Jake's Blog

I was eating some Frosted Cheerios a couple days ago while Dennis was sitting on the table.  He kept going after my food, so I decided to take a video of it.

I have been wanting another lizard after I had to get rid of Bella, but I needed one that wasn’t going to grow so big.  I’ve been looking at bearded dragons for a long time, even when I still had Bella so that was my most logical choice.

I affectionately named him Dennis.

He’s not the brightest crayon in the box, but he’s really fun to have around.  I got him from Animal Ark as  a pre-owned pet.  He has a little bit of MBD (metabolic bone disease), so he walks kind of funny, but I think he’s getting better with the proper lighting and diet.

He eats a LOT, and I found out that he LOVES crickets.  He can down like three of them in about ten seconds.  He also eats bananas, collard greens, leafy lettuce, apples, strawberries, and mangoes.  That’s all I’ve LET him eat.  For some reason he seems to be attracted to shiny things, so he keeps trying to swallow my headphones.  He’s also tried to eat my shirt, and other various green objects.

I carry him around my apartment everywhere and he’s really entertaining to watch.  He’s an curious little lizard, and he often has this inquisitive look when he’s checking out the room.

Overall, I think he’s well worth the price I paid for him.

I would like to propose a new practice that I think will benefit all those of the male gender (the straight ones, anyways) who are still involved in the dating scene.

I call it, “Give Slaps, Not Stand-Ups”.

To convey my point, I address the women:

Ladies, if you are asked out by a guy who you are not interested in, don’t give him you’re number. Slap him in the face!

Now before you disagree with this seemingly harsh proposition, hear me out.  There is a perfectly decent and humane reason behind what I am proposing.

There are only two reasons that I can think of that you would give a man your number when you are not interested (if I have failed to list others, please let me know):

1. You feel that you are somehow benefiting both parties by giving him your number because it is more polite or it lets him down gently.
2. You feel that it is easier to give him your number, then just ignore him when he calls you later.

I can tell you that the first reason is a serious fallacy.  Every male that I have talked to has agreed that he would rather be told straight to his face that a woman is not interested in going out with him than having said woman give him her number only to totally blow him off later.

If you find yourself agreeing more with the second reason, shame on you.  That is the most cowardly and inconsiderate dating tactic out there and there are a lot more assertive ways to convey your message, such as kicking him in the balls or pushing him in front of a speeding bus.

Trust me when I say that it is far easier for both parties if you just let him know right up front that you are not interested, and because you seem to have a problem with telling him using words, physical violence is obviously the best solution.  Surprisingly, you will find that men find the physical pain of being slapped in the face much less painful in comparison to the damage their pride takes when being led on or stood up on a date.

So give it a try.  With this method you can easily let him know that you aren’t interested, while simultaneously ensuring that he will never try to ask you out again.  It’s simply brilliant!

(If you haven’t picked up on it by now, I’ve had a bit of trouble with dating recently.)

About The Project

I have been working on a senior project with three other classmates since last semester.  We are re-designing letterstosoldiers.org, a non-profit website that helps the community get more involved in supporting the U.S. Military stationed overseas by sending care packages, writing letters, etc.

The website was originally designed using Microsoft FrontPage (ewww…) and is in a complete state of disarray, making it very hard to navigate and generally displeasing to look at.

Our task is to re-align the website so that it has a cleaner look and feel, and make it more functional and easy to use for visitors.

My role in the group is creating a web application that will make it possible for people to submit letters online to soldiers without any personal contact information being disclosed to either party.  It’s a bit tricky, especially if the soldier wants to send a response.

Progress

So far we have almost completed the design of the website.  We have created a template which we have installed in a content management system. We chose to use a CMS because it will make updating the site and managing content much easier.  It will also help to keep the layout consistent throughout the site, which will make the site a lot cleaner.

The web application is almost complete.  The core functionality is there, but I am still adding features to help streamline the process of sending letters back and forth.  Users submit a letter, which gets saved to a database on the web server.  An administrator checks the letter for content, then sends the letter to a soldiers email address.  The letter contains a link back to the site which will allow him to respond.  They submit the response, and it gets saved to the database again for the administrator to approve.  Once the user gets the response, the process starts over.

