Friday I went to the High School girls basketball game. It was exciting—yet the crowd of high-school fans were apathetic and sad-looking. Jake and Ted’s sister was crowned homecoming queen! We left for Lawrence directly afterward and stopped at this small town bar on the way. It was clean, there were people aged 15–60 all hanging out, live music by some middle-aged guys. It was so nice and wholesome, really the way a small town bar should be.

I have participated in two trips to Lawrence in the past weekends. Both were fun nights, followed by intense hangovers and plates of eggs.

A couple of personal rules I broke between the hours of 2–5 am:

1. Do not call people. (sorry to the people I called)

2. Do not attempt to insert reason and logic into a drunken argument.

Saturday night beer was consumed in a responsible manner in Council Grove and White City. We went to the White City Bar (Kelly’s)—which was cool, but not nearly as wholesome. There are just too many things to write about this experience. A lot was taken in.

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I forgot to mention that last week I went to a basketball game and they had dogs catching frisbees at half-time and they actually played “Who Let the Dogs Out!”

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Sleep Log
Sunday 5:00am–12:00pm, 6:00pm–7:00pm, 9:00pm–3:00am
Monday 7:00pm–8:30pm, 9:30pm–2:30pm
Tuesday 7:30pm–2:30am
(I have reached my fulfillment of excess sleep, and now only require the necessary sleep (5–7hrs) to be functional for the entirety of the day. I fall asleep in early evening and wake up at the moment my body is recharged. I am like an eager child.)
Wednesday 7:00pm–12:30am
Thursday 5:00am–12:30pm
(I take back what I said on Tuesday.)
Friday 4:30am–9:30am
Saturday 5:00am–12:30pm
Sunday 5:00am–1:30pm

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Regarding Art
I have been slowly transitioning from the title of designer to artist. My biggest worry about this move is people asking me to talk about art, explain myself, and listen to their opinions. I had a boost in confidence last week when reading an article about young people starting galleries. My biggest motivation for this transition is the excuse not to have a real job—”I am an artist.”

“As for the art, the reigning spirit seems to be coolly detached and style-conscious. With all the talk of youth culture being digital and high-tech, many of the artists shown in the new galleries are obsessed with craft and the physical act of making art. Knitting and sewing are popular, as is a kind of doodle drawing.
At the same time the works carry little social or political freight. Nobody is protesting anything…
“It’s all about being happy about whatever you can be happy about,” he said. “My generation grew up in a time when we didn’t have heroes. You grew up believing you were being hoodwinked and manipulated — and knowing you were, but learning to enjoy it because it came in fun colors or was on MTV…

While the art I am most interested in calls for social change, I don’t really enjoy or have the knowledge to create that type of work.

I am ready to quit graphic design. I just get bored and can’t seem to force myself to give a shit about this logo for a food distributor or whatever. Maybe since I don’t have to pay rent right now I have the luxury to have a bad attitude. All of this talk is more theory than action. I will most likely seek a design related job someday.

Hey dudes, I am writing this on Saturday in anticipation of being snowed in or hung-over tomorrow… getting ready to go to Lawrence to celebrate Jake, Ted, and Alison’s January challenge – no alcohol for a month.

edit: the hangover won

I’ve been sitting in front of the computer quite a bit, doing some freelance here and there, and avoiding going outside. I am a cold weather pussy. As far as the computer goes, my newest hobbies include looking at gossip blogs, [gawker, wonkette, adrants] news sites, [tmn, guardian, nytimes] and craigslist.

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Movie Reviews
netflix is awesome. I get movies in my mailbox! Matt Blume says that if you threaten to cancel they drop the cost by $5.

I gave you a glimpse of this feature last week with my David Cross, ‘Let America Laugh’ Review [not very good]

Manhattan, Woody Allen. Pretty good.

Devil’s Playground. This is a documentary about Rumspringa, the period when Amish teenagers get to go nuts and decide if they want to join the church or be like normal people. I have always wondered why people don’t make fun of the Amish more, they would never find out about it. I heard the CBS is pitching a Rumspringa reality series. This movie lacked the Amish teen sex I was anticipating.

