Time to cash in

Today I followed the rules of the pen. I carried and used a pen all day today inscribed:

HOTEL EDGEWATER CASINO
2020 South Casino Dr.
Laughlin, NV 89029
1-800-67-RIVER
A Circus Circus Enterprise

I was the hotel manager for this particular hotel/casino today. Now tell me: did I pull it off? Do I look like I could be managing in Laughlin, taking advantage of all the people wanting to make a quick buck? Many people did not like today's outfit. I personally think it is because they thought I was lazy and did not want to dress up like I normally do. Here, lean close, I'll tell you a secret. I have worn most of my clothes many many times, there will come a time when I will run out of ideas. This is how my Wednesday's dressing habits work (take notes). I wake up in the morning. I think to myself, "It's Wednesday, what should I wear?" Right then and there, I decide. Sometimes it is quite the struggle...like this morning. I saw my pen lying there, I read it, and bam, idea. Last year, I dressed up in a tie and white shirt most days. That was the collared shirt Wednesday. This year, I upped up the game, writing a story for most if not all my Wednesday outfits. It is a constant struggle (Just to fill you in, I'm listening to some awesome mood music right now from The Truman Show soundtrack: a struggling, fearsome quest into the unknown, inspired by the will of discovery). So there you have it, my philosophies and method of preparation for my much-loved Wednesdays. I bet many of you think I prepare and think about what I'm going to wear well before the day that begins with the letter W. No sir/ma'am. More often than not, I come up with the idea of the morning of. Fun stuff. Especially when I have ten minutes to get to school, that makes it even more fun.

In other news, I haven't heard from Hume yet. I don't have any idea when to expect them. So I guess I'll just wait. In other news, school is going so incredibly fast; we are on the last chapter of statistics and close in government. Time flies, whether you are having fun or not. In other news, senior events are rather mysterious. I don't know if I will attend some of them (Prom, Grad Night, etc). Advise me, dear readers. In other news, I'm still busy. In other news, old school Underoath (Acts of Depression) is pretty hardcore, maybe a little too hard for my tastes. In other news, I think I'm done with this post.

Actually never mind. I forgot that I was going to talk about my views of casinos. Casinos define the avarice of mankind. Check it out, the managers (who I was portraying) and brainiacs behind the whole operation rig the casinos to come out on top. This is common knowledge because what kind of person would maintain a business that loses money? However, the brainiacs know that people will not gamble if the odds are too high against them. They have mastered this concept. Now for the gamblers. What is the purpose of going to a casino? To get rich quick. We as humans want money, it's just part of life. If you found a stack of Benjamins lying in the middle of the forest while you were conquering the solo hike through the Sierra Nevadas (clearly nobody is around), would you pick it up? Of course. So, people go to the casinos to make money fast. However, how often does it happen? It may seem pretty often, since you always hear about the big winners. But do you know how many people go and lose? Exponentially more than the big winners, that's for sure. Anybody who is reading this and overall has come out on top at the casino, let me know. I'm interested. Casinos=brilliant business, exemplifying the pathetic plight of human beings.

Fun Fact: Did you know that there are no clocks or windows in casinos? They do this to make you lose sense of time. Whether 2 pm or 2 am, a casino will look exactly the same. They want to to focus on the game you are playing, gambling your hard earned cash away, without worrying about what time to get back or "it might be getting late." Heavy gamblers often don't have a clue whether it's dark or light outside, raining or sunny.

Only 1

I am sorry to admit I forgot St. Patrick's Day. Let me rephrase that. I never knew yesterday was St. Patrick's Day. No idea. I got to school and BAM! the color green invaded my eyes and BAM I knew instantly: it was St. Patrick's Day. I have not forgotten a holiday since last years Cinco De Mayo, an event I am not happy about. Anyway, I did not dress up for St. Patrick's Day yesterday. So, as today is Wednesday, I figured I would dress up for St. Patrick's Day the day after. It's only one day after right? So what? That was my theme. If you observe, I have "It's only 1 day" on my shirt. This worked out way better than planned. It was wonderful. Here's a synopsis: "Hey Morgan, you are one day late!" My response: "Yeah, but it's only one day!" as I turn and show my shirt. Mr. Jordan Dimock was the first to observe this phenomenon. It commented on it in an instant. I also wrote "SO WHAT" on my knees. This worked out wonderfully as well. Here's a synopsis: "Hey Morgan, you are one day late!" My response: "Yeah, but it's only one day!" as I turn and show my shirt. Not impressed, they respond "That's stupid!" to which I responded while directing their attention to my knees, "So what!" Pretty awesome. People enjoyed the goggles also. Really random, who wears goggles to school? I can tell you that I do. I have on two different occasions now. I ran into the problem this morning of what to wear on my face. I thought I had a pair of green wayfarers, but sadly I did not (If I remember right, I lost them last St. Patrick's Day. Ironic?). So I tried to think of what I could wear when BAM!: goggles. They have green rims and they match the intensity of the socks. Wonderful at its best.

