Highschool Graduate Seeking Work

I don't know how many people read this blog, but it is certainly less than the number of people that read the resume section at Craig's List. Nevertheless I am going to repost what I posted there, here. My email is faldwin@gmail.com if you are interested in contacting me about my services.

I have about six weeks free this summer, from June 23rd to August 1st. I can be available before then, but the schedule gets complicated, but I will try if you want. I need about 800 dollars to help pay for me go to the National Poetry Slam In Madison, Wisconsin. If you would like to give me 800 dollars I would be eternally grateful, but as that is extremely unlikely here are some of the things I can provide for you.

I know a quite a lot about computers, so if you need a techie I'm your man. I can build basic webpages, work with MS Office and Windows, a little bit of Mac and I can type about 30wpm. I could set up your computer, even teach you how to use it if you want. I know a lot about how to work with various internet applications, so I could run your website/blog/forum. If I don't know how to use it there's a good chance I could figure it out.

As I mentioned before I am a poet. If you need a slam poet for your event, I would be happy to oblige. My poetry has a narrative/declamatory voice, rarely including rhyme or consistent meter. In other words my poetry is more about what I say, than how I say it. However, I still put a lot of thought and purpose into my delivery, because I write my poetry to be heard. Keep in mind that much of my work contains language and content that may be considered objectionable. I am also good at reciting the works of others. So if you want me to lend my voice to classic or modern works I can do that too.

Another of my areas of expertise is teaching. I plan to be a teacher, and have acquired significant experience in this field, for someone of my age. I can tutor your child in all manner of subjects, and I can even work with adults. If I know it, then I can teach it.

I may even be able to do something else. If there is something that you need done, send me an email and we'll talk. I am pretty open-minded.

Despite being open minded, there are certain things I will not do. These include, but are not limited to:
Doing anything illegal, immoral, or dangerous.
Doing anything of a sexual or romantic nature (I'm not that attractive, really)
Working extremely late at night.
Working on Friday or Saturday nights.
Producing work for you to claim as your own.
Working for free.

So if you are need of a poet, teacher, computer nerd or anything else anytime within the dates of June 23rd to August 1st (or before if you are willing to work with my schedule) please don't hesitate to send me an email. You don't have to provide the whole sum, but anything you can do to help out would be much appreciated.

You can donate money, or listen to some of my poems at my blog here:
faldwin.blogspot.com
(Click on “Recordings” to hear the poems)

Hopefully this will result in some interesting work that will help with my sticky financial situation.

Masochist Motivation

After many weeks (or was it months?) my computer has finally returned from the black hole that is my brother's school. A long time ago the motherboard died. So we had to order many new parts, but I ordered some of the wrong parts and we had to get more parts. Then we needed to buy an operating system. All of this needed to be installed, at my brother's school, where he has little to no time to do it. But his computer teacher is an expert and we wanted his guidance. But now it has returned, faster and more powerful than it ever was. The upside to this is it can now play Oblivion the way it was mean to be played.

Oblivion is a fantasy role-playing game, that has awesome graphics. But of course those awesome graphics require an awesome computer, which we now have. Previous to this upgrade we had two options for playing the game. We could play it on "Low" which, while it didn't look great, was at least passable, and allowed for some level of immersion. But there was the slight disadvantage of having to play at 5 frames per second . The other option was "Very Low". This allowed a very playable framerate of around 30fps. We could even turn up the resolution, and add distant landscape. The only thing that we lost was lighting effects. Immersion is instantly destroyed when it is as bright as day, even at night, and even in caves. Cave crawling was a lot of what I did, so my game experience was essentially ruined, because I could stand going back to 5fps. So I stopped playing. I played Morrowind for awhile becuase the graphics were better, so I could get something like immersion. But reading everyone's dialogue is just not the same as hearing them say it.

But now Oblivion has returned. It can be played at "Medium-High" And I'm not playing it. My brothers have been taunting me with stories of waving grass, and imposing towers in the distance, but I have stayed strong. I am behind on my homework, and I have decided that I will not play Oblivion until it is caught up. I have a plan that should have me caught up by Friday. I'm off to put it into my calendar. Wish me luck!

