Anyway, my first class was Photography for Graphic Designers. To be honest, photography never really grabbed my interest too much. I realize that most art that us silly humans make, regardless of the type, is boring, dumb, or overrated. That’s why it’s hard to be a good artist. However, I’ve always felt like the ratio of good work to bad work is worse in the field of photography than most other art forms. It’s not that super awesome photography doesn’t exist though. The professor seemed pretty cool though, so I’m hoping that I’ll be exposed more to the kind of stuff that I like instead of the dull kind of work that I’ve seen in almost every gallery I’ve been to.

Of course, the first class was more of an introduction. For most of the first hour, she just told us a bit about herself and about how having a solid understanding of photography would benefit us as graphic designers. The rest of the class, she taught us about the various things to look for in a camera since obviously we’d be needing to buy a good camera.

It went well. After class, I came back and took a nap since I’d gotten myself all worked up about my first class. After that, I grabbed dinner, met up with Katie and her friends, and watched Saw III.

Not a bad first day. Now I just need to start looking at cameras and printers.

Hope all of your first days at school went well!

Instead, how about I make fun of the questions people keep asking me? If you’re already off to college, you’ve probably already had to face them.

People don’t aim to be unoriginal. They’re just trying to be pleasant and break the ice. It’s innocent, and they mean well. Higher on the list though are questions that aren’t annoying because of obvious answers or repetitiveness, but instead, are a little bit insulting or tasteless one way or another. Probably unintentional, but certainly fair game for making fun of and coughing at.

Every question on here has been asked by at least three people, so don’t be embarrassed if you’ve asked me any of them.
This list is should be taken playfully. Enjoy.

10. “What do you want to do after you graduate in four years?”
If I’m anything like most college graduates, I’ll probably be desperate to get any job at all when I graduate, but I think you wanted to hear about how I’d like to work for Google and change the world with my newly acquired artistic skills, so that’s what we can talk about.

9. “Are you excited?”
Oh come on. What do you think? Of course I’m excited. I’m nervous, too. In fact, I’m everything else that everybody else is right before they go off. Duh.

8. “Do you think you’ll have fun in San Francisco?”
Yes.

7. “August 27th? Isn’t that early/late?”
No.

6. “So, are you going to do anything wild?”
Gee, what could you possibly be looking for with this question? Yes, I’m going to learn to ride a unicycle while juggling live eels, injecting myself with bizarre drugs while wearing a beer hat, and having unprotected group sex while blindfolded. At the same time. And putting it on YouTube. Seriously. What do you expect me to say here?

5. “Did you get all your shopping done?”
Yes.

4. “Do you think you’re ready for college?”
Yes.

3. “Aren’t you grateful for this opportunity?”
Am I the only person that doesn’t like when people ask others if they feel grateful about something? There’s something simultaneously self-righteous and condescending about it, and summons the same awkward feelings as when people try to talk to you about your personal finances. Yes, I’m thankful for my blessings, but I’m also proud of having overcome obstacles.

2. “Aren’t you going to miss your dog though?”
Considering that I’m closer to Sparky than I am to pretty much anything, yes, of course I am. You already knew the answer, so there was no need to ask, but thanks for bringing forth enormous waves of absolute heartbreak by reminding me.

1. “So, are you actually, like, getting a four-year degree? For art? Graphic design, was it?”
With one question, you’ve managed to put down the field I’ve chosen to pursue, question the value of a bachelor’s degree in my field compared to a bachelor’s degree in another field, belittle the amount of time and effort needed to get such a degree, and patronize my scholarly pursuits. Thanks, jerk! Now watch me help design the control interfaces and concept art for the mass-producible robots that take your job and do it better and safer, the advertisements to help sell the robots more quickly to your employer, the cute stationary for your pink slip, and if you’re nice, the web site for you to desperately try to find a new job.

My dorm’s check-in is on August 27th, but we’re heading up a day early. So that’s actually just ten days away.

I’m going to miss my family, friends, and my amazing dog Sparky, but I’ve been waiting to go to college for my whole life and already had to delay it a year because of my health.

It’s almost time. I can hardly wait.

Granted, there’s a certain expectation of sass from the people who go on television court that would never be allowed at all in more traditional courtroom settings, but as you’ll see, this fellow was an exceptional moron. And don’t forget that he apparently went to law school for two years, too. If I were a judge and somebody did to me what this guy did to her, I’d shut him up and warn him that he risked being held in contempt. Then I’d give him basically the same scathing lecture that Judge Millian did. And feel awesome.

Enough blabber! The video speaks for itself anyway. Enjoy.

Hell. Yes. So basically, Judge Millian is my hero for the day.

As a real quick unrelated note just to get it out of the way, Krystal and I have split up. We talked about things and agreed that it would be best if we were just friends again. Since we still like each other as friends and all and feel pretty much the same way about it, we’re just going to be cool and skip the whole “awkward avoidance phase.” There’s still anime to watch and cookies to eat, after all. So there you go. No drama; just friendship. We will now resume our regularly scheduled internet.

1. Social: I’ve updated the About Me page here on my blog, cleaned up my Facebook, and joined a few niche communities like Last.fm and Plurk, so I should be “connectible” without having to spend much effort.
2. Physical: I’ve started a workout regimen that I’m hoping will be good for anybody starting at zero, like me. On Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays, I’m doing the Couch-to-5k-in-6-Weeks plan. On Thursdays, Saturdays, and Mondays, I’m doing the Hundred Pushups plan. And just because that left Tuesdays free and I want to go swimming, guess what days I’m going to try to hit the pool.
3. Monetary: I’ve saved up a few hundred dollars, so I’ll be able to afford the cheap flight back to San Diego every once in a while, and that’s in addition to the regular school breaks that my family will pay for. I should also be able to afford the occasional movie and restaurant.
4. Scheduling: All of my classes are spread out from Monday through Thursday, which means that I’ll have long weekends without having a “dread day.” My classes are later in the day so I can sleep in. It’s pretty ideal.

