Strange Research Study at UNC

I just received the following study invitation from UNC. For such an invasive study, it seems that there is very little information given.
—
Are You a Healthy Male Age 18 to 49?
Interested in Participating in a Clinical Research Study???
Investigators at UNC are looking for healthy men to participate in a
drug study!
1 Month Commitment – 1 Week on Study Drug
2 Inpatient Stays in the Research Center
Must be willing to have a flexible sigmoidoscopy
and provide rectal biopsies at two time points
$1350 Compensation for Completion of All Study Visits
Please contact Dr. Kevin Brown at UNCdrugstudy@gmail.com or
(919)962-0029 if you would like to learn more!

My ‘Inspiration’

Earlier this evening I was reviewing the contents of my “Inspiration” folder. It is a little folder that resides on my personal share on my server. The folder contains images I have collected for a while, most of which are very personal to me. The images represent my artistic and aesthetic interests. The folder contains a lot of pictures of muscular men, vases, bowls, and a variety of others I have collected over time. This folder is strange in that it reflects who I am at any given moment. I change moods and feelings so much, but this folder is always a strong collection of how I feel and whats on my mind over a longer period of time.
I started this folder several years ago when I first met Ms. Joan Tweedy, my first ceramics instructor. She told several of us who she felt were destined to enter ceramics as more than just an academic interest that we should begin collecting pictures of things that excited us and made us want to create. She stated to use walls for “active” interests and a box for “collecting”. I took this a little more metaphorically and began collecting imagery in a folder on the server. I have used this folder off-and-on through my artistic adventures.
I started this entry with the title “Being Gay and An Artist”, because a lot of the images in the folder are naked or half naked men, or little things from fetish interests I have. I looked at the folder and sort of had to giggle about how weird I have been about my aesthetic interests that have mixed with my erotic interests, because when those interests are shared, it comes down to aesthetics. I like it because its pretty! I have avoided including some aspects of the Inspiration in my work because I don’t want to be a gay artist, I want to be an artist who is also gay. When looking at the things I have focused on in the folder, most of the stuff seems really harmless, even if I were straight. The picture of chain, or the picture of a bicep could be integrated into something without risking anything. There is even a great symbolism that can be pulled from the picture of a tan muscled guy who is bound tightly in white rope.
If I am to become a serious artist, I think I must review my Inspiration folder and take it seriously, every last byte of information there is precious. Things I care about are there, they aren’t in some random still life.

Problem with Distance Education Courses

The number one problem with distance education courses is that the instructor isn’t close enough to strangle when they do something stupid. I have a health assignment due on June 14th, and it is still not posted to the course website. There were problems with the instructor not having things posted early in the semester, and I assumed that this was because the course had just gotten started and the instructor has a new baby. The missing assignment was noticed by several students about a week ago, and it would appear that the instructor hasn’t been in the course since then. A little funny, students are supposed to check in to the course twice per week, but I suppose that doesn’t apply to the instructor whose primary job it is to keep up with the course.

On my walls….

Hanging above my bed….


School of Athens [48″ x 36″]

Opposite, above my television…

Orion Nebula [36″ x 24″]

Beside my desk….

Mike Bibby [24″ x 36″]

In my closet….

Justin Timberlake [24″ x 36″]

Reflection on Time-of-day Photos

I hate my time-of-day pictures from my project this weekend. I think they are redundant and boring. I would have been much happier doing different scenes at the different times… perhaps based on what looks best for each scene. I felt restricted because I needed to be around the same place for 12 hours and I couldn’t see myself hanging around at my preferred landscape (Crowders Mountain) for 12 hours to do the photos, and climbing there 6 times definitely wasn’t going to happen. I think the pictures absolutely suck, but I suppose I will post them to the gallery this evening sometime.

Sleep Discrimination

I am not typically a day person, at least, not a dawn-to-dusk person. My present photography assignment requires me to be awake from “early morning” until “early evening” to get different levels of light. At the current time I am not being a “day walker”, so this assignment will be a bitch, but I suppose I will get it done.

The Psychological Impact of Doom

For the past few months I have been playing a PC video game, something that wasn’t normal for me for the longest portion of my life (unless we include Chess, Checkers, and Minesweeper). For a long time I never had any interest in computer games, especially not first person shooters, I considered them to be pointless. Now I find myself drawn to playing an old game that I played many years ago, Doom. Lately through a tool called ZDaemon, I have been playing the old standard Doom and Doom 2 games. In addition I have been playing with some add-on files for those games (WAD files) which extend what the game is capable of and provide new and more interesting game maps. When I originally started playing Doom again I was worried that I might become more aggressive or perhaps more anti-social, but I have noticed lately that it has made me more calm and less easily stressed about things. In addition, I have been playing in “cooperative” mode and have experimented playing with a specifically cooperative WAD. This type of co-dependent team-based game play is something I have never experienced before, but I have found it to be a good way to become closer to a person and begin to understand the cooperative strategies of that person.
I don’t know why I am posting this, I guess it seems like the only major aspect of my life I haven’t written about yet.

Public Sexuality

For my personal health and wellness course this semester I had to fill out a worksheet stating my feelings about sex and other assorted topics. As most of you know, I am gay, with a tendency to act asexual most of the time. I don’t make a lot of other information available to my general audience.
This evening on the course discussion board there was a married guy who was objecting to the worksheet and was requesting an alternate assignment because “Many of the questions are only acceptable for discussion between me, my wife, and my physician – certainly not in an academic environment.” If this was a survey at the start of a programming course I would agree with him, but its not, this is 2 weeks into “PERSONAL Health/Wellness”. Sexual health is part of the overall wellness circle, so we have to cover it. If I was dealing with a gym teacher and this material I would be more concerned about this, but my instructor is quite qualified in the area.
Below is the worksheet. The rules are that all questions must be answered to the best of our ability, and she will keep all answers confidential (unlike her human sexuality course which has to discuss everything openly).