Senior Year

I've been looking back on old sketchbooks and this is what I wrote in one of them:


Why don't we talk anymore?
I'm so terrified you'll forget me.
What if I don't improve?
Just because HE says it, doesn't mean it's right!
It's not right!
Sarcasm hurts more than you know!
I AM NOT WEAK.
Why did you say that?
I can't just sit around and watch it happen.
We're so divided, yet we come together and pretend we're whole.
Art means there's no drama.
I LOVE BASKETBALL!
Nerds are awesome.
Halloween needs to be everyday.
I get weird attachments to my pencils.
Why does fanart=1,000,000,000 page views?
I won't let you walk all over me ever again.
I LOVE being outside in the summer.
I <3 canoes.
What if I fail?
Sometimes I feel like a plant, I need sunlight to be happy!
I love being different.
Snow sucks. It's cold and wet.
I like water, lakes, rivers, streams, puddles.
I'm really pasty in the winter.
Granola is yummy.

It's just a weird collection of some thoughts I had back then. I guess the reason I'm posting this is because re-reading this definitely reminded me of some important things.

Some things worth remembering.

10.5.09

School starts today! Finally! Its exactly the thing I need after my awful weekend at work. Sixteen hours and only two orders to show for it. I'm afraid to do the math but I'm sure I was only getting a few pennies/hour.

Anyway, school! I'm pretty excited to get back into that routine again. My break from it was long enough. I WANNA ANIMATE. I'm actually not in any 2D classes but I think I'm going to buy a bunch of the paper and just do my own thing. I need to remind myself why I'm going to this school.

Downloading the 500 Days of Summer soundtrack right now. I can't wait until that movie come out on DVD. :)

~A~

9.9.09

I should be doing homework for my online classes right now. This is way more fun though.

Summer is over! :( And I feel like I accomplished nothing. No fun trips, no crazy parties, no adventures. I wasn't even in school... I just worked. Airbrushing definitely earned me some nice money, but I never have really judged success based on that. Now I just feel like I wasted these past few months.

So here's a mash-up of my summer sketchbook. Nothing that impressive, but definitely better stuff than what I was churning out before. Taking a quarter off of school helped so much! For once I was drawing because I wanted to and not because I had to. Even though I didn't really enjoy the break from the social side of school, I definitely needed a break from all the work. Due dates really put a damper on my enthusiasm.

Anyway, here's a look ahead for me.

1. Start school on Oct. 5th
2. Keep airbrushing throughout the winter
3. Race in my first alleycat on the 19th?
4. Continue to live happily in Minneapolis with my rock star maxcaven.com.

Yeah, about number three. It's an all female bike race called Babes in Bikeland. I keep reading about these races but I've never done one. This sounds like a fun place to start.

Wish me luck!

~A

Airbrush Monsterrr

A boy and his mom came in to the mall yesterday and asked if we could do a monster. The boy said the monster had to have four eyes, a blue and yellow face, green horns and fangs.
This is what we came up with.
:)

Things like this make my day.

Finally doing moar art!

Me.

Boyfriend.

ANGRY TOASTER

Music

New Place?

So I just got done checking out this little place. It was a pretty interesting experience..

When I first called the caretakers I thought I was talking to Roz from Monsters Inc. I had no idea what to say because I was expecting an introduction like,

"Hello, this is 25th Ave Apartments, how can we help you today?"

Instead it was more like,

"Hullo?"

In this grating, shriveled up smoker's voice. Then a long awkward silence then I gracefully responded with.

"Uhhhh."

Anyway. The caretaker wasn't too bad. She seemed nice, and incredibly honest. Especially when it came to her thoughts on the owner. He was a dick apparently, who never fixed anything and lied to people about problems with the room. Mainly about the back studios, which ran around 420/month. The reason they were priced so low was because the roofs leaked. Apparently enough to make parts of the ceiling fall on top of you. I saw one of those apartments. Not pretty.

I also saw two others. Apartments 7 and 8. Those were my favorites. 7 was a big studio, towards the front of the building and 8 was a "one bedroom" right above it. I think I want 8. It was probably the nicest looking room there and only 550/month. All utilities included, AND I can steal internet from the coffee shop across the street. Plus its a month-to-month lease so if I really hate it, or the ceiling starts falling on me I can get the hell out.

After showing me around the different buildings she invited me into her apartment and she and her roommate/significant other/co-caretaker proceeded to tell me all about the building and how they had come to be the caretakers there. Apparently they evicted all the prostitutes and druggies when they started up six years ago and turned it into cheap housing for MCAD students and old couples. They pretty much run the place, because the owner couldn't care less about who lives there.

Overall I just got the impression that I could probably get them to lower rent if I got on their good side, since they're pretty much the ones deciding everything. Maybe if things work out with this place I'll bake them brownies every month and see what happens.

April 29 2009

Holy damn, where did April go? I turned my back for a second and its already almost May. I've got all these things I gotta take care of before June, like finding a place to live, figuring out my school schedule for the summer and give Gap my two weeks notice.

Thats right. I'll no longer be working for Gap Inc. I got myself a job airbrushing t-shirts and other apparel (trucker hats woo!) at Valley Fair and the Mall of America! No experience required. Which works out well because I have none.

