Unclear

I popped into The University Bookstore this morning on my way to class to pick up a new notebook for my MWF classes and a couple of cards for some birthdays that are coming up in the next couple of months. I couldn't find a birthday card I liked (all that had fun covers had irritating attempts at humor within), so I reverted to my usual plan B and tried to find a quirky blank card. I think I succeeded, and grabbed a pair of the same design (which I won't describe beyond saying that they're a touch on the fuzzy side). I went to pay, and the check-out woman praised me for what great cards I had chosen. While I felt 'great' was too strong a word, I simply said that I hoped that the recipients would agree with her. She looked at me with a puzzled expression and asked me who was sick. I assumed she had misheard me (the 'si' sound is in both words), so I said, "oh, no, I said recipients." But that didn't seem to do if for her. "Recipients:" I continued hesitantly, "the people who will be receiving the cards." This was apparently what was needed to clear things up, for she smiled and gave me a good natured "oh, I see!"

Joe Ienuso, Chair of the Emergency Management Operations Team and Acting Vice President of Facilities Management at Columbia University emailed me just a few minutes ago and warned me that New York City may be getting up to a foot of snow this weekend. I wish I could be there to go walking through Central Park early one of these snowy mornings.

Home

I'm back in Minnesota after two safe and pleasant flights. I'll probably be pretty quiet for the rest of the month.

A romp in the park

Sameer and I partook of an exciting theatrical experience this evening (my last in this wonderful city for quite some time). We literally chased a production of Aphra Behn's The Feigned Cortesans through Central Park, stopping for each scene, and taking flight to arrive at the next one. The company's mission statement can explain it better than I can.

QNS

I ventured over to Queens for the first time since I flew in to LaGuardia in order to visit the Museum of Modern Art. The MoMA is normally in Manhattan, but they are rebuilding their site, and so a select number of pieces and a couple exhibitions are available for viewing at a special site called MoMA QNS. I didn't need much time to see everything, but the Tall Buildings exhibit was very interesting. My Columbia ID got me in for free, so the four dollars for subway fare was my only expense, a very fair price for such an interesting adventure.

Aria

Three doors down from my room here in Broadway resides a girl who, it seems, has both a considerable sexual appetite and a sizable pair of lungs. I think I've heard her in the throes of ecstasy at least a dozen times in the weeks that I've lived here, and her cries are none too subtle. I can hear her if I'm in the hall; I can here her in my room with the door open; I can even hear her in my room even with the door shut. To give her the privacy that seems appropriate, I've got to be in my room with the door closed and put on some serious tunes ("Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 2" works best, but I view it as a compromise).

Her privacy has been kept somewhat intact, however, by her anonymity. I hadn't seen her once the entire month I've live here. Until today. She was coming out of her room, as I was heading out for breakfast, and we exchanged pleasant hellos and the usual. She was tall and athletically-built—generally what I might expect for someone with such volume and endurance—but I must say that her speaking voice sounded very little like I had expected based upon my familiarity with her, shall we say, not-speaking voice.

Zen Palate

I just returned from an exquist dinner at Zen Palate. The restaurant has a diner component in the front, and a formal dinning room in the back; the menus are quite different, but all dishes are vegitarian. I had the Tapestry Embrance, which is described as "succulent mushroom steak, bran oats, cabbage, tomatoes, mushrooms, soy gluten, vermicelli, and sweet rice on the side in a special teriyaki sauce." This is a rather confusing description, but the dish is easily summed up as being rice, mushroom, and a meat-like mass of vegetable matter with teriyaki sauce and fresh grean beans and asparagus on the side. It was very good. I had a slice of Key Lime pie for desert.

The French Connection

I visited the Statue of Liberty this morning. The statue is very impressive and the museum is informative. There were numerous posters illustrating the continued goodwill between the U.S. and our oldest ally, France. I wish any Americans who still have misgivings toward that country could visit this museum. I booked our tour way ahead, so Rachel and I were able to go up to the observation deck and peer up into the statue itself. It was quite a morning. After that adventure, we traveled to Michelle's Kitchen, where Rachel's older sister Alison was working her final day. I had an amazingly good turkey sandwich and a delicious Boylan Bottleworks brand cream soda. Rachel walked me to my bus stop, where I caught the 96 back to the west side.

