Oh boy!

I got accepted into the Texas Creative program! I'm thrilled and ready to get down to business! I guess Ray Charles was a good thing! :) Highfive, verynice!

On another note...I'm casting my vote for our next president. Go Martha!

I'll brag.

4.0.

Yes, it's true. I got my first 4.0 of my college career. Let me remind you...I'm in grad school. Yep, kick-my-ass-study-all-the-time grad school.

4.0.

Cheers...I'm happy.

Success!

What's the Question? .....



This is what I'm turning in. I spent a lot of yesterday Photoshopping and I'm happy with the result! Success!

Grrr.

Road block. I'm definitely hitting one right now. My creative application is due Tuesday and I have yet to pick my answer to "What's the question?" I have some good ideas, I think, but I'm a bit wary...it's like most of the ideas could go the good way or the complete opposite. So...send some good vibes toward Austin tonight so I can figure out my answer!

Ahhhh.

I. AM. DONE.

I finished my first semester of grad school. Three to go!

Here are some of us celebrating our last day of Strategic Advertising Management...we were thrilled to be done! (And I celebrated last night again...I'm so happy to have a break! So happy!) At Crown and Anchor we played some silly drinking games and had ourselves a good time.

Wow.

OK, so things are going great right now and I'm thrilled to write about 'em. First, I'm the brand new president of the Advertising Graduate Council! I'm so excited to get things going! And I'm even more excited for the new set of officers...they're all amazing, inspiring individuals and I'm positive we'll do some great things for AGC.

Secondly, our group for account planning kicked ass with the Austin Farmers' Market presentation. So much that we won out of the class. (Yes, we "compete" for bragging rights.) And we won! And I'm thrilled! Our group, LuminoCity, went to Crown and Anchor (a little bar) for some drinks in celebration! Yea, go team! Here we are as items at a farmers' market - bread, cheese, dog treats, carrots and our target market, the suits.



Lastly, I picked up my CREATIVE APPLICATION! And my question is..."What's the question?" Yep. What's the question? So. Yeah. I'm keeping my journal near me at all times in case I have a little spark of an idea of what to do. Here are some of our rules...I'm sure you'll appreciate this. "No mirrors, glitter or puffy paint. No food, no blood - and keep it relatively flat." Damn...there go my first five ideas.

Oh my...

OK, now I'm back to being crazy-busy. I'm all over the place...meeting here, meeting there. There's so much to cram in before I finish the semester. And I must admit, I'm pretty proud of my ability to not freak out too bad. Emphasize "too bad."

Tonight my account planning group presents our final project we did for the Austin Farmers' Market. It's going to be about 20 minutes full of entertaining and engaging material that'll hopefully help the FM to get more people to attend and COME BACK. One of my favorite things our group did was some man-on-the-street interviews. Amanda and I went to downtown Austin a few weeks back and interviewed "suits" to see what they had to say about the FM, if they knew about it, what they thought was there, if they'd go, how they can make it better, etc. It's actually surprising how some people just automatically freak out when students ask for an interview. One man actually put his hand up and turned his head the other way. No words...just ignoring. I laughed at that one.

Well, I only have a few more days of class left (wow!) so I better get back to work. Today I'm meeting with my account planning group at 2 to go over our presentation and we present at 4:30. Then I'm off to meet my strategic group to analyze our final case study. It's a doozie, let me tell you! Too many numbers! Yikes! Then I'm going to the apple store to get my iMovie looked at. Then I'm back home to do some reading. Oh, grad school.

Somewhere in there I'll be giving myself a 30 minute break. Hopefully.

Breathe.

I finished my creative journal. 67 total pages. Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap!

Now, I get to enjoy some good home cookin'...at home! Muskogee, I'm on my way!

Busy!

Here are some things I'm working on before Thanksgiving Break...I'm so ready for tryptophan naps.

-Music Planbook for a local musician. I'm writing a pitch letter, press release, designing some handbills and working out their online press kit.

-Creative journal entries. I've still got some to work on before it's due Tuesday. 50 entries total. Whoo-wee!

-Strategic Advertising Management case study. We're working on a case study for "Saxonville Sausage Company." And since my
group got the best grade on the last one, we're stepping up our game to make sure we're still at the top. In other words, this is lots of work.

-Account planning final project. I'm designing the adverts for the Austin Farmers' Market for our group. I'm also in charge of creating videos for our presentation. We don't present until after Turkey Day, though, so I still have time!

-Breathing.

So, that about does it. If I sleep a lot during the break, this is why! OK, back to work. Peace.

Shows.

So, here's the concert-attendings so far since I've been in Austin. The list will continue to grow, I assure you!

1. Austin City Limits...amazing artists. I'm sure you know this already.

2. Meltdown 2007. Hilarity all night...I got to see Baby Bash (Sugar, sugar, how you get so flyyy?), Twista, MIMS (This is why I'm hot...?) and finally Three 6 Mafia (be jealous.)

3. Redwalls, Rooney and the Polyphonic Spree! What a fun show! Redwalls was a great band...I might check them out more later. Rooney...eh...a teenager's dream band. The Spree...wow...what a fun show! My ears were ringing for two days. Ah, I had such a great time. And it was such a good recharge to get me pumped for the rest of school! Woo, shows! The picture is of the Spree in their little robes. Beautiful

I'm ready for another! Bring 'em on.

Dream Job!

Some excitement...

I found out recently that my dream job is right here in Austin. If you don't know already, I want to work with concert promotions. I love festivals, music, singers, concerts, bands, and basically anything that has to do with this industry.

Anyway, I was scooting around the Austin City Limits Festival site to try and find an internship when I stumbled upon a company called C3 Presents. Brace yourself. They do artist management (Ben Kweller, Blues Traveler, Eli Young Band, etc.) and they do booking/promotions for ACL, The Big State Festival and freaking LOLLAPALOOZA. Yep.

So, needless to say, I applied for an internship with C3 and am eagerly awaiting a reply! Dream job found at age 22. Nice.

Creative?

All right, I'll explain a big part of what I'm striving toward. Once one gets accepted to the advertising grad school there is an opportunity for that person to apply for the Texas Creative program. This program is where copywriters (the people who write all the words in an ad) and art directors (in charge of the layout/overall feel of an ad) are formed. There are a couple of other tracks, but I'm more interested in creative, so I won't explain the others.

Well, to get into the creative program I must apply at the end of the semester. And here's how the applicaton goes: I get one question. Probably the most random question in the world. Out-of-left-field kinda question. For example: When did it hit you? Or...How bad do you want it?

I'll answer my question on an 11 by 17 piece of paper, being creative as possible. An example? One of my favorites I've heard of is when asked "How bad do you want it?" the student simply answered with a photograph of Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding sitting side-by-side in their skating costumes. Nice, huh?

So, I'll be applying for the Texas Creative program at the end of the semester! Keep your fingers crossed!

And so it begins...

Ah, the University of Texas...where I'll become a 'professional.' Where I'll gain the insight to create amazing, mind-blowing ads that can win awards. Where I'll push my mental capacity and learn more than ever imagined.

Welcome to the advertising graduate school. Welcome to the most challenging two years of my life.