Trying out a new layout

I'm making a pact with myself that I will blog more often. Mostly because I always think of things to write and never do because I'm away from my computer. The acquiring of an iPhone has helped immensely in that department. And I've figured out how to add posts from my phone to the blog! Hurray! I'm still in the testing it out phase but I'm hoping it will increase my frequency of writing.

The newest news is that Boyfriend and I are engaged! So I guess he will be Fiancé from now on. We're not really planning the wedding until I'm done with this semester but I have some really great friends helping me out with it. I also lost one of my jobs but I'm collecting unemployment. I did this mainly because it will give me a chance to focus on school without worrying about money too much. Because I'd been working so much, I think I let some of my school focus slip a little but I'm dead set on correcting that. Here's to trying harder at everything!

Tales from the library! And library-esque tales!

I recently sat down with an advisor and made a plan of work to get me through school. The LIS program recommends students do this after completing their first semester, which I think is a bit unfair. I can't decide what I want to do! I have to follow rules, though. I was assigned an advisor who was on sabbatical last semester so I took it upon myself to switch advisors and I picked a professor that I had a class with, assuming I would feel more comfortable with her because I knew her.

We had to reschedule the appointment two times because one of us was not feeling well each time. Luckily, this gave me extra time to come up with a more coherant plan than "I dunno... I just want to touch books." I hadn't really thought about my experiences at the Opera House as something I would want to do for real but the whole time I was scanning things I kept thinking that there had to be better methods to doing this. I have very minimal scanning experience and even less experience with photo software (like Photoshop or the like). On a whim, (well, a friend said I should take this class with her) I enrolled in a Digital Imaging class for the winter semester. It's only offered every other year and I'd heard awesome things about the professor. This is my favorite class I've taken in the program so far. We're learning all kinds of information about proper scanning techniques and about the retention schedule of digital files. Our group project this semester is working with the Charles Wright African American History Museum. We're helping them digitize some of their random collections for a future web collection.

So I'm officially going into Digital Archiving. This means that I'll be focusing on technology and building web collections for things. I'm really excited about this. I think that this will really help me after I graduate. I'm hoping that I can work for the Library of Congress doing something similar to the Flickr project they have. I also came across a job posting for the CIA that needed archiving experience.

The other news is that I'm going to be given more responsibilities at the public library I work at. I mentioned to my boss how I liked my cataloging class because to me, it's about fitting data into a puzzle and formatting things the right way. She decided that she wants me to learn how to process new books and do minor repairs. I've been feeling annoyed at that job because I don't have anything to do except help people at the circulation desk, so I'm glad that she's giving me a project. I have realized that I'm not sure I could ever work at a reference desk in a public library. I would really love to make the library I work at better but the director is super back-in-the-past and doesn't care about improvements. The reference librarians are all older and seem to like the job stability the most. There are also some annoying patrons I can't stand. I'm fine with chit-chatting and there are som patrons that I absolutely love, but I could really stand not to hear about which pet food is the best and did you know that Obama wants abortions for the whole world? It's totally true, the internet told me. I did manage to create a piece of art based on a patron's hair. He was an older gentleman but was going for that Bob Dylan-my-hair-is-its-own-entity thing. Here is what I produced in MS Paint:



I obviously need to learn Photoshop.

The infamous Christmas post.

Today is January 22nd which means it's the perfect day to bring out the Christmas pictures! Hey, at least it's less than a month since Christmas. That counts for something, right?

Because I'm in grad school and not financially wealthy, I opted to make most of my Christmas presents this year. The couple of exceptions being for Boyfriend (because I already had the perfect gift for him) and Mom (because she is notorious for not liking anything she specifically tells you to get her. Harrumph.). I made my sister a cute apron and it turned out wonderfully! Here she is enjoying it in its apron glory!


I wanted to make my Dad something that I knew he could use but that other people would see it and think, "Wow, that is a sweet thing, Mr. Reile!" so I made him a tie.
It turned out kind of lumpy and very wide at the top but it was my first tie and he promised he would wear it. When I talked to my mom last week she asked my permission to make it smaller and hopefully less lumpy. I told her to go ahead because she's better at sewing than I am. To her credit, even though I didn't make her anything, she was really proud of what I did make. I also made a couple of pillows for my Dad's University of Michigan themed room. It's kind of been the default present for my family to give my Dad but he still likes those kinds of presents. Or he's good at pretending. Either way.

