again with the storage closet

the above pic is a left-over VHS tape sleeve for the "reel" i submitted as part of my grad school applications back in January, 1996. the picture on the cover is a scan of a 16mm film frame (film!). it's from my first short with sound, "Étrangé." it's not as pretentious as it sounds. i am a pitiful script writer, so to fulfill the narrative assignment, i wrote the film in remedial French. turned out to be a bit of a cult fave among my film pals. did i mention it's a musical? those are my peepers behind the slate.


this installment of Storage Closet Rummaging will feature things found in the box marked: SHOW BINDERS/PAPERWORK
--instructions for "Using the TC-D5M Crystal Sync Recorder" and "Using the Mini AC Resolver"

--my diploma from Humboldt State U.

--several scripts and writing exercises from my Dramatic Analyisis class. this included an assignment to write a, "Brechtian-Based Central Reflector" scene. (there is a reason i am not a drama-nerd)

--an essay about procratinating the writing of an essay (clever!)

--a list of books carried by the HSU library (circa 1996) relating to submarine warfare in WWII

--hand written lecture notes headed, "Systems of Analyzing Illusion (re: Narrative)" that includes a depiction of the "Stayan Model" (what?) [see inset]

--a note under "Asian films": Compare: "Fistful" to "Yojimbo": Choreography in Fistful more in camera, Yojimbo w/in mise en scene. (mise en scene!)

--a photo copied poem titled, "No, Love Is Not Dead," by Robert Desnos that may be been originally written in French

--left over, unsent, handmade HSU graduation announcements. (these are really good. if i had a scanner i'd post a pic)

--2 issues of the "Polaris" newsletter. the newsletter for the world-wide WWII Sub-Vets organization. (i was researching a documentary that my pal, suzie, and i were brewing. it never came to fruition, but i still have a keen interest in, and middling knowledge of submarine warfare in WWII.)

--this photocopy of an article in a local Chinese newspaper regarding the production of "The Water Ghost" [i'm in the lower right wearing a manly shirt]

this box had about 12 binders and notebooks in it full of the detritus from college, grad school and a little beyond.
at the back of one binder (a university of san diego binder that was a hand-me-down from one of my HSU housemates [shout out, suzanne!]) had 3 xeroxed pages in the back pocket. poems and song lyrics: the aforementioned "no, love is not dead", a page of poems that may have been written by a friend, and the lyrics to "fair warning" from todd rundgren's album "initiation" (of course).

reading through the possible-friend-source poem, i have NO idea why i carried it around. here is a sample:

As I stand
on an empty bed
I wonder if you are still
torturing...
My tears consist
of blood
My blood consists
of wine
The corners of my room
have sprouted cobwebs
of despair

you get the idea.

lord. i don't remember being that maudlin. well, not after high school.

ok. the purpose of this binder clearing was to consolidate the few things i do want to keep (more on those later) into a box with the handful of video tape evidence of work. i've got my narrow selection to clear from the piano bench. along with the re-boxed xmas decorations [that havent' been used in at least 2 years, this one included] this box is going back into the storage closet.
that big (b.i.g.) plastic container full of FILM is still in there. i think that will stay there another year.

and now it is nearly 6:30. i'm looking at either thai food, vietnamese food, armenian food, or cake. all suitable.

out with the dross! or: chip chip chip continued...

it's sunday, labor day weekend. i'm moving some stuff around in my apt to make some room for a guest i've got coming for an extended stay.

i moved my sewing desk and machine into my bedroom, and put the cool, carved wooden chair in the dining room. (i really want to be sewing right now but am using all restraint i've got to keep on task.)

i was looking to file some stuff in my (very full) filing cabinet when i took a look at all the floppy discs (!) and old check registers in there. in the last 10 minutes i have committed discs containing Avid settings dating back to 1997, old clip art, EDLs from student projects, and scripts written while an undergrad (gilroy garlic festival!) all to the electronics waste bag. fonts, title sequences, avid bins, term papers...out!

am realizing that the clip art i use for my business cards is on one of the zip discs destined for the trash. hmm. i don't have a zip reader, but i better be sure i have that art on my laptop b4 i ditch that disc.

side note: my task energies gained a little oomf when i got a call telling me that we're starting work late tomorrow.

music series while cleaning, moving stuff, etc: doves: some cities; neko case: middle cyclone; flaming lips: soft bulletin.
snacks of note: pyramid hefe, trader joe's choc covered almonds

so long, farewell...

i consider it a mission. a task.

in an effort to not outgrow my apartment, i've been working on culling stuff from my belongings. stuff i don't use.
been working on it slowly, steadily for about a year. there are a couple areas of stuff that have been difficult: 1: music, 2: clothes
i'm not a fashion plate by any means, but i tend to keep clothes for ever. last night i was wearing coveralls i've had at least 10 years. last week, a sweater i bought at a thrift store when i was in high school.

