Insidecy

A New Start

cyserrano — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 06:12:00 +0000

I recently have been inspired to blog again… so hopefully this will happen. I’m starting my senior year at the University of Southern California in less than a week. There are a lot of new things happening in my life, so now is probably the best time to be back on the interwebs disclosing my life story to friends and perfect stalkers strangers on the WWW.

Stay tuned for some new stuff.

Cy-borg out.

I Miss Home.

cyserrano — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 12:25:02 +0000

It’s been months since I’ve been back to the Antelope Valley; seen old faces, clogged my arteries with Tom’s Chili Chese Fries, caught a movie at the 22, had a late night run to in-n-out on Ave. I, driven by where i worked, went to high school, middle school, elementary, and college in the span of one mile, played with Ewok, slept on the couch, called friends to see if they wanted to come over and hang, sat on the floor while mom gives me a massage, listen to King play saxophone, feel the cold linoleum under my bare feet, seen a joshua tree, watched a tumbleweed roll past, given Luke, Amanda, Hunter, Mike, Chris, Wayne, Charlotte, Azin, Charlie a hug…

I miss the AV.

Chris Jordan on the State of Our Nation

cyserrano — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 00:18:57 +0000

Recently, one of my friends Ben Blair told me about a four day conference called TED which essentially is a seminar of 50 distinguised speakers talking about everything from Entertainment and Technology to Politics and Social Issues. From TED.com:

“TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader.

The annual conference now brings together the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).”

I didn’t think to research TED when Ben told me about it initially, but today, fellow blogger David Bruno, who is the inspiration for my participation in the 100 Thing Challenge that he started, posted this video of Chris Jordan, photographer and cultural observer, giving his “talk” at TED.

About Chris:

“Photographer Chris Jordan trains his eye on American consumption. His 2003-05 series “Intolerable Beauty” examines the hypnotic allure of the sheer amount of stuff we make and consume every day: cliffs of baled scrap, small cities of shipping containers, endless grids of mass-produced goods.

His 2005 book In Katrina’s Wake: Portraits of Loss from an Unnatural Disaster is a chilling, unflinching look at the toll of the storm. And his latest series of photographs, “Running the Numbers,” gives dramatic life to statistics of US consumption. Often-heard factoids like “We use 2 million plastic bottles every 5 minutes” become a chilling sea of plastic that stretches beyond our horizon.

In April 2008, Jordan traveled around the world with National Geographic as an international eco-ambassador for Earth Day 2008.”

From TED.com.

As David Bruno says in his post, this video is certainly worth eleven minutes of your time.

Freebord

cyserrano — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 22:47:05 +0000

I’m not much of a boarder… at all, but this is sick.

It’s essentially a skateboard that rides like a snowboard. Check out their site at Freebord.com. The thing runs from about $209-$339. Be sure to check out the first vid on the mainpage. And wait for the end… ridiculous.

Disney Online

cyserrano — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 08:42:19 +0000

It’s been a relatively recent trend for major networks to stream full TV episodes on their websites. Being at USC this past year, I practically had no time to watch any television except for the occasional SportsCenter or Anderson Cooper 360. Being addicted to Lost and Friday Night Lights and not knowing when either of those episodes aired and most likely having class during those times anyway, I was extremely grateful that I could watch those full episodes online.

I just found out today that Disney has recently caught on to this trend and has started to host full movies online for streamed viewing. They’re calling it Disney XD. I actually just finished watching Monsters Inc. on Disney.com. Man that movie is still just as funny as the first time I watched it. Pixar can do no wrong in my opinion. Oh and who else is psyched about WALL-E? It looks fantastic and really funny. So yeah, go check out Disney.com and their streaming movies. Here’s a schedule of the movies they’re featuring.

“Finding Nemo” – was available online through June 13
“Monsters Inc.” – airs on ABC Saturday, June 14 at 8pm; available on Disney.com June 16-20
“Haunted Mansion” – airs on ABC Saturday, June 28 at 8pm; available on Disney.com June 30-July 4
“Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen” – airs on ABC Saturday, July 5 at 8pm; available on Disney.com July 7-11
“Princess Diaries 2” – airs on ABC Saturday, July 12 at 8pm; available on Disney.com July 14-18
“Freaky Friday” – airs on ABC Saturday, July 19 at 8pm; available on Disney.com July 21-25
“Peter Pan” – airs on ABC Saturday, Aug. 2 at 8pm; available on Disney.com Aug. 4-8

Thanks to John Frost at The Disney Blog for the info.

