“katharine miller”

look, i spend a lot of time on the internet. if i’m not sleeping or commuting or running errands, i’m on the internet.

if you type my name into Google (provided you spell it correctly or Cmd+C/Cmd-V the title of this post), i am the first four results. i don’t know how this is possible. this is through no web-magic or specialized SEO on my part. i am spectacularly unpopular in real life. i only have 16 followers on Twitter and half of them may be ‘bots.

my name is a fairly common name, even as k-a-t-h-a-r-i-n-e. it is not rare and exotic like Obba Babatundé. i am not famous or well-known or particularly accomplished. so, what gives internet? what sets me apart from all the other Katharine Millers in the world? can it be that i’m the most web-savvy? i’ve had web presence the longest? maybe one of my stalkers works for Google?

if you know the answer, feel free to share. knowing how i got to the stop of the list may help me manage my personal brand in the future (and whether blog entries about costumes involving dropped undergarments boost or hinder my popularity).

katharine hearts the ipod touch

i’m a little late to the iphone/ipod touch party. that happens sometimes. i didn’t switch from tapes to CDs until 10 years ago (but i glommed onto MP3s almost instantly). but now i’m here and waving my Apple flag proudly.

i love that the iTouch (dirty and wrong! i don’t care!) can replace my PDA, laptop, and iPod shuffle.  and i’m addicted to downloading applications.

on a recent tour of a local ad agency, we were given a little presentation on the importance of interactive media in design and advertising. and how the iPhone (and similar gadgets) opens up the possibilities. supposedly we’ll have the capability to scan a bar code on an ad, go directly to the company site, find the item in the ad, order it, and find the nearest location to go pick it up. you can buy a car while waiting in the transit shelter for the bus! hooray for the future! it’s no jet pack, but it’ll do.

with the iTouch, i’ve been downloading video podcasts to watch on my commutes and apps to keep me occupied otherwise. the downer is that a lot of the apps are wifi-dependent. no wifi, no access. but when there is wifi available, it’s so handy to settle bar bets and to satisfy those stream of consciousness ponderances, like what Isaac from The Love Boat worked on in the ’90s. it has not, however, helped me when my partner starts humming the harmony of a song and asks me to name it or when he’s trying to remember the name of that actor who isn’t handsome and often plays the best friend and may or may not have had a mustache at some point. he was in that movie with that awful woman that my partner doesn’t like but continues to get cast in things. so, i still need a device to help me with that. or Art Garfunkel.

katharine hearts argyle part 28

i’ve mentioned in the past that i could go two weeks wearing argyle and not repeat myself. after taking photo documentation of all my argyle sweaters, knits, and t-shirts, i’ve found that i could go just over three weeks (reserving weekends for pajamas) without repeating an argyle.  so as not to overwhelm those who must see me everyday, i limit my argyling to once a week or so.

as a joke for a recent class, i mocked up a potential magazine cover:

katharine has food obsessions

i am a natural born pessimist and very little in life actually delights me. aside from my partner/boyfriend/housemate/fella, our cats, and argyle, food is my escape from disappointment and stress. anyone in my trapezoid of friends knows that i’m prone to designating certain foods as my best friends. this probably upsets those humans who believe they should hold that status. since the Big Move, i’ve lost touch with most of my food friends. peppermint ice cream eludes me in the winter holidays, there are no Sweet Tomatoes or Mimi’s Cafes in the vicinity to satisfy muffin/lava cake/bread pudding cravings. and i haven’t been able to find Ben & Jerry’s Oatmeal Cookie Chunk in almost two years. i have found reasonable substitutes but it’s just not the same. my mouth is lonely.

i am intrigued by this Krispy Kreme bread pudding, but it would surely send me straight into a diabetic coma. well, i could use the rest.

katharine hearts zany night clubs

having visited Pleasure Island at least once a year since 1994, i’ve got a bit of a soft spot for the nightspot. it’s where i met my current boyfriend and most of my closest friends. and over 13 years, i’ve watched it disintegrate.

when the place opened in 1989, it was shiny and full of bright, happy late 80s colours. lots of aqua and hot pink, much like my wardrobe at that time. and for a long time the island remained bright and colourful and stuck in the era of parachute pants and crimped hair (not part of my wardrobe). the design was cheesy and dated, but remained mostly consistent throughout the nine acres. the miami sound machine had long disbanded, but you could go to PI and still feel like the rhythm was gonna get you.

