

woke up this morning feeling significantly better, though not 100%, and thoroughly exhausted. i was tired enough and even after waking up, walking around, feeding puppy and, y'know, carrying on with my day, i still managed to pass out for another hour and a half completely by accident. decided to get out of the house. headed to starbucks for a nice, holiday peppermint mocha. which, by the way, didn't come in the signature red holiday cup! disappointing. vented to smingle, who's sitting in urban lab studio right now. hehehe. anyhoo. it's now 2:30pm. first meal of the day: an artisan breakfast sandwich. so far so good. no urges to get rid of it immediately.

still can't even think about that pumpkin soup without wanting to throw up. so i'm going to have to ask aaron to help me get rid of it so it doesn't bring back those gross feelings...ew.

vox populi vox dei | milwaukee county courthouse

the hopeful.
before that debacle with the gross happened, i had an interview at eppstein uhen architects at their milwaukee office in the morning. first off, it was my first time to milwaukee. and hey, it's nice. cute. kinda like a smaller, less schnazzy chicago. i took the badger bus there since i hadn't driven on the highway before (i only just started driving on the beltline) and wanted to see what the trip would be like before i did have to make that trip by car on my own. btw, not bad. i totally could have driven there and back perfectly fine. damn me and my habit to second guess myself. anyway, got to milwaukee. started walking my way over to where the office was located in the third ward. so here is my interpretation of the third ward. it's like a combination of pittsburgh's south side and the strip district. or how i initially put it to aaron, "like the south side, but less kitschy", if that makes sense. cute historic district with art galleries, stores and coffee shops, and a couple of architecture/consultant offices sprinkled around. it's nice. i could totally see myself working there. even with the commute from and back to madison every day. the commutes would suck, but the drive itself is actually kinda nice.

so the interview: the interviewer definitely made me nervous with the number of time he emphasized that it may take some time for them to judge their need for production people. but anyhoo. the interview was for a production role at the milwaukee office. it would essentially be taking architect drawings and sketches and developing them into more technically correct drawings in revit. it would be a temporary position. but all the same, i need a job. and he did mention that it was definitely a good thing that i would be willing to work in either their madison or milwaukee office. because their madison office is the newer, smaller one and they were looking to expand, hopefully soon. again, like all architecture, it would depend on the demand. but i would love a position with this company. the more i look into eua and talk to them and learn more about them, the more i really, really, really want to work for them. their portfolio looks awesome. they have plenty of projects that really speak to me and attract me to want to learn more and be a part of them. and now having been to their milwaukee office, i love their office. it just seems like a really fantastic place to be everyday for work. i really don't care that i'd have to commute for almost three hours everyday just to get between home and work. i'm really hoping that all came across in my interview, because i think i sometimes come across as super understated, which would be bad in this case. i want this job. so badly. i'm super excited about it. and really hope it can happen soon. i really want to be able to get moving on doing architectural work again. as stressed as i was in school, i still liked what i did. and very much want to be able to get going in doing it in a work environment. i would do anything. seriously.

fingers crossed. hard.

the adorable.
as i mentioned in the gross, i had been on my way out the door when the onset of disgusting hit. i had been scheduled for a volunteer orientation session at the dane county humane society beginning at 6pm. i've decided to take on more volunteer opportunities while simultaneously actively working on my job search.  so i hit the road, still feeling queasy. and after the trip this morning convincing me that i could totally make the drive to milwaukee, i was thinking really hard about jumping on the beltline to give it a shot. i was still iffy about it until the i headed out after being sick at home and realized i was already running late, and my longer route avoiding the beltline may not get me to the shelter in time. so i decided to suck it up, my nerves about getting on the beltline and the queasyness.

now for the actual adorable. i got selected to be a canine companion at the dchs! i'm super excited. since all my plans to get a graduation puppy when i moved out here got shot down by the fact that finding a dog-friendly apartment was near impossible, i was hoping to get back in interactions with some adorable pups until i could finally get my own again. now i can! i still have to schedule training with my coordinator, but the gist is that i get to volunteer multiple times a week to play with dogs and pups, take them for walks, socialize them and whatnot, and also just, in general, help out at the shelter with cleaning dog dishes and supplies and doing a little laundry. i'm okay with that. fair trade. i am super excited to get started. even though i'm starting out just as winter is about hit. whatever! puppies!!! :) hopefully i can do it for long enough so then get more experience and volunteer at a more advanced level or in more than just one area. :) so excited. :D

so that was my day yesterday, very much full of super ups and downs, excitement and terrible then more excitement. as long as i don't think of pumpkin soup for a loooooooong while, i think i'll definitely be able to chalk this one up as a positive. :)

nomalicious!

