Tamika went out after we got up today, and headed to Café Jovial to get us some breakfast. She’s been feeling a little down lately, and I knew the trip would do her good. I’ve also been arranging for a retreat for her. Continue reading “Café Jovial, The Black Marks, and Nelson Mandela”
Alexandria, Moodboards, and ATMs.
Took the day to drive down to Alexandria, to work on the Bloomery branding project. Erik asked me to help out with building them a new look for a product line from a distillery out in West Virginia.
Of course, this was the day that it had to pour icy rain, so the roads were just clogged. I managed to skirt a lot of it with Waze, but I was still about a half an hour late. Everyone was happy to see me, though I felt out of touch. Work was buzzing, but I am completely out of it save for this solitary project. I’m glad Zerflin has been doing well, because otherwise we’d really be struggling. The work that we’ve had come in from A2L, Bainbridge, and The History Factory have kept us busy while Brightline works on landing more projects.
I settled in at Kristen’s old desk, she was a developer that moved on to another job.
The work was fairly simple; just reviewing Moodboards with Kuntz (Moodboards are essentially collages of images that we use for inspiration for the branding and logo), and then editing them. My laptop was mind-numbingly slow, though. The files were small, the operations quick, but
Dropbox chose that moment to sync with everything in the world, and so my work ground to a halt. What was only supposed to be a couple hours ended up being the entire day; I didn’t finish up the last round of edits until around 5pm.
Erik was positive, and even asked me about how the family was doing and inquired if I was receiving checks ok, which was really nice. Not all of our clients pay us in a very timely fashion, which is really difficult, but Erik has really been helping.
While I’d been waiting for the computer to kick in, I had been doing art venue research in Alexandria. I’ve already identified at least 25 different coffeehouses and galleries in Baltimore that I might be able to show art at. I hadn’t eaten all day, so I decided to swing by Firehook Bakery to get a chai and a croissant, and see if I could talk to the owner. I met with a Tunisian barista who was very friendly, and told me to call in the morning, because he and the manager would be working together then. He was really nice. I jabbered away with him in French; happy to be able to exercise my rusty language skills.
The ride home was even worse than the ride down, compounding my frustration. I had hoped to be in and our quickly so that I could get more Zerflin work done. Several of the Bainbridge sites were so close to being done… But it only got worse. I had a cheque to deposit into our Zerflin account, but even after trying 6 ATMs and consulting with a friendly Spanish furniture worker who was able to deposit his cheque, I wasn’t able to. Finally, with the help of the furniture worker I found a Capital One branch that was still open, and I stormed in two minutes before they locked their doors.
The man behind the counter patiently explained to me that no, I was not able to deposit money into my Capital One account with my USAA card… I had switched them in my wallet and had been using the wrong card in vain the entire time… Mortified as I was, the teller was very kind and helped me get my check deposit.
Having burned through no less than 8 podcasts on the trip, I picked up Chinese food at the Double Dragon and made it home.
Tamika was exhausted. She’d been working on a new coding project that she had taken on, and was worn out. We chilled for a bit and watched Key & Peele before diving back into work. I managed to get everything done I needed to, but I’m exhausted. And guess what time it is… 2AM…
Driving home from Pennsylvania
We spent Thanksgiving up on the outskirts of Philadelphia with the Pinkney family. It was at times strained and tense, but overall, it was a really nice trip. Highlights of course included dinner at her grandparent’s Barbara and Nathan, a discussion on homosexuals as a social group, and getting to see Life of Pi at the 309 AMC.
I woke up much later than I wanted to. Tamika and I had stayed up to watch the cliffhanging episode (what episode isn’t) of The Walking Dead, but by the time I was about to turn in; it was already 2am.
It almost seems inevitable; every day that winds up being my bedtime. It’s very frustrating. We’ve already identified that the bulk of our frustrations with life come from not getting enough sleep, and yet…
Tamika and I had agreed the night before that we wanted to hit the road by noon, but at 11:20 I hand only just gotten myself; so that wasn’t going to happen. I had a bunch of Zerflin work to get done before we headed out (a review of a Baseball website and some work on a 3D house), so I got through that as quick as I could and helped Tamika fold clothes and get the car packed.
The roads were pretty clear. So after a stop at the Wawa for some gas, a turkey club and a chai, we were on our way. We made decent time, and other than getting blown around on the bridge a bit, it was pretty uneventful. I finally got Waze and the iPhone’s Podcast app to work together, so we were able to listen to Radio Lab, This American Life and The Moth on the ride home.
I dove back into Zerflin work when we got home; and the kids drew on the iPad and played with some glowsticks they got. Tamika was exhausted, so she’s upstairs taking a nap now. Going to try to get dinner ready soon. Salmon, I think. And rice.
Testing crossposting from G+ profile to WordPress with an image
Church Politics
Today I began jumping with both feet into the world of church politics.
