Day II! Chunda Day '09!

Day II

Chunda Day '09!

It was a lovely morning! Tyler and I left his father's house to go to band practice with Ben as The Dreadnaughts! They played some beautiful Irish folk music for a good amount of time, while I played with Ben's dog Dudley. :) Oh, and I was blogging. Heeee. :D

After such merriment, we went to get some Dr. Thunder for this evening's festivities. I dropped a can. First party foul of the evening... Oh! What festivities you say? Well Chunda Day of course! What's Chunda Day you ask?! Well! Let me tell you ALL about it!
Chunda Day is the one day of the year (6/30) that all kids around the world, straightxedge or not, can get together and chug ridiculous amounts of Dr. Thunder soda. The logic behind this event is simple, since pot heads get 4/20, why can't sxe kids have 6/30? So, there you go.
Chunda Day.

Afterward, Tyler and I parted ways with Ben and headed off to band practice with Atlas the Atom Smasher in Agawam! The speaker cable caught on fire...excitement!

After a stellar practice, we then headed back to Tyler's Dad's house for Chunda! Festivities began! And well, thank goodness I'm here to embarrass everyone who partook in this event, because what's a straight edge drinking party without humiliating cell phone videos of your friends chugging soda from a funnel through a second story window?!

Sorry Tyler, at least for your friend's sake, you can't tell who it is.
But know that you're a champ for claiming this territory. :)
(Man, my voice is LOUD in this. I usually try to stay quiet when taping, but this time it was just too good.)
Either way, the night was wonderful. Tyler and I went to bed, didn't sleep much because of the amount of Chunda in our bodies (Tyler: Six(?) 355mL, four (?) 240mL cans | Chelsea: four 355mL, five 240mL cans)
Another very good day. :)
-CM!

Day I! Adventure with the Bisson Family!

I decided to keep a post-diary on the week ahead of me. All of these posts were originally sent from my cell phone with short description's of the events of my day. I decided to bring all of the parts together and elaborate a teeny bit for everyone else's sake. So here we go!

Day I

A Week in Berlin, Oh Where Did We Go?

So, my last final days in Connecticut before going back to Allston (and saying there) are being spent in Berlin (Bur-lin', not Bur-lynn apparently!) with Mr. Tyler Bisson (you can find him and Broken Records on my watched list, if I haven't brought this up already) and his family for a week. I woke up around 6:00am to finish baking, icing, and plating Tyler and Tim's (his twin!) birthday cakes.

Their birthday is on the 2nd of July, and since I'll be staying with them during it, I figured I could at least whip out the ol' baking skills and make them some cake! :) Afterward I went downstairs to hang out with my little sister Elayne (who had made the mistake of drinking a Volt Energy Slurpee before attempting at going to bed...needless to say, she hadn't gone to bed yet. 7:30am) and we both ended up passing out. She's towards the top of the picture in between the pink and the green pillow. My mother was creepy enough to take photographic evidence of it. I'm pleased! Tyler came and woke me up at 9am. We drove back to his house in Berlin, did some fun activities until Tyler had to go to class.

While he had economics, I decided to explore MCC a bit. I must say, Manchester Community College is a beautiful school.

It was huge, well kept, spacious, and had art work EVERYWHERE. They had a decent gallery, which was currently being switched, and even a pretty decent welding shop. If it were closer to me, and I needed to go somewhere, it'd be my first pick. Hands down. At 9:00pm, I realized I forgot to eat all day, got dinner! Went to bed at around 12:00am! Didn't sleep much! It was a good day. :)

-CM!

this weekend was the begining to a beautiful everything! The Photo Diary

And by weekend, I mean Friday-Monday.

OH BOY.
So! We'll go through this day-to-day in a picture-diary style, yes? Yes.
(All Next Level Shit Fest! Photos from Ali Lipman)

Friday:
That afternoon I went to see my original high school class graduate. It was incredibly odd to see all these people I've grown up with my entirety in education graduate after I've already left for college.
I saw tons and tons of parents I've known since I was in kindergarten, and teachers who came to see their old students from Jr. high school graduate. Including my Pre-Algebra teacher, Mr. Rollins, who, if there were a Santa Claus, it would be him. I swear it. He moved to fucking Nova Sco-shititstoocold-afor retirement. He's wonderful.
I went with my extremely dear friend Lucas' family. Which was also super wonderful. It was amazing to see him again. :)

After graduation, I went to my best friend from high school, Omeed's, graduation party. Which was stellar beyond the skies. I hung out with him, his family, and his girlfriend Emma for hours, and her and I were the very last to leave. It was super fun.















They had me put on his cap and gown, which, is extremely funny considering I did that last year with my friend Liz's at her school at their graduation.














