Snowpocalypse has Arrived

First, lemme just get this off my chest: WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON WITH THE WEATHER?! I mean, really, Illinois? You're gonna take a vacation and get Siberia to sub in for you?? That's just great. Fan-freaking-tastic. Negative temperatures, piles of snow and ridiculous wind are a greeeeat winter cocktail you've mixed up for us. 'Preciate it, you big jerk.

Okay, this isn't exactly what we're dealing with, but I forgot to take pictures in the daylight...

Considering it's January, I shouldn't be surprised that it's as cold as it is, I mean, it is winter, but the negative temperatures are a bit much. I'm especially grumpy because I have a funeral tomorrow for my brother-in-law's dad. I love my bro-in-law, but I don't think I'll actually be able to handle going to the graveyard. According to rumors, we won't be going to the grave site because of the cold and snow, so we'll see.

On the bright side, I got an adult snow day! Eeeeeeee!! It was kinda exciting. And what better to do on a cold snow day than to stay warm and do ART! Woo!

So exciting! Actually, I wasn't using tangible art supplies today. Hmm.

I've been practicing some digital art with Sketchbook Pro on my iPad and it's been a pretty fun time. The best discovery I've made so far is the nifty little button that allows you to draw symmetrically on both halves. IT'S LIFE-CHANGING! Do you know how many times I've wished for something so awesome?! It has made drawing faces soooo much easier!

My first doodle with it and - holy crap, she looks kinda Cher-y, yeah? Whatever, IT'S SYMMETRICAL!

So the parts of the day that I didn't spend doing some social media posts for work or cleaning I spent playing with my tablet. (It's the only place I can use and airbrush. ;) They expensive!) Apparently I'm going through a weird Pixie-eye phase.

See? Pixie eyes. And I hadn't discovered the Symmetricizer yet.

Seriously, I've been doing it everywhere. I had another awesome example, but for some reason the colors are wack on Blogger. Maybe some other time. But I have a thing for eyes. I think they're beautiful and fascinating.

Sketchbook Pro on my tablet seriously rocks my socks.

Eyes are great. I also finally got around to drawing Darth Maul for my cousin-in-law. (His favorite movie character of all time. He loves the baddies.) It's not the greatest and I still have to detail the rest of the eyes, but I'm pretty proud of what I've accomplished so far. I'm not adding it, because for some reason the colors when wack on it too! 

What the heck, Blogger?!! Throwin' off my groove, dude!

But yeah, methinks I had a pretty productive snow day.

For all those being tormented by Snowpocalypse, stay warm and be cozy! For everyone not suffering any of Snowpocalypse's numerous charms, may you be doused in icy cold water. :P

Hahahahaha...juuuust kidding!

Aby

Deep Musings and a Re-Evaluation of My Career

I've never truly desired to be a wealthy person. Sure, I've had dreams of unlimited spending limits and money would make decision making so much easier, but I've always been very aware that money will not make me happy. It's my personality type. Having money will not make me fulfilled and content. I'd rather be helping people and making a pittance than make millions and not impact anyone.

This has been something I've known since I was in high school, having first realized it on my first mission trip to Mexico. We spent a week working hard and long with only the basics, no technology, no luxury. I didn't miss my normal life at all. In fact, I was more upset to come home than anything. Every mission trip I've been on since has been the same. Coming home is more disappointing than anything.

Since this was something I knew before I really started looking into college majors, you would have thought my decision was going to be easy. It wasn't. Firstly, there are a lot of different majors to choose from. No longer are the choices teaching and nursing for women, which, let's be honest, is AWESOME, but really makes decision making a lot harder.

So when I started out contemplating my future career possibilities my senior year of high school, my choices were all things I was passionate about, things I loved to do. Art, writing, literature, and even some science - I loved them all. Art is what I'm most passionate about. I love creating and transforming something plain and bland into something awesome.

Unfortunately, reality hadn't yet been introduced to me. My mother made sure reality and I were very well acquainted. To my mother, financial security and stability are the most important things when making all major life decisions. This attitude is partly her personality type (she is the save for the future, not the present type), her upbringing (her parents lived through WWI, the Depression and WWII) and her life experiences (up until the past decade or so, my parents have been paying of some major business debt accrued in the 1982 Recession).

