Greater Satellites

Well, after a lot of saving, spending, saving some more, paying bills, saving yet some more, and ultimately having money stashed aside. I’ve started the process of getting my web site up and running. I’ve purchased two domain names (with a possible third on the way), signed up with a very decent (and affordable) hosting company, and got started on some possible designs. Here’s how I’m hoping things go down in the next month:

1. Get a solid, standards compliant design installed on a WordPress installation
2. Transfer all Blogger entries over to new website
3. Upload all samples of work that I am pleased with including:
   • Photos
   • Videos
   • Illustrations
   • Previous Sites I’ve Designed
   • Possibly random rantings
4. Decide on and start marketing one or all of the following services:
   • Web Design
   • Logo Design
   • Video Editing
   • Video Encoding
   • Search Engine Optimization
   • Print Design
5. Get some fancy business cards printed
6. Relax as the cash rolls in

There are probably a few more steps that I’m missing, but those are definitely some short-term, doable goals. The next time I check in… it’ll be on a new domain name. YAY!

Well, I’m having a bit of trouble sleeping, so I decided to blog about the weekend while it’s still fresh in my mind. I’m hoping that I just get so little sleep that I actualize a different persona. I think I’d call that person Tyler. Totally random, I know.

Friday began like most other days, with the sun rising in the east. I was up at the (relatively) early hour of 11am, beginning some design and data input work for my current (kinda) employer. Simulatenously, I began creating some new site mock-ups that I intend to use in future portfolio screenings for prospective employers. Jon and I discussed it yesterday a bit: It’s imperative to stand out among the crowd of sometimes thirty or more potential job candidates. Other than making a fantastic impression as far personality and work ethic goes, it’s as equally important to have a solid, diverse, and ultimately unique body of work on your side. Anyone could fiddle around with Frontpage (eck!) or Dreamweaver (bleh!) and have a halfway decent site up and running withing a few hours. A good designer should not only break you out of the slippery slope of template-ism, but also afford you a presence on these vast interwebs among your peers and competitors…

But I digress.

Point being that I sent out quite a few more applications on Friday with some updated template work. I’m excited to hear back from, well, any of them. As the day wound down, I started cleaning my room a bit and doing some laundry. How very home ec of me. When all of the very mundane chores I set out to do were finished, I decided to pop on a movie. In this case, it was the very awful Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers on the new epitome-of-awesome FEARnet channel. I remember watching that movie when I was much younger and getting a kick out of the gratuitous amounts of nudity and violence (but mostly the nudity… c’mon, I was 12!). It was such a terrible plot, but I appreciate and watch most horror movies, regardless of quality. Eventually Jackie showed up and she, Denise, and I hung out, had some drinks, and half-watched Darkness Falls. We had a good time hanging out and shooting the shit. It was an exceptional, indoors-y type night.

Saturday I sat around twiddling my thumbs for a majority of the day. I worked out a bit, sent out some more applications/proposals to local companies/businesses, and got some reading done. Kathy and Rich ended up stopping by around 7:30pm to hang out and relax. I like that my room is accepted as a decent place to chill, makes me feel good about the coziness factor of my house. Anyway, Jackie came by around 10pm and introductions were made all around. We got sucked into watching a pretty good portion of The Island, which is pretty decent sci-fi movie in this author’s humble opinion. Kathy and Rich bounced away around midnight, which is precisely when the J and I rolled our hungry selves over to Wawa for some sustenance. Upon return, we commenced the watching of Office Space, which my lady had never seen before. I know, I know, it’s crazy, but she iiked it right out of the gate. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to watch it all because she was feeling tired and it was getting late. Great times, all around though.

Today (technically yesterday) I woke up way late in the afternoon and did some reading. “What were you reading, dawg?” you may inquire, to which I respond “Only one of the best comic series I’ve read in a long fucking time, my friend, and that comic series is Marvel’s Civil War.” It’s a cross-over comic, so you get to see all of Marvel’s big names (read: Spider Man, X-Men, Captain America, Iron Man (douche), Fantastic 4, Avengers, etc) all at once. The artwork is really well done and it’s pretty fuckin epic. It’s definitely worth a look for fans of the Marvel Universe. Just as an aside, here’s another comic that I am totally psyched about.

