AngelVision

Upon admiring the fact that I've written three blogs in the same number of days (and shoot, the same number of months), I realized that:
1) They all mention my new job and
2) I have yet to describe my new job.


Ahem...my new career.


It all started on a bleak Sunday afternoon off from Pottery Barn. Feeling utterly sorry for myself, I hopped onto Craigslist's job postings for the first time in weeks, searching in mistaken vain for anything worthwhile.


Sure, there were more crap receptionist positions and I found myself looking for another part time retail job. I kept looking at jobs that required minimal thinking, minimal heart and minimal passion. I kept selling myself short...but I didn't want to.


So I looked into the writing jobs...which, as any of my fellow freelance writers/English degree bearers will know, are far and few in between. If I wanted to "be a contributer" to a "well paying" website, I could maybe earn an extra $100 a month, writing for 40 hours a month (Trust me, that's crapola pay, even for a freelance writer). Venturing out of my comfort zone, I perused through the marketing tab of the Craigslist classifieds.


And that's when I saw it: A position as a Junior Scriptwriter.


No cover letter necessary. Just a resume, links to worked I've done and is published and the answer to three questions:
1. If you could take any vacation, all expenses paid, where would you go and what would you do?
2. If you could have coffee with anyone in the world, who would it be and why?
3. What's your favorite TV show?


If I wrote something that piqued their interest, I'd get a call back. 


I got a call three days after shooting an e-mail. Five days later, an initial 15 minute interview that turned into an hour-long chit chat fest. Eight days later I was eating lunch with the entire company, critiquing and reviewing Impact Movies.


Three days later I was hired on as a scriptwriter for AngelVision Technologies. Yes, I've sold my soul, temporarily giving up the righteousness of journalism to be a capitalism whore.


Yes, I'm a marketing writer but the perks of the company are well worth it: I'm on salary and, after 2 1/2 more months, I'll start to receive real, live benefits. The company itself is quite astonishing: Last June AngelVision was named the 24th fastest growing company in Oregon, has been listed three times in Inc. Magazine's fastest growing companies and has won more than 165 awards for Internet advertising, email and viral marketing. 


We're pretty much BA at what we do. 


So what's my role? After receiving/hearing the messaging director's initial interview with a new client, I research the client and it's product and/or service then write a script for a 3 1/2 minute movie. It's a pretty fun challenge for me, considering I've never written for a medium that appeals to two senses; usually I just write for people to read. Now, I get to stretch my mind and let my creativity flow through narration AND visual movement. I'm surprised by how liberating the ability to write for visual cues is. 


At any rate, the Impact Movies I've already written in the past two weeks won't be finished products for another 2 1/2 months...but rest assured, I'll flaunt them once they're done.


And in case you were wondering, here are the answers that got this process and my adult life started:

1. Hands down, my dream vacation is a four month tour eating my way through Asia. I would spend my first two months teeing off in the far South, enjoying Indonesia and Singapore for coffee, then bellying into Southeast Asia for Thai, Laotian and Vietnamese cuisines. I would spend my third month solely in China, venturing to as many different regions as possible before relishing my last four weeks soaking up sake and sushi in Japan. It's a trip I've been planning for a solid two years now.

2. I've had the hypothetical "If you could have coffee with any person in the world" conversation multiple times within my adult life and I've always come back to Hunter S. Thompson, the driving force behind Gonzo Journalism. Sure, he was always on some type of mind warping substance (In fact, I'm sure my coffee date with him would most likely be laced with Wild Turkey bourbon) but his genius, creativity and passion for writing is -- and probably will be -- unmet within the realms of American journalism.

3. My favorite TV Show is The Office. Is any explanation really necessary with this answer?

Writing Fitness

I already know I’m not in running shape. The 20 and 30 minute walk jogs of huffing and puff lace my Nikes up for every other day for are pretty substantial evidential proof of that.

I’m surprised to find out that I’m out of writing shape…mainly because I didn’t think that was possible.

Yet, here I am, sitting at home with a bag of Trader Joe’s frozen petite peas nestled on my right wrist and forearm (I have to save the ice for cocktails with the world’s worst vodka, after all), nursing what I’m certain is developing tendonitis.

