the Journal of all things Duckhuggeresque

This is an odd lull in the summer. Haven't been feeling very productive... not really doing much online and been spending too many hours sitting around playing video games. Either way, I did get things together to have a pretty nice show tonight... enjoyable in a sense, yes. The mp3 archive might sound slightly different since I had to record it to my computer at home from a radio (rather than the direct feed to the air-program signal I usually record at KAOS). The playlist with the mp3 is here:

http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-07-13.html

Took a little bit of a spill on my bike on the way home. I was able to kinda' slide into the fall so it didn't really do any major damage to me or the bike. Stupid wet red tiles at Evergreen are stupid, wet, and red! Glad I took my laptop out of my backpack before going to the station though... falls like that are back for laptops, yes.

Just got back earlier today from a five day long stay up back and forth between North and South Mason County. Started out on Thursday with a trip up to Alln, WA for a dinner with visiting cousins from Canada and helping to clean out my mother's garage. Friday and Saturday was down in Shelton, WA for my sister's 10th birthday and the 4th of July. Sunday I headed up to my mother's place where awkwardness ensued with her getting me to watch some evangelical X-tian dvd about converting Islamic people (the whole experience seemed rather surreal). Finally took the earlier part of Monday to help out my parents by babysitting my younger sister (spent most of the time playing animal crossing wherein I whiled away hours catching bugs n' fish and writing absurd letters to the animal denizens of "Sunshine Town").

But yeah... took a little nap before doing tonight's show...  I still feel totally tired and "off" from my normal schedule. So much of those past five days were spent both waking up around 6am to 8am or so and most of the time was spent totally free of using the internet. It somewhat feels like an astronaut reconditioning after coming back from space or something.

Tonight's Chuggypig Unlimited Express somehow collided with my confusion and I found myself cueing up more music than I could use. Perhaps I'll save the Jan Jelinek and Satanicpornocultshop tracks I picked out for next week or something. I'm hoping this show was entertaining enough anyways... despite the near zombie state I was feeling in there.

The playlist & mp3 archive for the show is here:
http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-07-06.html

(a quick reminder that the mp3 archives only stay up for two weeks at a time)

Hey there, Alright... gotta' stop copping out on this blog (using only my radio show as an excuse to post). So today I'll post some sketches that I've done recently. These are all well over a week old... The window and angel ones were both drawn up during the Experimental Music Festival.

As far as what was up earlier today for me... wound up sleeping in pretty late again. Woke up around 4:30 pm feeling groggy and pissed at the humid weather. Drove down to the bank to take care of stuff with my monies, bills, n' such. Then I went and finally exchanged the crappy camera I bought at Radio Shack for a new one. Rather, I should say I used part of the return $$ towards a more expensive n' better camera... It was on clearance and the only one they had left...

 

It's a Sony CyberShot DSC-S950 and it's pink... the photo next to it there is one that I took of another pink thing that wound up mixed into the maccaroni and cheese I just ate. But yeah, it seems a lot nicer than the camera I got before... and Domenica had a CyberShot camera before that seemed pretty reliable and sturdy (surviving a collision with a staircase that almost snapped the fold out lens part off). I'll go ahead and post some more photos here:



This one is of a creepy-cute little milkmaid ornament/doll near the doorway to our apartment.... It jingles!



More dolls... this time an epic struggle perpetually going on atop our television set.



These things are like candy to me... seriously... I love these!!



And finally THIS THING... it's like an elk-head magnet doodad that I got a couple summers back when I went up to Canada with my mother to attend my Aunt Joan's wedding. This thing is awesome, much like other deer/elk releated icons and images... I love it!

Hmmn... this previous week seems like some kind of a blur lost in the morass of summer with my sleeping schedule jostled asunder. I think I've been spending too much time online... I suppose the good side of that is that I've had more time to research bands and interesting things... still, the downside equals out to me feeling somewhat "guh"!!

I had some odd dream just before waking around 5pm to start cueing up for tonight's show. In the dream I was at some kind of summer camp and people were coming down with an illness that was turning them into zombies. They weren't really "violent" zombies, mind you, but just kinda' restless moaning slightly discolored and sweaty looking people. Maybe that's a warning for what I should avoid letting the summer turn me into.

In a later part of the dream I was constantly packing things... changing pants and getting ready to depart in a massive camper wagon. At one point I need to release a series of levers and switches (like something out of a video game) to reveal a path to an immense room in the undercarriage of the wagon. The dream finally ends with me in this room. A cozy fireplace blazes near the hidden stairway. A table is set up around comfortable couches. I strike a match against my knee so I can light a pilot light hidden in some ashtray fixture on the wall.

