It's Wednesday

this is it

2013-05-22T21:30:00.001-07:00

This is the last Wednesday of the school year. This is the last "Collared Shirt Wednesday" of my schooling career. This may be the last "Collared Shirt Wednesday" of my entire life.

This outfit is particularly significant. Here's the deal:

The bowtie, the purple, blue, and gray one, was acquired this year, my senior year, a gift from my girlfriend, Ms. Morgan McGannon. This bowtie represents my senior year in college, represents a new living situation in The Bakery, represents a new relationship with Ms. Morgan McGannon, represents graduating college.

The shirt, the florescent orange one, was acquired four years ago, my freshman year, a $3 STEAL from the American Apparel Outlet at the Citadel Outlets (still the only time I've been there). This shirt represents my freshman year in college, represents a new journey that is higher education, represents a lot of fun and craziness and stupidity and immaturity, represents the beginning of my maturity as an adult.

The shorts, the white ones, were acquired three years ago, my sophomore year, a thrift store find to complete a "yacht club" costume. These shorts represent my sophomore year in college, represent the settling in to the college routine, represent developing friendships, represent the establishment and passion of my film and art interests, represent the continual push to create excellent work.

The socks, the brown ones, were acquired two years ago, my junior year, a gift from my mother on Christmas. These socks represent my junior year in college, represent the moving from dormitory to apartment, represent a reality check of academic seriousness, represent the establishment of Mawwiage Films, represent the realization of life-after-college, represent the last hurrah with the gentlemen I lived with for three years.

The shoes, the white ones, were acquired eight years ago, my freshman year in high school, a requirement to participate in the drumline. These shoes represent my high school years, represent the formation of my ideologies, beliefs and interests, represent the shenanigans me and my broskis rocked, represent the introduction to film and graphic design, represent the development of who I am today.

The broken pallet represents the normality of education being busted wide open. A teacher once said, "You're about to be fired from your full time job of 18 years. You going to have to pick yourself up and find a new job." I am 100% used to doing school. I've done school for as long as can remember. I will be doing school no longer. Broke that thing.

The undid bowtie represents the things to come. A bowtie is meant to be tied, that is its designed function. We go through education to prepare us for things to come, to teach us the skills to succeed in the workforce. Education teaches us how to tie the bowtie. It's time to get out there and learn.

Here's a video from freshman year for nostalgia's sake.

I will be writing an extended blog post at some point in the future. In the mean time, graduation is Friday. Un. Be. Liev. A. Ble. Can't even handle it.

It's go time.

Take a walk outside, it's nice out.

picture this

2013-05-15T19:55:00.001-07:00

This little bloggy blog has been the neglected these past few weeks because, well, these past few weeks have been some of wildest, craziest, overwhelmingest, loudest, unbelievableest weeks of my 22 years of life.

But first, a few things to note.

1. Today is the last "regular" Wednesday of my entire schooling career (at least as far as I know). That also means today is reserved for the 1984 powder blue Olympic suit. If you have followed the tradition, you will recognize that the 1984 powder blue Olympic suit is worn every last "regular" Wednesday of the semester. This is a tradition that has taken place since the middle of my stay in high school and has continued into my later college years. Friends, this is the LAST time I will EVER wear the 1984 powder blue Olympic suit in this context. And, hate to say it, but this may be the final time I wear this suit period (BUT you never know, I highly doubt I'll be able to stay out of this thing for long). This day means a lot for me and the memories packed into this fabric are leaking out with every step. I do know one thing though, I can't wait for my son to bust this 1984 powder blue Olympic suit out when he's in high school. That'll be the day.

2. Yeah, it's the last normal Wednesday. Which means it's THE LAST NORMAL WEDNESDAY. Graduation is looming. The "real world" is about 3 miles away, about to pick me up, and take me on a grand adventure.

3. Today, the wonderful world of allergens decided to inhabit my nostrils and create a continuous waterfall of fluid. After shaking the world, with deafening sneezes, I reach into the Kleenex box once again. It's a brutal day.

In other news, it's time for a run through of the last couple weeks.

First, here was the picture from last week. I didn't even post anything on the blog last week.

Two weeks ago, on May 2nd, my senior thesis documentary, the film that culminates my entire college career, premiered into the atmosphere of reality. "thisisstuttering" made it's first appearance in at the Biola Production Center in Studio A. I honestly did not know what to expect. Sure, thisisstuttering is extremely personal to me, and even personal to those who worked on it, but was it going to speak to the audience? I didn’t know. Over 300 people came to watch the film and the response was overwhelming. During the Q&A, I realized that thisisstuttering transcends the problem of speech impediments, but serves as encouragement and a personal account of overcoming PROBLEMS. We all have problems and a stutter is one of mine. Many people at the premiere spoke about how they were challenged and called to reevaluate their own struggles, proving that thisisstuttering is a film about living life. I was immensely humbled and overwhelmed with the comments and conversations that followed the premiere; God’s using this film and I am buckling up because it’s going to be a wild ride.

Here is one example of the effect it's had:

The National Stuttering Association also heard about the film BEFORE IT WAS RELEASED and not only did they love the final product and want to support it through and through, but they will be screening the documentary at their 30th annual conference in Scottsdale, Arizona in July! I am humbled by this opportunity and cannot wait to share my story with a community packed full of people who struggle as I do.

The Biola newspaper, The Chimes, also did a lil' writeup on the premiere: http://chimes.biola.edu/story/2013/may/07/thisisstuttering-awareness-speech/

I can barely even verbalize how this has all been for me. It's been wild. It's been freeing. It's been testing. It's been hard. It's been life-changing. This project has taken almost a full year to come to fruition and what a year it was. And here we are, about to embark on part 2 of the adventure.

If you care, follow on facebook: http://facebook.com/thisisstuttering
or check in to the website every now and this: http://thisisstuttering.com

In other news,

THE BAKERY DANCE PARTY 3.0 // April 26, 2013

This is the end of an era: THE FINAL BAKERY DANCE PARTY. The sweat rained, the walls soaked, the people threw down. The Bakery felt the love that night and we will all remember the Bakery Dance Parties forever. HUZZAH!

In other news, MY SISTER IS ENGAGED! Ms. Melanie Lott was asked for her hand in marriage by future brother-in-law Mr. Dan Mitchell.

Here is the facebook album description:

Dan Mitchell had a plan. He and my sister Melanie Lott were going to double-date with me and my girlfriend: headin' to Malibu to take pictures on the beach. Little did Melanie know, the objective was to get to a cliff where Mr. Dan Mitchell was going to take a knee and propose an offering of his hand in marriage. However, the whole day leading up to that moment, we had to "fake" this "picture-double-date." So naturally, in order to sell this fakeout, I snapped a boatload of pictures. This fakeout album is Morgan and I havin' a little fun. HOWEVER, take a look at this album for the REAL pictures, the pictures of Mel's and Dan's engagement: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4187479143973.1073741827.1794395519. I must say, Dan's pretty brilliant. Double-date with a photographer so you get up-close-and-personal pictures of your engagement without any suspicion. Good move Dan, good move.

And here are some of my completely-out-of-order-and-I-have-no-idea-why favorites:

And now some social media snippits:

Dishelveled

2013-05-01T13:42:00.000-07:00

This is my disheveled look. My documentary premieres tomorrow.

Mocked

2013-04-25T00:07:00.000-07:00

We're in the thick of things. Life's been crazy, life continues to be crazy, and most likely life will stay crazy. Some big stuff happened this week.

You remember the mentioning of my senior media project, "thisisstuttering" a while back. If not, here you go: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2012/12/thisisbig.html

Well, this week was another monumental week for the project: the second trailer was released and the premiere was planned. WHAT?! thisisstuttering is for real and will be premiering on Thursday, May 2nd, at 7:30pm at the Production Center (Studio A). Here is the facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/408322535931743/

There's also a website that will have updates as they come up:

http://thisisstuttering.com

And here is the trailer.

thisisstuttering :: official theatrical trailer from Morgan Lott on Vimeo.

This film has the potential to completely alter the course of my future. The possibilities are endless. I'm nervous, terrified, and insanely excited to see what happens.

But we have to finish the film first....

In other news, it was Ms. Morgan McGannon's 20th birthday last Sunday. We cruised to Southlands, then we cruised to Chipotle, then we cruised to Laguna Beach, then we cruised to a faux-janky hotel with a rad ocean view, then we cruised to Newport to her extended families house, meeting her immediate family there as well, then we cruised to Rothschild's to enjoy some delicious Italian food, then we headed home. A fantastic day, that is to be certain. She's wonderful.

Here's a quick picture:

And here's a quick sampling of words, simply for remembrance's sake and memory recall in 20 years. Outside Rothchilds. Homeless. Soiled. Police. Ambulance. Firetrucks. Old women: prime seating.

Here is some social media shenanigans from the week:

And that's the post, ladies and folks. It's so busy over here, it's unreal.

Busiest days of our lives. I've been so busy I've created laundry lists of things to complete everyday, something I normally do in my head. Lately though, that "list in the head" thing is just getting me overwhelmed. Plus, there's something satisfying about crossing an item off of a list.

