videos for Lincoln

We used to watch these at my Grandparents Murdoch's house.

more past design work

This beauty is something I made in Design and Color class at Ricks College, so like summer of 2001. It was my first (and only) linoleum block carving. I loved making it and mostly haven't made more because some girl borrowed my carving tool and broke the best piece. They really aren't that much money, but it is the principle of the thing. I also don't have any sweet ink to make prints with. In our class we all made one and then made 11 prints or whatever and we made books of everyone's prints. It was a really good idea, except mine is the coolest one and it isn't even that great. Everyone elses are so boring. Too bad. And yes, I did name it after a Phish song.

the root of all evil.

Today I bought some new shampoo and conditioner. Why am I so excited that I would post it on my blog? Because the shampoo is/smells like coconut milk. I love the smell/taste of coconut so much. SO MUCH! Do not worry. I will not eat my shampoo.

I first gained my love for the coconut in Hawaii:

I love it in pancakes and especially this most delicious drink:

So good! When I was in Mexico I got a coconut or pineapple popcicle every time we went to a store. You can get a similar type of popcicle here at Broulims, but there is a real shortage of real coconut around Idaho.

Since I'm sure you care, this is the conditioner I got:

Why did I get it? Because I read in a teen smut magazine that for good wavy hair to get Burt's Bees conditioner with Shea butter in it. Now that I remembered that part, I think I chose the wrong flavor of conditioner. Oh well.

Since I am unemployed I don't buy many things. Enough so, that when I do I blog about my hair supplies. Here are some things I would buy if I had money right now:

I want these new running shoes real bad. I think I've finally decided on the green ones.

I need this book for my collection.

I just flat out need The Office. I only have Season 3 though. I would like 1 & 2.
These are not the things I would buy if I had millions of dollars. Just really if I had a steady job or cared more about watching The Office than washing my hair.

job hunt update:

For those who wonder if I have a job or not, this is the most recent update.

Here is the email the guy I interviewed with sent me:
thanks for the thanks! It was nice meeting you in person. You have a lot of potential, and I enjoyed seeing your work in person. We are interested in talking with you further regarding a junior design position in the firm, but unfortunately our timing is a little off. Our highest priority right now is finding an Action Script/HTML/Flash web person - and until we have filled that position we can't really bring on another designer. We also need to finalize our move into our new space. Are you under a tight time line to find work? What i would propose is that we touch base at the end of next month if you are still available. Let me know what you think.

Does that mean if I wait another two months they will have a job for me? I guess I'll have to ask him. Maybe I should just take the job here at "The Rex" to be a secretary with graphic design experience. It is a movie theater with a bowling alley. I could be Pam in real life, except instead of working for a paper company, it would be a movie theater who Madison County forgave $80,000 worth of taxes they couldn't pay so they would stay in business. Maybe it would actually be a good thing. My working there for two months would help them get more business. Right? My design and secretarial skills would really help them.

My first book

I dedicate this post to Jenny, who requested I do more posts today so she can read them instead of work. Also, instead of me finding a good type face for her wedding announcements. I'll do it soon, Jens.
I often say I didn't do graphic design before college. But then I found this pop-up book that I made when I was 12. There is even a page about myself:
This is the best poem:
top picture

then you read the finely crafted poem:
then you can pull the tab and make the mom dino kick the poor crying baby dino. Now, I don't want anyone to think I was abused as a child. My mom never kicked me for getting sick, or eating limes. I'm pretty sure I had never eaten a lime when I was 12. I'm not sure why this is so violent, but the tab works pretty good.
The scanner quit working for me. That is why you get the super bad camera shots.

The best pop-up I've ever made I don't have because I gave it to a woman on my mission. She was having a hard time giving up smoking so I made her a pop-up card of herself in the water and when you pulled the tab down she went under the water and got baptized. So when she wanted to smoke, she could remind herself why she wanted to quit, using that. Looking back, it doesn't sound too effective, but whatever. We were making her signs and quotes to hang around her house and that is what I made.

What's in a name?

For some reason I clicked on a link that said to see how popular your first name was. I like how they say "popular" and not "common." My name is very common. Millions of people have the same first name as I do, girls and boys. There were four Ashleys in my high school graduating class (or I should say, me, the boy Ashley, Ashlee, and Ashleigh) and I'm pretty sure we were all in the same preCalculus class. But here is a graph that says my name was the most popular name in the 90's and almost was the most popular in the 80's. Hooray for me.

