8 posts tagged “newspaper”

It is going to be such a hectic week for me. This is what I get for procrastinating; however, some of my best work is produced at the last minute. The thing is, I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do for a story with sidebar until today. Luck was on my side because on Wednesday there will be a discussion group talking about my subject that my stories are on (which is Financial Aid). I'm hoping to find sources there. If I do well on this one, then I won't have do too much on the revision and then I can focus on the final story that I need to do. I've been trying to get around to it earlier, but a ton of things have gotten in the way.

Today, my reporting for mass media teacher asked me if I wanted to be an editor or an assistant editor for next term's newspaper. I wanted to do this until I found out that editors spend a ton of hours in the news room stressing their brains out over each issue. Now, I know in the world of news this is what I will be doing; however, I do help take care of my grandma and my aunt. He knows that, but he wants me do be more involved with newspaper since I want to be a journalist and this would look good on my resume. I do agree with that, I just have to really think about it. I'll also have to get my driver's license and a car in order to do this, so I don't have to hear my mother grumble about taking me there and back.

Well, I have to get back to work on gathering sources for my article and rewriting my story memo. Then I have to go to a lecture at another college so I can write up last out-of-class paper for International Relations.

WHEN WILL I EVER HAVE TIME TO KNIT! OMG! I barely have time to blog! I think I'm going insane so I'll live this post the way it is.

Boy am I tired. I'm working on an article for newspaper. My partner has been really great thus far. She started the article and right now I'm just fixing up things and adding some stuff. It's tiring though. We have a lot of info for this and it's going to be quite long. I think I'm going to wrap it up by 10 tonight and then wake up early tomorrow morning (probably around 6 a.m.) and work on it. I have found that I am definitely a morning person and not a night owl. I do some of my best work in the mornings, so normally that's when I do homework and other things. I think what also factors into this is that no one is up in my house in the very early hours of the morning...I should start writing my short stories at twilight.

Today, I completed my first full work week at my job. Yay! Some weird thing happened with the shipments of supplies for some things that we put in the bags, and because the shipping company is crappy, the stuff probably won't be in Monday, so I might have the day off...You probably don't know what I'm talking about. Here's what we've been doing lately at my job. Our electric company has this program for people who are late on paying their electric bills. They are giving them packages with energy saving stuff (according to the letter we put in the bag, all of the stuff is worth $33). The thing is, I don't think most of these people can afford buying this stuff. They only give them one energy saving light bulb. What about the rest of the house? They are going to need more rope caulking than what they do get. Anyways, there's not enough stuff for them to really be able to save a significant amount of energy...Well, that's what I do. It pays well and it has very flexible hours.

Finals week is two weeks away. I'm feeling the stress to get ready for it, but it seems I never have enough time to study, and when I do I always fall asleep in the middle of studying. I think I'm not getting enough rest or my biological clock is just not set to the normal 24 hour period. I don't know...

Well I better get back to working on my story. I want to get it done as soon as possible.

At about 7:30 p.m. I was greeted with a ton of snow falling on my head. It was cold. Luckily I was wearing my winter parka. It was really pretty because it was completely dark and the lights from the buildings on campus reflected off of the flakes. It was pretty cool.

I have my last story to do for newspaper and then I'm officially done with it. I'm working with someone on this so it eases up the work load. On Wednesday, I have have to do a group presentation for intro to public speaking. So far the damn thing sucks. Not because of the content or anything, but because I can't meet up with the people of my group. They all live on campus so they can meet up at 9 at night. I don't live on campus nor do I have a car. After going to class and going to work, I don't feel like heading back to campus to meet up with people. We do need to run through it so I'm trying to make my best effort to meet these people. I really haven't had time to practice by myself. Oh, and I just discovered today that I have to come up with a 6-7 minute persuasive speech. I don't know what I'm going to talk about, but I guess I'll figure it out.