100 Thing Challenge. Viva La Vida. Firefox 3.

cyserrano — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 08:14:53 +0000

I. 100 Thing Challenge

I recently found on popurls, which is now my favorite place online for finding more stuff… online, a very intriguing TIME Magazine article which over the last several days got me thinking about my life and what I hold important. The article talks about this dude David Michael Bruno and how he has committed to reducing the clutter in his life and challenging himself to try to live with only 100 personal possessions. He doesn’t count items that are shared by his family like the dining room table or the piano, but rather things that are for the most part only used by him. He’s dubbed it the 100 Thing Challenge and it’s recently gotten exposure to the world wide web through the TIME article and other forums. Another site I found interesting giving more insight into the challenge was ZenHabits.net.

I like to believe I’m a minimalist. It shows in my design and artwork and I generally just agree with the philosophy of it all. Do more with less. I think trying out this 100 Thing Challenge will be a great way to extend that philosophy to the way I live my life. It’ll probably be pretty fun, but a little difficult as well. By the end of this month. I’ll take inventory of my stuff and report on what I’ve got. Depending on what I’m starting off with, I’ll make a deadline for reducing my inventory to 100 things. That’ll be the start date for this year-long challenge. David is starting his challenge November 12th on his birthday. The challenge is to keep an inventory of only 100 things by November 12, 2009. I’ll probably start mine when I get back to USC and keep an inventory of 100 things at least through the end of the school year.

David wrote this in his latest post summarizing the 100 Thing Challenge and I agree firmly with it:

“My buddy Todd summed it up better than I could today when we were talking about it. He said, “Things are to be used. People are to be loved.” The crazy thing about our consumer culture is that we so often reverse it. We use people to get the things we think we’ll love. How stupid. As if fancy cars or more shoes are really going to satisfy us more than a great friend or a close relationship with our children.”

I think that as of late, I’ve been a little bit overwhelmed and engulfed in our consumer culture. Trying to get the latest gadgets or clothes or whatever. I think what I really value in life are relationships; how close I am to my friends, my contribution to society as a citizen, my family, etc. Committing to this challenge will help me put things in perspective and focus on what really matters in my life.

Keep checking back and I’ll keep you all updated. And if any of you want to join in on this with me, it’d be cool to have a confidant and partner(s) in this challenge.

More: Check out ZenHabit’s 10 Things You Can Do Today to Simplify Your Life.

II. Viva La Vida

I’m no music expert and I don’t know all the technical terms to describe the different sounds and attributes of a song (like our friends over at Pandora and the Music Genome Project), but I’ve been listening to Coldplay’s newest album for the past hour while writing this entry and I’ve got to say, it’s incredible. It’s quite distinctive from their previous albums. I may dare say I like it a little bit more than Parachutes.

This might sound a little funny, but for the last hour or so, I’ve been sitting in the dark in my living room, listening to Viva La Vida on my sound isolation earphones. I guess it helps to focus on the music a bit more. I feel like this album goes through a lot of different emotions. It just seems to flow so much more than their previous works. As the week goes by, I’ll give more of my thoughts on specific songs, but right now my first impression of this album is that it is extremely refined. It’s a great listen. Surprisingly enough for me, Chris Martin’s lead vocals take a backseat to the incredible composition and musicality of this album. There are so many points on this album that make me drift into my own thoughts and forget about anything around me. I guess that’s pretty powerful.

I’ve had the digital files off of iTunes for several hours now and I’m pretty sure that Viva La Vida is quickly going to be the Most Played on my iPod for the next several weeks. Sorry, Jason Mraz. (Although, his newest is really fresh. Check that out too.)

More: Listen to Viva La Vida, Violet Hill, and Lost? for free on Last.fm.

