November 2003 Archives
Well, it's been an interesting week. Monday I started my new job full time and yeah, it's pretty hectic right now. It's crunch time with a big deadline coming up in a couple weeks, and I'm still learning the ropes and getting the hang of everything. Monday - Wednesday passed quickly with no time to goof around. Fortunately the guy who's job I'm taking just promoted and is still in the department and has enough flexibility with his new job that he can help me out until this deadline is met. He really is a pretty cool guy, it'll be fun working with him.
It seems like Monday I had a sore throat and then by Tuesday it was obvious that I had a cold with the congestion and the sneezing and the aching, etc. So yeah, it's been a fun holiday being sick, but oh well-- it seems typical for me to survive through work just to be sick for the holidays when I don't have to work. Such is life.
On another note, I started a MoBlog the other day and got Shawn and Kato going with their own MoBlogs as well. Basically it's a photoblog where they send photos to it from their cell phones or from their e-mail accounts along with the text for the post. Pretty simple and cool for them to have blogs. Why do I have one? Who knows. Just for the heck of it I guess, since I have one of those trendy camera phones.
Links to those MoBlogs:
So a little over a month ago I went down to Provo and introduced Jesse (the 형부 mentioned in the previous post) to Korean food at Sam Hawk -- Marianne was present also but Sam Hawk was not new to her :) Anyways, a week and a half later we went to Korean again and Jesse was a fan. He's eaten a lot of food from different ethnicities, apprently, so Korean was not too exotic for him.
Add this enjoyment of Korean food to the fact that Mar and Jesse have been trying out different recipes and learning to cook stuff, and this was the perfect opportunity. Right now I'm at their place in Provo (using their ultra high-speed Internet, I might add... *drool*), where a bit earlier we made some 비빔밥. Dang, it was one of the best Korean meals that I've participated in making. The only way it could have been better is if we had had stone bowls to use when making it...
Anyways, good food, good times! This is definitely one one I'll make again.
P.S. Check out Mar's site in the next couple days, she'll have a couple pics up from the evening as well.
My 형부 sent this to me in an e-mail, hehe... worthy of posting.
Kato sent along this pic today from her cell phone and I thought I'd post it to update people on how chemo-doggy is doing... he no longer looks like a pink and white Chihuahua, eh? If you need a refresher on the lurking horror that was Gus a month and a half ago, click here.
Two Towers: Extended Edition comes out today, woo! Too bad I have to wait until I get off work to go pick it up. The ROTK soundtrack comes out next week, then the week after FOTR will be in theaters, and Trilogy Tuesday is less than a month away as well. Let the LOTR madness begin again...
Well, I think a lot of people caught the Christmas bug early this year as it started snowing on October 30. Granted, the snow has since melted and it looks more like November outside again than December, but it doesn't change the effect the early snow had on people.
My family gets pretty fanatic about Christmas. By November 2nd, my 2 youngest siblings had put up Christmas lights in their rooms, had Christmas music blasting, and were watching old home videos of Christmas. The rest of us settled for a bit of Christmas music and a viewing of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (that one never gets old). You'd have thought we were but a week or 2 away from Christmas, hehe.
Anyways, since the weather was good, we put up the Christmas lights today. It'd look better if there were snow, so let's hope it snows again before Christmas (and that it sticks). As a rule, however, we won't put up the Christmas Tree until after Thanksgiving...
Digital Ace boy here just got a little more digital. To congratulate myself on getting the Production Design job (and because I'll be making a little more at that job), and to gear up for some more holiday use of the digital camcorder, I treated myself to a DVD Recorder... woo! There's quite a bit to learn about dvd authoring but I'm excited to learn and start making DVDs.
Anyways, I can see this sucking away hours and hours of my time, hehe... I guess it's more productive than taking naps in the afternoon, eh?
Josh just sent me this quiz, to test your Digital IQ. Not unlike the geek quiz, I think this quiz is somewhat incomplete. It seems mainly geared towards adults and business people. Nevertheless....
Sloanie's Score: 141
You are a digital ace, expert in both practice and theory, and you take full advantage of digital tools. Some might call you a nerd.
Thank you, I prefer to be called "geek". Interestingly, when I took it I found that the majority of quiz takers (the largest percentage) fell in the above category (the 110+ category). Hmmm... why might that be? Perhaps most people that find that quiz or share it are fairly digitally inclined.
So I posted the other day about a job interview I had, and supposedly I would be contacted if I was "among the top candidates" for the position, in order to set up another interview. I didn't hear anything all week so I thought perhaps they had found some other people who wouldn't have school in the way of their work hours or something (I used this as my reasoning for not getting a call so that I wouldn't feel like I had failed at anything, in case I really had just been denied for lack of skill or experience or whatever, hehe).