Finals week is almost here (in two weeks in some odd days)! Thank goodness. On the other hand, it friggin' sucks. Get this, on that Friday I have to stay on campus from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. to take two tests! I don't even get to go to work that day which makes it an even more sucky day. I want to get paid, damn it! I don't think I'll be able to go to work on that Monday either because of the odd hour my Spanish final is, but I'll have to check out a few things. I'm trying to look on the bright side, there's only two more weeks of this semester left! YAY!

I don't remember if I wrote about it, but my whole right side is still numb. I've been to a plethora (I really like that word) of doctors and I've been to a neurologist, and they all can't see anything wrong with me. The neurologist says that he's seen this sort of thing happen with young people to are stressing out. I've been thinking about it, and I realize that I'be been emotionally strained. I started regular counseling sessions with one of the health counselors on campus and what was to be a thirty minute session became an hour and thirty minute session. I talked about a few big things such as how my family's feuding is really bugging the hell out of me. I talked about how my dad is a loser. I talked bit about how my best friend and I are drifting apart. There's even more that I need to talk to her about.

There's this whole newspaper thing. I want to get the credit, but newspaper is a pain in the ass for me. I think it's because I really don't like writing for print. I like working with cameras and editing film. I think broadcast and documentary making is more artistic and I need that artistic outlet. It's really making me think about switching schools.

The only solace I have are watching Asian dramas, Wonderfalls, and Pushing Daisies (It's a really good show. If you haven't checked it out then you should!)

I guess that's it for now.

Oh, I'm still unemployed. It seems like no one wants to hire me. I really don't understand it at all!

The song I wish I had on my iPod shuffle at the moment: Konoyono Shirushi-BoA

(A bit of explanation of the title: I'm an agnostic-atheist so I was sort of being sarcastic)

Anyways, one of my stories will possibly be postponed. If that happens then that would be great. I can do the two online articles easily because they are just 300-500 words and I have enough sources for those. Really, if things work my way then I would have been assigned to just the original story that I suggested, so that's cool.

I don't know if I mentioned it, but my first story of the semester of the print edition of the news paper was on the front page (hell yeah!). So far, there have been no complaints, so that's good. So it's my fourth story to worthy of front page news.

Now I should get back to studying for my test tomorrow. Then I have to do my Spanish essay (eh!). I think I can come up with a way to make it easy for me to do.

This song is stuck in my head as I'm typing this

I may not have a job, but it sure as hell feels like it. This week I'm not just stuck with one story to write, but three articles to write for my school's newspaper. One is dues tomorrow, the other two is due Friday. On top of this I'm going to several meetings tonight for tips on online news writing and on Thursday I'm going to a lecture that will be extra credit for my American National politics class. Tonight I won't be coming home until 9ish and Thursday I won't be coming home until 10ish. It's insane! Last night I stayed on campus until 7ish because of our usual story conferences. All of my classes get out @ 1 p.m. which is when I feel like going home. I'm not doing three stories in one week for a very long time after this.

I must say, I'm fucking tired of hearing about O.J. Simpson! Last night, I came home and tuned into AC 360 (I <3 Anderson Cooper) and the whole hour was about this shit! No! No! No! I don't want to hear about O.J. anymore.

I've been meaning to write an entry for a while. However, I became a YouTube/Crunchroll junkie so I've been consumed by vlogs and J-dramas and k-dramas for the past few weeks. Now, I'm back into the daily grind of school and writing for the school news paper.

So far, things have been pretty good. I like three of my four classes. American National Politics seems to be really cool. I'm a history buff so to be able to talk about what happened in American history as it relates to politics is fun for me. I don't know how I'm going to feel after the quiz next week...I might hate it after that if I get a bad score. According to my professor, most people do horribly on the quiz so she doesn't expect too much from us. See, she doesn't understand how I work. I think it's the competitive side of me when it comes to this. I have to do well on everything in order to be happy. I don't care if it's extra credit or just a practice test where you only get a few points for doing it. I'm obsessed with getting a good score on everything. It used to be worse though. Back in middle school, I would have a fit every time I got a B or less. Now I'm much more at ease with it. I know that a B is good. I'll accept a B, but I would much rather get an A. I don't have a cow when I get B's anymore; however, I still feel bad if I don't score well on things. So with this quiz, which is a 30 question multiple choice quiz, I want to get at least 25 questions right. I've been looking at the chapters and doing chapter outlines (which I thought I was done doing after taking AP US History). I'm going to be prepared! We'll see how that goes.

