Interns and the City

Interns and the City! Part 1.

Sick Daze

I think now is an opportune time to talk about an ever-prevalent question when you have a job: what do you do when you're sick? Considering Brendan digested some mischievous chicken, and that right now my plugged nose wants to kill me, I thought I'd muse on the moral dilemma that arises when you're actually SICK and have to decide whether to go to work. Just to let you know, I will not talk about the subject of "calling in sick" when we're healthy because, like inventing a fever in elementary school to miss a test, we all do it. Here are the scenarios; you can decide for yourselves and leave your comments below.

On Tuesday, Brendan felt fine until lunch: a half-hour after his chicken parm, Sam forced him to go home, as he had food poisoning. Although he felt awful, he was reluctant to leave and miss out on a day's work. He felt he would be letting me down (I assured him I'd be fine), and that he should wait it out. Sam and I, both slightly vomit-phobic, thought it was best if he take care of himself. Luckily, Brendan is back in the office today, and he's as energetic as ever.

On my end, a cold has left me a bit dazed and grumpy today. The worst part is that my nose has been completely blocked since Monday--and I'm talking breathe-out-of-your-mouth blocked. This morning I debated calling in sick, thinking that if I came to work I could spread my cold to everyone else, but I decided that the work is more important. Sudafed is useful, but my eyes are starting to glaze over.

So my question is, how much harm does working through sickness cause? Does the quality of your work slump so much that it's better just to stay home? Or, if you stay home, will you lose the valuable time you need to get your work done? Then there's always the conflict of losing a day's pay, which can be crucial for us poor students. I think that either way, we get behind when we're sick, so I guess we have to let our immune systems decide for us. Readers, tell me your opinions and stories about being sick on the job!

Other than that, week three is going well. Our subject for video number 4 : interns and the city. Check out the video shortly...I'm keeping you in suspense.

Goodbye, Au revoir, Ciao, Later,

-Kate

Long Live George Carlin and Patriotism

I write this blog with a semi-heavy heart...I ate McDonalds this morning (zing). However, next time you eat McDonalds see if you can listen for your heart working overtime to pump that weasel meat through your body. I would like to honor a visionary, Mr. George Carlin. There was a man with insight few possess and the ability to relate it to listeners in a way that was entertaining. A personal hero of mine right up there with the likes of James Bond, The Rock, Batman, Michael Jordan, and Eminem pre 2002. He just had a brilliant way of relating the stupidities of human systems and language that always made me chuckle. I always loved his take on driving, "Anyone driving slower than you is an idiot...'look at this idiot, hes driving 55!' and anyone faster than you is a maniac...'Jesus did you see that maniac!'" He said it was a wonder anything got done on this planet seeing as you are the only smart one! His comparison of football to baseball was hilarious as well. "In football there are penalties and in baseball there are errors 'whoopsies.' In football the quarterback, also known as the field general, marches his troops up field with short bullet passes and long bombs designed to find holes in the enemy's defense, in baseball everyone is just trying to go home 'Yay I got home!" Anyways I thought he was brilliant and will be sorely missed by many. My new motto is what would George Carlin do, I think if we all live like that this world will be a better place.

