Space

-reserved for a few words on the tattoo 2010 has inked into my life, and of 2011 beginnings.

Go

Unfold

"Look ma, no tweezers!"

miniature crane

Had explored and then out-grown origami when younger.  Recently folded a few objects for hospital patients and was reminded of how imagination and simple scraps of paper can inspire and uplift.

A Sentence, a Tunnel; a Nightmare, a Dream

A Sentence, a Tunnel; a Nightmare, a Dream from VitalSignsArt on Vimeo.

Sparkler

Am on Fire and that's not just the coffee speaking.

Have had packed schedules before, but this time is different.  

The losses, the gains - everything is deeper, carries more weight.  

On top of the responsibilities, been having an amazing overflow of inspiration, ideas, and creative energy.  

Am taking advantage of this sudden wildfire while it lasts; if only there were more hours in a day.

Sleep has become a figment of the imagination.

It's going to be a steep dive for a while, and I'm making every minute count.  Bring it.

Nneka, Soul Crush

Let Me Take Your Vital Signs

Summer thus far -

Adventures with best friends.  Soul-filling conversation, 

beaching, kayaking, rollercoastering.  Reading,
& random conversation on public transportation (favorite!).

New acquaintances & inspiring people,

and (so far) owning the latest bombardment of challenges - 

the Anything-worth-having-is-worth-fighting-for kind.

And in the midst of all this, there is a shifting of the universe.

---

A few links:

-->  A fairytale no longer: Cloth spun from spider's silk.  Neat, but, *shudder*.

-->  Found in Mom's Basement (+1 for creepy title!).  It's got a plethora of vintage advertisements, enough for cultural anthropological discussion, if you're into that sort of thing.  Regardless, get your fill of humor + design here.  So nerdy.  So cool.

-->  On August 9, 2010, Ed Stafford reached the Atlantic Ocean, completing his journey & becoming the first man to walk the entire length of the Amazon River.  HOLY SWEETNESS.  (Heart of Darkness, much?)

• The journey took 2.5 years.  The challenges, aside from malnutrition and injury, include: illness (dengue, typhoid, malaria, leishmaniasis, rabies from vampire bats), wasp nests + killer bees, snake bites, 20 foot Anacondas, Piranhas, Amazonian crocodiles, jaguars, and aggressive local tribes. 
• Fellow expeditionist Luke Collier began and walked with Ed for 3 months.  Afterward, hundreds of local people walked bits of the trek with Ed; one of them, Gadiel (”Cho”) Sanchez Rivera, completed the journey with him.
• Ed hopes to "draw attention to the complexities of the Amazon rainforest" with his adventure.  Oh yeah, and he supports 5 charities.

Overachievers everywhere are crying their eyes out.  Account of the trek here.

Heartbeat #3: Strawberry Fields Forever

EDIT: Taken off for use in another project


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* Posts entitled “Heartbeat” are works of fiction; resemblance to real people, events, or places are purely unintentional & coincidental.

Rose

Like breathing and exploring, destroying & creating is something that needs to be done regularly for the sake of sanity.

No supplies to be had currently, so just grabbed scissors, tape, and paper.  Ahh, bliss.  What are some verbs that bring joy to your life?

Applying "The 10 Principles of Design", to Life

crystal DNA, artist unknown
Dieter Rams is one of the most influential industrial designers of the 20th century.  He is best known for his work during a span of 40 years designing for the Braun company.  The following is how Dieter Rams defined 'good design' in Dwell Magazine (Sept. 2009); humorously, these guidelines could serve well for designing - not only objects, but a more efficient & fulfilling life, as well.  

May his words be of use and inspiration.

Good design must:

1).  be innovative

2).  be useful

3).  be aesthetic

4).  be unobtrusive

5).  be honest

6).  be durable

7).  be thorough to the last detail

8).  help a product be understood

9).  be concerned with the environment

10).  be designed as little as possible

Heartbeat #2: Dreams

EDIT: Taken off for use in another project


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* Posts entitled “Heartbeat” are works of fiction; resemblance to real people, events, or places are purely unintentional & coincidental.