Farewell, fellow Internet users. Take a breathe of fresh air. I want to as soon as humanly possible.

highlights

2013-04-17T12:38:00.002-07:00

I literally have no time for this today. There is so much to do in the upcoming minutes/hours/days/weeks/months/years.

Have a fantastic day. Enjoy every second of it. Be thankful for every second of it.

Here are some highlights of the week though. I've been enjoying these lately.

Sail

2013-04-10T13:01:00.001-07:00

The ship has sailed.

Spring break is over. The next break? The rest of life. We're in the final stretch, the last 100 meters of education. In a few short weeks, I will be a school-less hooligan looking to make an impact on the workplace. Can you say "I'm excited, ready, and somewhat prepared, but sort of terrified at the same time, but this is the necessary way of life and the necessary next steps in life so bring it on post-graduation life?" Oh, maybe you can't. But I can. And I am.

I don't have a whole lot of time left. Just a few weeks. And there's an absurd amount to get done. It's half crazy. I'm half crazy. BIG things are happening though, so that's fantastically exciting. Spring break was last week and it was simple. Relaxed. Lots of work was completed, went to a Giant v. Dodger game, had a picnic with Ms. Morgan McGannon, enjoyed the sun immensely, enjoyed the fam bam. Great week. Simple. Too fast.

In other news, here's social media snippets from the last two weeks:

I must say, I've really enjoyed including these in the blog lately. I helps speed up the "blog writing" process because I don't have to repeat myself. Efficiency is key in most areas of life.

Here's a few videos for you as well.

First, Mawwiage Films is back in business. Here is our first teaser of the season!

Second, this is video documenting one of my favorite happenings in my Biola career.

Third, this is a great commercial.

Fourth, this is a fantastic video.

And that's all the time I have for today.

Growing up is weird.

Do something childish this week.

writing

2013-03-27T15:56:00.001-07:00

This morning, I looked in my closet. Many of you have asked "how do you choose what you're going to wear on Wednesday's?" Every Wednesday, I wake up, walk to my closet, and decide what I'm going to wear. It happens the morning of, raw and uncut. Mistakes happen. This morning, I looked in my closet and realized something: "I'm really going to miss this." Last week, I wrote about the blog and how it has lost its priority-ness over the years. (If you missed it, take a look: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2013/03/advantage.html) My passion for the blog has been lessening as time has gone on. But, as I looked in my closet this morning, I realized my passion for dressing up on Wednesday's has not dwindled. I realized that I really like the creative challenge of creating a new never-before-worn-by-Morgan outfit out of clothes I have owned for a long long time. I really like the creative challenge of creating unique color palettes, pushing the boundaries, mixing pattern/color combos. I realized I don't do this for attention, I don't do this to get a rise out of friends, family, coworkers, fellow academics, or you, the faithful blog reader. I realized I do this because it's a creative outlet that only works within the school context. Once I graduate, I will likely stop dressing up on Wednesday's, not because I'm done and sick with it, but because there will be no venue for the artwork. I won't have the consistency to promote the continuation of this 6 year long habit.

Another aspect is the people surrounding me. I feel 100% comfortable wearing anything and everything on Wednesday's around campus, it doesn't phase me. Throw me in a working context when I'm right out of college? Eh, drop that 100% down a few percentages. I'd love to be transparent and transfer my comfortability into any working context that's thrown my way, but, honestly, that is going to be incredibly difficult to do. We'll have to see what happens.

All that to say, I am going to really miss dressing up all crazy and stuff. I've been doing this for 6 years, it's become a habit, it's consistent. I have taken 162 pictures of Wednesday garb. One hundred sixty-two. If you're interested, peruse them ALL here:

college: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.143439557753.137074.714162753&type=3

high school: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.34414107753.57636.714162753&type=3

Looking through these pictures is fantastic. Every single one of them is tied to a memory or a group of memories. Every single one is tied to a specific blog post that has these memories recorded for years to come. This fact is legitimately fantastic. Can't wait to show my grandkids this stuff.

In other news, last Friday, March 22, Ms. Morgan McGannon and I hit the town. If you recall from last week (Once again, ff you missed it, take a look: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2013/03/advantage.html), she and I babysat three balls of energy for an evening. Not only was it a crazy evening and will be remembered for quite some time, we made a few bux. We decided we wanted to do something fun with, a date of sorts. But what should we do? After we did some fantastic brainstorming (we played off each other's ideas very nicely), we arrived upon the perfect thing: Universal CityWalk and we HAVE to spend all the money. CityWalk is one of those strange places where there is so so so much to buy, so so so much memorabilia, touristy items, random gifts, but do we ever buy it? Hardly. So what if we went to CityWalk with the challenge to spend all the money we had? Sounds like a date night to me.

After we watched my sister Lacey absolutely kill it in her jazz choir performance at Fullerton College, we headed to CityWalk, used our earnings to pay for parking (boo) and then headed inside. We decided to get some food from the food court. Ms. Morgan McGannon picked up some Flame Broiler which proved to be a great choice. I, however, chose to go with Pink's Hot Dogs. Now, I have had only good experiences at Pink's, but this time was different. I order the "New York Hotdog." On the menu, it said "hotdog with spicy red onions." Sounded decent and safe, I like onions. Turns out I had no idea what spicy red onions were. This hot dog was quite possibly the worst food item I have ever purchased. I couldn't even stomach it, I tried. I tried to eat it, I really did. I couldn't do it. Ms. Morgan McGannon was kind enough to share some of her meal with me, bless her heart.

We continued on our way. Here are some pictures documenting our journey.

Super fun. And we got some super fun memorabilia out of it. And some super fun pictures. This girl is one of a kind. She rocks my world time and time again.

In other news, this week has been wild. SO much going on. Here's a review in tweets.

And that is the end of this edition of "It's Wednesday!" Lots of writing, lots of reading. That hasn't happened in a while. Writing is such an interesting concept: recording things, whether that be words, numbers, drawings, images, from your head onto another surface that can either be temporary or permanent. This writing I am doing right now will likely last until the end of the world. It's being permanently embedded into the recesses of the internet. It's like an engraving. Incredible. I'm writing about writing and as I write about writing, the writing is being written onto the written history of the world. Incredible.

Write something this week. Grab a piece of paper and a pen and just start writing. Go into it with an open mind. Let your mind wander, explore, investigate. Write it down. Seriously.

Advantage

2013-03-20T14:44:00.001-07:00

Oh, Wednesday's. The famed Wednesday. I've been dressing up on Wednesday's for 6 years now and have been writing this blog for 4. Four years. There are 243 posts on this here blog, documenting the life of this random dude Mr. Morgan Lott. 243 Wednesday's that preserve memories that will last longer than I will be alive (if the internet sticks around, that is). Friends, I am in a rut. It's been 4 years and my drive to continue this blog is growing thin. Not to fear though, I will definitely be continuing this li''l' Wednesday tradition into my college graduation. The reason I say all this is for this reason: it's amazing how our passions change. I used to be passionate about this blog. I'd get super amped to write about the crazy shenanigans my friends and I would get into. I would write posts like this: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2010/12/story.html or this http://emliv.blogspot.com/2008/12/be-ready.html and I would be so jazzed to share it. I would look forward to Wednesday's because I knew I could think about the week and write absurdities about it, saving it on the interweb to look at 40 years from now. "It's Wednesday" created a great outlet outside of the lull of school and homework. Nothing else was going on. Fast forward to today and my passions have shifted. I am basically out of school, homework is minimal. Most my time is spent working on films, weddings, freelance. I have a girlfriend now, she's fantastic. I'm responsible for my food, my rent, my utilities, my house. My friends are always busy/unavailable/moved away and they typically aren't down to do super super random stuff like what I talked about last week: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2013/03/skipp.html. And, to be honest, neither am I. We've grown up, we've matured. Our passions lie other places. Now, that doesn't mean I don't enjoy a random adventure now and again, because they happen all the time. My priorities have shifted a tad, that's all.

So, ALL that to say, this blog has also experienced a shift. You faithful readers probably know what I'm talking about. Maybe not. Who knows.

How have your priorities changed in this last 5 years?

In other news, this last week has been a rollercoaster. I can't go into too much detail. I do have one story though:

I went to Temecula for a couple days with Ms. Morgan McGannon to visit her family. It was wonderful: swimming, enjoying the HEAT, food, food, food, getting work done (surprisingly), PF Changs with her brother and Oz the Great and Powerful with the rest of the fam. On Saturday night, we babysat three of the neighborhood kids: two sisters named Kassidy and Kaylin and the neighbor boy Shane. These three kids are all under the age of 7 and, in my opinion, the PERFECT age to have an absolute ball. The reason? They're old enough to carry on intelligent conversation, laugh at jokes and tell jokes back, run fast enough to where "freeze tag" is a workout, the list goes on. And they are NOT old enough to be "too cool" for imagination, for fun games, for burning energy, for being overly disrespectful. So, to say it lightly, it was a BLAST. Shane and I teamed up as "the boys" and we conquered a fort, making sure the girls didn't get it, because, well, boys rule, girls drool. But, the evil girls had the ball and we needed to get it. Good thing we had our invisible weapons though because without those the girls would have taken over our fort. The girls had a secret animal and always had secret meetings, so Shane and I grabbed some testosterone and RAGED. We ran around the house, threw stuff, lounged on the couch. Then we watched tv. Here's a pic Ms. Morgan McGannon snapped:

And then, once we settled down, Kassidy and Shane started gettin' all in each others bizness. Ms. Morgan McGannon has the play-by-play (read from the bottom).