Today Kate and I are working on editing our video about aspects of working in the city + our interviews with the other Experience interns. In walking around the city we saw that Paul Revere's memorial cemetery was open and we popped in to honor some patriots. I consider that an aspect of working in Boston, in fact the rest of the nation is in a debt of gratitude to Boston. It was these wise old men from the late 18th century that started freedom as we know it today. Now I am not here to say America has the perfect system or that we have the perfect government and all that jazz, all I am saying as that this group of men stood up for what they believed in, came up with a plan and like the athletes they were, saw it to completion. They were huge underdogs in the war against the British Redcoats but that did not stop them. Through precision, planning, and determination few men possess they were able to defeat the mighty British empire and for the first time in a long time in history, the sun was setting on the British empire in America. I love those patriots just like I love George Carlin. It was quite an honor to stand on that sacred ground and pay my respects. It is through them that we enjoy the freedoms that few other countries have. Another thing you have to appreciate about them is this, they risked everything. These were not poor people who had nothing to lose, in fact they had everything to lose. Had the colonies lost the war those people that signed the Declaration of Independence would have been the first to be publicly beheaded, but as it has been written; you have to take big risks for big rewards. Is there a lesson to take out of all of this? I hope so. I do not wish to spell it out for you, but rather have you come to your own conclusions about what that story means to you. Maybe it means nothing, but if you search hard enough and think clearly about it you should be able to make the connections between that story and your college experience. Now again this wasn't meant to be a political statement but just a human interest story. Put yourself in their shoes and think about it. Also on a complete side note, there is a hilarious video about George Washington on http://www.youtube.com/. If you go to YouTube and search George Washington and click on the Cox + Combes cartoon you ought to have a good chuckle and at the same time see just what kind of man the real GW was. Until next time reflect on the two great Georges, Peace! Also feel free to drop me a line at interns@experience.com.

----------------<3------------------

Chez Masta Flex

Week Three

So as Kate pointed out ABC news was here yesterday. OMG OMG OMG!!!!! Actually, I found that their presence did not really distract me plus I am more of FOX news guy myself for their unbiased political reporting. Beyond that I am so focused and zoned in on my own projects that their segment didn't really rattle my cages; although had I not gotten sick off some disgusting Quincy Market under-cooked chicken I might have tried to talk job ops with them. My philosophy is this: I will approach anyone, shoot the breeze with them for awhile and sort of butter them up then drop this gem, "So what are the chances of a guy like me and a company like yours getting together in a employee-employer relationship." I mean, it's not always going to work but if you have a good rapport going with someone it will be tough to say no and you will always get a business card and point of contact. As Denzel said in Training Day, "Its not what you know..." and then the rest of that line is irrelevant, but it really is not so much about what you know as it is who you know. I use this to justify my 1.6 GPA (hahaha lol j/k).

Anyways so yesterday marked week three at work and as I mentioned above I got a little sick off some bad food. It is amazing that a woman with a nice smile was pretty much the only selling point on me buying that disgusting looking meal. The pasta was cold until she ran hot water on it and we all know how delicious nuked chicken tastes. The cheese had the same consistency as gum and now that I mention it, the taste of mint was lingering from that cheese. I was sent home early and I felt like a real loser. Today I feel great though, back on all two's and roaming the city getting work done! I do need retribution, so I am going to figure out the name of that particular joint and tell you all not to eat there. Somehow that doesn't feel like enough, so in a stronger gesture I might start my own TRUTH campaign were I make a commercial of all the people that get sick off of their chicken parm. In true TRUTH style, I will bring a hundred vomiting people to Quincy Market and park them right in-front of their stand and tell them to have at it. Then I will obnoxiously tell everyone via loud speaker about the dangers of poorly cooked chicken.

What are the rest of my week's plans you ask? Well, good question Donny. At the conclusion of this blog I am going to go to the media premiere of Hancock. Tomorrow I am coming back to work at Experience to finish week three's video and maybe find a home for my vacuum skit. Last week's video was too long and it was just kind of thrown in there out of the blue, so people did not want it in week two's video which will be re-posted in higher quality today. Week three's video will be posted Friday. It's of course the lovely and talented Kate K and myself interviewing a few interns from this company and showing you what working in the city is like. As always the vidz are entertaining and informative and of course under 5 minutes, so take the time or make the time to check em' out.

Music Currently Listening To "She's a Maniac" "Laffy Taffy" "Gasolina"

I can't believe Laffy Taffy was at one point the number one song in America. No offense D4L, plenty of offense to America's music buyers. Step your music listening game up! As always feel free to give your ideas, input, questions, or concerns to interns@experience.com. Ladies please keep the requests for my number at a minimum as I don't have time to read all of those.

--------<3-------

Chezzy B in da place to Be!

National News!