Challenges

The main challenge has been trying to coordinate and satisfy the client that we are building the site for.  There have been numerous misunderstandings, which has created a great deal of stress for both parties.

I get along really well with everyone in my group, although there are challenges that accompany any group project:

1. Someone always gets their feelings hurt or has their pride damaged.  Constructive criticism is always a bitter pill to swallow, and some people take it personally.

2. People have a hard time letting someone else be in charge and tell them what to do.  Most prefer to manage themselves, so naturally it’s a challenge submitting to someone else’s authority, even if that person is a fellow teammate and is just trying to make sure that things get done.

I don’t have a problem when I can see that people are genuinely trying to make a project a success, but it does bug me when people are just in it for a free ride.  Everyone has different skill sets and skill levels and some people may not have the particular skills needed to really be a valuable asset to the project, but as long as people are trying to do their part and put forth the effort to learn when they don’t know how to do something, I don’t have a problem.  What I get fed up with is when people in the group don’t even try, and when they just figure that someone else in the group will cover their butt.  That is not fair, and nobody likes cleaning up after people.

Thing is, I’ve been on both ends of the spectrum too.  I’d be a hypocrite if I said that I’m the perfect group member and I’ve always pulled my weight in past group projects that I’ve been a part of.  I try to learn from my mistakes though, and now I try to be an asset to the group in any way I can.

The things that I’ve had a problem with in this particular project is showing up to all the meetings.  I’m not as organized as I should be, and a lot of times I have forgotten to show up to a group meeting or slept through it.  My sleep schedule really sucks right now.

In general, I think that the biggest challenge for me is that I’m a perfectionist.  I want everything done perfectly, the way that I think it should be done and the way that I think looks the best.  I have a really hard time letting someone else do part of the design and although it’s not a bad design, it’s different than how I would have done it.  This is a personal flaw that I have to get over, but it definitely creates a challenge for me when working in a group where other people are in charge of the design.

Conclusion

Overall, I think this project will ultimately be a success; the road has just been a little bumpy.  My senior projects professor, Trudy Christensen, has been an extreme help in making this project a success, and is very supportive of what we are trying to accomplish.  She has told us several times that this is an excellent project, and is a good candidate for submission into the UVU senior projects competition at the end of the semester.

I became a member of the Students for Concealed Carry at Utah Valley University last week, and I will be acting as their Media Director as long as I’m here.  It’s kind of nice to feel involved in some sort of extracurricular program again.  I haven’t done anything like that since high school.

The whole purpose of the Stutents for Concealed Carry organization is to educate people about their rights and get the information out there so as to minimize the fear and incorrect information that people see so often from the media when it comes to owning or carrying a gun.

I was also talking to one of my buddies yesterday, and he told me an interesting statistic: people who are concealed carriers are five times less likely to shoot someone.  I’m not completely sure if this is a valid statistic or not; I’ll have to do a little research, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

I really think that the world would be a lot safer if more responsible citizens were active concealed carriers.  I’m firmly convinced that criminals would be a lot less likely to assault someone, break into houses, or commit violent crimes if they thought that more people were carrying.  Taking away or having more restricted gun rights is just going to ensure that there will be the same amount (or more) of criminals with guns, and less amount of innocent citizens with a means to defend themselves.  How much sense does that make?

My new TV got delivered two days ago and it’s gorgeous! Ten more inches of pixel real estate never looked so good.  I haven’t had much chance to test it out yet because I’ve been so busy with school, but I will say that Mass Effect 2 looks pretty dang good on a 42″ LCD

So, I decided to resurrect my blog a few days ago by updating the gallery and using a new template.  I’m pretty happy with how it all turned out; the template looks really nice and I didn’t have to make hardly any changes to it.

It’s been a long time since I wrote anything on here, so here’s a short update on how things are going in “The Life of Jake”.

School

Still here.  I’m hoping to finish all of my classes and graduate at the end of the Summer.  It really all depends on if all the classes that I need to graduate are taught during Summer semester.

