Jarrett's Journal

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-10-14T15:14:00

2009-10-14T21:34:46Z

I just had a conference with my English professor about my first college research paper that I wrote on "Don't ask, don't tell", and he said he loved it. But the best part is that he liked it so much that he wants to help me get my article published! He wants to meet with me later to edit it, update it, and rewrite it as an editorial that I could submit to the school newspaper or a local Utah paper. How exciting is that?!

Here's a link to download it if anyone wants to read it. It's in PDF format.
Click here to download

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-10-12T14:26:00

2009-10-12T20:44:14Z

Today I noticed that the colors of fall have really set in recently. Tons of leaves have fallen already, and most of the trees have an orange or red hue now. It hasn't started to get exceptionally cold yet though, I still need to get at least one more heavy jacket if I want to survive the upcoming brutal months of cold and snow.

I'm really excited for the snow though. I've seen snow plenty of times but I've never seen snowflakes while they're falling. I saw snow fall a couple weeks ago for the first time, but it only snowed for five minutes and it looked more like hail than snow (or what I've been told is "pellet snow"), so it wasn't that exciting. I want to see how good I am at making snowmen and other snow creations, I can't wait!

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-30T17:59:00

2009-10-01T00:04:11Z

It was snowing today, yaaay! Unfortunately it only snowed for like five minutes, and the cold weather system is moving away from salt lake city, but it was still enjoyable. It's been pretty hot here for the past few weeks, so hopefully this trend will continue as fall approaches. Of course I say that now, before the temperatures start to play a game of limbo.

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-28T10:30:00

2009-09-28T16:31:52Z

Aww, betrayal can be really sad [deviantART link]

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-27T14:20:00

2009-09-27T20:25:55Z

I've been working on a video project for a few days now, and I think it's going to turn out well. I'm a bit disappointed though, because the library provides camcorders to rent but no memory cards or USB cables so I can't even edit any of the video. So I can only use my regular point-and-shoot camera for video, which is fine but the video has obvious compression artifacts in it. :/

However, I am doing it in black and white so that should hide them a little bit. I edited for like five hours yesterday and I think it's coming along really well. It's basically just random scenes of me walking, skipping, etc. in slow motion around campus with music in the background, but I'm editing it to look more abstract and surreal, like using lots of reverse video and cuts that sync to the music. I'll definitely upload it to facebook once the contest is over, can't wait to finish it!

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-22T00:11:00

2009-09-22T06:11:16Z

Just saw this really cute but creepy cat on youtube

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-16T13:08:00

2009-09-16T19:14:10Z

I got my first english paper back today, and I got great reviews! I had to write on a local issue in your hometown, and needless to say San Antonio doesn't have that much going on. So I wrote on our water shortage, and had to take a position on whether or not the water restrictions were justified. Well obviously water restrictions are justified, so I wasn't thrilled to write the paper. But I got these comments back on it:

"Good, focused topic. Excellent writing. I'll be counting on you to help some of the others work on sentence structure and other language issues."

I'm thrilled that my professor respects my writing! Thanks GT english!

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-15T19:56:00

2009-09-16T01:58:52Z

I just got snow leopard for my mac yesterday, yay! In case you don't know, snow leopard, or Mac OS X 10.6, is the successor to leopard, or Mac OS X 10.5. I've been spending most of my time reinstalling my applications and setting up everything, which I enjoy doing. Most people installed snow leopard over leopard, leaving their data untouched, but you can make your computer run faster by installing the operating system from scratch (while backing up your files of course).

Some of the major changes in snow leopard include all programs being rewritten in 64-bit (so they run faster), a brand new Quicktime (which looks very sleek), a slightly better looking Finder, faster startup/shutdown, and takes up half the size it did before. Not very exciting changes, but it was only $29.

