Archive for the 'Home' Category

Highway to Hull

Published at August.10.08 in Home and Mobile. 1 Comment

I’m writing this in the backseat of Sonja’s parents’ Audi as we make the drive home to Mineapolis after a quick trip to Alcester, South Dakota, for a family reunion. (We’re actually quite a ways past Hull and have just driven through Sheldon, Iowa, but “Highway to Sheldon” didn’t make as catchy a title.)

I’ve now got one full week of the new job under my belt, and I’m happy to say that I still like it. The four days I spent there in mid-July were, in fact, a fine representation of the company and I wasn’t just being shown the “shiny bits” to make it seem nice.

Everyone I’ve met so far has been really cool and I’ve yet to meet anyone not suited for the position they’re in, which is a relief.

The funny thing that I’ve noticed is that, since this company is new to producing their own commercials, each shoot is still something of a novelty to them. On Friday, for example, there was a shoot at a local house. At previous jobs, the crew might have consisted of the producer, director, and copywriter (often all the same person), a shooter and maybe a grip. Add the talent and maybe you’d have four or five people on set.

Here, each one of those positions was an individual person, but add to that a couple sound guys, makeup, gaffer, another grip, lighting, and so on. Plus, the account manager was present. Then, throughout the day, various others would leave the building to “go see the shoot.” This included a couple other copywriters, a VP or two, the creative director, random executives, and another audio guy or two. I, on the other hand, was in the office all day working with the other editor but I think we were a couple of the only people from the creative department who did not visit the shoot.

I’m sure that once the “newness” of producing video in-house wears off, there will be fewer gawkers on location. But as someone who has been on countless shoots and knows how monotonous they can become over the course of a few hours, I can’t imagine wanting to hang around one all day if I didn’t have a legitimate reason to be there.

Maybe that’s why I prefer to work in post, and only occasionally go out on shoots. I’m fine with being there if I’m needed or if I have a reason to be, but I’ve never been one to hang around shoots for too long otherwise, especially if the director has already established a “rhythm,” or lack of a better term, on the set. New people showing up mid-shoot only distracts the talent and crew that is already in place.

So that’s my week. Sonja and I are still trying to decide where we’re going to live. A house may not be out of the question, and right now is probably the best time to buy one since the sellers’ market is in shambles. We still have to find the right house (though we already found the “perfect” house just outside our price range), and we still need to unload the house in Kansas City (see previous statement about sellers’ market). The good thing is that we don’t have to be in any rush, since Sonja’s parents are generously letting us live in their home until we make up our minds. Still, I miss my cats (who have taken temporary residence with my parents in Iowa), and it would be nice to have a place to call a home of our own again.

It’s an exciting (and a little bit scary) time in my life right now, but all the changes have been positive so far (when did this turn into a motivational blog?).

Signing off from Kansas

Published at August.3.08 in Home. 4 Comments

In a matter of hours, I will leave this house.

Then, I will leave this neighborhood, this city, and this state altogether. My car will be full of as many clothes as I can pack in the giant suitcase I bought for my honeymoon, while still leaving room for my iMac, my television, and whatever else I can squeeze into my hatchback.

I will be making my way north. Destination: My inlaws’ home in Minneapolis, where I will be staying for a few weeks while I get settled into a new position at a new department at a company that is just beginning to do what I’m heading there to do. I will be working as a contractor–basically freelance–for a few months, and then hopefully turn it into an “official” full-time career. It’s what I want to do, where I want to do it. And that’s what I keep telling myself.

Still, I keep getting choked up when I think about what I am leaving behind here in Kansas City. First and foremost, the friends. Sonja and I moved to Kansas in July 2002, and in six years, we have met some of the greatest people I’ve ever known. So many talented people with diverse backgrounds, somehow all crossing paths with us through a total of seven jobs, two apartments and one house. I didn’t get a chance to say a proper goodbye to everyone, but I don’t consider it goodbye anyway, because these are people that I know I will see again, many times.

Speaking of the house, perhaps that’s what hurts most. It’ll be easy to stay in contact with the people, but leaving our first house under these circumstances, so soon after moving in and making it our home, that’s what hurts. It hit me hard a couple nights ago, and even now, as I sit at my desk during what is my last real night here, it makes me ache.

