Resume writing

It's a funny thing when you have to update/rewrite your resume. OK - not really. (What's actually funny is when headhunters call it a re-ZOO-mee. But that's another story.)

I'm not sure if it's standard or we're just told it's standard to keep your resume to two pages. Is this because it's generally accepted that a human will become bored after reading (skimming really) two pages or is it to try and keep the verbose people tamed down? I like making lists and that means that one whole side of the page is open, but lists get long and boring... how am I supposed to know if I'm over two pages if my resume is in HTML?

Resumes are weird. You don't know who is going to read them or what they like - you get too generic and you don't seem special, but if you're too specific then people will be lost. It's all words in the end and if you try too hard to be a word-smith you seem transparent. Which makes me wonder if I need a degree in psychology to write a resume.

Which leads me to the graphic layout of resumes. Having a history in visual communication I want to spice it up a bit, but I'm told I need to use certain fonts at certain pt sizes (Times Roman at 12pt) which seems really bootleg to me - I don't like serif fonts and have decent enough vision to see 10pt - I mean, going down to 8pt would be a bit much I suppose. Anyways, I'm sticking with Arial at 10. Well, 11 in some areas for you challenged readers. If I go too standard, you'll just pile me up with all the other resumes. In the trash.

How about having your name on both pages? That seems like an utter waste of space to me and if you can't keep the two pages together then I don't really think I want to work at such a disorganized place - but maybe that means you NEED me there.

*sigh*

What's FUN is trying to code indents and bold type in HTML - talk about visual noise! It's like a pile of < / crap >.
Yeah - I'm a bit wonky.

Check out this crazy resume - WOAH! Do you think he has more of a chance to get hired because his personal logo looks like Jesus?!?! The text balloons remind me of a disemboweled body, lungs, heart and kidneys there...

spaceJASE.com v2.0

YAY - I've updated my website!
After the events of a couple weeks ago I was pretty down and knew in order to move on I was going to need to redo the 2 year old look and feel of my portfolio website. (as well as put up some new material) I went over to my buddy Chu's place and talked about what I could do. He had some great ideas and gave me a skeleton layout to start with. Well, now it's live and swanky. Take a look!
Will it help me get a job? I sure hope so! Stay tuned...

Mike & Ike, Target and Consumerism

Sometimes when you're trying to save money you get this burning desire to spend some. Is that the consumerism bred into us by American capitalism? I think it probably is. And like Don Hertzfeld says in "Rejected" - I AM a consumer whore.

In a weak attempt to get my "fix" we went to Target to get some minor staple household goods. (Cat-litter. Amazingly enough, Target sells the eco-friendly Swheat-Scoop brand at a much cheaper price than pet stores do... but that's another story.) Whenever we go to Target we take a peek at the clearance section on the ends of random aisles hidden back by the bathrooms. It's bootleg, I know. However, yesterday the jackpot awaited my ever miserly self and I stocked up on...
That's right. They had Mike & Ike candies for 0.46 cents a box!
(They were marked down from $2)

YAY! Consumer needs satisfied with cheap consumable flavored candies!

The game development industry

VGA out.
There were few of articles that popped up yesterday and today concerning my company.

They happen to be pretty relevant to me - so I think you ought to read them.
Here are the links.
Gamasutra article
Kotaku blurb
IGN
GameDailyBIZ
GameSpot
NextGenBIZ
Nintendo World Report

So, I am not alone in my plight - cross your fingers for all the peeps out there!

Now things get interesting...

Video Game Artist out.

Back and Busy

NO that's not my desk-space.

We're back from our trip.

We had an awesome time. We spent 2 days in Joshua Tree national park, 2 days in Wickenburg Arizona (G&M wedding), 2 days in the Grands Canyon, 2 days in Zion National Park & 2 days in Las Vegas.

I will post pictures sometime this week - I hope. After we got back, we decided we don't really like the layout of the computer room. Since AJ will be spending more time in here working on school stuff, we went out and bought a few pieces of furniture to better organize the room. I have spent the entirety of my free time after work building a desk, bookcase, TV stand & file cabinet and attempting to organize all my computer, art and game stuff.

Yup - my space is being taken over. I think I'll be moving out to the garage.

LOL - just kidding. Now AJ will have a reason to be in here with me!

Out Again for a week Plus

We're heading out again for a while. My sister's getting married in Arizona and then we'll be checking out the Grand Canyon and Zion. Should be fun - especially since we'll be stopping in Las Vegas for a couple days to see what all the hoopla is about. I wonder if it will remind of us the cruise ship at all...

See y'all later!

This is a view of Nassau Docks in the Bahamas. I stitched together 3 photos taken from the upper restaurant as we left. Our cruise was great - mostly because of the company we had! Brian and Kerri (The Soxies as I have started calling them.) were exceptional travel partners - always in a good mood and ready to explore anything and everything the islands or the ship had to offer.

The ship itself, a Carnival "FunShip", was a gigantic box containing a small piece of Las Vegas and about 2,500 vacationers. We stood in line a lot for food, to get off the boat at port and for food. There was food available 24/7 - it was strange. We worked out a few days in the gym to try and counter the eat-fest, and we danced a lot in the disco.

We tried snorkeling for the first time and absolutely loved it! We snorkeled on all three islands. When the boat docked we rushed off and tried to get as far from the port as possible. We wanted to experience whatever island culture we could and find the best snorkeling. At Nassau we rented a scooter and drove to "Love" Beach. On St. Thomas we took a bus and ferry over to St. John and hiked to Solomon Beach. On St. Martin we rented a car and drove around the entire island and snorkeled at Baie Rouge. I think we might go back to St. John to hike and snorkel - and maybe St. Martin.

After we got back, Brian took us to DisneyWorld so I could go to the Lego store! I got a shirt and mug, but no Lego sets. It was great to see all the kids & adults having so much fun.

This is a panorama of Grand Case on St. Martin. I was standing out on a pier. I think I could retire here!

Overall it was an amazing adventure and although the boat was the weirdest part, we still enjoyed being there because we could hang out and laugh a lot with The Soxies. We have done the cruise thing once now and I don't think we'll go on a cruise again, but we will definitely go to the Caribbean again. (And we'll definitely be hanging out with The Soxies again!)

I've finally found time to upload all of our vacation photos. Chu recommended Flickr.com so I tried it out. It's really cool but I spent a lot of time labeling each picture and writing a caption - they make it so easy!

This is the overlook on the trail on St. John. It was raining earlier - but it's still gorgeous!

Anyways - check out the pictures here: Carnival Cruise 2007 - Caribbean
I plan on putting more pictures up in the future to keep the traffic on my website down. The main "spaceJASE" photo gallery is http://www.flickr.com/photos/spacejase/