To Be A College Student for a Weekend

Hey everyone. This past Thursday was my film club's annual student film festival. Since I was a student 5 months ago, I made some short films with them and entered them into the festival. However, since I'm now a full time employee, I can't just go across the state and watch short films with my friends on a weeknight. So I had to use 2 days vacation time to have fun, and with the way my department is structured, it wasn't a problem (even though a couple of guys that know me from my internships gave me a hard time about taking vacation less than a month from starting, lol). So here's my experience.

I woke up Thursday morning and hit the road at about 10AM. I didn't have any trouble finding where I had to go, and when I broke for lunch I went to a GoodWill that was really close to the McDonald's I stopped at. I picked up a PS2 DDR dance pad for $2. The cashier was happy that someone bought it since apparently they don't sell very fast. After lunch I continued driving to my old college. I made it after about 3 hours. Once I got there, I made a quick stop at my engineering campus. I was hoping to see some old friends or maybe some professors, but neither were there. Well that figures, most of my friends that would hang out at the cafe or computer lab graduated, and it was during class hours so my professors were probably teaching a class. Oh well, it was cool seeing my second home again. After the engineering college I went to the GoodWill that was 1 mile away from campus. I bought a PS2 RF adapter, brand new for cheap.

After the GoodWill, I went to the student union where I wanted to hang out, hoping to find some old friends or just watch Toonami on AdultSwim.com. I had to re-configure my laptop so I could access the school's wifi. Now this Wi-Fi is just meant for students, but since I still have my log-in information, and they only reset log-in servers at the beginning of the school year (I think), I was able to log-in and still enjoy the student Wi-Fi. I told my friends I would be there, and one of my friends I met in my last semester stopped by to talk. Oh, I also had to use the visitor metered parking since I was a visitor. The meters at my college are a rip-off. It's 1 quarter for 10 minutes. Every meter parking I know of (down town my home town and down town my college's close city) give you 30 minutes for a quarter. I had to pay like $5 in quarters to park at the student union for the couple hours I was there. Then when I went to the auditorium parking, I had some trouble finding a spot since there was like some event going on, so I accidentally parked in "30 minute limit" parking, only to find out after pumping $1.50 in to see "the time's not increasing." I found another spot that was REALLY close to another car, so I had some fun getting out. Then I spent about another $5 on meters.

But then things got fun. I went to the building where the festival was happening, and went to where it was before. I set-up at a lounge and watched some more Toonami. Eventually one of the current members of the group told me they were meeting upstairs. I packed-up my stuff and met them up there. This is when I started filming the fun behind the scenes video I always do, and I'll get it all edited together, once I get my camera back from my friend. It was fun seeing them again. We hung out and got caught up while the others scrambled to get things all set-up for the night. And then TisLiberte, our former president of 3 years, showed up and that's when things got REALLY fun. Whereas I was one of the most dedicated member that really bled for the group in my last semester, TisLiberte was probably the most dedicated member ever and just brought a whole lot of fun to the group. Oh man we had some fun.

Now it's film time. Everyone got in and, well I'll let the video speak for itself (once I get the footage and edit it). I entered 3 shorts I filmed over the semester; got pyramid, Pokemon anime/game cross over, and School: an Educational Establishment (featuring iMonster). Halfway through the festival there was intermission. I changed into my Oddish costume. Oh that was fun, and everyone really enjoyed it. There was also photo booth fun. Here's the picture of TisLiberte and I.

Yeah it was fun. After intermission it was time for more films. After more great films, it was time for judging. I changed back into normal clothes, and took some more video. The winners were all deserving of their coveted golden VHS tapes (my idea from 3 years ago might I add when they were talking about how expensive real trophies would be). It was kind of symbolic in that the short film that had not only TisLiberte, our president of 3 years, directing it, it also had a founding father work on it, and we tried to call him in Florida to congratulate him live during the acceptance speech. We left him a fun voice mail. It was a fun 4 hours of short films, that ended at 11 PM. Why, because college. The films were really good this year. Like, previous years there were some really bad films, and not just "I'm an engineer that doesn't understand experimental art house" bad, but "film students in the group were making fun of how bad they were later" bad. This year they were quite funny/entertaining, and the worst was "well it just dragged on a little."

Afterwards, everyone that was still around went to IHOP for dinner/late night snack. There were like 9 of us that were there. It was really fun to just hang out with the film club again, while eating chocolate chip pancakes. One of the members jokingly asked the group (not the waitress) "what's on draft?" (There's no alcohol served at the international house of pancakes, so it was quite funny). Why ask something like that, because college. We were there for 2 hours having fun, hanging out, and enjoying breakfast food. One guy got a 55 and over menu option. I don't think the waitress really cared. Another member wanted a child smiley face pancake, but he decided against it and got an adult meal. Also, bear in mind that we got there at like 11 PM at night, and we stayed there until 1 AM. Why? Because college. I showed up at my friend who was letting me spend the weekend with him on one of his futons at like 1:30 AM, and he had a test the next morning at like 8:30 AM (I don't miss that part of college).

