July 2001 Archives

As a going away present for my week vacation, I have left all of you a newly-revised Charo page! Now, don't all of you go jumping up and down at once. I added a discography and filmography as well as revising the home page. I still have some more Charo photos that I have collected across the net that I want to get up on the site, but I wanted to put what I had done up before I left. So give it a whirl and let me know what you think.

Well I am done with my class and am even more prepared to head out on that job search. I also have filed for unemployment - woo hoo! A whopping $230 a week is coming my way, assuming I meet my job search criteria.


Well before I can be prepared for my job hunt, I am off to Phoenix and Chicago for visiting of friends and relatives. I will try and post while I am gone, but in case I don't, the daily update will resume it's regular schedule August 7.

For the last two days, I have been attending career transition classes courtesy of my former employer. It's actually been quite productive and it is interesting to see other people in the same boat but different circumstances. It further convinces me that if you take the people I know who were recently laid off, you could have a great core staff of a company.


Other than that, I have been fleshing out my resume as well as planning a trip to Chicago to visit Kris before he vamooses to points beyond next month. He has inspired me to expand my search beyond So Cal. Who knows, maybe I'll be moving overseas? You never know.

Well I am sad to say that as of today, I am not going to be hosting Who Wants to Be a Millionaire at DCA anytime soon. Perhaps casting will reconsider (if you are reading this, please can I?). I made it through callbacks, but in the end, no one who tried out for it in SF made it. My reward? I got to appear on the evening news on Channel 7 in the Bay Area and on KGO radio. A print person was there as well, but I didn't see anything written in the Chronicle or other Bay Area paper. I did have a fun time though and I also got a Regis mask.


The rest of the weekend was spent hanging with friends and taking in the uber-disappointing Jurassic Park 3. They needed something more at the end. I think a good explanation would be that it is JP2 without the San Diego sequence. I also discovered a new game called Cranium. Its quick to play and a lot of fun. It was better than Trivial Pursuit Genus 5, which despite some tense moments, sucked. The questions have too many clues in them and it relies too much on modern era stuff. Maybe that college education paid off, but the original Genus was way harder.


Ah yes, word on the street is that the Hotmail redesign was a success. Apparently it reset everyone's preferences so that things were sorted more logically.

Well I am off to Northern California to follow a dream. I'll let you all know how it turns out on Monday. Other good news is that I actually have something to do next week. Thanks to my former employer, I have three days of career counselling free of charge. Whee. I also should be getting my resume back soon.


The redesign trend continues. Today, Hotmail redesigned their site look and feel. Anyone with an account want to give me a review? Let me know.

Yesterday was the 46th anniversary of Disneyland. To celebrate, I headed to the resort to apply for a job and to meet my friend Scott. The day got off to a bad start because I found out that the parks were not hiring for attractions. So I headed over to the park to hang out with Scott. We had a great time catching up and going around getting my commemorative guide stamped so I could get the free pins. Scott also had a backdoor pass so we could get on all the rides without waiting in line.


We managed to hop over to DCA to visit with Leo a bit and then went back to Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln to wait for Scott's wife Debbie to show up. Just as we were waiting, I spotted Cynthia Harriss and Paul Pressler duck into the attraction. For those of you non-resort junkies, Cynthia is president of the entire Disneyland Resort and Paul is the former head of Disneyland and now currently in charge of all resorts. I quicky followed them into the attraction at a discreet distance. When the opportunity presented itself, I went up and introduced myself to her. I wished I had a camera and a Gorn.


So the topics of conversation we covered were: I applied for a job and there were no openings (She encouraged me to keep trying, I also mentione my desire for WWTBAM and she said they had some wonderful people try out and good luck with the tryout), The extra 'S' on the wall (The sign still says Walt Disney's Offices when in fact there is only one office - she assured me that the other office was coming back from WDW but said thanks she didn't think of that), her opinions of WDW (its large, its great to see how they do things, she likes our park better), backstage tours at Disneyland (She's not sure if she wants to do it but they are thinking about it. She still believes in the magic and doesn't want to spoil it, I commented how well the WDW version was run), and sharing the magic with children (I told her my Kameron/Super Star Limo story). She then asked my name again - including my last name and again encouraged me to keep trying.


The rest of the day was spent on cloud nine (and trying to convice Scott to give California Screamin' a try). After some dinner it was time to head on home, but I was further inspired by Cynthia and I am most certainly going to SF on Friday to try out. I'll keep you posted!

So its 3:45am. I can't sleep. I kept asking myself why. Is it because I am a lazy bum and have been sleeping until almost noon everyday (thanks to my earplugs)? Is it I am worried that I won't get a job? While those are probably not helping things, the real reason I can't sleep is because today was the audition to host Who Wants to Be A Millionaire-Play It! and I didn't go. I should have gone. I really want to be the host (call it a secret dream of every game show nut). The worst part is that I could have gone, but I only found out about it Sunday night, and while roller skating I talked myself out of it because I felt I would be under prepared.


It didn't help that the local news had stories about the tryouts and heck, even Entertainment Tonight had a bit. So ever since then, I have been kicking myself. Fortunately, fate has given me a second chance. There is another tryout Friday in San Francisco. If I can get my act together I want to go up there - for nothing more than to say that I did it. So what do you all think? Drop me an e-mail and give me some encouragement. Please.