ABC has graced our offices! ABC News Nightline (which is a national program) came to 2 Fanueil Hall today to film Jon Cifuentes, a May 2008 graduate from BC, as he interviewed for a position at Experience. Jon had done an Exclusive Experience with Experience.com, so he must have been interested in the company even before he interviewed. Compared with any other interview, what was different about this one was that Jon was trained by a career coach for his interview. During the interview, Jon wore an ear piece that connected him with the voice of his coach, who spoke into his ear and gave him pointers as the interview went along. Now, I bet you're wondering if that gives him an unfair advantage over other candidates who have to do it all alone, but I, for one, am impressed that anyone can pull off a good interview with a voice whispering in his head. If I were Jon, I'd be stammering and pausing in the middle of sentences.

ABC did a sort of "the aftermath" interview with the coach afterwards, and here's where I gleaned the most information. I crept over to the kitchen, which had been transformed into a set, complete with lights and a 2-camera set-up. I was astonished that our fluorescent lighting that usually washes out our faces had turned into a soft close-up lighting that made our office glimmer. Microphones, cameras, screens everywhere: I got really excited. I thought to myself - I'm on a set! Replace ABC with Oliver Stone and I'm on my dream location! My feet got all tingly. But anyway, enough gushing. From my semi-eavesdropping, I got some pointers on what makes an interview good when you're applying for a job:

1) Eye contact. Engaging the interviewer shows that you're genuinely interested and earnest about the position.
2) Lose the "like"s. I know it's hard for us to eliminate this particular four-letter word from our vocabularies, but if you enunciate and slow down when you talk, you're bound to notice a difference.
3) The tone of your voice matters. If you end every sentence like a question, you're going to sound insecure and immature, like you have little conviction over what you are saying.
4) Ask the interviewer questions, too, especially about the work environment. You can learn a lot about the ambiance of the company from how the interviewer responds to this question. Plus, it's just thoughtful and considerate to take the attention off of yourself!

Watch the ABC News Nightline program when it airs (they predict sometime next week), and you too will hopefully learn some good pointers!

Newly self-aware about the use of the word "like" in my everyday life...
-Kate

Tour of the Experience office and its employees!

Funkyslap #1

So first crisis at work averted, thanks to Adobe Premiere Auto-save.

3:45 PM: Brendan and I were editing our third video, which will be posted shortly, and as we were importing "funkyslap #1" (one of those royalty-free musak songs) to use in our video, the editing software just shut down. It disappeared. We opened the program back up...and all our work from the entire day had vanished. None of the footage was logged, no sequences were edited, nothing. I freaked, and ran up to Ally and Sam's office. Ally, very reassuringly, goes "Ok first step, don't panic!" I tried calming down while Sam sent out a High Importance email to the Help Desk. Then we hurried back down to the workstation to survey the damage. We were worried that even the footage of the Celtic's Parade was gone (eek!). We ran a number of searches through the hard drive, and luckily, Auto-save had recorded what we had done not 10 minutes prior. Phew! Just a little re-editing and we were back on track. All I have to say is, I'm so thankful that my computer is more conscientious than I.

In other news, I learned a lot about what makes Experience work this week. We conducted 5 interviews with a range of people: Tim in Sales, Craig in Product Management, Sarah in Engineering, Lauren in Client Services, and Kristin in Marketing. We were curious about how they got their starts, and also what they love about the job they do. Watch the video to find out more, but I'll highlight a few things here: Tim explained the exciting, social environment of working in Sales. Craig underlined the intersection of creativity and technology in developing product. Sarah talked about how exciting it is to work with Quality Assurance, which makes sure all the programs are infallible. Lauren illuminated the strong link between us students and Experience - that the company really believes in helping us find a career we love. Finally, Kristin talked about how marketing can overlap with PR, and even Sales. Basically, the entire company took shape in my mind, and I understood how everyone works together yet also contributes his or her own ideas and creativity to make Experience as innovative and helpful as possible. So, watch our videos - we are two interns imparting what we learn unto you, in hopes that you will learn something as well!

