Still waiting

So five o'clock has come and gone, and I haven't heard anything about the job. I had expected to hear from them by 5, because that's usually considered the end of the work day. I don't necessarily think this means I didn't get the job. Since they only interviewed 4 people, I'm pretty sure they would have contacted the 3 people who didn't get it, as well as the 1 who did, if they had made a decision. So they must still be working on it. Which, actually, is not that big of a surprise. When I interviewed Friday morning, they asked me for a few more references, which I emailed to them later that day. If they did the same with the other applicants, I would imagine they were still trying to get ahold of a lot of people today, since it can be hard to reach people on the weekend. The references I gave them might have been particularly troublesome, because a couple of them are based in Los Angeles, so then you've got the time zone thing to take into account. Not much I could do about that-- I lived in California for four years.

Also, it's still possible I could hear something tonight. When I first talked to the one professor running the program to schedule an interview, I think we had that conversation around 7PM. So I know he's open to the idea of doing business in the evening.

Anyway, still waiting. I'll let you know as soon as I have some news. I realize that maybe I'm just being delusional here, maybe they made their choice and then decided, "Eh, screw those other guys, they'll figure out they didn't get the job when we don't call them back," but after meeting with these professors, I really don't think they're the kind of guys who would do that. So, keep those fingers crossed.

-Nick

A (relatively) stress-free weekend

OK, so I survived the last day of classes without incident. My graphics project even turned out to not be as sucky as I feared it would be. And I thought my interview for the research assistant job went very well. I should be hearing from them regarding whether or not I got the job some time tomorrow (Monday). So keep your fingers crossed for me. If I don't get it, I'm going to try to not be disappointed or down about it. I've got some other ideas about ways to make money this fall, not sure how viable some of them are, but I'll figure something out.

It's been a very good weekend, and fairly relaxing, even though I've stayed busy. Yesterday I did some grocery shopping, cleaned up my apartment a little bit, then spent a few hours in the afternoon writing a long, long email to some of my buddies from college, with whom I had done a piss-poor job of keeping in touch. I'd been meaning to send a mass email out to them and let them know how I've been spending my life post-graduation, but I just hadn't gotten around to it, due to being lazy and busy and forgetful, at different times.

Last night I relaxed by watching the Bills-Redskins preseason game on TV. Ah, that good old feeling of watching the Bills and being disappointed by the result... how I've missed you. The universe is still in balance, it would seem.

Telling you what I did today is probably going to sound boring and unpleasant, but I actually found it very relaxing. I read the news. Pretty much all day long. See, during my last week of classes I had stopped reading the paper, but I get it delivered, so these newspapers were just piling up on my coffee table, a constant reminder of how I've been ignoring my journalistic responsibility to know what the hell is going on in the world. And my inbox was full of news updates from the New York Times that remained unread. So today I got all caught up on the news and it was actually a really nice morning/afternoon. I figure if you don't like reading the news and finding out about what's going on in your community/state/country/world, you probably shouldn't be in the journalism business.

I also watched the USA/China basketball game, which wasn't very entertaining (101-70 in favor of democracy) but it was decent background noise while I was reading the papers.

Tonight I'm thinking I'm gonna head out and finally see the X-Files movie, which I still haven't done (I actually haven't been to the movies since Hancock, which was over a month ago now. Just been really busy. And kind of cheap). It's a stormy night in Syracuse, seems like a good time to get my paranormal investigation on. Plus it'll be a 10 o'clock show on a Sunday at a mall that no one seems to go to, of a movie that has been out for several weeks and didn't do that well to begin with. I estimate there will be no more than 8 people in that theater, myself including. So the mostly empty theater should enhance whatever creepiness factor the movie has. Also plan on seeing Pineapple Express in the near future, and I'd still like to see Step Brothers, and I think there's some good stuff coming out soon (I'm hearing Downey is awesome in Tropic Thunder) so maybe I'll spend a lot of time in theaters during my vacation.

Okay, that's all for now. Hopefully I'll have a job by the next time I post. But if not, it won't be the end of the world. Peace.