OK so it's now Friday morning. I wake up at 10 AM (because vacation), and have some coco krispies while I surf the morning web. So this was kind of funny; I'm sitting in my friend's living room with his girlfriend, and the power was cut off because he forgot to pay the electric bill or something. It was kind of funny to see it actually happen. I went to McDonald's for lunch, and then pumped $6 into the meter so I could park until they stopped enforcing it. I intended to just watch Toonami until Pokemon, but I ran into a friend and we talked for about 2 hours. After she had to leave I watched Toonami, and hopped that I could see Saint and/or Sudden, but they were busy. Oh well.

So now it's Pokemon time. I wore my Oddish costume, and it went over quite well. The president has always given me a hard time about how cringey my costume was, since it's just a blue spandex morph suit with a plastic fern sticking out of the back. He was fine with it once he saw it in person, and the vice president wanted a picture with it for his snap chat. We had fun with a game of Pokemon Trivia, and it was quite a fun time, especially to be a college student again.

After Pokemon I went back to my friend's place and we ate the extra popcorn from the film festival while we watched Clerks. Oh yeah, a local movie theater donated like a couple cubic yards of popcorn for the film festival, and there was like a cubic yard left over. I took the left over and gave it to my friend as a "thank-you for letting me crash" gift. Why? Well I'm just naturally eccentric like that (it wasn't "because college" this time lol). We watched Clerks specifically because I was talking about it when we watched Bowfinger last time I was in town. In Bowfinger Steve Martin's character says something like "every movie is filmed on a budget of $1000," and Clerks really was filmed on a budget of like $1000 (though it was actually more like $23,000 according to Wikipedia). He really enjoyed it, and we had like $20 worth of movie popcorn while watching it. I also had like Indian Rammen for dinner with him (because he's Indian and a college student, so he of course had bricks of instant noodles sitting around that remind him of home). They tasted really good, but later that night I woke up with some indigestion because of the spices or something. Curse my Caucasian American intestinal system, because they were REALLY good. Oh well. After the movie we watched an episode of "Those Who Can't," because that was advertised on Crackle when we watched Bowfinger the last time I was in town, and he had a lot of fun with it.

It's Saturday now. Since I was on that side of the state, I decided I was going to take the extra hour to go visit Brandi. It was a little hard going there alone, but I still felt good to visit her. Her grave wasn't marked yet, so I spent about 5 minutes walking around the small cemetery "playing hide and seek." When I gave up looking for her headstone, I stood where I remember the burial happening and just said my prayers while looking around. Oh Brandi; even in death you're still very playful. After my last point of visit, I started the now 3 hour drive home. I got home around 5 PM and I had a lot of fun being a college student again. Well, now it's time to go back to being a real world adult. I'll be sure to link the film festival video once I get my camera back and the video edited and uploaded.

But until then, this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.

Amiibo Hunting and Final Loads of Free Crap Bash

(This is a little late. Events happened on September 11th 2015)

Hey everyone. Today is a rather dark day in history. In respect, all flags around campus were flown at half mast, and members of the military stood around one flagpole in reverence. As I passed that flag pole, I took my own moment of silence, and remembered how the world would never be the same after that day 14 years ago.

Coincidentally enough, this was also the day for my college's "loads of free crap bash" as I've come to call it. In previous years I've spent pretty much the whole day there, going to different booths, seeing what organizations are available on campus, and getting loads of free crap; pens, magnets, coupons, lanyards, and just out there stuff. It was great freshman year because that's how I figured out how to get involved, and sophomore year was kind of the same but to a lesser extent. But after sophomore year I know the clubs I had time for and could be in, so it just became about the free stuff, but I made sure to see everyone, and then last year I helped out with one of my clubs.

Well this year I wasn't able to have the level of fun I normally had. The bash was from 3-7, and I had class at the engineering campus from 4-6:30. This meant I would be able to wander around for about 30 minutes before I had to leave for my class. I also had class from 2-2:50 so that meant I wasn't able to help the clubs I'm in get set-up. Well, I was able to help my film club set-up some at 1:40 since their booth was right outside the building I had my class in, but not much. After the class I headed out with my singe sack and went grabbing. Most of the good stuff you have to play a mini-game for, and wait in line. While I enjoy the mini-games, I wasn't about to wait in line, so I just went to the open booths. I picked up a bunch of pens and magnets per usual, and a couple cups.

Instead of just listing it, I'll show a picture.

I have flyers, thunder sticks, a Frisbee, a hat, a micro USB cable, and some other things as you can see.

I was a bit surprised with how much stuff I got in the period of 30 minutes. I went to class, and the cool thing was that since this was the first week, and it's not a traditional learning environment, we were done at 5:15, which meant I could head back to the bash. Most people packed up, and I already got the good stuff, so I went to my Pokemon club and sat at the booth for 15 minutes. Then they decided to pack-up, so I went to my film club's booth and sat there for 30 minutes, and helped them pack up afterwards. They had balloons to draw the eye, and I claimed them. Lets see how long they last.

