minor update…

alright, i’ve got a little over an hour of actual free-time for once, however, i won’t address any issues in too short a time.  just making it known that i’ve almost fallen off the face of the earth, though not entirely…

if i recall, the last thing i mentioned was president obama’s status as a brand…since then, i’ve been incredibly swamped with matters concerning school, both academic and administrative; i won’t get into the latter just yet considering it makes my blood boil as of late.  when the ice is a bit thicker around next week then i’ll divulge openly.

on the plus side, i received two awards for my internship at HSP, one from college of dupage and – drumroll please – i did indeed receive the “national two-year intern” award from CEIA.  i’m thrilled about both, but i’ve made it a point to reiterate that i’m not sure what was so fantastic and deserving that i did during my time at HSP, but i appreciate the recognition nonetheless.  was glad to see the executive director for HOPE fair housing talking to karole at the awards reception last wednesday; hopefully something mutually beneficial comes out of that potential relationship…gotta love my new line of work .  it’ll be interesting to see if a partnership of some kind develops there.

it was far more rewarding to see casey receive the award for “outstanding faculty adviser”.  he deserves it more than anyone and i’m glad – even though i’m sure he’d much rather be left unknown – to have seen him recognized for the dedication he has to his students.

in other news, yes…i still have a job and my store is still open.  we’ve actually been grossing profits quite nicely, but we’re inevitably victims of the labor cuts and all the other procedural nonsense that’s got a chokehold on the company.  i find myself playing a wicked game of devil’s advocate that’s become quite exhausting as of late.  all i really care about is that i have a job to go to everyday, money in the bank, and have the occasional opportunity to do work in the community – as well as the freelance PR – for the “make your mark” volunteer events we host each season.  that’s all that keeps me going and keeps me from constantly thinking the worst.

the depaul/valpo PRSSA “taste of chicago PR” conference is finally this week!  i’m happy to say we’re overbooked, so it’s should be a blast.  i’m looking forward to doing some hardcore networking; it’d be awesome if this yielded some agency opportunities.  honestly, i’m just geeked about spending an entire day with a bunch of PR professionals…kid in a candy store’s all i’m gonna say.

i’ll have rolling updates about all this stuff since it’s become increasingly relevant in the past few months.  lots of juicy stuff about to happen toward the end of february into march.  looking forward to it…

i get lost in tall buildings…

ah yes, so i finally remembered where the library is…give me a break, i haven’t been up here in over a year.

i hate to admit it, but i have little to say other than hello, i am still among the living.  just been getting reacquainted and acclimated to the commuting and walking and sloth elevators etc.  surprisingly, i have little to complain about other than book prices.  i’ve addressed the irony between depaul and COD book prices many times before, but this quarter has been the kicker.  let’s do the math…at depaul, i currently have three classes and a total of ten required texts.  i’m also taking casey’s biz comm class at COD for the requirement and motivation which requires only one book.  since pictures are worth a thousand words, here’s one for you…with all sales taxes included:

depaul (left); COD (right)

now i’m not sure, but i’ve got a feeling e-follett’s got a pretty sweet scam going.  don’t cry for me though…i got my book on amazon courtesy of ecampus for $4.21, ha, suckers!  however, i found out something relatively strange.  depaul’s bookstore is provided through barnes & noble, which is nice; good selection of everything.  i found out though that e-follett is either a subsidiary or an affiliate of barnes & noble…strange bedfellows there.

finally, the only other interesting bit of bait that i have isn’t at all related to me, but to georgia; surprise surprise!  this past week, mikheil saakashvili attended meetings with NATO secretary jaap de hoop schaeffer who consequently condemned russian actions in georgia a month ago.  it’s a step in the right direction, however, georgia isn’t yet being considered for NATO membership for some time.  i think that’s a mistake, but there are obvious diplomatic issues that suggest – to me also, i promise i’m not a complete imbecile – that NATO membership for georgia, as it stands, could potentially create more challenges…say for example, a multi-national war against russia.  stuff like that.  so, i’ll leave you with another ridiculous picture that i took upon myself to edit for the sake of humor and truth and irony in it all…have a great day everyone.

mcgoohan…

truthfully, i have little to say to the effect of 9/11…it was a day that i don’t want to live again.  granted, i don’t live in new york, dc, or pennsylvania…but it was equally as devastating to me as an american.

i don’t think we learned a damn thing from it…

that said, it was my first day back at depaul in over a year, and it was fantastic…ultimately surreal, but fantastic.  it remains to be seen how things progress, but i’m confident that i won’t make the same mistakes again…i can say that most assuredly.

only one person to thank for it.