-Nick

The Last Day

So tomorrow is the last day of boot camp, and it's going to be intense. First of all, I start off the day with the interview for that research job I think I wrote about last week. That's at 9:30, and the professor told me it wouldn't take very long, but I'm still expecting to get to class a little late (I'm supposed to be there at 10).

Then, the day is going to be stressful because I have to finish my final graphics project by 5 (or, more accurately, by 4:15 or 4:30 at the latest, because after you finish the design, then you need to do a quick write-up about it, print everything out, organize your materials so you're ready to hand it in, etc.) I'm having more trouble with this project than I have with any other (and that's saying something-- at one point or another, every project has caused me to start spewing profanity), and I'm somewhat concerned. I'm not worried about my grade-- I've done well on everything so far, so I can afford to get a lower grade on this one without even really hurting myself. What worries me is that I'm seriously doubting my ability to even finish the thing on time. I should have stayed late in the computer lab tonight to work on it, but by the time 5 rolled around, I was so fucking sick of being there and I was getting really hungry and I just decided to bail. In my defense, I did quite a bit of work on it from home tonight. I can't actually work on the design, since I don't have the necessary software on my computer, but I did a lot of research, planning, sketching, etc. Anyway, tomorrow is going to suck, but I'll find a way to do it-- I always do-- and then the summer classes will be over. That's the thing that matters. In less than 18 hours, it will be over, for better or worse.

Okay, that's all for now. I'll write more tomorrow night, when I will presumably be very relieved and happy about having all this behind me. Unless I'm out partying and am therefore unavailable to write anything, which is a possibility. Although I actually think I'll probably be so tired that I'll just want to come back to the apartment and chill out, and save any partying for Saturday. Anyway, I'll be back with more posts over the weekend at some point. Wish me luck.

-Nick

The Coville Story

Hey gang,

Had my last day of news writing today, and turned in the Bruce Coville article. Now all I have to do is finish my final graphics project in the next two days, and boot camp is over. I need to get to work on that, so can't write much now. Oh, one thing related to my last blog post-- Kevin Smith won his appeal with the MPAA, and "Zack and Miri" is officially rated R, and he didn't need to make any further cuts. Good news.

All right, here's the article, if you're interested:

All in a Day’s Plork
By Nick Roberts

Bruce Coville, the Syracuse-based children’s author, has now published over 90 books. His career began in the 1970s, when he and his wife, Katherine, started making picture books; he wrote and she illustrated. His newest novel is “Dark Whispers,” the eagerly anticipated third installment in his popular “Unicorn Chronicles” series, which was published August 1.

Coville, 58, is a man of great energy. Speaking at his Clarke Street office, he often taps the surface of the desk in front of him for emphasis, jerks his eyebrows up and down, or jumps out of his seat to grab something from the cluttered bookshelf or the adjoining room. It is the energy of a man who gets to make his living doing what he loves most.

“I always had an affinity for being with kids, for playing with kids, for hanging around with kids,” Coville says. “I also knew I wanted to write.”

One of the reasons he writes for children is because, even now, many of his favorite books are kids’ books. He and Katherine have three children of their own; Orion, 38; Cara, 33; and Adam, 27.

“What I try to do, every time I write a kid’s book, is write a book that I would have wanted to read myself when I was a kid,” he says.

Likewise, Coville specializes in the science fiction, fantasy and horror genres because those were the kinds of stories he enjoyed as a child.

“I wanted to be the next Edgar Rice Burroughs,” Coville says. Fantasy also has some advantages over other genres, he points out.

“Writing fantasy lets you talk about big issues, more directly than you can in contemporary fiction, in some ways.”

As an example, he cites his most commercially successful book, 1992’s “My Teacher Flunked the Planet,” the fourth and final book in his wildly popular “My Teacher is an Alien” series, which sold over 1.5 million copies.

“It’s the most profound political and philosophical statement I’ve made, and it’s the best seller of my books, and a lot of people don’t know about it. I take a certain amount of pride in that.... That me and the kids have this thing.”

