I started a blog on blogspot. You can find it here: rabbit hole

I've been productive lately, spending a few hours at school each day, even when it officially hasn't yet begun. I'm making a new photo series, well, I made one photo, and am waiting for inspiration.

In the meanwhile I:
- read about mysterious serial killers and strange disappearances on the internet
- try to avoid doing the dishes
- do a bit of photoshopping
- browse online bookstores
- read gossip
- feel a bit feverish
- try to make a few websites
- watch Woody Allen movies
- plan my life one year ahead (and that's it, I promise)
- compare postcard printing services

I am in Paris. It's lovely, of course. Not too hot, but still I still got sunburnt in Versailles. We found a little farm in the back of the gardens. We skipped Louvre and the whatnot this time, but executed our tourist duties in La Defense, and the Garden of Tuileries, and gallery hopping in Marais. And standing in line for the Catacombs was a blast. I regret not taking my cheap Bratz doll camera with me. It's good for touristy shots.

I also bought a little book called "Simple Diary", with fill in diary entries that are a bit weird but eye-opening.

I will leave for France on Wednesday. I wait for summer all year long, but July is always unbearable - humid, lazy, transitional, the time when you think of how much fun dressing up in warm sweaters is.

This July I haven't been doing much. I've been visiting Central Finland, the weather there, the town fair and a summer in the forest. I've been going to school a bit, for days of silkscreening, film developing and printing. I've been to some art exhibition openings, and to bicycle trips to the wet suburbs with nothing but a dated mall. A few times I've been getting lost in a recreational forest park place, with so many routes and too little orienteering abilities. It's fine if you're listening to an audio book about the Appalachian Trail at the same time.

Most of all I've been having lazy afternoons of DVDs, indie films, the internet and trying to come up with meals with no hot ingredients, so you can eat them inside. I've been sewing a bit, and cleaning up and perusing ebay ordering cameras. I've gone through three cellphones this summer and I'm out of free film processing and interesting bookstores that Edinburgh had. I've been reading foreign magazines and waiting for autumn and next year and graduating and an American summer. I've been scanning some film I forgot about.

I haven't been to the cinema that much, mainly because all the films that they currently show, I already saw in Scotland in the winter. And I miss Boots, such a lovely place. And the patisseries.

Summer has kicked in, I'm not bored anymore! For the past few weeks, I've been tutoring my school's entrance exams (for money!), assisting an artist with a shirt installation (seen in Tampere this summer), making some sappy colour prints in the darkroom and getting ready to silkscreen some make-believe wallpaper. I guess I like coming home at 8 p.m. after a busy day. Now I'm sort of in between projects. I have some silkscreening to do next week, some things to sew, get all my summer photo gear and maybe scan some film. Then, I'm leaving for Central Finland for the Midsummer! We will be away for a week or so, enjoying my childhood sightscapes, some summer living and the midsummer sales with my mum. Then we'll spend some time in the village of Keuruu, doing more summer living and badminton.

I've come up with a lot of new project ideas lately. And I don't feel like reading any other artist's CV as of now, mine's impressive enough for the time being. I'm organizing all my film strips in three folders and hopefully scanning some more soon. Next week I'm going jogging again! I guess it's finally time after all this ice cream, at least the pizza was homemade today. And I'm waiting for a package in the mail... Does life get any better than this?

Once, again, almost bored to death. I can't wrap my mind around the fact that not so long ago I felt like doing things and making them up and going places instead of being a nerd at home all day. And I was working the whole day today, got back at 8 p.m. and felt bored in a matter of minutes. A change of scenery is what I wouldn't mind but it's not going to happen. In the meantime, I'm enjoying my lost moments on flickr.



Fortunately, I have scheduled work and project meetings for the next three days, and well, on the weekend you always feel less guilty for doing nothing. But I need to shoot some film in the next 7 days. And maybe play some computer games (do people still say that?), read vintage horror, organize a drawer or two, scan some travel pictures... Come up with a project, stop worrying about the more active people, go jogging, go see mum.

It's hot and humid and heavy and what a feeling is it to be thirsty all the time, eat only pasta and bread and Weetabix. I feel quite bloated and my legs are sore from sunny shoes and no exercise. I guess I will have to start jogging for real or something. Maybe rollerskating.

I got over the chronic boredom period, and I actually have plans for the next few weeks. This week, I'm working at my school's entrance exams as a tutor - basically just hanging around, trying to smile compassionately, showing the way to different rooms - and next week I'm assisting in a hanging of an exhibition.
I'm planning on buying a real camera of my own! I have a digital SLR, a 35mm film SLR and some pretty little oldies, but I might actually be ready for a medium-format old time fellow.
The heatwave is just like the dead of winter - you can't really do much, you're exhausted so you feel better about the future.

And it seems, so am I. I haven't done anything worthwhile for two weeks. The lack of deadlines and ongoing projects just makes me want to sit inside all day browsing social networking sites, watching Sex & the City and updating Flickr... I might send an occasional semi-work-related e-mail and go to an exhibition opening but that's it. Most of the time I'm bored out of my mind. So I have been reading about crime and suspicious disappearances, I have been reading the trivia sections on IMDb and frequenting the current offer pages on package holiday travel agents' sites.

