TheVacancy.Net Travelogue

July 2007
Wedding is nearly planned. Had my first experience with the hospital's "Emergency" room. Everything turned out to be fine, but seriously, the "emergency room" is no place to go if you have an emergency.

August 2007
Classes began again and I was more comfortable and excited beginning this semester than I was the last.
Bridal shower was small and intimate--but not without drama and a little Hawaiian flair.

September 2007
Got married at Hemingbough in St.Francisville, La, then co-hosted the party of the century. Returned to school and work the next day.
Came to the remarkable truth that people are always not what they seem. Gloriously happy to discover this sooner rather than later, but felt exceptionally stupid to have been deceived for so long. Considered becoming a hermit.

October 2007
Obtained a scholarship to Southeastern Louisiana University.
Married life just seemed natural: a normal progression with the occasional shock to see a wedding ring on your finger.

November 2007
Learned to weld. Not good at it.
Spent Thanksgiving on Maui (Hawai'i); remained in Hawai'i from the 19th until the 27th. Missed5 days of classes.


December 2007
Passed this semester by the seat of my pants: with a 4.0 GPA.
Spent our first Married Christmas visiting his dad in Huntsville, Alabama. Experienced altitude sickness and the furious wind of the arctic circle. Otherwise fabulous place.
Bought my first motorcycle.

Predictions January 2008...
Britney will release another single and perfume, further embarrassing Louisiana; Katie Holmes will morph into an alien and write a book; and due to the lack of active voters, there's a corndog eating contest instead of an election to win the White House.

January 2007
Began as a full-time student at Southeastern Louisiana University.
Held engagement party mid-month and began to suspect my friends are not who I think they are.

February 2007
Learned that Art classes take A LOT of time.
Tried on Wedding dress for the first time. Freaked out and took it off.

March 2007
Began to loathe the 35-mile commute to Hammond.

April 2007
Took bridal portraits and hated the way I looked in every single one of them. Wedding dress more comfortable by now, but the shoes were a different story...

May 2007
Survived final exams and did not regret enrolling in Southeastern once: Not during the classes, not during the commute, and not during the times when I thought I was going to DIE of stress.
Being a bride and a maid of honor proved to me difficult. Whose wedding takes priority: mine, or my best friend's?

June 2007
Enrolled in a summer course and commuted with Maid of Honor/Best Friend. Awesome bonding time that I should have interpreted as foreshadowing...

I made arrangements to purchase the Suzuki SV650!

After hearing what a few very experienced riders have to say, it's not too bad of a bike to start on. It's got a V-twin engine (as opposed to an in-line), so its handling and riding are more like a touring bike rather than a screaming, snarling Hayabusa.

Don't get me wrong--it's still a sport bike and its throttle is still testy like a sport bike, but it's more forgiving than a true sport bike.

Next up...a tattoo and a nose ring...wooo...rebel I am. This, of course, is entirely sarcastic. Tattoos and nose rings are hardly rebellious anymore. If you got a nose ring and a few tattoos to be rebellious, I got news for ya: Syrupy-sweet Kelly Clarkson has a nose ring and tattoos...you wanna be rebellious? Try getting branded and dermal implants.

Don't worry boys and girls...my conversion to Emo is not part of the motorcycle deal. :)

Love,
Lace

I'll confess: I've been snooping around on the internet for a bike. I took the MSF course in mid-December, and now I'm shopping for a bike.

Yes, I've heard all the ego-absorbed jabber before: "Get a big bike, you'll get tired of a little one FAST," "Small engines are for girls," blah blah.

Newsflash! I AM a girl.

I've looked at a Suzuki SV650, and I've ridden a GSXR600, a Honda NightHawk and a Rebel. There's quite a difference in them, to say the very least. I have limited experience riding and do not plan to limit other life experiences by being bound to another pair of wheels: a wheelchair.

So I've been quietly looking around on Sport Rider Magazine's forum and there's a great page on bikes for beginners. So here's a shout out to Sport Biker Magazine: Thanks!

Sometimes I wonder what I'm getting myself into: Louisiana was rated the WORST state for motorcyclists as far as safety is concerned...but then again, on which list HASN'T Louisiana been dead last? Still, I am very cautious entering this new territory.