The Harder They Come. A supposed classic starring reggae great Jimmy Cliff. This movie should be subtitled, because I couldn’t understand what the hell the were saying, talking all Jamican and what not. Plus it wasn’t a good movie. Basically a Jamican spin on the American western genre. The soundtrack is good, but they cycle the same 5 songs over through the whole movie…low budget.

Gimme Shelter. Documentary following the Rolling Stones in 1968 that leads up to this free concert they put on in San Fransisco. It was promoted as a woodstock type deal. Well, they had the Hell’s Angels help out with security and they beat up some hippies. Pretty ok. Made me see that Mick Jagger was a sexy bitch.

Stevie. A documentary about Southern Illinois white trash. Do you like long, depressing stories? This is for you. I enjoyed it.

Love Liza. I was stoked for this move starting P.S. Hoffman. He sniffs gas because he is sad. It wasn’t great.

Nico Icon. She is pretty, german, and sang for the Velvet Underground for a little while. She is also boring.

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Current Interests: Cereal, push-ups (the exercise), gossip, teaching Taffy the dog to fetch her hamburger. recieving mail, thinking about reading.

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Cities I have been to (outside of Kansas and airports): Kansas City, Chicago, Denver, Dallas, Seattle, New York, Orlando, Raleigh, Washington D.C., St. Louis, Vancouver, Des Moines, Sante Fe, London, Copenhagen.
I was hoping that list would be longer.

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Sleep Log
Monday 6:00am–1:00pm, 8:00pm–1:30am
Tuesday 6:00am–9:30am, 1:00pm–4:00pm
Wednesday 12:00am–8:30am (normal!), 2:00pm–5:00pm
Thursday 1:00am–5:00am, 5:00pm–7:00pm
Friday 1:30am–9:00am, 7:00pm–8:00pm
Saturday 1:00am–4:00am 7:00am–1:00pm

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E-mail Highlights

You should see this highly-lucrative freelance job I am involved in… Excerpt: “In the church of human connectivity, these hot dogs are the communion wafer… ” —Sam

Last night I drank three beers and felt like I was really having a freak out good time oldie. —Matt B

I’ve been thinking about you a lot lately. For the most part, because I’ve been trying my hand at silk screening, and failing miserably. What are you doing these days? —Colleene

Reply:

I am in beautiful snow blanketed Wamego Kansas. I am doing some freelance and I work part time painting at the newly opened Wizard of Oz museum in town!

who in the hell is hupe marrying?
where in the hell is that ole boy living?
i need updates.
by the way, stop sending me that liberal propaganda. —Jake

Picture of the week:

Holy Jesus, I am doing this thing again. Why? I am not sure, I have extra time. My sleeping pattern in beyond repair.I read through some of my old entries and I wasn’ t completely embarassed. Finally—you, my readers, demand it! I will try and update this every Sunday, so that you will see fresh content every Monday morning when you sit down at your desk with your fancy computer.

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Like I mentioned my sleeping pattered is f’d up. Here is as far back as I can remember:
Wed andThur – 3:30 to 9:30am
Fri – 6:00am 9:30am, 11:30am to 5:00pm
Sat 8:00pm to 1:30am
And here I am now, 7:0am Sunday morning. My mom is vacuuming already! She seroiusly has OCD for cleaning.

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There is so much I could type, I don’t know where to start. I am just going paste in some excerpts from last weeks e-mails (e-mail is my favorite thing) to give you an idea of what is on my mind:

1. Tonight I downloaded a few songs from this band, The Unicorns. Amazing. I just look at pitchforkmedia.com and scan the reviews.

2. I haven’t figured out what I am going to do with myself yet. I think I’ll be ready to move soon, but i’m gonna have to come back to KS every 3 weeks for weddings! I have 5 weddings to attend from April to October.

