Before I begin, I would like to notify everyone that I’m writing this post from work while I copy photos from CDs onto the hard drive of my computer. Without anything to do but watch a status bar, I decided to blog.

I have one day left before many changes begin happening in my life. Tomorrow is my last day working in the Office of Creative Services at Emerson College. After tomorrow I will move to a new apartment, begin a new job, and start traveling all over New England to tell high school students about how awesome Emerson is. Before I move forward, though, I’d like to take a step back and remind myself of how truly awesome these past two months have been.

I’ve learned how to better operate within a team. Chuck, Carrie and Nancy have been the bee’s knees in helping me along and become part of their well-oiled machine. I am a better designer for having worked with Chuck, have a renewed affection for grammar and punctuation from Fancy Nancy, and a new-found appreciation for project management from Carrie. I have a vastly expanded vocabulary with which to discuss design-related issues. I got the chance to hone my Illustrator and InDesign illustration skills, and am thus no longer afraid of the pen tool and pathfinder palette. I designed some fancy things. I learned I know a lot more than I think I do.

As excited as I am for my new job in the Office of Undergraduate Admission, I will most definitely miss this place. It’s been very invigorating to work collaboratively on design work with these fabulous people. It’s been wonderful to have access to awesome photography and top-notch printing. And, what is probably the most overlooked aspect of this job, I have thoroughly enjoyed Nancy sending me galleys that I don’t have to create myself. That, as Dorothy said through a tear-stained face to the Scarecrow, will be what I miss the most.

Out of all of the life plans I currently am weighing in my new project, I’m pretty sure I will always return to graphic design. With a heaping helpful of art history, of course. Perhaps I’ll design for a museum.

Oh wait, I’m already doing that.

…yeah.

i miss blogging. however, i’m once again a full-time student. in addition to a 20-hour-per-week employee of the performing arts department at emerson college. oh yeah, and there’s that business thing i do with jeremy, you know, on the side, purely for kicks.

as you can see from my photo, the interactive annual for commarts is now mine, and i really have to say i’m less than thrilled with it.

i just finished reading “fun home” by alison bechdel, the first book for my queer american lit class. it was a graphic novel/memoir by the artist of the wildly popular “dykes to watch out for” comic strip. i very much enjoyed her book, and the class is off to a fabulous start (despite the usual delightful few who make class worth coming back to time after time).

i began reading “heaven’s coast” by mark doty last night, the next book on our syllabus. it’s another memoir, this time about the author’s struggle with losing his life partner to AIDS in the 80′s. just a mild tonal shift from the long-format comic i just made it through.

i suppose i ought to get back to that book, it’s very heavy both in content and style, i’ll be amazed to make it through to the end.

today, i’m thankful for:

1. mitchi finally learning how to use his scratching box thing (but not very thankful for his newfound love of the catnip contained within)
2. the new commarts and what i’m sure will be yet another fabulous typography feature
3. my newfound appreciation for the gym
4. having my house key today (unlike yesterday)
5. my fabulous co-workers

what what? wasn’t it only yesterday morgan and i sat down and began discussing this year’s book?

no. that was january.

but IT’S FINALLY HERE!

you can follow map boston on twitter at www.twitter.com/mapboston

also, my copy of map boston and i just had a mini-photo shoot in the office. i now present you the fruits of that photo session:

what?? it’s actually here??

OMIGOD! IT’S HERE!!

the proud father

not as tasty as it looks…

…but feels awesome against your face (just ask maureen hautenaiemi)

hmm…i wonder where i should go for dinner? map boston will know!!

the perfect sans-serif font.

i have no idea where to find it.  i keep spending hours searching for it and i’m slowly coming to the conclusion that it doesn’t exist.  i have absolutely no idea where or how i will find the perfect sans-serif font.

i am now sitting in emerson’s cafe trying to begin the third design project this month for which i require the perfect sans-serif font.  this holy grail has continued to elude me for the entire month, forcing me toward either completely different or less-than-perfect alternatives.  the task at hand, however, simply requires the perfect sans-serif font.  there’s nothing i can think of doing that could be used as a workaround.

why did i branch into print design?

it’s absolutely frigid in the office today. i’m wearing a sweater.

it’s mid-july.

also, i’m pleased to state that mcc theater in new york has approved one of the drafts of the artwork i just did for their upcoming premiere of michael weller’s new play, fifty words. look for it soon everywhere. and i mean, everywhere.

also also, map boston will be hitting the shelves of major and independent booksellers throughout boston later this month! go pick up a copy and support mo, me, and the rest of the peeps who worked super hard to get that thing out! (you can see an awesome preview of the back cover at www.mapboston.com)

i suppose that’s all the news that’s fit to print! see y’all next time!

the title of my posting is a quote by a wise woman named michelle fiocca. it is about separating life from work. lately, we’ve been awesome at that.

tonight, jeremy and i enjoyed watching the delightful disney movie “enchanted.” apparently we’re the last two people on the earth who have not seen it. i must say i was in love from the moment julie andrews’ narration began. susan sarandon as the evil queen sealed the deal for me. it was brilliant.

