super cold alive

sitting here building a french hotel (don't ask), i just got a whup of memory from a weird dream i had last night. i had inadvertantly wandered into an integrated circut etching facility, where technicians would create masks for UV light to shine through, which would define the paths of the circuit. The lab was actually a little mechanic shop located in a european alleyway, looking much like a mechanic's hallway (though lacking much in the way of technology) and the techs were actually a bunch of dorky librarian-looking fellows -- stamp collectors -- something. I asked them if they were looking to hire another hand, apparently they'd pay $3000 per circuit diagram (a couple of days work, apiece) - each one was basically assembled by laying out domino-shaped blocks on a large piece of tracing paper, then plotting points from each of the four corners. the inside of the resulting shape would be darkened with a graphite pencil, depending on how much voltage would be conducted through (and marked accordingly with notes and numbers). It looked very complicated but also somewhat easy as hell - probably mind-numbing more than anything else, it just required some intense precision (all the squares would need to be lined up completely perfectly or the whole Mask would be useless). I was considering giving up my graphic profession to get into the hardware end of the business, interested in the endlessly complicated surreal patterns I could create for hours on end..