Despite its commercial success, the book failed to garner much attention among critics and reviewers because it was published as a paperback original and because it was the fourth book in a series.

Michael Stearns, 42, a New York literary agent and former editor who worked on several of Coville’s books in the 1990s, says that Coville would be an even bigger name than he already is, but the kinds of books he writes do not normally receive consideration for the Newbury and other major children’s literature awards. Even so, Stearns is a firm believer in the quality of Coville’s work.

“The ‘Unicorn Chronicles’ and the ‘Magic Shop’ books are some of the best children’s books out there,” Stearns says.

Stearns admires the passion Coville puts into his work. Some writers get into children’s fiction because they think it will be easier to publish there after failing in the adult fiction market, but that is not the case with Coville.

“Bruce writes for kids because he loves writing for kids,” Stearns says.

In addition to loving his work and having fun with it, Coville acknowledges there is a higher purpose to what he does, an educational aspect to children’s literature.

“The greatest tool... that people need for us to survive as a culture is empathy. And the only way to teach empathy is through story,” he says. “There’s no other way. Because in a story you live inside somebody else’s skin. And the more stories and the more compelling the stories, the more you help the child understand the other.”

Most of the time, Coville is happy with what he has accomplished and achieved in his career.

“If you have the blessing to make your living at meaningful work that you love, what more can you ask of success?” he says.

At other times, he lets on that he aspires to even greater things.

“What I really would love is for my work to be remembered 500 years from now,” he says.

Tamora Pierce, 53, is a fellow writer of fantasy and science fiction for young adults, and a close friend of Coville’s. She was in the audience at Boskone, a science fiction convention in Boston, when Coville participated in a discussion on how J.K. Rowling’s blockbuster “Harry Potter” series has impacted the industry. As Pierce recalls, Coville went to the microphone and articulated a thought that must have passed through the mind of every children’s writer.

“Why not me, God? Why not me?” he shouted, prompting laughter and applause.

The two sides of Coville’s personality, the exuberant side that does everything just for the fun of it, and the relentlessly hardworking side that always wants to achieve more, are both evident in his other business venture, Full Cast Audio.

Coville started the company in 2001 with friend and business partner Dan Bostick, 46. Their idea was to produce audio books with a full cast, so that each character would have a different voice. Unlike radio drama, which uses mostly dialogue and sound effects while eliminating narration, the Full Cast Audio recordings are unabridged, often using the book’s real author as the narrator.

“Full Cast Audio is a fusion of literature and theater,” says Bostick, who met Coville in 1989 when they were both acting in a local community theater festival.

The company records about 14 books per year, and will complete its 80th recording in 2009, Bostick says. Despite being so productive, the company has struggled to make money in its first seven years.

“We have hopes of making it a financially successful company,” Coville says.

That was never the main objective, however. Bostick recalls being taken aback when Coville told him, at the start of their partnership, that the primary goal was not profitability. He asked what the purpose was, if not to make money.

“It’s to have fun,” Coville said.

The partners hope that their fun-loving spirit will lead to profits.

“When you’re in the business of having fun, everybody wants to work with you,” Bostick says.

In this case, fun does not mean relaxed. The company strives to produce recordings of the highest quality, that perfectly realize the author’s vision.

“We’re very focused on the details. We’re both very exacting. We both have high standards,” Bostick says.

Others within the company share Coville and Bostick’s vision. Brett Hobin, 30, is the owner of Hobin Studios in Baldwinsville and the sound engineer/editor for Full Cast Audio.

“We all are (perfectionists). There’s no weak link. We’re all pretty good at what we do,” Hobin says. “We’re a bunch of workaholics.”

That might sound like a stressful situation, but Hobin says Coville makes it enjoyable.

“He’s pretty much a master of making comfortable and productive surroundings. We’re just a couple of pals doing work,” Hobin says.

Brett Hobin’s father, Todd, also works with the company. A 59-year-old musician, he records an original musical score for each Full Cast Audio production. Todd says the Full Cast team can work as hard as they do and still have a good time because they are so dedicated to their work.