III. Firefox 3

Nerds everywhere are going crazy because today is the official release for Firefox 3. Mozilla has put on their blog that they’re attempting a Guinness World Record for the most downloads on a single day. They’ve also put on their most recent entry the link for the download site for the new browser.

I’ve got to say that I am so psyched for F3. While no one is going to really even read this post until after it’s been released, I’m just saying now that I plan on being awake by 10am PDT to download the official release ASAP. I’m sure there are thousands of geekophiles out there who will be doing the same. This new browser has so many new features and a slick new design to go with it. It looks great.

LifeHacker recently posted an entry in their blog about the changes from Firefox 1.0 through 3.0. It’s definitely worth a read! One of the changes I am most looking forward to is the location bar update. You’ll be able to search your location bar in a topical sort of way using keywords. I don’t know how to explain all this stuff exactly, so check out that article to get the scoop on the newest Firefox browser.

I’m stoked!

More Design

cyserrano — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 04:34:03 +0000

This is what I ended up doing for that poster project. You can click to see it enlarged.

Secondly, I’ve been working on web design and such for the summer. Thus, my guinea pig project is the web site for the a cappella group that I am a part of at USC called The Trojan Men.

Check that shtuff out. More to come… definitely feeling the blogging bug coming back.

A Hot Tranny Mess

cyserrano — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 04:24:05 +0000

Thank God SNL is getting funny again. A spoof off of Christian Siriano, Project Runway 4 Winner

SNL: A New Bravo Show

Designs

cyserrano — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 03:44:53 +0000

Some preliminary sketches i’m working on for our poster project. Click to enlarge.

My project was to design a poster targeting the 30-50 year old male and female demographic under the category of “events” following the International Typographic Style.

The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place

cyserrano — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 02:17:42 +0000

One of the first EPs by the post-rock Texas band Explosions in the Sky. Go check them out. Purely instrumental. Driving melodies… it’s amazing. I first heard of them from the song “Remember Me As A Time Of Day” which was used as the theme song for NBC’s Friday Night Lights. Sometimes I just put this stuff on and sit in silence and think. It’s pure emotion.

“Your Hand In Mine” – Explosions in the sky

So lately I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and I’m just grateful for where I am in life. I’m content. I think I’ve been through a lot. Lots of emotional ups and downs. Lots of disappointment and heartbreak. Lots of joy and happiness. Lots of accomplishment and excitement. It’s pretty cool cause I can look back and see the different events that have shaped me into the person I am today. Though at the time, it’s hard to see things for more than what they seem, I can be assured that later on I’ll know exactly why I needed to experience it. Such is growing up.

Update on Trojan Men… I made it into the group. Thursday night was pretty crazy. I get home from the callback audition around 10:20p. We were told that we would be notified that night whether or not we made it into the group. An hour passes and I get nothing. I’m checking my email constantly and making sure I haven’t missed any phone calls. Around 11:30p, the leader and founder of the group Evan Bregman adds me as a friend on facebook. I accept thinking, “Okay… cool?” I check out his status and it says, “Evan is really happy with the New Trojan Men.” So my energy is renewed. I’m thinking that they’ve already picked and I’ll find out soon if I’m in or not. Midnight rolls around. Nothing. Now I’m bummed. I’m starting to think that it’s pretty jacked up that I don’t even get an email to say I didn’t make it. At a quarter after, my roommate yells from the living room, “CY, YOUR FRIENDS ARE HERE.” I’m initially confused. I’m thinking it’s my friends from church, but they never stop by this late. I go to the front door and it’s the guys from the Trojan Men. I’m shocked. They pull me outside, congratulate me on getting into the group and insist on taking me out to dinner. I go. I’m in.

Since that Thursday night, they’ve thrown a welcome party for me and fellow new Trojan Man Pierre, I’ve had one rehearsal, learning three new songs, attended a performance at CalTech, and have gone out for sushi in Little Tokyo for Evan’s birthday. I feel like I’ve integrated pretty quickly. The guys are amazing and so talented and unique. I feel like I have a lot to learn, but that’s the excitement of it all. Life is for living and learning and USC has been great for that.

I’m grateful. Go and be likewise.