ouch.

I know I haven’t posted for a while, but it has once again been a busy week. Freelance work for the opera as well as for a couple other companies over the last week and a half has made it very difficult to keep up with everything, especially trying to get everything done for my big apprentice meeting.

Oh yeah. I had a big apprentice meeting.

All apprentices were required to attend. It was the opening orientation for the new school year. Introducing the students to me as well as to the changes the committee has implemented for the program. Most of them made it, but a few managed to avoid it. Only one had an excuse. The rest, I guess, are not too terribly interested in their educational, and therefore their occupational, future.

Of course, the meeting didn’t quite go off without a hitch. I finished all of the paperwork for the packet around mid afternoon. When I tried to use the union copy machine to copy the packets, I discovered my copy skills have degraded over the years. Also, the damn machine wouldn’t do what I told it to, and managed to screw up my packets. So I was not able to complete packets for all of the students. However, we covered all of the material and I will be mailing each of them a complete packet first part of next week.

Not exactly the best start, but it’s a start. We carry on from here.

Ultimately, I will be learning some new skills. I will be learning to prioritize from an office setting. I know and practice prioritization on shows and projects, but there is a different approach while sitting in an office. It is kind of weird.

I am not an office creature. I have always loved my work but a big part of that has been the freedom of movement. Even when I worked at companies, I was always going to job sites all over the country. Now, I sit in the same “viewless” (not windowless) position day after day.

I believe very strongly in the program and its intended result. Obviously I believe I have something to offer to achieve this goal. But this whole office thing is killing me. If anyone has any suggestions on how to make the situation more tolerable, please let me know.

On that subject, I was approached today by one of the employer representatives, who made very strong and positive statements about their commitment to assisting the program and being available for training facilities and gear whenever possible.
Pretty good news. Although somewhat depressing that no one either knew of their interest or took advantage of this opportunity. Oh well.

My turn.

so much for that idea

so another week goes by and yet again, i managed to miss posting. although to be fair, it has been a pretty busy week.

on top of all my other little gigs and freelance work, i am also this seasons "runner" for the utah opera. i can't remember whether or not i have mentioned this before. well, the opera did a performance of pirates of penzance at deer valley, yesterday and tonight. which meant we spent all day monday and tuesday loading in. so for me, i got to drive up and down from salt lake to deer valley 7 or 8 times in two days. pretty exciting, huh.

i also, did a load in and out for one of my freelance contracts wednesday and thursday. kind of fun, but mostly made decent money for fairly simple work.

in between all the other work, i have been spending a lot of time in the office, trying to get everything done and ready to get the new apprentices going, and all of the apprentices geared up for the new semester. we have a big meeting next week and i still have to finish rewriting and creating some new policy information to go in their packets.

the capstone to this exciting work effort was i managed to lock myself out of the building. you see, i had borrowed a friend's car while he was out fo town. well, friday night, we get a little microburst, so i run out to make sure i had shut the windows. of course, on the way i shut the door behind me. so i had to go back this morning to get all of my stuff and finish the project i was in the middle of.
yay for me.

fun fun fun.

daddy, please take the t-bird away.

quick yet unsatisfying

dance concert went ok. had some trouble getting it up and running due to some faulty intelligence (the plot and paperwork i was given had incorrect information about what the theatre had) but we managed to get it all together in time for the show. the director seemed pretty happy and for the actual time spent programming, the show came out pretty well.

well, i don't know when i will be posting again, but there is a chance.

we'll have to see.

zen

pros and cons

moving away from the office for a while...

i am lighting a dance concert friday (tomorrow) and i went up to watch some of the dances and start working on a design today. so we sat through several performances of the dance company, who are mostly young (under 18) and some are obviously better trained than others, probably a factor of more time in lessons.

after watching several pieces, the director brought out one other piece; one he had choreographed and asked a couple of friends to do, friends that just happen to be the lead couple from san francisco ballet.

now i will be the first one to admit i know next to nothing about dance and less about ballet. and to be fair, it not my favorite form of artist expression, performance or otherwise. but the piece he had choreographed was beautiful, especially when left in the hands of two such talented and skilled performers. i may not care for ballet all that much, but i love watching professionals work, and at a job they obviously love a great deal. definitely moved.

hopefully the young ones will be inspired by what they saw. i was.

in other news...

i spent about an hour today in a conversation with a sikh. sikhism is a religion founded in indian, but quite separate from hindu. i learned a great deal about it, but have much more to learn. i was invited to the sikh temple here in salt lake and will probably try to attend soon. plus, they serve lunch. gotta love that.

well, thats enough for now. i may post more in the future about the sikhs as we go along. but thats for later...

zen muppet

rain powerless to defeat interview process

after weeks and weeks of some of the hottest temperatures we have seen around here for years, today, it broke. it cooled down. it rained like hell.

trees blew down, houses collapsed, roofs blew off, hail killed plants, planes overturned; the wasatch front was taken by storm.

thousands of people lost electrical service from salt lake city to provo. many are still waiting for it to be restored. crews working throughout the day and night.

and it still wasn't enough.

today were our interviews for the incoming class of apprentices for IATSE local 99 apprenticeship program. out of nine interviews scheduled, nine showed up. only one was late, and he claimed it was because the street was blocked off. (i later learned he was right; a water pipe had broken under the street and leveraged up part of the asphault. the police had parked cars along in front of it until work crews could get to it.) all of the candidates appear to have been acceptable. the committee agreed to allow all of them into the program. there will be more interviews next week for the last three candidates who were unable to make today's festivities. hopefully, they will come out as well. probably only if it rains.

on an unrelated note...

a friend of mine asked me to look at one of her friends' pictures on myspace today. apparently said female is having trouble getting a date, and my friend wanted to see if i had any insight, "from a guy's perspective." so i looked.

"wow."
"holy... wow."

i have no idea. she looks... umm, normal to me. all the right numbers of limbs and curves. now i don't know her too well, but from what i do know, she seems pretty smart, pretty funny, and downright cute as can be.

now, if only she lived closer...

zen