If you're in the Chicago area tomorrow, go and check out this event. If you're interested in helping undocumented students or concerned about immigrant issues, check out this article. Either way, read my story! I am needy! And pretty excited that I'm finally starting on what many of my classmates have been doing for the last couple of years.
http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/illinois/article_0361f934-5ccb-5ddc-900d-8a1057219c68.html
Friday, August 28, 2009
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Saturday Night Lights
Not much going on these last couple of weeks, just madly trying to finish up our final projects and hope that no lasting damage is done to our spirits (although it might be too late, for some...). Grad school is hard, yo!
My group for our Audience Insight class spent 6 solid hours today working on what we called "Week Zero Lite"--namely, designing a product for a targeted audience but without all the business/marketing planning side of it. We made a website for homeschoolers, which turned out pretty kick-ass, if you ask me. I am currently in love with the "Rounded Corners" feature in InDesign: it turns all boxes into boxes with ROUNDED corners! Eee! Excitement abound!! I'm trying to think of ways to incorporate the round-cornered boxes into my News Graphics/Design final...they just make me so happy! Clearly, I need to get out more.
Tomorrow will be devoted to my REAL Week Zero group, where we have to come up with a complete product plan for parents of children with autism. The designing part and thinking up story ideas and stuf is actually not so bad...what I'm really worried about is our presentations where we have to pitch our product to a panel of pros...and how we do is basically our grade for the quarter. Umm. Apparently it's pretty brutal and they just try to rip apart your product. I'm in charge of editorial/design strategy so...yeah. Tomorrow might be a bit iffy. Luckily, I like all of my teammates. Ooo! Maybe I will make granola for them! That would be fun.
Hmm...I wonder what it means when rounded corners and granola are the high points of my day...
My group for our Audience Insight class spent 6 solid hours today working on what we called "Week Zero Lite"--namely, designing a product for a targeted audience but without all the business/marketing planning side of it. We made a website for homeschoolers, which turned out pretty kick-ass, if you ask me. I am currently in love with the "Rounded Corners" feature in InDesign: it turns all boxes into boxes with ROUNDED corners! Eee! Excitement abound!! I'm trying to think of ways to incorporate the round-cornered boxes into my News Graphics/Design final...they just make me so happy! Clearly, I need to get out more.
Tomorrow will be devoted to my REAL Week Zero group, where we have to come up with a complete product plan for parents of children with autism. The designing part and thinking up story ideas and stuf is actually not so bad...what I'm really worried about is our presentations where we have to pitch our product to a panel of pros...and how we do is basically our grade for the quarter. Umm. Apparently it's pretty brutal and they just try to rip apart your product. I'm in charge of editorial/design strategy so...yeah. Tomorrow might be a bit iffy. Luckily, I like all of my teammates. Ooo! Maybe I will make granola for them! That would be fun.
Hmm...I wonder what it means when rounded corners and granola are the high points of my day...
Friday, August 7, 2009
Miss Havisham and a Cat Named Magic
Background info: For my audience insight class, my group is making a news product geared towards families who homeschool. Part of our research required us to actually go out and talk to a member of that community. I scored an interview with Cindi, the founder of a group called Homeschooling Gifted Students.
The day of the interview (today) was kind of grey and dreary. I was also running kind of late b/c I foolishly decided to, um, prepare a beef brisket with a seasoning rub, instead of, say, prepare for the interview by printing out the questions and whatnot. So I kind of dashed out of the door in a whirlwind of panic and trepidation that Cindi would find me sweaty and ill-kempt. Just another one of those maladjusted "public school kids" who can't self-organize my way out of my apartment (which is partially true).
I get to Cindi's house 10 minutes via speed-walking, and just took like 5 minutes to take in her house. Guys...I felt like I was Oliver, peeking up at Miss Havisham's home. It was painted an aging white, covered with vines and bits of leaves and pollen caught in elaborate spiderwebs all around the door and windows. Lace curtains dropped the length in all of the windows. The door was a dusty blue with an actual mail slot--none of the houses on the street had mail boxes, which means they have an actual door-to-door mailman. And the doorbell button was broken. If it hadn't been for the light blue car in the driveway, I might've thought that no one actually lived here. I pressed the doorbell anyway, and a few moments later, Cindi came to the door, and she was everything and nothing like what I thought she would be.
