Getting the fun stuff done first

In thinking about how to work on creative projects:

“Some people will disagree, but for me if I’ve written a meaty, delightful, wonderful bunch of scenes and now I have to do the hard, connective, dog’s body work of writing, when I finish the dog’s body work, I’ll have a screenplay that I already love.   I used to write chronologically when I started, from beginning to end.  Eventually I went, That’s absurd; my heart is in this one scene, therefore I must follow it. Obviously, if you know you have a bunch of stuff to do, I have to lay out this, all this dull stuff, and I feel very uncreative but the clock is ticking. Then you do that and you choose to do that. But I always believe in just have as much fun as you can so that when you’re in the part that you hate there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, that you’re close to finished.”

Joss Whedon

"How to be Prolific: Guidelines for Getting it Done from Joss Whedon"

Misplaced audience + other news

“Sometimes, I can’t tell if they’re talking to potential clients, or to other architects.”

marketing consultant Richard Staub, 

in response to star-chitects' websites with too much opaque language, aka "archispeak"

from Architectural Record, on the good and bad of architecture firms' websites

My answer: They're probably talking to architecture students.

Other articles of note:

-- Forbes' coverage of the rise of women entrepreneurs

-- Huffington Post on the perpetuating salary gender gap

-- Hoping to be more productive?  Me too!  Some tips from the NYTimes Small Business Summit

-- Using boredom to our advantage in the 99% blog post on its connections with creativity

International Women's Day

Celebrating women in public service

As of today (March 8th), it has been 100 years since the establishment of International Women's Day.  Even as a woman, I wasn't aware that this day existed until my supervisor at the Public Service Center brought it to my attention in the form of an article pitch to showcase a hidden gem at MIT: the MIT Women's League.  I then spent the last few weeks reading about the League's rich legacy, talking with some of its board members, and reading about intriguing public service projects the League has funded - for women, by MIT women.

These exciting conversations culminated in an article that was published in MIT News.  It's a short piece that focuses the limelight on the Women's League's tradition of public service - both to the community of MIT and on a global scale.  Take a look and let me know what you think.

Home-making

My housemasters (and bosses) were featured in the Tech Review, in an article that talks about the 42 professors and professionals who live in dorms across campus and provide a wise head to undergrads (and grads) across campus.

Kathy and Charles have made McC their home for 18 years, and yet they seem to never tire of living in an all girls environment!  (What stamina... especially for Charles and their son Cameron, who are the only males even permitted to live here - and with their own bathroom.)  Over the short amount of time as GRT, I've grown to really appreciate their leadership and mentorship, as well as their hospitality and friendship.

It's also been interesting just with the simple adjustment to what is considered to be my job this year, although I suppose it's more of a life encompassing activity since... well, I live with my residents, share their bathroom, hear their noise, chat with them, and generally contribute to the nice smells of baked goods wafting down the halls.

We also have done things like crafts together - these photos are long overdue, but it was a fun night of playing kindergarten and using a LOT of glitter :

Project: make signs of encouragement for midterms time.

... and use as much glitter in the process as possible.

My carpet still sparkles with the remnants of that night, but I'm glad there have been happy times like that to behold.  People often comment about my living with 48 girls (between two floors, of course).  My response: fun!  lively!  drama-filled!  noisy!  (in certain pockets)  What else to expect?  I do enjoy.  And I wish I had more time to actually hang out, bake/cook extensively, and plan more hands-on activities - but alas, studio and general grad life call me as well.  Balance is life's dilemma, but thank goodness for serendipity and spontaneity that create fun spots in the mix when planning goes awry.

[HK 26] : Canyon views

From the 30th floor of my office, although it's the mountains that engulf the view from my desk each day.  Often I'll see hawks soaring down from their sky perches.

The shot encapsulates the strange bedfellows of Tai Koo (my neighborhood) and maybe HK at large: commerce and commercialism (my office building), stacked residents in towering apartments, and lush mountains not so far in the distance.

And sunset - a somewhat unfortunate sight, since I took it today on a Saturday evening.  Oh OT.