given all the religion and philosophy i’ll be ingesting this quarter, i should be the most enlighted SOB this side of aristotle…onward to my first assignment: the conceptual meaning of “why?”…

to be continued…

check our phatty jamz…

ah, so quite relieved these days.  my aforementioned gripes of intellectual incompetence – how’s that for a paradox for you? – had everything to do with depaul’s school of education giving me the runaround rather than solving a simple problem.  after much cattle-prodding, i’m finally re-enrolled and ready for fall.  because they took forever to get themselves together, i registered for casey’s business comm class at COD as a safety net.  whatever, it’s one nite a week and it’s with him, therefore it’ll be painless and a comfortable environment; i don’t have many of those these days.

my classes aren’t particularly what i had in mind, however, i tried to make them as interesting as possible.  so, i’ll be dividing my time between “philosophy & its issues”, business ethics (philosophical inquiry), and “the qur’an & its interpreters”…and of course intro to business comm.  you can only get so enthused about requirements.  winter quarter’s where the fun’s at.  i’ll officially be out of SOE and into the college of communications.

in dividing my stress-time between school and socio-political conflict, i’ve been opening up to the strangest music.  if you know me already, you’ll know i never listen to the radio save for as an annoyance to wake me up for work at 3am everyday.  lately, i’ve been giving daft punk a try…i blame one of my exes for that.  i hate to admit, i jumped the wagon about a decade late, but they’re remarkably innovative.  earlier last week, i downloaded the “bosta” soundtrack.  essentially, i’ve been all over the place, finding i’m steadily becoming more intrigued by electronic-based grooves and samples rather than my usual bluesy backbone.  very uncharacteristic…then again, this whole year’s been as such.

so i have nothing more to worry about, right?  let’s hope that – with the expected financial exception – things will be a bit more comfortable and smoother for a little while.  i was going to write a wordy post about losing people close to me, but that doesn’t even matter to me tonite.  i wouldn’t say that i feel “good”, just like the world shifted a little of its weight off one of my shoulders.  and so, i say goodnite…

that was when i ruled the world…

sure, the one nite i have a million thoughts in my head and want to dedicate time to another late-nite blog from deep within my guilty conscience, i have to go to bed immediately after class since i have to serve the general public coffee at 4am…

i didn’t even get to present my speech tonite…kinda pissed. oh well…maybe i’ll get a chance to write something poignant while i’m up at depaul tomorrow…i’m both apprehensive and excited to be going back up there. it’s been almost a year to the day that i left.

should be interesting…

chocolate & cheese…

yes, you read the title correctly. i’m currently enjoying a nutritious lunch of month-old chocolate cookies and cheddar cheese curds! quite a tasty combo actually…though technically irrelevant.

i just finished up with my site visit. i suppose it went well…kind of hard to gauge when you’re sitting in your cubicle while the executive director and head of co-op are touring the building without you. i hope it went well. see, now i want that award…i want it so bad i can taste it.

in the same vein, i’m trying to gather information on how to nominate my PR professor for the outstanding faculty or adviser award. two can play at that game. besides, any success i’ve had has been because of his influence alone. i couldn’t nor would i have accomplished any of this without him.

so where do i go from here..? well, i’m struggling once again on my speech for his class. it has little to do with the class and everything to do with my internship wrap-up. i kind of wish i could just show it to him and see what he thinks rather than present it to a class that won’t care nor will they be the least bit interested. why? because the title is, “social media ethics in public relations: the benefits of utilizing social networking for nonprofit relations.”

that’s why…

otherwise, i’m nervous and excited about my meeting at depaul on tuesday afternoon. i’m planning on paying an impromptu visit to the school of education to see if i can’t put goffman’s notion of “face” to the test.

and since i can’t seem to motivate myself to get any work done, i think i’m going to duck out of here about an hour early and head back to school to wait for the traffic to wind down and maybe get more than two slides out of this presentation…

rollercoasters are fun…

so today’s been a rough day…however, generally productive and looking up on the depaul end of things. we had a bit of an emergency at HSP that couldn’t have come at a worse time considering all that has to be done for phase two of “feed the kids” which happens tomorrow. things were generally salvaged and smoothed over, it was just the series of events that led to it that made the day discouraging. without going into unnecessary detail, we had a mixture of food mishap due to lack of proper communication and the wonderful illinois prairie heat. but, overall, we have more food to distribute tomorrow which made it all worthwhile in the long-run. we’re still experiencing a bit of a food shortage, but this mishap turned blessing in disguise really helped the situation…even though it didn’t seem that way rushing and sweating and panicking in the warehouse to make sure all perishable food was stored as quickly as possible. all is well and tomorrow’s families will no doubt be the benefactors…good fuzzy feeling, ha.

on the depaul front…leave it to my PR professor to help me make things right for myself. the only reason i haven’t ever mentioned his name is for the sake that this blog is public domain and i don’t want to infringe on his privacy…but enough of that disclaimer. due to a connection he had who also had a connection that happened to be the associate director of transfer admissions, i just might be getting that last nudge i need to be readmitted in the fall. i’m not getting my hopes up, however…i always prepare for the worst and hold my breath for the best.