She was soft and plump, with a soft voice to match. Her hair was caught up loosely in a bun, and she wore a flowy sky-blue blouse, a colorful peasant skirt and sandals. She has a BA in government from Cornell and two long-haired white cats, Magic and Snowy. The kitties scurried over to check me out, kind like they were making sure I was okay for Cindi to talk to. Snowy seemed uninterested, but Magic jumped up and sat down next to me, butting my hand with its head for attention, so I petted it throughout the interview, which was enormously fun and seemed sort of just...right, given the space that we were in.
And her house was amazing. To the right when you came in was an actual little coat area, with red velvet curtains instead of doors. Her living room was spacious, her furniture and rug somewhat antiquated looking. Instead of a sofa, she had one of those really long, backless couches with very high arms on the sides. It was a faded blue, threaded with gold. A huge painting of a field of wildflowers perched behind the sofa. We did the interview in the living room, so I didn't get to see the other rooms of her house, but from what I could see, it was quite large and decorated with things that look like they should be in a museum. The flatscreen TV on the wall and a multi-tiered cat stratcher-thing by the bay window seemed oddly out of place amidst all the other pieces that seemed from some other time.
Cindi was super gracious and I had a really fun time interviewing her. She was very helpful about homeschooling resources, but mostly I was really kind of enchanted by her, her cats, and her home. Everything seemed kind of surreal, but in a good way. I half-expected her to serve tea in fine china, maybe go apple-picking in an organic orchard and make a pie to cool on the windowsill.
After that horrible rude interview with the tattoo artist earlier this week, this was a welcome breath of fresh air. There ARE nice people out there who want to be interviewed! I like doing this journalism thing after all!
The day of the interview (today) was kind of grey and dreary. I was also running kind of late b/c I foolishly decided to, um, prepare a beef brisket with a seasoning rub, instead of, say, prepare for the interview by printing out the questions and whatnot. So I kind of dashed out of the door in a whirlwind of panic and trepidation that Cindi would find me sweaty and ill-kempt. Just another one of those maladjusted "public school kids" who can't self-organize my way out of my apartment (which is partially true).
I get to Cindi's house 10 minutes via speed-walking, and just took like 5 minutes to take in her house. Guys...I felt like I was Oliver, peeking up at Miss Havisham's home. It was painted an aging white, covered with vines and bits of leaves and pollen caught in elaborate spiderwebs all around the door and windows. Lace curtains dropped the length in all of the windows. The door was a dusty blue with an actual mail slot--none of the houses on the street had mail boxes, which means they have an actual door-to-door mailman. And the doorbell button was broken. If it hadn't been for the light blue car in the driveway, I might've thought that no one actually lived here. I pressed the doorbell anyway, and a few moments later, Cindi came to the door, and she was everything and nothing like what I thought she would be.
She was soft and plump, with a soft voice to match. Her hair was caught up loosely in a bun, and she wore a flowy sky-blue blouse, a colorful peasant skirt and sandals. She has a BA in government from Cornell and two long-haired white cats, Magic and Snowy. The kitties scurried over to check me out, kind like they were making sure I was okay for Cindi to talk to. Snowy seemed uninterested, but Magic jumped up and sat down next to me, butting my hand with its head for attention, so I petted it throughout the interview, which was enormously fun and seemed sort of just...right, given the space that we were in.
And her house was amazing. To the right when you came in was an actual little coat area, with red velvet curtains instead of doors. Her living room was spacious, her furniture and rug somewhat antiquated looking. Instead of a sofa, she had one of those really long, backless couches with very high arms on the sides. It was a faded blue, threaded with gold. A huge painting of a field of wildflowers perched behind the sofa. We did the interview in the living room, so I didn't get to see the other rooms of her house, but from what I could see, it was quite large and decorated with things that look like they should be in a museum. The flatscreen TV on the wall and a multi-tiered cat stratcher-thing by the bay window seemed oddly out of place amidst all the other pieces that seemed from some other time.