Now for the spiel about life. Life has been absolutely insane: craziness. I know know that time really is of the essence, and that's not just legal talk. Time (I found this out the hard way yesterday) needs to be taken advantage of. It should not be wasted. This is unavoidable is some instances however. For instance, some classes at school, like the one I am writing this in. However, I am required by law to be here, but think of all the things I could do if I didn't have to spend an hour of my day wasting away in computer bliss (there's a hint of the class)? By the way, it's not always a waste, but it has been recently. Here's a rant. How do people have time for tv? I always hear people talking about their favorite shows and how they watch one, two, or even three shows a night. I don't understand. I have not sat down to watch tv in months and months. Maybe its just me. I guess I just get really involved. Music is huge in my life. I'm in drumline (massive amount of time), jazz (school, festivals, shows, etc), and play drums at Chapped/church (Wednesdays, Sundays). That's a lot. That's a lot of drums. Then, on top of this, I have video production which if you have ever had to edit a video/movie, you know what kind of time commitment that takes. There is probably all sorts of other things that I do, but rarely rarely rarely do I have a good chunk of time to just chill. For the first time in months and months, I chilled with a friend for a while. Mr. Kelii Miyata and I just toured Simi for a while, discovering some sweet spots in the city we all know and love. It was awesome and I miss just hanging with friends. I need to do it more often, but guess what!? Mr. Father Time has a different opinion.

Class is out: I'm out.

Every Fifteen Minutes

Wednesday was Every Fifteen Minutes at Royal High School. This program happens at Royal once every two years, as Simi High receives the treatment every other year. I volunteered to be on the film crew for the event. Here is what happens: A huge car accident is staged in front of the entire Junior and Senior class at the school. Here is the scenario: a drunk driver hits and kills other people, resulting in extreme sorrow and emotion. Twenty one students walked around school, representing students killed by an alcohol related accident. The job of the film crew was to capture the entire event and be ready to premiere the next day at a special assembly. So begins.

Filming the crash scene was a lot of fun. I was in charge of the master shot, meaning my camera was on a tripod and never left it. People who attended the event most likely saw me, as I stood right in the center probably blocking many peoples views. Sorry all who I blocked, it was my job.

So the film crew, at least some of us, stayed up all night long editing this bad boy. We finished at probably 9 am. I had a whole lot of fun though, Royal High School in the middle of the night is a whole different world. When we were finished editing our particular segments or just waiting for iMovie to extract audio (arg), we decided to run like mad men all over campus. Some of us played a mad game of hide and go seek. And some of us decided to pull a mad relocation of a secret substance (it's everywhere). I honestly do not remember a lot of what happened all night long as we just turned into mad, laughing crazy people. The room's air was moist, warm, and rancid. We had been provided Baha Fresh for dinner. What we didn't know was the gas it would produce. I'd say it his Chris the hardest. The smell raped and pillaged the nostrils.

As always, problems were continuous. I had never worked on iMovie before. This program drove me bananas because it is supposed to be extremely simple, but with its simplicity, it was extremely limited in what you could do. Multiple times, audio would be thrown out of whack, sometimes right when the segment was finished. I'm not going to go into it, but we lost a lot of time. I just had a brain fart (allusion to the events of the night) and I can't remember much more to write.

In the morning, Beau and I decided to dress up rather strangely and take an out of tune electric guitar played August Rush style and a paint stirrer and go out on campus and create some "sick beats" (thanks Austin). We had a good time in our epic tiredness and rhythm. The assembly was interesting. First of all, the most emotional part (for me anyway) of the video was completely lost due to stereo/mono conversion (if you have any idea what I'm talking about, I'm impressed). Second, the video wasn't even displayed in full-screen. The entire film was seen with the windows start menu (it was played on a laptop) and the windows media player interface on it. It was ridiculous. I don't think it was a successful screening for those two reasons. We worked our hearts out on that film and it wasn't even displayed properly. Luckily, the crowd didn't know what they were missing, so in that sense it was alright. It was still extremely frustrating. Watch the film as it was supposed to be down below.

The assembly was extremely emotional for a lot of people. The living dead as well as the crash victims all made statements to their friends and family as if they had really passed on. There was a lot of crying and emotions, as kleenex were being passed row to row. I think it was the fact that we had stayed up all night, but Nate Sutton pointed out of me and Beau a student in a red hat who was clearly bored out of his brain. This caused uncontrollable laughter (no offense to the current speaker at the time, we are deeply sorry) for a rather extended amount of time. I literally had tears rolling of my face. I felt really bad. I think I'm done. I might add more to this in the future. I don't know.