So I'm off to my other job - lifeguarding at a day camp (not gardening, as Brendan thought when he misheard me), which I've been doing for 4 years now. While I still love teaching swim lessons and, of course, basking in the sun, it's getting a bit repetitive. I feel as though I'm getting ready to move on, to make strides in the work world, while still trying to retain my youthful yearnings for excitement. I hope that my future career leaves room for that excitement! You know what? I'll make it happen. We can all make it happen if we want it bad enough.

Have a great weekend!
-Kate

Watch and Learn

Bonjour!

So, Week Two kicks off with a bang: first off, I had set my alarm clock for 7 PM, so needless to say I overslept. Luckily, my mom realized this (the joys (?) of living at home) and shook me awake. Then, a VERY energetic eight-year-old boy chose to sit next to me on the T, behind his parents, and proceeded to stand up and poke his mom's back constantly. His mom ignored him, which gave him reason to lunge into me at every turn of the trolley car. I don't know about you guys, but I NEED my personal space in the morning, especially during my hour-long commute.

But I got to the office and immediately felt better. There's something tranquil about my workstation...who knew an office doesn't actually have the awkward ambiance of "The Office"? We had a busy day lined up for us, conducting interviews with people in different departments of Experience. We've done two interviews so far, and I feel relieved when I hear that when they were in college, the employees who are now at Experience had little idea of what they "wanted to be when they grew up." Now they're working with this great entrepreneurial company that helps us curious but somewhat confused college students find our way in the world.

And I have to say, a little perusal of Experience.com in my free time has been extremely helpful. The Entertainment channel gives me hope that maybe someday I will find a career in the film industry...I even showed my sister the site, exclaiming that they have a Ventures Abroad page for students interested in studying/working abroad. She rolled her eyes, realizing that I'm just gunning for her to study in Paris, like I did (I'm not pushy at all, I swear!), but I think she still peeked at the page.

And...Brendan and I may just be hitting our fifteen minutes of fame earlier (too bad for our later selves) because we're featured on About.com! In the internship section, you'll not only find some lovely information about finding and succeeding at an internship, but you'll be able to click right to our blog (where you are now). Pretty meta, right?

I watched The Blob last night, and besides the fact that it is an AWESOME character drama with great special effects for the 50s (even the horror quotient resonates today), I'm thinking that Steve McQueen's character is a lot like us interns. We both have something to prove: "I want to contribute to my company!"; "I've got some great ideas!"; or "There's a flesh-consuming Blob in this town!". We want to shout this out to the high heavens, but in the end it takes a little patience and a lot of teamwork to get our bosses, or the disbelieving police officers, to recognize our sincerity. But in the end, it's all worth it. We learn a lot, and most of all, the Blob no longer bothers us.

Until next time,
Kate

My Birthday Post

Interns Log - Week 2

It is week two down here at the intern battle front. We just wrapped up today's meeting where we planned this week's video and talked about tornadoes. I was always under the misconception that it would be fun to ride a tornado; however, I was promptly corrected that although they may look cute and innocent they are actually quite deadly. In a perfect world I picture tornadoes having the same effect as broken fire hydrant. You know the scene, fire hydrant starts spewing water everywhere and all the kids run to it for a good time. In my own world I would like to see that for tornadoes, but alas, I live on earth. A fact that is slowly starting to sink in. Having said that here is the scoop.

Finding the right internship is like the situation I described above. I may be reaching but hear me out. At first, much like a tornado, it seems like fun. Sprucing up your resume, composing brilliantly over the top cover letters about how you have always dreamed about working for (whatever company), stories about how you have posters of banking moguls and white collar heroes that you have hung on your wall for inspiration, and interviews galore! Here is the thing though, once you get a little closer it starts to get scary (like the tornado). The interviewers as a rule are almost never as excited as you, there are deadlines that approach quickly, there are many other studs in the stable, and here is where it gets even more frightening. They may even reject you. At least take comfort in the fact that if you ever look a tornado in the face it will treat you with the same respect it treats everyone else.