Sunday is my new bowling day. From 6pm to 9pm I’m a possible and probable Brunswick-sanctioned substitute for a Friends & Family league up at the Brunswick Zone on Street Road. Today was my first day subbing on my dad’s team. I sucked pretty bad on my first game, only scoring a paltry 109, but my second game was a nice recovery with a 156, and the third and final game rang in to tune of 148, I believe, leaving me with the respectable average of 138. I had a lot of fun with my family, extended family, and the lady. I’ll be up there every Sunday until May or something (it’s a long God damn season). Got back ’round 10:30, ate a little, drank a little iced tea, read some news, caught a couple more of my comics, and that pretty much brings us to current.

I watch a lot of movies, I know.

I’ve found, increasingly, that my blog entries are mostly recaps of a series of days or even a week. This would explain why I don’t have a thousand entries and am still just shy of 300. This post is no exception. My story begins last Tuesday…

I was getting in the Thanksgiving spirit, merrily thinking about how much I was going to eat and musing over the possibilities of having a full stomach for the first time in 2006, a year that passed by almost as fast as those bullet trains in Tokyo. It was the early afternoon and I was browsing through the classifieds section in my local newspaper and on the internet. I came across the last line of a listing that grabbed my attention instantly, it read something like: “We’re a pretty relaxed group of people, no TPS reports to fill out here…” and decided to give it a shot. If they’re down to earth enough to semi-quote Office Space, then they must know the plight of the typical office drone. “These”, I thought, “are my people.” I compiled my online resume, but didn’t apply for the job. Call it cold feet. I knew that I had the skills they were looking for, but I just needed that extra little push to get me going. I saved my application email as a draft and feel asleep watching television.

Wednesday enters stage right (or should it be stage east? oh well…). I woke up just before noon and began my usual routine of reading the days news and my emails. The previous night just before going to bed, I sent my lady the first revision of my online resume for her perusal and opinion. Scanning through the normal junk newsletters that I subscribe to (for God only knows what reason) I found her response, and within that I found the little push I needed to get my ass in gear and apply for this job. I wrote a brief email which vaguely mirrored the block of text above this one, attached my shiny new resume, hit send, and hoped for the best. The post script on the email said “Gotta love Office Space…” As the day progressed I had a few errands to run, mostly Thanksgiving-shopping-related, and as such was not in the house for most of the early afternoon. When I returned to the computer it was around 3pm and I had received a response to the job. I discovered I was one of the last people considered before they removed the listing earlier that day, for a total of 314 interested people responded to it in less than 16 hours. I was asked to send along any portfolio work that I had done recently and so I sent them screenshots of the dark driving page, Excel Fuel’s original AG layout, a couple Mac-related sites I’ve worked on, a couple of my logos, and various other things. Within 45 minutes I received a phone call telling me to come down for an interview/skillz (yes, skillz, as in skillz that killz) test on Monday. Suffice it to say, this made my day and all of the waiting in line I still had to do worthwhile. After Jackie we began making plans to see each other because she was visiting family out of town for Thanksgiving. After some brainstorming and deliberation, we decided to hang out here with her friends Bridget and Vinny. They’re an interesting couple and I have a good time talking with them, so it was already shaping up to be a good night. Let us skip the waiting part right to when everyone arrived. After some initial chattery, we decided to watch Liar Liar and have a makeout party enjoy each others company. They all left (unfortunately) after the movie was done, making it an early night in the eyes of a few. But it was great seeing them, especially her.

I’ll try to keep the Thanksgiving explanation terse, because just talking about it makes me feel like there are mass quantities of tryptophan coursing through my veins. I woke up around noon and helped however I could in the kitchen, did some very last minute shopping, and tried to stay out of the way for the remainder of the cooking. Dinner was incredible, and it was shared with Denise, mom, grandmom, and my aunt. I’m thankful for friends, family, a great dinner, the new lady in my life, and our family coming together to help in the good times as well as the bad. I drank half a case of Yuengling after dinner and had some people over. It was a lot of fun and I was a lot drunk. I was also thankful that I didn’t have a hangover the following day.

Friday was more blurred than an image with a Gaussian distribution applied to it. I distinctly remember putting up and taking down a few decorations, that much was for sure. Nothing really major happened until Jackie showed up to hang out and be lazy with me around 8pm that night. We watched Comic Relief ‘06 for quite a while (we found it amusing) and then spent the rest of the night just hanging out and talking. It was very peaceful and a lot of fun considering that we really did nothing at all.