Another point of mention is Amiibo Hunting. Wave 5B I think we're calling it was released September 11th 2015, and normally I'm not able to Amiibo hunt the day of release because I had to work or didn't have a car. Not this time. This time, I went to Meijer at midnight to get what they had. I picked up Zero Suit Samus, Ganondorff, and Olimar. I was going to get 8-bit Mario, but something was wrong with my card so I was only able to get those 3. Besides, I was going to go to Target at 8AM to get Dr. Mario, so I'll try to get 8-bit Mario then as well. Neither store had many units available, so I'm glad I was there when I did. I was missing Bowser Jr. but I didn't know of a Toys R Us around my campus so I was going to let him go, but on Saturday I googled Toys R Us in my area, and I found one a couple miles away. I called them to see if they had Bowser Jr. in stock, and they did. I picked up Bowser Jr. and since they also had Smash Yoshi, I picked one of those up as well since all I can ever find is Mario Party Yoshi. It was pretty cool doing a midnight and store opening release. At Meijer people were just lining up and hanging out at the electronics counter, and at Target people were lining up outside the store. I was pulling in when they were handing out "line numbers," so I didn't get one, but I made sure I made it to the front of the no-number line.

Well that was my Friday and Saturday. It's weird that this will be my last "free crap bash." The closest thing I will ever have to this again will be a business convention and job fair, but it'll be professional instead of recreational, or maybe a convention, but the vendors charge for their stuff. But hey, Amiibo hunting was fun. Well, this has been Pokematic, signing off and bu-bye.

The Day Job Premier

Hey everyone, boy was today cool. It was the world premier of "The Day Job," a film written, produced, preformed, and, well everything that goes into making a movie, by students at my school. I'm in the RSO that they started, and while I didn't have a steak in making the film, I did advertise it. I changed my facebook profile picture to the poster for a month or so. I missed my giant pikachu. I also made references to it in your3minutes, but no one reads that except for 4 people in Russia. But the best thing of all was what I did with a poster. The picture speaks for it's self.

Yeah I turned my vest inside out, wore it backwards, and taped the poster to it. I walked around all day being a walking bill board. I guess I was the "poster child." I think I did some good advertising for it that way. I had some people ask about it and I told them it was tonight. Now for the actual event.

I was scheduled to do freebie give aways, but they didn't need me as it turned out. But I didn't find out until much later. I got there at about 8 pm, had to be there for freebie give aways at 8:30, was told I wasn't needed until 8:50, and the show started at 9. It was really cool. Since it was student made and the world premier, it was obvious that everyone that worked on it was going to be there. Some of the actors were in suits, and others were just dressed nice. The producer/directors, not so much. They just dressed normal, but whatever, it was there night and they could do whatever they wanted. There was a professional photographer getting all their pictures and such and were being organised into what needed to be done. Since I had nearly an hour to kill, I just followed them around, with the poster still taped to my backwards inside out safety vest. I brought a sarpee and got autographs on the poster from everyone who worked on it. I got them when there was a lull in the action or they weren't needed for a picture at that time. I even ended up in some pictures purposefully. I was in 2 pictures getting signed and in 1 by myself just showing off my dedication with the poster and all. Sorry I don't have them so I can't show them to you.

It was quite the premier. I heard the coordinator say to the producer/directors that "this is your Sundanese" referring to the film festival. There were photo ops, autographs, and an introduction by the producer/directors themselves. I know these guys from film makers club so they were happy to indulge in my autograph hounding. It also probably helped in making it more real for them. "I'm autographing a poster for the movie I made." Here's the one of a kind poster that will be worth big bucks one day.

The introduction was also cool. Just let us know some back story to the film and how it came to be. I hope someone recorded it so it can be a bonus feature on the DVD.

Now before you "click here for review," there are a few things I want to also mention. I did participate in the freebies, but not as a distributor but rather a recipient. The distributor for this movie was the Campus Activity Board, they're in charge of all the movie nights. They were the ones giving away free stuff that had their logo on it, not ours. I was going to help them out as partner, but since I wasn't needed, I got free stuff. In order to get free stuff, I had to dance. I can't dance, and especially not so when the music is slow. I'll have to see if that ends up somewhere. It was pitiful, but hey, got a free blanket out of the deal. There was also an after party, but because the movie ended at 11, was kind of far by foot, and I had a class the next morning, I was unfortunately unable to attend. I'll just have to hear stories next week at the meeting. I also don't know if I snuck in or if I was let in. Because I was going to do the give aways, basically working, I would have gotten in free. Well I didn't help out with give aways so I don't know if I was thought to be part of the creators, or if everyone just loved the advertizing I did, or because I was sceduled but since they cancled on me I still got in free, or whatever. If you're reading this guys, I will work off my $1 debt in getting this thing on netflix and hulu, plus I wrote a great review for it and will hopefully draw people to watch it and pay for it.

Hope you enjoyed and if you haven't read the movie review yet, click here. This has been Pokematic signing off and bu-bye.