Plastic Chord played a pretty rockin’ show at the Uptown Bar tonight. I expect you to be at the next Minneapolis show on August 25th (at Club Underground aka the Spring Street Tavern aka best Bloody Mary in Mpls). It’s a Saturday so you have no reason to not attend.

Also, I’m all moved in to my new place but it’s sort of uneven. My desk is wobbling as I type. Anyone have a few extra napkins I can shove under one of the legs?

Also, also: volunteer for events at the Bell Museum. There are some pretty rockin’ sci-fi movies scheduled for this month and I’d rather watch you scoop popcorn for me than have to scoop popcorn myself. Though I’m so excited that I’d probably march back there with you and help you make popcorn. What can I say? I enjoy making popcorn and I enjoy the Bell Museum. Anyway, check out the website for the upcoming events that YOU! can help make awesome: bellmuseum.org.

Love,
Amy aka Pork-CHOP

… the bumps were well worth it, however. I’ve been having a fun summer so far. I have not done as much design or reorganizing as I had planned to do this summer… I guess that is what August is for, because July will be over in about 3 days. (The days are just packed!)

So! Photos and clarifications. I last left you with some graduation celebrations. Since then, the following:

(1) I officially “toured” with Plastic Chord to Mankato, MN where they played at the What’s Up Lounge.

(2) I took photos and helped at the third annual Bike-In at the Bell.

(3) Some of my photos from the Bike-In are being used on the Global Bike Days website, too! (Check the schedule page for my photos.)

(4) I took Karyn for a night on the town to celebrate her freedom from school. We ate at Taste of Thailand in downtown Minneapolis, then went to the Pantages Theatre for Feist and Grizzly Bear.

(5) Rebecca and I went for an afternoon/evening of fun around lake Mille Lacs (which is probably when I acquired my itchies).

(6) Kristi and I watched the Pride Parade again this year. Every year it seems to get a little bit longer. First sunburn of the summer!

During July I will be attending a family reunion in Iowa, taking photos for an exhibit development project at the Bell Museum, heading out to British Columbia and Washington for a week, taking photos for Areca and Karl’s wedding, and moving to a new apartment. Then it will be August.

With the exception of Sunday, it was a weekend for photos. I’ll summarize as I give you the tour! (Please note that I will be ending this post with information not at all related to my weekend. I have very many things to write about today. This will get pretty lengthy.)

On Friday, the University of MN was closed for Spring Break, so I decided to relive my youth. I took the light rail (for the first time) to the Mall of America. Only a 30 minute trip from downtown Minneapolis!

First on my agenda was “Animal Botanical” — an exhibit from the Mall’s recent campaign, “The Park in Bloom.” Pretty flowers and shrubs shaped into cute little bunnies and ducks? I’ll take it!

It was also the day the Easter Bunny arrived at the Mall, so I got sneaky with my camera. I had hoped there would be frightened, crying children, but it was pretty early in the Bunny’s shift when I arrived.

After that, I took a spin on three rides that I thought I could get away with sneaking photos on while I rode: the Skyscraper Ferris Wheel, the Treetop Tumbler, and the Screaming Yellow Eagle. I did not get any photos on the Eagle since I was only one of about six riders. Not hidden enough. Oh, well.

I rode the Ferris Wheel with a young high school girl who was visiting with friends for her Spring Break. She came from Cedar Rapids, IA. She thought I was a weirdo with my camera, I’m sure, but did extend a pity invite to ride on some other rides with her and her friends. (I politely turned her down.)

And a brief stroll through Midway (where I saw some young men performing impressive moves on DDR)…

Then I was off for my first trek into Underwater Adventures! Very expensive, but I justified the price by remembering that my rides were free (a coworker gave me some vouchers). Turtles, and sharks, and barracuda: Oh, my!

(If only I had snapped this photo five seconds quicker – the turtle and the girl were nose-to-glass-to-nose!)

(All of those little specks are recently born babies! Definitely the most heart-warming part of the whole Adventure.)

There was a temporary exhibit about glass replicas of specimens: “Glass Sea Treasures of Harvard”

To be quite honest, I took over 300 photos on Friday alone. What can I say? I’m really quite a fan of fish, turtles, and other creepy/slimy aquatic creatures. (I touched a mantis and a horseshoe crab, too.) I was pretty much in love with the whole place. I wish it didn’t cost so much. I could hang out and watch the creatures all day long.

On to Saturday! St. Patrick’s Day! Early on in the day I discovered the “color accent” setting on my camera, so a lot of my photos are black, white and green. I set out with a few others for the parade in St. Paul, the post-parade pub crawl, and a post-pub crawl evening at Minneapolis bars. It was a long day, but it was a lot of fun. Next St. Patrick’s Day, though? I think I’d be up for the parade, but then I’m gonna go home. Those pubs were a bit too crowded for my taste.

(Sven Sundgaard is seriously oompa-loompa orange. I did get closer to him than this, but he was mobbed by girls.)