Dreams aside, have some interesting new music that I played on tonight's lodge... as well as some new and fun selections from artists I've played previously. The start of the show has a definite experimental electronic perhaps even somewhat dancy feel to it... although I do try to maintain my regular mix of "WTF combinations". Something about juxtaposing a very "pretty" song by Mirah next to a very "creepy" track by Nurse With Wound leaves me filled with maliciously giddy joy.

Nuff said for the night... I'll let the playlist and the show mp3 speak for itself from here on out. Remember, the mp3 of any week's show only stay up for two weeks at a time. It's a crotchity ol' DMCA thing n' all... so yeah:
http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-06-29.html

I'm going to go try to fix my sleeping schedule somewhat now... take more bike rides this week... perhaps haunt a coffee shop or something and get some art stuff done... maybe go to Shelton... maybe go to Allyn... or maybe just spiral further into an abyss... oh dear...

So here I am, just finished up with the first radio show since this weekend's 15th Annual Olympia Experimental Music Festival. The Festival went off well overall... the new Northern space seems like a good addition to Olympia and housed the fest well... I wound up "playing" with the Dead Air Fresheners during their set (reuniting with the band after some 8 years or so)... after the fest was all over a few of us went out to the coffee house Sizizis which is this really curious place on the upper area of 4th Ave near the Eagle's Hall. The place is all decked out with a stunningly dark ambiance and old ornate wooden furniture... doorknobs on the ceilings... good coffee and pastries. Best thing is, I hear it's a 24 hour establishment (something that was practically unheard of in Olympia before) so stop by if you get a chance!!

Anyways... with tonight's show... trying to play in a few of the new releases that I received from artists who played at the festival..  those few of note tonight are: Joy Von Spain's "Lady Lazarus", Eet's "Danger Barn", and Master Musicians Of Bukkake (by way of Bill Horist, who played at the film event)'s "Totem One".

The playlist and mp3 for the show is here:
http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-06-22.html

Cheers to Aaron Cayko of Dead Air Fresheners who stayed o'er at my place for the last two festival nights and just left back for Seattle earlier today. We drank way too much beer and ate way too much pizza. Watched Pan's Labyrinth again upon arriving home from the fest and Sizizis. I think I'll need some time of water and healthy salads to recover from the past two nights a little, yeah.

Alright... Finally got a copy of my video After Effects project up on YouTube.

Well, I was planning on going camping with a friend over this Sunday to Tuesday and thanks to Richard of "Dancing In Circles" for offering to sub my show... however... plans fell through and I wound up staying 'round here in regular ol' Olympia Washington this weekend... so that means another "Chuggypig Unlimited Express" proceeded forward. Don't really have a volley of fancy photos to share tonight. I should mention that I'm going to try to get the full video of my short video I did in After Effects these past two quarters "The Unboxing" up soon... so watch for that.

For now I hope this radio playlist and mp3 archive of tonight's show entertain you in some manner or another. Getting closer to my final show (before going on hiatus for a year, travelling to Japan) on Monday September the 7th (a day after my 32nd birthday).



Playlist w/ MP3 Player = http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-06-15.html




Another thing I should note before I go though... if you do like Experimental Music (as I often play on my show) then you should totally plan on coming to this weekend's 15th Annual Olympia Experimental Music Festival at the Northern!! Friday the 18th to Sunday the 21st... lots of good stuff in store for you, and be sure to catch the experimental film matinee happening from 2 to 4pm at the Capitol Theater as part of the fest. See you there!!



Oh, and if you have the capacity to do so... spread word about the fest on your Twitters, Facebooks, n' blogs to get the word out! In the past the festival had been operating on a grant... but since that grant is no longer around, it's operating on a much smaller advertising budget, yeh. It would be very kind if you could help out... yes yes!!


EDIT: Ok, I threw a couple images in because the post looked so dull without it. Images from the program guide and poster designed by Domenica. Another funny thing... on the way out of the KAOS air studios I was assailed by a somewhat intimidating "mini-Mothra" of a moth... the same moth I had mentioned seeing out the window earlier during the show. It seems like it liked the light outside our studios. Also, used the bathroom before leaving and as I went up to the door of the portable housing them, I saw a deer out in the grass staring straight ahead at me. Wildlife, everywhere I turn... yes.

