Publix

The grocery chain I can not forget to mention.

I've been to many different grocery stores over the years (coming from a different state helps), and even here in Sarasota I've shopped at Target and Winn-Dixie too. However I feel that Publix is my most preferred shopping place for the groceries I need (just as Art and Frame and Blue Line are for art supplies). Not only is it conveniently within a mile of the school, but they offer a lot of deals and sales from week to week on things I actually buy. That really helps a lot economically, especially when you're on a tight college student budget. This week for example, they had the brand of V8 juice that I normally get, as well as Sweet Leaf tea both on sale for buy one get one free. That gave me the wonderful opportunity of stocking up on them. It's the little things that really help sometimes.

Max Howard Presentation

So last night we had a presentation with Max Howard, who was a producer on a number of classic animated movies such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Iron Giant, Lion King, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, etc. He gave quite a talk about his experience in the industry, and what it takes to pitch an original story to a studio. As expected, he talked a lot about Story, as it is the most important thing when pitching an original idea for an animation, film, television series or whatever. I have to say it was really insightful to hear his experiences over the last 20-30 years, and how even not coming from an Animation background, (actually a theatre/ play background from England) somehow wound up working for Disney Feature Animation starting on Who framed Roger Rabbit in 1984 and how it was what got him into the industry because he had to collect a lot of different artists, animators and filmmakers together to work on the movie.

That's my favorite part about living in this area and going to Ringling, is that we get to hear different presentations, talks and speeches from professionals from all around the world. It's definitely the most inspiring thing to hear as a student living in the area.

UPS Drop Box

So today I went around downtown with my roommate to try and find a UPS box. He ordered a book off of Amazon for one of his classes, and when he went to read it, the book was missing about 30 pages. So he emailed amazon about it and they sent him a shipping label to fit it back. All we had to do was find a UPS drop box. Easy right?.... Yeah..

Anyway, we wound up driving downtown trying to find one that was supposedly somewhere on fruitville near or past 301. We never found it, so we tried looking for another drop box that was somewhere near Main Street. The UPS site said there was going to be a dropbox on the backside of 1440 Main street. That specific block of main street is all bars and restaurants. We walked down the back side of that street only to find garbage dumpsters from the restaurants. From there it said another one was in a building near Central or something. We wound up walking around for a while until we found the building and asked the guy at the desk. He said the drop box was around the corner of the parking lot. Sure enough, we found it there. Finally there was a UPS drop box and we could be on the way... right?

Nope. Unfortunately the box my roommate had was just about a cubic inch or two too big to fit in the drop box. From there we left kinda frustrated and wound up looking a UPS store. We eventually found one that was down 301. My roommate dropped of the package and we went back home. Pretty ridiculous adventure all to drop off a package that wasn't even our fault.

Outback Steakhouse

So a couple weeks ago I had the opportunity to eat at the Outback Steakhouse on the corner of Lockwood Ridge and University. Normally I wouldn't be able to afford to eat there, but I received a gift card from a girl who actually hit my car. Although it wasn't really that bad (just a minor scrape in the paint on the side door), she felt guilty about it. I told her it was too small to really be worth paying for to fix, especially since my car is kinda old anyway. Still, she felt bad about it, so she made up for it by getting me a gift card for Outback Steakhouse. Needless to say I went there with friends and they're food was delicious. Probably the best food I ate in quite a while... Yay college budget!

Shadocon

A couple weeks ago, I traveled with a group of friends a little ways out of Sarasota into Tampa. It was there that we attended Shadocon, a first year convention for anime, comic books, video games, etc. A lot of people go dressed up as their favorite characters. It was conveniently the weekend after Halloween, so my friends and I just used the same costumes. We had a blast attending some of the different events there, and it was pretty cool seeing people dressed as different characters. There was a costume contest, and various other activities as well. It was certainly a well-deserved break away from classes and campus.

On the docks by Marina Jack

So a few weeks ago, my roommate had to do a photo shoot, and I also needed reference taken, so we decided to head down to the docks by Marina Jack's off US 41 to get some nice outdoor lighting. We walked along the bayside up to G-Wiz, and found a decent spot on a pier where he took reference of me standing near a bunch of seagulls. After walking around for a bit, we also found a decent spot with a bench so that we could shoot my reference as well. Twas a rather pleasant afternoon in Sarasota's warm bayside weather. :)

Illest of Ill and Drunken Poet

So last Friday was the opening for the Illest of Ill. It's always a huge event for us (especially Illustration majors) to bring in an outside crowd and promote the artwork of our student body. The show was a great turnout, and we had the guest judge Josh Cochran fly in to judge the whole show. He gave an artist talk and presentation as well, very inspirational. After the event on Friday night I went out to eat with a group of friends downtown at Drunken Poet. I've always been a fan of asian cuisine, and the food there is really good (even if its a bit pricey). They had good service too considering our relatively large group of 12+ people. Al-in-all it was a pretty great night, and a good way to see more of the Sarasota area.