Happy Emma's birthday month to one and all! It has been a broadly nice one for me. Moments where it was so nice I actually thought 'this is a bit much' and moments of kinda shit stuff to balance it out. Perfect!!
However after last month's fun data vis diaries, everything I did this month felt kinda shit in comparison. Or at least, the outcome felt poor, but the process was enjoyable as ever, so I guess that's what matters. I tried to lean into drawing things without reference images as much as possible, because the whole reason I originally started doing the visual diaries thing was to try and improve my ability to draw anything I could imagine... But since going digital back in 2023, I do have a tendency to 'cheat'. (While also sort of believing there's no such thing as cheating as long as I do some kind of drawing every day)...
There's this weird hallway/room/interstitial space at LCC that's sort of hidden on the top floor and no one really goes there, and there's nothing in it, and I feel like spaces like this definitely won't exist in the new building (which we move to in 2027). It's kind of grimy but the sunlight just floods in and there's a beautiful view out across London. If it was a studio flat you could rent it out for a couple of grand a month. Anyway I've started taking a photo of it from the same position every time I walk through, at different times of day and different weather conditions, and when we're about to move out of the building I'm gonna print them all off and pin them up in the space anonymously as a weird little exhibition.
My partner was right, they never will look this sexy and cool again, because their strategy of gettign fit by wearing a hiking rucksack with a 10kg weight in it fucked up their back (but they were very excited about it here)
Saw my cousin Tom for the first time since he was an actual child. He was visiting London with a friend who's gonna study a masters at LCC, so I gave them a little tour and then took them for lunch at Borough Market. It was fun! (As someone who has not historically gone very much in on engaging with my wider family or having much to do with them, it's nice to actually like, proactively like someone I'm related to)
Went to the 'algo-rave' live coding clubnight (it was great, had been meaning to go for ages, so it was good to finally get around to it)... Then the next night went to the Private View of the Digital Folklore and Web Craft exhibition at the Photographers Gallery which V was part of. It was very small but very good, though I did not stay for long as private views are hectic! (I liked the vaguely shared aesthetic of the two events)
Whenever the door-phone goes at Samaritans I LEAP into action, ready to help... However sometimes it is just a toilet roll delivery (still, very important) (The visual reference)
It was Ellis's birthday party in the evening, and during the day folks had been playing Mother of Frankenstein. Part of that game involves having to assemble an elaborate jigsaw to solve a puzzle, and I've gotta say, as someone who is often slightly awkward and stressed at house parties, this was an extremely nice activity to participate in while gently mingling.
I really like whatever this tree is, with its cute baubles
A classic of its genre: hand-drawn visual diary done while in class teaching a session about visual diaries. (Didn't exactly fill the page, but ho hum).
Does your dog's belly smell a little bit like cheesy doritos? Or are we the only ones so blessed.
Every single year I am somehow taken by surprise by how green everything gets suddenly in March
My train stopped for ages in the weird mess of lines between Croydon and Norwood Junction but it was fine because I had a nice view of another train stopped on a bridge just overhead. Cool angles. I like trains.
Beth and Angus came over and we played some games!
As discussed — I am not very good at house parties. But I went to TWO this month! (This one felt like a cheat though, as I went in the afternoon, helped clean the house, kissed the host, then left unceremoniously early)
Oh, I did also eat a load of falafels at the house party, which was clearly a mistake (I should put together a compilation zine of all the visual diaries I've made about eating falafels then regretting it)
Went for a cute dinner with my partner at Mallow! We love fancy food! (We cannot afford to do this often)
TFW the fire alarm goes off 30 minutes before the session is due to end
Our current cohort of MA design for data vis students are going to do an exhibition at Chatham House soon (hopefully), which means I had to go there and seem like a competent adult who knows what she's talking about and is capable of wrangling them into shape. Then I went back to uni and tried to teach some other students how to use InDesign. Then dipped in at the end of our last years students' graduation ceremony (Keir put his fancy hat on me which I think means I have a PhD now). Then I went to the pub with my colleagues and for once in my life was not awkward and filled with self-loathing (which is what usually happens when I go to either house parties or the pub — I really am on a roll this month?!) (I really like my colleagues, which helps!)