Maybe I was the only one who qualified as "top candidate" because they called me today to offer me the job. Crazy. So I guess I'll be making the switch, at work, to Mac, to the Art department to be a Production Designer.
There's always a sense of uneasiness that I get with change like this but it's ultimately for the better-- a department where I have opportunity for advancement, better pay, more self-respect, and just exposure to the design field in general. I'm really just writing this to think this through and get used to the idea so thanks for bearing with me.
If my presence online during the day decreases, you'll understand. :|
Dan's in for it now!
Kato dressed up as Samara for halloween. I have to be honest and say that I've never seen a costume that gave me the willies but throwing that black hair over her face and walking around kinda zombie-like definitely gave me the creeps. Apparently I wasn't the only one disturbed by her appearance...
Well, I saw Matrix Revolutions tonight. All I have to say is, bring on Return of the King, baby...
Looking forward to:
Lord of the Rings: Two Towers: Extended Edition DVD - November 18
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King OST (CD) - November 25
X2: X-Men United DVD - November 25
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King / Trilogy Tuesday - December 16
Oh, and Happy Birthday Dan!
So I just had a job interview for a position in the company as a Production Designer (I'd be moving to the art department). It sounds like I could do the job no sweat, and it sounds like they're flexible with school (as flexible as they've been with me in this department). It would mean a pay raise but there is one problem (which, being in the art department, can't be avoided...)
The department is exclusively mac. *GASP*. Ok so I don't hate Macs, I actually think they're great computers. Using a Mac is sorta like speaking a foreign language. My native language is PC, and I've learned a certain degree of proficiency with Mac and I'm comfortable using it, but to completely abandon English (PC) for another language, that'd just be scary, heh. Ok so it's only for work, and I'm sure it wouldn't be too big of a deal. I just don't know all the ins and outs of the Mac like I do on the PC... I guess I could always learn, eh?
Anyways, I'm not really getting my hopes up for this job, I don't really have any idea who I'm up against, among other factors. I'm not hurting for a new job, but this would definitely be a step in the direction I'm headed with my education, not to mention a nice change of pace. I figure we'll just ride this one out and see where it takes us :)
Football is a typical guy subject, but I felt like ranting about it today.
I guess my beef is not so much with football as it is with sports in general. And what might that be? The commentating that you hear when you watch a game televised. I really don't watch other sports much so that's why I say "football" rant.
First, maybe they're catering to the morons of the world but commentators so often say the dumbest and most obvious things about the gameplay. They might say something as dumb as "if they don't get a first down then the other team will get the ball." Honestly, I wouldn't be suprised if I heard a commentator say that.
Second, I hate it when they are apologists for a certain team or player when they don't live up to expecations or hype (or in general when they are biased towards one team). For example, today the 49ers, a team that has been somewhat hot/cold and doesn't have the greatest record in the NFL this season, really handed it to the St. Louis Rams. At one point, when it looked like St. Louis was getting close to scoring another touchdown, the Niner's Mike Rumph played some good defense and intercepted the ball. What proceeded was what seemed like an eternity of the commentators trying to justify / apologize / explain why the Rams, who had a much better record and were favored to not only beat the Niners but bury them, were losing to the Niners by 20 points half way through the 4th quarter. Not a mention of how good the Niner's defense was doing. No mention of how great the Niners were doing by putting up so many points against such a good team. It was all "this is why the Rams are losing, they didn't do this, blah blah blah". It was ridiculous-- shouldn't a professional commentator be unbiased? How about a little praise for the Niners? Oh well. They are seriously annoying-- there should be a way to turn off the commentary on the game without removing the rest of the sound. As it is we usually end up turning the sound down (muting only brings up closed-captions of the commentary).
Oh well. Every now and then a commentator is good for something. Like one game I saw part of today, the Raiders / Lions game I think it was, a commentator was totally making fun of the kicker for high fiving his team after a punt-- he acted like he had just scored a field goal. Ah, that was entertaining. The other thing I enjoy goes back to commentators being retarded and that is when they make up words. The first the comes to mind is "Trickeration" (heard that on a BYU game once I think), and more recently I heard the world "self-tackle-ization"--- oh man that's a good one. I self tackle-ize myself all the time.
Anyways... I'm sure the future will hold new technology to allow the exclusion of sports commentary without muting the rest of the game. Anyone else learn any cool words from sports commentators?
P.S. It was good to see the Niners and Bears win this week.