3. I’ve never been to Minneapolis

4. I am pushing my art and illustration right now, I haven’t had to solve a real design problem in almost 2 years now, and I don’t really miss it. I do believe that if I work harder at the art aspect of my life I will be happier.

5. Also, I rented david cross, let america laugh dvd. not that funny.

6. I surprised myself by doing 30 push-ups tonight. I got weak shoulders.

7. Hey, maybe I will move to Portland. I have never been there, but I read a great book about it.

8. I lived in Logan Square for a year or so. Right now I’m in Kansas, thinking about where to go next…

9. I have never ever seen a logo like that before.

10. Went to the dance at the American Legion with my mom and my grandma. Geezers Gone Wild! Man, do old people love dancing!

11. The other day I was working and I thought “man, I am working. I am not in school anymore, and may never be again.” I didn’t really feel one way or another about it.

12. Hey, I am glad to hear about California, I have never been there, but I want to go soon. The plan is to buy a car (and a laptop) in April and drive East for a month, come back to KS for a couple of weddings, the drive West for a month and come back for a month, then back to KS for another wedding. That will be the middle of July and I will then decide what is best for Matt Cassity. But that is just this week’s daydream.

I am sleeping a lot, hopefully I will get over it soon. I remember this same thing happening when I moved to Chicago. Regardless it is ridiculous.

The big event last week was this bratwurst cookout one of the supervisors here threw. I guess New England types don’t eat a lot of bratwurst so this was a novelty to most people. The whole thing was done very proper–marinating the meat for 5 hrs in beer and onions… drinking a lot of beer, etc. I had a pleasant time, a couple of my roommates thought it was lame. There was a little campfire, so I just sat and stared at it, drank my beer, thought about how full of brat I was, while everyone else jabber jawed on about art or something. Now I want to eat bratwurst everyday.

Saturday night was this girl Jessica (one of my roommates) 19th birthday, so we got some booze and people together at our house. It was nice to have people over. I skipped out around 10:30 with a couple kids to go to this “dance party” in Williamstown. I guess I had my hopes set high, but it wasn’t the dance party I had hoped for. The bar was real nice, except you can’t smoke in bars in this town. It is kind of snotty b/c they have some snotty private school, some people refer to them as “rich pricks” but they seem ok to me. At the dance party this local 4 man hip hop group performed. They had a Jurassic 4 thing going on, I couldn’t understand the words, but they had the crowd of about a dozen going strong. “What’s up Williamstown.” They had good energy, I will give them that.

It rains a lot here. My only quasi-revelation came about this weekend while at “The Laundry Club” doing my laundry. I am reading this book, Blue Highway, which is about a dude travelling the back roads of America. He goes to all these small towns and finds all of these interesting people to talk to and focuses on the quaint aspects of the life there. It occurred to me that I am in that small town, but I only focus on the negative/cynical things about it. For instance, scratch-off lottery tickets. I am always thinking about the obsession so many seem to have with them. I thought about writing my own version of Blue Highway that was cynical and bitched about stupid people. There would be this big metaphor explaining how all the losing tickets are a symbol of all the losers that live here. I am sure it has been done before though. The only writing I do is this journal and lists. I write a lot of lists, then I don’t refer to them. Then I write more lists. Then I throw some other ones away that are like 4 lists back. I suppose I should get to work now.

Go to gripdesign.com and click “shop grip” I made the 2 black shirts on there!

BITCHING AND MOANING: Work isn’t all I had hoped it would be. Basically I feel like I am a sucker and overqualified. I don’t mind the idea of “paying my dues”–but I feel like I am in a time warp back to two years ago when I was doing the same thing in college, and actually getting paid. Another problem is that I am not sure this will lead to anything.

