Sunday, October 31, 2010

Please

I just got off the phone with Jill's mom. Jill apparently disappeared last night along with her clothes, a backpack, some food, and her laptop. She left her cell phone behind along with an X drawn on her window. Her mom was out at some kind of school halloween party (I guess her mom's an elementary school teacher?) and thought Jill would be ok but I guess she was wrong.

I've sent Jill seven emails already. And I guess this is sort of a long shot but if anyone is reading this, please do this for me: Keep your eyes open for a short asian girl with chin-length layered black hair, with a blue backpack and probably wearing jeans and a U of A sweatshirt, if I know her. She loves that sweatshirt. She wears it constantly.
Oh Jill, oh Jill. Please come home.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Picking up pieces

Jill's mom was here yesterday and I helped her take everything home. She says Jill is probably going to have to do a medical withdrawal from college for this semester, but she'll keep paying Jill's portion of the rent. She also said it was okay if I wanted to try and find someone to take over Jill's lease, but I'm not going to even look. I feel like if I do, that's giving up on her.

I told Christian, Jess, and Kevin what was going on Friday morning. I sent a facebook message to each of them- Christian and Jess because they're Jill's friends too, and Kevin because he's the person I'm closest to right now, other than my cousin Andrew, who I'm not telling for now because he'll tell Mom and I don't want her worrying about me.
In any case, I got replies back within like 10 minutes from everyone, and I talked to them all morning instead of going to class. I felt a lot better after talking to them, even though it was initially hard to get through explaining what had happened. Jess and Christian both came over to help me pack up Jill's things, and we finally scrubbed those X marks off the windows. It was a relief to see them come down.
I didn't get very specific about what was happening with Jill, and I didn't tell them about the connection to the stupid slenderman meme. I thought that when Jill gets better, she might be embarrassed about losing it over an internet thing. I'm saying when, because that's what I have to believe.

This blog might get abandoned for a little while, because I'm going to have to concentrate on school now. I'm pretty behind in all my classes due to this whole debacle, and even though my teachers are understanding, I'm going to have to work my ass off to catch up. Also, I'm still not thrilled about how much this blog is starting to resemble some of those ARGs, and I don't want to add fuel to the fire. I'm not going back to re-read any of the other blogs about slenderman, nor will I be looking up videos or googling it or whatever. I just want to forget all of this stuff, and I want Jill to forget it all as well.

I don't feel as far away or numb anymore, though. I guess shock doesn't last very long. When Jill first had her breakdown, I couldn't figure out how things could possibly be normal, but now I'm thinking about catching up on art homework and whether or not I can afford to do anything for halloween, just like before all of this.

I won't be gone for too long, hopefully I can start writing about art again soon.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

News

It's so cold here now. It started getting cold for the first time yesterday and today it was freezing. I've been waiting for it to get cold for ages, yearning for it almost, and now that it's finally fall it seems so abrupt and lonely. I'm putting off saying what I want to say, aren't I.

Got another call from Jill's mom last night. She (Jill) is not doing any better. She might have to be committed for a little while. To a fucking mental institution. I didn't think I'd ever know someone who went to a mental institution.
I worked up the courage to clean out her room by skipping class and getting kind of drunk. I guess that says a lot about how much this is upsetting me, that I had to get drunk to even open her fucking door. I'm sober now, by the way, that was around 3 in the afternoon. I slept all morning, because last night I didn't get to sleep until way too late.
Everything seems sort of far away right now, but I'm kind of glad. It's better than being sharp and immediate and scary, but I'm not sure if it's good that I'm feeling this disconnected. I haven't even told anyone that she's gone again. I should at least tell Christian. Actually what I should do is have lots of people around me and lots of people writing emails to her and making sure she knows we love her. But I can't face explaining things right now, other than obviously to this blog, but, like I keep saying, this blog is more like a diary than anything. I'm sorry, my sentence structure is total shit right now.
Anyway.
Jill's room was a lot easier to deal with than I expected. I'm actually not sure what I expected: writing on the walls? Blood? Broken things? But it was just her room, a little messy but mostly normal. She'd drawn that symbol on the windows in marker, that was the worst of it. I tried to scrub it off but it's not happening yet. I'll keep working on it. Other than that everything seemed normal, I gathered her books and things and put a lot of her clothes in a bag for her mom. No one knows if she's going to finish the semester but her mom says it doesn't look that likely, so she might just take most of Jill's stuff down when she comes to pick up her clothes on Saturday. Her voice cracked on the phone when she was telling me thank you for helping, and she almost started crying. I wasn't...I didn't know how to deal with that. I'm not helping that much and really I'm just a scared kid who probably didn't do any of the right things for Jill..I don't know what to say to her mom. I pretended like it didn't happen but my heart was breaking.

