Currently Listening to: The Tornado Lessons
By: Cloud Cult

Ch’yeah!!! (Cue Tiger Woods-esque fistpump)

So, yes Tiger won the U.S Open AGAIN yesterday, so this is a slight homage to him. However, I definitely did a tiger-esque epic fist pump yesterday when I got my phone call from Ben Popken, Chief Editor over at Consumerist.com, who called to say that I GOT THE INTERNSHIP! (cue the Hallelujah chorus…). I start on Monday, assuming that all of my Comcast Installations go according to plan and free of corporate shenanigans, and that I get my phone charger back sometime within the next week. My entire connection to the outside world has basically been cut off now that my cell phone is dead. I am a baby whose umbilical cord has just been severed from it’s mother and I’m not sure yet where I’m going to get my daily dose of essential nutrients.

I’m pretty excited about this internship, it was all I could do from doing an epic fist pump in the middle of the open studio surrounded by coworkers, but my overflowing enthusiasm resulted in a somewhat awkward conversation with Ben, since I really would just leave long bouts of silence as my mind raced all over the place.  He was as dazed and confused as I was I think. We’ll see how impressive my work in the Gawker Media Network becomes. Maybe I will conquer them.

Oh I will conquer. Yes I will conquer. I will conquer to the point that Gengis Kahn will shit his pants — IN HIS GRAVE.

Okay, now that I finally got that out of my system, I can move on to the meatier stuff. Savage Grace has released in theaters and I am shooting myself in the foot because I don’t know if I have the time to go see it this week and I highly doubt that it’s going to stay in theaters thru next week — you know how the indie film circuit goes. I already missed Mongol when it released and even though there’s a download online it’s harddubbed with Russian (it’s confusing enough to be reading subtitles– I don’t want to be jerked around with two audio sequences). I did, however, get a successful and acceptable (and awesome) download of In Bruges and Charlie Bartlett, and I’m quite excited about those. I apologize about not writing reviews for films lately, it’s just that they’ve all been so lackluster. Besides — I don’t really tell anyone this but I have this small little place in my dark heart for Romantic Comedies, I know, I pretend like I’m a high-and-mighty, holier-than-thou kind of person when it comes to movies. But sometimes a girl really needs to kick back and watch that pornography-for-the-female-mind bullshit that the media is feeding us today. I’m sorry, I know I will likely burn a thousand years in hell for it, but it is a habit I don’t think I can shake. But the jist of it is that I’m far to embarressed to write about THOSE films. Besides, the Great Debators, Dewey Cox, and We Own the Night hardly make up any solid writing material.

So, one little ferret ball of stress has been completely eliminated. Only to be replaced with some other bouncy beings which are constantly rotating about my head like electrons.  There are some personal issues with some specific relationships and friendships, then there’s the whole stress of moving, which has been near to impossible to completely finish with the lack of a car, and the fact that I’m still working full time. I’m angry, frequently tired, and I’ve developed an eye twitch that makes me akin to Mr. DeMartino from Daria.

I’m not kidding.

This stress may just be killing me.

Currently listening to: Sponsored by Destiny
By: Slagsmalsklubben
(oh how I love Swedish Techno beats)

I just realized that I’ve been negligent and forgot to bring my lunch this morning. I was so looking forward to that bologna and cheese sandwich and the sides of grapes and wheat thins. When you realize that you were expecting something and then it’s something completely different, kind of like when you drink orange juice but OH SHIT it’s actually milk, your entire body cringes with the shock of it and your face squishes into this completely distorted look that makes you look like you just smelled something that had been dead for at least four months, to be only slightly specific. So yep, here I am, sitting at work and realizing that I, like an idiot, left my deliciously scrumptious lunch at home. For shame.

