daines'n around

The second day has ended, and third day is about to begin, yet I feel as though I've been working at the paper for a month already. Being there at 8 a.m. everyday is so much easier than I thought it would be. There certainly is little to no down time. I'm happy to get the break to go to class when it finally gets around to happening. It appears as though every day from 8a.m. until noon, I'll be doing page layouts, primary editing (i.e. story organization and flow and awkwardness checks) contact calling and story planning. There is just enough distraction from the influx of reporters to prevent me from going completely batty.

I sit behind an iMac from the late 90s and hope against hope that MacWord doesn't unexpectedly quit on me.

I had propped my Mac up on some dictionaries before, but the publisher got angry, citing previous employers who did the same thing and how he searched for almost an hour for a dictionary one day. I found some phone books from 1998 and utilized those instead. They are slightly more stable. Whoever thought this iMac design was ergonomic at all never sat at a computer all day long.

I'll be able to summarize and synthesize my thoughts a little better once I get all of my plans fleshed out.

I'm up to four days a week at the gym, though they are more like nights. I'm so wound up from editorial work that I just want to run and sweat. It's nice to be back to some type of physical exertion other than the normal walk to my car from my house. Plans are in the work for hockey nights to return as well.

This insomnia thing is almost defeated. At least I'm tired at 2 now.

Week one at school and the paper is complete. I've spent so many hours at the paper, it's almost strange when I leave to go to class, or do something not involving reporting and editing. My struggles with writers continue. How do I convey urgency to them to provide quality reporting? Even in the Arts and Entertainment section, where little more than an opinion and an ability to convey emotion and response through words are required, I'm stuck wishing I could write these articles myself.

The Sundial is still undergoing issues regarding their web site, so I have no outlet to share some of the thing I've collaborated with. I'm saving all of my editing sheets for a scrapbook of sorts; if and when I get the energy and time to get around to that.

My student loan was finally processed, and the checks came in the mail. I'm going to have to crack down on my budget a little bit more; things are beginning to get a little tight.

I continually find interesting ways to entertain myself and friends in a free manner, well, aside from the gasoline. We played guitar out of a popular songs book for more than two hours Friday night. A regular kumbaya night, but the Cat Stevens renditions had to be my favorite. If you want to sing out, sing out indeed.

Yesterday I also managed to head to Chinatown in L.A. to get in on a little bit of the Kung Hei Fat Choi action. Take a gander at some of the photos here: Year of the Dog

I've shied away from blogging daily. This isn't because nothing is happening, but it may be that too much is happening. The second week of school is over, and it is appearing that week one was a warm up for things to come.

I began my 18 hours a week at the photo lab as the technician this week, and after 18 hours, only three students have come in to the photo lab. It is saddening to see all of these resources go unused. Perhaps if we had computers worth spending time on, more people would forgo their bedrooms and living rooms to come into the school lab.

With the lab job, this brings up my daily schedule to a ridiculous amount of occupied time. Shall I narrate a week of activities for posterity sake? Why not? I'll document how much of a masochist I am.

In short: I'm busy. Sorry if i'm self-absorbed this semester. It doesn't really involve myself, but everything that I'm involved with.

Monday:

• 8am (sometimes I'm a little late) Newspaper for 1)contacting media outlets for story 2) editing features and news stories 3) proofreading a&e stories waiting to be published.
  
• 9a.m. Photo lab technician duties until 11:30a.m.
  
• 12pm institute class for an hour-and-a-half (this may be preempted due to newspaper needs)
  
• 2pm International news media analysis class, three hours
  
• 6pm Newspaper for 1)copy editing of paginated pages 2) ensuring layout 3) preparing for Tuesday
  
• Sometime between 9:30pm and 10:30 pm, the newspaper is boxed, I walk to my car and drive home. I'm usually home about 11pm.
  

• 8a.m. Newspaper 1) Dummy layout for Wed.'s a&e 2) edit stories for length and tone 3) continue with next week's story ideas
  
• 11a.m. Photojournalism senior status tutorial: issues in photojournalism
  
• 1230p.m. Creative writing until 2p.m.
  
• 2p.m. Advertising photography until 5pm.
  