While I can understand all these driving forces now, I didn't in high school. I just wanted to know why my mom was such a Debbie Downer and harshin' my buzz. How I wish I could have had the insight I do now when I was choosing what to study. But, I hadn't yet taken enough psychology and sociology classes to understand what she was saying.

My mom has always been verrry vocal on how she thing I (and the sibs) should be living my life - and what she would have done that would have been far smarter, independent, frugal, you name it. To be fair, my mom has dealt with a lot of craptastic stuff in her life. The biggest being a very tragic accident for my family when she was 34.

My four older siblings were with her at the time and it happened on a cold December night when black ice covered the roads. The accident killed my youngest older brother just before his 4th birthday, injured by second oldest sister and oldest brother, seriously injured my oldest sister, leaving her in the hospital for months afterwards and left my mom with a severe head injury to the frontal lobe. According to people who knew my mom before the accident, her personality drastically shifted, which make total sense, considering where she was injured.

The accident happened six years before I was born. During that time, my mom was very sick from the head injury, fibromyalgia (a result of the accident) and debilitating depression caused by the loss of a child. It's very likely it took those six years before I was born to even start the grief process. To be perfectly honest, she's still dealing with it, 30 years later, every day. Heck, she can still smell the smells, see the colors, remember what everyone was wearing, how they all looked. I'm pretty sure she has PTSD and unless she decides to go to counseling (and stay this time), she'd probably going to continue reliving the accident and stay muddled in the grief for the foreseeable future.

At almost 25 (ahhhhh!) I know these things, I recognize the signs. At 18, all I knew was that my mom was shooting down every idea and every dream of a future I had. She still does that, and it's still something that I really struggle with. Parents are supposed to encourage your dreams, right? They're the people who are supposed to make you believe in yourself when everyone else thinks you're an idiot and foolish. It's so frustrating when one of those people makes you feel like your dreams and goals are "pipe-dreams" and unrealistic. So what if they are?! I always wanted to scream, it's my life to live!

My parents and I had worked out a deal where they would assist me with paying for college, I'd pay what I could from working in the summer and throughout the year and they'd fill in the rest, then I'd pay them back after I graduated. It seemed like the perfect solution. I sure as heck didn't have $30,000+ hanging around and no summer job I got would really help that much. Having just settled all their business debts at that time, my parents were very against student loans and my mother flat our refused to co-sign.

If I had been smart, I would have found another way to pay for school. I would have worked a year, or went part time. I applied for scholarships and grants, but I would have applied for more. Anything than to rely on my parents, because accepting my mother's payment solution also meant accepting her unasked for advice in all things college and future related and gave her a certain amount of control in my future in her mind - and probably a bit in mine too. And to my mother, an art degree was completely out of the question, so far off the table, I didn't even pursue it as a minor.

That's CRAZY. I loved art! Still do. I'm still creating, painting and drawing. I almost ended up in the Biomolecular Chemistry field, but thankfully the length of the program was a real deterrent in my mom's mind. She didn't want to be helping pay for seven years! Why, it only took her four years to complete her teaching degree in 1972! If that was good enough for her, then it was good enough for her kids. Besides, any more schooling and you might as well be a doctor.

I went through several false starts with majors before she stumbled on public relations. Admittedly, it's a pretty good match in terms of using my skill sets. It meshes the art side of things and the writing side of things together and they're both things that I love. I enjoy what I do - especially when it's on the more artistic side of things, but I can't shake the feeling that I'm doing what I do only because my mom wanted it done. I can't shake the feeling that every day when I'm going to work and all the dead lines and work is pressing down on me that there is no way I can endure this for the rest of my life.

Yeah, I did have my little rebellions along the way, like the internship I took purely because it was fun and interesting, not because it could help me get a corporate position, but overall, I did exactly what she wanted me to. And that really, really bothers me, because when it comes down to it, I'm the one who has to live with those decisions. ME. Not her. This is all on me, no matter how much I feel like she pushed me into it.

