Apple Store Followup . . .

We stuck it out the whole night. I feel proud of myself. It was still dang cold, but it was worth it. The sun rose to a lengthy line, which at its peak, I'd wager, contained 700-800 people. Perhaps more. No doubt the store was able to deplete 1000 unit supply of custom Apple "The Gateway" t-shirts. The Gateway Store team emerged from the secretive depths of the store every so often to stir up the crowd. The sidelines were dotted with reporters and journalists and the atmosphere was tense, excited and anxious. The journalists seemed uncharacteristically more interested in the 4 sleep-over fans older than 35, than the other two under the age of 21. But, no matter. I just found it strange. Rumors of an appearance by The Man Steve Jobs himself floated among the crowd, but no such visit by ANY prominent Apple executives graced our lovely out-door mall. Apparently Utah is still not important enough to recieve any kind of commercial attention. Finally at 9:59:50 am a cheerful Apple manager sprang from the front door and initiated the 10 second countdown. It was thrilling. To have been the 5th entrant is truly an honor. The employees were lined up from the front of the store to the rear and cheered loudly and gave high-fives to all of us drooling Apple fanatics. They allowed only 50-70 customers in the store at a time, so I greedily enjoyed an hour of bright-eyed wonder as I raced from kiosk to row to desk examining all I could, kindly excusing myself as I mowed over dozens of other desperate shoppers. I knew I had to buy something. Despite my determination to be frugal and rational, such an opportunity simply cannot be surpassed. For ages I've complained of an aching neck after hunching hour after hour over my 15" Powerbook typing papers, designing websites, or conjuring up the occasional blog entry. So I bought a Griffin iCurve (laptop stand), and an Apple Keyboard from which I'm typing to you now. It never ceases to amaze me how something as simple and ordinary as a keyboard can be renovated into something so luscious and aesthetically delightful. I grabbed my free t-shirt, containted neatly within yet another beautifully designed package, on the way out the door, and bid farewell to my new second-favorite destination in Salt Lake City.
Again, let me direct you to my new friend Kelly's blog who put together a nice summary and a descriptive photo album. Though I don't appear in any of the photos, you can see my blue denim blanket with red ties off to the left side of the frame in many shots. So, in conclusion, it was worth the freezing wait 110%; the reward was unimaginable.

Sleepover Grand Opening Line Party!!!

As a manifestation of my sincere devotion to Apple Computer and the Mac platform, I find myself writing this blog from a cement pad in the middle of The Gateway Mall in Salt Lake City. That is, I'm waiting in line with 4 fellow Mac fans, and a tag-along for the Grand Opening of the new Apple Store. I had originally planned only to come early in the morning, which come to think of it, would not have been early enough. So there I was, watching an incredibly artistic and visually stimulating movie, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" (highly recommended), at the very same mall, and found a line already forming at 1:30am, so we made an admittedly impulsive decision to join them rather than travel the hour's journey home only to make it again in the morning. I foraged through my vehicle and recovered a large picnic blanket, a couple of jackets and a pillow, and we've set up camp in a tremendously cold environment, not in the least friendly to those who wish to sleep. The lights are still blazing, the trains rumble by every hour or so, and . . . oh yeah . . . I'm FREEZING!!! But it's all for a good cause. I'm going to meet Steve Jobs, and win an iPod Nano. Won't that be cool?! I'll keep you posted. Thank goodness the Apple Store has a wireless network (who'da guessed?) and I've been able to write my messages, otherwise my fingers would be black and immobile at this point. Good times. I wish they'd just let us in. After all, the 6 of us are obviously the MOST devoted Apple fans in Utah!
Be sure to check out the blog of the guy sitting next to me The Educational Mac.

Have an Incredible Birthday!

Saturday marks the 1 year anniversary of the theatrical release of what I deem the most oustanding film on the planet, a masterpiece of Pixar computer animation, Academy Award-Winning "The Incredibles." I'll be wearing my Incredibles T-shirt all week, as I did the week previous to the DVD release. I threw a huge Incredibles party on March 15, 2005, the DVD release day, and only wish my friends were still around to have a repeat party (curse you, college). Anyway, join in the celebration . . . have an Incredibles party of your own! If you don't have it, buy it! If you DO have it . . . pat yourself on the back and rejoice! Then watch it again, and find something you didn't see before . . . watch closely. Happy Birthday Incredibles!

Invalid Squelching

    College started on Monday. The first week has been a fiasco. Though I entered the week with an optimistic and somewhat eager outlook, I've left it overwhelmed and frustrated. This elevated stress status was prodded ever upward by one particularly frustrating introductory encounter with the art department. The class : 3-D Design. We'd been instructed to bring foam core board, a bag of garbage and glue by a seemingly competent and enthusiastic instructor. Hopes were admittedly high. But my spirits sunk when direction came to "glue the garbage to the board in an artistic fashion." "A somewhat elementary project," I chided. 

    The included slideshow only amplified my frustration with the lecture. I'm an art enthusiast and normally defend those less-appreciated abstract pieces so openly criticized by ignoramuses. This however, was ridiculous. Scattered fragments of china, crumpled pieces of paper, and a dozen or so two-by-fours nailed arbitrarily together comprised the foundation of the presentation. The lecturer commenced to evaluate and analyze the works as one would a Michelangelo, Rembrandt or Dürer. "This guy was not concerned with negative space and focal points when he was making this," I thought, "He was thinking : If I nail these 5 boards together, I'll bet I can get some idiot to buy it for 3 million dollars." This is the kind of work my professor is expecting. This is the kind of work I can't appreciate, let alone create. 

    As I made my best attempt at the "garbage piece," (both literally and figuratively) I decided to take an alternative approach to the project, and alter the form of the foam board itself. The professor was making his observational rounds and promptly told me I was doing it wrong. If there's one thing I despise more than anything in the world, it's someone dictating the way I can and cannot create art. Years ago, while attending an art camp for talented elementary school kids, a teacher insisted that I darken the skin of an old fisherman figurine I modeled out of peach-colored Sculpey. I refused. The character was meant to be old, wrinkly, feeble . . . and pale. We fought it out. I'm not one for arguing with teachers . . . but I won.

    The point is, art is the artist's prerogative, and should not be dictated by anyone else's reckonings (With the exception of environmental pertinency. Pornographic paintings would be inappropriate, if not downright ruinous, if hung in an elementary school, for instance). I realize that statement is in conflict with the entirety of paragraph two. But it's a humanistic right and privilege to form opinions on completed works. I did not advise the designer to make it differently, do it over, or change it per my perspective. Those guilty are the shameless squelchers of creativity. Including any art teacher who oversteps his bounds and designates expressive thinking as wrong.

Official Illustrative Idea Groundbreaking

The philosophy behind this blog is to allow public creative expression of ideas and design, whether my own, those of a few trusted affiliates, and others' notable ideas as I see fit. As an artistic tribute to ideas in general, posts may hereby be expressed visually, through literature, or through other means, as the future would have it. I'm simply going to base post frequency upon the availability of expressable thought. Welcome to Illustrative Idea.