Short in Stature, Huge in Standings

Steve

2011-10-07T15:31:00.000-04:00

Nice size dent you left, buddy.

Latest Short Dedication

2011-08-12T01:10:00.000-04:00

"This one’s dedicated to all the great raging fires that have brought freedom to the oppressed, and H-E-Double Hockey Sticks to the oppressors."

Very cool video

2011-08-08T12:15:00.000-04:00

Trader Joe Dark Chocolate Covered Espresso Beans

2011-08-05T14:26:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow: Detox.

motivation

2011-07-14T06:48:00.000-04:00

I wish motivation was a kahlua/rice-milk based drink that tore open the space-time continuum and allowed you time to write in moments that don't actually exist in the real world. I've been wanting to write, and I've been jotting ideas down, but not a whole heck of a lot of actual production time spent sweating it out on the keyboard.

I think a lot has to do with my home office day job situation. It's all in the same place, so even when I'm not earning my paycheck it sort of feels like the stresses of that job aren't going away, and in the middle of writing some sci-fi action or mundane room descriptions I find myself opening Adobe Bridge and checking if I still have that group shot of transistors to work on.

I think my main problem, and I know I know, some of you wish you had this problem, is I really like my day job. I get to work from home, which is great, but it's totally not without its disadvantages. I have at least noticed the quality of my work has definitely gone up in the two years since I've been working from home, so I like that. (This also could be attributed to having more general experience in my field though.)

anyway, I lost my train of thought now and sort of forget what fire sent me to start this blog post. It's mega early and I'm usually still sleeping at this hour of the morning. To sum it all up, I'm a lazy bastard who loves his day job. I love writing too. I don't really want to help other folks with their projects so much anymore, as I've been doing a lot of that these past few months and it just grows into me wishing I hadn't taken on the project to begin with. At least my resentment doesn't show in my work because the client seems to be very happy with the end result. The time I spend on other people's stuff I tell myself I should be spending on my own and then when I get free time I squander it. Well, maybe i'm not squandering it as much as I think though. I'm doing a lot of reading. Magazine articles. News articles. Lots and lots of fiction. I'm really enjoying the work of Philip K. Dick which I've been meaning to read him for years and years.

Okay, I think I'll go back to bed. Very very tired.

peace,

So...finally bought a kindle.

2011-06-19T22:05:00.000-04:00

Flipping loving it. I've been selling off or donating large amounts of my book collection as well. An event happened a few months ago here in the house we're living that made my wife and I realize just how important it is for us to get rid of the glorious amounts of stuff we've been drowning in for the past few years. Having gone from a large three bedroom house with detached garage and work-shed in New Jersey to this small trailer in Massachusetts has really helped us realize how much we own that we really don't need.

It started with clothes and shoes for myself personally. Then I moved on to my book collection, which was already out of hand when we had the house to begin with. When we first moved here we had this trailer filled, along with two 10x10' storage units down the street at the local u-haul self-storage center. We're now down to a single 10x10 and lots of holes in the shelves in the house here. Also selling my LP collection, most of which I already had digitally.

Also parting with my comic book collection and getting rid of some guitars and probably one of my amplifiers. I've been foolish with my money. Some Americans wouldn't think so, some would say it was my money, I deserve to be happy. I don't think that's why I was buying so much crap though.

I'm not comfortable right now to stick with one strain of thought. Too much going on with my life this week. Very busy with work and trying to letter a comic for a friend of a friend, which sort of is helping me realign my desire to only work for myself when it comes to my creative endeavors. If something is bad, I like being the only reason it's bad, just the same as I enjoy basking in the glory of a job well done. Maybe I've just never found the perfect creative partner, who knows.

Also, in completely unrelated news, Ryan Montbleau Band has a live show for sale on their website from 5/29/2011. It's amazing. I'm sure the other shows are great as well, but this is the only one I purchased. Just wonderful. I wish them great success.

P.S. The kindle is an awesome, life changing device. Glad it's not a color tablet.

lol

2011-05-26T11:10:00.000-04:00

I like how my last post was about a mobile blogger app, technically giving me the ability to actually post more and yet that was about a month ago.