End

Today marked the end of my studio for this summer Intro to Architecture program. We had a final critique with a nice jury of four architects. One was German, one was Mexican, one was African-American, and one appeared to be your straight-up Caucasian American; all were quite helpful. The session ran over, stretching to a whopping five and a half hours and leaving me quite exhausted. I've still got a little bit of stuff tomorrow, but the class is over for the most part.

A celebrated the end with a shot of vodka and a relaxing shower. I ended up taking a shot because I popped into the room of a classmate to borrow some Tide when she, her roommate, and a friend were about to have some Absolut Citron. Not to leave me out of the festivities, they offered me a glass, and I accepted, having never consumed vodka before. I thought the drink was quite palatable. I don't really know how the Citron differs from regular Absolut, but as I've heard that Vodka is famous for being oderless and tasteless I'm assuming that the Citron can be no less "respectable" than the regular stuff in the way that drinking Bacardi Breezer isn't really the same as drinking rum. Any comments?

On my way back from the shower I heard very brief snippets of three phone conversations behind the doors I passed. Each voice was female.
Girl #1: "...and I was like..."
Girl #2: "...like, no, that's..."
Girl #3: "...like..."
We need to, like, break our country of this habit.

5

Things seem to be running it sets of five right now:

Last night Sameer and I went to see this year's Shakespeare In Central Park, Much Ado About Nothing, which is a play in five acts. The Public Theater puts on such a show each summer. Tickets are free of charge, but the line is unbelievable. Sameer waited for over 4 hours (perhaps about five?) to get our Row V seats. The theater is fairly small (about 2,000 we estimated), so that was just fine, but there must have been many people who waited without getting in. The show was terrific. It was the funniest play I've seen since the Guithrie's 2001 touring production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.

After the play we returned to Broadway, and I slept for five hours, then went to work in the studio for five hours. I came home to shower and eat lunch. After that I'll go back because I have five drawings to complete for tomorrow.

M. Night Shyamalan Presents

Sameer and I just got back from The Village. We both liked it, although I had some problems apparent holes in the plot that Shyamalan has managed to avoid in his previous and equally complex works. I think Roger Ebert was way off the mark on this one, but my hometown newspaper was a bit too generous.

Day of Endless Stupidity

THE MORNING STUPIDITY (the really stupid one)
I got a call from the Columbia mail center.
James: Good morning.
Male Voice: Hello. May I speak to James Heposki?
James: That's me!
Male Voice: We've got a package for you here at the mail center. We can't put it in your box because the name and box number don't match. It's addressed to box 7149.
James: So it has someone else's name on it?
Male Voice: It's got your name on it. Wrong number.
James: No, that's my number. 7149. I have the key to that box.
Male Voice: Well, the box is registered to someone else, so you'll need to come pick up the package.
James: Sure. I'll be right over.
So I went right on over, only to find an empty mail center.
James: Hello?
A woman, in fact the same woman who gave me the key to my box, emerges from the back room. The man who called remains hidden.
James: Hi. I just got a call to pick up a package.
Male Voice: James?
James: Yes.
Male Voice: Last name?
James: Hepokoski.
Woman: ID.
She scan my ID and places the package on the counter. I sign for it and pick up the package.
James: So, will I have more trouble with my box, or is it cleared up now?
Woman: How did you get that number?
James: You gave me that number from the list when you gave me my key, which opens that box.
Woman: Well, its registered to someone else.
James: I just got it in this second summer session. Could the registration be left over from the first session?
Woman: I don't know.
Male Voice: Are you a summer intern?
James: No, I'm a student.
Woman: You'll need to email these people.
She hands me a sheet of paper with instructions on it.
Woman: Do you have the key to you're box for the school year?
James: Well, I'm just a summer student.
Male Voice: That's what I just asked you!
The woman took back the piece of paper.
James: I'm sorry; I thought you said 'intern.'
Male Voice: Yeah.
Looking back, I'm not really sure if my problem got resolved or not.