Cindi was super gracious and I had a really fun time interviewing her. She was very helpful about homeschooling resources, but mostly I was really kind of enchanted by her, her cats, and her home. Everything seemed kind of surreal, but in a good way. I half-expected her to serve tea in fine china, maybe go apple-picking in an organic orchard and make a pie to cool on the windowsill.
After that horrible rude interview with the tattoo artist earlier this week, this was a welcome breath of fresh air. There ARE nice people out there who want to be interviewed! I like doing this journalism thing after all!
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Weddings & Procrastinations
I have a lot of work to do. I need to interview some people for this profile that my classmate and I are writing for a trade magazine, but more importantly, I need to find someone who's gotten a tattoo removed via laser surgery so I can finish my feature story on tattoo removals/cover-ups by Tuesday. This is a huge problem b/c I have yet to find someone to interview, and the deadline's creeping up kind of quickly.
So naturally, I decided that now would be a good time to update ye olde blog instead of actively calling tattoo parlors in desperation (some parlors are very nice; some are very, very, VERY mean).
I went to a wedding with Tyler on Saturday in Indiana (3rd wedding that I've gone to with him in 3 months...hopefully this is not one of those "8 times a wedding attendee, 0 times having own wedding" kind of things). His cousin, Jilliene, planned a beautiful outdoor wedding on a terrace overlooking a lush lawn and trees. She had one of those trellis things all adorned with purple flowers and roses, and all the rows were bookended on the aisle side with lovely flower arrangements.
Of course, it rained. It began to sprinkle mid-ceremony, so there was really no point in stopping the wedding after the bride had already processed down the aisle. It wasn't really raining in earnest, but it was just enough that everyone's programs got soaked and people were shivering from the cold, damp, grey Midwest summer day.
At one point in the ceremony, Jilliene and Eric performed a "Unity Sand Ceremony," where they took tall glasses filled with purple and grey sand and mixed it together in a bowl to signify their unity. I don't know if it was because I was cold/wet, or because I'm somewhat cynical about marriage in general, but this little ceremony struck me as, well, kind of hokey. I was feeling a little bit bad for thinking those thoughts during a wedding until Tyler leaned over and said, "At my wedding, I'm going to have a Unity Kitten Ceremony. It's where we'll each take a kitten out of separate baskets and put them together in one basket, to signify that we're now united, in kittens." We decided later than a heavy blanket should be thrown on the unity basket so that the kittens won't be able to escape.
Yes. Best symbol of unity, ever.
So naturally, I decided that now would be a good time to update ye olde blog instead of actively calling tattoo parlors in desperation (some parlors are very nice; some are very, very, VERY mean).
I went to a wedding with Tyler on Saturday in Indiana (3rd wedding that I've gone to with him in 3 months...hopefully this is not one of those "8 times a wedding attendee, 0 times having own wedding" kind of things). His cousin, Jilliene, planned a beautiful outdoor wedding on a terrace overlooking a lush lawn and trees. She had one of those trellis things all adorned with purple flowers and roses, and all the rows were bookended on the aisle side with lovely flower arrangements.
Of course, it rained. It began to sprinkle mid-ceremony, so there was really no point in stopping the wedding after the bride had already processed down the aisle. It wasn't really raining in earnest, but it was just enough that everyone's programs got soaked and people were shivering from the cold, damp, grey Midwest summer day.
At one point in the ceremony, Jilliene and Eric performed a "Unity Sand Ceremony," where they took tall glasses filled with purple and grey sand and mixed it together in a bowl to signify their unity. I don't know if it was because I was cold/wet, or because I'm somewhat cynical about marriage in general, but this little ceremony struck me as, well, kind of hokey. I was feeling a little bit bad for thinking those thoughts during a wedding until Tyler leaned over and said, "At my wedding, I'm going to have a Unity Kitten Ceremony. It's where we'll each take a kitten out of separate baskets and put them together in one basket, to signify that we're now united, in kittens." We decided later than a heavy blanket should be thrown on the unity basket so that the kittens won't be able to escape.
Yes. Best symbol of unity, ever.
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