Rings-Anonymous

Rings are fun to make, and to wear.  The more amusing and awkward, the better.  Hands are one of the most visible, communicative, and used parts of the human body - naturally, they've got to be decked out in style.  Nothing demure, I'm talking knuckle-dusters, eyesores, & the humorous.  A hardcore tribute to the hands that sustain us. 

Exhibit 1 (swoon-worthy):

 "Crystal Brass Knuckles (I am going to realign your chakras motherf*****)".  Debra Baxter

Quartz crystals, sterling silver 

Exhibit 2 (always prepared):

Emergency ring.  Artist unknown. 

Viagra pill not included, according to the article; which is great, because then it becomes kind of Alice-in-Wonderland-esque.  If anyone knows who makes these, please do let us know!

Exhibit 3 (the real deal):

Succulent Rings.  Barbara Uderzo.

The minimalist design is really appealing.

Exhibit 4 (raising the bar):

Paris (left); Chalet (right).  Villa de Reve Collection.  Philippe Tournaire.

rose, white and yellow 18k gold icons of Paris sit upon a single shank

"I don't want a diamond, babe.  I want a house.  Or a city."  (btw, the collection includes cufflinks, too!)

Bringing this topic back down to earth - the cost of something is not always indicative of avant-garde-ness or uniqueness.  Rather, it is creativity and a simplistic, focused design that sets a piece of work apart from others.  Now could someone please make a ring out of their baby teeth? Morbid. Awesome. Yes.

Stars and Stripes Forever

 ***

What a super weekend of sand and ocean.

Like it or not, our environment - its people, places, and traditions - influences who we are.   Whether we decide to change for better or for worse is up to us, but in order for change to occur, we must first acknowledge the source.
Every culture & country has good and bad points; rather than slamming the environment that shaped us and saying, I am ashamed to be associated with this culture/place, it would be more conductive if we could say I don't like the way X is in our culture/place; how can we improve?.

As with sports, you gotta root for your home-team, through thick and thin.  It's a beautiful thing to meet a person who is proud of the environment(s) that shaped them, who works to improve it, and is happy to share a piece of it with others.

***

Jasmine Morning

***

Recently, good and bad events are piling on top of one another so fast that my head is spinning and while this has inspired some ideas and conclusions, the thoughts are either too jumbled or personal so instead, a recount of this morning:

----- EDITED (for the sake of staying somewhat on topic): -----

Basically wrote about events a little before & after the spillage of my morning cup of tea all over some notes.  And how my laptop fell and went crack, like broken bone, upon contact with the concrete floor.  SAD TROMBONE.

---------------------------------------------------------------

What a lucky morning:
* Thankfully, tea is not sticky and does not stain. It smelled like Jasmine the rest of the morning – Zen-tastic.
* Am not much of a tech fanatic (if it works well, it’s fine by me), but after 3 agonizing hours of not knowing whether my laptop was alive or dead, I had never been so happy to hear it whirling to life! Two random pieces had popped out – which hopefully won’t affect computer function - was able to push ‘em back into place. Bottom corner = semi-split, & upper left corner (not the actual screen, whew) is cracked, inside & out. Keeping fingers crossed that this is the extent of the damage.
* The relevancy is that anything, including design, should be about quality, quality, quality.  This laptop might not be the sleekest, but the thing is a BEAST. Yessirrr.

***

Ghosts; a DIY

Free Letterhead

Bring back snail mail.  
Write a note to your co-workers, asking them to stop stealing food from the common fridge! 
Pimp out your to-do list. Heck yes.

VitalSignsArt letterhead

Home Stretch

***

Going to be gone for a while, hitting the books, and then, Playing! Also, a mini project is in the works. But it wouldn't be nice to tease you when this is all I'm going to say about the matter, so leaving it at this.

--- Mini update: ---
Basked in the sunshine this afternoon, as it was a perfect day. I am more of a rainy/cool-day person, but today there was a slight breeze going, and sunshine tingling on the skin. Ended up staying out for an hour,

soaking up that warmth & vitamin D while reading the most hilarious book ever.