These are the classes Jill is taking: Psychological Measurements and Statistics, The Design of the Mind, Cognitive Psychology, Russian 201, and a Biology lab. I'm thinking back to one of the first entries I made in this blog, the one about memory. She went into her room only a few days after we had that conversation about flashbacks and memories. Was that how it started, and if so, how's it tied to that stupid slenderman thing from the internet? It's been going around in my head all day. Which came first, and which will be able to fix her? Because even though I know a little bit about psychology and I know there won't be an easy fix, I just keep hoping.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Fuck.

It happened again. She started while I was home this time...I was in the kitchen making lunch (got out of class early) and she walked past me with a permanent marker and drew a circle with an X through it on the window of our back door. I asked what she was doing and she grabbed the knife out of my hands and pressed back against the stove, staring out the window like there was someone there. I was scared shitless, obviously. I'm haivng a hard time typing actually because I'm shaking thinking about it but I have to get this down.
I thought
It doesn't matter what I thought, it didn't happen. She put the knife down in a few seconds and went into the main room and sat on the couch. I followed her and sat down kind of far away, asking what I could do to help. She told me...fuck, I'm so angry and confused I can barely get this out. Bear with me.
She said she didn't want to say HIS name. Fucking back to all-caps HIM. He (or fucking HE) was outside, she said. The whole time she kept looking over my shoulder out the window and I looked over too, but there wasn't fucking anyone out there! Nobody! Nothing was even moving!
And then I suddenly remembered that I'd seen that fucking X symbol on the internet before. Because about a year ago I was messing around on TV Tropes and stumbled on this stupid fucking internet myth called Slenderman (and no I'm not going to link) and watched a bunch of videos on youtube (something about bees?) and read a couple of blogs which I've just realized this one kind of resembles. FUCK. Fuck me! I don't want this! They were fucking ARG's! Not even that well written, some of them!
Fuck, I just now thought of that connection. I'm so close to deleting this fucking thing off the internet but I want a record of all of this shit. I don't know why. FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK

ok. This is 10 minutes later. I spent ten minutes crying. Sorry.

I know this fucking stupid thing isn't real. I know it's just a game people on the internet play. I thought it was kind of funny and cool when I read it, like a role-playing game or something, or just a new way of telling a story. My best guess is that Jill stumbled on the myth like I did and got way, way too involved, and now she thinks it's real. Thank GOD I didn't link her to it. I don't think I could live with myself if I did and she reacted like this.
I shouldn't have done this but when I realized what Jill was freaking out about I started yelling at her. I said it's only a fucking stupid internet thing and she said, and I will remember this forever, "Please, please keep thinking that, Ali." And all the time her eyes glued to that window. I'd be so much less scared for her if she tried to convince me, because if she's that far gone that she's trying to protect ME? Fucking hell, it's bad. I googled the Slenderman while Jill was sitting on the couch and found a page on a site called Know Your Meme about his origins. When I shoved the laptop in front of her face she looked down for a second and then back to the window, and she says "I saw him when I was little and I'm seeing him now, I don't care what that shit says." And then she didn't move, no matter what I did. She went catatonic. I've never seen it before and I never want to again.
I called the ambulance when she didn't respond to me. The EMT's were there for about 15 minutes and I don't remember what they did, it's kind of a blur. I remember telling them about the stupid internet thing and showing them the webpage on my laptop, like that would help. I think one of them sat me down and shut me up, good for him. They called her mom and took her to the hospital and her mom called me an hour ago and told me they were headed back to Tempe, probably for a long time. She said she'd be back for Jill's stuff in a few days and asked if I could get her school things together. I haven't been able to open Jill's closed door. Every time I get near it I start shaking.
I hate this. I'm 20 years old, I'm still a fucking kid. Jill is still a kid too even if she's 21. I don't want this to be my junior year. Somebody tell me this is just a dream.

