High of 74 today. Bright and sunny. 20 degrees warmer than Pittsburgh. Ate Veitnamese with Factory crew for lunch- had some funky beef soup thing. Adam gave me a crash course on how it's prepared and how to eat it. Fantastically good food. The coffee was some of the best I've ever had.

Split the day between Factory (lunch), bda/rjbs/Gloria (post-lunch), Roland (post-lunch coffee, walkentalk and hangout), and bda (pre-dinner, dinner, post-dinner walkentalk). The rock I made a promise to on the Birmingham is now at the bottom of the Delaware.

I've adapted to the Grid a bit. It's still confusing, but more in a scalar sense. Philly just goes, in all directions. Pittsburgh is balkanized- segregated into sections by hills and rivers. Modular, isolated, labeled and stereotyped. Philly flows in ways that Pittsburgh can not, and the Steel City feels like a claustrophobic wasteland by comparison.

Train leaves in fifteen hours.

The Factory/CDC guys kick ass. Bryan kicks ass. Pete kicks ass. Adam kicks ass. rjbs kicks ass. Hunter kicks ass. Roland kicks ass. So many great people, such a warm welcome. I've had a great time in Philly and I think I've worn out my boots.

Katamari Damacy is the most insane shit ever.

Pismo's hinges are well past end of life- this machine needs to be replaced with something a bit more up to date. Or at least in better condition. The fan is probably the loudest thing on the first floor of the House Of the Harble.

Had a long walkentalk with Bryan covering System and ATC from different angles. My hands really need work, and I need to get off of my ass and start chunking out pages. Be less of a techgeek and more of an artgeek. Etceteras. Bryan suggested taking a poke at Slave Labor for publication of ATC. Other Factory members mentioned similar, and Adam had some interesting approach suggestions- I have a feeling the hacker perception of the comics industry is the one I should be listening to here. If anything, it's more varied, more earnest, and less jaded. The response to the ATC hardcopy was a universal Get It Published.

O_o.

Fucking intense, that kind of reception.

Actually put my sketchbook to use, too. Looks like shit, but it's crap paper and I'm still sketching in ink. It's something to do. It's nice to be drawing when I'm bored, rather than torrenting or looking at porn or playing quake or going {quietly|loudly} insane. Haven't sugarshocked at all- I've come close several times, but I haven't dropped off of the deep end into the Land Of The Assholes, thankfully. Stuttery with a lot of synaptic incapability, which is pretty frustrating- but the inability to articulate is preferable to vicious hatestuff.

I really don't want to go back to Pittsburgh, dammit.

I don't want to- especially seeing as how I get to dive straight into work, no less. Not something I'm looking forward to. Can't let the {town|place} grind me down to nothing. It wants to. It's been trying since 1997 and it has been trying especially hard over the course of the last six months. Harder than ever. You'd think it was personal. In a way, it might be- the city is a fickle, vicious lover and it's caught me looking and liking. Looking and liking a city that isn't rotting. A city that's a hell of a lot closer to anywhere.

That's a good thing- I have a direction to work in. Goals.

On that list, along with ATC, portfolio bulking, etc: Finishing up the PWF logo and doing some vizwork for the CDC. They know more or less what they want- I just hope I can give it to them. :D

I'd be hard pressed to find four consecutive days that were this cool at any point in the past.

As for the future, well... there's s3kr1t pl4ns regarding the expenditure of vacation time, and I'll need to seriously bust my ass on ATC to make everything happen On Schedule. I'd like to be out of excuses the next time I visit.