So yeah, done with another night's thrilling episode of The Chuggypig Unlimited Express... compelled to play more and more Japanese music as I find more and more of it... suppose it's a good prelude to my leaving for Japan in October... but yeah lot's of great Japanese bands tonight like Melt Banana, Hazel Nuts Chocolate, Pitcher56, Space Streakings, Hanatarash, Cyclon 86, Satanicpornocultshop, Taeko Oonuki, and Perfect Dancer. Also lot's of other wonderful tracks... such as the first track I get to play by someone off the new TESC student CD comp (a CD that I posted about in my last LJ entry, yeh).

The track was towards the very end of the show (placed strategically next to the KAOS Entertainment Calendar) and is by an artist called Foxdye who plays fun glitchy dancy type electronic funtime music. She is playing at the all day festival "Geoduck Music Fest '09" on TESC's Red Square Wednesday at some point during the concert's 12pm to 8pm running time. She'll also be playing at the 15th Annual Olympia Music Festival... and event filled with lots of interesting music coming up pretty soon here from Friday June 19th to Sunday June 20th.

Anyways... things seemed to go well tonight at the show... asides from the Production Studio computer not having a connection to ye old grand nets of interweb. Lucky for me I happened to bring my laptop with me tonight and was able to make this post n' upload the mp3 for tonight's CUE to the playlist page... which is located here, for you... for now: http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-06-08.html

(NOTE: Laptop upload was FAIL!! Had to wait till I got home to upload the mp3... but it's all set and ready for listening now... yay!)

Now I'll finish up this post with some photos snapped around KAOS' new digs:

  

 

 

 

* Top three photos are taken outside of the KAOS temporary location... kinda' nice n' spooky at night.
* The next few are taken in the Production studio where I spent time cueing for my show. Those headphones were broken when I came in, no honest!! Oh, and my laptop can be seen sitting there.
* Finally the last two are of my bike parked safe and warm inside & the watercooler (hooray for not having to run across from KAOS to get water from the crummy CAB drinking fountain!) I enjoyed a nice cup of hot tea thanks to that thing.
* Odd I didn't snap any photos of the air studio... maybe I'll show you some next time?

So let's see... Getting to the end of 10th week here and after eval week spring quarter at Evergreen will officially be over. I rode my bike up to campus today intending to back up my files on the new Simpletech 1TB external drive I had purchased at Beast Buy yesterday. I was also coming up for the additional purpose of seeing the copies of the 2009 Evergreen Student CD compilation "My Little Geoducks" that I designed the cover art for. They had come in and it was interesting seeing it finally in print. Parts of the color looked really good... some of it looked a little washed out compared to the original art.. but it came out well altogether.

  

Anyways, back to the whole portable drive thing... After testing it on two different computers with both USB and Firewire it was determined my new purchase was a paperweight! Luckily Beast Buy has a 30 day return policy and it's only been one day... so I brought it back to the store n' got my $$ies back!! Did some driving to some other stores and finally found a new drive to purchase (this time at the Beast Buy in Lacey) that was 1TB and had firewire (a Western Digital external drive) only it was a good $30 more expensive (ugh!).

Either way, being in Lacey I figgured taking advantage of the shopping options there would be fun. Thus I hit some of the asian markets and bought some fun foods... but also wound up going to the Goodwill on Galaxy Drive and found this insanely surreal OWL THING!!

 

I guess it will be another fine addition to my collection of insane knick-knacks and goo-gaws... such as Mr. Roo... something my old roommate Stewart Green had given to me. He claimed that he placed it by his bed to ward off nightmares. Honestly, this fake yarn bear piggy bank thing seems more likely to CAUSE nightmares... but then again... I love nightmares... and thus I gladly accepted his gift!



Also fits well with other thrift store found lookie-loos like the psychedelic flowery bug thing and terrifying wooden horse sculpture that I've picked up over time.



Oh yeah... and these photos are all taken on a digital camera I found on sale at Radio Shack yesterday. It was on sale for about $45. Not the best of cameras... but it does the job... likely means that I'll have more photograph laiden blog entires posted up here (fun Fun FUN!!) and also a camera I can take with me when I go to Japan in October... the blog for that (with only two posts so far) I've set up here: http://duckhugger.blogspot.com

Tonight's show went pretty well considering all the differences of the space I was in and the oddly rigged temporary microphone replacing one that failed (no, not the same as last week... a different one this time). It helped that I prepared my show last night... so I was able to be a bit more relaxed when I came in tonight and snapped a few photos before starting up (which I'll share with you soon here).