This dinky town is in the valley of a bunch of hills (one of them named Mt. Graylock) and it kind of makes me feel trapped. I just don’t think that anything exists on the other side of them. Most of this anxiety comes from just moving here and not really being settled in yet. I feel like I have too many unproductive minutes, but logically that is because I have so much more freetime that I am not riding the subway or doing other daily tasks that I don’t have to worry about here. Hopefully this coming week I will get into my groove and feel better about all of this. I have a pretty good list of goals to complete:
Self promo mailer, hmbl site, study design history, work, father’s day, expirement, make house a home, write, go to nyc and boston

IN OTHER NEWS: I switched from the nun’s room to a different room. It is bigger and has a better bed. I had originally taken the nun room b/c I thought someone else was going to move in, and since I don’t have any stuff to store up here I might as well. But as it turns out we are going to have an extra room to spare.

We had a little BBQ Friday night. We grilled Italian sausage and ate them on hoagie buns with peppers, very Chicago. And tasty. Afterwords we went to these other kid’s house, they are called Andy and Victoria. They are pretty cool artist-types, who I think just moved here for the artist-atmosphere. I think it is a funny idea for young people to move to a small town like this and make the best of it. They seem to have a pretty good social schedule, including an event they and some other people are planning–Under the Sea prom at the Masonic Temple, not your Grandmother’s Under the Sea prom. I am going to help promote it with my graphic skills. There is also this girl Kathyrn they hang with, the way she talks is great, not sure how to explain it, like an author maybe.

I got a call from this dude at the Kansan doing an interview regarding the Humble Empire, I’ll post it when it runs.

THINGS I MISS: Cell phone and 24-hr internet access (I can’t believe it), Friends (of course), Stuff to look at, city wise, Ease of eating ou,t Fast computer (mine is slow and loud), Nice apartment, Decent drinking wate,r Music
*this list makes me feel like I am getting soft

I am at my second day of work, an hour early because I can’t sleep. A lot has happened: Mostly food related.

I had a good week’s worth of send-off parties and packing in Chicago. The highlight was last Saturday night. We started at Sam’s, where we enjoyed a delicious grilled salmon meal. Then to Danny’s (ranked Chicago’s #1 bar) for a dance party that was started by none other than Kate E and myself. There was some intense dance offs between us and Danny’s patrons, and I am sure you know who came out the victor. Next stop–Green Mill. Where the house band called Sabertooth spews jazz all night long. I was pretty krunked at that time, luckily Kate E had her sketchbook, so it is all documented in writing. The sun came up and we went home.

For some reason I had a sharp headache Sunday morning… so after I recovered I had to do some serious packing which isn’t a topic people want to read about (moving sucks). Mark, Kate E and I had a great carribean dinner in the ‘hood. I have had lots of great food recently.

Monday. Time to fly out, the plane was packed, got to Massachusetts. My boss picked me up and we went straight to a pub called Man of Kent, I am guessing the propieter is from Kent, somewhere in GB. The place was coverd with Soccer jerseys and British memoriablia and we watched cricket or some messed up looking sport that isn’t baseball. I was surprised to see an establishment like this until I realized I was in New England. That is basically how everything here works, it is just like England, only newer. Where Old England is stale and crusty, our New England is fresh and polished to a shine.

Toured the facilities here after that. It is pretty crazy. It really is like they dropped this museum in the middle of nowhere. The art is amazing and everything is very relaxed compared to Chicago. There is really no formalities about the museum at all. The town is super po-dunk, way beyond what I had imagined. Possibly there is some non-po-dunk areas, but I haven’t seen them. The locals seem to enjoy scratch-off lottery tickets. People really do say “wicked.” Speaking of, that is a good segway to my living quarters. It is big old dumpy house, very similiar to old 1109 Tennessee in Lawrence, except not nice at all. It is yellow. My room looks like a room a nun or a mental patient would have lived in once, mostly because of the sketched out bed and bare hanging lightbulb. There are many different kinds of wallpapers throughout the house. So far I have 3 roommates who are all nice enough. Two little girls and this other dude. We spent the first night drinking wine and Keystones.