Rank shows how popular the name is in the corresponding decade. A rank of 1 means it is the most popular name for that gender. A rank of 1000 means it is the 1000th most popular.

Bar graph statistics are compiled and published by the Social Security Administration, based on samplings of applications for Social Security cards.

I would like to know what "From the Ash Tree" actually means. It says Ashley means "from the Ash Tree." That doesn't mean anything.

If you want to see how popular your name is, you can visit this link.

No more perfect pushups

If anyone watches ESPN, you will know about the Perfect Pushup. The commercials are very convincing and on very very often. My brother bought some and although I knew, thanks to Payton Manning that I could never have rock hard abs, I used them because they were there. Now my brother left and took his Perfect Pushups and I really miss them. I've tried to do regular push ups and they are not fun at all. I never realized how much I liked them until I didn't have them any more. I never did the Navy Seal Training routine. I am not that hardcore. And my brother damaged himself doing it (He is not a Navy Seal either...) But will I spend the 39.95 to get ripped and have my own set? No. This blog is not an advertisement to buy them. I'm just saying I wish I could still use someone elses, if only for the satisfaction that I did some push ups. I didn't use them enough to get ripped. No muscle change happened during the limited amount of time I infrequently used them. My arms do not look like that guy's. And, I'm glad about that.

Swatches

This is a story about the watches I have had the past 9 years. Yes, they do not work and I still have them. I loved my watches. I wish I had before pictures so you could see that they were cool at one time.

My first Swatch:

Both my Swatch watches were of the Scuba collection which meant they could go so far underwater or whatever. Mostly I liked them because they were substantial. I don't like a wee little watch. This one started out with a bright blue Velcro band (which it still has, but is not bright) and a twisty thing around the face which had something to do with keeping time, but I'm not sure what. My brother liked to twist them when I wasn't looking and he broke it off. The battery died after three years and I got my second Swatch watch:

I got this one the year before my mission. It started out with a brown Velcro band and a twisty thing around the face. The band broke really early on and when I sent it in to get fixed, they sent it back with this plastic thing, which was kind of cool but not nearly as cool as the first one (in my opinion). I shattered the twisty thing off by hitting it with my tennis racquet once while I was wearing it and playing at the same time. I'm not sure how I pulled that one off. As you can see from the photo, the plastic band was tearing through where I did it up. I was worried on the mission it would rip through completely (I glued it several times). The battery ended up going out before the band though. I only had a month or two left by that time and I was committed to getting a Swatch (if you can believe it, there were no Swatch stores in Roswell NM). So I waited until I got home to get a new watch. In the meantime, I did get a watch from Wal-Mart which I hated, mostly because it was from Wal-Mart (my mission is where I developed my first deep hatred and loathing of Wal-Mart. I had already committed never to shop there again once my mission was over).

So, I finally get home and couldn't find any Swatches that I liked. None. My brand loyalty to Swatch did not know what to do. I did not want to buy a Fossil because I felt like everyone had one and if I had one then everyone would have the same watch as me (even though they do have those sweet vintage looking tins). I hate wearing the same thing someone else has. But then in the mall one day I found this watch:

I didn't get the whole band in the picture, but it is basically a big Fossil advertisement. So I went from hating it to advertising it in one day. I do like this watch and I have only ever seen one other person wearing it- some girl from Sweden on the Subway in New York. (I'm not sure why I think she was from Sweden, besides her fair skin and foreign language. I'm sure her shirt didn't say that or anything.) The band did break early on, and I was worried they would give me a new band and I only liked the watch for the band but I sent it in and it came back with a new band, but the same design. Thank you Fossil. The band gets cooler with wear. True to form, I've had it about 2.5 years and the battery just died. But the band and face look almost exactly like they did when I bought them. My other watches barely survived their battery dying. So, I ask myself, what is the difference? The brand or the materials? My Fossil watch is leather which must be more durable. I haven't been any nicer to this watch than my others. It has been wet. It has been worn every single day. It has been wacked on things or gotten stuck in small places I've tried to reach. So I'm going to get my first new watch battery. It is kind of bitter-sweet. I still like this watch a lot, so I'm glad I get to keep it. The down side is I don't get a new watch. But since I am unemployed, what money would I use anyway? I have been very pleased with my Fossil watch, but I would still by a Swatch any day of the week.

