Great Saturday

Saw Camper Van Beethoven yesterday. Fan-friggin-tastic! It was all part of the "Far West Fest" for local station KWMR out in on the West Marin Coast. I've only heard the station maybe once or twice, but its great to be able to support community radio...even if it isn't exactly in my community. It should be though. Damn, I think I was born to live on the North Coast. Lots of free thinkers, iconoclasts, and yes, burnt out hippies reside there. I don't know if I exactly "fit in" with the crowd, but then, there aren't many other crowds I fit in with either; at the very least, this crowd is accepting of others. And entertaining. I had my fortune read for a dollar (and it was "work can be fun, don't forget it" good god I love irony). I bought locally made baked goods. I saw a VW Bus adorned with hippie flowers. I bought a beer from the market made by a local brewery that had a photo of Frank Zappa on it. Oh yeah, and the ocean is right there too. I've always dug that big old puddle.

And oh yeah, CVB were fantastic. They are great guys all around too; I got the entire band to autograph a DVD, and they were all gracious in doing so. Photos can be seen here. A video shot by yours truly can also be seen here. Ain't technology grand?

Oddly enough, as much as I've been to the North Coast, I'd only been to the Point Reyes area a scant few times; and I'd never actually been out to the point. I stopped at the park visitors' center first and walked the short "earthquake trail", where you go right alongside the famous San Andreas Fault. The Point Reyes area is a geologic anomoly; the peninsula itself is on the Pacific Plate, and the rest of the mainland is on the North American Plate. The fault bisects the two, first running through a valley, then a long vertically shaped bay (Tomales Bay). Theres a huge ridge you have to climb to get to the peninsula, then the rest is windswept rangeland. I drove out to the point, and I got almost as far as the lighthouse then kind of ran into a brick wall of congestion. Because my foot was still a bit sore, I didn't feel like walking all the way out, so I turned back. Fortunately, the beaches had hardly a soul, so I spent a while there -- especially at Drakes' Beach, which is a rarity on the Nor-Cal coast -- a wide, sandy, long beach with calm, safe waters to wade out in. If only the water wasn't so damn cold...

I also found out that Sir Frances Drake Blvd is *not* the way to get out there. God that road *sucks*. But I did at least find out that weaving your way through more remote backroads is ultimately quicker, and more rewarding.

The day was really nice though. I need to get out and do stuff like that more often (even though yes, it costs money...). I might go away for Labor Day weekend at least.

No new job for now...

Well, two weeks have come and gone since the second interview, and what I'd suspected for the past few days has come true: I didn't get hired for the Production Assistant job. I checked back in a few times since then, and they finally let me know by email today. It was for the reason that made the most sense to me too: I had the qualifications, but I didn't have the experience. But I'm not totally bummed out, because after all, I'm just a heartbeat away from a fantastic job.

Someone else contacted my house today about a possible interview, but I'm wary of it, because its somewhere that I didn't apply to. I imagine they got my name off one of the job posting websites I belong to. I might call them tomorrow just to confirm my suspicions, but chances are its one of those direct selling ponzi schemes I nearly got involved with a few years back.

Work for now is...work. In all honesty, things aren't quite as bad as they were 6 months ago, simply because I'm far more experienced, and I finally have someone else around me who is experienced as well. However, that person is out of town for the next few days (on the same West Virginia trip that I took this time last year), and I'm kind of having flashbacks to the days of old, like some grizzled, freaked out Vietnam Vet. But I sucked it up, kicked ass, and took names today. And I'll most likely receive zero recognition for it too.

So it goes.

Anyway, I've got a Camper Van Beethoven concert this Saturday, which I'm totally stoaked for. Even had a dream about them last night! What I'm not so stoaked about is my sore foot. I got some new shoes this weekend, and they seem to be helping me feet some (although granted it was ailing before I got the shoes). I'll get it over it in time. Everything works fine, and nothing is unbearable, it just makes the day just that much more crappy to deal with having an irritation like that.

Hopefully a vacation will come soon. However, I have Jury Duty in September, and the boss and his wife are going to be gone nearly half the month all together, so that kind of puts a damper on a late summer trip. October sounds more plausible. I wonder what the desert is like in the autumn...

Waiting

Well I went for the 2nd interview last Thursday. I think it went alright, but they had one other candidate. They said they would get back to me in a week's time. We'll see. It's at a pretty prestigious corporation, and without knowing who the other candidate is, its entirely possible that he has far more experience and skill than I have. But really to be at the point where I have a real shot at this job is fantastic. This means that I am just *that* close to getting a killer job, and getting out of my current situation. Even if I end up not getting the job, I don't think I'll feel terribly bad about it. I'll still have what I've got now, and even though I like it, I'm still in a pretty decent position there, and I'm going good work. Whether or not that killer job comes within the next few days, or the next few months, remains to be seen.

I had a fantastic weekend too. I saw Rush Friday night. One of my favorite rock groups since I've been about 16. Their heady lyrics and hard rock have meant a lot to me over my life. They did many songs they hadn't played in either a very long time, or in some cases, not at all. They were on the stage for nearly 3 hours too, so I got my money's worth.

Camper Van Beethoven is in a week and a half.

Saturday I hung out with my friend James, and him, his wife, and myself all saw The Simpsons' Movie. For those wondering, I thought it was a return to form. If anything, the quality of the movie was far above anything that had been produced by the franchise since the late 90s. And of course being a big budget theatrical animated release, the quality of animation was suburb; far and above anything on TV currently, even with the trademark Simpsons character design. Sunday, I checked out another movie, this time with my parents, called The Bourne Ultimatum. Its the third in a series of films where action and shaky camera work dominates the screen. As far as action movies go though, this one is at the top of the heap.

I don't have much planned for this weekend, which means I may just end up doing something incredibly cool. The weekends where I don't have anything going on sometimes end up being the best ones. And as I mentioned earlier, the following weekend is another Camper Van Beethoven show. Hopefully I'll get some neat photos of the group too.