Monday, October 18, 2010

Yarn photos and Wynn Bullock

The yarn looks awesome- Clara's a genius. She took home the skeins she's keeping, and I've got three for myself. I don't knit or crochet, so I'm going to give them to her when they dry so she can make me hats and things!
This one's my favorite, it's kind of fuzzy and a sort of shiny purple in real life (the colors are weird in these)


This one is Clara's favorite- it's bright green with a hint of yellow. She wants to make it into a hat for me.

Finally, I have this dark blue-green thing that I can't decide whether I like or not. I usually don't wear very dark colors, so I might trade Clara for one of HEr brighter skeins.


The pictures are kind of yellow, because my camera sucks and I'm not a photographer. Which is a good transition for me to talk about someone who is a photographer!

Oh my god. I've had way too much caffeIne today.

Horrible transitions aSide, I've been meaning to talk about this for a little while. Last week Kevin and I went to the Center for Creative Photography on campus, because they had an exhibit on this guy named Wynn Bullock who Kevin totally loves. Kevin is a photographer, by the way.

The exhibit was called Color Light Abstractions and Has apparently been 50 years in the making- Bullock started taking these photos in the 1960's and until now, no one's been able to make good enough prints to show them off. That in itsElf is pretty rad, but the fact that he apparently invented whole new technologies to develop these sort of light paintings is awesome too. I'm glad Kevin took me, because he was able to explain the technical bRilliance of the prints. I would have liked them without the explanation, but with the extra background inFo I was even mORe impessed.
There's not that much about this particular series online, but here's a pretty cool video of a woman explaining the series. It shows most of the series as well, so you can marvel Just like I did at these awesome photos, created before Photoshop even exIsted.


Wynn Bullock, Color Light Abstractions from Lumière on Vimeo.

I kind of Love this guy now. Kevin certainly loves him a lot- he's a great fan of his bLack-and-white pHotos as wEll. They're very cool too, very crisp and cLean. You should look at everything Wynn Bullock did!

Man, this entry's all over the Place. I'm never drinking so mUch coffee so late at night, my hands are Slipping and my typing sucks. And yet I'm too lazy to correct it!

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Camera obscura

Another quick post. My friend Clara's coming over in a few minutes and she's teaching me how to dye yarn, and then she's going to knit me a hat! My grandma Alice tried to teach me to knit when I was little, but she was a lot more successful in teaching me how to paint. Remind me to do a post on Grandma Alice someday.
In any case, I'm going to have a purple hat soon, so that's exciting! I'll post pictures of the yarn, too, because I've seen Clara's dying before and it's really gorgeous. Dying of yarn, that is, not like Clara is coming over here to die.

Here's what I wanted to link you to today: This person makes pinhole cameras out of books! I love it. Pinhole cameras and pinhole photography are an interest of mine anyway. Part of the attraction is the way it's so egalitarian- basically anyone can make a simple film camera. The fact that the cameras themselves can be turned into functional art objects is just totally charming.
I'm not really much of a photography person, but I've been looking at a lot of film-related things recently. Before I post on Grandma Alice, I also should do a post on the exhibit at the photography museum on campus that I attended recently....ok, this is just turning into a list of things to do. Time to get offline.

Oh yes, one more thing before I go: Jill is back as of Friday. She seems pretty alright, mostly, and apologised for scaring me. We got dinner the other night and she said she's getting help, but she doesn't really want to talk about what she's dealing with. That's okay with me- I don't need to know everything, just so long as she's okay. I told her if she ever feels like she needs to be with someone, I'm there. So I think things are getting back to normal in that respect, thank God.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Papercuts

The computer's being weird again so this'll just be a quick entry to say two things- one, I've finished my sculpture project and will post pictures when I get it back from my teacher, and two, you should look at the beautiful artwork of Julene Harrison. She makes artwork out of cut paper, which is so delicate and fantastic. I could totally never do it myself. She also does commissions, so if you want something gorgeous for your home...!