Simply fantastic. It was a great weekend. So much learned. Holy cow, so much learned.

In other news, here are some social media snippets from the rest of the week:

Bam boom bing. HERE WE ARE. RIGHT NOW.

Take advantage of every day. Every day is a new day. Every single day is a single new day. A unique day. A day never experienced before. A day that will never be repeated. A brand spankin' new set of 24 hours.

Take advantage of it.

skip_p

2013-03-14T00:04:00.000-07:00

We be cr-azy. If you are a consistent follower of this blog, you will have noticed there was no post last week. Last Wednesday was rather unique. I was given the opportunity to play cajon in the main chapel for the Day of Prayer, a day devoted to prayer. A small band of us led worship for the Biola community, a concept I often take for granted. We were leading our fellow believers in worship to our omnipresent, all-loving God, the Creator of the wind, of emotion, of honesty. Absolutely incredible. Following chapel, I headed to Downtown Disney with Ms. Morgan McGannon to eat lunch with her mom and brother at the famed Rainforest Cafe. This was nothing short of a riot as we experienced Kat, uncooked chicken, and an adventure through a cave to discover the facilities. Following an incredible ice-cream cone from Häagen-Dazs, we ventured through the extravagant hotel that is the Grand Californian; the place is marvelous. After some goodbyes, I headed to Wingstop with some old pals from yesteryear: Mr. Michael Warnecke, Mr. Ben Jacuk, Mr. Ben Coulton, and Mr. Scott Gamelson. We completely obliterated a table-full of wings and felt a good amount of sickness following. Nothing but good times, soo good to chill with the dudes again, felt like freshman year. This is the crew that JAMMED at the Ashley Tisdale concert. And Black Star Canyon. And many many other adventures. Miss those days big.

A picture was taken last Wednesday though, here it is:

Now, THIS Wednesday throws everything for a loop, because it's MISSION'S CONFERENCE. Now, what's so funny and ironic is that EVERY Mission's Conference is SURROUNDED by CRAZY things. Crazy crazy stuff always tends to go down around the conferences here at Biola. Don't understand why, perhaps never will. Here's links the the last 3 years:

2012: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2012/03/paint.html
2011: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2011/03/shack.html
2010: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2010/03/patty.html

This year is no exception. It's been straight nutty over here, but it's been immensely important and growing. SO many great conversations as of late, so many great examples of God's provision through difficult circumstances, incredible circumstances, friendships, relationships, education, creativity, LIFE.

Also, one of the BIG projects this last week was the Mission's Conference Promo:

This video? Quite the wild experience. I will never for as long as live forget the experience of filming this piece of work. We chose to film it in the Tropicana pool, the pool in my former living environment, a pool that is not heated, a pool that has been sitting through the winter undisturbed. Folks, this pool was COLD. We filmed for two nights and it was absolutely frigid, even while wearing full wetsuits. It's hard to explain how cold it was and I honestly don't know why it was. The way I've described it is: the pacific ocean is really cold. But what happens is you, especially while surfing or boogie-boarding or whatever, moving around and there's lots of energy in you and your body and the air and everywhere. There is an adrenaline while in the ocean that keeps you warm. So, in the ocean, it's freezing, you numb up, and then it's a blast. In the Trop pool, there was no energy, it was at a standstill. There was no surfing, it was at a standstill. We numbed up and it HURT. It was unreal, but hey, we got the shots, and the video turned out sweet. Oh, also, it's very hard to hold your breath while under freezing water. 1 second feels like 30 seconds. And then, when you put a bed sheet over your head, the intensity grows. Filming this bad boy was a BEAST. Turned out well. Mr. Cody Ramaekers and Mr. Frank Maldonado joined me in this shenagian. It's a picture of us after we wrapped.

It was so cold. I can't get over it.

Here's some tweets from last week:

LASTLY: My good friend Mr. Patrick Greene married Ms. Alex formerly known as Casey this weekend! This was the first wedding I have attended in which a good friend has been the one exchanging vows. I've been to a lot of weddings in my day but I've never been so excited and so curious on what this wedding would be like.

Okay, I have a story (if you are Patrick or Alex or anyone else at the wedding and you didn't know about this, sorry). I received the invitation a long long time ago. I read it once, didn't look at it again. The ceremony was at 5 in the evening on the 8th of March, 2013 in Camarillo, CA. I told my date, Ms. Morgan McGannon, we would leave at 2:45pm so we would have an hour of wiggle room in case of traffic. At about 2:40pm, I go to look at the address so I could get directions. I look at the invitation: "Ceremony begins at 4 PM." 4 PM?!?! Not 5?! NOOOOO! We leave immediately because if there was absolutely no traffic, we would make it just barely. There was traffic though. A lot of it. So we pull up, walk in. The ceremony had already ended. BOO! BUT, the reception hadn't started, we arrived right in the middle, so nobody knew! Well, maybe not.

So, we missed the ceremony. The worst.

The reception though? FANTASTIC. There were so many of my high school friends there, some of which I haven't seen in four years. It was so good to catch up and relive the "glory days," seein' our bro Pat get married. Super surreal. Ms. Morgan McGannon was a dancing queen, the dance floor was poppin'. There was even a mosh pit of sorts, we were tearin' it up. Such a good night. Can't believe Pat and Alex are married, we're getting older; old, old, older.

Here's some other random events/videos:

WOW. What a post. Certainly was not expecting that. Super dig. Super dug.

Have a pleasant week. Take some time to smell the roses. They're beautiful. And they smell great.

BUYS

2013-02-27T14:03:00.002-08:00

BUYS BUSYU SBYS SBUYSY BSUSYY BSYUY BUYS

Can't talk much. This is a whirlwind of a week. So much has happened, so much is happening, so much is going to happen.

I said I was going to talk about Valentine's Day this week. I can't though. It's a bummer. Maybe next week?

This last weekend, Mr. Dan Mitchell, Ms. Melanie Lott, Ms. Morgan McGannon, and myself headed to Simi Valley to celebrate the birthdays of my sibs Ms. Lacey Lott, Mr. Spencer Lott, and Mr. Connor Lott. Lacey turned 18. Unreal. Connor and Spencer turned 16. Unreal. If this keeps up, I'm turning 45 next week. It was a great weekend. Here's some pictures.

They went to Winter Formal. Happy birthday.

That's all the time I have for today! THIS LIFE IS WILD. Let me tell ya.

Look forward to something this week.

So-cal Media

2013-02-20T15:40:00.000-08:00

GAMETIME. Today I received my first trays of the incredible orthodontia technological invention of Invisalign. I'm rockin' them in this pic. Can't tell? Good.

It's been a crazy week. What's new, you ask? These days, every week is crazy. Taking 6 units is a challenge. Sure, I'm in class two days a week for a total of 6 hours. I have loads and loads of reading, but, you say, it's ONLY two classes. Here's the story: last semester, I had 21 units left to take before I was eligible for graduation. I had two options: take 21 units and become a slave to all things academic OR split the 21 into two semesters to allow room for somewhat of a work/social life. I chose to split my remaining units into semesters of 15 and 6. Sure, it's a tad more expensive, but for the sake of the memories, opportunities, and life experience, WELL worth it. So that's where I sit. 6 units. And BOATLOADS of outside-of-school work. Last week, I told you about Mr. Marc Wymore and his kidney transplant. Here's the video again:

This video has been received fantastically, it's been a privilege to watch Marc's story inspire and encourage over 3000 people in the last 3 days. Marc's sister, Corri, sent me this:

I am SO honored to be able to work on projects that not only are fantastic stories, but share the love of Christ through real life scenarios. Jesus is embedded in so many stories and I am continually seeking to capture those on film. Mr. Isaac Svensson and I are so excited to see what's next.

This week.

I'll let social media tell you a little about this week.

Yesterday:

Valentine's Day (more on this in a later blog):

Other:

And a couple videos:

This is a FANTASTIC&HILARIOUS drum cover of the famous Gangdam Style by America's favorite Korean artist, Psy. This dude is immensly talented, plays traditional, and performs unbelievable satire. The guy is brilliant.

Next: The Harlem Shake. This last week, the Harlem Shake has taken the world by storm. It consists of a 30 second snippet of Baauer's song "Harlem Shake." Let me show you:

And this is my friends, Mr. Ryan Cook, Mr. Sean Cook, Ms. Carley Redpath, and who knows who else.

The Harlem Shake is BRILLIANT. I'll tell you why: With a video like Gangdam style, every other video is an imitation of the original by Psy. No matter what the copy is, it always stems back to the original. With the Harlem Shake, however, no one really knows which is the original. Because they are all amateur quality and super low production value, ANYONE can make one and make it look like it was the original. And, because of this, people can be inspired to make their own by watching the original, a copycat, a copy of the copycat, or a 15 generation copycat. It's exponential. This is HUGE for a viral video and is the primary reason the Harlem Shake as EXPLODED this last week.