Ron got a Howler

Wouldn't it be cool if there was a "Howler" setting for sending messages on cell phones? So if you really wanted to talk to someone or tell them something and they were ignoring your calls you could send them a Howler and no matter what setting the cell phone was on it would just yell it out for everyone to hear. It would have to be regulated somehow so people wouldn't send them as jokes when you are in the movie or something. I think it should be looked into. There are clearly a lot of flaws with the idea, but it could be very beneficial as well.

And YouTube has a music video about Ron getting a Howler. Thanks Harry and the Potters.

Type can change the world

How Hoefler & Frere-Jones are involved in the presidential election.

click here.

Meet the Robinsons

If you haven't seen Meet the Robinsons yet, SHAME ON YOU!! If I wasn't eternally dedicated to Toy Story, which is and will always be the best Pixar movie ever, I would say Meet the Robinsons was. It is one of my very favorites. The Incredibles is also up there. That is a great one. Anyway, I've loved Meet the Robinsons since I saw it in the theater in Disney 3D...

I got it for Christmas and of course watched it many times, as well as the DVD extras. I love DVD extras almost more than I love DVDs. I found out the family Robinson is based on a book by William Joyce called "A Day with Wilbur Robinson." Which I checked out from the library. It is a children's book he wrote and illustrated, "a thickly disguised account of William Joyce's childhood." I love the paintings he did. It makes me want to write and illustrate a story. Here are some of the spreads, Pixar really basically used his illustrations for the movie, except made them futuristic. I apologize for the crappy photos.
cover:

He meets Lefty, Dimitri, and Spike

Wilbur says it is kind of dull there on that day. I love Lefty taking the backpack.

Carl looks like Carl. They are using a matter detector to find Grandpa's missing teeth. I wish I found that kind of stuff in my yard!

They tell this sister, Blanche, that her shoes look swell with her new prom dress when she asks. The other sister is named Tallulah. In the movie Blanche is Tallulah and is not Wilbur's sister, she is his cousin, but you've got to change some things.

Here is Grandfather in his lab working with his dancing frog band. This is what the book says: "Sure enough, there was Gradfather with his friends Mr. Ellington and Mr. Armstrong. Grandmother Robinson was helping." Yes. Ellington and Armstrong playing with the frogs. This is my second favorite illustration.

This is my first favorite illustration. Look at that frog with Grandfather's teeth so proudly on the blonde kid's head! (He doesn't have a name in the book. It is really William Joyce I guess.) I love that frog.

Anyway, good flick. Not many movies make families seem cool like Meet the Robinsons does.
Hopefully not too many spoilers here for anyone who hasn't seen it. I'm attaching extra videos for my friend Lincoln.

This one includes the happiest music in the world at the beginning. I love that music. I would piece together the entire movie from Youtube if I could.


Robinson family:

Trick My Truck

I do want a job. I need a job. But it will be a sad day when I actually have to work.

Lately I've been spending every night watching whatever episodes of Trick My Truck that my dad records. Yes, the one on CMT. Look at that facial hair! It is really scripted, but these guys are amazing at what they do. I really enjoy it. On the show, people call in with a sob story about why their trucker needs their truck redone and the Chrome Shop Mafia go take the guy (or girl's I guess, but I've never seen a girl by herself. Just in a couple) truck and totally make the outside look sweet. They always think of a theme that has to do with the trucker and they redo the entire truck interior and exterior to match. I even saw them change one guy's engine. Ryno, who does the paint job, is an amazing air brush artist. So cool. The interior guy, Rob, is a genius. He knows how to take a big bouncy ball, cover it with fleece and make a giant resin cherry to put on the top of an ice cream truck. Like a big paper maché thing. I've never seen anything like it.
Before:

After:

That was a very wussy example of what they do, but they are really creative and make really cool things to help people who need help. I recommend the show.

Rock Hard Abs.

I am not a big watcher of ESPN. My brother, on the other hand, left our tv running on ESPN for the last four months. As a result, I am familiar with many of the commercials. This particular one comes to mind every time I want to work out. There is no hope for me. Thanks Payton Manning.

yu.mm.y

If you have a del.icio.us account can you tell me your del.icio.us account name so I can add you onto my network so I can have access to so many other cool things on the internet? I do have Chris and Sam so far. In fact, it even said they were my fans. Thanks for that, Sam and Chris.

Something I am not good at is tagging things. You have to tag things in this blog and on del.icio.us. This is how I tag something: I think of whatever random word reminds me of that link that I would be most likely to search for if I wanted to find it. As a result, none of my entries share the same tag. It seems very unorganized compared to say, Cole, who has a nice solid list of ten or so that all his posts fit into somehow. So, if you are on my del.icio.us network, sorry about the tags.