Anyway, I had just completely reformatted the books I have available at the Amazon's Kindle store and Barnes and Noble's Nook store. Without saying much about the differences between the two e-readers, I only know the store I actually get any sales on is Amazon. I've yet to accrue enough to actually have them send me a check yet, but it's more about people reading my work than making money. If Amazon allowed me to give them away for free, I'd just do that for a bit to see if things took off.

Android's mobile Blogger app.

2011-04-09T18:31:00.001-04:00

Working fine so far, I suppose.
Just took a picture. We'll see how it formats pics and stuff.

an unprovoked rant about fiction.

2011-03-30T16:38:00.002-04:00

I don't know why, but I decided to write an unprovoked rant about fiction. Here's the end result.

So much has been done with fiction. So many places and characters have been made up, sometimes as a struggling artist you get to wondering what the hell is there left to do anything with? How many more dragons can put the hurt on a knight trying to save something? What else can go wrong on a faraway planetary settlement? Can four women sitting around a cafe table set in NYC not end up sounding like one of a thousand scenes from Sex in the City? Maybe. Maybe not. You have a voice inside you. A way of telling things no one else can. Give 5 great authors the same damn plot outline to any classic tale of whatever and you know you'll get 5 great different stories back. Got an idea that you're worried is too similar to Grapes of Wrath? I say, Who cares? I say, Do it anyway. I say, If all the good shit's been used up, get the hell down on your knees and scrape up what's leftover and make something, anything, just don't give up and do nothing. If all you see is a literary wasteland, then write wasteland fiction. Hold nothing back.

I told myself once, I want to kill a whale with my bare hands, so I wrote a story about a whale's last day on earth. I was in Costco once and thought to myself, "I wonder, with the way society is getting more and more open about sex, (albeit slowly, thank God) if you'll be able to one day buy a sex robot here." So I wrote a story about a lonely guy who does. In writing this paragraph I asked myself could there be a dangerous alien species that are shaped like toilets? Sure there is, because I'm going to make it happen.

I don't, in the least, claim to be good at doing what I think is fiction writing. But I know I'm fucking amazing at writing MY fiction, because no one else in the world can.

Coven. Salem, MA

2011-03-06T10:29:00.001-05:00

Best food ever.

Egypt

2011-01-30T01:26:00.000-05:00

I tried reading up on it last night to see what all the craziness is really coming from to try and get a nice fat worldly opinion of the junk that's going on over there and I fell asleep. I'm now afraid I'll fall asleep if I try looking it up again at all, so I'm just steering clear of the whole affair. Good luck good guys whichever ones you are.

Feeling Good

2011-01-21T16:21:00.001-05:00

I don't know what it is, but I just feel this need to create lately. I don't want to create crap, but at the same time I know I'm no where near the level of drawing or writing that I need to be in order to pull that off. But all the same, I do understand I can't get to the good stuff, till I get through the bad stuff. So no more being a wuss about it. I just need to do it, and eventually the shit will start turning to gold. I obviously have been given a talent, and I think to ignore it for the simple fact that its not aesthetically pleasing to my own eyes would be to deny my creator the gift he's given me.

Basically since I've had a kid a lot of stuff on how I look at myself has changed.

Will I ever "make it" as a writer or visual artist? I don't know, but you know what, I'm going to be doing both for the rest of my life anyway, so don't worry about it being good, just make sure it comes into existence in the first place. There's plenty of works by people who have "made it" and I don't particularly like them, but lots of other people do. Do the work for the enjoyment of holding a completed thing in your hands. Enjoy life, and what you do within the confines OF that life. You only have so much time to do anything. And at the end of it you're really only judged on how well you treated those around you, so why rush anything. Don't make the fast food equivalent of something pretty to stare at or read. Make something substantial that leaves viewers or readers changed after.

Damn, do I love me some new fonts

2011-01-04T13:20:00.000-05:00

Couple days late in writing this, but I'm just now finally recovering. On January first of every year for awhile now Comicraft over at www.comicbookfonts.com has had a crazy sale. This year every font family in their catalog was $20.11 each. Last year (1/1/2010) their sale was $20.10 and next year if they hold the sale I'm sure the amount will be $20.12each.