Boredom isn't good for me. My boredom mode is absolute; I can't bring myself to do the dishes, organise the wardrobe let alone anything substantial. I go into a place where time stands still and you just have to get through it somehow. I had big dreams about completing projects and feeling free and creative upon my return to Finland but I'm back in the grey area which makes me feel totally useless and panicky about succeeding and participating and scraping up quick projects to submit to seemingly important art shows. I don't even like participating that much.

Summer has been like this for me for a few years now. I'm too lazy to get a real job so I do school projects and trainee stuff I don't care that much about. And I just do nothing for weeks on end. Maybe assure myself I'm vaguely planning something, which often is totally irrelevant anyway. I need some willpower to get out of this. Maybe, tomorrow.


And to anyone who might be interested, see some of my photos on my flickr page:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/36061106@N02/

It doesn't get better than this. Moomin trolls flying in the sky... Oh I dread the applications for funding and such and cv's, statements, the copycat mindset. I want to move to another country. But then again, the Finnish summmer is ok and I can use school amenities and get mail order film processing and actually, I'm not bad for having done so little.

Things I'm gonna do this summer:
- lots of biking and exploring
- swimming in the lake
- darkroom stuff and stuff with light, too
- miscellaneous co-operative projects
- frequent the market and get some fresh flowers and straberries
- go to boring small towns

My day has been substantial. Idle hands and boredom. That's what makes you get up at seven and go to school even when you don't have school. I managed to get all my print mounting supplies but still I lack Hello Kitty stationery. This makes me miss being in Edinburgh and wandering around. It was mostly overcast and a bit unreal, but I miss the seaside and the smell of salt water. To go bird spotting in Musselburgh again, and mussel spotting and see the sulphur plains. I took seven rolls of film that day and processed it for free and they don't even do processing anymore here. Sucks.

I'm out of inspiration but I wrote a little four chord song about melancholia. The piano is desperately out of tune. I really miss my time abroad so I'm glad to complain about everything online, as I don't really feel like complaining to my friends. It's not their fault Finland is what it is. And it's supposed to be spring but not a flower in sight. I'm looking forward to First of May, though, it means going out with a camera and picnics and sparkly things and colours. I'm proud of my new photographic mindset.

I'm looking for a survival guide. I'm kind of over things in a way but my stress management skills are maybe worse.

Being back in Finland has been a bit disappointing, especially today. We went to see the town, to drop off some of my London film for processing, but they were over the whole film thing and had gotten rid of their machine. And the other place that still does processing is not your money's worth since you get the film back with extra fingerprints and scratches. So I guess it's mail order from now on.

We also wanted to pay a visit to the record shop that had been there for more than five years and now it was just gone. And it was hot and humid with nothing interesting in the book store, just dead ends, dead air.

I'm on the brink of finishing a project and it's not a happy place to be. My mind keeps going in circles - where do I get the print finishing supplies, how early do I have to wake up tomorrow, do I have to take phone calls next week... My to-do list keeps on getting longer, like the days, and thus, the hours for responsibilities. The summer climate keeps things light, yet at a distance and out of focus. Like my other eye, which I need to have checked.

I guess it mostly comes down to a deep-grown urge of having something to dread at all times. Having a possibility of failure, with the likelihood of a sudden tornado, though. Being prepared for the worst, they like to think, but it's just being prepared for the dread that you don't really want to be prepared for, but it's better to be prepared than to be suddenly stricken by shock, you like to think but you know you're wrong because you can take it, take the pep talk.

I'm just in time for the anxiety to kick in. I can't tell the time based on natural light conditions anymore, I can't tell which season it is as it's unseasonably warm outside. I'm not sure about the era, either, is this the lazy kind, the productive kind, the mess-in-your-head kind? The kind you go shopping for stuffed animals on? And to me, it sounds perfectly natural to end a sentence with a preposition.

We live on the southside now, so during day it gets humid and heavy. I draw the curtains on and mellow. My crayon box is getting lighter by the day with pencil shavings everywhere like ambrosia I wish. I don't really know my town by heart, like I know places I grew up around. My psychogeographical view of this place is very limited. I like the big windows and our apartment. We moved two floors down to a bigger one.
I only have two days to finish a set of drawings for an exhibition and I wish it was over already. I want to go and have fun with the film scanner and see all that's left of Scotland for me. I cross processed and light leaked and accidentally got the film a bit dusty. I want to go to cities like New York and Miami and see the colours and lack of them. I like having cameras around.

I want to read Trainspotting. In Edinburgh, I lived in those streets, though less heroin-ridden they seemed to be now than they were before.

A spring term spent in Scotland in student exchange, a month of fever-related on and off sickness and an ear infection and I'm back to the basics. I picked up some of the accent there, but I feel like I need to brush up on my English skills a little anyway. Dust days indoors don't really compare to my international adventures, but I get things done, slowly. Crayons, DVDs, bad and expensive food...