Lastly, this video was supposed to be embedded last week, but it wasn't. Bummer. This is an incredible movie trailer with a number of techniques that get my creative juices flowing big time. I dig it. Hope you do to.

And that's the post folks! IMMENSE! Lots of social media this week, hope you enjoyed that. Kind of an interesting way to go about it huh?

Challenge: make all social media posts INTENTIONAL. Form them, write them to document your life. Imagine that!

Valentine

2013-02-13T23:33:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and let me say, WHAT A WEEK for Valentine's Day to fall upon. This picture is a literal representation of walking into the future, time isn't stopping, the days still turn into weeks into months into years. We have phases, seasons.

If you read last week's post, you'll realize real quick it wasn't normal; in fact, it was pretty dark. If you read last week's post, you probably wondered what in the world was going on, what could possibly inspire such a vague, somewhat depressing quip. Well, here's the story:

Last Sunday night, the 3rd of February, there was a bunch of peeps hangin' at my house. At about 10:45 pm, I wanted to show Ms. Morgan McGannon a video as well as our new "chill zone," the garage. We just recently put a few couches, tables, etc. to make the garage a SWEET spot to relax, study, play music, anything and everything you can think of. Now, our lawn has not been maintained so our grass is very overgrown. In fact, here's a picture of it:

Now, Ms. Morgan McGannon was not wearing shoes and did not want to walk through the treacherous grass to the garage. Carry her? Why not. I pick her up, take a step into the abyss of the jungle grass, step into a hole/unevenground/SOMETHING that throws me off balance, I stumble, with Morgan in my arms, and we go down. Morgan's head comes in direct contact with the ground, we both stand up, seemingly alright. She mentions her head hurt, which is normal for someone who is dropped on their head. And then she needs to sit down, and then she is immense pain, and then she can't move her neck at all. WOAH. After some initial tests, she is able to move all of her appendages, which was great, but her neck and head were basically immobile... and in a lot of pain. NOT GOOD. AT ALL. I have been around a surprising amount of neck injuries and if there's one thing to learn, it's that neck injuries are extremely serious and can occur even in the simplest situations, such as being dropped onto grass. Neck injuries need to be treated as a worse-case-scenario because one wrong move and full body paralysis becomes an option. It's one thing to break an arm and assess the situation, it's another thing to mess with the neck. We stabilized her neck as best we could, talked to a number of reliable resources, and had to make a decision: 911.

The ambulance came, and we went. Surreal. X-ray. CAT scan. NEGATIVE. Good news. Strained muscles. Pulled muscles. Time will heal, throw some pain killers in the mix, a few days of intense soreness, and we should be good. However, what should have taken maybe an hour at the ER took 10. We spent all night in the ER, waiting, waiting, waiting. Listening to babies crying, listening to people coughing, waiting, waiting, waiting, listening to beeping, beeping, beeping. It was a LONG night. Mr. Karl Holmlund saved the day by coming to pick us up. Morgan was down for the count, and she would stay out for days.

I took it really hard. I dropped my girlfriend on her head. WHO DOES THAT. I hurt the girl I care for most. WHO DOES THAT. Yeah, it was an accident, I get it. I had little to no control of the situation. I get it. I still beat myself for days. And I'm talking BEAT. And you know who came through? Ms. Morgan McGannon did. She encouraged me so much even amidst her pain. The pain that I caused her. What an example of forgiveness, grace, and humility. Throughout this experience, I was continuously reminded of promises made by my Father in heaven. Even though I mess up, Jesus forgives and forgets, encouraging all the way through. SACRIFICIAL LOVE.

It's a been a week and a few days. Morgan is still in pain. Heatpads, icepacks, medicines, massages, resting. Some days are harder than others, some days hurt worse than others. We had some GNARLY conversations this week. I had some GNARLY conversations this week. I feel like I've matured 5 years, I feel grown up.

But you know what? I have learned SO MUCH. It's been a growing experience beyond belief. You could sit in school for years and never even touch on the things only experience and living through this has taught me. I am legitimately a better man because of the multiple complications that came up in the last week. I've heard them called GROWING PAINS.

Unreal.

#breathe

I have a few videos for you. They're rad.

First, enjoy beautiful music.

Second, Mr. Marc Wymore asked Mr. Isaac Svensson and I to document his miraculous kidney transplant. His sister, Corri, stepped up to the plate and donated one of her kidneys to Marc, a type 1 diabetic who had 10% kidney function left. This is his story.

Lastly, a FANTASTIC trailer. So inspired by this.

And, ladies and gentlemen, that is today's blog post. PHEW. So intense. I am so thankful for Ms. Morgan McGannon. So so so thankful.

Who are you thankful for?

Fragile

2013-02-06T11:12:00.001-08:00

Here's a picture.

This blog post is short because I honestly don't feel like talking a whole lot. It's been a BRUTAL last few days. I can't go into detail just quite yet, so I'll just put it this way:

Be thankful for everything you take for granted. For conversation, for hanging out, for walking around, for taking a stroll. Life's fragile.

future's now

2013-01-30T18:02:00.000-08:00

This is the first blog post of 2013 and the first blog post of the Spring 2013 semester. Take a look at the picture. This is a literal metaphor of looking into the future. The future is rapidly approaching, the future is among us. However, this time "the future" looks a little different. "The future" doesn't look like another semester of school, "the future" doesn't look like the same ol', same ol'. This future looks like NO school, NEW life. I will be graduating at the end of this semester in pursuit of success in the job market. After all, that's what the point of college is, right? A professor put it this way:

"You're about to be fired from your full-time job of 18 years and be forced to figure out how you're going to live. Does that involve finding a new job? Changing living conditions? Changing locations? Good luck."

The time is now. The future is now.

So, this is the first blog post in the last six weeks. When asked to describe my winter break, I have been responding with one word: "short." Yeah, it was six weeks. Yeah, many Biola students think it DRAGS and LULLS and takes just way to long. Me? I could have easily lasted a few more weeks. I've realized this is simply in Lott Family fashion. For my whole life, our breaks have been packed full of trips, adventures, fun, and the like. We travel, we sight-see, we do everything but sit around at home watching television. I'll give you the simple breakdown.

Finals → Wedding → Simi Valley → Reedley → Christmas → Walnut Creek → Simi → New Years → Rose Parade → Biola → IRIS → Ralph B. Clark Park → Long Beach → Young Empress → Temecula → San Diego → Temecula → Simi Valley → Ventura → Pismo Beach → UCLA → Biola → UCLA → First Day of School

Here's the slightly longer version:

After a week of difficult end-of-the-semester final exams, I spent two near-all-nighters editing a wedding video so the couple would be able to have their video in time for Christmas. I then headed to Simi Valley where I stayed for 1 hour before I left with my family to central California to celebrate Christmas with my extended family on my mom's side. After a few days and a lot of fun, we continued north into Walnut Creek to celebrate Christmas with my extended family on my dad's side. After a few days and a lot of fun, we returned home to Simi Valley to celebrate Christmas by ourselves, the immediate family. After a few days and a lot of fun, we experienced New Year's Eve with our long-time friends the Weirs and Gencarella's which led into a observance of the 2013 Rose Parade in Pasadena. I then made my way down to Biola University to participate in the interterm IRIS by speaking about my documentary thisisstuttering to preface the film The King's Speech. This then led into a visit from Ms. Morgan McGannon as we headed to Ralph B. Clark Park. Long Beach was next as Mr. Isaac Svensson and I prepared for a music video shoot the following day for a band called Young Empress, which turned out exceedingly well. I then made my way down to Temecula to visit Ms. Morgan McGannon and her family. We ate at a winery, we enjoyed San Diego, we enjoyed Temecula, we shopped at a mall, we enjoyed relaxing. After a few days and a lot of fun, I returned to Simi Valley to work hard before Ms. Morgan McGannon would visit my family. After a few days and a lot of fun, Ms. Morgan McGannon visited and we toured Simi, visited friends, stayed up way too late with Mr. Sean Cook, enjoyed Ventura, and prepared for our trip to Pismo Beach with my family. After a few days and a lot of fun, my family, along with Ms. Morgan McGannon and Mr. Dan Mitchell, made our way to Pismo Beach to enjoy a few days and a lot of fun, including but not limited to playing football on the beach, Joe vs. The Volcano, Quelf, McClintocks, and The Monster. We then headed back home to Simi Valley, Ms. Morgan McGannon left, and I said goodbye to Simi Valley as I prepared for a documentary shoot involving Mr. Marc Wymore, in which his sister Corri was going to be giving him, a type 1 diabetic since he was 2, her kidney in a miraculous kidney transplant, an evidential example of God's providence and provision. After a few days and my mind being rocked by the incredible intricacies of modern medicine, I returned to Biola and to begin the semester. And here we are. Right now.

Here's a slightly longer version of a specific part: IRIS.