Two years after college graduation, I'm so confused and unsettled. I go to my job and occasionally I enjoy the creative things I do, but I don't feel fulfilled with my work. I'd always thought I'd use my talents to help people, to bring joy to others. Instead I'm using it to meet never ending deadlines, hour after hour, day after day to improve the company's bottom line.

Steve Jobs once said, "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life." Regardless of whether he meant don't pine for someone else's life and mimick theirs, or don't let someone else decide your life for you, he has a strong point.

I can't keep living my life the way my mom wants me to live, or the way the rest of my family wants me to live. It might be all sunshine, rainbows, and lollipops, but it's going to get pretty miserable for me, if the past few months have been any indication. I have so many things I want to do and places I want to see and live...I can't stay where I am for the next ten years.

And that, perhaps, is the most heartbreaking. The company where I work is awesome and working there for multiple years would be fantastic. I love the people, the benefits would be amazing, but...I just...can't. I want to live my life, not merely exist. I feel like I'm just existing. I want to enjoy new experiences while I'm young enough to do all the things I want, not sixty years down the road after retirement. Forget that! So much of the world is left for me to see and so many people I still need to meet...I can't stay where I'm at. I know I can't.

This realization has been tough to deal with. I know I'll be disappointing a lot of people, especially my mom, but it seems like a pretty constant thing with her. I don't know where my path is going to lead, but starting right now, I plan to make the most of every moment. I need to find myself along the way. Somewhere, somehow I lost myself these past few years.

A friend was recently helping me sort through some of my confusion and she said something very wise. "I think for some things - like careers - it's between you and God. It's not your parents' place to nudge you in one direction or another. How do they know God's plan for you?" It hit me that I couldn't even remember if God had figured into my decision to go into PR and that's a sickening feeling.

Even if I take God out of the equation, do you know how scary and insane it is to realize that the biggest decision of my life might not have been based off of anything other than my mother's need for financial security and stability? Holy crap. Seriously, what the heck was I thinking?!

2013 was a learning year for me and, according to the Chinese zodiac symbols, not the greatest year. Full of bad decisions, heart break and painful life lessons, but 2014 is looking up. I have hope. I see what's wrong and I'm ready to fix it. Here's some of what I've learned:

• My happiness falls on me. If I want to be happy, I can't be living someone else's dream or following someone else's rule book. This means some changes are necessary. I can no longer live the life of a home body like my home body family wants me to. I need to explore and experience other places, people and cultures.
• It's never too late to go after what you love to do. It might not be easy, but it's not too late. If I want to do something with my art, or help people, there's nothing stopping me. Sure, logistically I may have to save up for a couple months or take a new job somewhere else for a year before I can enroll in an art program, if that's my path, but I'm the only one that can keep me from what I love at this point.
• It really does not matter at all if my mom is happy with what I do. She isn't the one who has to do it day in and day out, so really, it's my bidness, not hers. I'm sure throughout history there have been countless parents that haven't been pleased with their childrens' career choices (Am I right, parents of Amelia Earhart??). Eventually they'll get over it. Hopefully, when my mom sees how happy and fulfilled I am doing something that she didn't have planned out for me, she'll get over it. Knowing my mother, it'll probably take more time that that, but hey, that's her bidness. Besides, as I'm not planning to become something shady or criminal, I think she should be happy regardless.

So If anyone knows of some sort of PR type job in the San Diego area, or in the Austin, Texas area, that'd be cool. :) They both have some good art programs at their unis and are WARM, unlike Illinois right now. (For the record, Illinois is kinda sucky.) And I think I need a change of pace. I need to go off on my own and find myself. Maybe I need a jolt to rekindle my spark. I miss it. 

Sorry for the rant, I hope that my struggles finding my place will help someone out in the future. There are so many possibilities out there, never think you don't have any other options that the ones in front of you.

Keep up the awesome,

Aby

Excellent Design Work vs. Finishing a Semester Two Weeks Early

So, I was assigned to do an infographic for a class as a last minute final assignment (prof wasn't very exceptionally organized). The prof also gave the added incentive that if we had all our portfolio projects and binder completed, then we didn't have to attend class for the last two weeks, as our portfolios were technically our final.

As a result, our infographics were generally the easy version (infographic flow chart! boom!) and pretty lame. Here is mine:

Seriously, researching is impossible with the internet. THERE'S SO MUCH INFORMATION TO ABSORB! And so little time!!