This weekend I went roller skating for the first time in Aeons. I think the last time I went any type of skating was Valentine's Day 1991. It was a bizarre night that culminated in the car we were driving in coming to a halt on the Yolo Causeway. This was in the days before call boxes, and after sending people looking for a phone, the rest of us ended up on that freeway for about 7 hours.


Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln gets re-dedicated tomorrow at 7:45am on Main Street. I was thinking about going to see it, but I think I'll sleep in a tad and go apply for a part time job at the resort tomorrow instead. Its the 46th anniversary of Disneyland tomorrow and they always give away something cool.


Two recent site redesigns of note: CNN.com and The Los Angeles Times. Both redesigns were subtle, but improved the site usability immensely. Special kudos goes to the LA Times which actually made the site as readable as their paper.


On this morning's TPIR, Kenneth from the University of Saskatchewan won the showcase, but he didn't have anyone come up and celebrate with him afterwards. Did he go by himself or were his friends just camera shy?

Spent a nice day yesterday driving up to Santa Barbara and visiting with Chaos. The weather was absolutely perfect. We spent time watching Atlantis and having dinner at an Italian restaurant on state street. (Susie did you ever put away the leftovers that were on the counter??)


I have sent my resume to a professional. I was impressed with her work and hopefully she can do some magic for me and get me out in the workforce again. I do want to travel again so hopefully I'll get a job and then start 2-3 weeks later so I can go to Europe or something. At this point I'd settle for a job.

It is tough to have a lifestyle of sleeping in and job hunting in the afternoon when there is a major construction project going on next door. I did manage to get some applications in and am going to consult with a professional resume writer so hopefully I can get some good leads. Now if I can just get them to start sawing wood on the other side of the construction site.


I also did manage to watch a complete Price is Right for the first time in a long time. I was happy to realize I was still on the ball. If I was on the show today, I would have won a corvette. Time to get some people together and make some groovy t-shirts and get on the show.

I am working on a video catalog consolidation project. Some of you long-time clubbers might remember I used to have a video catalog of my movies on the site complete with reviews and ratings. The past two years or so, it is among the many things I have neglected. So in the past few days, I have been working on bringing my catalog back up to date. I don't really think it will be back on club josh, but it will allow me to see which VHS tapes I can toss or recycle since I now have over 40 DVDs. interesting to note, with my recent purchase of Superman on DVD, I now have more DVDs than Laserdiscs. About time!

This weekend I saw Shrek. People kept egging me on to see it saying how much I would like it. And as with most movies that people say that I would like, I didn't. I liked Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy's vocals, but the story was ho-hum and the jokes tired. The press made a big hullabaloo about the Disney jabs, but to me they could have been so much better. They were more pillow jabs than anything. Although I wonder if they were making fun of California Adventure when they showed up at the castle and no one was there.


Last night, in about an hour, Roger and Me completed an E-Ticket dash throughout Disneyland. We actually started at 10:30 and attempted to ride California Screamin' at DCA, but it was down (surprise, surprise). We then waded through the Electrical Parade mess and went across the esplanade to Disneyland where in one hour we rode Space Mountain, Matterhorn, Big Thunder Mountain and Indiana Jones. We were gonna complete the mountain ranges with Splash Mountain, but opted for Indy instead. For those of you keeping score that's three trips to the resort in one week - a new record.

I am so very mad right now at Rite Aid. The very one that is across the street from where there was a standoff yesterday with some guy from San Diego is where I took my beloved underwater photos from Bora Bora. Sad to report that in the middle of the standoff, the machine ATE my photos. Sigh. So much for underwater Gorn shots.


Yesterday was the busiest California Adventure has been since the AP preview day. While it was good to actually see people there, I was reminded that the best time in the parks is during the slow season. I still haven't decided if or where I am going to try and get a job there.

I have managed to add descriptions to Chapters 4 and 6 of the French Polynesia Trip Diary pictures. Only Chapter 5 remains. I am going to get around to doing it soon. Really.


Its been just plain miserable in LA lately. The humidity feels like South Florida and due to the holiday, yesterday all of the stores were crowded with people getting last minute items. I'll probably take in my usual fireworks at Disneyland. Today marks the two year anniversary of getting an annual passport. I tried to think of how many times that I have gone in the last two years, but it really is impossible. I know that the pace has picked up in the last year. For example, when we first got the passports, we didn't go again until September. It really wasn't until January or February of 2000 that we started to go on a regular basis. And now I might just get a job there - who knows?


Happy 4th of July or as they call it in England - the 4th of July. The US is 225 years old today. Wheee.

July???? Well I enter my first full week of unemployment. The bad part is that due to the holiday on Wednesday (that's Independence Day for you non-US people) there really are not many leads for new jobs this week. I expect it to pick up next week.


I saw A.I. this weekend as well as Office Space. A.I. was a very good Kubrick/Spielberg hybrid. I think the movie was OK, certainly not a masterpiece, but it was worth the bargain matinee price. A bit long in places, and I think the ending (the most Kubrick-influenced part of the movie) is where most people say "What the ???". Many people have suggested I see Office Space because it was hilarious. I can only say that the funniest parts of the movie were in the trailer.


I also ran into Ian from Innoventions again this weekend. I gave him the website address so Ian, if you are reading this, Hi - it was cool to see you again. Drop me an e-mail when you get the chance. The rest of you, um, you can write too.