This is my last show in this KAOS studio space (the one which I've done all my shows in for the past 12 years). By the end of this week we're going to be totally moved into the new temporary portable building (fingers crossed) where we'll stay while the CAB building is remodeled. Still, It's odd to see everything as it's striped out and boxed up. I'll go ahead and give you the link for the playlist and mp3 here and then you can scroll down and view the pictures if you like: http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-05-25.html

Here's a shot of the inside view from the front door/window... also a photo of the air studio all striped out:

 

Here's a photo of Johhny Koch (who does One Chord To Another) in the production studio before my show... and then here's a photo of me in the same spot as snapped by Johnny before he took off:

 

Next we have the CD Library, The Vinyl Library, and the Performance Studio getting all stripped out and/or loaded with boxes to move:

   

And Finally... boxes boxes boxes!!

 

See you all next week... although I just might be tempted to make a non-radio show related post before then, perhaps...

Uploading the mp3 for tonight's show to the website. It was a little bit of a drag doing the show tonight. Having so much of the station packed up into boxes around me is one thing enough to put me in an odd head space... but add to that some of our equipment at the station is broken... the Belar Optimod for example... and worst of all, the on-air mic (which is swapped out with an SM58 microphone). It kinda' throws the sound of things off and made it hard for me to announce without getting self-conscious about how things sounded.

Either way, the show wasn't too bad (I suppose)... your weekly fix of CUE, up now in mp3 form at the playlist: http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-05-18.html

Sorry to make this post mostly about bitching I'll try harder next week... ugh...

It's about 15 minutes after my show and I'm getting ready to put the mp3 up online again, then it's back home to relax and try to get some sleep before work n' school tomorrow. Worked in a slight bit more in the array of "noisy" music tonight than was last week's show... then again, I still played some damnably poppy n' twee music in the mix as well. I'm a sucker for that kind of thing, what can I say?

Things are starting to get boxed up around KAOS here for our impending move over to the portable temporary trailer buildings that KAOS will be housed in (starting this June). That nonsense has me a little nervous about upcoming Summer shows... but with luck everything will go fine, I suppose. I'm just hoping none of my favorite (or undiscovered favorite) cds n' albums don't go missing in the move.

Speaking of undiscovered favorites... I noticed a CD by the Japanese noise rock band Space Streakings in the library tonight. I have a 7" record by this band that I really enjoy... and somehow I've managed to totally miss that full album there for all these years. The year it came in was 1994 (three years before I got here) so I've had all this time of being totally oblivious to it... sheesh! Anyways... you'll find a track off that included in tonight's show as well.



Hmmn... mp3 is still uploading so maybe I should blab a little more, no?

I spent mother's day with my mom in downtown Olympia. Before we left my apartment I hid her mother's day card behind this old stuffed calico fabric cat-shaped pillow thing she sewed for me back when I was a little kid. The card itself had a water-colored drawing of the "calico kitty" on it I drew as well (sorry, no scan). She wanted to eat at someplace where there weren't too many people around and then suggested Saigon Rendevous. As suspected, the place was deserted. After that we went and walked around the wooden boat festival thing. I was a little bemused by one of the display tents that featured "magnetic therapy", but what can you say... Oly is full of magical thinking fruitcakes, yeh.

Oh but hey! The mp3 is done uploading and now the playlist page for the Chuggypig Unlimited Express as been updated to reflect that... you can get there via here:
http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-05-11.html

P.S. - Went and saw the new Star Trek movie with Luke and Domenica this last Saturday. I'm not a huge Star Trek fan, but I thought it was pretty cool. The actors were all pretty damn good in their roles... and the blippy bloopy sounds the ship made brought back nostalgic memories of watching the original show's re-runs as a kid in the early 80s.

Staying late at the mammal (MML)... working on getting the cd design finished... had to skip Japanese class tonight to get the work done. Either way... geoducks on the brain... I just thought I would make a quick post in order to juxtapose these two images...

 

Geoduck, meet Eraserhead Baby... Eraserhead Baby, meet Geoduck... That is all.

It's about 1:34 now and I'm nearly ready to leave the radio station. The few tick bars on the upload for my radio show's mp3 archive is almost complete and then it will be ready to share with all. It was a pretty fun show all in all... lots and lots of Japanese music this type around (becoming more and more of a theme as I probe into the depths of Japanese music scenes present and past).

One noted track about 19 minutes in is by Kiyoshiro Imawano and Ryuichi Sakamoto. Learned via a post  by zinagod that Imawano passed away recently at the age of 58. I didn't really know much about his music until now but I did enjoy his role as "Richard" in the film "Happiness of the Katakuris".