• 5p.m. Newspaper to make sure production has finished dummying a&e, copy edit it myself, give it to another editor to read over. if there is time left, make the changes on the production computer to the layout. if no time, trust my page with someone else
  
• 6p.m. graphics until 10p.m. but often let out early. Four hours of class is insane.
  
• Bewtween 9p.m. and 10p.m. return to the newspaper to ensure everything that can be done is being done.
  
• Drive home, arrive about 11p.m.
  

• 8a.m. Newspaper editor's meeting.
  
• 9a.m. Newspaper 1)contacting media outlets for story ideas and plans for future issues2) editing features and news stories for other sections 3) proofreading a&e stories waiting to be published.
  
• 12p.m. Institute class until 1:30p.m.
  
• 2p.m. Photo lab technician duties until 6p.m.
  
• 6p.m. Newspaper for 1)copy editing of paginated pages 2) ensuring layout 3) preparing for Thursday and Friday
  
• Finish day at Newspaper between 9:30 and 10:30 p.m.
  
• Drive home, and arrive shortly before 11p.m.
  

• 9a.m. Newspaper 1)contacting media outlets for story 2) editing features and news stories 3) proofreading a&e stories waiting to be published.
  
• 12:30p.m. Creative writing until 2p.m.
  
• 2p.m. Advertising photography until 5p.m.
  
• 6p.m. Photo lab technician duties until 10p.m.
  
• Drive home by 10:30p.m.
  

• 8a.m. Newspaper 1) Dummy layout for Mon.'s a&e 2) edit stories for length and tone 3) continue with copy editing my section and the other sections.
  
• my day ends when a&e is done and boxed up, and I feel I've helped out enough with the rest of the paper.
  
• After three weeks this is about 2 or 3p.m.
  

• 9a.m. Photo lab technician duties until 2p.m.
  

• Church 11:30a.m.to 2:30p.m.
  
• Church meetings 2:30p.m. until about 4p.m.
  
• Fireside or church activity 7p.m. - 9p.m.
  

That's where I am. I'm trying to be positive and not complain as much. I'm working on that whole smiling thing.

Today I sat in my room, stared at the ceiling for an hour and wondered how more surreal life's recent events could get.

One-armed half-hugs irritate me. But oh how a prolonged and warm embrace touches me down to the very core.

So let's try and write in this thing a little more often, shall we? It is supposed to be a document of my life, and apparently nothing has happened in three weeks, though, many things have happened. There’s no point in trying to catch up.

Being on my home computer is difficult when I return after being on an ancient Mac all day long in the newsroom in those uncomfortable circa 1967 chairs.

The sundial finally got their web site back together. However, most of the articles from this semester are not online yet, but it should be consistently updated from now on. The Daily Sundial.

The rain slips slowly past my hands, dripping down my fingers and collecting with rushing water around my feet. The city is mourning, the sky is leaking, and the news reports only read storm watch. It's 2006, and suddenly I'm reminded that I started high school 12 years ago. It's February, and the rains have come a month later than usual, but they are here.

The rain doesn't bother me. It makes me silently content.

The rain hushes the noise of the city around me. The lack of noise seems to have a calming affect on me, one of the few things that can possibly do so lately.

Tonight we sat in the newsroom preparing tomorrow's issue and we were examining other daily university newspapers. UCLA has a staff of more than 50. Pen State has a sports section that is more than 7 pages long. I sit and wonder why CSUN can't be this caliber of a paper.

We have the students, 32,000+ of them going to school together. There is an apathy disease spreading around campus. I try my best to remain ambivalent to the corrosive forces of the skeptics. I try my best to remain critical and offer suggestions to improve, but I can't fight a sinking feeling that I'm going to have to change something, or nothing will change. All the pep talks and confidence building in the world won't change the attitudes of reporters. I have two reporters who make efforts to cover anything Arts related. No one else seems very interested.

I can only imagine the frustration of the news section, with only two or three news stories a day the demand for photos increases... and I'm not sure if it is to feature the photos or to fill space. I pray that something, anything changes in the minds of the reporters. Something that would allow them to might find reason to inspire them to search out the investigative and interested pro-active approach to reporting.

So here I'll write about my experiences in an obtuse manner. And here I'll let the rain wash away ambivalence. Here I'll try again, to recapture my desire to excel, even if I have to write every article myself. I'm grateful I took out that loan. I’m grateful to maintain this journal.