I have only owned one style from them before and paid about $59 for it, so I was all over this thing. Below is a list of what I've aquired:

I got all International version if available due to my foolish dream of one day being fluent in French and should the need arise for me to lend my graphic skills in that language I won't be without the ability.

New year is off to a great start. Everyone's healthy and I have lots of work at NTE to keep me busy. Fun stuff all around.

Crazy, the power of actual marketing...

2010-12-30T08:35:00.000-05:00

...or coincidence. Anyway, what happened was last week with a ho and a hum I checked my sales reports on Amazon's book store, nothing on both titles. Fine. That's okay. I don't need book sales at this point in my life to feed my family. Last night I check my reports, nothing on my "H3110" book, but I sold 2 copies at some point of my Whale story. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0040GJBDW

I tweeted about it, as such: wow. I sold 2 copies of http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0040GJBDW this month. anyone who's read it, please leave a review.

I usually check reports only once a week, but I decided to check this morning as well. I sold 1 more copy in the course of the night. If an idiot like myself can move a copy with one tweet, I wonder how many copies the big dogs can move from a single tweet.

I was looking at my debt last night and although it's been blasted to smithereens this year I'd still like to sell about 5,000 copies of my books to help get that debt gone.

Thanks folks,

- -S

If'n the event ya tain't herd

2010-12-20T20:51:00.000-05:00

I started a music related youtube channel. http://www.youtube.com/baldingrocker

And the award goes to...

2010-12-06T13:08:00.002-05:00

Costco currently has Bravante Vinyards Red Seedless Grapes. Bravante was Wine & Spirits Magazine's 2007 Winery of the year winner, and they also were just awarded The Scott St. Pierre Damn Good Award in the Red Seedless Grapes catagory. Congrats Bravante!

Dodge Challenger Freedom Commercial

2010-11-21T22:52:00.000-05:00

Best car commercial I've seen in a long time.

Yo, first things first

2010-11-08T00:04:00.000-05:00

First, put this on the want list. http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Electric-Guitars/Les-Paul/Gibson-USA/Les-Paul-Tribute-1952.aspx

Next, we didn't end up selling the house till the end of Oct, but it's finally done and a huge layer or stress has been lifted from me. We walked away with an embarrassingly small amount of money, but in a time where some are losing money on a sale or even losing their home through foreclosure I am humbled.

I haven't been writing nearly as much as someone who claims to be a writer should be. But I've been playing my guitar like crazy. I purchased a Line 6 Pod HD500. Just an amazing unit.

I've been busy..

2010-09-09T12:11:00.000-04:00

Just FYI'n ya'll. I;ve been mega busy with tying up some loose ends in the negotiations of selling our beautiful New Jersey home. If all goes according to prayer, we'll finally have it all sold up and signed off on September 30th of this month. Very very exciting, I hope God isn't sick of my prayer voice (I think my internal prayer voice has an irish accent.)

Fingers crossed,

- -S

Kindle

2010-09-02T17:08:00.000-04:00

I cancelled my order. I'm a retard. I still want it though. I think maybe some rewards are best left for getting in Heaven.

Rest in peace...no seriously, get some rest.

2010-08-31T08:07:00.000-04:00

"I'm dying..." he said to me. Scott St.Pierre was not dying. I'm certain of this. Sick? Yes. Deathly ill? Please- not in the slightest.

"It's the eggs in the cookies I had at the airport!" he said excitedly showing no sign of sickness, "I've got salmon-nella."

"That's not what salmonella sickness looks like, just get some rest sir." His wife is correct. He's such a baby when he's sick.

Anyway, no news for the now. I lowered the price on his stories on amazon.com's kindle store. It seems the world of eBooks, at least with the lesser known author's has a different value system than the print world. Whereas Scott has sold plenty of copies of his printed short stories for $4 each, it appears that $2.99 is too expensive a price point for the unknown self-published ebook author. At least in regards to shorter fiction. I urge Mr. St.Pierre to keep in mind once his longer works are done with the editing stage that he should price them aggressively or at least complimentary with what's going on with the market.

Oh, one more thing, Mr. St.Pierre says in lieu of flowers send checks made out to his wife, Karen. Sigh, thank you.

- -Michael

ugh... still so tired.

