Ceci n'est pas une Blog

Got Plans? Got Plans!

No, not the Death Cab for Cutie album. Although it is quite good.

It's Saturday night and I'm in Hamilton, backed by the earnest reasoning that I'd be able to get some good work done. Catch up on some of my exciting reading before midterms that are prowling in a dark corner somewhere two weeks ahead of me. My parents were kind enough to come and pick up both Rockwell and me and deal with us in our exhausted, partially hung-over state. Now that I'm caught up on sleep and in some fresh clothes though, I'm doing a lot of thinking and getting pretty excited about some of the plans Rockwell and I have been formulating over the past few days.

As I said in the last post, during the summer we had some aspirations to make some media projects, like a short film or possibly a podcast. That didn't even come close to happening. Probably due to the annual lack of motivation that comes all wrapped up in the package of those lazy hazy crazy days of summer. The weather's getting cooler though, and it's snapped us to our senses. Although no project is officially in the works yet, we're playing around with several ideas and trying to decide what we want to focus on. What is currently under construction is a website and blog for our production company, tentatively called BeatRock Productions. (For obvious reasons. Peter wants to throw in an extra T to honour my name and make it more interesting, but we're still at odds over this. One of many troubles to come, no doubt.) The web stuff will all be posted here once we get it up and running.

This seems like an opportune time for another announcement. Rockwell and I don't know how long-term this series of projects is going to be, but its most immediate practical purpose is to serve as a portfolio that will be put to good use in looking for work and with school applications. Yes, school applications. The fact is we have similar long-term plans that both involve leaving Guelph for greener pastures after this year. Peter's planning on applying to either Concordia (in Montreal) or OCAD, where he was already accepted after graduating high school. As for myself, I currently have my heart set on transferring to York University for my second year.

So the painfully obvious question is: why? Here's a question I expect I'll hear a lot: what's the matter with Guelph? And here's the answer I'll always give: nothing is wrong with Guelph. My plans are what they are because of what is right about York. I actually have Katelin's uncle to thank for putting the seed in my head when he told me York is an ideal school for pursuing a career in Media. A month ago I had no idea whether I wanted to pursue social sciences or media as my "big thing". That's why I chose the courses I did, the key one being Languages of the Media. My prof for that class, Mark Lipton, has made an impressive career for himself out of his sheer love of popular culture.

The important thing is: I'm taking 5 courses this semester, 3 of which fall under the category of Social Sciences and 2 of which would probably be classified as...Entertainment. It's become pretty clear to me already which area interests me more. Part of it isn't even thinking as far ahead as a career, but just the notion of taking enough psychology courses to major in it is a little scary.

Anyhow, I've done enough aimless writing for tonight. I should get back to my Media reading. (James Monaco - How to Read a Film...a book I love. And hate.)

Aside: I'm really liking the sounds of The New Pornographers right now. I only had a few tracks for a while but tonight I downloaded about 20 more of their songs. I've also started listening to some Death Cab again. I went through a stage last fall/winter where they were about all I'd listen to so I got a bit sick of them, but they really do have a nice sound. I mentioned 'em at the start of this entry because they've been keeping me company throughout the writing of it. They're also playing in Toronto in a month. Maybe I'll go if I can find somebody who wants to tag along.

posted by Dave @ 6:12 PM