undead?

hmmm.... now that Mandy's switched to the new blogger, our old blog has indeed started working again. yipee skippy. now what will we do?

look at me: an english major, teaching

my first class monday went quite well. it was hectic getting all the projectory equipment set up but after that, the kids behaved themselves and i taught them a nice little packet of beginning HTML.

most of them had a lot of fun i think. it'll be cool, instilling their young minds with good design principles and CSS and all that....

as for the job interview, i failed for not being a salesperson. fine with me. i don't want to sell things.

in fact, i think i may just go down to the local applebees and waitress for the next few months.
it'd be so much easier...

[edit]
P.S.

i got this email from the blogger people yesterday:

Hi there,

Thanks for writing in. I'm afraid that you will have to wait for the last admin member of that blog to migrate to the new version of Blogger before you can access it.

Sincerely,
Karl
The Blogger Team

i'm not sure who else had admin priveleges but me... maybe Mandy? anyway, if the old blog does start working, then we'll decide what to do. i'll let you all know.

why mandy takes the stairs...

i'm just going to launch right into this, some of you know about it, some of you don't, and some of you were present...

i took time off work for christmas to go on vacation with my family so when i went back to work on thursday the 4th, I was feeling really out of the loop, like i'd been gone for a very long time and had way too much to do with not enough time, so i was ready to work hard on friday.

friday started out strangely, normally i'm not the first one up because my dad and sister and i all leave the house at around the same time and my mom gets up with us because she's nice like that. so i got up to take a shower and the entire house was dark. strange, but not completely unexplained because my sister's high school starts late on random fridays and my dad gets every other friday off. So when i got out of the shower and still didn't have anybody up, i thought that was getting stranger so i went to get dressed. while i was putting on my makeup, my dad came and knocked on my door and told me my mom had the flu - thereby explaining the complete lack of activity upstairs. i went up and packed my lunch and fixed my breakfast with my dad hovering nearby - completely useless, but trying to be helpful... by this time, i was late leaving for work and i knew i had a 9:00 meeting so it was crucial that i get there on time (by 8) so i could prepare for it.

of course, because i was running late, i ran into more traffic than usual! so when i got to work, i felt fortunate that i was only 20 minutes later than usual. being lazy and pressed for time, i decided to take the elevator to the 6th floor of the building because that's a lot of stairs to climb when you're in a hurry.

i got on the elevator on the 2nd floor and being distracted and ditzy, hit the button for 2. then i realized what i was doing and pushed 6.

the doors closed and the elevator started moving - down! the doors opened on the first floor and the button for 2 lit up. i thought that was strange but figured it didn't know what to do because i had requested the floor it was already on. then, it went up and it opened on 3 but the lights said 1. getting stranger, but still not a big deal. finally i made it to 6 and the light above the door said 6 and the bell dinged, but the doors didn't open.

i pushed the door open button and nothing happened. then i tried the 6 button again, still nothing. i worked my way through all the buttons in the elevator and then tried to open the little door at the bottom for the emergency phone, but it was stuck!

i whipped out my cell phone, a little concerned, and called lisa and said "this is the weirdest phone call i've ever had to make, but I'm stuck in the elevator... and explained my situation.

she tried pushing the elevator call button to let me out and when that didn't happen she alerted the receptionist in our office who called the building manager. she came running and stood outside the elevator shouting in, asking me if i was okay (and sounding a good deal more upset than i felt). they told me that the elevator company wasn't answering and so i would need to use the phone in the elevator.

i got down on my hands and knees and tugged as hard as i could on that stupid little door and finally it popped open. i pushed the call button and was connected with the sandy fire department. the nice woman on the other end of the phone said that she would send someone right out, and to just stay calm. i didn't think that would be a problem because i thought the whole situation was actually pretty funny, especially considering one of my new years resolutions was to take the stairs from then on. and i was excited about the possibility of meeting a cute fire fighter, who was coming to rescue me!

while i was waiting, my boss came out and shouted in that he was sorry i was stuck, and this was the only time i could use that excuse :-) then he told me if i got bored, he'd round up a group and they'd come sing through the elevator doors to keep me entertained.

i went back to waiting and text messaged almost everybody whose number was in my phone because i was getting bored and kept thinking about what i would do if the elevator broke and dropped... not comforting! finally the repair guy got there (not a fireman like i had hoped, or even a cute man). he might have been old and fat, but he was a sight for sore eyes.