I got Boyfriend a video game and this T-shirt from Threadless.com. He's wanted that shirt for a long time but I ordered the wrong size and when I sent it back to exchange it, they were out of his size! So I was foiled on the awesome present front. He did like the Lego Batman game I got him, though.

I did manage to be secretly awesome on getting my parents to buy Boyfriend the present I really wanted to get him: Mac OS X Leopard. He was so surprised and happy! Look at his happy face! I told him that I had sent my parents a list of things that we wanted but I left off that I asked them to get him this. And I'm glad my parents decided to get it for him, too. I got a lot of really great presents, too. Boyfriend got me these super cute slippers and I got more sewing accouterments from my mom. What did I get my mom? I bought her a weaving book she said that she wanted. The funny part was that she forgot that she told me about it and was really happy when she opened it. Then I told her that she told me to get it and it was funny that she hadn't remembered that.

When we were at Boyfriend's family's house, we had lots of good food and quality time with his niece and nephew. His nephew got Guitar Hero World Tour for the Nintendo Wii and we played it. We've vowed that when we get out tax returns back we are going to buy it because those drums are too much fun to play. I sometimes think about buying it now but I suppose food is more important.

So this was Christmas. I think this holiday went very, very well. I was glad that my presents went over well and I genuinely had fun with our families. We're going back to visit family during my Spring Break in March and for a whole week so that will be great. It's weird that the older I get, the more I enjoy my family. Someone must be drugging me or something.

I also wanted to post these Christmas cards I made for Laura and Sheree. I'm super, super, super bad at sending things like cards out and just sending them things in general. I'm going to try to send them more things because I need distractions from homework and what better way than to send things to friends overseas. So, Sheree and Laura, here are what your cards would have looked like, had I sent them. The star represents where I am currently located in Michigan: the city of Royal Oak. Or at least as much of an approximation as I could eyeball.

I also couldn't decide which one to send to which person so that's my other excuse for not mailing them. And they're bigger than my hand (here's a picture of one of them by my hand) so how could I have mailed them?! There isn't anything written inside because I got lazy. But I cut out all of the Michigans and animals myself. It was hard to get that penguin's wavy thing right. Just so you know. This is what I do with my down time at work. Halfway make Christmas cards. Please know that I do miss you two and thanks for not being as lazy as me and sending me cards!

That's all from the Christmas holidays. I'm actually going to make a post tomorrow of this really awesome shirt I made and my new haircut.

interview, schminterview, i nailed that!

I had an interview today at the Southfield Public Library. I basically forced myself upon the library a couple of weeks ago when my class visited. This is the most beautiful library I have ever, ever seen. I had applied for a Library Aide position there a few months ago so after the tour, I talked to a woman who worked there and explained my situation and could I apply for the Intern position they had? Because it's a Youth Intern position, she gave me the name of the Youth Services Director. I decided to call a few days later, while being frustrated with my job. I scored an interview! They still had my resume on file!

I went down during my lunch hour for the interview and was a little late. The library has this massive parking lot and the offices were up on the third floor so I sprinted toward the entrance and up the stairs. I scared this woman ahead of me because she was trying to walk at a normal pace and I just charged up behind her. I was totally out of breath as I walked into the office but I tried to calm down as best I could. I apologized for being late and the librarians were the nicest ever. I feel pretty confident that even if I didn't get the job, this was the best interview I've ever had. This internship would give me a huge opportunity. I would be responsible for maintaining an aspect of the collection, giving school tours, and a million other things. They did ask me how well I work with children and I was completely honest. I said that I've been getting better at relating to them but that I've had minimal experience dealing with them in real world settings (read: babies kind of scare me). I was completely serious when I said that I would love to have more experience with children and that although I am not super wonderful around kids, I'm really passionate about the library field. Even if it turns out that I don't want to go into Public Librarianship, I know this would be good for me.