So I’ve come to realize that I may have developed a slight addiction, maybe it’s to reading, maybe it’s to the internet, maybe it’s to the foolish belief that I am constantly expanding my mind, I don’t really know. I feel that a lot of other people out there like to stay well informed as well, but I don’t know if reading a 10 page New York Times article on shared parenting is really appropriate for a girl who is only 19 and barely making her way in the world. There’s also the media factors, I follow at least two different podcasts — Diggnation for one, iFanboy because I’m just such a comic book whore, and then the other various ones on history and classic novels. Now that I’ve realized that PBS.com has multiple full length presentations on their website I basically shat myself with excitement, if I were to have any clue as to what an orgasm actually feels like I would have sworn that I came when I found out.  Brilliant Broadcsts from Growing Up Online to Fighting Child Prostitution to exposes on childbirth injuries prevalent amongst Ethiopian Women. Cracking the Maya code?! This shit is like crack cocaine to me! I’m a kid in a metaphorical candy shop! I want it all and I’m going to be on the biggest sugar high of my life!

I feel like I’m addicted to information, that I can’t process enough facts and statistics at once, I want to be well informed of the world around me, sure The Onion is fantastic material, their written satire really can’t be beat. But I’m thriving on this real news, these real reports, The New York Times education and film sections should really just IV right into me, I don’t need food. I need this stream of information. It doesn’t help that I’m reading books like Generation Me: Why today’s young Americans are more Confident, Assertive, Entitled — and miserable than ever before,  Class Matters, and Sin No More: From Abortion to Stem Cells. Understanding Crime, Law, and Morality in America . What am I? Fucking…55? I should be off reading the lated book by Chuck Klosterman (though I have read his work) or praising the work of Chuck Palahniuk (God that last names hard to spell).

Here brings in that whole…paranoia business. I’m sitting here devouring all of this information, gorging myself on it really. I find myself reading things about the economy, the possibility of universal healthcare, jobs that pay surprisingly well, and parenting for pete’s sake. I feel like I’m 19 but I’m constantly looking to the future. Looking for the position that I think is best, planning my co-ops a good six months ahead of the game, causing myself to needlessly worry about…well…everything it seems. Planned assets, property prices, the economy, my childrens school districts, parenting methods, job choices. I mean, I could go on and on. My boyfriend frequently chides me for being so quiet when we’re walking places, the real issue is that I just don’t want him to think that I’m some worry wart freak of nature, because as we’re walking I’m considering the cost of living of where we’re walking, approximate taxes, how much of an annual salary I’d devote to a mortgage. Crazy things like that. I’m fully aware that this boy wants to marry me, but what if he stays at the same job? These crazy thoughts are running through my head all the time. Today I was picking apart the article on parents who opted for Shared Parenting. Really? Two parents with part time jobs and still having to pay for daycare? I don’t even know how that would work out for you financially, that leaves you no room for upward movement within the company — you’ve basically just stuck yourself in the same position at your job for the next 10 years. Besides, your company has to be amazing if they’re going to give you benefits and all of that other jazz. Working part time the average family is looking at an average COMBINED income that might (if they’re lucky) graze the 60,000 dollar mark. Combine that with the average home in the US costing 200K (note that that translates to more than 3 times your combined annual income) — that leaves you looking at being in a constant state of debt — with your mortgage approaching 1/2 of your income. I don’t know if  I could live with that kind of stress and pressure.

Gah! I’m thinking again. Damn me. I love McDonalds.

For the past week I have been what I can only describe to be a stressball with the energy of a crazed ferret — bouncing around the walls of its cage and searching for an escape when it eventually dies of self-inflicted internal injuries and foaming at the mouth. There has been the recent acquisition of the new apartment, which, due to several epic three-hour long trips to the gleaming beacon of Ikea, has now been somewhat furnished. I’ve been spending this week running about like a crazed madwoman, calling the gas and electric company to transfer service, contacting the devils I know to be Comcast to get my (hopefully) high-speed internet connection set up in my name, rushing about to find the perfect fathers day present (which turned out to be a 1-year netflix subscription and a Roku Box), arranging for the locks to be changed, scheduling plans for the week, and most importantly worrying about my internship application to Consumerist.