2010-08-29T03:03:00.001-04:00

Just got a call from Mr. St.Pierre. He's woken me up to inform me he's given me the day off and wishes for me to post that there will be no post today, but there is always a chance he'll get to one himself.

sleep,

sleep.

The Parade

2010-08-28T23:59:00.002-04:00

We all got an early start this morning. The Gulfstream G150 was ready for takeoff 5 minutes before we even got to the airport. The city of Jacob in Idaho was opening a whaling museum today and had just found out about Mr. St.Pierre's story, "The Oldest Whale Ever" just this week and made all the arrangements for us to travel out there for the day to commemorate the occasion.

Mr. St.Pierre seemed to have enjoyed the attention, especially the cookies at the airport, saying they specifically reminded him of the cookies he paid entirely too much for once at this deli shop at Rockefeller Center. Even more impressed that the airport snack shop had rice milk, which in itself was a miracle for Mr. St.Pierre.

The ceremony was quaint and weren't we all surprised when they asked Mr. St.Pierre for a speech about the importance of whaling museums. His speech is below:

Hello, My name is Scott St.Pierre.

I'd like to this time to thank Mayor Grint for inviting me.

You know, I've been to a lot of places

and see a lot of museums and none of them

had cookies as good as they do in this city's airport.

(wait for applause)

Whales are important.

And so is Idaho.

And if someone dares tell me Jacob, ID isn't important,

I'll kick there asses.

(wait for applause)

Thank you.

Yes, these were taken from his notes and should not be taken as a record of what actually happened. Oh, he said these exact words alright, but if you replace the "wait for applause" with "observe the look of shock on attendee's faces" that may be a more accurate portrayal of his speech.

On the way home, with the help of a phone call from his agent, he realized he might need to work on his public speaking chops, mainly his writing for public speaking.

I'm at home now, half asleep, and I promised Mr. St.Pierre I'd send this post out before Sunday. So very tired.

Introductions.

2010-08-27T17:39:00.000-04:00

Hello, as foretold by Mr. St.Pierre in yesterday's post, today and most future blog posts will be submitted by myself, Michael Shakespierre. I have been assisting Mr. St.Pierre in medial tasks from time to time over the course of about a year now, and I am pleased to "step up my game" as he puts it, in helping him out in maintaining his blog, so he can focus on his fiction work and various other adventures that seem to pop up from time to time.

Mr. St.Pierre wishes to thank you all for your warm wishes in his books acceptance into Amazon.com's Kindle book store. He also isn't mad at any of you for not having purchased them yet, and no, not owning a kindle isn't a good enough answer because your iphone, android device, ipad, even your PC and or Mac have the ability to download Amazon's free Kindle software. Even if you don't buy Mr. St.Pierre's books there are over 600,000 books in the store available to download, and LOTS of free book content as well.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/mac

http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/pc

http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/ipad

http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/iphone

and for you android users, you can just type "kindle" in the android market search bar.

That's all for now. nice meeting you all. We'll be seeing you.

Whole lotta Tutz

2010-08-27T00:02:00.004-04:00

http://www.graphicmania.net/35-stunning-photo-manipulation-photoshop-tutorials/

Some of these are insane. Just figured I'd throw something out there.

Also, speaking of throwing things out there...I've thrown myself! Check it out: http://www.amazon.com/Scott-St.Pierre/e/B0040VSUG6/

That's right, I'm now officially a published Author on amazon.com's Kindle Store. It's a great feeling.

My only beef is all the "how to market your book" articles I've been reading tell me to blog. And as you know, if you've been a follower of my actual blog for any amount of time, I have trouble sticking to the flow of blogging. I'm just not that into writing about real life stuffs. I loves me some fiction writin', but self-targeted journalism isn't my thing unless it's in my actual journal and no one's getting a peeksy at that thing till I'm dead. So with that being said, from this point on, I'm turning my blogging duties over to my trusty assistant Michael Shakespierre. Look for a new post by him tomorrow. Pip Pip. Brighters days and such.