Saturday I woke up late (I think I see a pattern emerging here) and did some laundry, cleaned my room, and performed a few other minor chores. I caught up on some reading and did some research on video and editing equipment that I’ve had my eye on for a while now. It was all very informative and time well spent. I love learning, especially that specific kind of self-motivated cerebral drive. I went over Jackie’s house later that night and helped her with some computer related tasks (I’m good like that) and then we went out to Top Dog in NJ for some drinking and dance. We hung out, took some pictures, drank it up, the girls (Syl and Jackie) did some dancing, and then we left. It was as cold as a motherfucker that night; one of those “see your own breath”, breezeless nights, so I made it a point to stay close to a certain someone to keep her warm. We eventually ended up at my domicile where we played with the cat and worked on comfort and logistics. I’m a bad influence, I keep people out and awake until all hours of the night. I went to sleep somewhere in the 5:45am arena.

Sunday is always a hazy day for me. I’m almost totally convinced that my mind doesn’t turn on for Sundays. I can say that I downloaded a slew of new music on Sunday for my listening pleasure. Albums include: The Human Abstract’s Nocturne, Incubus’ new Light Grenades, Foo Fighter’s new live album Skin And Bones, the somewhat older Postal Service’s Give Up, and Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut. I have a lot of listening to do.

Monday morning, 11am, I’m standing outside of 124 Chestnut waiting for Jared to come open the door so I can have my interview and test. I’m a mixture of over-confident and excited, but ready to strut my stuff. Jared made a scheduling mistake and actually wasn’t expecting me until 11am on Tuesday, but luckily had some time to sit down and interview me despite the mix up. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t covet the jobs of people already working there. It seems like such a laid back atmosphere with a bunch of cool people doing what they love to do. Fortunately I think I left a good impression. Without going into too much detail, my test basically consisted of converting a Photoshop web site mock-up into a functioning, active page. It took me about two hours, but I took my time and was thorough. The end result was almost identical to the original, so I was pleased. After the other designers took a look at it, they commented on how clean my code was (to the nerdy, it’s quite a compliment) and I left shortly thereafter. Now I play the waiting game, although I should know for sure no later than next week.

Today I woke up and did some design work, some coding, some reading, and a small amount of learning. I chatted it up with Denise about this and that and ate a Wawa pork roll sandwich which are delicious, by the way. I got to talk to my girl shortly after she got out of work, although I missed one of her calls earlier in the day (oops). The rest of the day was peaceful and serene. Good times all around.

I worked for a little bit creating a layout that reflected my personal “web style” and wasn’t a pre-packaged Blogger special. This is the outcome and though it’s not final, it’s pretty damn close. I need to tweak the bottom area a tad, but I’m really enjoying the color scheme, background, and size.

I’d appreciate any feedback about it, especially from Windows users. If something looks off, let me know so I can fix it up straight away. Let the comments fly!

These updates are about as erratic as my current sleep schedule… go figure.

Well, the birthday is in 4 days, and I am quite excited about that. I hope, more than anything, that I get to see some of the family that haven’t been too accessible in recent months / years. It would also be nice if some friends I haven’t seen in a while were able to come to my birthday get together in Atlantic City on February 4th. It will be bitchin’.

School is going great. I really dig all of my classes and I’m doing quite good in all of them. Audio class is especially interesting because we’re learning Pro Tools and working in an incredible Mac lab. I really dig going to school and all that’s left for my life to be in perfect balance is finding me a decent part time job with hours that fit my schedule ::cough:: design ::cough::.

I’m not really in creative writing mood lately. I have, however, been in design-mode overdrive. I’m quite pleased to say that the new dark driving web page is complete and sexier than ever. You can check it out by navigating on over to http://www.darkdriving.com.

I’ll have more updates when time and creativity permits. Just know that I have some incredible plans in store for the very near future.

Man, designing is definitely one of those things that you can fall out of practice with. Trust me, I’m racking my brain right now trying to come up with some cool designs for a new dark driving (corporate) website as well as my own personal page. It’s not so much an issue of getting stuff to look cool, it’s trying to figure out inventive ways to display the content. I became even more inspired by the issue of content when I read this article…

Redesign vs. Realign

Anywho, I’ve already scrapped three halfway finished templates with no end in sight.