Diana Grande's blog

Mystery of the Last Name Solved

My friend recorded this at South by Southwest this year as a thank you gift for me. I mentioned to him earlier I had no idea what the original pronunciation of my name was... so here it is, straight from the Norweigen's mouth:

Grande

I went out for a cup of cheap coffee

The 15 minute break came at the end of our six-hour long animation class today and I was desperately in need of a cup of coffee. Normally I would run to starbucks across the street, but today with only a dollar in my pocket I went to the little falafel place down the street for my fix. Whist adding creme to my coffee, a man in the corner eating a gyro was watching me intently. Finally he asks in a heavy unidentifiable accent, "Who is your hair stylist?"

me: "Uh, Great Clips?"
man: *laughs* "I'm a hair stylist from New York. I have a shop down the street and I'll style your hair for free."
me: "...huh?" (articulate as always)
man: "Your hair type is what I'm looking for. Would you like to see my portfolio? I used to style for Martha Stewart in New York."
me: "Oh...um, I have to get back to class."
man: "Ok, well come to my shop tomorrow. Here's my card. I will do a nice cut for you, it will be very nice. I can dye it too if you like. No charge."
me: "uhhh, ok."

So looks like I'm getting a free cut tomorrow after work. Yes, I realize it seems a tad creepy. But he did have pictures of himself with Martha Stewart. As long as he doesn't make me LOOK like Martha. Damn, should have waited instead of dropping 35 bucks to get it trimmed in January :\

Art Blog

I'm now on my 3rd week as a first-semester graduate student in Animation and Visual Effects at the Academy of Arts University in San Francisco.

Here are my classes for the Spring '09 semester:

610 Figurative Concepts (intensive study of human figure)
611 Visual Development (visually developing characters and story)
612 Principles and Pipelines (animating basics)

Not having any formal art background I'm in all the basic foundation classes. Which is fine with me. My instructors are amazing and I'm loving it so far despite the six-and-a-half hour class periods and resulting sore back and hand cramps :\.

In the first two weeks of class I've animated a hand-drawn ball bouncing (week 1) and a personified flour sack jumping on a stool and doing a flip off, created thumbnails for my own asian-based female Zorro, and drawn a whole shit load of arms and legs. Not much exciting yet...
My animations so far have been recorded on a "lunchbox" which means they're on VHS. Not sure yet how to go about transferring that online. Maybe could take a video camera...

I'll be posting some of my assignments in a separate blog from now on.

I like the idea of recording my progress through school, however given my shoddy blog record and work/class schedule I can't guarantee consistency.

Obama St

Bush St renamed Obama St

Awesome. Thanks kotog for the link. I was downtown all day today and didn't pass Bush St unfortunately...I wonder how long it actually stayed up. Apparently it was done by a well-known group of pranksters called "Laughing Squid."

I'm absolutely exhausted. Woke up 7am this morning to watch the inauguration then spent the whole day 10-7pm running errands downtown, getting my official ID and art locker included. There was a buzz of excitement all over downtown today. Everyone was wearing Obama tshirts and randomly cheering Obama's name on the bus. I wasn't among the masses watching at the Civic Center this morning (couldn't have fit on the bus if I tried anyway) but got to watch the celebrations on big screen TV at C's, with T, D and current roomie. This week is madness. Tomorrow I start work, orientation is on Thurs/Fri and then classes start Monday, which means today was technically my last day of "freedom." Sad. Although can't complain- the past two weeks we've been blessed with sunny perfect weather in the 70s, which I've been soaking up every bit of on daily jogs, afternoons at the beach, hiking, and roof sunning. Really, can't complain :)

Oh yeah..."work" tomorrow is my new job as the assistant to the Animation Department at my school :P During my interview my new supervisor let it slip that a great deal of the job is down time in which I can use the schools software and equipment to do my homework. Sweet. Not to mention all the other benefit of working within my own department...

Some other new exciting stuff of late too ;) ... but that's enough for today. Gunna shower and crash for an early start tomorrow.
GOBAMA.

Haircut

Went downtown and got it cut New Years Eve. Told her to cut off any part remaining from my razored Japanese cut from July.
Not sure about the bangs yet, but an improvement.

new haircut

An Update

I haven't been in much of a mood to update lately, as you may have noticed. I figured I at least owed it to those few who still bother to check up now and then to know what country I'm in and such other developments of consequence (check my flickr for more frequent life updates).

First of all, I left Japan. After much research and deliberation (and moaning and bitching to others about what to do with my life) I finally decided to bite the bullet and go back to school. This decision in itself took about a month.
The winner: Academy of Arts University in San Francisco.
The program: Master of Fine Arts in Animation and Visual Effects, with an intended focus in storyboarding.

Some other options I was considering:

• Hospitality Internships in Barcelona, Rome, London and Chile
• Working Front of House for Cirque du Soleil
• Cinematography Apprenticeship in LA
• Going back to Catering
• Japan-related/Intna'l Relations Work (about the only thing I'm qualified for now)

I won't get into the "why" of the decision-making progress 'cus it's boring and I have an interview to get to in half an hour. This does mean I will be plummeted even further into student debt and have devoted the next X number of years of my life in my 20s to school that I may not be able to afford. I'll take it in stride.