this brings me to these t-shirts. the black one is from an FM rock station i listened to when i was in jr. high and high school. the back of the shirt says, "stick it in your ear."i cut the sleeves off and the neck out. i wore it to tennis practice in high school. and probably to the mall when i wanted to look cool (because sometimes my nazareth t-shirt was in the wash.)
the mottled, beige looking shirt is a 1982 cheap trick tour shirt. my mom poured bleach on it, not knowing it was in the washing machine. that's how it got it's color (this is NOT the only article of clothing that fell to this fate: my first 501's, my favorite yellow striped shirt. at a certain point i began doing all my own laundry for this reason). cut the sleeves and neck out of this one, too. back then, everything was cut for guys and had high necks: i cut the necks out of all my t-shirts.
i got the cheap trick shirt at a concert in hayward with my friend, patty sparkman, who had never seen the band before. (science fact: this was in the non-tom-peterson/ jon-brant days {see inset}).

there is a pic of me wearing this shirt, pre-bleach, in my sophmore yr. yearbook.

so. two weeks ago i took these shirts out of the "shirts in limbo" pile with the intent of either cutting them up for dusting cloths or throwing them in the trash.

they got as far as my sewing desk, where they still sit.

by the end of tonight, they will be in the bag of former shirts now in the service of wiping the dust off surfaces in my apt.

maybe.

SCREEN DOOR MACH II

brief update: the screen is mended, paint is re-touched, and is now back leaning in the kitchen door jamb awaiting proper installation. it will happen!! tomorrow i'm calling a shop in hollywood that installs doors. if it's not prohibitively expensive, i'm gonna make an appointment and get this show on the road! WOO, DAMMIT!
{this shot was taken after the torn screen was removed and paint touch-ups were in progress}

for the record:
beer of note: deschutes brewery, mirror pond ale
snack of note: trader joe's nuts about raspberries and chocolate trail mix

11.26.08-post hal hartley, al wazir, eye of the hawk

am feeling a drive to consolidate.

don't know if it's the movie i just watched, the dinner i ate or the prospect of having the next four days off from work: i'm motivated to shed stuff. to pull out 150 cds, 30 t-shirts, the unused cafe table wedged between the filing cabinet and the wall in my sewing room, all the bits gathering dust from lack of use in my apt, and haul them out to the goodwill, cd trade in, wherever someone might find a use for them...

i struggle against my pack-rat tendencies: i don't want to save every scrap and clipping, just the odd ticket stub or note from a friend that will rocket me back to that time and place. last week during some deep apt. cleaning i looked through a collection of bits in a box on my bookshelf. i've had this box since 1985 and filled it with things when it was still a new thing in my life. most of the time i forget it's there. every couple of years or so i open it up and there it is: some of 1987. grateful dead ticket stubs, a nyc subway token, sea shells collected on long island, cat whiskers from a tom cat who moved into my apt, stones from some gem shop in los gatos.

i don't want to go through my life dragging trunks of relics from all my years, but i do like a few small things here and there. the polaroids on my fridge, a photobutton of a grade school friend, a mug sent to me by my sister the summer of 1990 when i was desperate to know someone was in my corner-even from hundreds of miles away...

it's the nature of acquistion that one has to make space for all this stuff. i don't want to make more room. and i don't want to out grow this apt. i'm tired of having to move things to clean under them.

so.

got to thin this stuff out. i'm also reluctant to put anything in a landfill. so, if it's at all of use, i want to find a home for it.

i know how this goes: i am swept up in the excitement of a new endeavor, try to tackle it from too many angles at once, get sleepy and never quite accomplish what it is i'd set out to do. i've got four days off. step one: establish a clean slate. start with the laundry. that will have me focused on cleaning out the closets. (is it too much to want all my clothes to fit into drawers and closets and not have ever revolving piles of shirts and sweaters that i move from place to place?)

and i'm going to play the piano this weekend. all that potential music in there. and my memories of playing that piano are directly tied to family holidays. i don't remember they were thanksgiving or christmas holidays: i just remember loading rolls in the piano in the basement of my grandparents' house while my brother, sisters and cousins played pool there. oh! i am just realizing now: this piano is the biggest artifact that i am toting around. and it is so heavy i can't even move it to clean under. ha!

man, i am a sentimental bugger. blindsides me sometimes. :)

a friend of mine used the word savor in a converstion we were having. (i've been trying to figure a way to relate the context, but it just gets too weedy). the minute she said it i could tell it was the idea i'd been looking for: i've got too much dross. (now this started as a writing about objects, possessions, stuff and clutter but one may apply it liberally to broader concepts as well. ;) )

ok. when i sat down to write this i put on grant-lee phillips nineteen-eighties album. it's done and the fab mix from my pal john in central fla. has just come on. laundry sorting music if ever there was!

feeding into this: tomorrow is thanksgiving. it's been raining off and on all day. hands down my favorite time of year. and how can a girl even think of sewing when she has to move stuff off the desk to even get to the sewing machine? honestly.

for the record: mentioned at the top of the letter: movie viewed: unbelievable truth, hal hartley, dir; dinner eaten: al wazir, shwarma plate; days off: thanksgiving holiday weekend :) woo!

and this is how it starts! good night!