I was honored and curious to speak in front of about 100 Biola students about my life as a stutterer and my film thisisstuttering. To understand the context read this: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2012/12/thisisbig.html. This was the first step of complete vulnerability and honestly in direct response to the release of the trailer to thisisstuttering. It's difficult to put into words how this speaking engagement went, it was an incredible experience. The entire day was preparation for the viewing of the film The King's Speech, "the story of King George VI of Britain, his impromptu ascension to the throne and the speech therapist who helped the unsure monarch become worthy of it." A number of professors spoke on different topics, which led to Mrs. Teri Clemons, a speech pathologist/professor at Biola, to speak about the science of speech impediments. I was then introduced as a "real-life stutterer" and I told my life-story, what it's been like living with a stutter, the challenges, the trials, the learning opportunities. I then showed the trailer to thisisstuttering and talked about the project, the challenges, the trials, the learning opportunities. The audience was then polled for questions, to which I answered to the best of my ability. It was at this point when the significance of this speaking engagement became known. First of all, and this has taken me 21 years to figure out, but God has given me my speech impediment for a reason. I've come to the realization that if this film changes one person for the kingdom of God, then my years of struggle and embarrassment have been worth it. It's easy to blame God for my stutter, "what did I do wrong? Why do I deserve this?" Instead, it's "use this for your glory" and "reach people that would not be reached by any other means." So, I spoke publicly about my deepest, darkest secret. I was vulnerable. Following the Q+A, a number people came up to me, saying things such as "I have never told anybody this, but I'm struggling in this way" or "thank you for being vulnerable, now I will be more intentional and sensitive with my friends." These conversations following the session are what turned this opportunity from "cool" to "INCREDIBLE." God is using this film in ways that are just barely becoming known. This has already been a life-changing experience and I am nowhere even close to be able to predict what is coming next. I can barely even handle it. God's got this.

WHAT.

Here is all sorts of different media things from break. Enjoy.

And that's that! That's the post! Unbelievable. Shout out to Dan Mitchell for taking the last few pictures of Ms. Morgan McGannon and myself. I'm all about them.

Think about your last few months. Think about all the things that made you genuinely happy. Are those things substantial enough to base a lifestyle of them?

Finale

2012-12-19T18:16:00.001-08:00

Today is the final Wednesday of the semester. Today is the final day of the semester. Today was the final day of the semester. I'm going to wake up tomorrow and realize "yesterday was the final day of the semester." Fall 2012 is TOAST and Spring 2013 is fresh bread waiting to be placed in the toaster. It's incredible to think I will NEVER be taking a general education class again, no more classes that I have to take to simply satisfy a requirement. If I choose to take classes ever again in my life, they will be intentionally and beneficially chosen for the sake of personal learning. None of this "oh, I HAVE to take one more science class because I HAVE to or I WILL NOT GRADUATE." None of that.

We're growing up. People are graduating. School is done. School. That thing we've gone to most weekdays of our entire lives up this point. A professor put it this way: "You're about to be fired from your full time job of 18 years." We've been full-time academics, spending our time in schools, in studies, in educational practices. That world is about to be vanquished, kaput, straight toasted. We're about to enter into this thing called the "workforce." Sounds terrififying. But you know what else it sounds like? ADVENTURE. Time's only moving forward.

To all my fellow Biolan's who are graduating, the world is yours for the taking. You have the opportunity to literally, figuratively, and spiritually change this planet if you take the skills you have learned through this point in your life and utilize them. Biola's a good school, they're relevant. You're ready to make an impact on this thing called the "workforce" for Jesus. Let's go. I'm rooting for you. I'll see you in the "workforce" in 6 months. Pumped to hear the stories.

In other news, here's a fantastic .gif:

In other news, here's one of my favorite blog posts of all time. SO RIDICULOUS.

http://emliv.blogspot.com/2011/05/high-five-for-first-kiss-birth-of-viral.html

In other news, here's my families Christmas card:

In other news, here's a fantastic video:

In other news, this week has been ABSOLUTE INSANITY. It's finals week, projects are due. I decided to go above and beyond on a specific Graphic Design book assignment and it ATE my time like a juicy cheeseburger. I've spent probably upwards of 30 hours in the Art Lab, the famed 82, in the last 4 days. And then Ms. Morgan McGannon has just been a twinkle in my eye. She's fantastic.

Here's a few tweets from the week. They're pretty vague. In fact, some are VERY vague, possibly so vague I won't know what they are referring to in the years to come. So, future Morgan Lott, these tweets were somewhat significant this week. BAM.

The joys of social media.

Okay, well, I'm out. I'm taking this girl out of the town tonight. This girl, the one in this picture.

Go outside right now. Look at the sky and how vast it is. IT IS UNBELIEVABLE. The sky goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on. Think about that for a second.

Nicknames

2012-12-12T23:57:00.000-08:00

You remember last week? When I said it was decently significant? I showed you a screenshot of a tweet? Yeah? No? Here's a refresher: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2012/12/thisisbig.html. More on that in a bit.

Folks, it's finals season. This is the time when people start gettin' a lil loopy, the library is WHERE IT'S AT, and sleep becomes a thing of the past. Projects, projects, projects; papers, papers, papers. Finals season is when college gets real. Classes begin to mesh. And whether you want to or not, you have to recall information you have learned throughout the semester to a point where an "A" is deserved. My largest project is an assignment for my Graphic Design Forms I class; a 100+ page graphic design book on an episode of "This American Life," the radio show on WBEZ hosted by the elegant Ira Glass. I chose an episode called "Content Unknown," and I have been enjoying myself thoroughly. Here are three of the 50+ spreads.

So, something big happened last week. It requires some backstory though.

On October 20, 2012, my house, The Bakery threw the FIRST Bakery Dance Party, a party that exceeded all expectations and was a blast and a half. Here's the blog post detailing that event: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2012/10/blog-post.html. At this party, at my house, a number of visitors showed up that the members of our house did not know, which is GREAT. It was cool to open our house up to not only our friends, but to the Biola community at large. There was a certain point when I noticed a certain girl enter the scene, I had never seen her before, and she caught my interest. Huh. I continued dancing to my lil hearts content, shooting photos up the wazoo and happened to snap a few of this certain girl. Here's one of them:

At the end of the party, I noticed this certain girl heading out to leave, so I quickly stopped her and asked for her name. She said, "My name's Morgan." I have to be honest... I didn't know what to say! I must've answered "uhh... me too!" We had a short exchange and that was that. Fast forward a couple days, Ms. Morgan McGannon sees me sitting at the Flour Fountain, she joins me, and we start a conversation that lasts from 10:30am to 3:00pm. I asked for her number. Fast forward a couple days to November 8, I have asked Morgan out and we head to downtown Los Angeles for the LA Artwalk. It's a good time, we cruise around, look at some bizarre art, look at some bizarre people, enjoying each other's company. As we walked around, we stumbled upon this RAD Hyundai hideout with all sorts of crazy things to do, including this wild photobooth that connected directly to facebook. Take a look!

We then took off to Hollywood Blvd, the Walk of Fame, a place you can't go without wild memories being made. It was a late Thursday night, the Walk of Fame was not as crowded as it would be on a Saturday afternoon. Earlier that evening, the film "Lincoln" had premiered at Grauman's Chinese Theater, so the red carpet, large trailers, and the rest of the big kado were being cleaned up, preventing us from experiencing the grandeur of the famed Chinese Theater. We had to walk around it and as we were, we were approached by two gentlemen. They proceeded to ask if we would like to help them out with their web series called "The Dark Knight Retires," the scene would involved the actress (which would be Morgan) getting mugged, and the scene would end. They assured us it wouldn't take long. Morgan quickly agreed, which surprised me, because the two gentlemen did not have a camera in hand, did not necessarily look like filmmakers, and Batman was nowhere to be seen. To make sure these two dudes weren't con artists/muggers/bad guys, I started to lay down detailed questions that con men wouldn't have answers to "What lenses are you shooting on? How many episodes in your websites? What episode is this that we're filming? When does it premiere? What is your medium for release?" They answered these questions without hesitation, so I eased up. Turns out, "The Dark Knight Retires" is a webseries made my "YouTube Celebrity" Mr. Hunter Davis. Here's the trailer for the series:

So, the scene takes place, Morgan does great, and the whole event is hysterical. The shoot finishes with a Taft-Hartley signing and we were on our merry way.

Perhaps my favorite part of this story happened after it was all over; it was when Morgan turned to me and said "This WOULD happen to me, this kinda stuff ALWAYS happens to me!" To which I responded, "I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU JUST SAID THAT. This kinda stuff ALWAYS happens to me too!" If we keep this up, we'll have stories to fill novels to fill libraries. Here's a picture. I was under the impression we were supposed to be "hard" like Batman. oops.

Night ends, Morgan and I keep chat chat chattin'. Chit chattin' a lot. Here's a couple more pictures. And then more chat chattin'.

And then, long, DTR-esque, story short, I take Ms. Morgan McGannon to Pershing Square in downtown Los Angeles to ice skate. You know, we're skating around, the moment came,...

And that was that! So we're all OH-FISH as of what was actually December 6th, and you know what? It's been GREAT! It's a been a whirlwind of a couple days and it's been amazing to think about the process it took to get to this point. Unfortunately, this isn't quite a topic for this blog discussion, but if you're curious about what in the world I'm talking about, ask me and we'll chat. I will say this though: it's been incredible to see God show up within our conversations and within our relationship. She's got a heart of gold and challenges me to be a better person, something that is immensely important to me. The evolution of our relationship has been ridiculously natural and easy... it's difficult to convey over text. I'm way too excited to see what God's got in store for us and that fact that we're both trusting God to guide, discern, and wise us up is, in a word, RAD. Phew. Love it.