One last thing, Nate Sutton edited the crash scene. It is brilliant, by far the high point of the film. He edited that segment for probably 8 straight hours. Heroic. Also, Hans Gundelfinger made the opening titles. Awesome way to open the film. Props.


Royal High School - Every 15 Minutes from Morgan Lott on Vimeo.

Royal High School - March 11-12, 2009 - Every 15 Minutes



"Every 15 Minutes is a two-day program focusing on high school juniors and seniors, which challenges them to think about drinking, driving, personal safety, and the responsibility of making mature decisions. Along with alcohol related crashes, it focuses on the impact that their decisions would have on family and friends."


The Crew (As appeared in the credits)

Producer:
PTSA
Royal Video Production

Director:
Harriet Hunsaker

Co-Director:
Alicia De La Torre

Assistant/Producers:
Baylee Fode
Cody Edmonson
Ethan Castillo

Cameras:
Beau Akers
Sarah Barson
Chris Deveux
Baylee Fode
Hans Gundelfinger
Kamaile Kim
Morgan Lott
Tamara McCarty
Sevag Mehterian
Tyler Nicodin
Chris Oestman
Tim O'Hayer
Gabriel Pabon
Nate Sutton
Austin Volpe
Denise Wrigley

Editors:
Beau Akers
Cheyne Austin
Chris Deveux
Hans Gundelfinger
Morgan Lott
Tamara McCarty
Sevag Mehterian
Nate Sutton
Austin Volpe
Alicia De La Torre


The Cast

Crash Victims:
Sergio Cortez
Erick Pahua
Nicole Houghton
Katie Bannon

The Living Dead:
Juliet Buff
Kaitlyn Carter
Jamine Castillo
Amy Cole
Kristen Currie
Paige Egizi
Hayli Harrah
Jamie Honea
Jarrett Leiner
Michael Leipzig
Kari Lev
Alyssa Moore
Kelsie Oberender
Donna Parry
Taylor Rapp
Annelli Redlin
Kelly Ross
Monica Schmidt
Mallory Short
Stephanie Siewert
Lindsay Szymanski


oh yeah: somethings I remembered/people reminded me: while some of us were hard at work, four people at a time were jamming to Rock Band in the other room on the big screen. Pretty epic. Also, me and my buddy Beau Akers had a phat chillout sesh, listening to some phat chillout sesh tunes. We just sat and chilled for a good while....

Senior Ditch Day 2009

I had this awesome idea. When I heard Senior Ditch Day was "scheduled" for March 6, 2009, I had to come up with something creative. How about coming to school on that day wearing a "Senior Ditch Day 2009" t-shirt? Sounded pretty good to me: done. So March 6, 2009 arrives. I was rather skeptical on who would follow through with this declared ditch day because, if I remember right, the senior class declared a ditch day last semester sometime and it was a complete failure. I show up at school in my garb and enjoy the emptiness; seniors actually did ditch. I arrive in my first period class to a class full of probably fifteen students, that's like half. People enjoyed the shirt and I enjoyed wearing it. I think most people found the irony amusing and questioned my thought process: my job is done. Second period won the least populated award. It was awesome, we pretty much just drew stuff the whole period (Ms. D said Beau could paint one of the walls. I'm going to help him. It's going to be epic, and that's being modest). Mr. Patrick Stevenson wins an award for "catch-phrase creator." He told me that I was ditching ditch day. That is exactly what I was doing, so I proceeded to tell people this. Mr. Patrick Stevenson gets all the credit.

Moving on: lunch. Today was the last day to turn in AP test order forms so I decided to turn it in during lunch with my buddy Mr. Scott Weir. We begin walking across campus and people really begin to notice what I am wearing. It was really interesting walking past people and feeling the heads turn with every step. I can't imagine what it must be like to be a big time celebrity, must be insane, and rather disturbing. Anyway, I successfully purchase my 3 AP tests (subject to change) and I begin walking back with Scott. This is where the story gets good, so it deserves a bolding:

I am walking past the band room when two administrators spot me. At first, I thought they were chuckling at my shirt, but that thought was quickly shot down with the exclamation "That needs to go!" I thought I heard wrong. Was I really getting dress coded for showing up to school wearing a shirt declaring a school wide holiday (in a sense)? I was at school! It wasn't like I was promoting Senior Ditch Day out of school while I ditched. I was at school the day many seniors were not. I asked her why I was being coded and she simply said "You heard me." Interesting. Mrs. Administrator told me I would be escorted to a restroom to turn my shirt inside out, so I follow a yard duty to my place of changing. While we walk, I told the yard duty I had been dress coded and I was just wondering what was offensive about my wear. I asked him what he thought was wrong with my outfit, and he proceeded to tell me "I think it is the socks." (!) This is a literally laugh out loud moment. Use the highly over-typed acronym as much as you want, because right now you actually are laughing out loud. Are you kidding me! This yard duty seriously saw nothing wrong. Anyway, he did not take me to the restroom, but to OCS (On Campus Suspension). And who runs OCS you might ask? Mrs. Brown of course! I couldn't tell if she was mad or not that I was being dress coded, especially since I sported a sweat band, sweet shades, and high-water sweats with yellow socks. I tried telling her the situation but she instantly shut me down. She said I had to read the "Dress Code Polices," a group of rules highlighting the severity of a dress code violation and the formality of a parent phone call and delivery of new clothing. I did read this and immediately following, I said "Look. Mrs. 'Administrator' caught me and told me all I had to do was turn my shirt inside out. She didn't say anything about making my parents come and give me a new shirt." I ended up turning my shirt inside out, thankfully, but not without and formal dress code violation and addition to my permanent record. If I violate the code again, I will get a Saturday school. It's not going to happen intentionally.

The rest: I walk to yearbook. My outfit now is really strange as I am wearing a simple white shirt. During the period, Ms. Kyra Wendling mentions my shirt and I have to explain my story. Many people could not believe something like that could happen, and Mr. Lev just got a kick out of it. I'm not going to lie. I now had a good story and a sweet blog post. People are going to want to read about this. It's big news. Not really, but it's bigger news than it would have been if I hadn't been coded. Later in the day, I saw Mr. Patrick Stevenson once more and I told him the situation and we both laughed a mighty fine amount. We also recalled the instance where he almost got Saturday school for sitting on the ground. Yes, you read that right: sitting on the ground. What is this world coming to? I honestly have no idea.

So this day went from a normal Friday, to a normal Friday without a bunch of Seniors, to a t-shirt busting, to a school wide news story. Pretty cool for just a day of the week. One last thought. Word of mouth is absolutely insane. One hour after it happened, three different people, all of which do not know each other, came up to me and said "I heard what happened! yadda yadda yadda." This stuff spreads like butter on hot toast. So here is the advise for the day: do not gossip.

June Gloom

June Gloom: the name of the game. I dressed in gray today, reflecting the mood and tone of the day as rain made its presence known. One item of importance was not caught by any one person. Due to the rain, I did not wear dress shoes with my "suit," I wore my average sneakers. Alas, I did not perform as I should have. I feel like I am talking in a rather bourgeois tone, but do to sitting in the beloved Royal High School library, this may be expected. Moving on. Today after school, I am going to a meeting for the "Every 15 Minutes" multimedia team. I signed up to film all day the 11th, then edit all night for the "Every 15 Minutes" assembly the next day. "Unique in its design and powerful in its impact, 'Every 15 Minutes' is an educational experience that reminds us all of the dangers associated with driving while impaired. The crash is staged, the emotions are real!" That's a direct quote from their website (http://every15minutes.com/enter/enter.html) ladies and gentlemen. It should be rather interesting.

Life update. The college search is coming to an end as I am officially accepted to Biola University, along with its film school, and Point Loma University. Pretty cool, I'd say. However, now I have to decide which one to go to. I'm not going to go through that here, but if anybody has any information concerning the Graphic Design and Film majors of Point Loma University, please let me know. I have a wealth of information about Biola (I have my resources), but have very little about Point Loma. Let me know.

Also, I interviewed for Hume Lake summer staff on the 1st. I'd say it went pretty well, but basically I was told it is unlikely I will get the position I want due to graduation and absence during the first two"ish" (thanks Mr. Shuster (nobody will get that unless they are in 3rd period stats)) weeks of summer. Nevertheless, I did give a demo reel to my the Hume representative and hopefully it will set me apart from the rest. Mr. Rich Baker himself told me that. Hopefully he is right. It would be unreal to be working the media department at Hume during the summer. Absolutely unreal. I have my hopes.

That's pretty much it. I've been in arguably the busiest weeks in my entire life, last weekend was ridiculously, atrociously, masterfully insane. I guess it is better than sitting at my house, doing nothing, or going out and getting in trouble with the people who don't do much with their lives. If you are somebody who has a whole lot of free time, I mean no offense. I continue to sit in the beloved Royal High School library, wondering what I will do for the next half hour. Probably some government homework. Speaking of government, I need to refill my peanut/raisin/chocolate chip mixture (If you know what I'm talking about--major props). Have a wonderful day everybody and June is arriving way to quickly.