A quick medical lesson for those of you aren’t familiar with tendonitis: As my oh-so-scientific-looking picture shows (And no, I didn’t draw it), tendonitis occurs when a tendon is inflamed from overuse. For the wrist, that means the thin, little muscles and tendons that move these texting, typing, dishwashing hands of mine up, down, left and right are probably throwing little temper tantrums from repetitive keyboard typing and mouse usage.

At first I was a bit afraid I was developing carpal tunnel syndrome after just eight days at my new job but realized, after a bit of Google searching, that since I’m not experiencing any numbness or tingling in my palm, thumb or index finger, that I can luckily rule that secretarial injury out the window.

But then I realized I could be developing tendonitis since my wrist and outer forearm are aching like a beeeeeeeyotch. I first noticed the pain during the final hour of my day at the office (Goodness, how American and adult and suburbanly mature do I sound saying that?!) on Monday but it subsided by the time I was drinking a beer and watching ‘Secretary.’ On Tuesday I noticed that the pain began a little bit earlier in the day and didn’t subside; it was so annoying that I couldn’t bring myself even to Facebook after getting home and carrying the basket at the grocery store was a wee bit more than my tiny wrist and skeletor forearm preferred to carry. Then yesterday the pain began around noon and didn’t go away – probably because my ‘office’ is actually a room equipped with a 24/7 cooling vent that won’t shut off which means it’s freeeeeeeeezing (Yes Mom, I’m imitating you), making me cold to the bones – and working at PB, even for the short time I did, made it worse. Cooking dinner? A nightmare. Changing the radio station while driving my car? Yowch. And don’t get me started on the anguish I had while texting.

It throbbed as I went to bed, even after washing down ibuprofen with the last dregs of my Bridgeport Hop Czar.

It throbbed as I woke up this morning, still zombified. It hurt in the shower while washing my hair, in the car while banging my steering wheel with curses at traffic.

And it hurts now, after sitting for the Channel 13’s hour of The Office with frozen peas on arm.

Hmm. Maybe I should go to the doctor (Or suck it up and stop being a wimp?).

And, from the looks of my condensation-laden bag sweating on my arm, to the grocery store to pick up some non-mushy pods.

The Best Things In Life Return

A recent Time Magazine article had a lead stating that nine out of 10 Americans are moderately or very satisfied with their jobs.

I am beamingly happy to say that I am now one of those nine Americans.

After 54 weeks of piecing together part time jobs, mashing schedules of two and three positions like stubborn middle-of-the-puzzle jigsaw pieces, I landed a real, adult, full-time, salaried and benefitted career.

Just two weeks over a year since graduating from the University of Portland, I (siiiiigh) sold my journalism loving and writing soul to the world of marketing.

And after three weeks of writing scripts and taglines and calls to action, I couldn’t be happier. Apparently, 42.29 percent of my fellow advertising cohorts are also like me, very happy.

It’s a bit odd; so many Websites, journals and articles say that the key to happiness isn’t about having a job or money or financial security but I have to admit, after a tumultuous post-graduation year of paycheck to paycheck survival, my happiness increased 10 fold thanks to this job.

Most of those Websites, journals and articles that pop up on Google results say that true happiness comes from inner peace. But who’s to say that having a job you love isn’t a key piece to having inner happiness?

If I look back at the first year after graduation, it’s easy to complain, whine and cry that the environment I was so readily tossed into was totally and completely unfair. It wasn’t ready for me (Ahem, 12 percent unemployment in Multnomah County alone) and I wasn’t ready for it (Real world, say whaaaaaa?).

It’s easy to say that nobody handed me lemons.

It’s easier to say that if, by freak chance, lemons came my way, I never made lemonade.

Rather, for the first time in my life, I morphed into someone who tossed lemons aside when they came,

mistaking them for some type of mirage of bitter nourishment. I became a reactive individual, clamoring to keep my head just enough above the water to take a hopeful deep breath, rather than the proactive go-getter I had spent the last 23 years of my life as.

I found though, that I wasn’t the only person. A colleague at Pottery Barn waited two years before grabbing a secretarial/receptionist position with the Portland Youth Philharmonic (YAY Jason!!!). A fellow UP alumni who graduated in 2005 with a mechanical engineering degree still can’t find a job in his field after being laid off 15 months ago and now toils away in his garden, blogging about his agricultural adventures in unemployment.

