I'm Back

Pardon the absense since my last post but it's been hard for me to sit down and write since my job requires me to do the same. Life has been crazy lately. I had to cancel my Christmas plans to go see my brother, nephew, and nieces because of the newspaper job. Instead of hanging with my family on Christmas day I went to see Alien vs. Predator: Requiem and decided to sneak into No Country for Old Men and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. That's right, I did nothing on Christmas, but this problem with work won't be continuing for much longer as I will be quiting the paper in the next two weeks. While I'm not a fan of getting yelled at for what I consider petty things, that is not why I'm quitting. I'm quitting because I will be adjunct teaching at APU this spring. I will be the faculty advisor for my old student publication The Clause. I will only doing this class at APU right now, but I've made it through the extensive interview process involved to teach there. From now on, when I apply for a different teaching position on campus I will only have to meet with the person in charge of the specific class I hope to teach rather meet with a dean and someone from the provost as well. I'm finally optimistic about my teaching future, though I have no idea what I'm gonna do for a job during the summer. It's gonna be an interesting semester. Hopefully quitting the newspaper in West Hollywood will help write here more. Until then, peace.

New Happenings

So it's 1:39 in the morning and I've had a little bit to drink. I acknowledge that this could be a very incriminating post, but I'm okay with that. I've had a long day, thus I chose to end it by having two red bulls and vodka, a beer, and a bunch of chips and salsa. Oh yeah, I also watched Saw III with my room ate and friend. It was a long day because I haven't exactly made the smoothest transition into my new job at the newspaper. I'm a perfectionist in my writing, and this flaw/quality caused me to work too slowly today. I was given seven pages to design today, but since I hadn't started them, due to the two articles I had to write, by 2:30pm, I had two pages taken away and only designed five. While this inevitably made my day easier, I was still very embarrassed thus incredibly frustrated. I felt that I could complete the pages, but my boss did not. And it is very hard to work with someone constantly reminding you that you're working too slow. I had an off day, but constantly hearing that I'm not where I should be will not help. I love that those in charge get more so irritated even though they're not the ones doing the work. I know I fucking screwed up, I don't need to be reminded, so fuck off.

Well, I made it through the day just fine. Normally, I would be dwelling over how badly I performed but something else happened. I received an email from the communication studies department at APU asking if I wanted to interview for a job teaching Intro to Journalism. One of my teachers is going abroad next semester and told me she would recommend me to teach some of her classes...apparently she did. I could be teaching a college class in the spring. Further, the email I received had an attachment from the film, television, and theatre department which stated that the dean of that department, who I have been in contact with, is planning to use me for a class in the fall of 2008 for Christianity and the Creative Process. I know that everything is hearsay and not for sure but it all gave me hope in the future and allowed me to think less about present failures and more about future success.

Thanksgiving and Anime

So my Thanksgiving break is coming to an end. I've been in Florida since last Wednesday hanging with my family. I come back to SoCal tomorrow and literally have to go straight to work from the airport. Thanksgiving is always fun because turkey, stuffing, and mashies are my favourite foods. Most of the holidays with my parents are spent hanging around doing nothing. We did even less this holiday because we didn't even leave the house that much since we had so many leftovers from Thursday-thus we only ate out twice the entire week. So we chilled and watched a punch of movies: Beowulf, Lord of War, Battlestar Galactica: Razor (it was pretty sweet and tied into the show rather well), Wild Hogs, and whatever else was on. It's always fun to do nothing and talk with my parents and pet the dogs, Shaq and Falkor, and cat, Thor (I know, our animal names are inspired by sports figures, an '80s fantasy film, and Greek mythology). I was able to be a little productive during the week. I began working on my movie "Top 10s" for the years 1999-2007. I also finished my review on the Beowulf for my job.

I did something else of interest as well. As I've said before, I've been getting into anime and I have a new favourite, and I've been watching it every night after my parents fall asleep. It's called Bleach. The concept is simple enough:
A high schooler named Ichigo, who can see spirits, comes in contact with Rukia, a Soul Reaper from the Soul Society. She is insured when fighting a Hollow, souls become demons terrorizing the real world. She temporarily gives her Soul Reaper powers to Ichigo to fight the Hollow but his spirit energy absorbs most of her powers. She is then stuck in the real world and Ichigo becomes a substitute Soul Reaper. The storyline becomes more complex with the addition of around 30 characters. Rukia is eventually arrested for doing this and will be executed in the Soul Society, thus Ichigo and his several of his classmates, who have received spiritual powers because of their invovlement with Rukia and Ichigo, go to the Soul Society to break her out. What follows are crazy fantasy battles, rather enjoyable characters, and very odd Japanese humour. I'm very hooked on this show as I've seen 80 episodes and there are still 70 more to go. I love ninjas and fantasy, and this show has it all. Right now, Ichigo and the gang are fighting these creatures called Bountou, which are basically vampires-hell fucking yes! In conclusion, post-colleged nerdom reigns supreme and I'm very okay with that.