Woody Allen Quote

2010-05-21T09:44:00.002-04:00

"In my next life I want to live my life backwards. You start out dead and get that out of the way. Then you wake up in an old people's home feeling better every day. You get kicked out for being too healthy, go collect your pension, and then when you start work, you get a gold watch and a party on your first day. You work for 40 years until you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You party, drink alcohol, and are generally promiscuous, then you are ready for high school. You then go to primary school, you become a kid, you play. You have no responsibilities, you become a baby until you are born. And then you spend your last 9 months floating in luxurious spa-like conditions with central heating and room service on tap, larger quarters every day and then Voila! You finish off as an orgasm!"

Cleaning out

2010-02-22T15:36:00.003-05:00

I was cleaning out this large portfolio of artwork I've done over the past 20 years or so. Lots of fun stuff, but some of it was very very weak. Hopefully what some of it gets recycled into will become paper for a better artist than myself. Shouldn't be too hard. Basically if it was uninspiring, I tossed it. If I could do better today, I tossed it. If it was sentimental...I kept it.

Business Cards:

This thread over at tentonstudios.com got me thinking about my own business card situation, which is very sad indeed. My last business card said, "comic artist" which is fine, because at the time of it's arrival I was very much trying to push myself as one one. But having quit that dream and moved on I find myself wondering, really what the hell am I? Yeah, technically I'm a graphic designer for my day job, but I really want to be a professional writer. And then there's the artstore that my wife and I have started. Maybe I should have some titles with check boxes on the front of the card that says "Pick the me you want." Then they can check off art supplies, writer, designer, loving dad/husband. Whatevever they want. I'm not entirely sure how much of me is kidding about this idea. Eh, moving on.

Also:

Selling your creations is an awesome feeling. I guess just giving them away to people who actually want them would be an equally awesome feeling, but I needs the money right now, yo. So I sold a few copies of my new short story "H3110" last weekend at a comic convention me and a bunch of the Ten Ton guys were attending. It was a fun little show. Good crowd. I brought the art supplies with me and sold some of those too. I also submitted the story to Asimov's sci-fi magazine. According to their website its still in "open" but "received" status, so that's still better than "closed" and "rejected."

How's the weather?

It looks like it's going to be an awesome day today. The boy (19 months old) has gotten really good at throwing the ball back to me. If it's a big enough ball he can catch it pretty good too, if nothing else is in his hands. We bought him a bike helmet yesterday so we can ride him around in the bike seat we found being thrown away. So far he doesn't like the helmet at all, but he's just going to have to get used to it because there isn't going to be any compromise on this issue.

Okay, that's it for now folks. Word up.

Also, have your lady friends check out my wife's blog at ksaintp.com.

Things I need to work on.

2010-02-18T10:12:00.003-05:00

Okay, I'm putting this list out there for some of you suckers to hold me accountable on.

A.) My website. I'm not looking for a complete redesign or anything. I think my mainpage is strong and just works well enough for what I do. It's the "what I do" part I think that needs the help. Some of the links have been festering for awhile now, we're talking years and what's even amazing is as long as they've been that way, as I'm typing this out I'm getting ideas. Perhaps that's the power of blogging? I've written in my journal about this stuff but perhaps it's the whole "putting it out there" aspect of blogging that is getting my gears turning a little bit. Whatever it is, sweet!

B.) I need to do way more fiction writing. As guilty as I am I'm actually feeling good about the amount I've produced over the past year and I'm off to the best start this year than I ever have been. I've also just agreed to provide some content for a Zine my good friend Kurt Christenson is working on, so there's a little fire under my butt to work on that stuff.

C.) I need to stop getting irritated at people that call it "The Mac Store." Yes, it's called the Apple Store. Yes the sell Macs. Do these same people call Victoria Secrets the Bra and Panty Shoppe, or Barnes and Noble the Book Store? Okay, probably they do on that last one, but I've heard it enough times from too wide a demograph of people to simply sum it up to only stupid people saying it. As a Christian I can only ask the good Lord to forgive them and also accept his forgiveness myself for getting so aggravated over something so dumb.

Might it be a marketing flaw from Apple themselves, if that's even possible? (The answer is yes, it's possible) A branding problem? It's hard for me to think of it as a problem when I see how popular they are. But also, it's usually cheaper to get stock macs from Amazon. And to those who don't know it, they carry the same warranty as Apple Store bought macs and yes, you can still do the whole genius bar/help desk thing.