(This is an authentic Irish piper—he played a version of “Amazing Grace” for us then got really cheesy. But he was nice, and funny, and we were all drunk and impressed.)

(Do I look like I’ve been celebrating for 15 hours?)

Sunday consisted of not wanting to move from the couch. After a quick, greasy brunch, I watched movies on TBS all day. If I could re-do the holiday, I would drink more water and be productive on Sunday.

Some other notes of interest:

Note 1: I finally also uploaded my photos from the Plastic Chord show at the Hexagon. Most of them are blurry and that’s fine, because that is how I felt all night anyway.

(I’ll be taking some wedding photos for this lovely couple in the summer! Joy!)

Note 2: Once I muster the motivation, I will most likely be paring down these albums to essential/awesome photos. I have a summer project in mind for adding URLs to the descriptions for each photo that I reference in these sort of posts so I don’t ever delete those and the entry that they’re summarized in is easier to find. Also I’d like to go through most of posts and add labels for each one. I am really a fan of tagging things.

Note 3: My Flash lessons are going well. Tomorrow I also start a three-day (9 hour) tutorial to learn Adobe Illustrator. I am going to be master of my digital domains (and I am constantly thinking about a new design for amy-berg.com, among other sites that I’m supposed to be working on). I can tell you right now, though, that summer won’t be long enough for all of the projects I want to get done.

Note 4: I’m already trying to decide which classes to take next semester. It’s just all so awesome and I don’t have enough hours in the day to get everything done ever!

Okay, for real, y’all. I’m done now.

A few things from my little life this weekend…

1. Plastic Chord show on Friday at the Hexagon? I drank way too much, which is yet another reason why I need to hire a chaperon. I’ll blame Kristi for providing a box of wine before the show and myself for buying shots during the show. I also took very many photos (to be posted later when I am less lazy), and I’ve really surprised myself with how terrible they mostly are. Watch out! Drunk girl with a camera! Also I was dancing a lot and fell over, too (I already have problems with balancing when I’m sober). Now my arm has a big, blue bruise. I don’t bruise very easily, either. That must’ve been some fall, but I didn’t think so at the time.
   But, anyway, I’m reminded as to why I stopped drinking so much. Moderation is a very good thing. Maybe this time I’ll remember for good as I’ve spent most of the weekend feeling sort of embarrassed, even though I think I was just a fun, energetic sort of drunk.
2. The carpet in my bedroom is still quite damp, which is irritating. My feng shui is suffering.
3. I’ve started watching a video tutorial for Flash—currently I have an 11 hours “essentials” disc set, and when I finish I will be borrowing a 10 hour “beyond the basics” disc set. Next week (after Spring Break), I have to commit myself to creating a new digital game for the remainder of the semester. I feel like my goals are overly ambitious, but hopefully that is also good motivation.
4. I’m finally selling my collection of Nine Inch Nails CDs/DVDs. I have literally spent half of my life collecting these things, but now I’d rather have the money. I’m a little angry with myself for selling my three “We’re In This Together” CDs for so cheap, but I just had no idea how rare they are. Oh, well. Their new owner (Kristie) will hopefully enjoy them much more than I have been. If you’re a NIN collector, you should email me for details about what I still have. I have almost everything until recently, when Trent Reznor decided to shave his head and start working out. It’s just not the NIN I fell in love with anymore.
5. Ellipses is still cute but I wish I could give him a friend because I am pretty boring and I think he is starting to realize that. I wish he would lay on my lap more often. The end.

Plastic Chord is at the Hexagon tonight! If you come we will drink beers and enjoy the music together.

Friday, March 9, 9:30 p.m. @ Hexagon Bar (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
Saturday, March 10, 9:00 p.m. @ Mad Planet (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)
Sunday, March 11, 8:00 p.m. @ Canopy Club (Urbana, Illinois)
Monday, March 12, 8:00 p.m. @ The Modern Exchange (Southgate, Michigan)
Tuesday, March 13, 8:00 p.m. @ Cafe Bourbon Street (Columbus, Ohio)
Wednesday, March 14, 9:00 p.m. @ The Nite Owl (Dayton, Ohio)
Thursday, March 15, 8:00 p.m. @ (Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin)
Friday, March 16, 8:00 p.m. @ The Klinic Bar (Madison, Wisconsin)

(Plastic Chord on MySpace)

In other news, I came home last night to a note from maintenance. There had been a leak in my bedroom window (also known as my fire escape) and they had come in to repair. I guess they’ll be back again today to vacuum for me. It’s a mess, though. Half of the floor in my bedroom is soaked (just one of the joys of a basement apartment). Ellipses keeps peeling the paint off the wall where to water has dampened it, too, which freaks me out. I should check to see if there is was a lead warning in my tenant info booklet.

I wonder if Ellipses bites the maintenance guy’s ankles while he’s trying to work, too.