Aww, look at the snow leopard

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-09-06T12:13:00

2009-09-06T19:18:01Z

So I'm on this road trip in Colorado with one of my roommates Alex and my friend Danielle. Now Alex and Danielle are pretty much bf/gf at this point, and Alex has been acting like a douche ever since. Every time I did the speed limit on the highway he would complain that we really could be going 5 mph over the limit without a problem, and would mention this fact literally every 5-10 min. Then he said I was "driving like a drunk man" and called me a "fucking idiot" when I took an exit too early. I told him to cut that shit out, and that's finally when Danielle said something, so he was (relatively) quiet for the rest of the trip.

We arrived in Veil, CO where his house is yesterday, and ever since then I've been treated like a third wheel. Ugh! And apparently we're going to see a bluegrass concert later tonight, and I'm not the biggest bluegrass fan to be honest.

It's not all bad though, we did chill in a hot tub last night, and I'm taking some great photos of beautiful Colorado. I'll post all of the photos of my trip to facebook by monday, but until then here's a preview:

Click on an image to see it's enlarged version

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-07-31T17:15:00

2009-07-31T22:40:15Z

Thoughts from Jarrett

I went to the mall yesterday and bought a bonsai tree from an Asian woman who's first language wasn't English. I asked her how to take care of a bonsai, since I've killed one before, and it was a bit difficult to understand her, but it made me think how hard it must be for her to live in a country where it's difficult to communicate with almost everyone.

Then I started thinking about the best way to communicate with someone who has difficulty understanding you. Slowing down your speech a little helps, as they have more time to process your words and phonetics, but if you slow down your speech too much it will sound like you're baby talking to them, and that will probably offend them. The best strategy is to elaborate your sentences and make them clearer.

For example, if you were giving directions to someone who knows English well, you might say "Go down 'till you see the McDonalds, take a left, and the Best Buy'll be on your right." But if you were giving directions to someone who doesn't have a firm grasp on the English language, it might be better for you to instead say "Go down this road until you see a McDonalds. [short pause] Then take a left. [short pause] Then keep going. The Best Buy will be on the right." The more context you give, the more context clues they can use to understand you.

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-07-23T08:58:00

2009-07-23T13:58:09Z

Well today I'm heading to New Orleans with my family for a vacation. I'm sitting in the truck, trying to survive in the cramped prison they call the back seat My jeep is much better for traveling but we never take it cause apparently it's too old (by 3 years).

The vacation should be fun though. I don't know what we're doing, but I know we're going to see a jazz show or two and that's good enough for me. I'll be sure to post pics to facebook!

Post from mobile portal m.livejournal.com

mondokoosh737 @ 2009-07-22T17:42:00

2009-07-22T22:44:47Z

Thought this comic was funny

Pictures for sad children

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-08-08T19:20:00

2008-08-09T00:20:37Z

School is about to start, in less than three weeks, and I'm trying to be optimistic. I like seeing so many people everyday (as long as it's not CRAZY loads of people), but I hate the process of new classes, new parking spaces, new class schedules, new body clock schedules, new lunches, and all that grand new stuff. Sometimes change is bleh.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-08-05T16:10:00