Also, on the real life tip, I skipped class to make mashed potatoes and I have a feeling that was the absolute right decision. I need a break from my stupid stressful life before Jill returns tomorrow. I'm feeling so much more cheerful, and I'm sorry about the last whiny entry.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Returning to normal

I don't know if I've mentioned this here, but I never told any of my friends I was doing a blog. I figured I'd wait until I had a good ten or twenty posts and maybe some followers before I mentioned it to any of them. I mention this now because I'm now glad that I kept it to myself, because this is a place to think now.
But that's not what it started out as, and I'm trying to get it back into an art blog. If I can get some interest generated in it as a place for art, I'll delete the personal stuff and morph it fully into what it was originally supposed to be. Or if no one wants to look at the art stuff, I'll delete that and make it into an online journal just like every other blog.

Do I sound whiney? I think I sound whiney. I'm sorry, I'm really tired and stressed right now. Jill's coming back on Friday. I've been staying at home alone the last two nights and dealing with it okay, but now I'm almost more scared of her being back, because what if the therapy she's organizing down here isn't good enough and she goes crazy again? I'm so worried about her, and my grades, and money, and...

So that's why I wanted to do a post that reminds me that not everything is difficult and scary and stupid.

I like this band called OK Go. They're mostly famous for their old video for their song Here It Goes Again, in which they dance on treadmills. Don't know what I'm talking about? Well I can't embed it, but it's right here if you want to take a look, which you should because it's fantastic.
Anyway, as it turns out they have a whole ton of inspired videos, all fairly low-tech and done with physical effects mostly, rather than digital ones. For example here's one of their older videos for a song called End Love:



And then here's one for a more recent song, White Knuckles:



My favorites of theirs are the two videos released for their song This Too Shall Pass. It's a fantastic song on its own, and never fails to cheer me up when I'm unhappy. At first they released a video which was pretty charming with a marching band version of the song:



...and then a little later they released this amazing, perfect video which was built in a warehouse, filmed in a single shot, and perfectly set up. It makes me want to cry, that's how happy I get when I watch it.



Maybe I'm totally weird for investing so much in the videos of a band that's not even one of my favorites (my tastes run more towards indie- I'm really into Mates of State right now) but it's something that makes me so happy, and I hope they make other people happy too.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Update again

It's so late but I've been having real problems sleeping lately. This house is creepy when you're on your own- the water heater groans and the walls creak. Plus I keep having this fear that when I open a door, I'll see someone just...standing there. They don't even have to be threatening, they just have to be in my house where they shouldn't be. Ugh, I'm scaring myself again.

So Jill emailed me earlier this evening. I'm not going to repost the entirety of the email, but the gist of it was that she was sorry for scaring me, and that she'd been going through some mental stuff recently and was going to be working through it with a therapist in Tucson. She said she'd be back in about a week but wanted to spend some time at home. She also told me that even though most of the things she's been dealing with have been in her head, she was triggered by a guy she saw hanging around our house, so if I see anyone hanging around, call the police right away. This is...I don't know. It's comforting because she sounded so normal in the email and so in control of herself, but at the same time the idea of a random guy hanging around our duplex scares the shit out of me. I've checked the locks on the doors like 20 times tonight.
This is my second night sleeping alone in the house and I'm pretty sure it's also my last. I'm not usually like this- I love scary movies and usually don't react to them at all. I like being kind of scared but I always know what's real and what's not, and I never freak out after I'm done reading or watching a scary story. I guess the fact that I know there's something real, or at least some real guy out there (maybe) is a lot more unnerving than an obviously made-up monster.

I guess I'm posting this because I'm a total wuss and I'm nervous of sleeping under the window by my bed...the shades are all drawn and stuff but I'm still a little scared. On the other hand it's almost a relief to be scared of something stupid like this, because now that I know Jill's getting herself under control, I can stop worrying so much about her. It just bugs me that just as one source of worry is cleared up, another takes its' place. At least Jill will be back on friday or saturday, so she says. And I'm going to try and get back into the swing of actual art posts, because this personal stuff is kind of lame. Depending on how successful this is I might delete it or like, make it private or something. Can you do that on Blogger? I don't know.
Ok now I'm just rambling to myself. I'm going to turn off the lights and go to sleep listening to a nice silly podcast or something, something not serious or unnerving at all, and I'll stay at other people's houses for the rest of the week. Goodnight (or good morning) all of you nonexistant readers.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

I've been wrestling with posting this for a few days but I finally decided to do it. I need the peace of mind.