And it’s complicated.
When I was in college, we spent a great deal of time at the Rafiki House playing a game called Mafia, in which players try to pick each other off without other players knowing who is in charge.
After learning what I now know about our limited congregation (I have less than 40 people to work with) this will probably use more complicated.
I was nominated to be on what is called the Nominating Committee, in which I help find people to fill the various positions within the church.
4 of the positions have the elected official be on the Board, which has rules about not having two family members being on at the same time.
Our church has several large families in it, so figuring all this out will be tricky.
In addition, I’ve also discovered that there are about 15-20 people who aren’t members, but could be. And then there is a list if people who have left the church who are still considered “members”, but who just don’t attend. Only official church members can hold positions of office, which further complicates things.
I may have to draw diagrams to figure all of this out!
Nya turns 5
Nya’s birthday party was today, and of course she had some very interesting and rather grown-up things to say.
After her party had died down, she was collecting her presents together and opened a present from her Babchi. She paid a lot of attention to all of the little things her great-grandmother had gotten her and then asked me if we could thank her.
Surprised and pleased, I asked her if she would like to write her great-grandmother a thank you note. “No,” she replied, “we could just call her. Like right now. Do you have your phone number in your phone?”
I dialed the number and handed her the phone.
Later, after we had set our prayers, Nya was going upstairs to go to bed when she asked, “Could we leave the bathroom light on?”
“No,” I replied, “we should really start turning it off because the light attracts bugs.”
She thought about this for a moment. “I have an idea. What if we left it on, but if either Arion or I come into your room in the morning and wake you up,” (which they both have a very bad habit of doing) “then we’ll turn the light off.”
I couldn’t argue with that logic. 🙂
Dreaming of the FLOTUS
She smiled in a rather sweet way, but with an air of someone who is used to directness; as if she was waiting for the Wrap-It-Up orchestra to strike up, and planning her turn to speak. Tamika couldn’t stop smiling bashfully.
“I love your hair,” Michelle (as she insisted we call her) said sweetly, making Tamika blush even deeper.
“How did you all meet again?” She asked, and Erica launched into the strange circumstances. Ayinde wasn’t there, oddly, and I puzzled whether he was off chatting with the President. Former President? It was hard to tell. Where was I? When was I? I struggled to get my bearings.
We were seated at a table in a fancy room; pretty but not ostentatious Victorian decor surrounding cherry wood furniture with gold and white trimmings on everything. Waiters came and collected plates as we played with the remainder of our key lime pie.
Erica was well dressed. But this was not unusual. I grasped at a fleeting memory. Had she just introduced us to the Michelle Obama? Had this really happened? I reached for my glass of water and gulped.
“So, I hope you don’t take me too forward, but I wanted to know if you could look at these. I’m frustrated and I don’t know what to do to get them to turn out right.” The First Lady took out three papers from her purse and handed them to me. I took one, gave one to Tamika, and one to Erica.
Erica looked it over and was first to speak. “Wow. These are really bad.” She was right. The appeared to have been created in Microsoft Word. Design elements, if you could call them that, were giant royal blue boxes with yellow and white Times New Roman text on them. I instantly felt a tinge of pain as I thought of how it would feel to screw up so badly that the President’s wife wanted to go elsewhere.
“I know…” replied Michelle exasperatedly. “I tried. I really did. But perhaps I’m just not good at communicating these visual things. I just don’t get it.”
“Ben and Tamika can handle it. Trust me.” gushed Erica, “You did take a look at the things I sent over, right?”
The FLOTUS nodded. “You guys are really good. I’m perpetually impressed at how entrepreneurial you guys are. All of you!” She gestured at Erica too.
I nodded. I didn’t know what else to do. “Well, sure. We’d be happy to help out in any way we can.”
“I’ve seen the work. I have no doubts.” She rose. “Shall we go for a walk?”
At which point I woke up. It seemed fantastical. Far-fetched. But oddly plausible.
New Video! – Yeah Baby
Arion tries on Tamika’s ridiculous sunglasses.
So, Facebook just announced the release of a a new camera app creatively called “Camera”. This comes on the heels of Facebook acquiring Instagram only last month. Instead of making it easier to share photos to Facebook via Instagram, they’ve created a whole new app, which shares a lot of the same features Instagram has (they even added filters). Facebook has a history of shutting down services it buys, it’s already done that to Gowalla, Beluga, and a host of others. I’ve got a whole lot of friends on here I don’t have anywhere else, so I’d like to invite you all to add me on Google Plus, which I’ll be posting photos to from. Add me on, just search for benjancewicz@zerflin.com #facebook #camera #instagram #socialmedia #gowalla #youngsavage #zerflin
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Shiny new JD Rellek ID cards! #zerflin #jdrellek #idcards #design
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