2008: Year In Review, and Hopes & Goals for 2009

In spite of some bad things that happened to me this year, I have to say that 2008 was a very good year for me. In fact, this is probably the first time I've been able to look back and say I've had a really good year.

I attended two festivals this year--South By Southwest, and the Woodstock Film Festival. I also took an improv 101 class at UCB Theater in New York. I'd like to do 201 at some point, but right now, I have other things to focus on. For six weeks, I got to work at a job I actually liked.

Goals for 2009

Get the DVD done. It's actually the priority for me right now, other than continuing to look for new work. The sooner the DVD gets done, the sooner it gets out there. The sooner it gets out there, the sooner I can move on to future projects.

The Next Movie. Realizing that the scope of the DVD, it's priority has receded, but still really important. I have an idea and some locations where I want to shoot, but that's about it at this point.

Keep On Working, Hopefully In Jobs That Don't Suck. The last job, I liked. Unfortunately, economic conditions forced me out of that situation. As I have mentioned, I'm working on a stopgap measure, but it would be nice to continue to have a job (or jobs) that I like. When my old supervisor returns from vacation, he's going to appeal to the corporate office to get an extension on the project. But returning there is more of a "no" than a "yes" at this point.

Go To Tribeca & Take Improv 201 at the UCB Theater. This is a longshot at this point, but I'm interested in going. It's all going to depend on my employment situation, and whether or not I can make the time to go. If so, I'd like to do both about the same time.

I have two New Year's Resolutions: To keep losing weight, and make The Bondy Blog regular reading. I've been trying to become fluent in French for a couple of years now, and If I can make a habit of reading the blog, I'll master the language.

Hope 2009 will be a good year for you as well.

The Long Road Ahead

Now that things have begun to settle down (if only for awhile), I've been thinking about the things I would like to do in the future. One of the things I would like to do eventually is return to the UCB Theater in New York and take more improv courses, and perhaps even their writing courses. The big question is not only how I will go about funding this, but how will I support myself for the duration of my marticulation.

I suppose that if this is what I desire, it will happen and everything will take care of itself.

In addition to returning to Ithaca tomorrow, I will also be launching my DVD fundraiser. Please look at the website, and give what you can afford.

First Post!

At the beginning of this month, I travelled eastward to the Woodstock Film Festival to work as a volunteer. The Friday Night of the festival, I was working the merch table by the main office when I encountered a notable filmmaker and blogger who'd recognized me from my YouTube videos. He noticed that I hadn't made too many videos in recent months. The encounter inspired me to put myself out there again. I figured there were a few people who still wondered what I was up to. If you're one of them, I made this blog for you.

So what happened? After I got back from SXSW, I had a lot of footage to edit, and I eventually exhausted myself making those videos. Also, I felt like I had accomplished what I intially set out to do in making those videos. A few weeks after my return, I passed my road test to get my driver's license at the ripe old age of 26.

Meanwhile, I was really starting to chafe at my job. When I had been hired there in the Summer of 2005, I was broke and needed the job to survive. I liked the company and the camaraderie (which is why I stuck it out as long as I did), but never really liked the job itself. In November 2006, I had been given a warning, which led me to go into counseling and helped me turn my situation around. I took time off here and there--to go to New York, SXSW, and to take Improv 101 at the UCB Theater. Everytime I would come home and return to my job, it became, "I've had such a good time, and I have to go back to this???" I could never bring myself to turn in my two weeks notice, because I feared falling back into my pre-job situation. As much as I didn't like my situation, I felt that it was still better than having no job.

By August, I was getting restless, and I got careless. To be frank, I began taking my frustration out on a few customers who had been trying my patience to begin with. Finally, on September 30th, the day after the Dow dropped 700 points and two days before I was supposed to go to Woodstock, they decided to terminate my employment. In addition to the recent events, they took the 2006 warning into consideration.

I take full responsibility for the actions that led to my termination, and I deeply regret the way it ended. Had I known that things would turn out the way they did, I would have seriously started looking elsewhere at the start of the summer. Since the warning they based it on dated back to 2006 (usually, warnings are removed after six months), I plan on writing a letter to the corporate office, but only after my unemployment insurance is straightened out.

The good news is that I had three interviews in the span of a week, and hopefully will be getting called for a second interview for one of them soon. Even though it's grunt work, I'm excited about the position. It would be nice to actually have a job using skills that I was trained in in school. I plan on looking for a place to stay on the day of my second interview.

And the videos? I'll go back to that eventually...maybe. But this blog is my way of staying in touch with people. Now more than ever, I need to reach out to people as I get things straightened out.