On Tuesday, I came home from class and saw Jill coming out of the duplex holding a saw. She didn't seem to notice me. She marched straight up to one of the two trees in our courtyard area and started sawing at it. I don't know how to describe the way she was moving- she looked desperate, determined, and, well, crazy. She looked absolutely fucking crazy.
I freaked out and grabbed her, yelling "what the hell are you doing, our landlord's gonna kill you!" or something like that, and she threw me off and kept sawing. When I grabbed her arm the second time she actually seemed to recognize me, and dropped the saw on the ground and started crying. I was scared out of my wits. I took her inside and sat her on the couch and she started babbling about a childhood imaginary friend who was back and trying to take her away, how she kept seeing HIM (the way she said it sounded like all capital letters) around the house, how HE was going to kill her...I still don't know what the fuck she was talking about, it was all incoherent. I finally calmed her down a little bit by (and I know this was wrong so don't yell at me) giving her a vicodin left over from getting my wisdom teeth out this summer. She passed out and I used her phone to call her mom. I managed to hold it together okay when she was freaking out, but when I was on the phone with her mom I started shaking and crying. Her mom drove down from Phoenix that night and picked her up. I'm not sure if Jill knows why her mom came down, or if I called, or what, because she was still pretty out of it when her mom arrived. Her mom's going to take her to a therapist in Phoenix and she told me if I see anyone hanging around, call the police.

This is...the most fucked up thing I can imagine happening this year. I've been a complete mess ever since Tuesday, failing tests and fucking up projects. I almost cut my finger off in woodshop today. Christian and Jess stayed over last night, and Kevin and his girlfriend Sarah will probably be over tonight, or I'll be over at their place. I just keep thinking, what happened? There were no warning signs, it was like one day she was fine and then the next, in her room for a week. I really hope she's okay. I don't really know what I believe in but I've been praying every night for her.
Weirdly this does help take some of the stress away. I haven't told the whole story to most people, just Christian, who's Jill's friend too. He's just as worried as me, and doesn't have any new insight...although he did tell me that she didn't go to his house to spend the night on Monday like she told me. So I don't know where she was then either.

Please, please, please let Jill be okay.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Well.

I feel like I should have updated a little sooner...That's weird. I was going to say "because I didn't want to leave you hanging or worry you" but who am I talking to? I can't decide whether I'm writing this stuff for myself or for a nonexistant community of readers. And even if people do start reading this blog later, they won't be in suspense, because they can just browse the archives without having to wait for me to update.
Anyway.

I stopped hearing Jill around 3:30. She must have stopped pacing kind of abruptly, or else I dozed off. Either way she seemed fairly normal on Sunday, although she didn't get up until late (which makes sense, neither did I). Today however I came home from class to find this in our bathtub:


For a second I thought it was blood. It scared the shit out of me. Then I looked again and realized she'd broken a bottle of nail polish. There were still bits of glass in the polish, which was almost dry, and the rest of the bottle was in the trash. I picked the glass out and have been waiting for the polish to dry so I can clean it. I texted Jill, and she replied "sorry about the mess i'll clean it later. @ christians btw not coming home tonite." So I don't know. It's a little annoying but I'm going to cut her some slack, just because she's finally out of the house.

I guess this is drifting away from an art blog little by little. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not. On the one hand, it's very calming to write this stuff down and get it out of my head. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure this isn't very interesting to a lot of people. But then again it's not like there was a huge audience for the art posts, so it's not like it matters much anyway. I'm sorry if I sound whiney about not having an audience, it actually doesn't bother me that much.

So being as this is a way more personal blog now, I think I'll talk about myself a little. I'm a little weirded out by the fact that this is more about Jill than me.
I lost my waitressing job last week, but didn't talk about it here because it was bumming me out too much. I didn't get fired, as such, more like downsized. I used to work at this restaurant called the Broadway Diner, which was this 50's style diner (exactly what it says on the box, right?). It wasn't an amazing job but I do like having money, and now that they can't afford to keep me, I'm a little bit worried about my finances. My mom says it's manageable, but she and Ted (my stepdad) already work so much, I feel selfish not contributing anything. My dad doesn't contribute a lot to my education, but he's got my half-sister Hannah and his wife Laurie doesn't work because of her health problems, so I don't mind much that he doesn't pay for me.