We were really fortunate with this house. It’s in the perfect neighborhood, surrounded by perfect neighbors on all sides. These people welcomed us so warmly last May, and just as we were getting to know them, we’re leaving them behind, too. As silly as it seems, I feel like we’re kind of letting them down. Stupid, I know.

I love this little house, even with its squeaky floors and too-small garage. More than any other place I’ve lived, this feels like my home.

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What I keep having to remind myself is that this is a positive change. It’s a step in the direction we want to head. Sonja and I always planned to eventually move to Minnesota, where she grew up, just not this soon. But then, starting in mid-April when I was laid off, a series of events started to unfold.

First, three job interviews for three jobs that I didn’t want, though I tried to make it seem otherwise when talking about it with my friends. I think all along, I was trying to convince myself that these were jobs that I wanted, even when I knew they weren’t.

Each position was close to what I wanted, but each had something I didn’t like about it. One was a “junior” position that was beneath my skills; one was at a fledgling company that I didn’t feel had the resources to ever really become anything more than what it already is; and one that was so stiflingly corporate, I knew before I walked in the front doors that I did not want to be there.

During all this, a person from my past called me to do some freelance work, which saved me both financially and mentally, as well as prevented me from having to swallow my pride and work full-time at my other gig, a part-time retail job at the Apple Store. That job was supposed to be just for fun and a little extra spending money, but was looking more and more like it may have to become my real job instead of just my “retail experiment,” as I called it.

Freelance turned out to be a big success, and at times, I was busier than I had ever been, but loving every second of it. I was finally able to do what I wanted to do on my terms and make some good money at it. At one point, I even had to scale back my availability at the store so I could devote more time to my freelance projects.

Then on the last day of June, we were dealt another blow when Sonja was part of a round of layoffs at her job (though vindication would come in time), which forced us to seriously look at our options for the future. I still hadn’t heard back from the third job after my second interview there, so I announced a decision to Sonja while we were standing in the backyard: If I didn’t get the job, we’d move to Minnesota.

Wait, I need to back up: In April, the same person that gave me my first freelance job had also asked if I still had plans to move north, which I did, but hadn’t given them any thought. Now that we had a house, we were more tied to Kansas City than ever, or so it seemed. A little bit later, that same person announced he was moving to Minneapolis to build the video department at an established marketing agency, and told me he’d need help.

So I called the hiring manager at the third company, but the tone of his voice told me the answer before he could get the words out. Yet, even as I was being turned down, I was feeling relieved, very similar to the feeling I got when I walked out the front door of my last job back in April. Had they offered me the job, I would have taken it for the money and benefits, but I knew that it was not what I wanted to do, and it wouldn’t get me where I wanted to be.

That phone call started us down the path that leads to where we are now. Sonja and I spent about 10 days in Minnesota a couple weeks ago. I got the rare chance to “test drive” the company while they got to do the same with me while I worked there as a contractor. When I left at the end of the week, I felt something completely different than I had about the jobs I’d interviewed for and the jobs I’d held over the past six years: Hope.

I started the week hoping that the company was well-established and intelligent, and that the position would be a good fit for me. At the end, I was hoping that they’d seen the same promise in me that I saw in their organization. I was only there for four days, but I was excited for the future of the company, and I hoped that I’d be a part of it.

That brings us back to today. Our home on the market, packing our belongings back into the boxes we pulled them out of a little over a year ago, and cramming what we can into an 8′ by 8′ storage unit across town.

And so, when I set out in a few hours for the unknown and the uncertain future, I know that I will be feeling a lot of sadness for what we are leaving behind, but I know that the opportunities that await me are, without a doubt, the best thing that could have happened to us at this point in our lives. We’ll be in the place we wanted to be, and I’ll be doing what it is that I love to do, at a place that is serious about giving us the resources to do the best job possible, and really, that’s all that I could ask for.

Still Kickin’

Published at June.2.08 in Cars, Home and Work. 1 Comment

I guess now is as good a time as any to post. Hi folks, remember me? Yep, I’m still alive. I’m going to use a little trick I learned from Nathan to keep track of what I want to say in this post:

1. Interviews
2. Freelance
3. Car Repairs
4. Har-B-Que

1. Interviews

Yes, I am still without full-time salaried employment, but I have found that I am loving it. In fact, I’ve been busier over the past month than I was in the four months prior, so it turns out, getting laid off was a huge boon to my productivity.