It'll be a full time job starting May 15th. I might die because for at least a month I'll be having a full time job and full time school. But at least it'll be something I enjoy doing. AND I'll get to be outside. I don't know how I would live being stuck up in the Gap all day while everyone else had fun in the outdoors. 

So of course this job leads me to deciding to go to school at least part-time over the summer. I'd prefer to take the whole summer quarter off, but I still gotta talk to my advisor. I love summer. I NEED summer. I want to have a life, and see Max on a regular basis and go on adventures. 

I need fresh air!!!

Anyways, I had my first training on Monday. It was pretty awesome, despite only working on dot and line exercises. Airbrushing doesn't seem too hard. Its just one of those practice things. The more you do it the better you get. And of course, the better you get, the more money you bring in. 

Wish me luck. 

Color Set

I woke up to snow on the ground this morning. Wtf Minnesota... Why can't you be like the other states that actually get warm in the spring? Why must you toy with my emotions giving me 50 degree weather one day and a blizzard the next? You broke my heart Minneapolis. I thought you'd be better than Duluth. I thought you wouldn't sink that low. But you did and left me to lock myself in my room and cry myself to sleep.

Tweetin' It Up

Yeah I'm on twitter now.

http://twitter.com/annafleissner

Sunday, March 29th, 2009

This picture is a work in progress and is really nothing related to anything. I just don't like posting entries with only text.

Um, my grandpa passed away early this morning. He had been suffering from Alzheimer's for a while now. The heart attack he had led doctors to an infection that was present in most of his major organs. There was really nothing they could do.We heard a couple hours to a couple days. 

We weren't incredibly close, but he was kind of my last connection to my grandma, who I was very close relationship with. She passed away when I was in eighth grade from lung cancer. She smoked a lot back in the day.

Anybody who says that smoking doesn't hurt anyone except themselves couldn't be more wrong. And I'm not talking about second-hand smoke.

Lake Ave

I'm possibly doing album art for these guys? 

Physics

There's this man in my physics class, mid to late 30's probably. He talks like he knows everything. He's also constantly interupting people while they talking. Its patronizing and very frustrating. Today was worse than usual.

So Blythe and I decided to draw some pictures!

I'm not this violent in real life.

I promise.

:)

www.annafleissner.com

This blog will be more blog-ish from now on.

Check it! I have an actual website. Its small, and my very first one so its not amazing. But it's a start! 

Can only go up from here...

Max and I

Fighter

More sketches. I haven't had many major-specific classes this quarter, plus I've been caught up with my english paper. Close to being done though.

NEW HAIR

OH MY GOD SHORT.

I like it though. 

:)

Grainy pictures taken with webcam. Its cuter in person. 

Om nom nom

New header!

I dunno why I draw myself so much.

Coraline

Speed paint.

This movie definitely gets my stamp of approval. ...not that anyone needs my approval for anything. GOSH think for yourself for once. Geez.

But seriously. Go. Its amazing.

"Its COR-aline."

I want her hat.

no lines

Hold

Blue

I'm afraid to sink and I'm afraid to swim,

and I'm sad to say I miss my friends.

~Brandie Carlile

Some songs just make me think of different things.

Done!

Work In Progress

Lady

TODAY SUCKS

I need to learn to take my own advice and save my work OFTEN. My external hard drive just killed one of my pictures... Time to walk away and take a few deep breaths. 

...then throw my hard drive out the window.

Can today really get any worse? I still have to work tonight so we'll see.

I guess I could be these people though.

Paint Practice-Skin

I feel like a could push my values so much more. She's also very grey. Haha, thats why its called practice though right? :)

Check out my fancy new header.

:) 

Yay.

Some Quotes

Found em on some cards.

"If you're going to be passionate about something, be passionate about learning. If your going to fight something, fight for those in need. If you're going to question something, question authority. If you're going to lose something, lose your inhibitions. If you're going to gain something, gain respect and confidence. And if you're going to hate something, hate the false idea that you are not capable of your dreams."

~Daniel Golston

"Walk with the dreamers, the believers, the courageous, the cheerful, the planners, the doers, the successful people with their heads in the clouds and their feet on the ground. Let their spirit ignite a fire within you to leave this world better than when you found it..."

~Wilferd Peterson

I dunno.

Good words to live by I think.

The second one reminds me of Camp and all the people that went into making that place amazing. 

Work AH!

Something traditional. I just can't ditch those markers. :)

I got my work schedule last night and I'm not working at all this week. My first thought was, AH! BAD! THIS IS BAD! My second and third thoughts were kinda all along the same line. I knew things were going to slow down in January, but I guess it didn't really hit me until now. 

I think I might have screwed myself over this weekend. I was scheduled to work Saturday and Sunday, but I had my friend Conor's birthday in Duluth to go to. So I found someone to work and managed to get a ride up there. Throughout the holidays I had been finding other people to take my shifts so I could go do whatever... I don't know if my managers are seeing this and saying "well why should we schedule her if she's just going to give it to someone else?" or if its just January being January. I really hope its the second one.

On the bright side...

I suppose now I'll have time to finish up that bartending thing. I haven't been there in over three weeks now. I hope they let me back! And not having to work I can focus on school too. I start on the 12th.

I'm just gonna have to buckle down, hide my debit card and try and spend as little as possible in between now and when I manage to start working or find another job.

:A