It was super easy to make, considering all I had to do was pretend I was researching a topic and then document everything. A thrilling glimpse into a 45 minute window of how my time gets spent (or wasted. don't judge me). 

Any way...Happy 2014! May your year be awesome and full of excellent experiences!

I Am A Slacker.

I have a confession. It's not pretty, and I really don't want to admit it, but I will to keep my blogging honest. Here goes...I am a complete slacker at this blogging thing. THERE. I said it! I know you were probably thinking it, I mean, my last post was in December 2012, but no one wanted to put me on the spot and call me out on my slackerness.

Well, no one except my siblings - but they don't count.

But yeah, major slacker.

You should know that I am totally committed to doing better in 2014. For reals. Who knows, I might even get three whole posts next year! Woooo!

Well, now that I've got that off my chest, I'd like to wish everyone Happy Holidays! May your 2014 be wicked awesome!

3 Vacation Locations I Will Never Visit (Probably)

I have a confession: I love traveling. There, I said it. As a travel addict, I have been to many different places in my short 23 years. Sadly, most of those places have been in the United States (29 states, baybay!) and Mexico, so I've got some catching up to do elsewhere around the world.

That being said, there are some locations I will not pay to visit. Were someone else to pay for me, that would be another story entirely - I love a good free adventure. Even a not good free adventure, I'm not picky.

#3: Bangkok, Thailand

Bangkok got a lot of free press from The Hangover 2, and while it is said that all press is good press, I'm not sure that is the case here. The movie shows the seedy underbelly of Bangkok, which I'm sure their travel bureau is super thrilled about.

While potential visitors are assured that the crime rate in Bangkok is comparable to similarly sized cities in the world, there's still a worrisome amount of crime.

Do not get any closer.

Bangkok has huge problems with drug related crimes, including drug trafficking, prostitution, and gambling. Now, I am not an expert on reasons why tourist travel to Bangkok, but considering the ease that drugs, prostitutes, and gambling venues can be acquired/found, I'd say that's a large attractant to a certain type of tourist.

I don't really care what other people do on their vacations, buuuut I'm not looking for cheap and easy drugs, prostitutes, or gambling on a vacation. I'm looking for relaxation, warm weather, and a beach.

Bangkok also has an absurd amount of traffic accidents each year. There were nearly 38,000 accidents in 2010 alone, which resulted in 16,602 injuries and 456 deaths. I don't know how that compares to similar sized cities, but the traffic situation in similar sized cities, like London, doesn't look like this:

"Mommy, I have to go potty!"

Or this: 

"Turn left, then get in the right hand lane."

"Oh, screw you, GPS."

Aaaand one more:

"We have a dinner reservation at 8 next Thursday, sooo if we leave at 2:15 today we might get there on time."

There would be no vacation in Bangkok, it would be one long, continuous traffic jam. The horror!

#2: Guam

Guam is an idyllic little island in the South Pacific that is all of a whopping 209 square miles. That makes it smaller than the majority of the eight islands that make up the state of Hawaii. And, like Hawaii, it's a tropical paradise. 

From this distance.

The only downside to Guam, aside from the the 14 hour flight from California, is that it is crawling (literally!) with snakes. Before Guam became infested by the brown tree snake sometime around World War II, the only snake Guam natives had to worry about was a blind snake, Ramphotyphlops braminus. The  Ramph Bram (I refuse to type all of that again) is very small and is often mistaken by locals as a nothing more than a worm.

This ferocious beast is scourge of ants and termites all over Guam.

Once the brown tree snake was introduced to Guam, it essentially became a feral animal. In the thirty years since it's been introduced, the brown tree snake has managed to take out ten of the twelve native birds indigenous to Guam. If the brown tree snakes were humans, they'd be Hitler and the Nazis at the height of their douchebaggery.

"Heil Mich!"

According to several smarticle types, there are 13,000 snakes per square mile in Guam. That's two and a half snakes every square foot. I dunno about ya'll, but I don't like snakes enough to have to worry about tripping over them every step I take, even if it would be comical. 

Picture this, just with bajillions of snakes snickering at your humiliation.

