I guess my first post wasn't too bad. I mean, I shared it with my 527 friends on Facebook and achieved 15 views. So yeah, 1 in every 35.13333... people at least opened the link. I'm on a roll.
As an update to last week's post, my two stories did end up (finally) getting published. My story on the English Blend chocolate fondue event can be read here and my story on Micah and Jordan Black's wedding can be read here. I did hear back from the photographer. I was saved by the grace of one of her photos, which is now the feature photo for the story. I love the joy it captures of the two lovebirds. Of all the stories I have done for SC.TV, the #JordanIsTheNewBlack wedding is by far my favorite.
As for this week, aside from making the proper edits to the aforementioned stories, I took on the story of Sterling College's 2018 winner of the Homecoming T-Shirt Contest. I thought I would really enjoy this story because Patty Davila is the winner and I know her. We currently have a class together and had one together last semester. (Plus, she loves The Office. How can she not be an exciting person to interview?)
I also interviewed Tess Canon, who sent out the link to SC students and faculty to vote on this year's submissions. That was exciting as well. We acted all professional and sat down in Student Life and talked like we were on Jimmy Kimmel Live! It was fun.
The not so fun part was rushing the story. It was assigned to me during our 8am meeting on Tuesday morning. I probably wasn't quite awake yet because I agreed to do the story despite its due date of 4pm the following afternoon. I was back-to-back scheduled with class, work, and presentation prep stuff until after midnight that night. And Tuesday is supposed to be one of my calmer days of the week. On Wednesday, I didn't have a time to work on the story until 11pm that night, well past the story's due date. I attempted to ask for an extension for the story, to no success. I was met with questions like, "Can we talk later today?" to which I responded with, "I can't. I don't have time. I'm booked 'till late tonight. That's the point I'm trying to make."
*headbang*
So, I did what I feel like most students would have done in my situation. I skipped chapel. Man, I felt so bad about it. I still do to this very day. There was a bat that interrup-- I mean, I missed an opportunity to praise and learn more about God in the midst of my peers. I feel so guilty.
Alas, I got some things done. I did some homework for my afternoon Web Design class so I could focus on the story later on in the day, only to find out that the class period that afternoon was a lab day that was intended to let us work on the homework I skipped chapel to do.
*headbang*
Man, I don't know if it was a sign from God to allow me to skip His chapel service to work on homework that was intended to be done during a class later that same day so that I could instead write my story during that time or not, but that's what I'm rolling with.
Long story short, the t-shirt story was turned in on time with less than satisfactory quality. What I mean by that is I'm required to write about the story in this post but I'm not required to share said story on my personal social media accounts. I shared the English Blend and Black Wedding stories because I think they are of quality. I like the way they turned out. Do you see what I'm getting at? If so, here is this week's story in all its self-contained and mediocre glory. If not, you can still wait for the doctor. He will be out to explain it to you shortly.
To those of you still reading, I apologize if I seem like I am complaining in all of this. I want to be honest with my experience but I don't want it to seem like I totally hate my experience. I took this lab this year after learning and experiencing a lot about the journalism world during my time in the lab last year. This year's lab brought a new instructor with completely different expectations. Last year's instructor taught us how professional journalism works and how to get our writing out into the world to be read. This year's instructor expects us to be professional journalists with the time, experience, and quality only he has. While I appreciate his experience and desire to produce quality content, I don't think he quite understands that this is a one-credit lab and not a three-credit class. If I had known how unnecessarily difficult the work for this lab is going in, I wouldn't have enrolled in it. To make things worse, the ball didn't start rolling until the week after the add/drop course date, meaning I didn't know what I was getting myself into until it was too late to get out.
*headbang*
Alas, I am here now. I am struggling to make the most of it. I have a couple close friends in the lab who are also experiencing similar thoughts and we help encourage one another to keep moving forward.
I would also like to apologize to those waiting for the doctor. It's not that he won't be out to see you, but he would probably won't be out for a while. I have a headache that he wants to check out.
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