Yes, that Consumerist. You know that one that is part of the almighty Gawker Media family, once home to Emily Gould and still a parent of one of my other favorite blogs to read, Gizmodo (they just have that sense of humor that Engadget lacks, and the blogging skills that would make Geekologie writers weep). You know that Consumerist that has an Alexa ranking of 5,316 and was in PC magazines list of top 100 classic websites. Anyways, all of that said, I was more than overjoyed two weeks ago when I saw their posting requesting an intern, nothing too serious, it was simply asking for someone who will basically filter through all of their gmail to find the juicy stuff for their posted stories. I, being the easily excitable person that i am, nearly shit my pants and then proceed to try and write the most witty and memorable e-mail ever while flying by the seat of my pants (after all I only have two to three paragraphs with which to impress Ben Popken).  That said, a copy of the original e-mail is getting pasted below as-is, please ignore any grammatical errors, those are because I was as excited as a fucking chipmunk when he finds out he has musical talent and his name is Alvin. My fingers trip over what my brain is trying to say to them.

“Hey Consumerist!

So I just wanted to tell you what an ideal and awesome intern I would be — I fit into all of your requirements, I suppose I’ll just go through them one by one. Because, you know, that’s the most orderly way to do things.

Requirement Numero Uno : Love The Consumerist.

Okay, so I don’t walk around wearing an “I Heart Consumerist” t-shirt butchering of the original Milton Glaser design. But you guys are on my Speed dial (yes, the Firefox add-on) and I read you with a sort of religious fanatacism. Not so fanatically religious that I’d burn myself or bomb anyone, but you get the drift. I live for your Morning Deals and your eternal bashing of everything that is Dell.

Requirement Two: Can commit 1-3 hours every other weekday, without fail.

I am on the computer at work for nine and a half waking hours of the day, then I return home and after cooking myself a splendid college meal (Ramen Noodles) and then usually turn to the internet for some form of entertainment. It’s either that or me working on my latest Vimeo Video, WordPress entry, or Portfolio update. Once my present fulltime job is over (June 25th) my freetime is bound to just exponentially increase, and 1-3 hours a day on Gmail really isn’t going to slow me down one bit.

Requirement Three: Enjoy asking strangers for followup information.

Of course not everyone is most adept at talking to strangers in social situations, myself included, if you’re asking me to do so via the internet or by phone, I’m 100% there. No Problem.

Requirement Four: Are adept at sniffing out the one good needle in a pile of haystacks.

Okay, so I’m not very adept at “sniffing” and distinguishing a tiny piece metal from a bunch of dead overgrown grass. I will however jump in that haystack from the second story of the barn, roll all around in it and either find the needle and hold it up with an epic stance, or have it get stuck somewhere in my flesh. Either way I found it and I found it with enthusiasm!

Requirement Five: Are a Gmail master.

G-mail master?! More like G-mail guru. Paris Hilton totally considered to hire me to walk next to her so she could appear more “web savvy”. I have multiple accounts, forwarding galore and I have the keyboard shortcuts down pat. Did I mention that I also read through the entire Lifehacker article when it released?

Requirement Six: Live for Labeling

I don’t have a secret stash of label machines laying about (I used to have one on a keychain somewhere) but I did label all THREE of my drawers at work “Pirate Hats”, “Secret Stash” and “Self Defense” respectively. No, there is no alcohol sitting in my secret stash drawer and YES Self-Defense is full of plastic knives from the kitchen.

Requirement Six: Rock Gmail macros

I’m totally rockin’ the Firefox extention for that — I’m a big fan of Quicksilver and this totally saves me time.

So, basically. I’m a hard worker, incredibly enthusiastic, a college student, and a fan of your site. If you wanted something a little more serious I can send that your way. I have a list of references who attest to my completely professional demeanor in the workplace. I only figured that since you guys were after all a part of the Gawker Network — you’d appreciate my fine writing.

Thank you for the opportunity,
Rachel Mercer”

Contact information was redacted

So that was that, I sent that e-mail and a couple of follow-ups. I started being paranoid of being “that annoying overreaching girl” and stopped sending anything at all. I basically sat at my desk at work 10 hours a day incessantly checking my e-mail. The following week I receive a response e-mail from their weekend editor, Carey, who basically says that they’re now reviewing applications. Great, they received my email and now I am crossing my fingers so hard they might break because I really want this job.

One week later…
SUCCESS! Ben Popken, the editor of the site, e-mailed me back!

from Ben Popken [redacted] to [redacted] date Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 6:58 PM subject re: Internship. I want it. mailed-by consumerist.com

)

Hi Rachel,

Thanks for your (enthusiastic!) application. I’d like to interview you for the position. Do you have some time to talk over the phone this week?

