PLEASE NOTE: the following bit contains information about the iphone, including (but not limited to) my opinion about the iphone, thus rendering it of little consequence to basically anyone on Earth.

So I had an iphone, for about 24 hours. The virtual keyboard was a total dealbreaker. Maybe my fingers are too fat, maybe they have been spoiled by the tactile feedback afforded to me by my blackberry… regardless, the iphones’ input method was a dog. I mean yeah, you go to the apple store, you play around with one, and perhaps you think (as I did), “wow, that iphone is quite a sexy litte number”. But the thing did not stand up to actual standard use.

Then also, the whole lack of text-selection and copy-paste, and the interface quirkiness (it’s all very well thought out, as anyone will tell you, but that is exactly the problem: it is well thought out, but that hardly guarantees intuitiveness to anyone who is less than 100% cerebral in the manner in which they use their fingers) and the rather strained ichat metaphor for txting… and, and, and. It’s cute, but it fails. Plus, what is with the email options? It will check for new messages either a) never; b) once every 15 minutes, or c) once every half-hour??? What the fuck am I, twelve years old???? My ugly-ass blackberry (to which I have reverted) gets my email as soon as you fling it at me.

Plus, you know, six hundred dollars is class money.

Yeah so yeah. I didn’t drink no Kool-aid. Just so you know. You wouldn’t think that, necessarily, given that you can’t swing a dead cat in my personal living space without knocking over at least 8 or so apple products, but anyway no. Not this time.

Anyway. It’s been a pretty good summer, despite the fact that I spent most of it completely freaking out and acting generally antisocial. For a while there, I didn’t really want to do anything except draw letters and write code. I was fortunate enough to live near Christian (and indeed I still am, for a few more weeks), cuz he would drag me out and make me drink beers, even when I was maximally clammed up. He would then altruistically permit me to effusively babble on about whatever it was that I was thinking about at the time (usually type design) while graciously and generously not smacking me in the face. Really, I couldn’t ask for much more.

So yeah yeah. A few more projects to wrap up, and then it will be fall. I suppose this was my last “summer break”, but really I had such a blast doing actual work, such that the very idea of a “summer break” is complete moot. I am ready for the REAL WORLD, again; bring it on I say. I do have to get through this nastay thesis thing, and then ok yeah. Yeah! I’ll see you back here next year… you can buy me a beer at Enid’s, and I’ll draw a typeface for you. Yes.

Been rather crazy lately, with the finishing of work and the preparing to leave New York for Providence, blech. Read a lot of books lately: that new ill-designed Houellebecq, that depressing but intriguing Murakami bit about the Tokyo gas attack, some old Salinger and Bukowski and other such shit. Mostly pleasantly untheoretical, in anticipation of school again I guess. I started the Superstudio Middelburg Lectures book but I got annoyed with the footnote typography and threw it across the room, and then drank whiskey.

The shit I did for Merce Cunningham ended up being pretty good, I think, which is a rare thing for me to say, cuz usually my own work does not thrill me, especially this sort of work, which was mostly code. I sort of hate writing code with all of my heart, really, but it pays the bills so I do it, which of course makes me feel like a dirty whore. C’est la guerre, no? Yeah.

The trouble, really, is that my social circle is composed mainly of people who do not write code. This is sort of by design, really, cuz nothing is retardeder than a bunch of geeks sitting around talking about code. It gets very old very quickly. Shit was particularly bad in Troy, where we were all geeks of one stripe or another, and I recall that at one party at Kevin’s, we made the rule that there would be no computer talk after midnight, and it was a good rule, indeed.

So but still I have the urge to shoot off my mouth about code, now and again. So what I am going to do is put a bunch of code talk in the “extended entry” portion of this “blog article”, yes, and if you are so inclined you can click the little link and read all about that nonsense, so it’s not all up in your face. How’s that? I think that’s good. Yes.

Anyway. In non-code news, I am going to the beach tomorrow with my friends for labor day. This particular beach is in Amagansett, which is a good place to go because you can avoid sounding like an utter douche and saying “oh yes I’m going to the Hamptons”, because you’re not, technically speaking. Anyway it’s not like that anyway, we stay at a total 70’s-vintage beach house owned by Anna’s parents, not some twatterrific mansion. So yeah. Fuck yeah!

-fish