I really liked Edinburgh and the suburbs and the river nearby and the villages. And Polaroid film at Boots and everything else (except for rye bread). And I went to Dublin and London - where I spent the last few days horizontal with the fever and painkillers, and the painkillers come in cute boxes.
Now it's just Finnish everywhere and rude people all over. And the totally unexpected nausea from sugar, the usual. I took lots of pictures there and took advantage of the film processor in the school. And of course the Polaroid. I saw things for the first time - like a fox, a motorcycle on fire, wild geese, tidal islands... I feel wiser and more secretive.

The problem is trying to adapt to my old ways, or rather the environment. I guess I'll go out on biking trips with the cameras and try and bake some cheesecake once I get over the things I need to get done in a few weeks. Summer is always unbeatable.

This week I have been around bubble wrap and phone calls, printing out instructions and posters. I hope it all turns out somehow less troublesome than angry librarians and lost packages. I plan to lose my headaches for the rest of the week, maybe deal with some press releases or something.
These endless summer nights have been about camera-hunting rabbits and a hedgehog, who dwell in the lost oasis nearby. The panorama camera I got from my boyfriend's mother has revealed its secret heartache glamour and I'm in love.

I'll have some more work next week (and the one after that), I'll be tutoring at the entrance exams in my school. Those poor artists-to-be, I hope they won't leave with their mind shattered and souls torn, like some people. Surely everything works out. I can deal, I do okay with people, not everyone will mess up, the transport system doesn't usually fail, people know how to use phones, I sound cheery enough, my work's okay, I have a rabbit and there's chili chocolate, too.

When I go to art museums, I pay needless attention to the artist's year of birth in that tiny white note beside the piece. And the years are approaching mine, and it feels like the end of the world. When I meet 1987 I must be done. I must be late by then, hopelessly behind on everything. Not one good project have I finished until now, and I've had time to play boys' computer games and stitch pieces of colourful fabric together.

I came across some online portfolios of photographers, born in 1986! I only have one year! And I feel horrible having to pay 7 euros for developing one roll of 35mm, and I don't have a theme, I don't have a project. I've lost inspiration, because well, the art world says it doesn't really exist. "It's supposed to be fun, yet comment on the very structures of society and the art context." Or "You will fall in love, you're not supposed to make up your whole life when you're in your early twenties." I like this one better. Being in love with something, haveing a vague word to describe a feeling to capture, not being just clever but substantial. Knowing French, going to the gym, writing essays about films and discussing psychology with my mother; I guess I can handle this.

It seems that the inverse to-do lists make me quite comfortable, so today I took part in the boring list of following activities:
I stopped by the post office then headed to school to print some colour channels for my next silkscreen project. With the world so sunny and all, I went to see a photography exhibition (the best of last year's visual journalism) before heading home. And I didn't go home, but to browse some art supplies and I bought three pencils (one was turquoise green and one metallic pink).
Today I also studied some American photography theory and (this is what I'm most proud of) actually worked on my summer (or forever) project and found several possibilities for the exhibition space and even used my wide network of one regarding the project. Plus it seems so much better now, the whole exhibition. Not just my artwork.

Still, the art market out there seems hopeless. Maybe I'm in the wrong school, but they simply will never be all over me. And I don't have any good ideas to work on anyway. But at least it's semi-sunny.

I completed most of my to-do list today, and my summer job is a bit more massive than I thought. Lots of phone calls, and PhotoShop (yay!), DVD-making, maybe even travelling... It sounded intimidating at first, but now it's kind of lovely. Tonight we're watching House and munching!

I didn't find a tiny light bulb, but my portfolio's as good as new, I have an idea for my next silkscreen project, I read through the March issue of Art in America (well, it's mostly ads anyway), and then discussed the exhibition project I must now manage, promote and give my firstborn for. Oh, I feel productive and accomplished, I even picked up a little pink shirt at the flea market, missed lunch and dinner and got a headache but a friend at school was extra nice and I feel less silly now. Oh the spring!

I might just shoot my dollhouse photographs next weekend, if I find a tiny little light bulb, and can figure out a way to expose without using the flashlight and focus. Fortunately I have some paid work to do over the summer, and some other intern possibilities. And I'll still have time for orange juice, boring afternoons and such.

Easter candy's gone, there is a deadline for getting dressed and chores, running errands and meetings. I'm going to just rest for a while, then go to school with pictures to print, maybe look for that light bulb shop nearby, read the camera magazine, print out some new material for the portfolio, then discuss my summer responsibilities, then take pictures for a drawing due this week, then I don't know, cook!

We had a school trip today, a tour of five or six art galleries. I liked some. I got a little job, for a month in the summer or so: promoting and handling the exhibition we had in the autumn. Very useful of me. The coursework from the last few months is still unfinished, but I'd just rather move on, enjoy photography and forget any useful comments about my work that will only get me down. On top of it all, I've come down with a cold, too, and I feel like drowning in blankets and reading some Harry Potter, maybe smunching on a cookie or two.
My portfolio is pathetic!