sparkle sparkle

on christmas night, we shot off a big bunch of fireworks, and after about 2007 tries, i finally captured a few good ones on my hot new camera. HOT, eh?! twinkle twinkle

snowshine

happy holidays !!
yeah. i just love this old chair, so i took pictures of it. yes, of course it's orange.














and also, neat shots of inside my dad's shop of his welder and some tractors. grrr.

here are a few pictures from the farm. YAY snow!


AND i made a snow angel. RAH.

back, back, back . . . back, in the U.S.S.A.

i'm baaa-aack.
i'm in minnesota (and i have apparently forgotten how to spell it, because i couldn't decide if there was two 'n's or not - WTF?! ridiculous. I'm fine now, i know it. don't worry.)

there is tons of SNOW here. wow! white christmas it is, yay!
it is also COLD here. gee, surprise surprise. And i thought Paris was bad. HA. I guess this is really it, i'm not a Californian anymore!

so if you feel like calling me on a phone, i'll be at my parents' house from Saturday til Saturday the 28th. I'm not going to post the number on this wwwebsite, so just email me and i'll give you their number.

right now i'm in "the cities" staying with Pasternak. She's at work, and i'm eating all her cookies at her house. yes!

la la la, le corbusier

i took a little excursion out of Paris, to see what is probably the most famous house in architectural history: the Villa Savoye built circa 1929 in Poissy, France by iconic architect Pierre Jeanneret - known as Le Corbusier. My classmates Pierandrea, Brandon, Rajat, Ahbishek, and Brian were with me on the little journey which took about 40 minutes from the center.
















it was amazing to see, surprising even to myself (as i personally am a much bigger fan of his Chappelle Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp - which was too far and too expensive on such short notice, though of course we tried to arrange - i must visit soon)!

really, amazing. here is a slideshow so you can pretend you were there too. perhaps i can get some better pictures - i messed up my color balance somehow, oops.

i just don't get it

France, i mean. What is up?! Just look at this picture of me sitting on a terrace overlooking the skyline with roses. Huh?

I hate to be a downer, but i'm still "London". You have to pick, there is no wishy-washing. Choose. Paris or London. Let me know your results, i'm curious why! . . . I prefer friendliness.

Though aside from the psycho-crazy-killer hotel conceirge at our second hostel (he was so mean and frightening we left the hotel - though we should have known from its cheap rates and one-star rating) the trip was pretty good. I enjoyed hanging out with my classmates and also seeing some new urban/architectural spaces as well as revisting some i've seen before. There were many things i did not see however, but it just takes time to transport and get around with so many people.

There was about 18 people from my class that went and stayed one night in the Grand Boulevard district near the Opera (and near lots of shopping) - and then i stayed on 2 more nights in the La Marias district (which is much more hip in my opinion) with the girls, Yvegenia, Anastasia, and Hang. We did a lot of walking the first two days with the class and it was COLD. holycrap. brrrr. We visited The Pompidou Center (Renzo Piano), La Defense area with a scary christmas village set up in the middle of the corporate financial world, and Parc de La Villete (Bernard Tschumi). Oh yes of course we also walked along the Seine, past the Louvre, the Opera, the Bastille, Notre Dame, etc. Bleh.

As for french food, we had savory crepes for lunch one day and sweet chocolate crepes on the street at 2am when returning from the bar one night. I did also want to have an eclair, but was frightened away by their prices: 2for20euros! whoa, just for a pastry?! Wine with dinner of course, but i found just the table wine to be a bit overpriced just because its "french". Also, the girls and I had a great dinner one night of Mussels with Roquefort and Belgian beer.

And of course, the Eurostar, ahhh, the EuroSTAR. what a beautiful lovely ride. So peaceful, so fast. I almost wish it took longer! Way to go traintravel :)

I will post a little slideshow of Paris images soon, just have to create it and get some images from other people (my camera battery is crap and kept dying).

the race continues

taking skypege to a whole new level are bootyAmy + beverlyErin, with a 3 hour conference call with me, holycrap. (though most of that was spent elfing ourselves) now, if anyone can figure out how to have video during conference calling, you will surely be the new skypampion - we seem to only be able to have it when speaking one-to-one, boo.

but of course, Funk, i did not forget you, the one and only person (well besides my mom and my sister) to call me - and weeks ago too. You are in another league! Yes, AND for using a calling card all on your own, 2000 points! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, FUNK!

and allisneak, i know who you are . . . .

it's over.

i'm done for Term 1! It seems i'm still tired, as yesterday i slept 11.5 hours straight (woke up at 2:30pm completely confused)! ahhh, sleep. glorious.


final review was . . . ok. Not great, but not bad - i'll take it! I still have work to do (make a documentation book of studio work + write a big term paper i haven't started) that is due the 1st day of class in January, but hopefully i can get some of that done before i go home for the holiday.

so i'm going to Paris

on Wednesday, Dec 12th (at 7:30am, WTF) i depart for Paris Franceypants. "For School". Yep, we are taking our first studio trip, although only half of my class is going. But that will be a good thing. A 20-person mob of architecture-happy tourists taking photos of random alleyways and wierd buildings is better than a 40-person group, right?! Should be good, atleast the wine and cheese will be . . . not sure how much i love Paris. Maybe it will change my mind! I'm returning to London on Saturday afternoon, Dec. 15th.

also what is cool about this trip, is we will be taking the Eurostar's new highspeed train from the new St.Pancras station (semi-close to my house now - previously out of Waterloo) and the trip totals only 2hours and 20minutes. Fast. Speedy. Through the chunnel. There is supposed to be some bigdeal champagne bar at the new station too. Boo-yah.

ciao chaofaces

okay everyone, so after this weekend i'll have actual TIME to speak to people (well, when i'm not drinking heavily of course), i.e. sign up for skype if you want to for FREE

Big Al gets the prize for 1st place - she did this weeks ago and we had a long chat!
Nanchao gets the prize for 2nd, but with Honors - she signed up and we had a real phone call with VIDEO! i saw her. she saw me. we both looked like crap, etc. :)

i miss my commenters (even the anonymon) or else send me emails! hell, if Prachi can send them from Nam . . . (cheers P). ok.

countdown 3 2 1

this is it.
my final review is on wednesday. yes, this wednesday, the 5th. F!

the official last day of TERM 1 is this friday the 7th. The school is having a big xmas party which is supposed to be a blast. YAY.
i can't wait to have some drinks!

yeah, so wednesday, yikes.