The first day at work was alright, no training, just straight to work. I don’t think I will have any problems or confidence issues here. Everyone knows my name, but I don’t know theirs. My boss took me out to lunch (because it was my birthday–thanks to everyone for the rash of e-mails!). I think I had fried clam or something, basically it was a platter of fried things that all tasted the same. Everyone kept going on about how good it tasted. While it was good food, there was little distinction between the french fries, fried fish and fried onion rings. For my birthday we went to the bar at the Holiday Inn for a couple drinks and food, then to this place called the Homestead. The Homestead is the type of place you want to go into, but you are a little afraid. All in all it is pretty sweet. Me and Shea (the other dude mentioned above) waltzed in like we owned the place and ordered a couple of Buds–pounders, none of that bottled piss. The barista delivers them with quickness and says “dolla feefty each” at that point I was hooked on the Homestead. Immediately this dude started talking to us, (mostly Shea, because I suck at small talk and don’t know anything about the Red Sox except the Nomar sketch on SNL, which I doubt they find funny) his name was Sloober, or Sluber (he isn’t sure on the spelling of his nickname, I think you can just pick the one you like better if it’s your nickname, Sloober/Sluber seems to think the givers of the nickname, his brothers (crazy sons-a-bitches), determine the spelling (Sloober is also unsure of the reason he earned the nickname, I thought maybe a combination to words that descrive a personality trait, but it didn’t seem to fit.)). Sloober had a lot to say. It was a great conversation, however I was cautious not to say anything at all that would challenge his beliefs as he seemed like he could fly off the handle pretty easily, especially when he would wave his empty drink around to gesture a point in his story, then take a sip from it.

Since I have been here, I have spent a total of about $10.00, all on booze or Gatorade. I buy the Gatorade when I drink too much booze. Sometimes I think I am going to die of boredom out here, other times I think it is alright. It should go by pretty fast though.

I can tell you one thing I am haven’t done for a while — buy groceries. I just eat out every meal (cheaply) it is kind of liberating and leads to a lot of free time. I don’t have to think, “what do I have to eat…what do I want to make?” I always know the answer—I have flavor-ice and spaghetti (no sauce). It also makes me fell like a local. For the next week at least.

Like the past several weeks, I maintained my new weekly tradition and got completely crunked Friday night. I went out to dinner with Mark, Kate E, and the cute show folks at a Greek place (good). Then met up with Sam and friends to drink at multiple bars. The best was the last place. It was a crowded, half underground place called the Raven. We were standing there talking about cell phones or something, and this guy at a nearby table just falls over backwards flat on the floor. It was like a stuntman or a cartoon type of action. Then he just lay there flat and motionless on the floor. I was standing inches from his landing spot, staring at him, I seriously thought that something had happened to him. There was just no way in my mind that someone could be that drunk. Some other people picked him up, Kate E pointed and laughed, and Sam bought him a shot.

The worst part of moving is people asking you if you are excited to move, or if you are ready to move, are you packed yet…all that shit. I am not the type of person that anticipates things, I just wait until it comes and deal with it accordingly. My departure date is Monday, June 2nd. I will be traveling by airplane and no, I am not ready.

You will share a bedroom with another intern and common space (living room, kitchen, bathrooms) with the other interns in your house.

Phone numbers and email addresses will be assigned after you arrive.

As I mentioned last week, I am done at the museum and they gave me my daily journals from when I worked there and it was really cool to look back six months ago and see what you were up to, so I tried to get back into journaling again:

5-21-2003
I took a cab to work today and I don’t want to get on the train again! I swore I to myself that I wouldn’t be the cliché/stereotype complain about public transportation, but I really am sick of the train — going underground is the worst. However, I took the bus home and drew in my sketchbook the whole way. A lady said “that’s good” and laughed, even though it wasn’t that good. The drawing was actually a joke, that I am not convinced she was privy to. I talked on the phone all night and doodled on the computer. I am thinking about making these doodles into my first flash project, as I have been meaning to learn flash.