“Virtually anybody that works with us is passionate about what we do. You don’t have to drive anybody. We’re already driven,” he says, adding that, “Every day is a blast with Bruce.”

Pierce, Coville’s friend and fellow author, is one of the writers who has been most involved with Full Cast Audio. 10 of her books have been recorded by the company, with Pierce serving as the narrator. She even wrote one novel, “Melting Stones,” as an audio book exclusive for Full Cast Audio (the print version will be released later this year). When Pierce approached Coville with the idea of doing a Full Cast exclusive, he was excited.

“First I had to convince him I wasn’t pulling his lariat,” Pierce says.

In addition to working on new books and directing productions for Full Cast Audio, Coville maintains a busy travel schedule. He gives many speeches at schools and appears at conferences and conventions, such as the summer conference for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. This year’s conference took place from August 1-4 in Los Angeles, with Coville giving the keynote speech.

Bostick says Coville makes so many appearances because he knows he owes his success to all the fans, young and old, who love his work.

“He operates constantly within a state of gratitude,” Bostick says. “He truly is grateful to every single person who likes his work.”

Considering his travel schedule, his writing, and his audio book productions, not much time is left over for leisure activities.

“It’s not too much of an issue because I plork,” Coville says. “‘Plork’ is a word I made up for myself. Play and work. Plork. It sounds vaguely dirty, but it’s not.”

He considers most of his activities plorking because, “If I wasn’t doing Full Cast Audio as a business, I’d still love to do that. If I was working full time at some other job, I’d write because I wanted to.”

Next up on the plork schedule is the fourth book in the “Unicorn Chronicles” series. “Dark Whispers” ends in a cliffhanger, and Coville says some fans are already clamoring for the next installment.

“It’s the only thing I dare work on.”

Story is done, some cool pop culture stuff, etc.

The Bruce Coville story is done. Basically. I drafted it yesterday, and I still might tweak it a bit before I turn it in, but no serious alterations will be necessary. I sent it to my professor after I finished it to see if he had any suggestions or problems or things he wanted me to change, but he told me at the beginning of class today that everything looked good and I didn't need to worry about changing anything. So any changes that I make will be purely for my own satisfaction, because it bothers me if something that I wrote does not read as well as it could. I'm also always looking to cut out unnecessary words and sentences, but my prof seemed OK with the length, even though I went over the recommended word count significantly, so I'm not too worried about that, either. As with the cigarette tax story, I will post the Coville article here, but not until after I officially turn it in. So, sometime tomorrow, in other words. It might be fairly late in the evening, since I don't know what time I'll be getting home tomorrow. I have class until 4, then a meeting about one of the classes I'm taking next semester, then I might go to the computer lab and work on this week's graphics project, which is the only thing I have left to do before the end of summer boot camp. Then it will be two weeks of vacation before the fall semester starts up the last week of August. I can't fuckin wait.

In one of my weekend posts, I put up a link to an article from the New York Times about a new drug that scientists have been testing on mice. If you didn't hear about this, they gave the drug to completely sedentary, inactive mice, and it produced in them the sort of physiological effects you would expect to see in animals that were exercising a lot. They got faster, stronger, gained endurance, etc. Now, they're not sure what side effects there could be to using this drug, and they're also not sure it will work in the same way on humans (although it seems reasonable to expect that it would).

But let's imagine for an instant that the pill would work on humans and that there were no significant negative side effects. All you have to do is take this pill, and you will become bigger, faster, stronger, even if you don't do a damn thing (and, obviously, people who do exercise will experience even greater results). They're talking about using the pill to help people who have been weakened by disease recover, and of course that should be the first priority. Give the drug to those who need it most. But wouldn't everybody want access to the drug? I know I would. It's the kind of miracle pill people have been dreaming about for decades. It makes you stronger, presumably more attractive (at least to people who appreciate an athletic figure), and would come in handy if anyone ever tried to mug you in the park. Or when playing on your company's softball team. Or whatever.