How do you find the right internship you say? Well that's a great question. For me it was a process of elimination, as in I was eliminated from some of the internships I applied for. Sounds tough but actually it is a blessing in disguise because A) it makes your choice easier and B) sometimes companies know better than you if you are cut for the sort of work they offer or if you would even like it. At least such was the case with myself. As I am starting to get my feet wet in this company I realize that this sort of environment is probably what I was cut out for or what I cut myself out for. Either way I feel pretty lucky to have found an internship I like. I still do not know what I want to do when I graduate, but at least I know which direction I want to head in. I know it sounds pretty vague and so forth and what about those of us who were not so fortunate to find an internship they like? Well take the experience and use it for what it's worth on your resume is all I can say. People value perseverance.

Anyways today I am working on a new video with Kate. We are going around the company to interview people from various departments and ask them how they got started in their line of business. I haven't started the interviews yet but I imagine there will be as many different stories as there are different people. People who knew from the start, people who sort of fell into their jobs, and people who figured it out the hard way. I guess the best piece of advice is this and perhaps best put by the late Tupac, and that is "Baby don't cry, you gosta keep ya head up, even when the road is hard never give up." Basically, keep your heads up and don't settle until you feel right. Thats all for today.

Buenos Dias,

-----------<3-------------

Brendy Chez-boa

Yay! We’ve got our first two videos done! Readers, let us know what you think, s’il vous plait!


Introduction Video



First Day Video



Peace out homies,

Brendan and Kate

Finished vids and the mean dad

href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Go0MWSo24rU/SFGZhAI3xuI/AAAAAAAAABM/zXIEz2KkPWg/s1600-h/me.JPG">Welp as promised the much anticipated Thursday update. For those of you who are just tuning in me llamo Brendan T Cherry and I am working on videos about my internship for the summer, of which as of right now the introduction video and first day video are finished. The intro is 1:30 seconds and has a taste of entertainment but mostly just a quick glimpse of what we are doing. The second video is about 3:45 and is a rip roaring roller coaster ride through the first day and a little more info. They are both pretty good and my partner and I will continuously make better vids. Its like when a boxer has a fight, before each fight the boxer will always say, "This is the best shape I have ever been in!" The same will hold true for our videos as each video will be the best video we have ever put out. Anyways they are both pretty amusing and will be promoted on Friday 6/13 (tomorrow) through experience email but you can also find them at http://www.experience.com/ on the internship guide channel.

The past two days have been only mildly eventful. Wednesday was the second day I was here so the first day excitement and what not was pretty turned down. For me things become routine pretty quickly and I usually do not get excited about things so much as I sort of take them as they come. Maybe you can tell by these blogs but maybe not, I tend to be all over the place and think the same way. I actually just found out something pretty interesting that I did not know before - the Jung Personality test. It's a very helpful tool and easily google-able. You answer 75 brief yes or no questions and then the test will mark you as a certain personality type. I found it to be extremely accurate for me and some what insightful. It can be helpful for those of you trying to figure out what your thing is; I mean don't expect a miracle but a finger in the right direction can go along way. For me when I was a kid I really wanted to be James Bond or Batman, but those got ruled out as real possibilities when I picked journalism as a major.

In other news, I have found Faneuil Hall to be a pretty colorful place. I went to get lunch at the local quiznos sub shop and I saw what to me was the strictest Dad I have ever seen. He had two little boys with him and I noticed him when he chose to order their subs for them against their will. Being little boys they fussed about their father's low carb choice for them. When the woman behind the desk said, "Is that all sir", he immediately went into a rant that went something like this, "You see! She knows enough to call me sir! What have I taught you guys, huh?! Smarten up or I will give you something to fuss about." Beyond the immediate offenses you could take to such a demeanor I have always found that "something to fuss about" line pretty funny. I mean I already have something to fuss about, thats why I am fussing, what kind of sense does it make to get me fussing about something else, in fact why don't you quit fussing about my fussing and we can all move on! Those kids did learn a tough lesson early though, that being the man or woman with the money makes the choices.

Having said that keep reading and watching the videos so we can help you help yourself find the right internship and show you about the process. Other then that I am finished for the day so Im'a rest these old bones.

Cheerio,
--------<3----------- interns@experience.com I hope to hear from ya'll soon.