You might notice other tracks in the show that were previously listed in the "listening to" section of my posts such as Kimitaka Matsumae's "Koi no Mixburger" and Choco's "Ame no Hi Futari". Yup... often my show is a venting point for playing all the latest music I have listened to in the weeks before.

Anways... the mp3 is up for your listening pleasure on the playlist here: 
http://www.duckhugger.com/cue-playlist/cue-2009-05-04.html
I'll be taking it down (in the wee hours of May 19th).

Another note, before I go... apparently the show that Phan Nguyen subbed for me last week was officially my 12 year reunion show... looking at my old air-check tape from 1997 (yes, I still have it) it fell EXACTLY on that day! Weird weird... and perhaps a little unfortunate I didn't realize till after the show... but still, It was nice to have a break.

Not much to post really right now... a lot of work is going into trying to get the Student CD artwork and layout done for this year's compilation. I'm hoping to finish most of that up tomorrow so I'm going to try to get to sleep soon here even though I was pretty sleepless last night into early morning... finally fell to sleep and then woke up at 4pm. If I can get to sleep by 3am here and even get a few hours of sleep in... that would be nice.

Earlier today around 6pm had some fun hanging out with a fellow comic drawin' geek named Max Brooks who posts here at Live Journal under the name sexualcabinetry. A few alcoholic drinks were had... but most of what I consumed was coffee... blabbing about a variety of interesting things and topics there at Ben Moore's.

The night before (Friday night) had a fun romp of bowling with the Electronic Media peeps over at Westside Lanes. The bowling was fun despite my sucking ass at the game. The beer was wayyy too expensive but I had some anyways... it seemed my bowling got a little better after the first couple drinks... and then perpetually worse thereafter. It's like the boozing to bowling ratio was set on some kind of curve, sloping up towards "Rollin' Some Decent Strikes Hill" and then down into "Rollin' Some Suck-ass Gutterballs Canyon". Oh well, fun was had... that's what matters.

Alright, so I'm sleepless tonight and was inspired by an entry my friend Brandon Graham drew up for Harvey James' "Activity Week" thing here: http://harveyjames.livejournal.com/126072.html
...thus I've crafted my own (kinda' rushed up) entry for it... which I'll post here now (note the lower left is the original which my drawing is based on):



I really need to go to sleep now... I have to wake up in 4 hours... ugh...

Alright, sorry if I'm about to get more than a little schizophrenic in my uses of Live Journal here... but I thought recently that It would be a fun idea to share albums and tapes that I've come across in years past via the 50￠/$1 vinyl and tape bins at random thrift stores. With sharing sites like Megaupload n' the like it's getting easier to share things like this. So yeah... I'll start out with this one... A full children's album by Frank Luther called "Macaroni The Little Pony".



I can't quite recall where I picked this one up at... most likely from someplace like the Olympia Goodwill or Lacey Value Village, where I would repeatedly retreat to in order to scour through their piles or records for long lengths in search of new oddities to mix with on my old Super Secret Lodge Show.

I have to be honest I never really listened to this record all that critically or thoroughly before now. It has many wonderful sounds to sample peppered throughout... from gleeful organ backing music to an assortment of exuberant animal noises... and I think that fact distracted me for quite a long time from actually focusing on the absurd story that it holds.

The story is basically as follows... A little pony and a girl with a golden curl are born at the same day "far apart, far away". It's stated that the pony and the girl dream of being united with each-other (like some kind of fateful psychic link, I guess). There's a deliriously giddy song the little girl sings when she first sees Macaroni, while visiting the circus, exclaiming "Why that's MY little pony!" despite it being the first time she's seen him.

There's some other highlights to this album such as the sound where Pattycake the Parrot scolds Macaroni with interjected scornful squaking sounds...  the curious lyrics presented twice in the train song "Rattle rattle rattle rattle boop boop boop... The train ran over the chicken coop!!" (wait, what?)... the villainous Mr. Envy who steals the pony away and paints it black (how exactly does one paint a pony I wonder?)... the welcome song of the forest creatures after Macaroni escapes from Mr. Envy (with a frog who sounds somewhat like the midget from Twin Peaks)... etc...

The full download with mp3s of both sides and a .pdf copy of the cover can be found here: @ MEGAUPLOAD or here: @ RAPIDSHARE

Just wanted to post this... a quick view of part of my room just to the left of my computer here where my bookshelf and lamp resides. The main bookshelf I got from a garage sale for a preschool going out of business. The red crate above it is something I've had since I was a child... above that is a paper box and above that is a little wooden box that my ex-girlfriend Courtney made as a present for me.