Next order of business: THE BAKERY DANCE PARTY 2.0. This was round two. People DUG that last one, they demanded another. We opened up our house, The Bakery, and, well, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves:

TOO MUCH GOOD STUFF. To see the FULL album of SWEATY PICTURES: click: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.304126426364600.65411.279911478786095

I'm literally speechless. We provided music and water and around 270 people showed up to our little house. UNREAL. (By the way, that number was determined by: 150+ leaving through the front door at the end of the night, 11:30. People leaving through the back gate into the driveway, probably around 50. People coming and going throughout the evening, probably around 60-80 [Our most packed moment was around 10:15]). People came for good clean fun, NO alcohol, NO freaking, JUST A BLAST. And when sweat is literally pouring down the walls like waterfalls and dripping from the ceiling like rain, you know it's been a perspirational night.

GOTTA LOVE IT.

And that's the post ladies and gents. It was a big one. This week was HUGE. Unreal. Never would have guessed in a million years. Oh, one last thing, the Bakery Dance Party 2.0 was placed an interesting time. Remember how Morgan and I met during the first one? 2.0 was the day after I asked her to be my girlfriend. The Bakery brings people together.

GOTTA LOVE IT.

Goodnight and good luck.

thisisBIG

2012-12-05T14:53:00.000-08:00

This picture is symbolic.

See that palette, how it's shattered? It's symbolic.

Yesterday was HUGE and I didn't even realize it until it happened. I'll show you why. WATCH:

thisisstuttering :: official teaser trailer from Morgan Lott on Vimeo.

This is the teaser trailer for my documentary, thisisstuttering. This is a project that has been in the works for months (or if you want to get specific, 22 years). thisisstuttering deals directly with my own speech impediment, a stutter that has plagued me for years. The film documents that progress made during the summer of 2012 as I went through another round of speech therapy.

We've been working on it a while, the content is not new. I've seen it all, been editing it, talking about it, working through it. We produced this teaser and it turned out great. I was excited to release it. And then the moment came to make it public. I released the teaser and shared it on facebook, and then IT HAPPENED. At the moment, I became mentally disheveled. I could never have expected what happened and I will attempt to explain it through words. When a person "suffers" from a speech impediment, the automatic instinct is to hide it, to mask it, to deal with it any way possible to prevent people from noticing. We stutterers develop habits to get around certain words, to push through blocks, to avoid potentially dangerous situations. Since I was a kid, I decided I would not let my stutter control me, I would not let it stop me from doing what I wanted to do. Obviously, having a stutter made things difficult, but I tried to push through as best I could. Nevertheless, I never introduced myself as a stutterer, I never associated myself with the problem. People would notice when they noticed and I didn't point it out.

When I released this teaser, a made a MASSIVE realization: I am letting the entire world know I have a stutter, a quality of myself I have been trying to hide with all my might for 18+ years. Unreal. I flipped out, I had to play drums real real loud for a long long time. I laid on the ground. I sighed a whole bunch. My heart was beating nonstop for 3+ hours. And the weirdest part about it was it was COMPLETELY unexpected. Even in the moment of realization, I feel like it was my subconscious freaking out. There are so many complex incricacies to this speech impediemtn that have formed my character and who I am today, many of which I have never processed. The release of this teaser is the beginning of the process of process.

I don't know if my words do the feeling justice. No idea.

When the teaser was made public, I immediately headed to facebook to tell the world. The responses shocked me:

I can't explain the significance of these comments. The response to this project has been simply unblieveable, I'm overhwelmed. The fact so many people are intrigued/interested/curious/loving a topic that is socially so frustrating/confusing/embarrassing/mocked is INCREDIBLE.

I only have one thing to say: I can honestly say I do not have a clue what is going to happen with thisisstuttering. It feels like a volcano getting ready to erupt, it's impossible to know how wide an impact this is going to make. I'm immensely excited and dangerously frightened to see this film take shape.

If you want to keep up to date with thisisstuttering, please visit http://thisisstuttering.com and "like" on facebook.com/thisisstuttering

You'll be hearing a lot about this is the coming months, so GET READY. Unreal.

There are a few other reasons why this week is immensely important, but unfortunately, I can't quite share with public ears.

I'll give you a screenshot and keep it vague, the same why I kept vague on the twitter-sphere.

And here's just a vague phrase to help trigger my memory in the future days/months/years:

Wait 6 months, read, FINALLY, that was easy #mf

And there you have it.

THE BLOG POST OF DECEMBER 5, 2012.

This week be cray, y'all.

Take a trip to somewhere you don't normally go. Hike to the top of a hill. Walk in a ditch. Roll in the mud. Jump on a trampoline. Use a pay phone.

The Climb

2012-11-28T15:55:00.001-08:00

It's Wednesday and it's madness. Registration for classes took place this week. Here's mine:

There are a lot of implications, assumptions, epiphanies embedded within this schedule. First, there's only 2 classes, 6 units. I'm only taking 2 classes next year because that is all I need to graduate. I have two college classes left of my college career, my educational career. This is it, the big kahuna. Also, if you notice, these are both Bible classes. No general education classes, no film classes, no art classes, just straight up Bible. I have heard nothing but GREAT things about these two classes and I am ecstatic to focus, for the first time in my life, on Bible classes. Typically, my art/film classes dominate my schooling, sending the Bible classes to the deep end to doggie-paddle. Not this semester. Bible classes are controlling this swimming pool. Lastly, due to the minimalist structure of this coming semester, there will be more time to take on the world. Personal projects, freelance projects, creative projects will have time to breathe, will have time to fester outside of the educational world. Next semester will serve, as least I predict it will, as a solid transition between the said educational world and the said "real world." As always though, this is all SUBJECT TO CHANGE.

So last week was Thanksgiving. I'm ALL ABOUT Thanksgiving. Here's what I posted on Facebook (I've realized taking screenshots such as this one keys you into the emotion of the actual day, rather than a recollection of the emotion of the actual day, knawatimean?).

Thanksgiving is an amazing holiday. It was great being home, with the fam bam and gram. It was great being away from classes, away from campus. Even though there was oh so much work to be done, being away from classes was a rest in itself. It was a great time of revitalization, eating eating eating, and resting. Thanksgiving is an amazing holiday.

Last week, or should I say two, I mentioned the rock climbing trip, "one of the funnest most bestest trips of my college career." Folks, it really was. Here's why: rock climbing was described to me as both a solo sport and a team sport. Here's why: rock climbing is very much solo, you climb by yourself, you depend on yourself to get to the top. You yourself choose to keep going, to give up, to try a different route, to lunge, to jump, to try again. However, MUCH of rock climbing is the reliance on the belayer, the encouragement by other "teammates" and our teach Dave Bedell, the excitement of everyone when you or another teammate reaches the top. And because of this, everyone on this trip was in it together, everyone made it to the top every time. Seeing "teammates" overcome the obstacles of the rock and their own personal vendettas? INCREDIBLE. This paragraph failed before it even began in describing the authenticity of the trip, words aren't enough. Scratch that, there's one word that described it:

SPEECHLESS.

Here's are photos I snapped. Joshua Tree is beautifully beautiful.

Here's our group, taken by the guy two pictures up.

Can't even begin to describe it. People told me "the rock climbing trip is the best thing ever." I somewhat believed them, but I thought "I'm sure it will be great, but it can't be THAT great, best ever? Naw. There's no way." After I got back, I was the one saying "the rock climbing trip is the best thing ever." Sleeping in tents in 25 degree temperatures, cooking by flashlight, climbing rocks I never thought were climbable, enjoying the company of a FANTASTIC new group of friends. It's too much, too great. THE BEST THING EVER.

This post is complete. It's ended. This the end. Go explore somewhere, somewhere you've never ventured before. Learn something new, try it out, experiment. People don't do that enough.

beeday

2012-11-14T15:45:00.000-08:00

It's November 14th, 2012. The day after November 13, 2012, the day of my 22nd birthday. Birthday's are funky things, I suppose the reason is because it comes once a year, noting the annual recycling of the human body. Once a year, I recognize I am a year older. That's it. I am 365 days older than I was last year. A birthday official-izes that. Nevertheless, it was a good day. I slept in, my three hour class didn't happen, and then I wrote a paper and prepared for a final rock climbing exam. The final went well, although I am BUMMED rock climbing is over (I'll touch on that later). Then I headed to my sister Melanie's house where she so graciously hosted a fun birthday shindig! Friends from all walks of my life showed up and it was a fantastic time of socializing. Side note: seeing friends from one walk of my life meet friends from another walk of my life is pretty fantastic. In the end, my birthday was a good one, people are kind. I wrote this on my facebook last night:

This all holds true.

I also enjoyed returning to the ancient days of my birthday. For my 18th birthday, I tried out a birthday party for the first time since 2001. Check out this motley crew:

Want to see all the pictures from this wild event? Here are the facebook albums, back when facebook albums could hold a maximum of 60 low-res photos. OH, how times have changed.