D.) The Bible. I know I'm probably losing some of you with this one, but oh well. I needs to be reading me some more Bible. Life things just seem to align themselves better when I'm on point and devoting some time to this stuff.

E.) Get more of me out there. Success isn't so much about how the world sees you, it's about the amount of acceptance you have for yourself. You can have nothing, and if you're happy, to me you're successful. It's not to say I'm not happy...but I can easily say I'm not satisfied. I know there is more to me than what I allow out of myself. I'm capable of so much more. So that's really my new goal. More. Better. More and better. Sometimes more, sometimes better, sometimes both at the same time and reversed and upside down and sideways. But hopefully never something with neither, which I think would be nothing.

Never nothing again, forever and ever, amen.

- S

Intuos4 Hmmph...

2010-02-17T17:17:00.003-05:00

So, my Intuos4's micro-USB port stopped working this morning, which was expected. The day I first got it (May 09') I was surprised at how non-snug fitting it felt when I first plugged it in. Thankful that Wacom was considerate enough to include an option for them crazy left-handed folks. Without delay I plugged it into the other usb port and my little function button blinked back to life. I then called WacomUSA and they emailed me an RMA that's good for 90 days and the fantastically english speaking customer service rep assured me that she was 95% sure that my problem would be covered under the warranty. Luckily my wife has a Bamboo that I'll have to get by on while Tessie is in the shop. Yes...I named my Intuos Tessie

My iPod's name is Salt
my Macbook's name is Space

If your life is a conversation, let's change the subject.

2010-02-12T13:30:00.003-05:00

My name is Scott St. Pierre.
I am many things to many different people, but how many things am I to myself? And of those things which ones are you happy to be? Which ones are you you great at? Which ones do you only want to be better at because it means strengthening your career path, which in these hard economic times is very important but at what cost to the strength of your family time?
See, I've been doing some thinking, and it's the kind of thinking that gets people in trouble. It's the "is who I am who I'm supposed to be" type thinking. But I know who I am, and who I'm supposed to be is the guy who does the things that brings in enough money so the bank don't take the house and the gas people let us stay warm and clean and the electric people let us see at night and give power to or charge the batteries of our electronic-distractyoufromyourtruedestiny-devices.
Don't let that last sentence fool you. I love technology. I really do. I get excited when I read about giant leaps in processor speed or the crazy methods of data storage that some scientists are researching. But I guess I'm just starting to wonder what it's all building up towards. Why did we all actually need "a computer in every home?" Why now do we need 2+ computers in every home?
I don't have many answers for these questions, so if you're reading this looking for some great insightful way to find some kind of meaningful solution that you can then apply to your or life, I apologize for that now. I think a first step is to downgrade, if only in our minds, the usefulness of these machines that we depend on for so much. If we don't slow down, someone is going to end up creating a widget that cross references the local temperature with traffic patterns to what was on TV and then to a database where it looks up a personality profile so it can determine what sort of mood your wife is in on any given day so you won't actually have to ask her how her day was. Yikes.
In closing, I think for the weekend I'm going to give this computer thing a rest till Monday morning. Maybe get some reading done. Draw a picture with an actual pencil on actual paper, and bust out the crayons and not have to give a shit if that shade of color named Purple Mountains Majesty from the ole 64 color box of Crayola's is in RGB or CMYK. If anyone needs me, you can FedEx me or go the green route and send a carrier pigeon.

Things Done Changed, Kid.

2010-02-10T19:20:00.004-05:00

Seeing as how my last post was issued in July, it seems I have quite a bit of catching up to do as far as informing the adoring public as to what I've been up to.

We'll pick up where we left off last time.