in total i was stuck for 30 minutes. i made it to my meeting on time and didn't even have the worst elevator experience of the day... one of the other girls in our office got stuck in a big accident on the freeway so she got there after i made it out of the elevator and got in the same elevator. she was trapped and then it suddenly dropped down a couple feet (a much bigger deal when you're actually in the elevator) and she only got out when one of the guys on the 5th floor pushed the elevator button to go up to the meeting and it opened.

so that's my story of the elevator. the moral is keep your new years resolutions!

eek again

so... this teaching gig of mine begins on monday. apparently there are seven kids crazy enough to want to try and learn webdesign from me. i'm not in the least ready for this...

also, i have a job interview tomorrow, downtown Seattle, for a managing editor position at some magazine. i'm insanely nervous about that. i hardly remember applying for it.

we'll see what happens. i have my doubts about my abilities to manage anything, but i do know i can edit. wish me luck.

in other news: i'm going to the dentist next week. once that's done and i have my shots, i will be able to submit my mission papers. it's taking far far too long.... but i guess i need to be patient.

hello again!

I just want to say hello to everyone since I was inactive/too stupid to use the last blog that was available; no one's fault but my own! Hope everyone is alive and well.

live from la mele grande

hey guys and girls!

It's probably a good thing Amelia "inadvertently" killed the old blog spot so we can all start anew. So how's everyone doing? still kicking A-double S I trust?? I'm still scraping by in New York, wondering if I want to finish school or not. By show of hands, who thinks I should finish and who thinks I should regain my sanity and quit? Any good books to read that anyone would like to recommend? Preferably mindless and inconsequential prattle vs. deeply provocative prose. I'm listening to The Be Good Tanyas right now, I submit that to the board for review. Hope you're all doing mighty fine. I miss you all!!

this is all my fault

dearest fellow alumni,

i am very sorry for killing our old blog. it was all my fault. in my enthusiasm for the new version of blogger, i attempted to switch the blog over and was careless enough to let it get lost in the ether.

blogger has been notified of the problem and perhaps they'll fix it. but for now take this brand new sparkly replacement blog as a token of my appology.

invitations/emails will be coming to your inboxes very shortly.

dead?

long live the ghost of Ray B. West.

eek

woah...

so i have a chance to teach a bunch of 10th graders webdesign, as part of the home-school group my mum and siblings participate in.

when i was in tenth grade, i didn't even have my own email address, did i? my how times have changed...

anyway: anyone remember the most helpful techniques rylish used when he taught us?
anyone think i'm crazy to even think i'll have anything close to the kind of patience you need to teach anyone anything, much less children?

i've been looking into free webdesign software... there's apparently some open-source stuff: Nvu. Mum says they've formerly used FrontPage. As FrontPage is being discontinued last year, this is probably not so smart a move...

Anyway, I'd love to hear ideas or other forms of support from all of you lovely fellow-alumni. This is a pretty cool opportunity and it pays well in spite of the limited hours, but I'm basically scared out of my wits.

Networking (don't tell cheryl)

So I got an e-mail from a former roommate who wanted to know if I needed a job. I told her no, but I'd pass it along to people I know from the major.

JeriLynn, I know you read this, maybe you can pass it on for those losers who forget it exists.

Its at Gecko Software, they are wanting to hire a tech writer, part time, who has a quirky personality (the boring ones don't last long apparently) and web/graphic design experience is a plus.

Interested: contact Kim Lyon at klyon@geckosoftware.com

Why?

Hey, why isn't our new design for the English dept.'s website up yet? I thought it was supposed to be up by now!

Anybody know?

-jeri

New Year Resolution

Right now I'm watching Supersize me! on tv. I think it goes along with the New Year resolution fad that people have in January. I'm not big into New Year resolutions. I believe in all year round resolutions.

One of the things I got with my first paycheck was a membership to the gym. When January hit the amount of people doubled. My dad and I are betting that by the time summer hits, most of them will be back to their regular ways. AH well. Better machines for the rest of us that stick it out.

Today at work they gave me the annual report to do. I've been doing the weekly report on my own quite nicely (once stupid male masoginist were introduced to the idea that I AM NOT A SECRETARY and can now do my job). The 2006 annual report is due Feb. 28th. But I'm not worried. They just barely finished the 2005 annual report before Christmas, and the 2003, and 2004 annual reports the month before that. I will be doing the job that 3 engineers were splitting ... do I want to make a joke here or leave it to you all to assume?

My best gift at christmas (besides Balderdash of course) a Barnes and Noble card. I now own two books that I haven't even read yet and have plans to buy two more. I'm in heaven.