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.43751987753.68453.714162753

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.43746092753.68445.714162753

This is crazy to look back on as well, the beginnings of my creative voice within graphic design.

The invitation:

And here's the blog post for some fun writingz: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2008/11/18-yo.html

SO, rock climbing. I went on a rock climbing trip this last weekend with the rock climbing PE class at Biola University. I have ONE thing to say (because I will talk, explain, and show pictures of this trip hopefully next week): this rock climbing was trip was one of the funnest most bestest trips of my college career. I'm all giddy, like a little kid. It was SPECTACULAR. I'll tell you about it soon.

Unfortunately, this trip took the entire weekend so I am LOADED with work to do. This will have to be in for this edition of "It's Wednesday!" Thanks for reading. Without you, this blog would still exist but the motivation to write wouldn't really. I am encouraged over and over by you, the reader, to continue utilizing this free web service we like to call "Blogger" to expel and derive and enunciate on short cusps of my life.

You're the best. Keep being the best. Tell someone else they're the best and that they should keep being the best. Then, tell them to tell someone else that they're the best and that they should keep being the best. The cycle continues and all of a sudden the whole world is encouraged (or just really egocentric).

You're the best.

SURPRISE!

2012-11-07T16:00:00.001-08:00

Busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy bee.

It's actually quite absurd. Never before have I been going, constantly, for days, weeks, months. A to-do list that is requires daily pursuit but seems to grow as the days go on. Don't get me wrong, I'm having the time of my life BUT the amount of "stuff" that needs to get done, the petty things, the social things, the school things, the career things, the identity things, the fun things, the annoying things, the required things, the overwhelming things, the underwhelming things, the friendly things, the THINGS. SO MANY THINGS. So many good things, so many necessary things.

Intentionality has become an essential part of my life. Historically, I have had the problem of overcommitting, saying "yes" to to many things. In the last few months, I have been intentional with how I spend my time and YES it has not always worked out as planned. For instance, social media often presents a fantastic way NOT to use your time wisely. This has been an area of struggle for me, so I took note and sought to eliminate the time wasted. I have to be intentional in friendships. If I let it, my schoolwork/funwork/filmwork could EASILY take up ALL my time. I have a deep passion for these artistic mediums and I could pretty quickly become a recluse. BUT, people drive me. Relationships drive me. And you know what the problem is? THERE'S SO MANY GREAT PEOPLE. How does one effectively maintain and grow friendships? Intentionality. In order for a relationship to work, there MUST be intentionality in the mix; spending time, having fun, chattin, livin life, all of the above. If I became a video-monk and festered in front of the computer, all my relationships would fall apart. It's simple. So, that said, balancing schoolwork with funwork with friendwork is no easy task. I've had a hard time with it.

And then, it's ironic, this blog. This blog is a perfect example of a "waste" of time. This blog is not helping my schooling, not furthering my career opportunities, and is encouraging the sit-in-front-of-the-computer side of me. What's funny too is that half the time, I talk about "how much work I have to do" or how "I'm SO overwhelmed with stuff," but yet I have time to "waste" writing these "useless, meaningless" words on some website. With every blog post, I seriously consider stopping. What is the point of this thing? Once a week, Wednesdays, I write about "stuff." Anything. I write on this blog about this blog. What's the point? But here's the thing, and here's what's ironic about the whole deal: this blog has proved itself COMPLETELY worth it TIME & TIME AGAIN. Looking back on old blog posts not only triggers beautiful, fantastic, priceless memories, but also serves as a record of my journey through personhood. Embedded within these lines are thoughts, actions, and ideas about how to live this bizarre thing called life. This public journal, which in and of itself is terrifying, is documenting the life of this crazy dude named Morgan Lott.

Game on.

Know what else is funny? This is a stream of consciousness blog. Nothing's planned, nothing's thought out ahead of time. I start writing and what happens happens. I genuinely was just going to write "Busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy bee." and THAT'S IT. And then, so typically, the words begin flowing and all of a sudden a deep, philosophical blog post is written about the very idea that this blog is a waste of time and I should be spending my time elsewhere. The irony is overbearing. This also needs to be said: WORRY is AWFUL. I am blessed to avoid worry in most situations, you know why? I'm confident God's got it all in His hands. I'm on a track, not to success, not to popularity, not to riches, I'm on a track to strengthen and grow God's kingdom through my work, relationships, family, and everything in between. I trust that this STRAIGHT ABSURDITY OF A LIFE is a training ground, preparing me for what is to come. God's got BIG plans for ALL of us. Worry kills any hope of recognizing those plans.

If you read this far, I commend you. You have just peered into one of the deeper entries of this here blog. REALTALK.

In other news, just yesterday Mr. Barack Obama was reelected to serve a second term as President of the United States of America. I revisited my blog post after t

Have a great day today. Get outside and go for a walk. Any distance. Could be 10 meters. But here's the catch: during your first step, appreciate your ability to walk.

And to those of you who CANNOT walk, get outside anyway. Fresh air is enough rejuvenate any slowing soul. During your time outside, appreciate your ability to even be outside.

Hallow

2012-10-31T15:52:00.003-07:00

Today is Wednesday, October 31. Today is also Halloween, All Hallows Eve. I'm dressed up as an Insurance Salesman. On Wednesday. Everyone dressed up for Wednesday. It's great.

Here's a short history of Halloween.

Short History of Halloween
Just about every culture sets aside a special time to remember those who have died and give reverence to departed ancestors. Halloween started out as that kind of celebration. It has mutated since it came to America. The Mexican version of Halloween is Dia De Los Muertos, Day of the Dead.

Halloween's a pretty interesting holiday. People do weird stuff. People say weird stuff. People wear weird stuff. People think weird stuff. It's also a holiday that transcends age. Last week, we made a late night run to Denny's and a group of Halloween celebrators walked in, all dressed up and "fancy." They were probably late 20s, early 30s. They could have been standing next to the elementary kids who dress up for reading time. Transcends age. People do weird stuff.

Let me tell you something. LIFEIZCRAY.

Don't have much to talk about. Because so much is happening. So many projects to juggle, so many conversations to be had, so many passions to pursue. It's all a mad conglomerate of stuffs, compiling, compounding, abstracting upon each other. It's a world of trouble, it's a world of craziness, it's a world of learning and pursuit and excellence. This is the time for it, right? College? Be pushed further than I could even imagine? And THEN some? Yup.

Here's two examples of what I've been working on. I've been digging them BUT there's bunches and bunches of work to be done.

Here's a poster for the All Student Art Show that has been showing on campus all this week.

AND SleepTalk100 was shown at the gallery which was an unprecedented honor.

Have a merry Halloween everybody. Eat some candy, down some sugar, celebrate a straight up bizarre holiday.

GOTIME

2012-10-24T17:35:00.002-07:00

RGB. My life is engulfed in creative speak. I live, dream, speak in creative terms, I have conversations all day about creative things, I work on creative projects all day every day. It's almost overwhelming. Scratch that, it IS overwhelming, it overwhelms most aspects of my life. Film, graphic design, photography, music; these four creative fields DOMINATE my days. Today I wore RGB, red green blue, the additive color mode that infatuates most mediums outside of print (all hail CMYK). The combination of the primary colors of red, green, and blue, will make up any and every color you can think of. That said, as college is slowly coming to an end, I'm realizing that the reds, the greens, and the blues of life, three categories that have NO REASON knowing each other, are coming together. Things that have been taught to me since I was a child are now becoming very important. Habits I have developed over time now matter. My interests I have developed, practiced, and perfected in these last four years of college are all of a sudden going to be what I base my livelihood after. RGB. They're coming together. Becoming 1. And I'm only 21, almost 22. I've got four words.

WHAT IN THE WORLD.

Life's crazy. These last couple weekends have been MADNESS.

CRAZINESS ENSUES

Last Saturday: Pumpkin Patch.

Ms. Alyssa Morris and Ms. Bree Kather had a brilliant idea: go to a MASSIVE pumpkin patch, get lost in the corn maze, watch pumpkins get launched into space, search for the PERFECT pumpkin, and then carve that perfect pumpkin. And that's exactly what we did. Ms. Alyssa Morris, Ms. Bree Kather, Mr. Michael Warnecke, Mr. Joel Limbauan, and myself headed to Tanaka Farms in Irvine, CA to this big ol' pumpkin patch. There was this WILD corn maze with all sorts of WILD kids running all around it. There was this pumpkin cannon that launched pumpkin rejects into a barren hill (the pumpkin canon guy was great, way too enthusiastic for his own good). There was THOUSANDS of pumpkins, many of which were not suitable pickings for the PERFECT specimen we were looking for. Nevertheless, "perfect" is hard to come by, virtually impossible, so we had to settle for less. We then went back to Ms. Alyssa Morris' house where her mom prepared a FANTASTIC soup-in-breadbowl dinner for us, a dinner we did not deserve. As the night continued, Mr. Ben Jacuk joined us, we ate candy, and carved pumpkins (the girls provided WILD accessories like glitter and paint to decorate the pumpkins, two materials I had never considered using before). I may include pictures at some point, they haven't been uploaded to Instagram yet, so I can't quite spoil the experience. Overall, GREAT day/night.