[HK 8] : Workin' lady again

This is One Island East, a 10-12 min. walk from my apartment.  I work on the 30th floor, which is in the middle of the tower.

The elevators themselves have no buttons, which I learned the hard way on the first day of work.  I didn't realize that in the elevator lobby, you first have to punch in your floor number, and then it will tell you which elevator to line up in front of.  Once inside, the doors smoothly glide open, revealing a frosted glass, uplit interior.  Very high tech and cool, but trouble when you don't know where you're going, get off on the wrong floor, and then end up surprising the maintenance people by popping out of the fire stairwell into the back-end service area.  At least I'm not very tall so it's hard to surprise people... (unless I sneeze or use my "public" voice).

The security camera above was watching me, so I said, "smile!"

One of these days I'll work up the nerve to take a picture of the office itself.  In the meantime, bye to the office, hello to bed.

The lobby at night, as I was leaving after hours in the rain.

- - -
currently:

• feeling : sleepy and photoshopped out for the night
• weather : rainy and humid

First job surprise

Filling out summer job documentation means digging back through the past to see...what did I even do as one of my first jobs? One of the most fun ones I had was working for Inside New York, that ubiquitous guidebook to NYC that every freshman at Columbia (and some other random schools and law firms) gets during orientation. I usually don't reference it anymore, but I made note of it today and happened across the website for the first time in years.

And to my pleasant surprise, the site is looking really good! The guidebook in the past was purely a printed resource, with an inquiries-only, minimal website with no content. Since then (gosh, has it really been 5 years?), the student staff has really hauled out to make an actively-updated website with all the reviews right there, with changing content and a blog.

It's cool how you return to your old roots and see how things have grown.

Any other first job stories?

The choices to make

"It’s not innate gender differences that hold women back (just look at this year’s Nobel Prize winners in science). It’s not even gender bias (OK, maybe a little, but that’s not the biggest problem). It’s that science is demanding and very, very competitive. No matter how family-friendly a given university is, a scientist who chooses to have a baby risks having her next big breakthrough scooped up by a competitor who chooses to spend 24-7 in the lab. Changing that will take more than a handful of policies; it will require changing the nature of the game itself. I don’t think that’s possible, and I’m not entirely convinced it’s desirable. It’s competition, after all, that spurs innovation and advancement."

Janeen Interlandi has some interesting thoughts on the whole “why aren’t there more women scientists” thing. (via newsweek)

Isn't it attitudes like this that create such imbalances in the whole work/life debate? The question of "family vs. work" is a critical one for professional women (not just scientists) and one that I ask myself as I move forward with my degree and career, but it just isn't helpful to make the dicotomy turn into "those annoying kids getting in the way vs. that next great discovery that will make you famous." It's really about priorities and what's considered valuable: fame and reputation vs. people?

What's actually worth it?

The first webinar

One of my tasks at my internship, among loads of other things, was to take on the job of coordinating and moderating (and eventually trouble-shooting) a Green Development Center webcast. Now...I've given plenty of presentations within an academic context, but not many in the professional world, and a total of zero web-based ones. This was new territory, but it's been a cool experience learning in the last couple months about the process of developing one and just researching and getting educated on the topic itself.

I've heard about off-site (or modular) cnstruction a little bit, but just imagined cranes swinging boxes in the air - very cookie cutter building and not very interesting. However, after chatting quite a bit with the panelists, who are all experts in the field, I soon realized that there was a lot more to it. It means that buildings can still be customized, but instead of constructing it directly in the site ("stick building"), it's fabricated in the controlled environment of a factory and then shipped and placed with a crane. The regulated atmosphere doesn't automate the process necessarily (not a conveyor belt, but still people doing the work), but it makes it faster, often cleaner, and more integrated of a process.

This diagram from some UVA students was helpful in illustrating how off-site construction goes from factory to site:

(UVA)

Then...take 2 months' worth of research, conference calls, and ta-da!

The hour and a half went well yesterday, despite some technical hiccups. Wahoo - that's one big project done.

I won't go into length about off-site construction itself, but some of the things I noticed:

• The making of a good Powerpoint is KEY - and I was shocked at how many presentations (not necessarily those of the presenters, but just in general) were just..not...very...good. And they're being shown in very professional settings, so I guess I've taken for granted, being in the design world, how important aesthetics and just plain readability are in getting your point across.