2008-08-05T20:10:02Z

These stories keep coming out in the news, and its getting disturbing. Isn't it 2008? What happened to the progression of society, and the decline of barbaric attacks against other citizens, other people, of all kinds?

~~~~~

Report: Anti-gay violence on rise

(New York City) The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs said Tuesday that the number of violent crimes against LGBT people is up significantly in 2008.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-08-01T02:38:00

2008-08-01T08:03:21Z

Well since Deb has done a photo survey, I must as well to keep up with the times. But...I'm doing a different photo survey! You thought you could get me, but you couldn't!

1. Your Age:

2. Place You'd Like to Travel:

3. Favorite Place:

4. Favorite Object:

5. Favorite Food:

6. Favorite Animal:

7. Favorite Color:

8. The town you grew up in:

9. The town in which you live:

10. The Name of your pet:

11.Favorite thing to do:

12.Dream car:

13.Favorite kind of shoes:

14.Favorite Tv Show:

15.What makes you happy in general?

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-07-27T01:43:00

2008-07-27T06:43:48Z

I haven't posted to my journal in a while, but that's mostly because nothing has really happened this summer that I care to write about. I was going to keep a journal of my trip to Europe, but there's so much that happened on that trip, and most of it was bad, so I don't really want to write about it. That trip really messed me up emotionally for a while, but I'm fine now, of course.

What I will do, though, is try to include more into my journal, such as music, videos, random thoughts, hopes, and such. I had been trying to keep my journal feeling like a traditional diary, but now I realize what a waste of energy that really is, especially when you get and give a better experience, from more than just words. I hope that made sense.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-04-23T19:14:00

2008-04-24T00:15:04Z

I just recently discovered that you can import feeds to Facebook notes. So I imported my LiveJournal. Now whenever I make a post to my journal, it will also appear on my Facebook notes, which is great. If you are reading this post on Facebook, then the import works. Keep posted.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-03-22T23:26:00

2008-03-23T04:27:43Z

I talked with Domenica recently, and I haven't in a while, so that was cool. It turns out that she's in her local GSA club, and active in promoting acceptance of gay people, which is great! She's going to send me a packet of how to start a GSA club, so hopefully that will work out. Musha said she was trying to start one, but that was a few months ago, so I'll have to see if we hit an obstacle or something, as I'd love to have one my senior year. But anyways, me and Domenica talked for about two hours, and it was great to catch up on stuff. I wish she was still here though, she could have helped started a GSA over here, gosh!

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-03-16T00:04:00

2008-03-16T05:03:29Z

So I found out that my car's totaled, but I just recently found out that the engine block is cracked on both sides. So my parents got me a new car, a 2000 Jeep Grand Cherokee! It drives well, it has lots of room, it's got a great stereo, and it has an electronic console on the top that gives me the temperature, the gas mileage, how many miles I have left until I need to gas up, and other cool stuff! However, the gas mileage was supposed to be 17 mpg in the city, but the console has been telling me numbers from 12-13 mpg, so now I feel guilty. At least it's better for the environment than my old diesel car was!

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-03-01T20:07:00

2008-03-02T02:07:41Z

Today I was hit by a car, and as you would imagine, it wasn't fun. I was driving behind the Walgreens, Whataburger, and Wells Fargo. I arrived at the crossing behind all of those places, when a woman in her huge GMC Yukon was approaching the crossing. As she was just coming up to the crossing, at a place where its understood you need to stop, I continued on. She wasn't paying attention, and rolled on through the crossing, and T-boned me.

I got out of the car and took the keys out of the ignition, but the car was still going. It kept on running for another few minutes before it finally turned off, which was really strange. The front side of the passengers side door is now crunched, but it looks fixable with body work. The lady was really apologetic, and even gave me a hug since she hit someone "so young".

My mom saw the accident as it was happening, as she was going to meet me at the Wells Fargo to give me some tacos she had just bought from Taco Cabana, and parked next to the Wells Fargo in order to catch me. Funny enough, she was praying for me to drive well right before she looked up to see me get hit. I guess she forgot to pray for the other drivers to drive well too!

The cops came, wrote a report, but since the streets were on private property, there was no definite right of way to be determined for Insurance. My mom said that she isn't going to pursue an insurance claim, unless the cost for fixing my car costs something like $5,000+. My car was towed to a car repair shop that we've been to before, but they appeared to be closed when we called them, so we'll have to check up on it later.

