It’s been snowing a lot here on the East Coast. Here’s an iPhone video I shot yesterday plus a track that I made for a commercial that never aired.

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This wallpaper is so amazing.  Wallpaper is one of the reasons I want to live in someplace that I own, or at least someplace I know for sure that I will be in for a long enough time to invest in some real decor.  This paper is gorgeous and calming and has just enough design to be interesting but isn’t overwhelmingly patterned as to be distracting.  And I LOVE the fact that it is just on the one wall, serving to extend the headboard and really make that wall outstanding.
Check …

Dave fortifies with a cup of Bustelo brew
and then proceeds to clear the 1 foot of snow off the car with a plastic dustpan and an old frying pan
and after 1.5 hours, we have success!

Check out this pretty cool infographic (from last.fm) showing the music that New Yorkers listened to compared to the music the rest of the country listened to in 2009.  It’s interesting to see the curves of how much earlier certain music was adopted, and in greater numbers compared to outside of New York, and how much more diverse the rest of the country is in comparison.
Plus the information is displayed in such an interesting, colorful and easy to comprehend way.  More like this, please.
(found via American Copywriter)

This weekend I made cheese for the first time ever.  I like it.  It was the easy goat cheese recipe that I found on Serious Eats, and we ended up with a little ball of goat cheese ricotta.  There was only one dire moment, and it was when I realized that maybe I should have cut down the cheese cloth to a more manageable size, rather than leaving it in the 2 yard form it came in, “just in case.”  Talk about unwieldy!  However, it was pretty delicious, and I’m …

The assignment:  Take a CD that you think is badly designed and design new cover art for it.  This art should be able to evoke the feeling that one gets when listening to the record or a song.  Bring in the song to class to play along with your design.
Soooo, I had a hard time finding a badly designed album cover that I could actually come up with a design for.  I decided to go with The Lonesome Crowded West by Modest Mouse because even though I personally find the …

Art done by lunchbreath, as found on Core77.

(And I admit to being guilty of several of these after initially getting the program, but now LESS so–which I’ll take as a sign that I am growing with my Photoshop!  Ahem, though I still do love a drop shadow.)

(via Design Fetish)

I really, really want a tropical, sunshine-y, beach-y, swim-filled vacation.  Now, please.
(restaurant off the coast of Zanzibar, found via gimme gimme)

The assignment:  Come up with ideas for 3 book covers, each focusing on different copy as the priority: the title, the subtitle and the authors (Magic with Cards, 113 Easy to Perform Miracles with an Ordinary Deck, Garcia and Schindler).
The biggest problem I am having is not necessarily coming up with the ideas (rudimentary as they are), but is graphically representing them the way I see them in my mind.  Since this class is primarily about ideas and not about layout, I guess basic layout works, but I really wish …