The Apprentice Project

Got a reply from the place I want to do a placement:

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you; we’ve been extremely busy. We had a look through your portfolio and site and we like your stuff. Unfortunately, we just can’t look far enough ahead at the moment to guarantee a place for you. We will keep your details and we’ll be in touch if anything does come up.

Sent quite a nice reply saying I will do ANYTHING to get a placement there. Hope it works, at least I’m “on file” for in the future. Don’t know what I’m going to do next, got a test on Lightwave in a few weeks, better get cracking with the tutorials. Got our ideas finalised for the special effects showreel too, i’ll let you know when its done.

Now i’m back busy at uni with assignments et cetera, there are going to be less posts on here, but the ones I do post will be important ones. Just ones to let you know about how my career is going, designs i’m doing/done, and maybe some information about good books I’ve read/music I’ve bought/other random topical rants.

I’ve been asked to make flyer for a ‘birthday party’ with the Queens of Noize DJing. Keep your eye out for the finished design.

Just downloaded and playing with this Flock browser. I’ve been reading about all this web 2.0 malarky and its all very interesting. Some of the ideas here are really great, the theme is a bit bleak but christ, i’m blogging from inside the damn thing, can’t be bad. I won’t bore you with any more details, go have a peruse for yourself at flock.com. It has integrated Flickr and Delicious support too by the way. Should be great when its finished.

Was getting really worried after mum rang yesterday and said “What are you going to do after Uni, come home whilst you look for a job?”. After chatting to Claire we decided we’re going to rent somewhere in Newcastle still, get full time jobs in retail or something and look for a ‘real’ job whilst we get some money together. I was wondering what type of jobs are available at the moment so I dived on monster.co.uk and there were loads of new media openings so that cheered me up.

Did a bit of vector art yesterday, click the image for a bigger version.

Spent quite a bit on amazon last week; bought an extra 512mb SD card for the holiday and a AA battery charger for my wireless mouse batteries. After getting this Microsoft intellimouse wireless bluetooth explorer effort I didn’t think the batteries would run out so fast, only about a week of heavy use. Also bought four new books to add to my collection: Life of Pi, Memoirs of a Geisha, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time and The Kite Runner. I’ll let you know how they read.

Four jobs I’ve had:

• Paperboy (Bells Stores)
• Stockroom Assistant (Next PLC)
• Sales Assistant (Game Stores)
• Sales Assistant for a second time (Game Stores)

Four movies I can watch over and over:

• The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
  
• Memento
• Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind
  
• Reservoir Dogs
  

Four places I’ve liked:

• London
• Guisborough
• York
• Newcastle

Four Five TV shows I love:

• 24
• Lost
• Family Guy
• Friends
• Band of Brothers

Four places I’ve vacationed:

• Porta Rico
• New York
• The Lake District
• Center Parcs (All of them)

Five of my favorite dishes:

• Thai Green Curry with Sticky Jasmine Rice
• Haagan Dahz Cookies and Cream Ice Cream
• Bolognese
• Chilli Con Carne
• Sunday Dinner

Four sites I visit daily:

• del.icio.us popular (new)
• Boing Boing
  
• Flickr
• Digg

Four of my most Favourite Novels:

• The Time Travellers Wife
• Angels and Demons
• The Wasp Factory
• Cloud Atlas

My four favourite albums at the moment:

• Deerhoof – The Runners Four
• Clor – Clor
• Caribou – The Milk of Human Kindness
• The Rakes – Capture / Release

My four favourite drinks:

• Chocolate Milkshake
• Coffee (in any way shape or form)
• San Miguel
• Tropicana (any flavour)

These things are always interesting to read, might as well jump on the bandwagon. None of these are in any particular order by the way.
 

How crazy are adverts getting please. You sit down to watch something, after something like the first two sentences are spoken, another set of adverts begin. What’s the crack? At least the adverts are interesting sometimes, like the new Honda advert.
My debt isn’t as bad anymore, only five hundred into my overdraft. Would be better if I could get my emergency tax back from Game quicker though, damn P45. I was managing to get taxed thirty pounds for every one hundred I earned, how terrible is that.
Not as bad as some people though; Claire was watching This Morning this morning and sent me an email whilst I was at Uni, as below:

“There were these parents on; their son had hung himself two WEEKS AGO, all because of uni and DEBT. it was over xmas, and he hadnt got his wages through, and had gone over his overdraft by accident, and didn’t realise… and HSBC were flailing at his mum, and she said well let me give you a cheque and stuff, and they were like “no, we need to talk to the account holder etc etc”. SO after a week, the lad managed to get back home from uni to sort it out at his OWN BRANCH because the HSBC in his uni town refused to help! The people at his own branch said the same and because it was after 7 days or something, they took his overdraft away so his debt was like a LOAN. and it meant that he was in £1,600+ debt, with no free interest. How shocking is that. Anyway, he got stupidly stressed over it, and his parents were being supportive and stuff, but he was saying he’d have to drop out of uni and stuff and what else is there to live for? So he killed himself. HSBC just wouldn’t listen to anyone. GET INTO NATWEST JAMES!

All HSBC said on This Morning was “We apologise for the loss of your son, however, debts can’t go unpaid and its in the best interest of our customers that we provide the best service for them, and therefore everything was done to aid your son”. SURELY it would have been better to just WAIT TILL HIS WAGES CAME THROUGH?!”

Think she might be right; I should go change banks.

Claire and her course mates finished editing their fashion documentary yesterday, which I helped with a bit (transitions, titles etc) and it has turned out really well. Similar, if not better than daytime documentaries on ITV at the moment, I said they should send it in, but they were having none of it.
I’ve noticed three coffees on a morning really helps me to keep awake at Uni, something is fundamentally wrong about that. The coffee machine Claire got me for Christmas is great, quick and tasty when combined with Douwe Egberts filter coffee. Think I’ll have another now.

If I can stop shaking.

Had a photoshoot a couple of weeks ago for the Northumbria University prospectus, and i’m featured with my girlfriend on page ninety-three. Take a look at the ‘Visual Culture’ section in an exclusive pdf here. Surely this counts for something in my Apprentice Project? It shows how I am keen to participate in curricular activites, doing the university a favour. And I’m famous, what company wouldn’t want to employ me?

I’ve never realised before how much time washing the pots takes. Including drying and putting away, washing up for two people takes roughly thirty-five minutes every two days, thats two hours of scrubbing crockery a week, thats four and a half days of washing up a year. Those four and a half days I could be watching television, or playing computer games, or writing this blog!

Am I doing something wrong here? Am I missing some trick which everyone uses to wash up in half the time? Imagine when I have children, even more pots, my life will be taken over!

If I ever miss a day posting on here, thats where i’ll be; locked in the kitchen, sporting marigolds.