As it turns out the Writing for the Web class I am taking this quarter does not count towards my degree requirements, but the good thing is that it is forcing me to write. The class has mainly been focusing on showcasing the differences between writing for a paper/magazine and writing for the web. The major difference is that for the web, it should be shorter. Period. Short paragraphs, concise sentences, plain language. We are too impatient with access to too many other resources to waste our time on long articles that never get to the point. The textbook is great and is probably the only one I will keep from this quarter. Anyway, we just had our 2nd original website article due this past Sunday. The teacher posted them all, and we have to go through and critique at least four of them. I read through them this morning. They were on a variety of topics and interesting for the most part. However, I was absolutely floored by the grammar, syntax, and spelling mistakes.

I will say that such things are a peeve of mine anyway, and I enjoy editing just as much as I enjoy writing. I also understand that grammar, etc. is not easy for everyone. But if you are in a writing class and turning in an article that is worth approximately a fourth of your grade, wouldn't you make sure that every word is spelled right and that every comma is where it should be? If I wasn't sure about something, I just ask a friend OR there is a writing lab that will proofread your papers with you and show you how to fix them. It's a free service people! Okay, I'm done now. Maybe it just irritates me because I went through my article countless times to make it as perfect as possible.

Also, I found this interesting. Our last week of the class, the instructor gave us a lesson about freelance work and finding it, etc. I didn't know that the term "freelancer" supposedly dates back to the Middle Ages and Renaissance, referring to knights who had fulfilled their service to a king or other leader and became mercenaries. They were free to hire themselves out to anyone able to pay for their services. Hence, they were "free-lancers." Neat huh?

Before I started back to school, I was just beginning to hunt down freelance work - writing and proofreading. It can be a hunt too. I had a handful of websites I would check every day for postings, sites to look through the news to see if anything inspired an idea in my tiny brain. I did have a few ideas and had a handful of query letters done, but only a couple got sent. It's work, but I need to make the time for it somehow; I need to start building a publication portfolio as everyone asks for one. But how can you build one with getting published first and how can you get published with out a portfolio of articles? Argh. I am lucky to know a couple of people that live in Arizona now but used to work for mags here. They will toss me leads once in a while, and they always let me name drop...but I need time to pursue those leads. Somehow.


And on an entirely different note, we just got machines from a dairy farm, and the entire shop and office now smells like cows. X(

I really do intend to post here everyday. :(

My sister graduated high school Saturday. I amazingly did not cry, she did though. :) She was beautiful, and though she still has some growing up to do (don't we all) she really has become a lovely, intelligent, and mostly charming young woman. 

We had her graduation party yesterday. I saw so many people I haven't seen in months or years. Saturday night I even saw people from my class that I haven't seen literally since the day of my high school graduation. Though it was nice catching up, visiting home for any length of time always reminds me of the trappings of small towns and why I do not miss it completely. Sure it's peaceful and quiet, but...well there's always a but isn't there?

She doesn't get to go on her senior trip due to scheduling conflicts with her work, so my present to her was a roadtrip to a locale of her choosing within an eight or so hour's drive. I think she is most likely going to pick a beach (ugh, guess that means I'll have to buy a bathing suit). I am so looking forward to spending that time with her since I know that it will just dwindle as we get older. She'll be away at college soon and busy visiting friends and her boyfriend when she's home, so I'm going to take the time while I can get it. ;)

As is becoming the norm, a long post about my weekend. :) My weekends always end up being entirely too busy, I so want one just to relax someday.


So Columbus is trying to become more of an artsy town. One way they are doing this is bringing more indie films in. We have these really great theatres run by the Drexel company. They originally started with two small theatres that showed pretty much strictly indie films. I cut my teeth on indies at one of these with movies like 21 Grams, Shattered Glass, and Bubba Ho-Tep. Now they operate a couple more mainstream type theatres, that are nice and plush and my favoritest places to get an enjoyable, comfortable movie-going experience. This weekend was the Deep Focus Film Festival, only in its second year and really starting to become popular. My friend Naz is exceptionally gung-ho and brought me a schedule like two weeks ago and made me pick out movies so he could buy tickets. So Friday, we went to see The Puffy Chair, preceded by the short called Junior! The Wendy's Guy. The short is frakking hilarious and was totally worth the price of the ticket by itself. For those of you who didn't feel like clicking the link, it's about a guy named Junior who works at a Wendys at Texas A&M University and is the fastest cashier ever. He's trying to break a sales record, and he has one of those great infectious personalities that make you grin from ear to ear. If you can find it, watch it! Now for the Puffy Chair, it's a great example of why I love indie movies. Very much a family production, brothers directing/writing/starring. It's a great movie for dialogue and conversations and the interaction between the actors was just, wow! The movie was also shot beautifully, with several scenes at key moments they made the shot a bit blurry and brought it back in focus. It just accentuated what the actors were saying. I highly recommend this one as well.