A sign

Today I had a job interview in Boulder Colorado. Not only do I LOVE Boulder, it went really well. He took me out to lunch (literally) and showed me their new office space right by the Pearl Street Mall. Their company is really a lot bigger and better than I expected. There are five partners and they just merged with some architects so they can do more environmental graphics and stuff like that. I am afraid to write the name of the company because they will probably track me to my blog and leave a comment, but it does have the words ARCHEtecture TYPEography and the number 5 for five partners. No, not Pentagram. He didn't really leave me with any impression of if I would get the job or not. He has to talk to his partner. But I have had a sign that it will happen. And this is what it is. My dad and I ate at the Pei Wei Asian Diner and I picked out my fortune cookie and said, lets see if I get this job or not. This is what I read when I opened it:
"You will spend many years in comfort and material wealth."
What did my dad's say? "You will witness a miracle."
So, I am pretty much a shoe-in for this job. Even if they don't want to hire me, the stars are lined up against them. So, if you need anything important to happen, go to Pei Wei. Hopefully no one from there will stalk me to my blog.

I miss The Office #3.

I've realized many of the clips from The Office I used to watch are not there anymore. People have probably taken them down because of the WPA writer's strike. We should not be watching The Office for free when the writers are not getting paid for it. I did find a link to write a letter to the people in charge to tell them to end the strike. You can find it here. They have a template letter you can send. I wrote my own, asking them to please tell me what happens to all my favorite characters.

Clips I would post if they were still on YouTube and there was not writer's strike:

• Andy singing "Rainbow Connection" to Pam in a high falsetto voice with a banjo. Favorite part: when he sings ainbowray onnectioncay in Pig Latin.
• One of the cold openers from Season 4 when they are having a meeting and Michael is talking about something really lame but everyone else is watching the dvd screensaver, wishing and hoping and cheering when it gets close to and finally bounces out of the actual corner.
• Jim as Dwight/Dwight as Jim
• Andy singing "Take a Chance on Me" to Angela. (yes, I love Andy and his singing.)

So I am going to stop posting about how I miss The Office. I really thought the strike would be over by January. It is not over. I thought if I wrote about it more maybe it would help it come back. Bring awareness, you know. Or at least help me deal with it. Maybe I'll start a new campaign to bring awareness to things I care about. I'll call the first one, "Walmart, the whore of all the earth" or "If everything is made in China, where will the Americans work?" Something like that. I'm obviously not the best of writers. I'll think about it. Oh, I also have learned the health benefits of taking iodine. Maybe I'll write about that. I take Kelp for an iodine suppliment. For the best effect about 40mg a day. To read more on the benefits of iodine, visit here. We have no iodine in our diets. It can prevent cancer, obesity, cure all Thyroid problems, etc. Amazing.

I miss The Office #2.

please give me The Office back.



I've been watching Freaks and Geeks as a substitute.



On a separate note, it is really creepy that when I post something on my blog about someone or something like a t.v. program I get comments back from the people who's job it is to regulate the internet. Like my last post, for example, and the cat lady one. Whose job is it to do that kind of thing? One day I'm just going to post a list of companies or programs and see who responds. I'm not worried about people tracking my comments of The Office, because no one is working there right now.

Project Runway

Any other watchers of Project Runway? Last night the challenge was they had to make dresses out of things they could get from the Hershey's store in Time's Square. It turned out pretty rad.

I miss The Office #1.

I also really miss The Office. When will the writer's strike be over? When will I know what happens to Pam and Jim, Andy, Angela, and Dwight? When will I hear Andy sing again? When will I see Jim and Dwight fight again?

Change

Reasons I miss my designer friends today:
• Books! Other people's books. I love books. (and magazines.)
• They don't act like I'm weird when I pick things up off the ground and keep them.
• I really miss the Indie rocker clothes and dancing. It was a big shock when I saw a kid at a restaurant in Rexburg walk by me wearing tight pants and a black t-shirt and I expected girl pants and they were Wranglers.
•Someone would have watched Helvetica the movie with me tonight. My brothers are very negative about it.

Thanks to those who send me cool design links (Nora the piano playing cat was right up there. Bardhi is also a good supplier.)

Spot on, Wally.

Just in case you missed this. It is from November 29, 2007, clear last year, but my brother and I still laugh about it. Nice work Scott Adams.