in 2006, PI underwent some construction that resulted in the demolition of two stages, and effectively wiping out outdoor entertainment there. a recent visit revealed most of the shops to be empty, foot traffic to be almost non-existent, and no more bright colours. all pretenses of the island being a series of warehouses and mentions of Merriweather Pleasure have been eradicated, except for plaques remaining in the Adventurers Club. the colour scheme has been toned down. the beige bridges are not beckoning the young club-goer.

architecturally, not much has changed except the removal of outdoor stages and a wider bridge onto the island. the colour scheme for the railings and ticket trolleys is jewel-toned, but it doesn’t read well in the dark. the neon signs have not been updated and retain the hot pinks and aquas of yesteryear.

with the closing of nightclubs–the Rock N Roll Beach Club closed within the past month–and the addition of generic themed restaurants and shops, WDW is allowing their brand to be infiltrated and tarnished. the company is sacrificing personality and coherence for dollar signs. will it be worth it in the end?

katharine does not heart destruction, still hearts internet

while checking my email sunday night, i happened to notice the AP headline “Storm Impacts Alabama Town.” anytime Alabama is mentioned in a headline, i tend to click it to see what nonsense my native state has involved itself in. i was surprised to find that the small town mentioned in the story was my hometown, the town where my family still resides. it was just a couple of hours after the tornado had hit when the story broke, so i clicked over to the Montgomery Advertiser to get more details. photos and snippets of information had been posted and i found that the tornado had ripped a path through familiar roads and right into my family’s neighbourhood up to the Wal*Mart and points north in a matter of minutes.

in the past when tornadoes tore through nearby counties, there would be a minor bit of debris and power outages. which is what my family experienced, although i wouldn’t find out until the next morning (lesson: always have a fully charged mobile device). all that i could see from the photos were houses that were smashed apart and dozens of shots of the broken storefronts in and around Wal*Mart. my family lives just a few blocks from where the destruction took place. and they emerged without a scratch and without property damage.

as of yesterday, it was determined that 800+ homes sustained damage from the tornado and 150 homes were lost. fatalities = zero.

i’ve been looking at photos of the destruction since sunday.  they range from arty to genuinely heart-wrenching, with the inevitable schmaltz (American flags placed just so, dramatic shots of stuffed animals next to a framed portrait of a child). the cynic in me says some awards will be won for those photographs. and those awards aren’t going to rebuild the 150 lost houses or repair the others.

sometimes the wind can be a big German man, other times it’s a force that cannot be reckoned with.

katharine recaps 2007

that was certainly the most eventful year in quite a while. it began with my return to school after almost 10 years (i’ve taken a bunch of courses online, but have avoided campuses since 1998). i survived two semesters and emerged as an honour student. i’ve also survived a full year living in another country. some people might say, “yeah, but it’s Canada. how different can it be?” well, my wallet got heavier from all the coinage for one thing.

during the spring and summer, i took WHiRR out to five craft shows in town and introduced Canadians to Boris. my inventory dwindled down to everything in my new Blissfully Bitter shop and a lot of boxed cards. people respond favorably to WHiRR but i don’t have a grand time manning tables and trying to deal with customers in noisy churches. so i’ve taken a hiatus from that for a while.

professionally, i wrote another profile for Orlando Arts magazine and completed projects for two clients—a brochure for a local community organization and t-shirts and postcards for a local pizzeria.

during my breaks from school, i took several trips stateside. in february, i visited my mom in Atlanta (she lives in my hometown in Alabama, but i’ve become unwilling to tolerate the growing delays via the ATL airport just to visit red mud and rebel flags). i dragged her to the design museum there to see the Cartoon Network display. i was enthralled, she was bored. we met up again in Atlanta in August for more food and shopping. she’s partly responsible for my ever-expanding argyle collection.

earlier in the year, boyfriend and i took a day trip over to the Toronto Islands, where i manned a vehicle without crashing or nearly crashing for the first time (my childhood is littered with instances involving wheeled modes of transportation and minor injuries. wheels are not my friends). we also went to the Great Wolf Lodge in Niagara Falls, under the impression that we’d hear a voice-over he’d done for the company (we did not). we did play their mini-golf and my game showed marked improvement from years and courses past.