Intermediate Spanish is cool. We are forced to talk in Spanish a lot more, which I think its a blessing and a curse. Really, I just need to realize that everybody in that class is in the same boat as me and we all lack confidence when it comes to speaking it. One thing that really annoys me is my professor's neck/chest hair. He can wear a button-up and you can still see his chest hair on his neck. I don't know, but that just annoys me. I don't know about you, but chest hair should only be on chest and not neck.

Intro to public speaking is pretty good, too. We have a small class so it's easier to do presentations because it's easier to reach the audience. It's also an advantage to know the demographics of the class before you come up with your presentation so you know how to get their attention and keep their attention. I'm pretty sure I'm going to learn a lot from this class.

Now, the class that puts my teeth on edge my math class. We had to pick out math class based on our SAT scores. This posed a problem for me. I wanted to take Algebra and Trigonometry because I really wanted to work on my skills and ACTUALLY LEARN SOMETHING, but my SAT scores wasn't high enough. Why, you ask? It's because I fell asleep in the middle of taking the math portion of the test. Yep. I fell asleep. So I got a score of 570 or something like that. So I'm in this class that's like remedial math for people who didn't understand the crap they taught in the 9th and 10th grade. Right now, we are undergoing the "hardest" part of the class, which is the Fibonacci's sequence.   Now, I understand that some people don't understand this stuff, which is alright.  The world doesn't revolve around me, so I know she does need to teach it, but WHEN YOU ARE "LECTURING" THE EXACT SAME THING THAT'S ON THE PAGES OF THE DAMN TEXT BOOK, IT DOESN'T REALLY HELP ANYONE LEARN ANYTHING MORE!!!!  Her whole lecture was the very same from the book. And she is going painstakingly slow for me. So I decided to talk to her to see if I could get independent study. She says that she doesn't have enough time to meet outside of class. We don't need to meet outside of class. She could just give me all the assignments that we are doing this semester and I could just do them. While she's teaching the class, I could do the quizzes. We don't need to meet outside of class. So she decided to give me the chapters to look at so that I can see if some of this stuff is new. None of it is new to me. So my  mom says that I should be happy that I can get an easy A. Again, there's something that people don't understand about me. I can't just accept an easy A. It doesn't really feel like I earned it. I need to have learned something and have been challenged in order to feel like I earned that grade. It's the whole principle of going to school.

So yeah, that's how I feel about my classes. As for news paper, I have two stories to do. One is for the online edition and I just have to write a short article (from 200-500 words) on how we ranked on the US News list for best colleges for 2008. The other is about the influx of the freshman class and looking at recruiting and admissions and such. Also I'll have to look at how are we going accommodate the increase of students since the uni, I go to is a small one. I think it should be a relatively easy article to start off with. I'm going to have to spend sometime in formulating questions tonight though.

The new system for the newspaper is beat reporting. At first when I learned of this, I wasn't really open to it. I liked being able to do stories from different aspects of student life and administration stuff. With beat reporting you are pretty much stuck with one area to cover. On the other hand, it makes life quite easier because you become familiar with certain things dealing with your beat so writing becomes easier. Also you get to know your sources and as your sources become more familiar with you, it becomes easy to get info from them because you have that rapport already established. After thinking about it for a while, I'm warming up to it.

Well, I think I'm going to stop writing now. I had quite a bit to get off of my chest I see. I really want to talk about my adventures in trying to get a part time job, but my fingers are tired of typing.