All to thumping music from an event in the distance... so perfect. Not usually one for cheesy sentiments but who cares - feeling all inner-peace-y, mellow, and floaty-but-grounded.

Good vibes to last 'til the next de-stress.

Trace Nuclear

Trace Nuclear from VitalSignsArt on Vimeo.

DIY: Zebra-Print Shoes

Material:
*  Plain canvas shoes
*  Fabric pencil
*  Fabric paint - white, optional: black
*  Stiff craft brush (wouldn't want to ruin a fancy art brush!)
*  Blunt-ended toothpick

Step 1: 
*  Using a fabric pencil, lightly mark placement of white stripes.  You can cover the whole shoe in zebra print, or you can do patches, whatever your design preference may be.  I chose to block-in only the middle of the shoe.
*  Don't worry about darkening your lines; you should be rubbing away each stripe before painting over it anyways, because the powder from the pencil interferes with paint adherence. 

Step 2: 
*  Start painting in the stripes with fabric paint!  Again, this is just design preference, I chose to mix the white + black into a very light gray.  You can make your stripes plain white, or go wild with a different color!
*  This is where the blunt-ended toothpick becomes your best friend.  Even with a stiff brush held perpendicular to the fabric to 'beat'  in the paint, the color does not pop enough, and the resulting lines are not clean.  Use the brush to paint in the general silhouette (see stripes on the right side of the above picture), and then using the blunt-end of a toothpick to fill in the details (see the 3 darker stripes on the left of the picture).
*  Allow irregularity, otherwise your lines will just end up looking like chevron stripes.  =/

*  Do the inner side of each shoe first, so that your 1st attempts at painting on canvas material are in a more inconspicuous place, and let dry.  Then, paint the outer side of each shoe.

Heartbeat #1: Place of Lost Words

EDIT:  Taken off for use in another project


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* Posts entitled “Heartbeat” are works of fiction; resemblance to real people, events, or places are purely unintentional & coincidental.

Calling All Elitist Liberal Arts Scholars, or: "I'm so Deep"

Don't get me wrong - I love symbolism, metaphors, and allegories.

My favorite books are the ones you have to analyze to the last drop, the ones where each word is so thick with meaning, that reading the book is like wading through hot fudge sauce (delicious *wink*). 

***

Sometimes though, it's good to not over-analyze, and to just...relax.  With that, I'd like to share a few chuckles with you, courtesy of spoken-word artist, Beau Sia:

Triple Tribute

One only hopes that they received as much in this life as they have given.
 

***

Lee Alexander McQueen

 *Vogue Girl Korea, August 2006.  Photographer:  Kim Han Jun*

Daul Kim

***

Michael Jackson

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, but what a brilliant flame in between.

R.I.P.

Universes within Universes

University of South Carolina School of Medicine.  Microbiology & Immunology Online, "Real-time PCR".  Dr. Margaret Hunt

Agarose gel (1% Trevigel)

Guo X et al. Genome Res. 2003;13:1810-1817, 2003 by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press
Guo, Xianwu; Flores, Margarita; Mavingui, Patrick; et al. "Natural Genomic Design in Sinorhizobium meliloti: Novel Genomic Architectures" Genome Research, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press. 2003;13:1810-1817. Online.

Pulse-field gel electrophoresis. Replicon structure of S. meliloti 1021 and derivative strains.
 ---------------------

Breathtaking images of a genetics lab technique called gel electrophoresis.  The first image reminds me of headlights on the road at night, ice, illuminated high-rise windows, and dancing stars.  And the second image brings to mind india ink brushstrokes, and x-ray skeletons.  Universes within universes.

Scientists use gel electrophoresis to separate DNA molecules by size.  Each band you see represents the accumulation of molecules of the same length.  A common method of viewing these separate bands is to stain the gel with ethidium bromide, so that the bands of DNA will fluoresce when illuminated with UV light.

Imagine these printed on fabric, so that we could 'wear' our DNA.

