Every Monday I typically wake up with the same feeling: "Shit, work today". Working 40 hour weeks is significantly more grueling than being in college, where the concept of weekend/weeknight kinda just blends. But today was different for me, I woke up, and after the initial rage towards me alarm, I realized that this was the last Monday of my internship, my time in California, and my summer. Feels like just yesterday I was back in Massachusetts trying to explain to my mom that this was a real job and not some kind of scam.
I certainly enjoyed my time in SoCal, but I don't think I had the opportunity to fully experience it. To boot, we had so many activities already scheduled for us, which were fun, but I don't feel like I have fully absorbed the culture. I came to this realization earlier this week, so on Sunday I began an expedition to a monument that no LA trip is complete without.
The hike up there was a tad harder than I expected, and not very contusive to flip flops. My feet wear a trifecta of dirty, bloody and blistered afterwards, but it was worth it. I also fell down a dirt hill and lost my apartment keys, which well probably run me about 200 bucks. Shit happens, I bite financial bullets and move on.
I finished the daylight off by surfing at Hermosa Beach. Unfortunately, I don't feel like I surfed enough this summer. That being said, I probably wouldn't have surfed as much if I was back home. I'm going to miss my board, Sheila. She was good to me, always there when I needed her and never asking anything in return. I like giving inanimate objects feminine names because it holds women up to a higher standard. Like, my surfboard doesn't have all these annoying emotions I don't care about, and it never talks about birth control pills or other taboo subjects.
Tomorrow we have to do a "report-out" on what we've been doing all summer to some executive head honchos, and after that, it's pretty much time to get in a Tejas state of mind. Can only imagine what the next four years bring, but I envision a few good choices in a sea of bad ones, and hopefully no regrets
Hey all, all 5 people that have viewed this blog that is. I haven't written much in a while, mostly because work has been kinda draining and stuffs been monotonous. Recently, my friend Rob got a blog (robinmunich.blogspot.com), which got me thinkin' about writing on this again. I quite enjoys my time in California, but I never really though there were many expiereinces worth righting about. Like, what was I supposed to do, write about surfing and chilling one a week? It would be the same thing over and over again and I would feel ashamed to write a blog like that. I thought i could instead use this blog to express myself, but my constant efforts to stay G-Rated got in the way of that. Since nobody reads this anyway, I'ma bump it up to and R-Rating. Not a controversial-graphic-violence-nudity-and-sexual-content R, but a would-be-PG-13-but-they-said-fuck-twice R.
As for censoring my behavior, I'd like this blog to be an honest insight into my head, but I also would like to gain employment again after this internship ends. To compromise, I may occasionally use weak innuendos that the younger crowd will pick up on, giving this blog a "holding my hand 3 inches away from your face saying 'I'm not touching you'" feel to it. So what the fluff have i even been doing this summer? Evidently spending too much time with Mormon coworkers because I just said fluff instead of fuck. To be honest I think I can cut down on my swearing, haven't felt as much need for it anymore since I left Boston. Related, I'm pretty sure I haven't uttered the n-word aside from singing along to songs in about 4 month. Same goes for misuse of the word "gay". This isn't the only self improvement.
I was about to use this next paragraph to talk about all the ways I've been bettering myself, but that's dumb. Instead I'll began to recap about what I've been doing recently. So this dude that hired us, Rich, is like uber wealthy and has a dope house in Palm Desert. He wanted to make sure we had a nice time in California so he's been treating us to stuff, such as this tour of America's Largest Windfarm
As well as a zoo in the desert where I met my boy Felix
And a day at Del Mar, the racetrack that Bing Crosby himself envisioned
That's Deji btw, majority of my time has been spent chilling in the apartment with him.
Last Saturday I fulfilled my childhood dream of going to Six Flags Magic Mountain, after which I will ever be able to return to the humble amusement park that is Six Flags New England:
That ride in the background is called X2, one of my favorite rides of the day. My Magic Mountain lived up to the hype I had in my mind. I ended up going by myself because everyone I know out here couldn't stomach rides. Wow, I really have toned down vulgar language. That sentence was supposed to be "everyone I know all pussied out" but my fingers typed something completely different. Must just be the cooperate environment. Anyways, when I got there I went straight to Full Throttle, the newest ride which was sure to have the biggest line. In line i struck up a conversation with the a group of 5 people behind me in line. Full Throttle sat 2 per row and they had an odd number, so I rode with them. We parted ways after the ride, but then I ended up running into them in line for another ride! At which point of course, they signaled me to linejump like a mofo, and after the ride they invited me to roll with them for the rest of the day. This was clutch because I had no idea how to find anything in that humongous park. Anyways, I've been to Disney, and i can safely conclude that Magic Mountain is at least 2-3 times happier. That's realtalk.