#1: Ramree Island

This one is a bit of a cheat, since it's not really a vacation spot, buuut I'm running with it, dang it. Ramree Island is located in the lovely Burma, an exotic locale that was pretty consistently dissed in the King and I. Interestingly (perhaps too strong of a word to use), Siam and Burma did go to war, but it totally ended in a tie, so the King and I was just a massive piece of propaganda put out by the Siamese government...ninety years after the fact...(okay, that might just be a theory.) Granted, Yul Brynner as the King of Siam does make a very compelling argument for the Siam side of the equation. Well done, casting directors.

Even in Lady Gaga clothes Yul's stare could beat an opposing force into submission.

Ramree Island is as lovely as the rest of Burma. Visually. And from something airborne. Preferably from a distance that won't be landing on the island. If you are going to land on the island, you'd better hope cartoon physics apply and try and flap yourself away from the land part of the island.

I was looking for a more illustrative picture, but got distracted by this. So DEAL.

Why all the evasive maneuvers? Because Ramree Island is basically a swamp. A giant, island sized swamp, full of super swampy things. The island is inhabited by thousands of saltwater crocodiles, which are apparently the most deadly in the world, the salt obviously giving them super powers.

Fun fact: this croc wants you dead! 

Not only that, the island is swarmed with mosquitoes carrying malaria and venomous scorpions. You almost get the feeling that pure evil is spawned amidst this trifecta of terror. Want to know just how deadly this island is? Of 1,000 Japanese soldiers forced into the swampy areas during a battle in WWII, 20 survived. TWENTY! That's a 98% death rate! Aaaaaaaaaaahhh!

Hand-Lettering Like a Boss...ish

I have recently been working on my hand lettering skillz - and by recently, I mean the last three days. :) Anyways, I'm just exercising my current hand lettering skill set and hopefully expound them. Basically, I'm hopin' to become a professional, ya know? ;)

Here's the first one an "L".

You can most definitely see the imprint of an 'e' from the page before. :) There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to the letters chosen for these, I pretty much just chose ones that I thought would look cool with the style. And because I'm super lazy and never happen to have a ruler handy, these were all done freehand.

Which is only impressive with this "H", really.

And it's not as spectacular as it could be, but it's very 3D, yeah? It reminds me of the digital Tremont T's I worked on for the football team when I was in high school. :) Oh how technology has advanced! And oh how much easier it is now! I look back and can't believe how much time I spent doing things from scratch without using any Adobe products. Craziness.

This one is an "A" I worked on. Not my favorite by any stretch, but its still part of the collection.

It's also more sloppy than the others, probably because I lost interest and so it got significantly harder to focus on being neat. :P

This "B" is probably my favorite, or at least tied with the last one I have. It's soooo....futuristic Gothic, I think. Our family has an old school German Bible that's been handed down for generations and this letter is part that lettering mixed with swirls and decals. Loves. :))

It was originally supposed to just be white on the inside with some simple shading, but it would have looked better in color that way. Since I was only using a graphite pencil and the paper, I decided to give it a 3D-ish vibe.

This last one is a "K" inspired by a Polish (I think...it could be Hungarian) artist that writes poetry out in the most beautiful calligraphy. I'm completely fascinated and want to attempt colored versions with ink!

Got some lovely little smudges, too. Gives it character! ;) I absolutely adore this style concept.

Welp, I'm off for some snooze time. Probably...hopefully. :) Nighty night!

Aby

I'm basically the next Bill Gates...

I'm feeling pretty smug right now. Wanna know why? I'll share, it's no problem. I'm smug because I am so technologically advanced that this post is coming to you directly from my iPad. That's right, people, I can post without using a computer. BOOM.

Now, I realize that many people have probably accomplished this feat already, but I don't really care. I applaud them and their technological savvy, but what reaaaally tickles me is that I have figured this out by myself!

Mwahahahahaaaa!

I would like to apologize at this time to Mr. Gates. Sir, I'm sorry I used you as my smart computery person when talking about using an Apple product, that's my bad, but I think you epitomize successful computer geek and I'm not cool enough yet with technology to basically be Steve Jobs...

Lots of linguini! Or love, whatevs!

Aby