L-O-V-E, baby

Happy (almost) Valentine's Day!  First, a little Spoken-Word by Beau Sia to warm us up -

Listen for:  "Shawty!  What's yo major?" and "...in a wonderful, perfect world with our two children: Elga and Lamar."

Now that we're all nicely endorphined - I present to you a poem - a favorite because it is not cavity-inducing, and is magnificent in its simplicity.  If you haven't found a Valentine's gift for your significant other yet, You're Welcome for the inspiration, haha!
 

By Polish writer Wislawa Szymborska:

http://www.mission.net/poland/warsaw/literature/poems/lovesigh.htm

Ultimately, Valentine's Day is not just for couples.  It is for friends, family, and strangers.  It is a holiday for reflecting on

        if you've been allowing yourself to be Loved,

                                                                   if you have given Love,

                                                                         & how you will continue to shower those around you with Love.

When in doubt, love.

To: Nurses and to those in the Medical Field

There were two nurses talking today, chatting about their weekend, work, who had night shift, and so on.  One of the nurses remarked, 

"I can't count how many times I've stayed by a patient's bedside, trying to keep them alive through the night.  If I had a nickel for every time that happened..."  

To all nurses, and to all others in the medical field - paramedics, doctors, technicians, therapists, medical scientists and engineers - Thank You.

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/22719239@N04/ / CC BY 2.0

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/22719239@N04/ / CC BY 2.0

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/foxtongue/ / CC BY 2.0

Single and Mingling

Like the chocolates in that I Love Lucy episode, a constant stream of thoughts runs through my head, independent of the current time/place/people.  And like Ethel and Lucy - wrapping some chocolates while letting others escape - sometimes I find myself filtering things that I actually want to say, and other times saying things aloud that I mean to keep to myself.

When talking with people, I may respond to a particular subject based on whatever is running in my stream of conscious currently.  Things running through my stream of conscious may include fresh conversations, things I've recently read, and weekly plans. 

This week, the coincidental sujet du jour among friends and acquaintances has been marriage/dating.  For the past few days, I've had conversations with various people about relationships, like: what a serious relationship means, at what age do you envision yourself getting married, is marriage a priority, and when is a relationship considered "too slow" or "too fast"... Consequently, there has been a lot of repeated hypothesizing and explaining and discussing, all on separate occasions.  So I've felt like the topic's been exhausted.

Unfortunately, at the end of this week, the topic of marriage/dating came up again, and my 2-cents was basically, "I'm not a commitment person" and "Marriage...eh."

Which would have been a fine statement... if the people I was talking with had been present for all the other conversations I've had this past week about relationships.  But this was completely out of context, without the background info, and hopefully my seeming distaste for relationships/marriage doesn't make it on the Grapevine.

So, clarification - I'm open to relationships and marriage.  And I wasn't making light of marriage or people in a serious relationship; that kind of dedication is admirable.  Simply speaking for myself though, I'm not at a point in my life where that is a top priority.

At my peers' and my age, we're still changing, deciding what kind of person we want to become.  If I find the right person, then of course, I'd want to make things work.  Until then, I am comfortable doin' my own thang, and enjoying the freedom of not being 'attached'!

Afterall, going out with someone just for the fun of it, finding out what you like and don't like, is what this period in life is for!

"...'cause girls just wanna have funnn, oh, girls just wanna have fun..."

;) that is all.

Insomnia on a Monday

"When you have insomnia, you're never really asleep, and you're never really awake."

- Fight Club

Am naturally a creature of the night and enjoy the time between 11pm - dawn because it can be wild or calming, and is completely magical either way.  Since waking up at 5:30 am everyday recently however, mornings have really grown on me.
So now the dilemma is - I don't want to sleep at all.  So much to explore, do, and experience, and so little time!

Eminem, Comedian

Ah, Eminem.  Pop-culture commentary at its best.  Much of his work is vulgar, childish, and based on shock factor - it makes people outraged and squeamish, because for some, it is a reflection of a side that they dare not reveal. There’s a lot of truth behind what the lyrics convey, and how the public reacts to his work is a commentary in itself.