Idleness wore us down.  Paycheck-to-paycheck living wore us down. The American Dream? Ha. Inner Peace? Puh-lease.

But like any period of struggle and strife, I admit that I’ve morphed, and perhaps even grown, as a person. For the first time in my life I am truly independent. While I may have resented my parents last winter for letting their baby girl go without a meal or two, I’m thankful that I’ve learned the masterful art of frugality and budget balancing (how many 20-somethings do you know with that talent?). With a bum hip still bumming me out, I transferred my strained love-hate relationship with running into a fascinating hobby of urban walking, checking out my neighborhood with Walker over a cup of coffee. 

Over the past year, despite EVERYTHING (break ups, shingles, firings, cancer, etc), I’ve somehow managed to become this slightly normal, uber-confident young Portlander.

I happily became…wait for it…an adult.

Whoa.

On an end note; I almost feel bad for the other guy who was hired with me. The 23-year-old landed this scriptwriting position, snatched up the American Dream, with three weeks of his collegiate career left. He won’t have to worry about how to pay rent, how to buy food, how to survive from one day to the next without losing his mind. Part of me, that girl who I used to be 12 months ago, is insanely jealous of him. But the majority of me? The woman I am now hopes the best for him, knowing that he won’t get the opportunity to grow, mature and learn about his self the way I was forced to.

He might not enjoy those lemons as much.

Comeback comeback

So this is the second “I’m blogging again” post that I’ve written since starting my blog way back in late November.

Whatever.

A lot of people have tried the comeback comeback and, considering I’m pretty awesome, I figure that I can re-earn the love and trust and loyalty of the few people who actually read my blog just like others.

I mean just look at Robert Downey Junior: He started his acting career at the age of five and grew up on screen and in the tube throughout the ‘90s (I write like I actually witnessed this but, considering that he was born 21 years my senior, it’s obvious to assume I’m pontificating over celebrity nonsense) before going totally off the drug-induced deep end for a solid five years. He tried to comeback with a role in Alley McBeal in 2000 but didn’t hit life-changing rock bottom until he was on the Oprah Show in 2004 (What is it about that woman?) when he realized he couldn’t actually continue a life of jail and drugs.

Now he’s a super awesome bad ass who runs around in iron suits, beating up bad guys and trying to get into The Avengers. His role as Iron Man is laden with such irony (IRONy?) too that it’s submissively comical: An ex-drug addict superstar cleans up and plays an ex-alcoholic superhero. Classic.

Comeback Specimen Number Two: Britney Spears.

In a one sentence summary of her life; she tumbled down from her throne as a Mouseketeer turned teen idol turned adult-man idol turned cracked out Las Vegas-eloping (to a Wangster, none the less!), Madge-kissing, baby-having, head-shaving nut job. Now she’s all back and hot, making music that makes the white boys at Pottery Barn shake it in the early morning like they’re Beyonce (You know who you are and I miss being all OCD about the store with you terribly).

You might say she only had one comeback attempt but she had two; remember when she tried to be all clean and sober after her second son? As we all saw on Family Guy, which obviously didn’t pan out too well for her.

And the third comeback comeback of the blog post would have to be Brett Favre.

Wait. No…he never successfully came back, did he (Insert an, ‘Oooooh, Sick Burn’ tease here)?

At any rate, what I mean to say through my random celebrity knowledge (Which I did actually have to wiki because, let’s face it, I don’t care enough about celebrity life to have these factoids readily available within my brain), is that I am making my comeback comeback into the blogosphere.  I’ve had enough people tell me that I need to/should blog again (Ahem, Clara) and, to appease and hopefully entertain them, I’ve gone ahead and succumbed to peer pressure.

I should probably work on that slight flaw in my character. If I keep doing everything my friends and family suggest to me I might become a full-on, 24/7 carnivore (Ahem, Walker), dye my hair hot pink or red (Ahem, Mom, Sean) and become really fat, just because I can (Ahem, Diane).

Luckily I don’t have an agent telling me I should get back into the game.

Because Lord knows, the last thing I want to be is a comeback comeback comeback like Brett Favre. Sometimes enough is enough.