But I have interviewed at a couple places, some more desirable than others, but the more interviews I do, the better I get at them. I haven’t been officially “turned down” yet, so I’m kind of in “waiting-to-hear-back limbo.” There’s one job that I’d really like to get, one that I’ll be okay if I don’t get, and one that, while not my ideal position, is with a good company any would be a great foot-in-the-door there.

Why am I so busy? Well, I’ve still got the part-time job, but in addition to that, I’ve been …

2. Freelancing

Yep, I’m now an “Independent Professional” (according to my LinkedIn profile). I’ve got a couple projects going on right now that are keeping me pretty busy. One that allows me to work at home, and another that takes me back to my previous, previous job, which is a lot more surreal than I expected. Will this trend continue? No one can really say for sure, which is one reason I’m still interviewing. I’m trying to make it work, because, as it turns out, working from home is really nice.

3. Car Repairs

In my last, rather ambiguous post, I posted a picture of my lovely car with some not-so-lovely damage that I inflicted on it myself. So, here’s the story in a nutshell:

Late one Thursday about three weeks ago, I was leaving the part-time job, where I have to park on the top floor of a four-story parking garage on the Country Club Plaza. Since it was late, the roof of the garage was mostly empty, and my car was the last one in its row. So, instead of backing straight out of my parking spot like an intelligent person, I turned my wheels and backed out at an angle. This would have worked anywhere else, but I forgot that I had parked next to a three-foot-tall cement pillar, and here it is:

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I was parked where that Escort Wagon is. When I checked over my right shoulder before backing out, I, of course, didn’t see anything, because as you can tell, the damn pillar is three feet tall. After I started moving, something in my subconscious reminded me the pillar was there, and I whipped my head around mere micro-seconds before hitting it, so I got to see the whole thing. Except there was nothing to actually see, because the damn pillar is three feet tall! All I saw was the movement of the car stop abruptly while an expensive-sounding crunch filled my ears.

I got out to survey the damage, which you see in the previous post. You can tell by the crease in the front fender exactly how tall the pillar is, and you might also be able to tell that if the pillar had been just one inch taller, it would have completely taken off my passenger-side mirror.

So, that’s that. I was mad at myself at first, and also embarrassed because the tire was loudly rubbing on the inner fender for the drive home. Then I realized, hey, it’s just a car. Even if it’s a car that I love like a member of the family (which i do), it’s still just a car, and it will be fixed. It could have been a lot worse, and I’d rather that it was me that caused the damage than someone else, like a friend or relative (or wife).

Sonja and I dropped it off last Monday night (Memorial Day evening) at the bodyshop with the promise that it would be done by Friday. Well, auto repair being what it is, and my history with cars being what it is, I knew fully well that it would not be done when promised. Part of that is because the replacement door skin was damaged upon arrival at the shop, and another part is that the holiday pushed everything back a little bit (parts’ arrivals, the queue at the bodyshop, etc.). Another small part is that auto repair, like weather forecasting, is not an exact science, and all timelines and dates are merely suggestions. Again, because I was anticipating this, I wasn’t surprised when I learned that it would not be ready on Friday. It is, however, supposed to be done today (Monday, June 2nd), but I have no way to get to the body shop before they close, and likely won’t until Wednesday morning, but that’s okay. Sonja has been a real champ letting me share her car for the past week, and it has allowed us to spend quality time together as I drop her off and pick her up at work.

4. Har-B-Que

Finally, Sunday, May 30th, was the Seventh Annual Har-B-Que, hosted by Kyle’s brother, Brian Harbaugh. This year’s was the biggest turnout so far (I think). It was so hot, though, that by the end of the day I was so sunburned and tired that I could only manage to finish a few babyback ribs and call it a day. We didn’t win any trophys, but we did have fun. Maybe next year we could do the grilling inside.

Well, it’s 2am and I have to work at the store tomorrow. I took the past 8 days off to get my freelancing stuff in order, but that ended up getting backed up anyway when one of my external hard drives crapped out. That’s what I get for trying to render to a USB2.0 drive, and it’s why I’m getting a couple 1TB FW800 drives in a couple weeks. Hooray for nerdery!

Hooray! I’m an idiot.

Published at May.9.08 in Cars and Home. 3 Comments
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