O is for Over the Hiccups

I met my friend Rob my sophomore year in college. He lived down at the end of my 4th floor hallway at Charlesgate, his room facing what was then called "The Pit"--an inner alleyway/parking lot/stable roof behind the main building. He had a succession of roommates--one who didn't get along with him, another who dropped out, and a third who was only temporary since he wanted his own room.

Rob was the guy who introduced me to Negativland with their Escape from Noise album, specifically with this song. We hit it off well as we were both obsessed with 80s college rock at the time...he was big on Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr, and we both shared a love for The Cure and Bauhaus. We were also both writers. He was majoring in writing while I was a film major, but we both often found common ground in talking about the stories and poetry we wrote.

One of my fondest memories is when he and Colin and I, after staying up way too late after going to see Oliver Stone's The Doors downtown, had decided to make good on our threat to videotape silly goings-on at Charlesgate. It started with me behind the camera and filming Rob in the hallway and heading into his room. Once Colin arrived, Rob threw on The Doors' classic track "The End"--itself used in a pivotal scene in the movie we'd just watched--and proceeded to make an extremely bizarre and silly video of the two of them lip-syncing it. Goofy goings-on included Rob attempting to really sing, Colin doing an interpretive dance, Rob eating a sandwich in time with the song, and other goofiness. It ended with Colin tripping over something on the floor and falling on a cup (which Rob had purposely dropped not three minutes before, which was caught on video) and cutting his hand open. Long story short, Rob and Colin headed to Mass General while I headed to bed (I had to wake up stupid-early the next day), and they videotaped even more weirdness in my absence. A few days later Rob and I tacked on one last thing to the production, with him doing a hilarious melodramatic interpretation of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, and the video was finished. We called it 413, which was Colin's room number.

I unfortunately no longer have a copy of the video (last I knew, our mutual friend Lissa had my copy, and Colin had the only other copy), but I always say that that was probably the best visual production I'd ever made, better than the film projects I had to make for classes.

[Writing] The Pictorial Joncwriter Review

emmalyon and I have been visiting various Boston landmarks the last few days during vacation, so I decided I'd take some pictures of things and places that have influenced my writing over the years, or were at least important to my writing. Enjoy!

( There are places I remember all my life, though some have changed... )

I wish I'd have taken more pictures (I would have liked to have gotten pictures of Charlesgate, my apartment in Allston, and a few others), but we didn't have the time. I may grab those pictures from the internet later on and post them in a follow-up, however.

We'll be heading out west to my parents' house tomorrow, so I will most likely be taking more reference pictures as the week progresses.