Went to see Danny Brown at Koko. I'd never been to Koko before and it is such a nice venue. I say this as someone who is mostly now too old to want to stand all night and definitely too old to want to stand in a mosh-pit, but also still really wants to be able to see. You can just climb up and up and up the stairs and there are more and more levels, and at the very top level there's not many people, comfortable chairs, and you can still see the stage really well?! I was complaining here about not being able to see though, because I feel like there's been a trend in recent years towards backlighting performers... Which looks really badass for like... one song... but then at a certain point you're kind of like... Can I please actually see the person I paid to see!? (And Danny Brown has been working out, damn, why would you hide that from me). As you can see from this person's compilation of footage, for most of the actual songs, he's kind of just a shadow? Anyway there's my grumbling over — it was a great show, he's great, and Koko was lovely, so on balance I had fun (and I enjoyed trying to depict the backlighting issue in these drawings)
Breakfast rituals
Me and Mum went to see the Chiharu Shiota and Yin Xiuzhen exhibition at the Hayward Gallery. It was good, recommend.
Me and Beth went litter picking! Extremely wholesome Sunday activity! (This is an artful depiction of when you use your picker to pull a fragile old decaying empty plastic bag out from under the soil)
A day SO NICE that I found myself thinking 'Do I really deserve this much loveliness?!'
(Waking up at V's and having leisurely breakfast and slow working / taking a meeting with a nice colleague who basically showered me in praise and told me all the illustration students loved me / meeting with my other colleague who I work with on MA Design for Data Vis and having a fun session planning the next term / eating a delicious dinner my partner made)
Such a nice day that the next day I was uncharacteristically sleepy (like, took myself out for a nice walk and got halfway and felt like I needed a lie down)
Bad/sad stuff happens too though. After 9 (!) years doing design for the wonderful Happy Valley Pride, we have amicably parted ways because they have new trustees and have decided that they should work with a more local designer. Sad for both of us I think (as I said to them at the time — sad for me both practically, as they're one of my most consistent clients and I like 2 make moneyyyyyyy but also sad more creatively because we have always had a lot of fun together, and made some cool weird stuff over the years!) I will be very sorry to lose this one, but hopefully we will still collaborate on bits and bobs.
Then: BIRTHDAY!!! Another utterly lovely day — coincidentally it was the LCC staff development day (aka LCC staff fun activities day). I hovered over the 'book' button when they released the free tickets for the activities and managed to get ALL the good stuff — a massage, flower arranging workshop, kintsugi workshop, and free lunch! Then after all that I went out for dinner with EIGHT of my friends (perpetually a little bit surprised when people actually show out in numbers to hang out, extremely wholesome, very good)
And then on Friday, me and my friend Alex went to the V&A late event, where V and lots of other cool people were demoing games, the algo-rave people were playing, and there was a bunch of other vaguely game/tech/art related on show. It was pretty good though very busy, and we didn't get to play nearly as many of the games as we would have liked to as the queues were too long.
However, as mentioned, this was definitely all just way too much fun, way too nice, so obviously it was time to get sick. (A cold, not COVID, and not the worst — I am fine, just annoyed)
Kelly-Jessie got bitten on the nose by a rat! I laughed. (It was not serious and didn't leave a mark, but she put her nose into a hedge very enthusiastically then rapidly recoiled, a rat ran off, and she spent the next few minutes rubbing her nose and looking annoyed about it)
Taught for a day on one of UAL's spring school programmes in which 16/17 year old kids from around London come and get a taster of uni life. They're always SO good and SO cool and often do better work than first or second year undergrads. I ran a new session I'd just written about data gathering and visualization and illustration and I think it went well?!
I am still sick though. Didn't have to go to work today so I stayed in bed for ages. My partner has been sleeping on the sofa because I am gross (to be totally clear, this is not a major hardship, our sofa is actually quite comfy and we both kind of like sleeping on it occasionally as it feels a bit like a cute camping trip but without all the suffering of actual camping). Anyway I also like having the bed all to myself and committing bed sins like leaving tissues everywhere and eating food and working.
(I would like to add that I did eventually get up, mow the lawn, hoover, make a big dinner, take a serious meeting and walk the dog! I am powerful!)
My partner is probably doomed to get sick too anyway, but we're hoping they've maybe managed to avoid it... Because in a couple of days we are going on HOLIDAAAAAYYYY! (More on that in next blog).
Hope you're all enjoying lovely green springtime!
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