Weblog

Okay, when I think back to the jobs that I've had in my past, there's aren't that many that I look upon with great delight. Sure, with my wicked sweet computer skills, I've worked at some wonderful places and some places that I don't care for at all. However, when I think of what my absolute favourite job was, I have to say that it didn't involve computers at all.

For a little over a year, I worked as an employee at a local noodle restaurant. Saying that I worked as an employee is about as specific as I can be without being too verbose. I really did a little bit of everything while I was there: washed dishes, waited on people, took orders, worked as a sauté cook… Since we were the slowest store in the chain, we really had a lot of time to learn how to do everything instead of simply specialising in a particular area. That meant that I learned how to cook.

As much as I did love food service, the pay sucked. Yeah, it was a nice job while I was in high school. Of course, there probably were some better paying jobs out there in food service that I could have had if I had looked for them.

Here I am now looking for a job that's just going to get me through the next five months until I go to graduate school. A job in food service seems to be something low commitment enough to abandon when the time comes to head to Nodak. The sad part is that it's making peanuts compared to what I could have be making if I would stick to an IT job.

Essentially, I've already come to a conclusion. Everyone always says to get a job that you love instead of a job that pays well. Well, that's good advice to live by, but I feel like I need a little bit of encouragement in this regard.

Encouragement? Anyone?

So, I commented last time about how journalism is dead and how technology killed it. Well, I thought that since technology was the future, I was secure in my job. Well, then I remembered that I didn't work in the technology sector; I worked in the broadcasting sector.

In summary, I lost my job.

I somehow justified it to myself to take a vacation to Arkansas and see my dear and dearest friends graduate from my alma mater and simply hang out with Jeremiah. But now, I'm back in Colorado with no job and a bad œcomony. Pretty much, I need a job that will get me through to only May when I'll hopefully go back to graduate school.

Anyway, if you happen to be interested, check out my résumé.

Well, it's the end of an era for me. The oldest newspaper in the state of Colorado is going out of business. Well, I shouldn't bury it yet, but unless a buyer decides to purchase The Rocky Mountain News soon (which seems unlikely), it will be the end of the newspaper.

I majored in computer science. I hate computer science. I would have much rather majored in journalism. Fortunately, while I was in college, I had the opportunity to get a small taste of journalism while the campus newspaper had me write a few columns for it.¹ It was perhaps one of the most amazing classes that I took.² Honestly, I really wonder where I would be now if I actually went through with switching my major like I planned.

Well, it's ironic: journalism is a dead industry… and the computer killed it. The news that you get in the paper is already outdated as soon as it's printed. With the presence of image manipulation programs like Photoshop and The GIMP, photographs can be used to distort the truth to the degree that photojournalism is loosing its credibility. Online classified advertising sites like craigslist target a much broader audience at a much cheaper price.³ It's the truth of the times: computers are au courant; journalism is the past.

Ironically, my university decided to end its computer-science program, but it kept its journalism major. It seems like the wrong decision in the grand scheme, but I know that they had good reasons for it.⁴ The other irony is that I'm working in that same computer industry that's killing journalism. It worked out for me that I stuck with the computers. I have a great job while those over at the News are going to be looking for jobs.

Still, it's sad: I killed journalism. I'm shouldn't be too sad about that. After all, the telegraph killed the Pony Express,⁵ but life is better today because of it. Now, the Internet⁶ is putting the newspaper out of business. Indeed, I shouldn't be too sad about it…

…except for the fact that I kind of like having my news on paper.

I guess that there's still Time Magazine.

1. Even though columns aren't really journalism.
2. Despite taking it at the worst time of my life, but that's a story for another time.
3. That would be… free.
4. Imagine that: JBU having good reasons.
5. And the telephone killed the telegraph.
6. Which is possibly the greatest invention yet.

Okay, life has gotten to the point where it just doesn't seem worth living anymore.

When I was a younger child, my dear grandfather would occasionally come to visit us. When he did come, he wouldn't come emptyhanded. No, he would always come with a package of cookies. Specifically, they were the taffy-flavoured, crème-filled Mother's brand cookies. However, we only had one name for the cookies: they were and are and forever will be known as Grandpa cookies.¹

The sad news: Mother's Cookies is no more. They went out of business. There are no more to be sold. My brother even tried to find them online. He couldn't. This means that I can no longer enjoy the taste of soft taffy with crème after it's been baptised in milk. In short, life is no longer worth living.

1. The fact that they were Mother's brand cookies and we called them Grandpa cookies confused me.

I kind of take the bus everywhere I go these days. As much as I would like to claim that my taking the bus to get to and from everywhere is motivated by some noble desire to save the environment or cause less congestion on the highways or something along those lines, none of those really matter because I don't have a car. Regardless, I pollute less, I save money from not having to park, and I snicker at the poor bastards stuck in traffic while the bus cruises down the express lane every morning.

Anyway, this evening on the way back home from work, we passed a bus that had broken down. The driver had the good sense to stop and take on the passengers from the other bus. Needless to say, it got a little crowded. When I noticed that there were ladies that were standing, I did what any young gentleman should do: I offered my seat to one of these ladies.

Here seems to be the irony worth pointing out: most women who I offer the seat to refuse to take it. Most of the time, they simply decline politely. However, it's not uncommon at all for a woman to give me a stare of surprise with a look of near disgust as if to say: “Did you really just do that?” It's almost as if I were treating her as a member of the weaker sex and insulting her in the process.

That's totally understandable. What once would have been considered chivalrous is now fundamentally sexist. This is America: the nation that was founded as an experiment in egalitarianism.¹ Americans (at least Americans now) take equality so seriously that “separate-but-equal” wasn't equal enough. So, pretty much, the thought that treating a woman as anything that might seem different is cause for an alarm. Maybe some people are shocked that society has decayed so much that such a response from a woman is cause for an alarm. Regardless, the last goal of chivalry is to offend. Also, societal norms change, and it's the people who don't change who end up looking like idiots.

The only thing left to do to make a weblog entry like this complete would be to ask my multitude of female friends what they think about it. I'm way ahead of myself here:

• One person said that every time a man does something chivalrous like giving up a seat or holding the door open, she, if only for a brief moment, “falls completely and totally in love.”
• Another said that she would simply appreciate it since it was the way that she grew up in her Midwestern life.
• Yet another said that she feels that men should still give up seats on the bus, she prefers to stand thus begging the question “Why bother then?”

I feel the need to continue writing, but my eyelids don't want to allow me that pleasure. Besides, tomorrow morning, I'm waking up early to go eat breakfast with some of those female friends of mine.

1. And, if you ignore slavery, segregation and the now everpresent trend to see terrorism and Islam as one in the same, it's sure has done a damn fine job.