July - Came and went.
August - I'm sure something fantastic and brain stretching happened in August, I just can't remember what it was. Oooh, maybe my Wedding Anniversary? Sure, why not?
September - Okay, this was a big one. See, sometime in August I asked my Boss if it would be okay to let me try working from home a few days a week to help myself and him get a feel for how it would be if I was to start working from home for the company full-time. (Not Freelance) I had done loads of research on the subject and printed them out for him to read along with a brief proposal. A few weeks went by with no response and finally one came. It wasn't a no, but it certainly wasn't a yes, yet.
What transformed it into a definite yes was nothing short of a motorcycle crash. No not literally. To make it literally a motorcycle crash I'd had to have been on a motorcycle, but I was on a scooter and if I was to only walk away from that experience with one new nugget of knowledge it would be that hitting the pavement at 35mph and surfing it for 30feet into a curb, you realize that the asphalt, gravity and it's buddy inertia really don't give a shit what sort of vehicle your body fell off of. It had your ass and it was going to do to you whatever it wanted to. It chose to slide me into the curb on Valley Road in West Orange, NJ. It didn't even care that it placed my bike in a no parking section after the crash and kids, when I opened my eyes after I realized I stopped moving the face of my helmet was pushed right up against the curb and even had the yellow "no parking" paint scraped right across it. I only broke my pinky and my favorite expensive windbreaker (only cost me $45 but retailed for $300+) somehow didn't get a damned scratch on it.
The night before (Sept 1st,) I had sent my boss a reply to his "not no, not yes" reply to my initial proposal. So, he received that email and the very next contact he gets from me is me telling him I'm in an ambulance being taken to an emergency room. I sat in the ER for 12 hours before my surgery and 16 hours after I left my house I was finally back home. I just realized the tone this posting has taken and I'll have none of that.
Fast-forward to today, but not just yet. Sept 1st was the last full-day I've worked in the office. A week later I went in and he OK'd the trial, but it was 5 days a week. Better than I expected. My hand was in a full cast for two weeks, and then a half cast for four weeks after that. Sometime before Christmas I was deemed full recovery by my physical therapist. My Boss has never asked me "when I'm coming back" and I think my work somehow has vastly improved. I don't know if it can be attributed to the non-45minute commute, the non-constant distractions of the average workplace or perhaps it's just the regular course of my professional development but I know I'm definitely working harder. It's not about work output, for me it's about the quality of that work and of proving to them that I'm actually working. My eyes are constantly glued to the screen in the event they email or IM me. I do not want to let them down or ever make them think I'm not working when I should be. I've become addicted to accountability.
I think one of my coworkers even IM's me in an attempt to try and catch me off guard. Which adds to the stress of constantly being on lookout. My gateway to the company is using Microsofts Remote Desktop Connection, which means my entire office work screen is windowed with no sound. So I try to maximize the window and resize all my other App screens to be just above the taskbar of my office connection window. Sometimes I forget to resize the apps and if I'm lost/zoned-out working in Photoshop/Indesign/Illustrator I sometimes lose track of time and might be 10-15min late on a notification. That stuff freaks me out even though morally it shouldn't because I know what I've been doing, but again, they don't so if I'm ever questioned it's going to be impossible not to sound over defensive. So all I really can do is to make my work speak for itself.

Art Director? Me?!

2009-07-24T01:11:00.002-04:00

I've taken on the title of Art Director ay my company. No one handed me this title, I decided to swipe it by default. I'm the only one doing any graphics for print or web here, and I'm the guy with the Camera saving this place thousands of dollars annually, so you're damn right I'm the Art Director!

Also, I realized I could probably be out-schooled by any other art director out there, but as far as anyone currently earning a check in this building, I'm top dog. 

Adobe, I'll see ya Friday.

2009-01-14T15:40:00.001-05:00

I'm so late to this party...

2009-01-07T11:34:00.003-05:00

This Weather is Cra-zazy

2008-12-15T08:22:00.004-05:00

It's almost 50 degrees outside with the rumor of it reaching about 60 by mid-day. My wife and I are almost done beating the crap out of a cold we were starting to get at the begining of the weekend and now we have to deal with this. We've been pumping ourselves with Orange Juice and Emergen-C drinks all weekend. I feel better this morning than I have the past two, so I have that going for me. I just worry about tomorrow. It's said to be around 35 degrees and rainy. That's when you need to worry about catching a cold, or catching someone elses, when the temp drops so fast like that.

Speaking of tomorrow being cold and rainy, I start a part time job tomorrow in the city. I'll be one of those mysterious people who type out the closed caption words for the subtitle track on TV shows. I really don't know much about it, but it's called "logging" and it pays more than it would if I got a job at our local walmart, and so far I'll only be doing it for two days. I'm not looking incredibly forward to it, but money is getting tight and sacrifices do need to be made if we're going to survive these times.