After the movie, Nazaire & I decided were starving and needed some beer because we both had long days at work, plus it was Cinco de Mayo which apparently everyone now celebrates regardless of whether they're Mexican or not. Kinda like St Patrick's day. So went to a pizza joint near the theather and got a pizza with anchovies - Nazaire is one of the few people I know who doesn't recoil with disgust at the mention of the word. We kicked back some beer and stuffed ourselves with pizza. We had a bit left and Naz insisted I take it, so I did. Drove home, really tired and slighly inebriated and left the pizza in my car on the passenger side floor.


which leads to


Saturday, I rolled bed entirely too early to meet my friend Melissa and her two kids at the zoo. There was some sort of parent's expo, and I have never seen so many frakkin' people there in my entire life. I waited 30 minutes in a line on the road just to get in, and then parked in a BFE lot that I didn't even know existed. Finally caught up with Melissa at the front gate and she also has the two kids she babysits during the week because their mom & dad wanted to do something. So now there is me, Melissa, and 4 boys ages 4, 2.5, 1, and 5mths (Ryan, Paxton, Brandon, and Parker respectively). We were outnumbered, there was no hope. Ryan and Paxton, the two oldest, spend all week together. They have their own little language and you can just watch them whispering, plotting on how to give us headaches. Melissa was pushing the stroller around, plus she had to stop every few hours to nurse Parker...so I got to be 'chase-them-around-everywhere' person. Which I did a LOT of, I also did a LOT of yelling "RyanPaxtonBrandon stop/wait/quit" all in one breath. Yep, timfromcali, they were those kids. We had a blast though, I don't go to the zoo with kids often (I am all for adult only day at the zoo btw) and they just see things so uniquely. Brandon was afraid of the goats at the petting zoo, Ryan wanted to chase the geese around, Paxton was all about the playground. But they were so willing to learn too. They patiently listened to the lady at the kangaroo walkabout, and they listened to me - I had to teach them that gorillas weren't monkeys you know. I also made them deathly afraid of komodo dragons. :D At the end of the day, the kids were tired and cranky, as were Melissa and I. They were tired of walking, hell I was tired of walking. So Melissa had baby Parker on her hip and Ryan and Paxton shoved in the stroller. I had Brandon on my left hip (sleeping and drooling on me), two pastel stuffed monkeys hanging from my neck, a diaper bag with purple elephants on it over my right shoulder, and one of those huge twisted suckers, half-eaten and sticky, sticking out of my back pocket. It was excellent birth control for me I must say. We decided to head to my car, since they were parked in an even further BFE lot. I unlocked the car, opened the door, and we were met by the ungodly stench that leftover pizza with anchovies apparently creates when left in a hot car. It was horrible, and I mean that in the strongest sense of the word. We opened all the doors to let it air out a bit. Then we sucked it up and piled the kids unceremoniously into the back seat. On the way to Melissa's van, which took forever due to traffic, Ryan pukes. I assume it was the combo of lots of sugar, hot sun, and anchovy smell. Paxton, in reaction to Ryan, also pukes. X( It was actually pretty funny, but not fun to deal with. We made it to her van with no further incidents, and since she is super-mom she had plenty of things to clean up my car with. So yeah, great birth control.



So I really wanted to go home and collapse in an exhausted pile...but I still had two movies to go to. Yipes! Quick shower (and disposing of the anchovy pizza) and I was out the door (looking very beautiful btw in pre-2nd-pregnancy clothes that Melissa gave me). Naz and I met for a very quick bite and then saw Wah-Wah and The District!. Wah-Wah was full of excellent actors and actresses (except for Gabriel Byrne not getting nearly the screen time his character deserved), the story was so-so. The District was so unique and out there you couldn't help but like it. It was done completely in 2-D animation, and it was frakking hilarious, just really cleverly written.



Sunday I slept in, recovering from a weekend of movies and kids. Then I had a modeling job from 1pm-4pm downtown. The studio had one-way blinds, so I could see everything on the street - people walking by, etc. but they couldn't see in. It was a little disconcerting, but I got used to it. Afterwards, since I was in the area, I decided to go to my favorite ice cream place. I was going to drive, but at the last minute decided I would walk. It was several blocks, but I figured it would cancel out the eating of the ice cream a bit. ;) On the way there, out of the corner of my eye I noticed someone on the opposite side of the street pretty much keeping pace with me. Once in a while I noticed he threw a few furtive glances in my direction. He wasn't scary looking and had nice hair, so I wasn't worried (love that rationalization!) but he did look familiar. Finally I had to cross the street, and about halfway through the crosswalk I realized who it was - I saw the recognition in his face too - and broke into a run and practically tackled him. It was James!!!! I used to work with him at Deer Creek, he was the only person close to my age at the front desk, and he was my hiking buddy - we had fantastic times walking, picnicking in the middle of trails, musing about life, and so on. I always adored him, but we never really got to hang out as much as we would have liked because his girlfriend at the time was fiercely jealous. After the near-tackling and excited exclamations about running in to each other, how long it's been since we've seen each other (5ish years!), how different we both looked, and grumbling about how we never exchanged numbers/email - we calmed down and I mentioned I was going to Jeni's and he was actually headed to the North Market too, but for actual food. So he got dinner, I got Jeni's and we headed to the park across the street, claimed a picnic table, and tried to catch up on the paths we've both traveled over the past several years, and talked until it got dark. He was closer so he drove me back to my car, where we talked some more. It was just so amazing to see him, and so weird to think that if I would have drove to Jeni's I never would have run into him. I *love* fate sometimes. He apparently lives up here now too, so we exchanged phone numbers and email addresses this time and are meeting for dinner later this week to catch up more. :D