THE LUNCHTIME STUPIDITY (the funny one)
I went to lunch at Pinnacle with Sameer. I forgot my water bottle, so I bought a drink. I got a FUZE Healthy Infusion, specifically "focus," which is "orange mango fortified with...essential vitamins & zinc." The side panel lists zinc and 7 vitamins it has, along with a sentence or two about the supposed effects of each. I learned that zinc is "known as a 'mind-sharpening' herb that enhances capillary circulation and increases the supply of oxygen to the brain." Really makes me want to start a little garden back home and grow some zinc and perhaps other elemental metals.

THE LATE-AFTERNOON STUPIDITY (the least stupid one)
Monica, our critic came to talk about our work. I tried talking to show her my drawings and talk about the issues I'm having with seating in my site. She wanted to see my model. I pulled it out of my bag, and told her that I wasn't really using it. She wanted to know why, and I told her that it was frustrating, because it was made of a material with which I don't like working, and that it was based on the dimensions she gave us, so all three axes are on completely different scales. She told me that I couldn't just do all the work in my head. I needed to get ideas out. I told her that I have dozens of drawings, and tried to show her, but I guess she didn't see the merit in drawings. We talked for twenty minutes, in which I was told that I shouldn't worry about the real site, but only my models, and that the material for which I'm supposedly designing (1 foot strips of wood) didn't matter. Any linear material is the same. I tried to explain that there was a big difference between a structure made of foam and a structure made of steel, but made no headway. We definitely have very different ideas of architecture. I was really staving to see the big picture as I worked, and Monica is much more process-oriented.

I'm going to start in a new direction tonight. I'll make some weird and utterly useless sculpture and think up a bunch of BS to explain why it is genius. I'll play the game, just like the rest of the class. I'm not happy about it, but after today's conversation, I see that I have no choice.

Ain't It Funny How Time Slips Away?

Checking the local weather this morning, I saw that the 10-day forcast extends to the end of my summer session. This is going by so fast.

Postcards

Our studio had a big critique today. Each of us presented in front of the class, our TA, our regular critic, and between one and three guest critics. Some students were lucky enough to get Danielle Smoller, who runs this summer program. She gave some truly excellent critiscism. I only presented to one guest, whose thinking was so similar to that of my regular critic that it wasn't overly helpful.

Anyway, we got the night off. It's raining, so I've been inside, writing postcards to various family members, and a small selection of friends who seem to value the postcards I've sent in the past. Some are Columbia cards; others I picked up on Saturday at the Met.

I realize that I've neglected to mention that trip, so I'll just say that Mike Borkowski was in town, so Sameer and I took him down to go to the Museum of Natural History, but that was full. Honestly. It was full. So we went to the Met, and had a grand ol' time. My favorite part were the Chinese prints. There was a piece called The Palace of Nine Perfections that I thought was absolutely amazing. On the way back, we stopped for dinner at this kooky little place called Quintessence. We knew going in that it was a vegetarian place, but we were surprised to learn that they served only raw food. I had some interesting nut meatballs (balls made from the meat of nuts), two types of salads, and a drink that was a green mixture of kale, pear, and (if I remember correctly) passionfruit juices. Perhaps it wasn't worth the price, but it was memorable.

On a final note tonight, I'll mention that thunder sounds really weird here; I think it echoes off of thousands of buildings or something, but that's merely a conjecture. I can tell you what it sounds like: It sounds like what I imagine a five-ton garbage dumpster dropped off the Chrysler Building sounds like when it hits the ground. How do you like them apples?

Bathroom Humor

Of the thirty or forty people on my hall, I know the names of five. These five are my RA, a girl from my studio and her roommate, and two people who live a couple doors down who seem to run on schedules similar to my own. Ben, the only guy in the bunch, and I seem to run on similar morning schedules. He's very often shaving just as I'm getting out of the shower, so we chat for a bit. We were discussing future careers this morning (he's interested in neuroscience), and I told him that I could very easily see myself enjoying my work in architecture. He had a good joke that told me I wasn't alone in my enthusiasm:

A doctor, a lawyer, and an architect were discussing the merits of having a wife or a mistress. The doctor favored having a wife because of the prestige that accompanies a strong marriage and a healthy, growing family. The lawyer knew that everyone already thought he was no good, so he figured that by enjoying the mystery and intrigue of a mistress, he would suffer no loss in image. The architect thought for a moment, and then announced that he would rather have both. The obvious advantage is that he could tell is wife he was with his mistress, tell is mistress he was with his wife, and then go work in his studio.