Saturday:
7:00AM- Tyler comes from Berlin to pick me up for our lovely adventure of the day; Next Level Shit Fest! in Brattleboro, Vermont. :) We drove off to the other side of the state, and then waited for Ms. Ali and Shaun to show up at Tyler's house. Ali and Tyler (That Really Awesome Guy with a Guitar, aka, TRAGWAG) recorded a few songs while Shaun and I laughed hysterically at their hilarious ways with one another. We both decided if they just recorded their recording sessions, and sold it with their CD, sales would rocket. :) it was hilarious for all the ages.
After this we went off to the farmer's market while Tyler played with his friends some Irish music, which was lovely :) Shaun bought some fresh bread for $3, and I bought a pint of strawberries for $5. :)

We then left for Brattleboro, Vermont! Took a super stellar two hour drive, and found our way there. We showed up to the church, while a gentlemen on a bike with a cart and a planet Earth flag sped by yelling to meet him at the town green.
I gave my strawberries away to a nice man in a parking lot, and we made our way to the town green. There we were welcomed by our friend Pat the Bunny (Wingnut Dishwasher's Union) and was given an orientation guide. It looked like this!:


We made peanut butter sandwiches and layed in the grass, played zombie tag, and enjoyed other wonderful things.
The fest was less of a festival and more like my school's last day of classes, the SMFA Blowout! Which involved tons of games, activities, painting, music, dancing and all over merriment.

The Blowout! had a parade for New Orleans, (NOLA) from a bunch of free food for everyone to the school, and then Next Level Shit Fest! had a parade to a place where a ton of free, healthy, delicious food was being served to everyone from the park!

We saw Sunflower Spectacle, Douglas Bourget, Rebecca, Rob, Nicky Burger and Sugar Ray played in the park, followed by an open "mic" with a performance from the one and only TRAGWAG (Broken Records) and then closed the evening with AWESOME performances from Compression Fraction, Pre-School (ex-Michael Jordan Touchdown Pass) Heathers, Ghost Mice, Endless Mike ad the Beagle Club, and Wingnut Dishwashers Union People's Liberation Orchestra!
I forgot how amazing Heathers was. I haven't been able to stop listening to their album since Tyler and I got it. You'll see.

So we packed our things and headed home. Failed attempts at sleeping in the back of a car with a very tall boy and a very awkwardly sitting, leaning, laying, me were forever hilarious.
I am the most awkward person on the planet, let me tell you!
Ali's little red car had it's birthday at 200,000 miles! She had me take a picture, so here we go:

Happy Birthday Little Red Car!!

We got to a place to sleep, slept, and had a wonderful day!

It was something like 2am probably.

Sunday!
Sometime in the morning!: Ali had already left, and then I was off with Tyler, his brother, and father for a Father's day breakfast. I had called my lovely dad and Peepop (grandfather) and sent them my love and blessings.

Then ran away to Tyler's got ready for his show and had an overall great time, we listened to Heathers' album all day.(I told you) The show was super stellar; Atlas the Atom Smasher (Tyler and my dear friend Aaron Hibbert's band with other wonderful people) Paranoia Dance Party (who apparently knew people I lived with and other related friends) Slow Fuse Burning and Alton Bay. The Best of the Worst (played at the GreenLight Festival last August) was scheduled to play, but their drummer was in the hospital. I hope he's doing better, my prayers are with him. He's a super amazing person, it was awesome to work with him last year.

The show was so good. Fresh honeydew melon was enjoyed with ice cream and the company of lovely folk.
The night ended, and we all went to sleep.

I had a really lovely sleep :)

Monday!
9am: Woke up, but didn't want to get out of bed. Ever. I could have stayed forever.
12pm: "woke up" to a tuba. It was awesome. :D I enjoy Tyler's brothers super so much.
Actually got out of bed that time.

Listened to Heathers all day, hung around with Tyler and then got driven home.
Got my lease signed by my awesome new room mate, Kristen and went home.
It was a good day :)
12:AM


And today, well, I've written this post, called Mr. Malcolm Tent, went meowmeowmeow with the cat box, and I'll leave you on one last note:

I'm listening to Heathers.

Enlighten me pleeeeeease.
(Oh! Perfect timing to real life!)


-CM!

I'm all bruised up! (Ladies and Gentlemen, featuring David Palmer)

Which means the show last evening was a giant success!
I also had a really stellar time in Berlin for Tyler + Chelsea Super Fun Game Day part I! with, who but of course, Tyler Bisson! :D
Thanks to everyone again who made it possible, and TFT, I'll see you in New Jersey.
:)

So, hey, lets talk about

DAVID PALMER.
(Hell yes, he is amazing.)

So, there are some things I should give you before talking about him in depth;
My first experience with David Palmer's work was in my "But is it Drawing?" class with Dawn Southworth.