As far as the lamp goes... that was something I picked up when Domenica and I were living together in Lacey, WA near a cemetery. It's two lamps attached to a spring-loaded pole that can fit pretty much anywhere in the house. Sitting atop it is one mis-shapen bunny rabbit that I got from the Red Barn Thrift Store when I worked there in 1996. The doll is another thing I got from working at a thrift store... this time from when I worked (briefly) at the Oly Goodwill. It came all tangled up in thread and red netting like that... decided to keep her like that.



The bird to the immediate left of the doll in this photo here is a gift given to me by Dennis Driscoll... it makes funny tweeting noises... yay!

Ok, So I'm back from a trip I took up to Shelton. I'm going to post another blog about something of mine. This time it's not something in my room "per se" but something I've had up, around, or hanging out at various apartments over time. This is a "painting" although really it seems like some kind of mass-produced print (framed up to look like a painting) called "Fear Not, I Am With You" by Alex Nuckols.





I found it while walking through the Goodwill on the corner of Harrison Ave & Cooper Pt. Rd. I would have almost missed it if I hadn't looked down noticing it sitting on the ground by one of the aisles. Once again, it's an item of utmost oddity and tackiness... that backwoods "good ol' boy" American flavor seeping through into religious manifestations. I noticed also that the perspective seems a little askew in this thing... making jokes several times that Jesus isn't actually guiding the trucker through the trecherous pass but actually distracting him.

Jesus: "Hey look at that bird over there!"

Trucker: "Shut up Jesus! I'm trying to drive!!"



It's also amusing the little details put into this picture like the "12" (as in 12 disciples) that is on the front of the truck... and these licence plates which all seem to be Bible verses. I'll post links to the verses respectively via the "Flaming Fire Illustrated Bible":
Revalations 3-20, John 3-16, Romans 10-14, Luke(?)10-27



I'm kinda' surprised another photo or copy of this hasn't shown up on the internet in all these years. Like I said, it's not a "one of a kind" painting and looks rather mass-produced. There are some other interesting examples of paintings and images like this out on the net however like the ones here, here, over here, n' here.

Alright... so tonight was filled with going down to Artswalk in Olympia... wandering around... buying a book on Asian cooking ingredients for part of my cooking obsessed little sister's birthday present... taking the bus back to Evergreen... working on my "Unboxing" video project... and finally coming home here. Going to go out to Shelton tomorrow and hang out with the family (my sister's birthday and all being the main reason behind that).

I did feel like I needed to post a Live Journal entry tonight though... I checked out a camera from Media Loan to get some "texture" shots to use in the unboxing thing... then I figured "Hey! Maybe I should document some things in my room here before I leave to Japan and pack all of it up, eh?".

So this entry is going to be about a vital item in my room that Domenica always liked to call "The Buck". It's one of those "Mink" style acrylic/polyester blankets from Korea that one might find sold at a gas station or such. I worked for about 4 years at a Comfort Inn down in Tumwater and at one point it was owned by a Korean family... during this year our Christmas bonus was our pick from a bunch of these blankets that the owners had gotten for us.

At first I was a little disappointed... I mean, Christmas bonuses in the past were gift cards to places like Fred Meyer that I could actually use for groceries or other "essential" items. I already had a blanket and didn't think I really needed a new one. Oh how wrong I was!! Rifling through the options availible to me (Whales, Flowers, Mountain Lions, etc...) I finally came across something that made my heart skip a beat!! DEER!! Oh my!! Possibly the tackiest thing ever!!... and yet... It was oh so "in line" with my sense of backwoods aesthetics!!



To make a long story short... I brought this thing home and soon found that it wasn't just good for it's kitch value... but it was also very Very VERY comfortable!! It was also the perfect thickness for me. Not too thick that I get sweaty and hot while sleeping... but not too thin that I get cold. I have to honestly say that It's the PERFECT blanket for me and I love it to death! If I can, I might think of ways that I can get it shipped to me when I go to Japan this upcoming Fall (if it's not too expensive to do so).



I should also note the images I've chosen to put overtop this lovely blanket (above my bed) that are also all deer themed. I'll post the photo of that now yes....



Alright.... enough about that... perhaps I'll post another entry themed around something in my room here soonish... or maybe something about something curious I've come across lately (Like that entry on the Polta animations). Really, what would you all prefer? Does anyone really care?