• Off-site construction and other systems-based building techniques aren't taught at all in school. I suppose they border on the building science side of things, which has a weird role in academia. One of the panelists seemed gung-ho about me bringing this back to the classroom realm...but we'll see what happens.

• Coordinating 3 busy people for a slew of conference calls and meetings, across time zones nonetheless, is a little stressful. To say the least. We got through it, though, and I was pleasantly surprised - and grateful - how, despite the many reschedules, these professionals were really flexible and willing to put the effort into this presentation even though it was a voluntary effort.

Technology: love it, hate it, can't live without it.

green: what about the rest of the rainbow?

green (adj.)
to green (v.)
greening (n.)

i have green up the wazoo (wherever that even is). i am greened out.

honestly, i have never seen so many references to the word "green" in my life than during this summer internship. of course, i work for the green development center - that in itself should have clued me in. however, the casual way this word is thrown around really makes me question whether people know what it means.

"green" has moved light years beyond its meaning as a mere color in a crayola box, although some people still might conceive of it as such. (just check out my classmate lara's search for green bricks for our vault project, and you'll probably laugh.) but still, what do people typically even mean when they use it?

in my work this summer at a community development non profit, i think most of the time it refers to a very amorphous collection of things that is somehow good for the environment. it's vague. it's a buzz word. and saying it means the speaker/writer is off the hook for actually being more precise. even substituting it with "sustainable" (another buzz word) or "environmental (my word of choice) helps to a certain extent... but not always.

when i ask more probing questions like, "so, what exactly are these 'green features' you plan to incorporate in your project?" sometimes the response has been, "what do you think we should do? maybe energy star appliances and solar panels?" when you get to the bottom of it, most users seem to equate it with a smaller carbon footprint and energy efficiency. and solar panels - almost always. i don't mean to minimize the importance of energy savings, but what about the rest of the environment? water conservation? materials? renewables?

outside of the affordable housing scope and in the blogsphere, i've come across "green" referring to eco-friendly products made from recycled materials or from some soy-based organic material that is supposedly not harmful to the environment (note: it's "not harmful," not "good" or "friendly to"). here, there's such a pervasive "feel good" atmosphere that i've seen categorized as "rose" blogging - posts that are meant to make the reader feel warm and fuzzy inside.

ugh. i already don't like chick flicks, so let this not be another syrupy story.

i think society needs a larger vocabulary. and less clip art.

what about the working women?

i haven't included a substantive update lately, but life post-semester is relatively relaxed - for once! it's a strange and freeing sensation to be in what we might call the "real" world after so many months and hours wrapped in all things architectural (or, even more specific, all things studio): studioness. now there's a bit more time to walk at a leisurely pace and explore this place called boston and cambridge, which i've only glimpsed in brief spurts since the fall when i first arrived in new england.

last week was my first working at the Green Development Center of the LISC, a program within this national non-profit with their boston office located just where the back bay meets the south end. i'm finding more and more during my lunchtime explorations what a great neighborhood this is - one direction the shops and hotels of boylston and newbury, the other direction the victorian rowhouses and sidewalk cafes of the south end.

the work has also been interesting and pretty different from the type i've done in the past at architectural firms. my organization works in community development (such a broad term), helping neighborhoods become more sustainable (also a broad term) - mostly in the economic and social sense, but now moving to address building practices, which is where i come in to lend some technical expertise (to me, "expertise") towards research, education, and overall advocacy for green building (and to get people to stop using the word "green" so liberally).

on the side, i'm also trying to figure out the fun things to do in boston over the summer and found this design guide put together by the blog design*sponge. it's pretty heavy on the home furnishings side of things, but seems like a fun start for exploration.

and...for other random things occupying me, i'm in the process of preparing for a 2 week workshop in mallorca, which requires steel toe work boots. FRUSTRATING process! this cat-and-mouse chase just sends the wrong message about women and construction... but now i'm off to investigate the ONE store in the public transit-accessible boston area that might actually have a pair.

wish me luck.