a day in photos. also, an introduction to circuit bending

Sadly, my weekend is over and it is back to work tonight at 4! Im starting today off with this blog post and then I have a number of errands to run before biking to work. I actually took quite a few pictures of my weekend and I am super impressed with myself for doing so. Like I said before, I really want to start taking more pictures so I am trying to get in the habit of it by encouraging myself to even snap pictures of the little things. I think I am going to try and do a day in photos post at least once a week. So here was my Sunday in photos...

 I took Emily for a walk to the coffeeshop thats a little over half a mile from my house. She loves to get out of the house and now that my ankle is getting better, im finally back on a regular walking schedule with her!

 This is a beautiful house we get to pass going to and from the coffeeshop. Isn't it adorable?!

 This is my yummy iced coffee from Woodlawn Coffee. It's in a paper cup to save my hands from the cold. I really wish that I would just like hot drinks, but I just dont. Ha. Whatevsss

 After going to get coffee with Emily, I was on my way to brunch at Club 21 with Danica. I really wanted to bike (now that I can bike again, I try and ride anytime I can), but it was raining. On my walk to the bus stop I passed the car my neighbors down the street are selling. Its $4,500 and I really want it! Its like my dream car! Eric says theres probably a ton of stuff wrong with it. I still really want it.

This is my bus transfer and its awesome. Why is it so awesome?? Because it went until 4:30. I got on the bus at 12:50. Thats almost 4 hours! I love when bus drivers give you super long transfers. I used this to get to and from brunch! lax bus drives for the win!

 This is my beautiful friend Danica! Highlight of brunch...the whole thing! When I got there, she was already a couple mimosas in (we picked this place for the $10 bottomless mimosas) and she was sitting outside with a wonderful older gentleman named Earhart. She's so ridiculously nice and friendly, she can talk to anyone. Also, we talked about ironing clothing and she told me the last time she ironed anything it was with a curling iron and she just skimmed her clothes with it to try and use the heat to get some wrinkles out. hilarious and brilliant. 

 These are our bottomless mimosas. I think we were about 6 deep at this point.
After brunch was over, I took the bus over to Eric's apartment. We had plans to go shopping at Goodwill for old toys so he can teach me how to do circuit bending. Here is the wikipedia definition of circuit bending, "Circuit bending is the creative customization of the circuits within electronic devices such as low voltage, battery-powered guitar effects, children's toys and small digital synthesizers to create new musical or visual instruments and sound generators." So basically we opened up some old kids toys and poked around the circuits until we found something that made the sound change. Then we soldered wires onto them that we then attached to either a switch, button, or knob so we could manipulate the sound. The whole process is a sort of trial and error thing and can be a bit frustrating, but it was super fun. We havent finished any of the toys yet, but the following pictures are of the first part of the process. Once we finish them, Ill post even more pictures. If you are still confused about circuit bending, here is a basic tutorial!

 Old toys we got at Goodwill for circuit bending. Note: the toys have to be of a certain generation so that when you open them up they have open exposed circuit boards. Newer toys don't, so they wont work. 

 Opened toy, See the circuit board? Thats what you poke around at!

 This one took a while, but we finally found something that changed the sound. Eric is soldering wires on to the circuit. We actually ended up breaking this one. It's pretty easy to short circuit these toys and we (and by we, I mean Eric) accidentally broke off a couple resisters and the toy just stopped working. Damn! Oh well, we had more toys to mess around with. 

 This is a mini toy keyboard that Eric already had. We opened it up and there was so much to mess around with. We are still trying to find the sweet spots on this toy. 

 Oh here is Eric! He is trying to strip the casing off this wire. After this night we decided to go get a few more supplies at the hardware store the next day, including wire strippers! We are becoming regulars at the hardware store down the street from Eric's apartment, which we both think is pretty cool. Being regulars for the win!

Happy Eric! 

The End