The article also mentions that they're already working on developing a test for the drug so that athletes cannot use it to gain an unfair advantage. This appears to make sense, at first. But imagine a scenario similar to the one I described, in which the drug works on humans the same way as on mice, it has no destructive side effects, and now let's add in one other hypothetical-- now the drug is widely available and affordable. I think it's safe to assume a solid 90% of the population would be using it. And, if that were the case, would it still be banned in athletics? Would we enter into a bizarro sports world that would be the exact opposite of the way things are today? Imagine if professional athletes were the only humans NOT using performance-enhancing drugs. Would we still watch the NFL if most of the fans could run faster than Terrell Owens?

That brings up another point about sports. If the drug were declared safe and not banned, and everyone were using it, it would really open up the competition for positions as professional athletes. Obviously, natural talent and ability would still be an important factor, but if the drug continued to provide rewards in proportion to how hard you worked, how often you exercised, etc., that would mean that an average guy with a tremendous work ethic could easily wind up playing center field for the Red Sox... or at least the Orioles.

And, as you've probably considered by now, think about what this could do to/for the population as a whole. A race of superhumans with great athletic prowess, speed, and endurance has been imagined by science fiction writers for decades. Now, with the development of drugs such as this one... it could actually happen. This is some crazy shit, I'm telling you. Of course, chances are it will never happen, or it will be years and years before the drug hits the market. These things take a really long time. First the scientists will need to do more studies and tests, working their way up to human testing, to see if it even works on us. And if it does, then there will be another long process to see if it's safe to use on people, the FDA would have to sign off on it, etc. I mean, best case scenario, we're probably five years or more away. But keep your eye on this. Fascinating stuff.

Okay, now for some pop culture stuff that I'm excited about. I've been pumped about Kevin Smith's new flick, "Zack and Miri Make a Porno," since the first time I heard about it. I became even more excited when I found out that Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks were playing Zack and Miri. Well, my anticipation cranked up another notch yesterday when I saw an article about the movie on Rotten Tomatoes (well, it was actually an article on Ain't It Cool News, but Rotten Tomatoes linked to it). A reporter from AICN caught up with Smith at the San Diego Comic-Con, and interviewed him about the movie. The interview was interesting, but it was mostly stuff I've heard Smith say before.

The really interesting part of the article was that the writer described, in detail, a scene from Zack and Miri that Smith showed to an audience at Comic-Con. I will link to the article below, but I'm giving you a spoiler warning now. It doesn't give away any major plot elements or anything, but I know some people never want to read scripts or dialogue in advance, and want to experience everything in the movie for the first time when they walk into the theater. I understand that position, but I've never been particularly troubled by spoilers, so I didn't mind reading the article. The article described what was happening in the scene, but it focused mostly on the dialogue.

By the way, I was reading this article in the writing lab for my news writing class, while I was waiting for some of my classmates to finish up a quiz. So I'm trying to be quiet and not bother anyone, but I was having a really hard time not laughing my ass off. This dialogue is golden. Some of the funniest of Smith's career, I would say. And filthy as all hell.

On the subject of being filthy, Zack and Miri received an NC-17 from the MPAA, and they upheld that ruling when Smith appealed. He's going to make one final appeal to the ratings board to get it down to an R, and he says that if they say no, he'll just have to make some cuts (releasing with an NC-17 would be financial suicide). As far as I've heard, the MPAA's problems are all with visuals, not with dialogue, which is a relief to me. If they have to cut out a half-second shot of full frontal nudity, that would bother me a lot less than if they cut a single line of hilarious, filthy dialogue. But, hopefully, they'll win the appeal and won't have to cut anything at all. Anyway, click here to read the article if you want to disregard the spoiler warning.

Some cool books coming out this fall:

Stephen King is publishing Just After Sunset, a story collection, in November. This will be his first book since the novel Duma Key, which was absolutely amazing. If you haven't read that one yet, do so.

King will also be part of an anthology called The Living Dead, which is a collection of stories about-- you guessed it-- zombies. There are some really big names attached to the project, and I'm gonna be buying this one as soon as it hits shelves. It's out in September.

Also in September, Chuck Klosterman is publishing his first novel, Downtown Owl. I'm a huge, huge fan of Klosterman's work, and can't wait to see what sort of zany stuff he does with a novel. There's apparently an excerpt from it in the new issue of Esquire, which I just bought today but have not read yet.