it's fried rice night! :)

sheep test.

went apple picking a little while back. door creek orchard also has a sheep farm. adorable.

wanted to test out posting from my phone via email. so here's a sheep.

baa.

since i could hold my head up high.

so it's been awhile since i last updated. mostly because, well, there hasn't been much to update. but here goes:

what's the same.
i'm still unemployed and actively job-searching. it's still eating away at my soul and will to keep doing it. i'm still playing ultimate. i still have a bunny who poops like a maniac on crazy pellet-inducing laxatives. i still want a kitty but am in no financially-sensible state to adopt one.

job searching.
economy has been messing with the job search, which makes it super unfortunate, but i'm doing as much volunteering as i can i guess. i'm volunteering coordinating winter workshops for the madison trust for historic preservation, while also building with habitat for humanity dane county/habitat young professionals every other weekend. i've also been in contact with nps lowell to discuss potentially doing some work for them remotely, but so far they're still working out their budget so see if that's even going to be a possibility. fingers crossed.

hot yoga.
i restarted doing hot yoga at the studio on willy st. there happened to be a groupon around the time i was trying to find a place to do some restorative, low-impact workout nearby so i jumped on the chance. its been great. i really love it there. the instructors are awesome. and its actually gotten me into practicing at home every morning too. unfortunately, my groupon deal is running out and, while they're offering a deal for groupon users for their first month of membership, i still can't afford it because a) i'm unemployed and can barely make rent anyway and b) the deal is only for the first month out of a three-month obligatory contract/commitment. boo. so i'm doing what i can for now and am crossing my fingers real hard that i'll find a job soon that a) i'll really like, b) will be able to support me financially and c) allow me to afford the things on my to-do list, ie. adopt a kitty, keep doing yoga and pay for my ultimate expenses.

fall league!
so since i last updated, summer league and the club season ended and fall league has both started and finished. aaron and i both played in two back-to-back leagues because we both realized that one game per night twice a week wasn't really enough, especially considering the club series had ended already. our early co-ed team, why did it have to be snakes, finished the season going 7-8 and trailing off at the end due to multiple injuries on the team, including myself. our night owl team, snake eyes, fared a little better by finished the season with a 9-9 record. we started out strong, hit a huge slump in the middle, but then locked it up and finished strong again by winning through playoffs to win the championship. :) we then went on to play the other division champions and won on universe to be big boy finals champions. and this was when we were missing toby and sarah, two significant assets to the team, and only having 3.5 women, as i was still coming off a sprained ankle and could only run at about 65%. all in all, a decent season. apparently it became snake eye's thing to only win close games. all of our playoff games went to universe. so our final plus-minus came out to a whopping +3. whoops.

visits!
aaron and i got to have a fun visit from corey + gail this past weekend. it was definitely good to see them an take them around madison. although, as we soon realized, there isn't all that much to take them around to, especially since their trip was under 48 hours long. :P turns out, the shorter the trip, the less we really want to spend  significant chunk of it sitting in a car to get places. saturday night was a lot of fun. dinner at graze with andy, jake, melissa, shultz, sarah and brando. then hanging out and wandering down state st to the chocolate shoppe. this probably wasn't the healthiest weekend, but it was a good one. :) can't wait for more visitors.

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so going through old posts, i realized i actually could post videos. and this one is too good to miss. the video is only really the first seconds, but i don't really have the capabilities to trim it right now.

andy decided to give aaron a ride. what would possibly go wrong?

smile and wave for the camera!

oh right. that. that's...bad...?