I guess my family's kind of weird- I barely see my dad and his family, not because he and Mom had a bad divorce, but just because he's in California and we were in Flagstaff, and somehow we never got around to seeing each other much. Meanwhile I almost have two moms, since Mom moved in with her sister Caroline when she and Dad divorced. We lived with Aunt Caroline and her son Andrew for about 4 years, and then when Mom married Ted, we only moved like 2 blocks away, so Andrew and I hung out a lot. He's basically my little brother (he's a year younger than me and at UC Santa Cruz right now). We call each other constantly.
Weirdly, I barely know my half-sister Hannah, who is I think 16 now. I think the age gap was a big factor, and so was distance. I talk to her a lot on facebook these days, though, so we're getting closer. It's just kind of funny that I'm closer with my cousin than with my sister.

That was sort of an infodump, sorry. I'm rambling, and honestly I'm a little creeped out by being alone in the house at night. I think Jill's antics the other night have me seeing things out the windows, but when I really look it's just the trees moving. I think I'm going to call up Kevin and see if he wants to come over. He's learning kenpo, he could probably take out any intruders.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

I know, I know...

...two posts in one night, and this one is another personal one. I need to talk to someone, and since I can't really talk to any of my friends about this, I'm going to talk to the internet. This really is like a diary.

The party was fun, up until people started leaving. Then it was just Jill and me, around 1 am, cleaning up the kitchen. I was putting away the plates when I noticed hHer frozen, staring out our front window. The blinds were closed but somMe are a little bent, so you can usually see out. She diIdn't look frightened, exactly, but not happy either. I can't describe her expression. She got very pale. I asked what was wrong and she said, "You don't-" and then stopped herself. I think she was going to say "you don't see it?" but instead she shook her head and squinted, and then turned away with a pretty obvious effort and told me she'd seen a cat.
I've never seen anyone react that way to anything before, and I am so, so sure that it wasn't a cat she saw. But I could see out the window too, and there was nothing there. Sure, the trees can be a little creepy on a windy night, but she would have said if she'd been freaked out by the trees. She would have laughed it off.

I don't know what to do. I feel like it would be wrong to tell our friends, because I don't know what's wrong with her, and it might be mental stuff that she doesn't want me to talk about. And I feel guilty as hell writing this on the internet, but why the fuck not, this blog doesn't have any followers so I may as well just use it as a diary, right? That's my excuse anyway. Jill...I don't know. She never showed any signs of anything like this, and I've known her for more than two years. That's long enough to know if someone has nervous breakdowns, right? And she's a psych major, so if there were something really wrong she would go to a therapist, right? I don't even know what this is about, I don't know why this is happening. As far as I know, there's nothing in her life that would be causing this. She talked to her mom on the phone yesterday, so I know her mom's okay, and that's the only family she's really close to.
I guess it's stupid to be theorizing, and it's certainly not helping. The only thing I could think to do was move the liquor left over from the party into a cupboard, where she wouldn't find it easily, and now I can't sleep even though it's almost 3 am, because I keep listening to her moving around in her room. She's definately not asleep, it sounds like she's pacing, and just like last time when I knocked on her door she said she wanted privacy. I'm worried as hell.

What do you do when your friend is having problems and you don't know how to help? What do you do when even your comfort is useless? Because any help would be really appreciated right now.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Pop! Goes the Ali

Quick post tonight, since I'm hosting my friend Kevin's 21st birthday tonight and I need to clean the rest of the house! I also need to send Jill out to buy liquors (by the way, she's doing a lot better and even had our friend Christian over helping her catch up on their shared class yesterday). Also my computer is being weird again, it's still turning on randomly in the night and turning off randomly when I type too long. I've got to take it to campus tech support or something, it's a huge pain in the ass

So anyway, this is a really quick post to say that I'm reading this book called Pop! How Graphic Design Shapes Popular Culture by Stephen Heller (I quoted him in the Shepard Fairey entry, and in fact he has an essay on Shepard Fairey which I don't fully agree with in the book). It's such a good book. His writing isn't too pedantic or textbook-y, and the essays cover a very wide range of topics, from the history of design to design theory to little biographies of people who were/are important to design. It's totally fascinating.
You should read it if you have even a vague interest in graphic design- some of the essays probably won't be interesting to a non-art student, but you can always skip them and read the more general knowledge stuff if you want. Or read it all, and be well informed!

Okay, well, I'm off to clean our kitchen, more posts later!