So I booked my ticket to San Francisco, hired a moving truck and headed west after visiting family in MN and Pittsburgh while simutaneously working on my portfolio and application to school. Moving was a bitch, and expensive, as moving across country usually is.

I bought my tix to SF anticipating living outta a hostel while I searched for apartments. Fortunately last minute I remembered an ol' high school friend who was living here. Thanks to her generousity and couch I only spent one night at a hostel the day I arrived. "The couch" was my residence from Nov 3rd-Nov 24th during which I spent every waking hour perusing craigslist sending out replys and making my downtown apartment rounds.
# of Apartments Viewed: 33
# of Ads Responded to: 100+
What a bitch.

In the end, I didn't even take one of those rooms posted on craigslist (although I came very very close a few times). Instead, a friend of my sister's who I met at the opera in Pittsburgh end of October contacted me saying he had a friend in SF looking for a new place. I contacted her and we met for coffee. She happened to have a friend, who said she had a friend, who was also looking to move to SF. I went and met potential roomie #2 at a lingerie shop in Haight Ashbury 2 days later whereupon we agreed to open up the search to 3-bedroom apartments. Me being the only one in a desperate-need-a-place-asap situation found an affordable 3 BR apartment in our mutual desired neighborhood (the Richmond). This place turned out close to perfect, which meant schmoozing with the landlord a bit, taking pics to send to RM#1 and #2 to get approval, filling out a credit check, calling the other places I was looking to move-in to and saying "Thanks but No Thanks" blah blah etc etc... anyway, within 4 days our names were on the lease.

SO, now I am living with a friend of a friend of my sister's, and a friend of a friend of a friend, of a friend of my sister's....ha.

Oh yeh, forgot to mention that my 2nd week living on "the couch" I got a call from AAU saying my portfolio had been accepted. Woohoo. And yes, I moved to SF not knowing whether or not I'd be accepted. Figured if I was rejected I'd work full time and apply later.

I now live in a fully furnished (thank you family, friends and craigslist) 2nd floor apartment in San Francisco, Richmond District, 30 min walk to a beautiful tourist-free beach, another 30 min walk to some of the best museums in SF in Golden Gate Park, and a huge-ass balcony deck with a view of the Golden Gate Bridge. Oh, and a dishwasher and on-site laundry. Awesome.

Now I just need a job to keep it. Did I mention I was a waitress during all that too? Not anymore. I quit. Worst. Job. Ever. Came home wanting to cry every night and not even enough money in my pocket to pay for groceries. The search continues...I've got 2 more weeks until classes start and a few job opps in queue. One being working for the SF 2009 Census Bereau. I have an Employment Exam I'm scheduled to take shortly, which I should  be leaving for right about now...

Cheers.

I am proud to be American again. Hisashiburi.

reverse-culture-shock-bitch-slap

lying in a bed, 6am, been up half the night. I've been back in the states now for over a day. Haven't accomplished anything except for purchasing a portable hard drive on amazon to back up my laptop which is threatening to crash any moment :(

I didn't wanna stay cooped up in the apartment yesterday, my first day back in America. Especially considering the unbelievably perfect weather, so headed to the MN State Fair with my mom which happens to be walking distance down the road from my mom's new place. Haven't been to the fair in aaaaages. Used to be an annual tradition but since fleeing west 6 years ago haven't been back once.

Turns out I forgot what white people look like. I mean hordes and hordes of them, for miles up and down the road with their tattooed red skin, hair dyed in greens and purples, large bellies protruding from tshirts parading their political candidate of choice, eating gigantic portions of oily things on sticks, making very loud obvious statements about their immediate surroundings... found myself gawking at passerbyers just like the little old Japanese ladies once did at me sitting at the train station in Fukumitsu.

I think I need to take this one step at a time...today I shall go to Target and purchase something with my credit card. Tonight I will watch the news in English. Any maybe tomorrow I'll be ready to call someone I know who doesn't know what 'inaka' means. Now I just need to get out of bed.

Fever in transit

I came to Taiwan with a fever of 100.7, according to quarantine. They caught me at Taipei airport with one of their fancy heat-sensing televisions. I was released after my friend explained that I've been sick, but they made sure to check up on me 2 days later to inquire about my condition. After a week of fever in Tokyo and 10 days of coughing (hacking my lungs out) I finally visited a doctor in Taipei. Turns out I have bronchaitis, which is a relief actually. Sucks to be sick on vacation but was imagining things much worse. And they have really tasty cough syrup medicine here.

Sitting at a internet cafe in Hualien now with a 20-something boy and girl on either side of me both playing DDR on their computers speakers full blast, both smoking cigarettes. Haven't had a chance to do much past three days here due to my condition but like what I've seen so far, or rather eaten. It's like a tropical, delicious Tokyo. Except there's nothing Japanese about the place other than the whole clean, modern part.

my computer screen has just informed me that I'm out of time.

zai jian.

amongst the chaos

I finished JET.

aaaaand I got a haircut!

ta-da

Before

After

Actually this was 2 weeks ago. I asked for a trim and instead got a Japanese razored hair cut :\ It's nice for summer but hard to put in ponytail.

Life has been completely chaotic. Hence no update.
Right now I'm busy packing up 2 years of my life in Japan, cleaning, saying goodbyes, getting ready for Kim's visit, trip to Kyushuu, Taiwan and when I have a moment to breath, consider my plan of action upon my return to the States August 30th. Wish me luck.