Then again, my money says that this joke is more often told with an engineer filling in for the architect.

Tired, Poor, etc.

I'm going to see the Statue Of Liberty National Monument on 7 August. The statue, which has been closed since 11 September 2001, is opening on 3 August, which coincides nicely with my visit here to New York City. I should be done with all my work by that time, and be able to spend a leisurly morning with my sight-seeing companion, Rachel.

Site Analysis

My work in the studio has been focusing on a site at the west end of Canal Street, which about three-quarters of the way down the island. I created a comic book-like collage of the site and the surrounding areas to fulfill the first objective of my assignment, and I've worked with Eric Rogers to get a scaled down (but still quite large) version onto the web for your viewing pleasure. You can access it here.

Many Meetings

Yesterday afternoon, I walked out of Avery Hall with an architecture student from a different studio. We both felt the other looked familiar, although he was more certain that I was. After talking for a moment, we discovered that we were both UW-Madison students. Discussing the campus and life in the Madtown, we found that not only did we go to the same school, but we had lived in the same dorm. Needless to say, we were both quite surprised.

Today, I had a more intentional run-in with a different Langdonite. Rachel, who is in the city to work for ABC, also works at a Starbucks on the Upper East Side. I headed over there and ate my breakfast while she concocted various overpriced drinks for the wealth residents of that area. I greatly enjoyed seeing her again, if only for a short while. The most interesting part of the visit, however, was my random encounter with someone from Great Barrington. She wasn't a Simon's Rock alumna, but had gone to the boarding school in town (in the days before the school catered to troubled students).

To be efficient, I made a stop at the near-by FedEx Kinko's before breakfast. It was pretty empty in there, but the one other customer kept the employee's hands full. Some middle-aged woman was trying to do some tricky double-sided, collated, stapled packets, and was unsurprisingly having difficulties. She yelled a lot, and demanded her few cents back every time she failed to get it right, which was every two or three minutes. The guy trying to help her was very patient, and when he came over to input a password at my Sony PictureStation, I learned that he was recently from Guam, and had to deal with rich, snotty women like her on a daily basis. When I went up to pay for my photos, the woman was screaming that one side was blank, and it wasn't stapling. I cheered up the staff a bit by complaining that my photos were also blank on one side and unstapled. The woman, thankfully, was too absorbed in her own problems to hear.

Garbage in New York

I've been riding the subway with some frequency, and I've been reading Jane Austen's Persuasion to pass the time. Some people show some level of interest or recognition in my book, but most don't have any idea what it is or don't even look, which is fine. I'm in the minority with a real book; most of the readers have a daily publication with them. When I arrived here, I expected to see a flood of The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, but I was mistaken. What's the most frequently seen publication on the 1 train? I regret to say it's the New York Post. Our populace prefers complete rubbish to actual news. It's rather disappointing, if not surprising.

Jugo de Coco

I'm getting home just past eleven. It was a long day of class, followed by a quick trip to the store for ramen and coconut juice. Since I'm tired and not feeling creative, I will entertain you with the list of ingrediants in this 80% fruit juice concoction.
young coconut juice
water
sugar
young coconut pulp
citric acid (E330)
potassium metabisulphite (E224)
It's a product of Thailand, manufactured by Thai Agri Foods Public Company Limited. Strangly, the only other language besides English on the can is Spanish. I don't get it. Maybe it'll make more sense in the morning.

Shanghaied

I had my first day of classes yesterday, and it was a rather full day! To make a long story short, I found myself in Chinatown by dinner time, researching a 40-foot segment of Canal Street. Since I was in the area with another classmate and more experienced New Yorker (named Alex), we dropped into a local restaurant for dinner. Joe's Shanghai at 9 Pell Street is one of four locations, and I suspect the original. It was good Chinese cuisine, but their "soup dumplings" were really their signature dish. Instead of serving dumplings in soup, they served the soup in the dumplings. Their menu purports that they have an official website at www.joeshangai.com, but I found nothing there. In searching, I came across a brief review in The New York Times.