If Eminem ever retired from rapping, I think he’d be a stellar comedian. As shown through his albums, he’s got a way with words, he’s got the sarcasm and the observant part down… and after coming across the following clips, one can see that Em’s got the timing/performance aspect as well.
But apparently he’s already been told that, as mentioned in his lyrics (“Marshall, you’re so funny man, you should be a comedian, **ddamn”).      ;]

Eminem Teaches Jimmy Kimmel how to Rap (embedding disabled, find clip HERE)

and...

Countdown

----- EDIT (an unrelated mind-ramble) -----

Science, art, entrepreneurship.  Traveling, writing, drifting… yes, I want my cake, and to eat it too.  To be at all places, all at once.  To live one life, and then another, and another…

… if you could visit your FAVORITE amusement park once in your entire life, and you only had time for ONE ride, which one would you choose?  Witty solutions from readers aside, I suppose the answer would vary depending on the person. 

For me, there’s more than one ride I’d like to go on, but long waiting times for each!  (No fast-passes in life, drats).  There’s so much I want to accomplish within a certain time-frame. 

Being vague here because it is the internet after all, but I do have specific goals in mind.  These goals are not a dreamer’s fantasy, without foundation… obviously, to be good at something one must FOCUS on that specific area.  Knowing this is frustrating at times; I would like to accomplish so much, plus not be half-assed about each endeavor, but to give each my all (ironic wording, much?).

*note:  When I say “accomplish”, the aim is finishing the task, not money or fame (though they are sometimes side-effects).  It just feels like there’s so much to put out into the world; so much potential for creating and destroying.  (The wonderful thing is that everyone has great potential, but that’s a conversation for another day).  Like getting your hands on buckets and buckets of paint – it would be boring to just let them sit there, or to merely paint a house… a more entertaining choice would be to splatter the walls/floor/ceiling/people with the paint *grin*. 

Recently, to avoid starting many goals but finishing none, I have been reminding myself to be patient, and to take things one step at a time; that with hard work, all that needs to be accomplished will be, in their own due time. 

Been paring down on a lot of things already; setting aside the less time-dependent goals for later… like accepting that learning a new language will not be possible anytime soon as my hands are already full; gotta look at the big picture.  Currently, have decided on 2 (okay, 2.5) main, career-related goals to focus on.  Bring it.

Through the Looking Glass

Went to visit a loved one at the rehab center (for people recovering/living with injury/illness) a few weeks back. We were waiting at the sidewalk of the loading zone for the transportation van to come.

There were other people in wheelchairs, waiting in groups for their transportation van. Some were talking amongst themselves, a few were lost in their own world, and others were people-watching; a generally pleasant atmosphere. My group was conversing, laughing; the usual shenanigans for a close-knit bunch.

But then I felt these eyes, this unnamable energy. So I looked around for who it might be coming from. Apart and further inside the curb sat a lone elderly man, watching us; it was his vibe I had felt.

His eyes were still on the surface, tumultuous within. He had a shock of thinning white hair, and his skin was creped paper and colored with age spots. The man’s frame suggested that he must have been sturdy and wiry once. Now his thinning body was neatly bundled up in a forest-green fleece zip-up. His presence was quiet and dignified as he sat, hands on his lap and elbows resting on the arms of his wheelchair. One hand held a simple brown paper bag, another clutched a walking cane.

He stared as our group joked and jostled good-naturedly. I tried to brush him off as just another casual observer, tried supposing that he was only simply thinking about what he would have for lunch and that his eyes had happened to rest upon our group. But all the while his presence was completely different from the others that waited around us; his eyes lost, yet alert, soaking up the love and interaction that perhaps seemed familiar.

A while later, the man’s van came and he was, curiously, its lone passenger. As the vehicle pulled out I could see from the corner of my eye, his singular silhouette, back upright, hands neatly holding his brown paper bag and cane.  Proud as he was, his head still turned slightly to catch a last glimpse of us.  The intensity of his lonely gaze burned through the window as the van drove away.