Work

I quit my job at Verio Webhosting in May, and was unemployed throughout the Summer and the first part of Fall.  Basically just relying on student loans to make ends meet.  It was really nice to take a break from working and just focus on school.  I got hired on at Utah Valley University in the middle of Fall semester as a Flash designer in their Center for Digital Design and Development.  It’s been nice to brush up on my Flash skills, but I still don’t like using it that much.  I would rather make a website look nice with just HTML, CSS, and maybe a little JavaScript and PHP.  The grant for the project that I’m working on for UVU is up in March though, so I’ll have to find another place to work after that.  I really enjoy doing freelance web and graphic design, so I’m hoping to find people that need a website and are willing to pay for it.  I’ve vowed that I’m not doing free websites for friends or family anymore.  It’s not worth the time or the stress involved.  On that note, check out the website that I just finished for a good friend of mine at dreamlandinfilm.com.  I also did another website, gourmetguac.org, for a client that is marketing this product to help fund a non-profit organization.  Best guacamole I’ve ever had!

Family

Well, another one of my younger siblings has beaten me to the altar.  Shawn got engaged last November and is getting married this March.  I’m happy for him and Britanny, and hope everything goes well for them.  Guess I better get married soon so people stop asking me when it’s my turn.  Seriously, that is the most annoying question that anyone can ask you at a wedding.

I officially became an uncle on Christmas Eve!  I’m pretty excited about it, but it makes me feel a little old at the same time.  I get to see my nephew when Steve and Audrey come to visit in March for Shawn’s wedding.  I’m pretty excited!

Other Stuff

I’ve been snowboarding quite a bit this season.  I like to think that means I’m getting better at it, but I can’t be sure.  Mostly I just go for the fun and the company.

As soon as my contract is up in August, I’m officially getting out of Provo.  I can’t wait!  I’m sick of getting stepped on by money sucking apartment management and corrupt parking enforcement, and I’m generally just ready for a change of scenery.  Not entirely sure where I’m going yet, but it will definitely be closer to Salt Lake.

That’s pretty much the latest scoop on what’s going on with me.  I’m trying to be a more avid blogger, so hopefully there will be more frequent posts.

This semester has been a struggle for survival.  I’m taking 12 credit hours & working full time on the swing shift, which equates to no social life what so ever…  Saturdays are the days that I catch up on my homework, as well as my sleep.  Luckily, I won’t have to worry too much longer about fitting everything in.  My academic adviser told me that I could probably graduate next year if I play my cards right.  I’ll have to go to school this summer and take a lot of classes, but I’m ready to be done with school so I think it will be worth it.  I think it will be awesome to get out on my own, and I have been thinking about starting my own freelance design company after I graduate.

My mom was going through photos the other day and found this one from when we lived in Detroit.  I thought it was pretty funny because it proves that I was a nerd from the get-go.

So, I haven’t posted in a while so here’s the latest update on what’s going on in my life lately:

I was able to participate in something pretty fun that Tony Hawk thought up.  It was called the Tony Hawk Twitter Hunt, and it consisted of Tony Hawk sending packages out to be hidden in cities all across the United States, then posting their locations on his twitter page for people to find.  I volunteered to hide a package on his Twitter page and to my surprise, I got a tweet from him asking me for my contact info.  To make a long story short, I got a package a few weeks later to hide on October 15 somewhere in Provo.  I ended up hiding it in some bushes at the Provo Town Center mall outside the theater.  It was kinda fun watching his twitter page the next day after I sent the location of the package to him.  You can see my hint to the location of the package here.  I was just relieved that some mall security guard didn’t find it first.  Click here to see the tweet posted when it was found.

Other than that, there’s really nothing that has happened that is particularly interesting enough to post on a blog.

Okay, so my younger brother gave me a hard time the other day about not having enough pictures or information about him on it. I got to thinking about it and realized he was right. I don’t have enough pictures of my family on my blog, so if you go to the gallery you can see pictures of my family now. Hope your happy now Shawn!