Also, next Tuesday on the 17th of June will not only mark my second week of work here and thus a second video but also my 21st year on this planet! I suppose you don't need to know this but it feels good/right to tell you! Happy Fathers Day to Papa Cherry as well and to all fathers. PEACE!

So now I know why movie editors don't sleep. Yesterday it took us about 6 hours to complete our first 1 minute 30-second video. Between the re-shooting, editing, laying music, and of course our lunch break, we had our work cut out for us. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining - on the contrary, I've gained even more respect for the creative, sleep-deprived zombies who scan through the hours of footage to get that one amazing shot. The editing process really is remarkable, because you go from choppy, static clips to a seamless story (in the ideal world, that is. We're still working out some kinks in our video-making skills).

That said, creating video will definitely be the most time-consuming, but also the most rewarding, aspect of this internship, in my opinion. Working in-depth on a project always inspires me, especially when the task at hand allows for collaboration and input from my coworkers. I definitely value collaboration over authorship, even if the film world and most of the corporate world are dominated by big-headed individuals who don't like to delegate. Fortunately, I'm finding that Experience is a collaborative environment where everyone is willing to help everyone else out with their projects. All the different departments here at our offices in Faneuil Hall feed into one another, all with the goal of helping students launch stellar careers. As the summer goes along, Brendan and I will expose you to this collaborative side, featuring interviews with and blogs about different aspects of this company.

So, if you have any questions about what makes a company run well, inquiries about the different departments, or any feedback in general about what we're writing and screening, please drop us an email (interns@experience.com), comment on this blog post, or put your own editing skills to the test by creating a response video! All comments are welcome and appreciated, even criticism (criticism is huge and obligatory in the film world...and since the film biz is my tentative career path, I have to get used to it).

My thoughts go out to Thelma Schoonmaker (Scorcese's incredible editor for The Departed)...

Blogging soon,
-Kate

Update

I'm updating my blog today to let you know that I will really be updating my blog tomorrow. Today marked the first day of work in which I have actually worked hard all day. There were no TPS reports, no old man Willmington saying, "Hey champ, hows about you be a team player and go fetch me a coffee", and there was no one breathing down my neck. Basically, I'll give you today's goods and tomorrow's goods when Thursday evening rolls around. To quote the great Wimpy, and I am not even sure if this really applies but take from it what you will, "I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today." I know what I am trying to say now and that is I will gladly write for you Thursday for the day off today.

Ciao

<3------- Chezberto

Take-off

I've always loved airplanes, but purely for the take-off. As the plane moseys down the runway, my anticipation builds, those butterflies in my stomach getting ready for some height. After rolling along for a bit, the plane stops. When it starts up again, gears shift and I feel the acceleration pushing me into my seat. Faster, faster, faster, until I feel a lurch and I'm no longer horizontal. As the people turn into ants and the trucks into toys, my favorite part of lift-off occurs: the stomach-drop. The weightlessness is unnerving at first as the plane adjusts to its new height and gravitational pressure (sorry if this is nonsense, science folks...I'm a French major), but then, right after that, is the exhilarating freedom of being weightless among the clouds. It only lasts a moment, after which the cabin pressure makes me feel normally heavy again, and I'm slightly nostalgic for a moment ago when I defied gravity. But then I remember...I'm in the SKY! Whoopee.

So I guess today, my first day at work here at Experience, is the take-off, complete with stomach-drop. It's been an overwhelming but incredibly fun day, and I've felt both weightless and heavy in consecutive moments. Coming in this morning to an office full of welcoming and enthusiastic people, I felt the acceleration capacity of a fast-paced, dynamic company. As our boss led Brendan and me on the "first-day" tour of the office, I smiled and joked with many people on staff, maybe not remembering names, but definitely remembering comments, ie, "no candid camera!" Getting the layout of assignments for the next eight weeks was grounding but exciting. Brendan and I have a lot of work to do, but it's great work. At one point this afternoon we even looked at each other and said "We're getting paid for this!?"