5-22-2003
I have this fake e-mail address that I use whenever I have to sign up for anything on the web (in order to avoid spam to my real e-mail). A long time ago, when I first got the internet at home I would write e-mails to people whose names I found randomly listed on web sites. Most of the time people would write back saying “Who the hell are you? Do I know you?” I wouldn’t really address that issue and keep writing them as normal. This took a lot of time to maintain, so I quit doing it, however one of my best corresponders actually wrote me the other day! I was sure surprised…

Jimmy.
Whatever happened to you?
sb

I got lots of cool things in the mail this week. People love getting packages. Don’t ever let anyone say otherwise.

One of my most faithful readers asked about my many web sites and if they could somehow get a web site of their own. It is true, you to can have your very own spot on the world wide web. If you are interested, just ask.

Hi party people,

This one is again delayed after a trip to Kansas. “What is going on there?” you may ask. Well Saturday night we celebrated the engagement of Jake Pugh and Allison Scott at the Abe & Jakes drinking establishment. Sunday was graduation at KU. It was great to see everyone and made me wish we could all live in a huge mansion together like Wu Tang.

The Friday previous to that I got really drunk and regretted it the next morning.

I am done working at the museum and I will miss my co-workers there.

I am real tired now, so I can’t type any more.

Monday – Whirlwind Heat, Estelle’s

Tuesday – Laundry

Wednesday – Winged Migration

Thursday – Vernissage

Friday – MCA Staff Show closing, Danny’s

Saturday – SNL

Sunday – PBS

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Who else besides me wants to go to Branson?

I am a little late on this issue, a lot going on this weekend and didn’t spend too many hours at home. Here is the play by play:

Wednesday night I went to see this band the Postal Service. They are the the hottest thing out there right now. Their first album came out just a few months ago and the concert sold out. Pretty crazy. The crowd was just as I had pictured emo, indie, scenesters, hipsters one after another…very few, if any, normal people. The antictipation was high and crowd response was great. The band must have been impressed with how well they were recieved. Some chick ordered shots for the band which the waitress brought on stage between songs, the singers was like “I’ve done a lot of rock shows, but this is a first.” The girl who sent the shots up was wasted and thought she was a celebrity or something. The only other annoying thing was the people who watched the show through the viewfinder of their digital cameras. All in all a great show.

Friday was the MCA staff art show. If you work at the museum and make art you were eligible to be in this gallery show. I think about 50 people were in it total. I was impressed with the talent, it was wierd to see this stuff and try and imagine these people making it at home, especially people you thought sucked. I got a lot of comments and positivity for my work and even sold a piece right there on the spot. There was a lot of free beer, so I got fairly krunked. Afterwards we went out with the usual crew and some people from the musuem. Around 2am my boss from the musuem didn’t think we should stop partying and invited us back to her apartment, but it was so late and I had been drinking for around 9 hours, so I had to decline. I was pissed because she lives in Marina City, which are those 2 towers in downtown Chicago that look like corncobs:

After all of that I had to get up and go to work Saturday. I was a tired one. I was planning on meeting my friend Grant at Midway airport at 7:45. I had a couple hours to kill so I went to go see ‘A Mighty Wind’ –the new Christoper Guest movie (same people as Best in Show). I didn’t really think it was funny, definitely no Waiting for Guffman. After I met up with Grant, we went on a quick pub crawl of Wicker Park and went home. The next morning we got up at 7 am to go help his sister and brother-in-law move. We got done at 1pm and went for some lunch and ended up drinking for 4 hours and getting completely faced. So there I was, it was a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon in Chicago and I was hammered riding the bus home alone. It was fun.

I think I drank about 50 beers last weekend.

The only other notable event of last week I can think of right now was when I was visiting the other art musuem Thursday afternoon. I was standing in a hallway looking at the map on the wall, this girl comes up to me and says “can I ask you a question?” Since a lot of people ask me questions at work I graciously replied yes. “What’s your name?” Matt. “Oh really?” Yeah. “Cause I thought you were kinda cute” Okay, thank you (embarrassed and quickly looked away). This would have been totally cool had she not been 15 years old. My love knows no age.

Unti next time.