the boyfriend and i took a whirlwind trip ’round New England in October for leaf-peeping and visiting his family. most of my photos from the trip were just blurs of colours. i can certainly see the appeal of Vermont and the Adirondacks for visiting, but darling give me reliable internet access.

a few weeks ago, i took a trip down to Orlando to visit familiar faces and be silly. while i’m no longer in love with Orlando and tropical weather, i did need my partners in silliness and random shouting and giggle fits. i have yet to find Canadian dopplegangers of my giggle partners.

i also started learning sign language and stopped trying to hide my hearing loss. this is probably what some might think of as “emotional growth.”

that’s the basic overview of my life in 2007. what does 2008 hold? steady employment? selling out? licensing deals for WHiRR? clinical depression?

katharine hearts her boyfriend

most people know my boyfriend as an actor. drunken tourists in Orlando have known him as one “zany” and “eccentric” character or another. few know him as a songwriter and even fewer know that he studied as a musician.

over the course of our many years together, he’s penned five songs for me. he’s recorded a couple and gave a performance of one that would make Tom Jones blush. under his Ghost Balloon moniker, he’s uploaded two of his songs. take a listen and see if you aren’t humming them in the shower tomorrow.

ghost balloon on MySpace

katharine hearts nostalgia

i just found an old blog of mine hidden somewhere in the internet wayback machine (don’t go Googling it, it will only make you feel old).

in these archives, i found the following amusing (to me, at least) bit of nonsense:

There’s a lampshade hanging on my hat rack as if to suggest that one returned from a party, the kind where people wind up wearing bits of home decor, and simply hung her new hat with no concern to its origin. Perhaps she huffed out of the party without so much as a “Good day, sir” to the host and failed to realize the object remained on her head. Perhaps it was a silly hat party, and being without a red ballcap, she flung a black lampshade atop her head with the hope she’d win the Silliest Hat contest.

Perhaps I should put aside all silly notions and pack the damn thing.

and a quote:

We’re intellectual opposites. I’m intellectual and you’re opposite.- Mae West

maybe next week i’ll invite you over to flip through my old yearbooks and brag about being the editor of my high school’s dinky newspaper (where the advisor’s biggest piece of advice was “people like to see their name in the paper.”).

katharine is challenged

in november, i took on the challenge to learn ASL by the end of the year. as 2008 rapidly approaches, i’m proud to say that i’ve learn how to finger spell and still working on conversational signs and grammar. at this point, i can tell you what my name is and how i’m doing. i have not learned any curses yet (i’m sure when i do, i’ll use them all the time…mostly in frustrating classroom situations).

i’ve mentioned before that i do have a hearing impairment. it’s frustrating because it is an invisible disability and i can participate in enough conversations that people can easily forget about it. i got this book, Missed Connections, a few weeks ago and it’s really helped to ease some of the irritation i’ve had with myself. my disability is like a strict parent, putting limits on who i can and cannot talk to and where i can and cannot go. and it colours the way others may see me. i can be seen as dumb, aloof, rude, racist, dull, slow, and/or bitchy all because i don’t contribute to a conversation or respond quickly.

i haven’t yet found a clear, concise way to explain my condition to normal people. what i experience in daily interactions is a bit like a game show…sometimes it’s Wheel of Fortune and all the vowels are there, i just have to fill in the consonants. sometimes it’s the Match Game without the euphemisms. i can fake my way through most days if i’m surrounded by clear English-speaking people. if you’ve got a heavy accent and want to engage me in a conversation, brace yourself for a blank stare and half answers. know that i respect your culture and nationality, we just can’t have conversations on the bus or in the supermarket.

i spent a lot of years avoiding my disability and letting it push me into a social anxiety disorder. while i’m far from conquering the invisible beast, i am striving to work with it and getting more interested and involved in HOH (hard of hearing) advocacy. if you’re on the same party cruise with me or are close to someone with a hearing impairment, i recommend reading Missed Connections. it was published in 1999, so the information about hearing aid technology might be slightly outdated, but the experiences shared in the book still ring true (that’s not just your tinnitus acting up).