Security

Nobody probably notices this stuff but me, but I am an architect and I am pretty observant. And I am probably partly crazy. Oh and I spend a lot of time in public bathrooms. Ever notice that the only place you see non-reversing security screws are in public restroom stalls? Probably not. But I am guessing people want to be most destructive when they have a few minutes to just sit and relax and tamper with things; and bathroom stalls are their favorite things to tamper with apparently. "Just sitting here with my screwdriver... might as well take apart this stall door."
Check it out next time. I've never seen these anywhere else.

New stuff I am working on at work

This is a project I am working on at work for a developer in the city. It's been a pretty fun project so far. It's an 80 some unit apartment building along South Street and Broad Street. Hopefully it goes through. It's been approved through zoning and should be approved by city council in the next few weeks. It's still in the very early stages and will probably change significantly. Pretty exciting though. Click on the images to enlarge.

first stab at a lobby

lobby

New Sketches

Chinatown YMCA

Zoning Committee Hearing

Locust Bar

Collingswood Theater

Tortilla Press

Rules Committee Hearing City Hall Chambers

Novel idea

I am sure this isn't a new idea and I'm sure someone has thought of it before, but I thought about it again last night and thought it was really funny still. I think it would be a great idea to open up an Irish bar called Shaquille O'Neal's. Like fancy kelly green script lettering outside... all irish gimmickery inside. beads, shamrocks, the works. No allusion to Shaquille O'Neal whatsover. And if it really took off, it would be equally funny to open up another bar right across the street called Donovan McNabb's. Same thing.

bathroom thoughts

Why do people care so much about when/if/or how frequently someone takes a shit? Maybe it's not that they care about it but it seems to be something that everyone has an opinion about. For example: "Oh, you go every morning?" "You go twice a day?" "Some days you don't go?" "Oh, I go as soon as I wake up and right after my morning coffee." "I have a schedule." "I hate vacation, it throws off my whole schedule." "Let's not schedule that meeting for eight o'clock if you know what I mean." "You gotta go again? Jesus!" "Sometimes I go four times a day!"
But no one really seems to care either way about someone's pee schedule. People just pretty much go whenever they feel like it and no one gives them any shit about it.

Cabs

I got into a cab the other day for work and this was in the window. I thought it was pretty harsh. The cab driver was pretty cool, but I wanted to be like.."dude, lighten up. No hugging? Fuggkk." He left out some pretty disgusting things that apparently he deems permissible though. Interesting. I should have gone through a whole list of things that he could add. It could be called the Sit Still cab.

Never fails

I like to think that I have a pretty good and diverse music collection. I have cool friends, what can I say. But I'll hand someone my ipod and say "just play whatever... it's all my music, so I am going to like it." They'll inevitably pick something like Miley Cyrus Party in the USA. I don't really have a problem with that. I mean, I do kinda like that song. Admittedly it was a guilty pleasure of mine. It's not like I am listening to it every few days or anything. Or they'll be like "damn..... you have a lot of Madonna, wtf!?" I mean, it's not like she didn't have a hundred hits. I'm sorry but if you have the Immaculate Collection you automatically have 40 Madonna songs. Just never fails that I'll hand someone my ipod and they pick out the three songs I would like least like to listen to.

Life isn't so easy anymore

I had a friend over recently and I was just doing some last minute things around my house so I told her to make herself at home while I finished up whatever I was doing. I handed her the remote and she politely declined. Luckily, like everyone else she had a smartphone and could easily entertain herself. I realized then that she probably just didn't want to bother with the complicated nature of watching tv these days. I can't watch tv anywhere but my own house honestly. Someone hands me a Comcast remote, forget it. Maybe I know how to work one of their remotes but if it's the other remote that I'm not familiar with, no chance. Do I press "all on" or do I press "TV ON" then "cable on"? Power ON? Cable ON, then TV ON? Do I turn up the volume on the Comcast remote or on the stereo remote or the actual TV remote? You have Dish network? I don't even know what a Dish remote looks like. Fios? Do I press STB? If I press power is it going to F-up your whole set up? Do I change the channel on the Comcast remote or will that mess up everything? Oh you have one of those all inclusive 300 dollar radio remotes. You have the charge it? WTF? Can't we just have a TV that integrates the box into the tv and just have one remote that has six buttons? Power, channel up and down, volume up and down... and netflix. play/pause. fast forward/rewind. What am I forgetting?