Huffy Flounce

How many people were there for the group interview?

Four people total; and if I understood correctly, they're looking to fill two positions. There was one person there with an M.A. in publishing and previous experience in an editorial assistant position. The second candidate has an M.A. in English and the third one a B.A. in anthropology. At least I can feel good about my academic degree, I guess - or bad, depending on how you look at it.

There's such a thing as an M.A. in publishing? I honestly didn't know that.

Regardless, best wishes, Mal. I hope you get the gig!

Current Mixed Feelings

I was going to try to sneak away to Pittsburgh next month to see Bruce Springsteen play with Joe Grushecky & The House Rockers. I waited two days to buy tickets, which was more than enough time to sell out both shows.

But...I guess on the plus side....I can pay off my student loans that much quicker and be a few hundred dollars closer to getting out of debt?

Cool story bro!

Did you make sure you got that into the interview? How hard you had worked to get there?

Current Mixed Feelings
It's been cool being able to log in to AMC's website and watch videos there, but the player has been really glitchy for me. I've tried it on a couple different browsers, and the problems are the same.

I'm interrupted a lot, so I'm having to pause the video a lot. That wouldn't normally be a problem, but if I'm away from the computer for, say, ten minutes, weird things happen. Either I will get a message saying playback failed, or the player will hang up on me, or it'll log me out when I try to start playing the video again, or the audio will start playing again and the video will freeze on the last frame shown.

With a lot of players, if something like this happens, you can just click a little before or a little after where the marker is, and things will be fine. With this player, it almost always jumps back to the 10:57 mark. This isn't that frustrating when I'm only twelve or fifteen minutes in, but if I had made it thirty or forty minutes into the episode, it's a bummer. It means I have to let it play through until it gets back to where I left off. If I try to click a place that's beyond the 10:57 mark, it just keeps jumping back to 10:57. It might show me a single frame at the desired time, but it will jump back to 10:57 immediately afterward.

This only happens, say, 85% of the time. It happens 100% of the time on certain videos, but it only happens most of the time on others. On the rare occasion that it will let me advance to a time that is not 10:57, it may deposit me two or three minutes before or after the time I clicked on. It will then make me sit through more commercials than usual. Sometimes, the commercials (usually the same four or five) will go on four minutes or more. I suspect that it depends on where in the video you click. My guess is that when the player recognizes that you tried to advance to a place in the video that had X number of commercial spots preceding it, it will make you sit through the equivalent length of X number of commercial spots. This isn't too bad a frustration (I can check e-mail or work on a puzzle) if it gets me where I wanted to go without going on the fritz again.

The first video I tried to watch failed to play back so many times that I eventually just sought out a pirated copy. The second one failed a couple times, but I was able to watch it. The third video logged me out while I was watching it. When I refreshed, all the episodes had disappeared. It was like this on multiple browsers. I had Jubbers go to the site, and she, too, was unable to get any episodes to show up. It was like this on AMC's site for a stretch of at least four hours. It wasn't just The Walking Dead. None of the videos that required a log in were available to stream. They just disappeared, and AMC never posted any kind of message saying there were temporary difficulties or site maintenance issues.

So far, every single video has glitched in some way.

I'm posting in "Mixed Feelings," because, again, it's still cool that I get to watch the episodes.

It really must have something to do with your frequent stopping because I've watched the episodes on two different computers without any glitching. I can confirm, however, that skipping just doesn't work. It exactly the way you describe it: regardless which point on the timeline you click, it simply won't get past a certain point in the episode.

I often think about getting a second degree. At my age it would have to be part-time, evenings etc.

Which could be difficult because my job is pretty scattershot when it comes to regular hours.

I've actually decided to apply to a low-residency MFA program that specializes in writing for children and young adults. If I get in, I'll be over *cough cough* 50 when I graduate. I also realize the world isn't clamoring for another MFA grad, but on the whole it's still cheaper as a midlife crisis than buying a new Corvette.

You'll get in.