Last Sunday: Film Festival.

Last second, I was asked by Mr. Alex Sparks and Ms. Cherith Simmons to design the credits for the short film "Two Car Garage and a Swimming Pool." So I did. And I dug them. And they dug them. "Two Car Garage and a Swimming Pool" screened at SPIFFest, the San Pedro International Film Festival. I was invited... as the title designer.... I'm not complaining! It was a great time, super super random, there were some BIZARRE films that screened, the most bizarre, in my opinion, ended up winning an award. Eh. We played hard.

Afterward, Mr. Taylor Moore's mom treated us to a nice dinner aboard the Queen Mary cruiseline! We were dressed to impressed for the Film Fest, might as well go somewhere where dressed-to-impress in a requirement. Great people, great food, great venue, great memories. Thank you Mrs. Moore.

Last Monday: Birthday Party.

Ms. Missy McAllister turned 21 on Monday. Ms. Giselle Gonzalez had a brilliant idea, "Let's celebrate Missy's birthday by going to the beach for sunrise!" So we did. 5:30 am, we took off from school, headed down to Huntington Beach and enjoyed the slow light crawl that is sunrise. It's true, the sun does not rise over the ocean BUT being at the ocean during sunrise is still a wonder in itself. There was this great pre-morning mist that inhabited the atmosphere, the air was crisp, the waves were being ROCKED by surfers of all shapes and sizes. It was Ms. Missy McAllister's birthday. We then headed to this small breakfast join called the "Sugar Shack" and enjoyed a nice warm breakfast at a ridiculously early hour. Definitely a good time, definitely a tiring time, and we got back just in time for class to start! HUZZAH!

Friday: GYRAD

Gyrad. Get Your Roommate A Date. This is a Biola tradition that, in my opinion, is an absolute blast. Here's the objective. Get Your Roommate A Date. Simple. It's popular among dorm life, I went on a few my freshman/sophomore years. Then I moved off-campus. I haven't even heard of GYRAD in two years. And then I was asked on one, and I said "YES, OF COURSE!" I love these things and here's why. They're just fun, a good ol' time with more often not a member of the opposite sex that you do not know. It quality time to get to know another human being. A lot of people do not like GYRADS, perhaps it's because they take them to seriously. Perhaps it's because they think they are lame and boring. Let me tell you something, even the most riveting and life-changing, fun things can be "lame and boring" if you put your mind to it. Likewise, even the most lame and boring things can be "riveting and life-changing" if you put your mind to it. All that said, I super dig gyrads.

So, Ms. Rose Peterson asked me if I would like to go with her roommate Ms. Addi Esson and I was all about it! The gyrad was as follows: BIGGER OR BETTER. Start with a penny, go around the neighborhood(s) and ask "Do you have anything bigger or better than this that you would like to trade?" If yes, they trade and you have a new item. Fun game. A group of four of us, Ms. Rose Peterson, her boyfriend Mr. Michael Morton, Ms. Addi Esson, and myself set off to conquer this game. We ran into all sorts of interesting folks, the best being a woman moving out of her boyfriends house. They were both snapping at each other as he was trying to find something to give us. She kept calling his house junk, that we could literally "take anything because it's all trash." We ended up getting a LARGE dog house from the gentlemen as the woman drove away with all her belongings on a AAA truck (those guys come in all emergencies apparently). The dog house ended up being the largest item of the gyrad, so we won in the size category! Super fun, lots of good laughs, good memories, solid gyrad, always a fan.

Saturday: Bakery Dance Party

So the house I live in, it's called the Bakery. Many, if not all, off-campus houses have a house warming party of some sort, welcoming in friends, acquaintances, and random people into their homes to enjoy and experience the space. The Bakery wanted to throw and dance party AND THAT WE DID. There are many reasons why this party was a massive success. 1. We kept it DRY. 2. We kept it CLEAN. 3. We kept it BUMPIN'. 4. We kept it SWEATY. People had a BALL. It was so so much fun, so so much high temperatures, so so much sweat. BUT people had a BALL. I could go into the logisitics, but in a way, it needs to be kept secret so the next party can ROCK THE WORLD. SO fun. It's been talked about everyday since. I talked with Mr. Kyle Norman and Mr. Cody Ramaekers for a straight hour about how fun it was. It was JUST FUN! Can't wait for the next one. Here's some of my favorite shots from the night:

THIS ^ is a PERFECT example of how the hosts of the party should be hosting the party BEFORE IT EVEN STARTS.

AND BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.

That's the post, ladies and gents. WHAT. A. LIFE. WE. LEAD.

Do something you've never done before this week. Watch the sunrise. It's beautiful. Watch the sunset LITERALLY watch the sunset. Sit there and watch the sky turn colors. Watch it all. And love it.

Confliction

2012-10-17T15:58:00.000-07:00

Coming soon.

Punky

2012-10-10T16:11:00.001-07:00

It's Wednesday. Certainly is. It's Wednesday again. And again.

Today's clothing styles is symbolic. Exactly a year ago, the clothing styles were the same. Take a look: http://emliv.blogspot.com/2011/10/storytime.html. This is important, it is INCREDIBLE how much happens in a year. We look the same, we dress the same, but we're a year older and a year wiser. This is when this blog comes in real handy (I've debated quitting this thing many a time); it allows for an opportunity to remember, reflect, and learn from the past. It's crazy to see that a year ago, Mawwiage Films was finishing up it's first summer and how far we have come since then. It's crazy to see that a year ago, the SWAGTACULAR video had just been released:

SWAGTACULAR // The Chaos from Morgan Lott on Vimeo.

This video was the BIG one. It legitimately changed my life. I began to see life differently, I approached filmmaking in an ENTIRELY new way, I had been exposed to an entirely new world creatively, relationally, and personably. This experience set me on a new path school-wise, career-wise, and turned me into the person I am today. This was a year ago. 1 year.

School's been nuts STRAIGHT UP but it's been fun as well STRAIGHT UP. Last week was Punk N Pie, Biola's annual talent show. I was part of a group called Hau Fun, led by the multi-talented Ms. Sarah Hau, covering "Some Nights" by fun. This was A BALL. So so much fun, so so much energy, so so much sweat. It brought me back to my drumline days and it was FANTASTIC to be back. Running 4 bars over and over, marking time, the whole shebang. Such a blast, so loud. And let me tell you, if you want a GNARLY forearm workout, beat the living daylights out of a turned up kick drum with a mallet with all your might. Enjoy the show!

Here's a picture the multi-talented Ms. Caitlin Helms snapped. JAM ON.

PLUS. My fam bam came down for Biola Weekend and were able to experience this madness! The college kids cooked dinner for the fam bam and it turned out delightful. Delicious.

AND, just for good measure, here's the video from our performance last year. JAZZERCISE, this group went down in history. It's difficult to beat it, definitely difficult.

WOW WOW WOW.

I'm speechless. Love it.

So that's it for this week. Some nice recollections. Punk N Pie is always fantastic. This year's was better than the rest. I heard it said that previous year's talent shows felt like high school talent shows. This year, high school was left in the dust. A FANTASTIC lineup, most of the acts original and surprising. And letting the audience vote for the winner? Definitely a good move. Will the REAL winner please stand up? Taking away the judges and letting the crowd decide worked out very very well.

Do something fun this week. Get crazy, go wild, do something out of the ordinary, throw a spin on your week, GET NUTTY.

Bye, folks.

Conflicting colors

2012-10-03T15:33:00.001-07:00

WILD TIMES WE LIVE.

Ms. Norma Santamaria told me I should randomly choose items to wear for this Wednesday. So I did. And then I realized some interesting symbolism. Check it out: conflicting colors: teal and blue. They're close, but definitely not the same. They don't go well together. They're close, but definitely not the same. In the last few weeks, I have been exposed to a number of young, creative 20 y/o's who are creating content that is simply unbelievable. The amount of potential I have seen in people my age has inspired, terrified, and humbled me to the utmost. These people are the teal, I am the blue. My work is close, but definitely not the same as some of these unbelievable creative's. It doesn't match... but it's close. Should it match?

This week has been pretty wild. Due to awful sleeping habits, my body gave me a wake-up call and gifted me with a fabulous case of the common cold. Way too many Kleenex later and a rad video shoot at the Ronald McDonald House in San Diego, I headed home to Simi Valley for a sunrise music video shoot with my pals Mr. Kelii Miyata and Mr. Brent Rowley. Sunrise is CRAZY. It literally lasts 15 minutes. At 6:25am, it's dark. At 6:30am, the sun begins it's rise. At 6:45am, IT IS COMPLETELY LIGHT. Don't blink. We got some pretty great footage, Mr. Brent Rowley's a natural.

I admit, I'm a tad lackadaisical. It might be because I still have awful sleeping habits. And I woke up at 10:30am this morning, realizing that my 10:30am class was starting, realizing I had zero seconds to get to class, realizing I was going to be late for class, realizing that is ALWAYS a big bummer. When mornings start in this fashion, it throws the whole day into a gnarly funk.

I'm experiencing this funk.

Have a bless-d day, encourage someone, laugh with someone, get serious with someone, dig down deep with someone, get witty with someone.

LAUGHS! from Everynone on Vimeo.