Realistic

Two thing happened recently that inspired this post. The first is the meltdown of the family computer. Because we have little money and my brother has access to a computer teacher willing to help us, we decided we would simply buy all the parts we needed and save a whole lot of money. Which we did. But in the process I learned a great deal about computer hardware. Trying to decipher all the massive lists of specs to figure out if all the parts you just chose will work with each other is a complicated task. But I found it to be quite enjoyable. (Yes I am a computer nerd, it says so in my profile to the left)

The other is a post I did recently entitled "Dream" in it I maxed out all the stats on a Mac Pro, and found that I could finally accomplish my dream of world domination if only I could scrape up 23,000 dollars. Today, as the post title indicates I am doing a slightly more realistic build. This time of a PC. These were the rules I set down for myself.

1. I must spend as little money as possible
a. Exception: Because I am trying to be realistic I decided that I would spend up to five extra dollars per product in the name of increased performance
2. The sum of all the parts must be able to result in a fully functional computer.
3. All parts must be available on Newegg.com
4. No monitor, mouse, or keyboard is neccessary. (I already have those)

So after much head scratching, clicking, and replacement of products, this is what I ended up buying.

A black and silver case with included power supply ($38)
An 80 GB hard drive ($36)
An AMD motherboard with an onboard graphics chip ($40)
A CD-ROM drive ($12)
A 512 MB RAM stick ($10)
A 2.2 Ghz AMD processor ($45)

Even when you add in the price of shipping the total comes to a paltry sum of 210 dollars. You might wonder why everyone doesn't do this. Just figuring out what to buy took all of my nerd powers. Then you have to put it all together, without breaking any of the expensive parts. It doesn't require years and years of training, but you need to know what you're doing.

Then comes the operating system. There is no way that this thing would run Vista, and it would have a hard time with XP. Plus both of those operating systems cost money. I built this system with If I ever happen to come across a spare 200 bucks I might do this, if only for the sake of testing the limits of my nerdiness.

If anyone that know about building PCs is reading this, I would be much obliged if you would check my work. As far as I know it will all work together, but you never know.

As I write this post I realize that this computer needs a name. I've always like the idea of naming computers, but never had the chance. I have decided that this computer will be called Siddhartha. This is both because of its spartan nature, and because it is the book I am reading right now.

I realized also that the computer I am typing this on needs a name. It is an older iMac, that I got as a gift. I have decided to name it Freen. I have three reasons for this. The first is that it was free, so that is in the name. The second is that Freen, rhymes with sheen, which reminds me of the eternal Mac sexiness. The third reason is that Freen rhymes with green, which is the color of the speakers and side panels.

Wow, this has been a long post. If you've made it this far I'm impressed. But fortunately for you, this post is over. I'm off to read Siddhartha.

Dream

I was playing around on the Apple website, and created the computer of my dreams. Observe its supreme awesomeness:

Two 3.2Ghz processors
32 Gigabytes of RAM
4 Terabytes of harddrive space
NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 1.5 GB
2 30" widescreen HD monitors
2 Super Drives (both capable of playing, and burning CDs and DVDs with Dual-Layer support)
Airport Extreme card for connecting to Wi-Fi networks
Wireless Mighty Mouse
Wireless Keyboard
iWork '08 (Apple Office Suite)
Final Cut Express 4 (professional video editor)
Logic Express 8 (professional audio editor)
HP Photosmart C7280 All-In-One Printer, Scanner, Copier
AppleCare Protection Plan (extended warranty and support)

This computer could run ten, high end, next generation games at the same time, without blinking. This computer is overkill incarnate. Computers won't need this sort of power for years. This computer could take over the world, three times over, while rendering an entire computer animated feature film, in the time it takes to check your email. This is the Mac Pro. It will not simply blow your mind, it will twist it in so many ways you will be convinced that you are a pineapple ballerina. Fortunately this computer probably has the power to examine the complicated processes of the human brain and figure out how to straighten you out again. But there is one reason I have not already ordered this beautifully terrifying machine. Click the link below and look at the column on the right. You'll see what I mean.

Mac Pro

Aggravation

As you may have guessed from my last post, my computer has been acting up. Or more accurately, not acting at all. When I press the power button it does nothing. I'm hoping its the power supply, because if its the motherboard, then I might as well get a new computer. Anyway, in honor if this computer woe, I am posting a poem. I think that I will be posting poems every Wednesday, from now until I decide to change things. So then, without further adieu, I give you a poem.

Computers

Argh!