jeffrey + upstairsloft

It’s that awkward time again to face the music–the melancholic, yet enjoyful tune of leaving a home. Well, I never considered Sacramento as “home,” given my family is nearly two hours away, but that’s not the point.

Kate and I moved to Sacramento on the first day of January in 2004. We spent our time exploring Sacramento, familiarizing ourselves with the streets, the landmarks and the eateries. We took classes for the sake of taking classes to remain insured as full time students, but truthfully, we were just awaiting our admission into Sac State, which required a huge amount of patience with the whole Governor Gray Davis shit happening.

We got our acceptance letters, spent a year as lower division graphic designers, got accepted into upper division and the rest is a blur only traceable through recalling benchmarks. Much like Jun doesn’t remember street names but remembers landmarks, my design education, those “aha!” moments and those areas where I felt myself grow are landmarks to me to identify the past two years. Fall 2005 might as well be called GPHD125, or the year we had our asses handed to us by Gwen and Kelly.

Kate and I have lived in Sacramento for 3.5 years; that’s almost the same as high school. Ahhh… the mysteries to solve from this point on. In those four years of high school we made so many self discoveries. In in the 3 years we spent in junior college, we were in that transitional stage to prepare ourselves for what we would become when we moved to San Luis Obispo or Sacramento. Only in high school and in state college did everything feel absolute and planned. The junior college days were hazy with weighing in all our options, figuring out our adult selves and figuring out true friendship (that sounded so Harry Potter).

Now that we’re graduated, now that today is our last day living in Sacramento, we are finding ourselves amidst that hazy period where we can only secure vague plans. So much of our life right now depends on being hired by the right studio, making decisions with our better judgment, while making a shitload of mistakes.

In the next 5 years, I will be married, have a sick ass design job, and live in San Francisco… or West Oakland… or New York. Not much of anything is absolute at this point other than the fact that I will be living at home until I find a full-time design job. Nothing is absolute except that today is mine and Kate’s last day living in Sac.

Before I settle myself back to seclusion of anxiously continuing the last of the Harry Potter series, I just had to get a piece of my chest. Much of this summer has been devoted to making plans with cousins, family, and friends. As much as I appreciate the people who travel the extra mile (in Paul’s case, the extra 300 miles for flying up from LA twice) to join us, it’s really quite shitty how flaky those around me have become. I’m firm in saying that Kate and I have made great efforts to fit people into our lives but sadly, it’s rare for us to say things work the other way around.

I’m beginning to just give in to not contributing to planning anything at all that’s not business-related. No matter how hard we press on about this matter, it just never really soaks in with people about how shitty these circumstances are. A fifth of the people in my life sputter convincing words that they’ll join us but that lost its meaning. “Yes I’ll go” can only be assured the moment those people are in the car ready to take off to one of the many planning summer events. Regardless of any excuses, the end result is that the original roster drastically changed and we have to re-think the whole plan, arrange rides, switch times and all that. Geez. Imagine all the punks who dare promise to attend the big day.

Back to secluding myself from all possible spoilers.

I finally caught up.

>>> Newly Posted Lomos (err… excuse me, XAs)

I know there are a ton of iPhone reviews out there for techno nerds alike to consume. Most of the reviews I read were from those claiming to be power-suit, power-tie, power-steering fellows (would they even have the time to write a review among their claimed 400-500 e-mails a day?) Anyhow, here’s some perspective from a dude who, like so many, is struggling between the analog and digital, receives a fair amount of valid e-mails per day and needs order in his or her life.

Throughout my six years in college, my pops has handed me down nifty little Palm devices. I gave them a try (I’m quite proficient with these technological things) and I just didn’t like them nor did they help me retain that order many of us seek. Syncing, PCs, Palm’s interface were all rubbish. It was more more efficient for me to keep at the analog with handwriting due dates, appointments and all that sort.

Well, I still handwrite my appointments since we’re constantly in edit mode and no date is ever written in concrete, but much like my meeting notes to its refined counterpart, I find myself memorizing dates better when writing them down in a book all scribbled out and typing them out (even at my busiest times, transcribing my notes into digital form was always worth the extra time) . Then syncing my iCal to the iPhone is a breeze. Thank you Apple for being firm believers in functional and beautiful design. The interface is friendly, simple and functional. I don’t have to strain to deconstruct the hierarchy of information. It’s all quite plain and clear, beautifully set in Helvetica.