I've been doing stand-up in LA about once a week. People even laugh sometimes. Good shit. It's a good excuse to actually get my ass into the city too, something I don't do often enough
I also started watching Breaking Bad recently, which i something i seriously regret not doing earlier. Perhaps more on that in a later post.
In a week I move to Austin, TX to start my first year at UT. I'm like, so excited you have no idea. Even though I've only spent a weekend in Austin, it's one of the coolest cities I've ever been too. Right now, the world feels like my oyster, and I'm ready to crack it open with a small knife and eat the slimy organism inside
Hey yall, nothing captivating really happened this week, but tonight is the night I've been waiting for since last years The Dark Knight Rises utterly disappointed me. Yes, I am indeed referring to the release of Zach Snyder's "Man of Steel". I love superheros, and whenever one makes it to the big screen I can't help but have a bit of a bias towards liking the movie regardless of the inevitable camp. But before I go and see America's first super hero in his epic action, let's take a look at my personal favorite moments in super hero movie history
#10 Superman Flies around the world really fast and reverses time(Superman, 1978)
Okay, okay, I know this scene is pretty much just the definition of Deus Ex macchina, and opens up a world of inconsistencies (why didn't he do that in every movie?) but this film INVENTED the superhero movie. It's become a common theme in superhero cinema to have the hero showcase their best abilities in the climax, and that practice was first done in Donner's Superman. And that theme song is just great
#9 Spidey & New Goblin vs. Venom & Sandman(Spider-man 3, 2007)
You are probably thinking "HOWZ THIS ON THE LIST SPIDER MAN TREE MEZZED UP VENOM HE WUZ IN THAR FUR LYK TEN MINETTEZ". That may be true, but those ten minutes were [expletive] -ing awesome. His size left something to be desired, but Venom looked ILL. It was an iconic fight, helped give Spider-man 3 SOME credibility.
#8 Statue of Liberty battle (X-Men 1999)
This was among one of the first superhero movies I ever saw, and it dared to go somewhere the genre had never gone. Nolan's Batman Begins made darker, socially undertoney movies the norm, but X-Men is where that all started. This scene has some of Marvel's finest heroes stopping some of Marvel's finest villains from unleashing his plot to kill all humans... because he is racist.
#7 Thor invades Jodenheim (Thor, 2011)
(clip's from the next scene.. all i could find... sorry)
This was probably the most epic scene in the movie. Only problem was, it happened in the beginning, then left us with a two hour lull of Shakespear-esque drama. Oh well, I guess that's just Kenneth Branagh doing his thang.
#6 Iron Man and War Machine vs. an army of drones (Iron Man II, 2010)
Iron Man II is one of those movies that people don't really like. Sure, it really skimped on Iron Man action. Sure, the villain kinda sucked. But it had a few things going for it. 1)Don Cheadle 2)Scarlett Johansson 2)This Scene. Its got it all, witty RDJ banter, men in metal suits effing ish up, and....well thats about it
#5 Batman/Joker interrogation (The Dark Knight, 2008)
My mom would probably agree that great acting is more important than great action. My mom has also never seen the Dark Knight because she "hates science fiction". Her loss. RIP Heath
#4 Tony's one-boot one-gauntlet brawl(Iron man 3, 2013)
Recent Iron Man films had Tony seeming virtually invincible when he's inside his suit. Black's Iron Man 3 changed things up, and dealt with Tony's dependence on his suits. When only two parts of his suit any his call to battle, Tony is left to fight off Killian's henchmen, exposed, and the stakes are higher than ever
#3 Batman's big unveiling (Batman Begins, 2005)
How do you keep a superhero realistic and exciting at the same time? Chris Nolan knows how! Two words: su. spense. After a long backstory, Batman slowly unveils himself, utters everyones FAVORITE line, then knocks out Falconi
#2 Spidey vs Doc Ock on a Train(Spider-man 2, 2004)
This scene is the quintessence of superhero films. There's a good guy, there's a bad guy, there are innocent civilian's as leverage. It's just so exciting, Despite the fact that Spidey technically loses in the end. I loved this scene when I saw it at age ten, and I still love it to this day
#1 The Avengers v the Chitauri (Avengers, 2012)
This is going to be hard for future movies to top. This is pretty much the reason people love superhero movies. Some of the most iconic characters in comic history, sharing the screen, fighting bad guys. The juxtaposition of Iron Man, Hulk, and Thor alone is mind boggling! The reason Marvel's comics were so great is that everyone's favorite titans shared a universe, and were able to team up. Whedon brought this concept perfectly over to cinema, especially with that one continuous shot that pans through all the Avengers. As an added plus, this movie made it absolutely imperative that DC/Warner Bros get on track to a Justice League movie, which will probably have and equally if not better climax!
So that's it. I have tickets to see MoS in an hour, so tomorrow I'll throw up an update to how that was. For now, I'll live you with a quote which needs no citation, "UP UP AND AWAY!"