George R.R. Martin's "A Dance With Dragons" is rumored to be coming out sometime in the fall, possibly as early as September, but I doubt it. He hasn't made any official announcement on his web site, at least not the last time I checked, so he probably hasn't even finished writing the book yet. But he is getting close, so hopefully fans of Martin's brilliant "A Song of Ice and Fire" series won't be waiting much longer.

Okay, that was a long blog entry. I have other stuff I intend to write about, but no point in throwing everything I've got out there all at once. I'll hold some back for tomorrow, or whenever the next time is that I have the time and opportunity to write a substantial blog post. Catch ya next time.

-Nick

Productive weekend, ready for the final push.

It turned out that I didn't have nearly as much free time this weekend as I thought I would, which is why I didn't post more on here. I actually spent pretty much all day yesterday and today working on various things. I had gotten behind on reading the news for a few days, so I was catching up on that, which is quite time-consuming. Try reading a newspaper front to back sometime, not just skimming articles and only reading the ones you're interested in, but really trying to absorb all the information in the paper. It takes a surprisingly long time. Especially with those thick Sunday papers.

Anyway, I was also doing more work on the Bruce Coville story. Thankfully, the two sources that I still needed to complete the article got back to me. I spoke with one of them yesterday, and just finished the interview with the other one a few minutes ago. So now I just need to organize my notes, figure out what material I'm going to use (and I have a TON of material) and then I'll be ready to write. I was planning on writing a first draft of the story tonight (and my first drafts usually bear a striking resemblance to my final ones) but now I'm not sure I'll actually get through the draft. It's already 8:30, I need to look over the notes quite a bit, and I'm distracted by the return of the NFL. Yes, it's the Hall of Fame game, and it's completely meaningless and not even that interesting, and Peyton Manning and Marvin Harrison aren't even stepping on the field for the Colts, but still... it's the NFL! Anyway, even if I don't write the draft tonight, the story's not due until Wednesday morning, and they're giving us the afternoon off tomorrow and Tuesday to work on our stories, so I've got oodles of time. And I'm not a man who uses the word "oodles" often or lightly.

There's been a lot of interesting stuff in the news lately. The guy who was probably the anthrax mailer killed himself as the feds were closing in, the presidential campaigns are starting to get down and dirty, the oil companies are reporting record-breaking profits while automakers are reporting devastating losses (wrap your minds around that one), but this was the story that interested me most over the weekend. When I've got some time to write more about it, I will, but for now just read the story and ponder the implications. Okay, that's all for now. Still got some work to do tonight.

-Nick

Magazine project, job possibility

Okay, so here's my magazine project that I did in my graphics class this week. For an explanation of what the assignment was and exactly what I had to do, see previous posts. I think there's also a link to the original Esquire article in the post before this one. These images are JPEGs, so the resolution isn't great and it might be difficult to read some of the smaller print on the second spread. If you want to see it in greater detail, let me know and I can email you a PDF.

The other piece of news I have right now is that I got a call yesterday from a professor about one of the graduate assistant jobs I applied for a couple weeks ago. I knew they had already filled more than half of the jobs, and I hadn't been contacted by anyone, so I just assumed I wasn't getting a job and I was thinking about other options for making money during the school year that I could look into. So this call really took me by surprise, especially since this was one of the jobs I thought I had the least chance of getting when I applied. It's one of the highest-paying jobs that was available, and also one of the more time-consuming ones, but I've sort of learned to get along without free time or much sleep this summer. So I really want to get this job, but it's no sure thing at this point. The professor told me I'm one of four people that they're looking at, and I have an interview for the job next Friday. So I'll just do my best to impress them when I do my interview, and hope for the best from there.

Okay, not going to write any more now, although there are some other things I'd like to comment on (a lot of sports stuff-- the Manny trade, how the Bills are looking so far, the crazy Brett Favre situation, etc.). I'll probably be back to write more later this weekend, maybe even later today.

-Nick