Because it's becoming winter and the season is effecting my mood, I've been a little more contemplative about my place in this world. I am very glad that I decided to join this program. It's funny because I've loved to read since I was little but never seriously considered librarianship, as far as I know. During the interview, they asked me why I chose this field. I said that I originally wanted to get my MFA but there was a set back (read: I got depressed after not getting accepted right away) so I chose Wayne. I think that I am way happier in this program than I would be as an MFA student. I feel a lot less self-conscious and I feel that this is really something I could be good at. I'm getting an amazing amount of support from my friends, relatives and Boyfriend. It just feels right.

DEEEETROIT BASKETBALL!

Boyfriend had some of his friends come out last night and we all went to a Pistons game and got into some shenanigans. We had planned this for a while because we would be unable to get home for Thanksgiving and one of his friends was going to be in England over Christmas taking his British girlfriend back home. The tickets were a super good price but apparently there were some problems with credit cards and what not. There was a moment where we thought we wouldn't be able to go; luckily, we were able to get the Palace of Auburn Hills to issue us enough seats in the very back row of the stadium.

If you look closely at the ticket, you can see the words "partially obstructed" on the bottom. We were hoping that we wouldn't be sitting behind a dumpster or anything like that. Really, "partially obstructed" meant that we were in the back row of the press section where we would need to stand up to see it. It wasn't that bad, actually. The basketball players are tall enough that they didn't look like ants and they had the game on the Jumbotron, which helped.

This was my first Pistons game, actually my first professional basketball game. Emma, the English girl, had never seen a basketball game at all. I actually wouldn't mind going again to a game but hopefully with better seats. The crowd was really energized. The only thing that was weird was actually getting to our seats. There was an elevator that would take us up but it took forever to get a car that was empty enough for the six of us to squeeze in. We asked people where the stairs were and we got multiple answers ranging from "oh, there aren't stairs to that level," "well, you can use the emergency stairwell but I can't promise you the door will open up when you get there," and "they're between these seats." When we tried to find them between the sections we were shooed away because we didn't have tickets in that section. Finally, when the game was over, we walked down the hall and DOWN A FLIGHT OF STAIRS TO THE NEXT LEVEL. So... thanks Palace employees for not letting us get exercise. The Pistons won and it was really awesome. I had talked to one of my friends the day before and he had just seen the Orlando Magic play the Milwaukee Bucks (who the Pistons played last night) and said that the Pistons would pretty much kill them. The game was closer that I would have expected but I was really impressed with the Pistons. I've never been a basketball fan, or really any kind of a sports fan, but there is something to being at a game that makes me interested in them.

After the game, we wanted to go out to the bar, although I was the designated driver so I wasn't too concerned with the drinking. Boyfriend wanted to take them to this really awesome bar called Gusoline Alley but when we got there, they were at capacity. Maybe this is just me showing how uncool I am and not used to the bar scene, but almost all of the bars we tried to go to had lines out the door or were super, super packed. We finally were able to get into one bar but we wanted somewhere to sit down. We decided to find somewhere closer to the apartment and ended up going to this restaurant/bar called Royal Kubo. I had been invited there by my cousin a while ago but I didn't end up going so I wasn't sure what to expect. That place was crowded and so so loud. I ended up only having one drink that night but combined with the loud bar and staying out until 2:30 a.m. made me a zombie today. I've basically been sitting around in my pajamas drinking tea and watching movies. Which is really nice but would be better if my throat didn't feel like I swallowed a sword. The moral of this story: I'm getting old and my healthy eating habits don't really allow room for partying. Which is fine, I'd rather keep this weight off than drink a million drinks in one night. By the way, I'm officially down 16 pounds! Whoo!

decisions, decisions

I called my parents to ask them to vote for Barack Obama yesterday. It turns out that they already planned on it. Hurray! That makes me feel a lot better about the state of things. I know that the whole world wants Barack Obama to win and so do I. I get so sick of listening to the one-issue voters and closet (or, not closeted in some cases sadly) racists. The fact is that he is ready to lead our country. This country shouldn't worry about whether or not gays can marry but that we make sure America isn't going to go down the crapper.

There are some big decisions being made over here. I won't say too much but I'm really excited for this next year to get under way. I think it will change things for the better. Part of me can't believe it's so close. But I can almost get a grasp on my whole life for the first time. Which takes a lot of pressure off these shoulders. I'm also down almost ten pounds due to my lifestyle nutrition changes. I have a lot to go but it's getting easier as the days go by.

Here's to this next week!