Howdy, it's been a few days since i posted, which was really concerning my parents. But note that this was my first week of working 40 hours, which has been taking a toll on me, I have complete faith that I'll adjust. Anyways, I found out what my main assignment for the summer will be. Basically my employer has these power supplies all over the country, and needs a system set up to make sure they are in working order. Problem is, half these supplies aren't even in the company database, so I have to track them down, get the correct data, and then set up said system. I took a tour of the facility, and took some sweeeeet pictures, but I'll hold off on posting them because they totally spoil where I work. My boss said he'd look into the policy regarding whether or not I can say it on here.
In other news, I went to the pier for dinner Wednesday, to a restaurant with a 360 degree view of the ocean, and live music:
Also, this week brought us a Magic Johnson sighting!
Sweet I know, yesterday I took Sheila out for a spin and was violently assaulted by 6 foot waves. Looks like i need some practice, which is why I'm headed to the beach after this post.
Last night I went to a boxing match, which was something I'd never done before, and it was much more intense than I anticipated
That's It for this post, hopefully I'll be getting myself into more misadventures soon!
When I last posted it was saturday, and I had yet to figure out the wifi in my apartment. Turns out the back of the packet that the cable company left had the SSID and WPS key written on it, so that solved that mystery. After that saga was over, I decided to head to Redondo beach, which turned out to be only a half hour walk from my apartment. It's a really cool area, which is evident from the sign:
And of course the Pier itself:
But of course, I was only interested in the waves:
I then proceeded to go to a small Mexican food establishment, after a brief episode of embarrassment due to the fact that I didn't know what a "wet" burrito was, and the fact that the woman working did not speak English at all and couldn't explain it to me, I received one of the best burritos I've ever had. Apparently a "wet" burrito is one that has been soaked in salsa, rendering it delicious but also very messy unless eaten with a fork and knife:
After returning from the pier I decided to go shopping at Vons, a SoCal supermarket chain which happens to have a franchise across the street from my apartment. I couldn't believe some of the deals. I then fell alseep watching Frida on the Spanish channel.
My trip to the beach on Saturday solidified my intentions to buy a surfboard, so Sunday morning I picked up this baby for the unbeatable price of $50, I call her "Sheila"
Sunday afternoon my roommate moved in, and we had dinner with two of our supervisors, and today we started work. Turns out our employer will be providing us with a Toyota Forerunner to share over the summer which is going to be SOOOOOOO clutch other than the fact that it gets like 17 miles to the gallon. I'd write more about how work went but it was the first day so nothing important really happened other than some boilerplate orientation stuff, plus this post is getting pretty long as is.
Stay tuned!
YQ
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Touched down in LA successfully! Well, that was yesterday, but I've had a day to collect my thoughts before writing. I woke up this morning with no alarm at 7, so clearly the jetlag is still affecting me. My apartment is pretty sweet, my roommate(who isn't here yet) and I both get our own bathrooms, so I wont have to deal with the travesty of a bathroom that I had freshman year of college. Just thinking about that makes me sick, but I digress.
As I write this I am sitting on the rather comfy carpet of my living room, with my computer plugged into the Ethernet port on the router. This is because there are like 30 wi-fi networks in range with rando names and I cannot for the life of me figure out which one corresponds to the router 6 inches from my head. Figuring this out is on today's to-do list. Also on that list is a walk to Redondo Beach to see what all the fuss is about. There's also an In-n-Out Burger about a mile from here, which I need to check out at some point. And I mean ACTUALLY check out, unlike the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, which I lived across the street from so a year and never went into.
Anyway, that's about it for updates, but I have only been here about a day. Next post will probably contain some pictures too.
Hello all, my name is Kevin Quigley, but you can call me Yevin if you are into that sort of thing.
I'm originally from Melrose, MA and went to Malden Catholic High School, after which i studied at Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston for a year. Wentworth cramped my style hard so I decided to transfer to The University of Texas at Austin, which will hopefully be much more swag-filled (lack of a better term).
Tomorrow morning I will be moving out to LA for the summer, where I will be working an internship. I don't think I'm supposed to say the company due to legal mumbo jumbo so ill hold off on that for now. It's not actually in LA, but in a nearby city, Torrance. However I'm still going to say LA, because people from Melrose say they are from Boston all the time and nobody complains (nobody important anyway) so the same rule must apply out west.
I made this blog for two reasons:
1) I want to get more into reading and writing so that i feel like less of an ignorant American, this blog will help with the latter
2) My family and friends will probably want to keep track of what I'm doing, since most of them live in New England and I will be all over the country for the next few years. Maybe I'm just thinking too highly of myself, in which case I defer to rule #1
Anyway, if anybody is at all interested in what I'm up to, check out this blog, I'm sure i will fill it with many tales of fun, excitement, love, hate, and quality dining advice. Also, sorry to those who are fans of my irreverent humor, but family will be checking in here, so i will keep it PG-13 at most.
