What will my college degree do for me? I recently changed my major from journalism to electronic media, which closes many doors but also opens many new ones. I am not entirely sure of the exact position that I am going to seek after high school but it will definitely be something in the media department. As a kid I dreamed of playing in the MLB as a 1st baseman, but that dream escaped through the dream catcher after my freshman year of high school. I played baseball (or teeball) from around age 5 until I was 16. I lived for baseball. If I wasn’t in my backyard playing baseball as a kid, I was watching it on TV or playing MVP Baseball on my Playstation 2. My late grandpa always told me I should be a play-by-play announcer because of my knowledge of the game and its history. I would still love to be an announcer but I’m not sure that is my calling. When I decided to quit baseball following the summer after my freshman year, my parents were pretty upset. They never missed one of my games and were disappointed to see me just quit playing the game that I loved so much. I still miss playing baseball and have contemplated joining the USD club baseball team but it’s been so long since I’ve swung a bat that I’m not sure I would be any good. The reason I quit in high school was because for 2 years in a row I got one of those coaches that favors their own kid and makes sure that he is in the game at every second. Even though I had the highest batting average (around .400) on the team and played good defense, I only got to play in maybe 20 innings the whole season and I finally had enough. Now I want to work behind the scenes of baseball broadcasting, whether it be running a camera, editing clips, whatever it may be, I just want to be a part of the game.
Monthly Archives: December 2011
Week 14 Freestyle
Finals week, everybody’s favorite week of the semester. I’m not sure that I am really ready for this semester to be over; it seems as though it just started. This has definitely been a memorable semester for me as I finally found a major that I am 100% happy with: Electronic Media. This semester has also been my most successful semester, as I currently have a 4.0 while taking 18 credit hours. I only had two actual finals this week. The first was today (Monday) for English Grammar, which almost didn’t even happen because the instructor showed up to class 16 minutes late. My last final for the semester is for Finite Math and it is Tuesday morning at 10:30. I currently have a 94% in the class and found out today that in order to keep my A I would have to score at least a 32%, which I think I can handle. Finite Math is the last math class that I will ever have to take (hopefully) and it has definitely been my favorite math class. College Algebra was hell for me. I always liked math in middle school and up until my sophomore year in high school, when I had a terrible Geometry teacher. I had A’s in every math class I had ever taken up until Geometry, and from Geometry it was all downhill. I don’t think I managed to get anything higher than a ‘C’ from Geometry all the way up to College Algebra. This semester was different though. I was lucky enough to get a great instructor that made everything make sense to me. I got a 60% on the first quiz of the semester but from then on I never scored lower than an 85% on any quiz or test, something I am definitely proud of. Hopefully my portfolio gets a good grade so I can earn my first 4.0 since middle school! If I get an ‘A’ in Creative writing I will have increased my GPA from 2.2, 3.4, and 4.0 in my 3 semesters at USD.
Week 14 Freestyle
Way back on May 17th, 2011, my life changed forever. I was at my sisters 30th birthday party when she surprised everyone with the news that she was pregnant again…with twins. My niece and nephew, age 7 and 3, were just as excited as I was. It has been a long summer/fall waiting for them to be brought into the world. Her due date was supposed to be in January but it is normal for twins to be born about a month early. I got a surprise phone call from my nephew at around 8am on Sunday morning telling me that “my baby brother and sister are here.” He didn’t sound very excited, but that’s understandable because he probably wouldn’t believe it until he saw them. Unfortunately, since they were born a month early they were required to be in intensive care, even though they are perfectly healthy. One thing that frustrates me is that in order to visit in the intensive care unit you have to be at least 10 years old; my niece and nephew are 7 and 3. I felt bad that I was able to go into the room and see the twins while their own brother and sister were forced to sit out in the lobby and look at them on a tv screen via a webcam. It’s still hard for me to grasp that they are finally here as well, and I’m sure it won’t seem real until they are able to go home and to be held, which should be sometime this week (hopefully). Their names are Gradyn Gabriel (boy) and Gracyn Delaine (girl).
Week 13 Freestyle
Choosing a major in college is probably the hardest thing you will ever have to do. Hell, I was told my freshman year of high school that I needed to decide then what I wanted to be when I’m done with school. Asking a 15 year old to decide on his future probably isn’t a very wise idea. The truth is it’s never too late to decide what you want to do. I came to USD as a business major because I had an amazing business teacher in high school. Did I really want to study business in college though? Hell no. To be honest I really didn’t know what I wanted to even remotely think of doing until my 3rd and current semester of college. I switched from a business major to a journalism major late in my 2nd semester because I wanted to pursue the path of becoming a sports writer. But when it came down to it I really don’t want to marry my career in the long run. When I started this semester I got an email about joining the media groups in the CMJ department and I was immediately intrigued. I always wondered how a news station worked and I was able to learn hands on when I joined Coyote News. I’ve worked my way from studio camera operator to audio board operator in my first semester. In the next semester I hope to be able to work my way even further up the ranks to director or producer. I also joined Coyote Creative (formerly U.Imagine) because I was interested in how TV ads were put together. Without the hands-on learning provided in these two groups I wouldn’t have a reason to be at USD. I’ve decided that I am going to pursue the path of either a video editor or something in the similar fields. This way I can combine my love for sports and my love for video production.
Week 13 Process Post
For this weeks process post I am going to talk about how I plan on forming the end of my short story. I have not exactly decided the path I want to take with my story. I have two completely different endings in mind that I am trying to decide on. The first ending would be the predictable ending in which Dale would track down Nelson and serve justice by killing him. I feel as if this would be the easier ending to have but I am leaning towards the alternate ending that I have come up with. The alternate ending was something that I hadn’t planned on implementing. I was writing about a characters dream for the in-class exercise and then it just sort of popped into my head. I decided that I might try to be different than the rest of the authors of the world that create predictable ending. I did not want to have my story be predictable like the others. One thing I cannot stand is the predictability of every single romantic comedy; guy meets girl, they fall in love, they fight and fall out of love, they get back together and live happily ever after. Even though my story is not a romantic comedy, I don’t want to write a predictable ending. I haven’t exactly worked out all of the details yet, but I have a strong idea to build off of and it will surely be a surprise to whoever winds up reading it
Week 13 In-class exercise
Short story exercise- character dreaming
When I laid in bed that night I didn’t sleep. It didn’t matter if i was sleeping or not because I kept replaying the sight of the murder I had witnessed just hours ago. Maybe I did sleep. Maybe I was replaying it in my head as a dream. When I got up the next morning I was a new person though. I was traumatized. New blood is pumping through my veins. I have a new calling. I will serve justice in vain of those who have escaped or fooled justice; just like my idol, Dexter. Dexter was born in blood; I was reborn in blood.
Chase isn't creative. 