She run and owns Clark Gallery in Lincoln, MA with her husband Dana Salvo. (clarkgallery.com) So, considering she has this lovely source of artists, she decided to share it with the class. Only myself and my friend Alexa (who is incredibly talented) showed up. The show at the time was on lines, and Palmer's piece, man, did they fucking stand out. Seeing them from across the room, I was absolutely captivated. I couldn't stop looking at them, they're HUGE. And not only huge in the sense of size, which they are (64x64 inches,) but also by power and intensity. I fell in love with them so quickly, I even dared to ask the most heartbreaking of all questions,

"How much?"

End of the story is, my little pizza wallet didn't just happen to have $10,000 in it that day, so, this would have to wait a while...actually a long while. If I wanted to just come up with that much money that quickly, I'd need to give two months of my life up to some scientists in a room with no windows for a sleep study (if you complete it, that gives you about $5,000, per study) But I'm not getting into that right now. I was to talk about Palmer. I want to talk about him, and his beautiful electric blue beauties.

The process behind this is nifty also;
Palmer dangles himself over his giant pieces with a large 27 inch paint brush and one can of blindingly perfect white and another of this bright, vibrant, blue (which also happens to be my favorite blue.) In one, long, stroke, he drifts his body and his brush along the canvas; twisting and twirling over his piece. That's one of the things that grabs me, he's not only just making one mark and then moving along to the rest of his day; he throws his body into it. He dances as the movement you see on that canvas. And if it doesn't feel like a right movement on canvas to him, he'll let it dry, sand it down, and repaint that perfect white over it again until you could never tell in the first place there was anything ever there. He has done this over, and over, and over again on the same piece of canvas. One after another until he sees that it feels right.

Now, that's what I feel is so amazing.
I can't begin to grasp how much emotion and energy is put into just one trial of these. There is no good enough way to describe how beautiful and massive these pieces are in person.

I can't recommend anything more than if you have a chance to see one of these, please, take it. Even the white background is enough to make a person feel like they've fallen into a peaceful, but strong, infinity. There is no flaw, or mistake, in any of these paintings. When you first see them, you think they must be some sort of photograph, or an extreme macro-closeup-super-view of some sort of something, anything. But as you follow the brush strokes, (which are extremely captivating to follow) you can't find yourself cutting your journey short. Almost like waving your closed palms in a pool in front of your body; you feel the push and pull of the water and pressure you have created.

These are one of the few paintings I will have in my possession before I die.

Oh, and fun fact: it only takes 10 seconds maximum to make one..if it takes any longer, he starts over.

Over and out,
-CM!

I haven't been doing any art-related posts lately.

(Sorry again.)
I've been trying to catch up with life and get everything together.
I'm almost done with this stupid apartment thing, and now I just need a room mate from now- Dec 31st.

ADVERTISMENT TIME!!!
A lovely apartment with living room!
Only $430/month! Heat/hotwater included!
I'll fucking pay cable!
justlivewithmeohfuckingpleasehelpmehere.

Alright. So, now that that's taken care of. I've been really busy. Too busy to really put any backbone into talking about art and all that jazz, so I apollogize. I'm in Connecticut for a month for many assorted events. One of which is my original class' high school graduation (makes you feel old, don'it?) This is especially odd for me because I never had a graduation, well, in a classic sense. I never walked, got my name called, worn a pretty dress, none of it. I graduated early, promtly packed my shit, and left for SMFA. I'm holding myself back from showing up with my gown and just being all "wh-what do you mean I'm not on the list?! omgomgomgwhatdoIdo? omg omg please please let me walk, I'm so confused!" Hah. Funny. No.

Either way, I'll be there.
Watching people I've known for my entire K-12 education walk.
Get their names called.
And smile.

And with that, I will smile.
Because that actually makes me very happy even though I didn't get to live it out on my own.

So, I'm in Connecticut in a month. My friend who has been away at school for two years is coming home in this time too. I'm extremely excited about that. I've missed her, a lot. Soon before she left, her and I parted ways. I've been keeping in touch with her father to find out how she has been, and she sounds wonderful. He told me she wanted to see me the day after she got home, and when he said that, I felt wonderful too. I'm just really excited to have her home again, and as the friend I knew before. :)
(January 28th, 2006) Being stupid and scene or not, I still love you, and the friendship we had, and we're going to continue.

Another event that's occuring is one of the last The Flaming Tsunamis shows ever. That's a bummer but also really excting. I'll get more into them another day. Y'know what? Okay, the last show ever, I'll make a TFT post. Describing who they are, what they have done for the CT Ska/Punk scene and all that jazz.

Good. :)


Well, I'm off to another wonderful day of eating honeydew melon and sitting outside, maybe. My friend Tyler has been telling me it's gross out, let us hope he's wrong. :(

-CM!

I was hiding under your porch because I love you.

Yes. I love Up. I love Up so much.
So so so so so so much.
-CM!