Everything is going according to plan. If any of you that are already out at college have any tips though, please leave a comment.

The Department of Homeland Security has expressed great interest in making everyone that wants to get on an airplane wear a special bracelet that can be used to shock you so badly that you won’t be able to move for several minutes per shocking. It also features a built in GPS, so they can monitor you and shock you from anywhere. It will have all your personal information stored in it, and can be used for “interrogation purposes” as well.

Expressing interest isn’t the same as seeking implementation, but with stuff like this combined with President Bush pardoning himself against potential war crimes, I’d almost bet that you thought about George Orwell before I even mentioned him in this sentence.

We need January. Immediately.

Alright, before you die from wondering what the heck I’m talking about, here is how I totally should have asked her. Enjoy!

Wasn’t that just wonderful?

Anyway, on a completely unrelated note, I’m going to try to get myself Comic-Con tickets for Saturday and Sunday. I’ve been getting emails from people wanting press passes lately. Sorry folks, but media pre-registration closed quite a while ago.

There’s still on-site media registration, but since I don’t have the energy to jump through the hoops again this year, you’re on your own. If you have a blog with an RSS feed (they pretty much all come with a feed anymore), I can add easily incorporate it into Bagelwood Central and syndicate your stuff, but that’s as much as I’ll do this year.

To make a long story short, the store refused to let a five-year-old girl who was having a bathroom emergency use their restroom. Needless to say, the little girl defecated all over herself and her parent, at which point they finally ran to a movie theater that let them clean themselves up.

If the store manager hadn’t mocked the humiliated family afterward, there might not have been a story. But the manager did decide that it would be a wonderful idea to further agitate them, and so now it’s been picked up by The Consumerist, which has additionally pointed out that as a matter of fact, there’s a rule in California called the Uniform Plumbing Code that requires a “toilet facility for customers, patrons, and visitors of all mercantile and business establishments.”

And with this embarrassingly heartless breach of both California regulations and just the simple Golden Rule itself making it onto the front page of Digg as well… Rut-roh for the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory!

Score one for the karma police.

Update: I can’t stand people that counter legal citations with, “Well, you’re not a lawyer, so you should just shut up!” Well, I found somebody that did that, and then went on to insinuate that anybody sympathizing with the little girl is just an anti-business radical. Here is what they said.

Is any one hear a lawyer in California who specializes in these type of cases? Does anyone know exactly what this establishment was zoned as, or what it technically is operating as? I think the the answer is no. Quit trying to act smart by pulling laws and facts out of our ass when you are neither fully briefed nor fully trained to handle the situation. Get off your soap box and stop wasting our time.

As for the whole “human compassion” argument, what if that girl shit herself in the food prep area, in it contaminated the food? What then? Or what if she had some sort of virus that got on the food and made people sick? Is that mother going to cover the store for their losses? No, she isn’t. This is a complex situation which can’t be simplified because you think big bad corporate America is wrong.

Brilliant in countless ways, no? Anyway, I couldn’t help but respond. Admittedly I was a little bit snarky, but that’s just my sense of humor for you. And it’s a Digg comment anyway, not a grand treatise. Just enjoy it.

Heaven forbid regular people be able to use the internet to look up laws and make sure that corporations are not ignoring them! How pretentious! Who do these people think they are, living in a democratic nation with a “by the people, for the people” attitude toward government? Stupid empowered citizens and their anti-American penchant for citing things like laws!

But seriously, if lawyers were the only ones meant to be able to understand the rules we all have to live by, then we’d be in a pretty bad situation, don’t you think? “You have to have a restroom for people to use” is a particularly easy to grasp regulation in my opinion.

If they want to do business in California, they have to play by California’s rules, and they clearly did not comply with the Uniform Plumbing Act, which quite plainly states that they need to provide restrooms to customers, patrons, and visitors. The opus is on them to make sure that they are complying with all applicable business regulations. Oops.

Now, of course I agree that it would be a bad idea to just let people wander around where the food is prepared, but that’s why you don’t put the restroom that you are obligated to provide for people in the middle of the kitchen.

This is not a complex issue at all. This is a case where an entire store did not go by the golden rule of treating others as they’d wish to be treated, resulting in some pretty gross humiliation of a little girl, which in turn is resulting in the company being exposed for not being in compliance with the law.

Sorry, but I seem to still somehow find myself feeling much more sympathetic toward the little girl that was pointlessly humiliated than I do toward the heartless, law-breaking corporate entity that humiliated her.

Doesn’t it make you want to go learn tai-chi or something, just to be able to move this smoothly?

It’s actually called “contact juggling” apparently, and I’d really like to learn how to do it. I can already juggle normally, but this is clearly something completely different. Heh, I’m imagining myself off at college doing this in my dorm room, and my roommate coming in and immediately being hypnotized now.

Anyway, just thought I’d share it since it was so cool.

Also, you might want to bookmark it so that you can have something on hand to show people that ask you how they should secure thier computers, or when they ask for recommendations on the first things they should install when they buy a new computer, or whatever. It’s nice to be able to just have one thing to link them to so that they can help themselves.

Sure, I’m partial to my own article, heh. But I really do hope that you find it helpful whether you use it yourself or save it to give to others.