There’s a handful of things Apple needs to address and I am sure they will, seeing that they’re quite responsive to user feedback. Browsing the web is an awesome luxury and it’s seemless (Flash support is on its way). For me, the most important thing is for me to be able to send and receive e-mails, and use the phone. Secondly, Kate and I like traveling and discovering new places and the biggest reason for to have pocketable internet is to look up directions, view maps and Yelp.

All in all, I am extremely pleased to embrace the iPhone. Depsite it’s marketing hype, it really is a helpful little gadget that. I invested about two hours of my life aligning its uses to suit my needs and so far so good. E-mail, internet, iPod, texting. I’m as connected as ever, which kind of sucks, but thank you Airplane Mode for isolation-at-a-click.

Somethings I hope to happen:
8. A headphone adapter that flushes into the iPhones recessed headphone jack
7. Enable Push E-mail for POP e-mail users
6. iChat would be nifty
5. Allow Main Menu customization. I don’t care for Youtube & Stocks
4. Add Address Book to the Main Menu so it’s not 3 clicks into the Phone feature
3. Copy & paste, multiple deletes
2. Custom ringtones (supposedly this is being addressed)
1. Jetpack capabilities

Advice: Never give up the paper and pen.

I guess the last time I scanned and posted any lomographs was after my trip to New York last year. I got caught behind needing to scan 7 sets with Fall 2006 being my busiest and most insane semester–including deaths, design internship, helping with teaching and my design classes. I remember promising to castrate myself in January if I never got to scanning. Well, I broke that promise and I am still attached. But yes. I am scanning. I am down to my last set. It only took nearly a year.

So why I only had 7 sets since last year? I promised myself not to take any analog photos until I catch up on scanning before I get myself in a bloody mess I put myself into in the past of having to scan over a dozen sets. It’s hard for me to muster up any patience to sit down and proceed with my boring little workflow of scanning photos.

Anyhow, these 7 sets I am scanning also mark the beginning of my Lomo LC-A hiatus. New York was the last time I put the trendy little Lomo LC-A to use and resorted to an even more remarkable, compact and photographic piece of equipment. I’ve been using my Olympus XA (after giving my XA2 to Kate).

I miss film and I am putting my analog cameras back to use. I have much more free time than I’ve had in the past year and freelancing, spending time with the fiancé, family, exploring places and traveling sum up my summer vacation. I can’t quite look for a job until after my 3 week vacation to the Philippines.

It’s weird being engaged. Today, I’ve received a handful of calls, congratulating me. Not only that, Kate and I are a bit shy towards each other, like we’re new. And in a way we are new. We know each other so much but this is a new stage in our relationship; it’s a huge stage. “Jeff, can you pick me up from my house?” is read in a completely new context. Her mom can’t stop smiling at us and it’s a mixed bag of accepting adulthood and knowing I am still and forever a child.

I still laugh at anything that has to do with poo. If I’m eating and you make a poo reference, I will join you and we will knock down the list of classifications of different poop. I spent a whole day hanging out with my 10 year old nephew and cousin daring each other to do stupid things around the mall while our parents shop. My 18 year-old cousin and 16-year old brother are much more well-behaved than I am. I even dared my 10-year old nephew sprint around the mall shirtless. He’s a porky kid. And I was having a shit load of fun laughing my ass off with 10 year old kids. Yeah. I’m getting married. Scary. Ha.

Then, there’s Kate. A girl, with every right wins all the goofy awards in the world. This chick cracks me up. She also balances me when I get too out of hand. And she gets along well with my family. I was wondering where she was at my house and I found her laughing her ass off to my a short movie my 10 year old nephew and cousin made. I’m extra sensitive to my blessings now that I am engaged. This is all regular, normal Jeffrey living but I am taking notice of all the beautiful subtlities in my life that have to deal with family, friend and my fiancé. Being able to notice those things makes me an adult; but the world would be upside down if my heart wasn’t always that of a child.

World, as of June 30, 10:50PM, Kate Reyes is my fiancé. I’m glad to have had all the support I had to pop the big question. Many of the biggest people in our lives were their to witness the proposal. This Tuesday will be our six year anniversary. I’m still shook up. I have a fiancé. Hi, this is Kate, my girl… oh I mean my fiancé. Crazy.