Hallelujah! It was a complete surprise, I had just worked my third16 hour day in the span of a  week and I was totally bushed, it was 10:30 at night, and I was frantically calling my best friend to tell him and bounce response ideas off of (we kind of have a bet going on as to whether or not I’m going to get the job, his bet is that I will, my bet is against me, after all I’m probably competing with 250+ applicants, all of whom have amazing blogs of their own, he says that I’m going to get it — but has no real argument as to why.) Anyways, I ended up very quickly writing a general response read it aloud to my friend asking if it was funny but not, you know, that “I’m trying hard to be funny” funny, and sent that e-mail through the intertubes.

from Rachel M <redacted> to Ben Popken <redacted> date Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 10:25 PM subject Re: Internship. I want it. mailed-by gmail.com

Hi Ben!

(that exclamation point indicates the ridiculous amounts of enthusiasm with which I am presently writing this e-mail.)

I am still working my full time job/internship/indentured servantry but I (hopefully) don’t have any late nights ahead of me this week. I am free on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday after 5:30 pm or if you’d rather schedule something during normal business hours I can actually take a lunch break and talk to you sometime in that ambiguous three hour period when people actually take lunch.

Looking forward to speaking with you,

Rachel Mercer

Huzzah! It was sent. There it was, he had e-mailed me at 7pm on a Monday, I responded within 4 hours, I figured I was solid. Now it’s nearing the end of Wednesday and I’m wringing my hands again, I swear I should learn to knit or something constructive so I don’t end up biting my nails to an oblivion. At least work requires me to use both of my hands because I’m using all the shortcuts ever needed in InDesign/Photoshop/Illustrator and the mouse to clickity click everything in sight. Then there are the times when I’m writing these posts, which are borderline ridiculous. Anyways, I finally got approval from Chris to go ahead and call the guy, we’ll see how it goes, I’m probably just going to do the follow-up email, because I don’t want to appear to be a stalker.

In the meantime, I realized that when I’m walking to work, I’m incredibly frustrated that I can’t blog while I do it, or at least have a rapid transfer device to transfer the words in my head somehow to paper or and editable format (wow, that was almost edible…that’d be weird. TOAST …brain… transfers…words on TOAST!…anyways…). I find myself having a lot of thoughts that I really want to write about and I never really get a chance to. I also kind of see different film shots in different places, that very strangely replay in my head. Sometimes I enjoy splicing them together and then adding a soundtrack or Michael Bay-esque special effects, but that’s only when I’m sleeping.

One of my favorite scenes is in the mornings when I am walking from Downtown Crossing towards South Station when I am walking against the flow of a lot of the foot traffic.  I sometime like to walk in the middle and watch the people break apart and walk around me, looking at all of their faces. Then I find myself walking across the bridge with about 15 different thoughts that I really need to have written down.

I came across some really interesting broadcasts which I recently discovered (by that I mean read about on consumerist) from PBS.com, one of the ones that I readily grasped and listened to while I was working was their Frontline piece on Universal Healthcare, which went to 5 different successful Capitalist countries and compared their national healthcare methods to ours. It was really interesting, and I found it incredibly enjoyable and informative — you can find it here. It’s a very large topic in the upcoming presidential elections, so I feel like it’s good to be well informed. I also spoke about this last week with Philippe who is from France, and felt like I didn’t really know what I was talking about.

The other one that I’m listening / watching to presently is Growing up online. It’s really quite interesting considering that I was one of those kids, heck I am one of those kids. You know that whole thing, blogging and having a myspace page, facebook, etc. I was laughing my ass off because to kick off the show they were playing hardcore music and showed some nerds having a LAN party in their basement playing Counterstrike. I’ll have more commentary on this later … probably in conjunction with my completion of reading Generation Me.