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etc.
other than that stuff, life has pretty much been the same. hanging out with mad udderburn folks. job searching. hanging out with B. more job searching. figuring out christmas vacation. figuring out a possible trip to ny to visit jess and anna. more job searching. preparing for my first madison winter. planning for my first madison thanksgiving (weird.).

just a little extra something.

from thisisindexed.com by jessica hagy

one more time WHOA!

so this post originally was supposed to be about how i finally got my madison public library card and borrowed my first book as a resident of madison, wi.

but no.

the madison public library system has got to be one of the most inefficient and uncooperative library systems i've ever encountered. seriously.

so i've been here for almost two and a half weeks now. but unfortunately, i can't actually apply for an official state id/license until i have proof of residency that goes back at least 30 days. that said, the public library will let you apply for a card, but they'll just have it mailed to your residence instead of just handing it to you over the counter then and there. i was okay with that, so i applied, gave them my address and went on my merry way to wait until that little piece of plastic would show up in my mailbox.

never happened.

two weeks later, still no library card.

"what's up with that?"

turns out, for some unknown reason, the card couldn't be delivered to my place. my name is on the mailbox, the address on the envelope is correct. how do i know this? it had gotten returned to the library in the mail and the man i was talking to at the counter was currently holding it and waving it in front of my face.

"can i have it?" (can i? can i have it? can i?...can i?)

nope. they still needed proof of residency. remember the part where i haven't been here for 30 days yet? yea. i explained as such and further explained that this is why i applied to have it mailed to me in the first place. i also walked out specifically to check on the damn card situation. library dude's solution. "we'll just hold on to it here until you bring in your proof of residency, 'kay?"...um...excuse me? you're holding it in your hand. so the usps screwed up and apparently don't know how to read a mailbox. my bad? not really. and seriously, i came back in person to ask where my damn library card was. okay, i get that its not proof, but it means i haven't bailed from the city. and as much as i want my library card to borrow books for free, i really can't picture any scenario where i would camp out in madison, wi (outside a library that isn't all that nice to begin with) for two weeks, just to pretend i live here, get a library card and then steal then shit and peace out of town with my vanload of stolen books. if that's your idea of plotting to steal shit to sell and get money to live on, i hate to tell you this, but you're doing it wrong. very, very wrong.

moral of the story: GIVE ME MY GODDAMN LIBRARY CARD.

let's just say that, at this moment in time, i'm not in any mood to head out yet again to wave my proof of residency in front of library dude's face to finally get handed my mail.

thirteen. fisheye.

my new toy! :)

 i've been scoping out lomography for awhile because i really love their stuff. i miss using film. experimenting with my images without knowing the outcome until i get the film roll in for developing. i settled on the fisheye2. i gotta say, i love it. i'm still trying out new things like color gels and the multi-exposure (mx) function, but it's all going really good. :) i'm super happy with some of the shots i've gotten so far.

the little humpty dumpty man sitting at the main entrance to the epic systems campus. i love the colors that came out with this one. the angle also worked out really well with this subject.

oh hai.

my first victim. hehehe. my adorable little puppybutt. sorry about the flash, but again, the colors and effects that came with it worked out well.

a little fun with multi-exposures out by the state capitol.

the state capitol.

the old orpheum theater on state st. i really love the angles in this shot. it was pretty much what i was imagining and hoping would happen.

yesss! an intersection along state st. coloring came out well. angle got all the composition elements i wanted, including the centralized capitol. even got a sunstar with flare in there. all-around happyface. :)

i had to get a little too close to these tracks for comfort.

i mostly took this shot for the content. the strong horizon line with train tracks contrasted with the manhole cover and the vertical towers on the left.

<3 sun stars and flares

the terrace above the front entrance to my apartment complex. the grid warped nicely. again, topped nicely with the sun effects. fave.

experimenting with color filters.

decided to try out some color filters, when a certain little bunny came exploring. this is definitely a favorite shot. and the color addition actually worked out decently. i've been trying other colors since, but this is one of the best.

self-portrait at my finest :)

just to see what all the fuss is about.

so puppy's taken up a new habit. licking rugs. for approximately five mins at a time. i blame reggie.

on the other end of things, apparently reggie has taken to standing in the middle of my old bedroom where puppy's pen used to be and whining. he misses the stinkyface. that is both adorable and a little sadface.

it'll be nice to go visit them after their move.

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oh yea. HAPPY JUNE, EVERYBODY! :)