Next?

Yay! I am finally finished! I have a few bugs to work out in it (like the "lobby" link....click it and you'll see...)

But I am in Huntsville, Alabama until Monday evening, so it won't be until Christmas that I can fix that link. Oh well...

Hope everyone has a safe weekend. Watch out for those DWI checkpoints. Or....you could just not drink and drive. :)

Love,
Lace

Here's a little taste of what my new site looks like.

Two more pages and I'M DONE!!!

Complete:
Home, Art, Blog.

On Deck:
Bio, Links.

(insert excited squeal here)

I've been working steadily on my website. It's going to be completely different, and I've run into a few problems. I know the world is just DYING to know what I'm up to (haha), and it's basically been one issue after another. But I'm not discouraged!

I'm having a few problems with my new gallery. It's been a little bit of a battle trying to get the images to display how I want them to.

I've also got writer's block. You would think a person could talk about him- or herself forever, but I'm honestly running out of interesting things to say about myself. I'm just me. Nothing to brag about.

The news is not all bad.

First, the design of the site is remarkable. It is coming out better than I imaged. I love the look of it. It uses advanced graphics such as .png, so it will be best viewed in Firefox 2.0 or Internet Exploroer 7. I recommend Firefox-- it's got fewer bugs. Download Firefox here. It's FREE!

I have changed the orientation of the navigation panel: it will no longer be on top. I've moved it to the side, and it works much better for this site. It'll be spectacular!

Stay tuned!

I'm redesigning my site, and it's really going to look great. The last three "looks" have all been white text on a black background. Now, I'm going for something completely different: animation throughout the site, a more intuitive theme, and a better color scheme.

Previously, I've had a simple white-on-black site, a "Color Wheel" site, and a "Film" site. Now, It'll all be themed: from the links to the images to the graphics. Everything.

It'll take some time for me to completely redesign and rearrange the architecture, but it'll be worth it.

Color Wheel Site:


Film Site:


New Site:
?

As I reflect on an ending semester, I realize one of the classes I dreaded the most in August is the one in which I learned the most. I will miss this class over the holidays, believe it or not. Much of my graphic design and photography sense is intuitive, but sculpture and three-dimensional objects are not one of my strengths.
Jeff's a great instructor, and he pushes me. He pisses me off sometimes, and he can be a real hard-ass...but I really, really like that. I want to be better. I want to be pushed, but I also want to have a friendly relationship between myself and the pusher.
Jeff required each student to submit a "final portfolio CD." I developed a full presentation of my work. Some sculptures I feel just as passionate about as the day I created them, others I remember being more attractive. I do wish I had had more free time (i.e.: no job) to fine tune my sculpting skills.

Enjoy!
Final Sculpture Presentation (requires Flash viewer)

For my final sculpture this fall, I thought for a long time on how to weld something under a severe time constraint, but also something that could demonstrate an idea. It wouldn't have to be straight-forward, but perhaps something that makes you go, "Ah-ha!" after you've heard the name, seen and interacted with the piece, and put them together.

I thought a lot about how marriage is taken so lightly nowadays. I know of many couples who were only married for a few years (or months!) before they called it quits. Sometimes, someone within the couple had had an affair--be it emotional or sexual. I decided I wanted to imitate that struggle in my final sculpture, titled, "Lust Entanglement."



Two rings are connected by a chain--the lust. They can get physically close, but can never actually hang from the same bar since a thick weld--an obstacle--stops them from truly being "together." One ring can travel far away from the other, while the other ring is limited to a small area of the sculpture. An individual can make the choice to acknowledge his/her feelings and get far away from the situation, or that individual can allow the lust to pull him/her closer to the situation.

The key word here is choice.






I especially feel celebrities perpetuate the idea that marriage is something done when the relationship hits a plateau. Or when they hit the 3-month anniversary of their first date. Or just for status. Some of them find that marriage "isn't cool anymore," and bail when they find out being single is "cooler."

There are those who know themselves well enough to know their own weaknesses within a relationship, and I have to respect them for not falling victim to the desires of the id.