then we came into the office and began working. i haven’t been out since. mitchi (our new design critic-in-residence) has been in and out, offering constructive criticisms and climbing on jeremy’s desk.

well lambs, i’m off to go perform my nightly ritual of washing my face and reading dorothy parker to my cat.

today i’m thankful for

1. tuesday being my day off
2. my air conditioner (which i hardly used today — stupid me!)
3. the tasty dinner my manfriend cooked for us
4. “enchanted”
5. a client who understands what a pain in the ass copy edits are

vicki clark and her winston-salem accent get me every time.

so i’m here, sitting at my computer, at 12:10 am after having just put four loads of laundry in their respective dryers in the basement with jeremy. instead of, say, working on my gay-allegory-in-”waiting for godot” paper, i’m instead going to update my severely neglected blog.

spring semester is winding down, and not a moment too soon. once all of these projects, papers, and exams are done i will be two semesters away from getting the damn piece of paper. diploma, please! i have thoroughly enjoyed my time at emerson, and have made friends and contacts that i feel will be in my life for a very long time and will be helpful to me and my career. i have done so much growing in this place and because of this place. at the same time, i feel that i’ve done all the growing i can do at this place, and really feel it’s time for me to move on with my life and my career. the absence of that damn piece of paper makes it impossible for me to do so.

ugh.

in other news, the development of “the singles: britney in her own words” is in full swing. shannon and i are hard at work to bring the best of the best to this project. there will be a developmental reading in the hemingway-hayes living room blackbox theatre on may 24, 2008, sometime in the evening. drop me a line if you’d like to be on the vip list.

and now, for an aside: listening to “the light in the piazza” has given me an idea. what if the as-yet-to-be-named arts collaborative were to stage updates of traditional musicals in which the lead female ingenue character has a developmental disability which is kept a horrible family secret not to be revealed until act II? just like clara, only not actually written that way. the phantom of the opera? once on this island? into the woods?

speaking of theatre, jeremy and i saw suffolk university’s production of “hair” this weekend. now, i went into it not liking the show, and hearing what a brilliant director suffolk’s head of theatre marilyn plotkins is.

my belief, after considering various options, is that dr. plotkins actually thought she was directing a production of “godspell.” this revelation has allowed me to reconcile SO much that i thought was lacking in this production (most notably the fact that nobody onstage seemed to have any idea of what the words and lyrics coming out of their mouths meant — strongly indicating, at least to me, a lack of focus in their direction).

moving away from the “godspell” theory, though, it is very difficult to find any redeeming factors of this production. the set was inventive although impractically executed, creating awful obstructions to sight lines. the lighting was very “rock concert” and seemed to be trying to compensate for the poor quality of everything else by being distracting. many of the voices were fine, and the ensemble vocal work was good, from technical standpoints. there was absolutely no emotion (or, to clarify, correct emotion) in any of the performances, dialogue or lyric or otherwise.

in the end, i actually do feel very bad for the company of performers involved in this production for what they had to go through to perform this show. it is my belief that it is the responsibility of the director to indicate the direction the show is supposed to go in. the director is supposed to have the overall vision and answers to all the questions about intention in the actors’ performances. seeing that there was no visible intention in their performances, i can only assume that dr. plotkins’ “direction” began and ended with blocking notes.

mounting a theatrical production without an overall concept or vision circumvents the potential of the piece to affect or move an audience. mounting an abstract piece such as “hair” without one is like committing suicide.

better luck next time, friends.

just finished a bunch of mockups for a meeting with the fabulous morgan first tomorrow afternoon. there we will discuss colors and fonts. oh, the fonts. they’re stunning.

in the words of the incomparable jennifer holliday, “you’re gonna love meeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaahhhhhhme. you’re gonna love me. ooh ooh love me. ooh ooh ooh love me. love me. love me. love me. loooooooooooove me. you’re gonna loooooooooooove *dramatic breath in* meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee HUH!!”

or, rather, you’re gonna love the new map boston planner.

yes, that’s it.

i designed a poster that is in macy’s flagship stores windows displays.

maybe i am going to be good at this.

well kids, it’s official.  i own a business.  and no, fellow members of david kelleher’s digital media class, it’s not being operated out of my dorm room and featuring awful rollover effects produced by a windows version of dreamweaver mx 2004.  it’s an honest to god we have a business certificate and bank account to prove it business.  it’s hot.

too fabulous for words is its name, in case you couldn’t guess from my most recent post.  and yes, that’s another link to it.

so what else is going on?  this weekend i’ll be in the berkshires with jeremy.  that’ll be nice.  norman rockwell, MoCA, a nice little condo, and an amazing man.  i’m amazingly happy with how that sounds.

tonight brings completing the into the woods publicity for the f.u.d.g.e. production.  auditions are next week!  dear sweet jesus, that’s soon.  i need to practice my audition pieces.  the poster is going to be awesometastic, though.  i’m using the witch’s beans as the visual theme.  i’ll post it up here when it’s finished.

i’ve exhausted things to say.  i’m going to go do some real work now.

peace, friends.