10 things about Jimmy

Feelings on coffee....

I'm going to be brutally honest, I despise the taste of coffee. When I go to Starbucks or any coffee place, I get mochas which don't really count as coffee. The more sugar and sweetness, all the better to cover up that horrible taste. If I drink coffee (black, straight up), its because I have to stay awake or I need to focus for some reason, not because I enjoy it. When I start to become dependent on the caffeine intake in order to function after days/weeks of regular consumption, I look forward to the times when I won't need it to form a coherent thought in my head.

Favorite color....

It was blue (not carolina blue, ugh, disgusting, boo Tarheels) but then I met orange. Now it is a combination of blue and orange. Think Boise State or the Denver Broncos. I don't get the whole architects' liking black. Its ridiculous, why would you wear black when its hot outside? Black is only good for fancy parties and funerals.

I'm from...

Greensboro North Carolina. Good place to grow up and to end up at. I'm not so sure about the in between.

Previous life before architecture....

There really was no before. I've known since I was 12 what I wanted to do. I just took a longer path to get here.

Favorite road trip foods....

I like driving to places but I like being efficient about driving times. I don't like to stop a lot and that means I usually don't eat and/or drink a lot either. If I have to, a bag of cheetos and a dr pepper.

I'm looking forward to....

The world's largest tree house in Crossville, Tennessee (which we saw today), the Thorn Crown Chapel, the Chapel of the Holy cross, and Taliesin....architecture that isn't a victim of globalization and modernism (its a box but is it a library, a museum, a school, a factory...a house?).

My preferred mode of road trip documentation....

I occasionally take amazing photographs, so I prefer a camera. I appreciate what technology has done for humanity but I still feel like digital cameras have cheapened the art of photography. Everyone is a photographer now. They don't even look at what they are taking a picture of, they just click a button several hundred times and then these digital images end up on a hard drive, where they stay forever and rarely take physical form. If you could only take 24 shots you'd be more thoughtful about what you were looking at and how a photograph was composed. Honestly, nothing beats being in a darkroom developing your own film and making your own prints. I'd take that over photoshop any day.

Books I brought on the trip....

Reading MVRDV
Folds, Bodies, and Blobs, Greg Lynn
Reinventing the Skyscraper, Ken Yeang
The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
The Ghost King, R.A. Salvatore
The Age of Darkness (Horus Heresy Series book 16), Christian Dunn
The Outcast Dead (Horus Heresy Series book 17), Graham McNeill (reading now)

I will read the at least three of these because we have a lot of driving to do on this trip.


What would I do if it had to be something other than architecture...

I would find work in the video game industry. I was raised by my nintendo and every subsequent gaming console after that. When we got enough money, I graduated to pc gaming. People hate on gamers but its no different from watching a movie or tv, even reading a book. Its better because you are in control...I'm not talking about crap games that last 4-6 hours. Electronic Arts, one of the larger gaming companies, has capitalized on a system of producing the same thing every year (madden football, heck any sports game, even modern warfare <- Activision) and charging $60 for it. That is a crime. I don't know why people continue to pay for that crap.

I like games with epic stories that help me escape to another world, a world that needs saving by me!... Mass Effect, Fallout, the Elder Scrolls series...blends of action and role playing. They also provide a different experience with every play through. I don't like to admit it but I've put in 150 hours playing Skyrim since it was released in mid-november. Some economists say this game is the sole reason why America's economy is in the toilet. I totally agree.

So the short answer would be working on games like that.