But the stomach-drop of the day, the real proof of flying, was shooting the beginnings of our first video. I held the DV camera in my hand as we ventured into the 90 degree Boston heat, the overheated battery almost melting under the heat from the sun. I was worried about getting the right shots (the unnerving part) but also inspired by the liberty we were given to "go out and have fun with this!" (the exhilarating freedom part). We got some great footage of Faneuil Hall and its surroundings, which you'll see in the upcoming videos, and I even felt pretty comfortable on camera, which is a first for me. Now onto editing (which I love) and posting of the first video!

Please stay tuned as Brendan and I take you for a summer-long ride of the intern's life as we document our time at Experience! With us you'll peer into the day-to-day scoop of having an internship, both at Experience and through interns at different companies. You'll also learn about the facets of a company and the diverse career paths of the people who make it run. But most of all, you'll hear about us goofing up, trying to be humorous, and basically having a trial-and-error summer! Can't wait.

Until next time, I'm signing off, complete with a two-fingered pilot's wave from my temple to the sky.

The Beginning

Dear Blog,

Although this internship is the proverbial "wetting of the feet" for myself as far as entering a professional atmosphere is concerned, I still decided to use this format as a reference to one of my favorite childhood characters Douglas Yancy Funny from the hit Nickelodeon cartoon "Doug". He began every episode with a journal entry entitled Dear Journal and I will do the same for this blog. I would like to tell you about myself but I figure you will get to know me through these entries in your own way which is probably better then me trying to explain myself. For some of you I may come across as a wise old sage with insights few posses, others may see a goofy half wit with a keyboard and an attitude; however my only real concern with this blog is to come across as genuine and relay my internship experience to you.

As the great Wilson from "Home Improvement" once said when quoting someone else who I can not remember as well as Wilson himself, "A man who writes about himself in his own time and place writes about men from every time and place." Wilson was full of sage advice. I just moved to Boston aka the Hub from a small town southwest of Worcester known as Leicester. Previous to being the proud home of the biggest Wal-Mart in New England, Leicester was really known as a place George Washington once passed through on his way to more important places, so it was a big change of scenery for me. The only thing I can really say about Leicester is its inhabitants are really proud of being from Wolverine Country and old folks gather at Mike's Donuts where they can talk about 19-dickity-six and all other Leicester nostalgia. My first night in Boston, specifically Mission Hill I witnessed a pretty intense fight outside my window. I tried to stifle the blows to the one poor fellow by playing "Why Can't We Be Friends?" from my window, but the joke went pretty unnoticed. Also, on my first day to work I got hit by car in what turned out to be pretty uneventful. I was able to sprawl on the car and the guy completely hit the brakes I sort of tumbled backwards in about as comical a manner as possible. I think I heard a few laughs because I was obviously physically OK, mentally I felt pretty youtube-able which usually isn't a good thing. I ran off on the guy that hit me because I didn't want to be late for my first meeting and he was shouting at me for jay walking so I just sort of ran and yelled my condolensces while continuing my impressive bound to Fanuiel. My biggest relief was realizing I wasn't going to walk in bleeding and with a roughed up shirt. My Dad who is a man of principle immediately told me I need to have my head on a swivel in the city and to leave my mom uninformed about this story.

Anyways I supposed I am rambling a bit but I will miss the Cherry family as a staff, label, and a crew this summer and this will especially hold true around bill paying time. My first official day in the office is today. I was lead around two floors of offices and introduced to everyone and forgive me to anyone who reads this and I do not remember your name, I will try hard. This will be especially hard because I was very tired this morning as last nights heat and my lack of suitable cooling unit made sleeping somewhat of a chore and there are many names and faces. The past hour and a half has been me writing this blog and getting to know my partner Kate. We started brainstorming ideas for the first video and I think you folks will like it and I invite you to check it out. I will post the link when I know it but I think if you can find this blog the vids are not far off. To quote the stranger, "Welp, that about does her, wraps her all up. Things seem to've worked out pretty good for the Bren and Kate, and it was a purty good story, dontcha think? Made me laugh to beat the band ... parts, anyway."

I will keep on postin' you keep on readin'.

-----<3------->
Brendan "The Chez Man" Cherry