But this is very stressful for me. I drive to school, I drive people from clinical rotation back to the school, I drive myself to and from work, and I drive to the movies and such places to have fun with friends. And I was supposed to try and go out with Zach this weekend, and this complicates things. My mom said she might rent a car and let me borrow hers, but she moved away from that idea as the day progressed. I hope that's what ends up happening, because it's such a pain to be driven everywhere.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-02-25T18:48:00

2008-02-26T00:48:22Z

Today Kevin, my manager, was really rude to me. He's still upset that I accidentally let it slip that he was on a smoking break when his mother was here. And being Kevin, he continued to talk about it and make jokes about it nonstop, and will probably continue to do so for another month, as he did when something similar happened with Deb. Then he made me eat my sandwich really quickly so that I could help another customer, even though there were already four people in the front, as Tiarrah decided to work tonight even though she's not scheduled to, and even though he sits in the back when just two people are working on a customers sandwich. By the time I finished, the customer was already leaving.

Then I realized that since Tiarrah showed up, they didn't need me, as only four people are needed on Mondays. Now it's common for people to ask to leave if there are more people than usual working, so I asked Kevin if I could leave. He said "No, we need five people tonight." Then I said "But Marshall only has four people working tonight on the schedule." To which he replied "Well, now we need five" as he walked away with a sly smile. So I called Marshall, told him the situation, and he told me I could leave. Then Kevin showed up and asked me to start doing the dishes early. This is significant in that he made Deb do the dishes early when he was trying to punish her, so now he's treating me like he treated Deb a few months ago. So that's when I told him that Marshall said I could leave. He of course was all pissed off, and told me to "get out". I told him it was nothing personal, and he again told me to get out. So I did, and as I was walking away, he spit in my direction. I had walked far enough away to where that didn't matter, but that told me that he's now super pissed, and will probably rant about this for another month, while telling anyone who cares to hear.

I'm getting really sick of this. That's what I get though for working at Quiznos, you end up with a bunch of immature co-workers. I already have three months down, so I'm going to start looking for a new job, somewhere where workers don't yell the n-word and listen to the same twelve Latino songs all night long.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-02-07T22:58:00

2008-02-08T04:58:04Z

I went to Reagan's production of "West Side Story" tonight. The first half had its flaws; the audio was too soft and the lead singer's pitch was off. But come the second half, the audio regained its power, and the final scene was very dramatic. The girl who played Maria was very good, especially in the last scene.

Anyways, I also saw Sisa there. I haven't seen her in a month, but she's as happy as ever. I was going to sit next to her during the second act to catch up, but there were no seats left. Sisa was like "Jarrett! Just sit down, pretend like you had this seat" and I was like "No, they're standing right here, and they're going to be mad". But hopefully we'll keep in contact, even though she never answers her phone.

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-02-02T15:50:00

2008-02-02T21:50:09Z

I talked with Kyle about my possible date with Zach, and it turns out he knows him, and gave me a few more clues of who he is. He's in ROTC, he's pretty built, and he gave me his full name. So I looked him up in the yearbook with his newly revealed last name, and now I know what he looks like. Deb's going to give him my number on Monday, since she was sick on Thursday, so I'm in a bit of a state of anticipation!

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-01-30T22:46:00

2008-01-31T04:46:02Z

I seem to be having a bad habit of posting major things a day after they happen, but whatever. Deb seems to have possibly found my first boyfriend! His name is Zach, and she's about to give me my number. Even though it's through friends, it's still really exiting! I'm pretty nervous too!

mondokoosh737 @ 2008-01-27T00:02:00

2008-01-27T06:02:41Z

I haven't posted to my journal in a while. I hope I can get back into the habit; I've just been so busy lately.

Tonight was pretty fun. Arielle, Jenn, Kara, Katherine, Deb, Lauren, Diana, and her friend Jackie came. I got some great gifts, such as a cute puppy stuffed animal, "Middlesex", and cold, hard cash. Gosh, I don't even think I counted how much cash Kara gave me! Well, anyways, there was a pretty awkward moment where Lauren learned that Diana had read one of Ann Coulter's books when she was twelve, and suddenly turned morose, and didn't talk to her for a little bit. Thankfully it was fine later.

We went to Barns & Noble after that, and visited places such as the Manga section, the magazine section, the awkward relationship/sex section, the bargain priced section, and the cute valentine's day section. I showed Kara and Katherine some Postsecret books for the first time, and they found the secrets interesting, as most do, including me (of course). I'm glad I was able to have a good, small, quiet celebration of my 17th birthday like this. And nobody sang happy birthday in the middle of the IHOP (thank god)!