beyond that, i’ve got a lot of catch-up work to do this week before and after my site-visit this thursday from the head of co-operative education & internship department up here. i’ll have a few final mentions of the work i’ve been working on at HSP. as always, i thoroughly encourage anyone who reads this to look into HSP and similar programs like it in your own communities.

given the times we’re in and the direction we’re headed as a society, it’s up to us to take care of each other…not the government’s. the government’s only there to serve as the rule-maker and deal-breaker…if we can’t take care of each other, then what’s the point?

solidifying faithlessness in systems…

so i pretty much just found out that i won’t be going back to depaul in the fall…i’ll have to wait for my appeal to be heard during winter intercession for possible re-admittance in january of next year.

in other words, i can forget about graduating on time…

all that was looking up is in the gutter again…and people wonder why i have no faith.

cynical much..?

alright, maybe i have been a bit pessimistic and overly-critical about everything these past few years. don’t expect that to change anytime soon…however, i must say, though i barely have enough time to think these days, i’m beginning to feel my turns for the worst turned out for the best.

take college for example…total mess. i wasn’t completely honest when i wrote my first entry. i’m a student at depaul university, yes. however, i’m on academic leave because i was too immature my first two years away from home to handle life and all the wonderful dark alleys i ended up getting lost in. currently, i’m at another institution that shall remain nameless considering there’s still a personal sense of shame knowing that i ended up in the exact place i did my best to avoid my entire high school career. it shall also remain nameless for the sake that it turned out to be the best thing that could’ve happened to me at this point in my life…

granted the students aren’t the best and brightest, but there are a few florescent bulbs in the batch which i’ve had the distinct pleasure of sharing a classroom with for the better part of the past six months. it’s the teachers that have left me at a loss for words. these people are some of the most brilliant intellectual minds i’ve ever had the honor to study under…one in particular who is the very reason i’ve come to realize that this place was essentially what saved me from myself.

i’ll save getting sappy for another blog on another day when i’ve actually accomplished everything i set out to last july. it’s been a long road, but it’s almost over…and i’m not sure yet how i’ll feel when it all comes to that grinding halt.

just an observation…

a bomb is still a bomb, even if it isn’t one

the school shooting generation has grown up. those of us who were in junior high and high school during the days of columbine are now in college. the copycat incidents piled up after columbine and have continued since virginia tech and more recently, niu. personally, as a member of this delusional, co-dependent generation, i’m ashamed to admit i call these people my peers. it’s all been hitting closer and closer to home since virginia tech. first niu where i frantically attempted to call an ex-boyfriend who’s been one of my best friends for over ten years, and failing because the cell towers were overloaded the day of the shooting. next came iadt’s bomb scare where my best friend is a student…a fashion student…people who generally can’t figure out how to properly insert a upass into the turnstile, let alone build a bomb. and it’s finally come home to me. yesterday, there was a fake bomb threat on the lewis center at depaul where i am a student, at a building i frequent for classes.

my overall point being, my generation possess limited to no coping skills without the assistance of prescription drugs. i know it seems a bit out there to state a claim based upon anti-depressants or attention/mood-altering drugs, but think about it for a moment…the generation to have ritalin and adderall shoved down our throats because our parents were too busy or unwilling to deal with them are now without mommy’s cheerful reminder to take your pill(s). most of us are in college and find it more profitable to sell our adderall to fellow students who’d like a high or just don’t feel like taking the pills anymore given that we’ve grown out of the drug-induced social coma and are now encouraged to interact and be extroverted whereas before, over or hyperactivity were seen as the demons. what happens when we all graduate college and a slew of business massacres are committed because we can’t cope with everyday life, a family, and a career?

thankfully, i had parents that nurtured my imaginative and intellectual growth by giving me the option to question…everything. i, unlike these “kids”, didn’t go through adolescence or my teens in a haze of confined, false reality. i am an atheist yes, but i was given the option at a point to decide if i wanted to go to mass anymore or if i even believed in god at all even though it was met with disapproval and abandonment by my own family. i was given the opportunity to read any book i wanted and formulate my own opinion of the world i lived in. these kids suddenly snapped out of the daze they were in for so many years and realized nothing is how they thought mom and dad said it was going to be.

so parents, my advice to you is this: stop coddling and drugging your children and allow them to think for themselves to promote a healthy intellectual development. stop contributing to the interference of MY personal freedoms and educational growth that my parents refused to deprive me of because you couldn’t stand little jimmy and jane banging on pots and pans, playing tag or house in the backyard, or tried to make friends in school. because your “perfect” children are murdering or maiming MY friends and interfering with my life since they’ve been cast out of yours.