Oh, and Tim Horton's now has butter caramel iced cappuccinos. *is in heaven*

Lots of important life stuff going on for me right now. Things to think about, decisions to be made. However, it's not a bad place to be in because those decisions do not have to be made right away. I have plenty of time to research and look at all the angles and generally overanalyze them, which is just my nature. Most importantly I have people that will support me regardless of what direction I decide to go in. The one thing I know I want to do for sure is finish school, ideally as soon as I can. That will require transferring to another university in the fall. Which is admittingly a bit of pain, but no big deal other than getting transfer credits ironed out. *sigh* I don't remember what movie it's from but this quote so applies "Life doesn't always turn out the way you plan." And thank god it doesn't actually. ;)

Enough aimless rambling from me for today.

When I originally signed up for this account, it was with the intent to write something every day - just to get me in the habit of writing more. I think any writing is good. So that's my goal, maybe my late New Year's resolution even, to write something every day. We'll see how that goes. So be warned, you guys might be in for some very boring posts about what I ate for lunch or something. ;)

Fun Things About My Weekend:

- Friday I cooked a lovely dinner for my roommates and a friend, pasta with a simple rosemary cream sauce and really cheesy, garlic-y bread. We watched Reservoir Dogs, which my one roommate who has been home ill with mono for a month and watches Hallmark/Lifetime movies all day long, thought was "weird." He also turns his nose up and my indie, "artsy-fartsy" movies though. ;)

- Saturday, I met with an advisor at my college. I am trying to figure several things out in that area, lots of decisions to make - but lots of information to be gathered before those decisions can be made appropriately. This involves my insane thought I posted about Friday. I also played tennis for the first time ever, and though I really sorta sucked, it was fun! And one hell of a workout. I think I sweated off all the pasta I ate Friday. I went to see Thank You For Smoking, which I highly recommend. Aaron Eckhart was just hilarious in it, and his character makes some excellent points about arguing and bs. I also watched the 40-Year Old Virgin (I related to some of his geeky stuff entirely too much) and the Upside of Anger (don't bother unless you have a thing for Kevin Costner). AND I still studied some too.

- Sunday, went to a local Viking Fest (http://www.ashvillevikingfest.com) with my friend Nazaire, saw some fun shows, ate lots of good food, ran into some Rennie pals,and got a damn nice sugar buzz from I don't even know how many honey sticks. ;) I spent my evening working on math, decidedly not fun. It makes my brain hurt! 

AND I talked to [smakeupfx] from ET lots this weekend, which is always fun and makes me smile hugely. :D 

And I've actually been able to squeeze in reading something other than textbooks recently! I made a valiant effort to read Shake Hands with the Devil by Romeo Dallaire. Dallaire was a general in the French-Canadian army, and in the book he recounts his experience as the head of the UN peacekeeping mission in Rwanda. Which as we all know, failed miserably. It is a moving, heartbreaking story. He is quite detailed in his account, and we also see how each decision affected him and how it eventually led to a severe case of post traumatic stress sydnrome. However, it's just too tedious for me right now. I had an ever-expanding cheat sheet for acronyms from everything to BBTG, broad based transitional government to RPF, Rwandan Patriotic Front and they went on and on. I just couldn't get caught up in it, so I gave up for now. ;) Instead, I am currently reading Tarzan of the Apes. I am enjoying it immensely because it is beautifully simple. The language is not superfluous, yet it paints a rich canvas full of interesting characters and happenings. Maybe one of the reasons I get so immersed in the world is that Burroughs takes great care to describe the sounds of the jungle - when it storms, you feel like you can reach out your window and feel the rain and see the lightning and the gorillas huddling under ancient trees. *shivers* It is excellent stuff. I also started The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova, thus far I am intrigued enough to not want to put it down. It has a very DaVinci Code feel to it, but with Dracula and Vlad the Impaler instead of Mary and the Holy Grail! :D


*cross-posted to LJ