Page Design Software

I've just finished my second week at my job working for Park LaBrea News/Beverly Press. In the first week I layed out four pages and this past Wednesday I layed out seven. I always enjoy doing this stuff, but I've been having many set backs to finishing at a reasonable time. I have a rather old iMac computer, a bad chair, an old newspaper for a mouse pad, no Photoshop on my computer, and, most importantly, we use Quark to do page layout. Yes, this is a post to bitch about using an archaic design program. I fucking hate this program so much. There are basically two design programs, InDesign and Quark. Newspapers used to use PageMaker and when Quark came out it was the new savior. PageMaker became updated and turned into InDesign, but most newspapers had gotten used to Quark and didn't want to switch. But InDesign is the better program. Tool bars, look, program compatibility, and whatever else, InDesign is just better. I used to be so fast at layout and now I'm working on a program that's half as good and twice as old. I'll get used to the program but it's just so slow. Oh well.

Good-bye Starbucks (thanks for nothing)

I gave my two week notice at Starbucks today. After two years of coffee and tea(rs), I am almost free. I will soon be having my "Fuck Starbucks/Belated Graduation Party." I can't wait to burn my hat, apron, and work shoes and pants. This is all possible because I got a new job. Along with substitute teaching, I will be working part time for Beverly Press, which publishes Park LaBrea News. Check out their website at www.parklabreanewsbeverlypress.com. They gave me a test run in which I wrote them a movie review with a deadline of the next day. I wrote a review on 30 Days of Night (in three hours) and sent it off to them. They published it in the 10/25 (check archive for a PDF of the article). They called me for a second interview, and on Tuesday they offered me the job. It's part time but I'll be doing movie reviews, page layout, copyediting, and whatever else they tell me. Right not I'm working on a review of The Darjeeling Limited. It's good to be done with Starbucks and finally using my journalism degree.

The long day to come

Tonight of all nights I should be in bed, but my hope to one day become a vampire continues to effect my sleeping habits. Alas, my nocturnal yearnings will have to take a backseat to waking up at 6:30 to be at San Dimas High School by 7:15 in order to spend the day subbing for who knows what. I'm not complaining because I do enjoy my newfound career, but right when I thought stability was on the rise I received a call from Beverly Press, a newspaper in Beverly Hills. They want to interview me after I'm done subbing. Thus, I will be hustling from San Dimas to Melrose Drive, while finding a place to change into my interview clothes (which I just finished ironing [I also had to put together an updated version of my writing and designing portfolio]). And after this interview I have to head back to Glendora during rush hour traffic in time for my 6:45 shift at Starbucks (yeah, I'm gonna be late to that one).

For those who care, I sent out my resume and writing samples to the Beverly Press for a job opening doing movie and restaurant reviews. I explained that restaurants are not my background but can quickly become competant. I had given up on a call since I sent it out like a month ago (and the ad on journalismjobs.com has even expired), but they called back. They said they were looking for a writer and someone to help with layout on Wednesday. I explained that I am a strong writer (and they obviously liked something since they called) and that I have a background in layout using the program InDesign. They use Quark (as most places do, though I'm not a fan), but the guy said that he thought I could get used to it pretty easily. Well, they want to meet me and here we are. It's a part time deal, which works great with subbing and trying to prepare PhD stuff. Plus, he said it could evovle into something more perminant. Here's to, hopefully, putting my degree into practice...it's about fucking time!

TV series checklist

I hate regularly scheduled televison, but when shows come out on video, I'm quit the fan of marathons. I thought it would be fun to create a list of all the TV serieses I've watched.
Completely Viewed:
Battlestar Galactica
Lost
Heroes
24
Scrubs
Arrested Development
House
Friends
Firefly
The Office
Babylon 5
Avatar: The Last Airbender
Samurai Champloo
Undeclared
Seen most of:
Supernatural
The Boondocks
Family Guy
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
30 Rock
Mellenium
The X-Files
The OC
Getting into:
Bleach
Naruto
Entourage
Rome

P.S. 30 Days of Night was a pretty damn solid movie. The critics said that it did for vampires what 28 Days Later did for zombies and what Saw did for serial killers, and I rather agree. These were not the cliche vampires that enjoy the night life because of their twisted sexual desires. These were smart vampires that acted more like the ultimate hunter. The blood hunger of children of the night with movements similar to a werewolf. S.O.B., I really love vampire films. This one did it right, so fuck what a lot of the other critics said.