I'm for serious

2008-12-08T14:12:00.001-05:00

I'm mapping out my plans for a complete overhaul of my website, scottstpierre.com. I'm in the severely early stages of learning Flash, but due to the simple requirements I've made for myself, I think I may be able to pull it off with the limited knowledge I've so far acquired. I've narrowed down my website's requirements to 5 key areas.

News. This would be what most of you are reading right now. A simple link to my blogspot page.
Links. This would have the tentonstudios.com link and ironically enough, my linkedin.com link as well along with whatever else I want to link to.
Writings. Right now I'm bouncing around a few different titles for this section, but I think it's important that I start showcasing my writing in a more public forum. With the trouble the publishing world is going through right now, I don't see some giant company coming along and picking up a relative no name to gamble thousands of dollars to promote. Most of the content will be complete stories, but the larger works that I've completed will more than likely just be a few chapters with the full PDF available for sale through Paypal.
Music. While I know for a fact that any sort of career in the music business is unlikely, I do think some of the songs I've written do have a smattering of entertainment value and that perhaps they might make at least one person smile, if only on the inside. If having a music section of my little ditties can do that to at least one person, then I think having a whole section devoted to it will be worth it.
Gallery. I like to take pictures. Like most photographers I like to share those pictures with other people. This is the section I would share the pictures I liken to think people would enjoy looking at.

While there is certainly more to my life than being a wanna-be writer who used to write songs but currently enjoys dabbling in photography, I think my online presence is best limited to these things. If something unfortunate happens, like I lose my job, I will most certainly add another section titled "Portfolio" which will be filled with the pretty graphic images I have created for my current job.

The company seems to be doing well and since I've taken over photographing all of the product shots I'm saving them a ton of money when compared to how much the independent photography studio was charging them, so I at least have that value to my employment here. Buying the Adobe Creative Suite (mentioned in my last post) played a large part in increasing my value to this company. I think, in a lot of ways, that showed my boss that I am, indeed, dedicated to my position and would very much like to add value to my skill set. We're currently on a salary freeze, and though I was due for a raise last October, there is little doubt in my mind that I won't at least see my Creative Suite investment given back to me in my wage increase. In the least, it doesn't hurt dreaming. In this economy I'm just happy to have a job. I'll worry about an increase when I start noticing all my co-workers driving shiny new BMW's.

Whereas our hero talks of Adobe CS3 and the possibility of a free upgrade to CS4

2008-12-05T11:55:00.000-05:00

After purchasing Adobe Creative Suite 3.3 last early September, I wasn't completely taken off-guard by the announcement of CS4.0's oncoming release. If the ideal situation presented itself I would have certainly delayed my purchase, but necessity took precedence over convenience due to an oncoming project I had to perform for work.
The last version of Photoshop I had used, prior to owning CS3, was PS7. The differences are like leaving someone who you used to love for someone who completely adores you and just wants to hear your whole story. Someone who's so completely willing to make the world an easier place to walk through.
I digress, my father-in-law suggested to give Adobe a call to see if I somehow qualified for the upgrade seeing as how I did purchase so close to the upgrade's announcement. I had already looked into it online and found that others had tried with little success. Hearing David's suggestion out load and not reading it on an LCD display made so much more sense than reading about other people's failed attempts. I decided to give it a go.
I spoke with Jillian, she was delightful, but not from this country. I even called her out on flirting with me. Anyway, she said she could make an exception for me because, apparently, she could peer into the future and could see how great a man I will become. This is merely my assumption as I didn't give her much to run off of in the present. I had to simply procure some proof of my prior purchase and make sure that information gets delivered to Adobe. As it stands currently I'm awaiting Adobe to approve of my documentation and to ultimately ship out my 4.0 upgrade. The question that remains lingering in the back of my head, assuming that they do actually send me the upgrade, is will it be the Retail 4.0 upgrade or the Student edition.
Not sure. I'll be letting you know, world. That's right. I know longer pen these for friends or colleagues, or for America. Scotty gone global, nay, Universal. I'll talk to anyone and am constantly happy to do so.