My son is staying with us for the summer! Yay!
He's staying in the room attached to the only bathroom with a tub, which has become my bathroom. So I have to share. Boo.

neglet wrote:I also realize the world isn't clamoring for another MFA grad, but on the whole it's still cheaper as a midlife crisis than buying a new Corvette.

No, the world is apparently clamouring for more drone operators and reality television.

My midlife crisis will likely involve skydiving.

If the parachute doesn't open, it'll cease to be a midlife crisis.

True, but on a more positive note, it might be followed by an afterlife non-crisis.

My father was a paratrooper. He made over one hundred successful jumps. It destroyed his ankles (military parachutes are designed to get you on the ground as quickly as possible--for obvious reasons), but he looked back on it as a positive experience.

He talked about taking me skydiving, but it never came to pass. He took me parasailing once. The trip up was cool, but the period of time spent in the air after the ascension is kind of lame. The descent is also kind of cool, I guess.

I probably enjoyed bungeeing more than parasailing. I don't know that I'll ever go skydiving. It's pricey, and I'm not really a thrill seeker. Tandem skydiving is cheaper, but I'm too fat for it.

I know that I wouldn't have the balls to jump unless strapped to an instructor who basically manhandled me out the door.

I would only skydive if someone was first able to break my deathgrip and pry my fingers off the door.

My father said that the majority of people have at least some fear of heights whether or not they admit it to themselves. He also said it was healthy to have this and that it was important to remain respectful of the danger inherent in a long drop.

He told me there was a certain height at which we cease to be able to process how high up we are, and that our brains have a way of abstracting distance beyond that point. He said it's scariest just below this point, and it's less scary above it. I can't remember the height he said was the scariest height. I think maybe it's just under forty feet, and I think the pre-parachute training tower they use (the one with the airbag at its base) is around thirty-four feet. This puts them right at the supposed scariest height.

I feel like thirty-four feet is right. Might not be. I could probably look it up.

I'm pretty sure we talked about our relationship to heights on Corona. I remember Quasar saying something about learning he was afraid of heights one summer when some job required him to scale a water tower.

I didn't really think I had an issue with heights until we went to some Mayan ruins at Atlun Ha in Belize a couple years ago. We climbed the tallest pyramid, at 54 feet high, and as soon as I got to the top I wanted to turn around and hug the walls and climb back down.

I have done a grand total of one parachute jump with a static line attachment(not really the same as skydiving), and one bungee jump. Both over twenty years ago. Really had some balls back then...

Well, I have resolved to skydive this year, at least once. This must happen.

I am similar to you Negs. I think I have mentioned it on here or Corona before.

Absolutely no fear of heights that I had recognised until, on a trip to Paris, the queue for the lift down from the Eiffel Tower was big so we took the stairs. The stairs up there are the metal mesh variety so you can see straight down past your own feet to the Paris ground beneath you. My legs went wobbly and whilst I wasn't panicking or crying, I didn't enjoy the walk down and didn't want to let go of the hand rail !!

My other uncomfortable phobia is suspension bridges. I have nightmares where I'm driving up a bridge and just keep going up and up until I start slipping back down. So of course now I have to regularly cross the Chicago Skyway bridge on my Michigan-Chicago drives. I really don't enjoy it in the winter with lots of snow.

I know I already mentioned this on Corona, but I didn't realize I had a fear of heights until it was explained to me. My hands and legs would get weak when I'd approach an edge. My heart rate would also increase, and I'd feel butterflies. I liked the feeling. When I described it to someone with a fear of heights, I was told he felt the exact same thing.

I guess I'd never quite put it together. I thought maybe it was adrenaline/excitement. I always felt--still feel, really--a bit of a desire to edge closer. Whenever I get too close to an edge, though, it's nearly incapacitating. That probably should have clued me in. I'm not sure why it didn't. I think maybe I just wrote it off as the result of too much excitement.

Ever get a strange urge to jump?

Nope, just me then.

I thought that was mostly stockbrokers.

I realize you work in the financial world, but it can't be that similar.