kind acts of randomness, and vice versa.

after weeks and weeks of saying it, i finally dusted off my photoshop palettes, and cobbled together a few pieces of text and eyedropper-picked colors into a neat little banner for myself.

i've always adored the ability of PS to grab colors from external documents anywhere on the screen (or parts of the OS and GUI themselves, for that matter) without having to open said items in the program. before i knew about this lovely little marvel of modern technology, i would spend much time sitting with a color picker and a visual reference, trying desperately to color-match. efforts such as these were almost always in vain.

this blog is titled thinking on the clock for a few reasons, some obvious, some not so evident. the glaring one being that i write almost exclusively while i'm at work (be it here, a random musing on a napkin during lunch, livejournal, emails to myself etc). at work i get some much-valued time to be alone with my thoughts, and thusly, they are allowed to come out with a slightly higher degree of clarity than at other times, when they may seem a bit more muddled.
the other is a bit more remote, and comes from a lyric from a song by a band called hey mercedes. in the song, titled 'the frowning of a lifetime', our friend 'kelly got caught, thinking on the clock', suggesting that a creative mind in the workplace isn't always encouraged.

and now, for something completely different.

so, it's now mid-august.
since last time (these are way too few and far-between, i know) quite a bit has happened.

i went home for almost 2 weeks in early-mid july. i had a stellar time. it wasn't nearly long enough, however. i start to wonder how my life would be right now had i actually gone all the way to calgary. since my departure last june, i've been home twice, seen my mother twice aside from that (she's been in the city), my sister has been through once, various other friends have found their way through the city, and i've had the opportunity to find my way back to another incredible part of my life in my girlfriend, who is also going to be able to come for a visit this month. if i take a look at how many of these things would have happened had i gone to calgary, i'm hard pressed to say for sure that any of them would have.

this past week i also saw a few bands that i've been really looking forward to. sherwood opening up for motion city soundtrack.
there were also a couple of other bands, one called the forecast (who, while energetic and technically great live, had the worst sound of the show, which is sadly the fate of many first-on-stage bands: they get the least time with sound techs, and are generally kinda hurried, and often have lower-end gear than bigger bands) from peoria, illinois, and another called the higher from las vegas i think, but i didn't much like them or their attitudes, so i'm not even going to bother linking them.
i had been waiting to see sherwood since i met them at warped tour in montréal in 2004, and their set got canceled due to low ticket sales or something. great live show, as i had hoped. and motion city... well, they were just stellar live. everything i had hoped for and more. i'll probably go see them again when they come back in november.

and now, since this post has set off upon an enormous tangent (i always manage to run on at length when i've got a lot on my mind) i'll end it here, with a few images.

the first is a view of a pool/maintenance shed in the middle of eglinton park, here in toronto. i live about a 65 second walk from this park, which is pretty convenient for late night escapes from the apartment or mid-afternoon enjoyment of sun. this particular shot was quite late at night or quite early in the morning, depending on what kind of a person you are.


















this shot was taken while i was home in nova scotia, and is of jenn grant backed by the boys from in-flight safety, whose drummer can be seen here.