Currently listening to: Hummingbird
By: Born Ruffians

So I’ve officially lost my status as a functioning member of society. I got my free trial for Netflix today for Two DVD’s at a time and unlimited rentals. Totally worth the 14 bucks a month, especially since Chris was so nice to get me the insta-download box for my birthday. (What a great friend)

Anyways, that fact aside I’ve also spent a week without updating, my essential excuse is that there was a massive time-crunch with work, I had to (finally) close on the condo, switch over the utilities and facilitate furniture deliveries. The Disney Project also had a massive deadline which resulted in multiple 16-hour  work days during the week. Needless to say I’ve been stressed, busy, and a little bit worse for the wear. Therefore all of my free time has been effectively divided into movie watching, comic book reading, and sleeping. Tonight I plan on taking my partner out for a nice dinner, since he had such a bad day yesterday and I kind of abandoned him to go to a friends barbeque — not to be a terrible girlfriend, I just really wanted to get out of the city for a bit.

This next week is going to be filled with phone calls to plan internet and cable installations, water, trash pickup, recycling, furniture assembly, and lock changing. I plan on purchasing a bike as well as the various safety accessories so I can facilitate transportation to and from school for myself, as well as some summer recreation.

I am too busy with work to presently write another post, hopefully I’ll be less exhausted when I arrive at home and we’ll see how it goes. Movie reviews to come for: Walk Hard, The Great Debators, We own the Night, The Oh in Ohio, and the Cider House Rules

Presently listening to: Show me your bones by Land of Talk

So I’m anyone out there has actually heard of Couchsurfing. It’s basically a quasi-social networking site of over 100,000 people that is frequently used for those who are travelling around different countries and would like to 1) meet new and interesting people and 2) can’t really afford to pay for a hotel. Now, I’ve had a couchsurfing experience in the past — when I trekked down to New Haven all by my lonesome because I just really wanted to see Mates of State live. Anyways, it wasn’t a very bad experience — the people that hosted me were very very nice, and I’ve never really hung around anyone within the Gay community before so once I adjusted a bit it really wasn’t a big problem.  He also smoked lots and lots of weed. That just made things a little weird, and then I got lost for about three hours into the wee hours of the morning, yes it was raining and yes, I was tired as hell, and yes I got approached by multiple black men asking me if I wanted a ride in their cars.

ANYWAYS I know that was a bit of a tangent there, but I have my first couchsurfer who is staying with me now. His name is Philippe, he’s a very nice young man from France — amazingly enough he’s travelled to the US and is going to D.C, Montreal, New York, Chicago, Toronto, Cincinnati, Cleveland and Boston all in a month for less than $1K! It’s amazing.  The entire trip is also taking him about a month. Which is kind of ridiculous, I don’t think I’d be able to do that, let alone go by myself.  He’s a very intellectual young man who speaks impeccable English. Sprightly with dark hair and dark eyes, definitely my type — he’s quite cute, really, but I think that a lot of that can be attributed to the accent and overall very European demeanor. Anyways, I spent a majority of my day off yesterday showing him around the city and trying to give him a good tour. The weather was perfect, he couldn’t have asked for better weather and we managed to see a lot of the beautiful sites around the city which was very nice and relaxing for me, albeit tiring. We spoke a lot of the European opinion of America and though we both have our differences I think that we were both sensitive enough to the subject that it didn’t erupt into any arguments, there were definitely some difficult questions regarding the war in Iraq, American’s present view of the Bush administration, and the possibilities of public healthcare. Apparently I also speak French with a bit of a Chinese accent, which I found to be incredibly amusing. It’s been a very good time so far, we’ll see how everything else goes. Also it seemed like he was far too well versed in every single movie made by Michael Moore, which I found to be simply aggravating. I feel that if people who dislike America have a problem with it they should just emigrate, seriously. I would do that if Hillary became president. Not even kidding.

Speaking of American Politics, I read this very interesting essay in the New York Times today regarding the ever-present topic of Abortion. As a woman reading this article I can’t help but have my stomach turn to think of the pain that these women were subjecting themselves to in the pre-Roe times. It’s hard for me to take a stance on abortion, because really I’d never want to go into a doctors office and literally have them scrape or suck the remnants of what was once my child out of me. But then there’s thinking of the consequences that surround the birth, I’m 19, I’m certainly not adequately prepared to be a mother, but is walking around for 9 months, popping the thing out and then giving it up to the state really an option? I don’t think so. I feel that women deserve to have the choice, it is an age old practice that has been distorted by the forced views of religion and men upon us, not meant to be controlled by government.

I have movie reviews for Dewey Cox, The Great Debators, and We Own the Night, which will be written later today.