Focused.

We're starting focus groups for 489 tomorrow. This presents an excellent opportunity to tell my story about being a participant in a focus group.

I was in a relationship at the time, and was walking across campus holding hands with my significant other. We were stopped, somewhat awkwardly, by a guy who observed that we appeared to be in a relationship, and asked if we would participate in a focus group. We agreed--there were free movie tickets on the line.

When we arrived, we were taken into separate focus groups with others of our same gender. And once there, the focus group turned out to be about shopping for engagement rings. She and I were certainly not yet that far along in our relationship, and the problem of choosing the right jeweler was not one that had ever crossed my mind. While the other guys told about ring shopping, I had nothing to contribute. And I felt really, really awkward, the whole time.

But in the end, it wasn't a total loss. At least I got the free movie tickets.

A new website. It's cool, too.

My portfolio's online now. You're welcome to go take a gander at it, if it interests you at all.
www.rogerpimentel.com

It'll just take a minute.

If you have a second, will you help me out and take this survey? It's for my capstone class, and we need people who aren't into video games to take it.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=286803198011

Thanks!

For your consideration.

It's getting to be time to screen shirts again.

I've been wanting to do this shirt design for a while, so it's going to be first. But I'm open to suggestions on layout, colors, design, etc. so I'm putting it up here for comment. And if you end up wanting one, I'll just have you bring me a shirt and chip in on the chemicals, and I'll screen it for you.

Without further ado, two drafts (you can click on them to see them giant size):













So far I like the weathered look, but again, I'm up for suggestions. This is going to be my first two-color print--and I like the idea of doing dark green on a lighter green shirt.

Thoughts?

An open letter to our water pipes.

Please please please, please please, don't freeze again, please please please.

Yours,
R

3/24 and 4/24

The 24 experiment continues to go well. I'm told that yesterday's two episodes are the logical progression from previous seasons--once you've had a few thousand close calls, once in a while a bomb has to go off. And it seems that as long as you're having a bomb go off, it might as well be nuclear.

In what I've seen so far, there seems to be a pretty subtle (but surprising) undercurrent of liberal political agenda. The President is doing everything he can to stop the attacks, and hasn't even looked outside of American borders for an enemy. I think that pacifism might stop next week, though, because the preview said something about retaliation. It's just interesting to contrast President Palmer's response to President Bush's response in roughly similar situations.

So far I have to favor the fictional president.

1/24 and 2/24

So, I made a decision to watch "24" this season. I'd only seen one episode before tonight. I'm making a point of it, because I like to be up to date on stuff. And my roommate Angry Block really likes it.

I just finished watching the 2-hour season debut, and it's pretty cool. There's no mistaking why it's so popular: it's full of action and suspense and Jack Bauer biting people. Watching two hours of it was like watching an action movie--but an action movie that doesn't waste its time with romance or any feelgood crap. The characters are established, the setting is simple. And these two hours were an exception in that it went so long before anybody died.

It's all red and no yellow. Not that I'd know anything about that.

Also, somebody posted a plug for the Cecil shirts on Dave Barry's 24 blog last year. I don't know who it was, but it's on this page:
http://blogs.herald.com/dave_barrys_blog/2006/04/24_1.html
It'll save you time if you hit ctrl-F and search for "cecil" instead of scrolling through.

Empowering myself daily, through a rigorous brushing regimen.

My toothpaste tastes really bad. There's nothing wrong with it, and I have to assume that it cleans my teeth well--it's just a disgusting flavor.

It looks like it should be good. It comes in what appears to be a galvanized steel tube, showing the industrial-grade strength of its cleaning. The flavor is (I kid you not) "Empowermint". I thought for sure that would be a winner.

But the real problem here is not that my toothpaste tastes bad, but that I am unable to throw it away until it is completely gone. Not until every molecule of paste is out of that tube will I be able to part with it. I'd sooner squeeze it all into the sink and throw away the empty tube than throw away a tube with perfectly good toothpaste in it.

I even looked at other toothpastes when I was at the store on Monday. But I knew I wouldn't buy one.

Recommended just for me.

I bought one of my textbooks online today. It was the text for my typography class, and I got it from Amazon.

You know, though, how when you buy something from Amazon, it looks at what you're buying and what you've bought before, and it recommends other stuff? It recommended something for me. A book. Called "You Are Worthless."

I'll just go to Barnes & Noble next time.

More.

It's been requested that I put up the rest of my yo-yo publicity pics. I just have two more.

First the straight-laced one, for conservative clients who like smiley, clean-cut young men:


And finally the dramatic shot.


I've gotten a few names from folks who are coming to the show on Friday. If you still want to come, let me know by midday tomorrow (Thursday) so I can add you and send the list off to the good folks at BYU Athletics.

Friday. You should come.

On Friday I'm going to be performing my yo-yo show at the BYU women's gymnastics meet. If you'd like to go, I can put you on the guest list and you'll get in free. They told me I can bring as many people as I want, so don't hold back. I just need the names of anybody who'd like to go.

The meet is at 7:00, this Friday (the 12th). I'll be performing after the first rotation, so probably like 7:20.

It should be pretty rad. See you there...

Another breaking news story, brought to you by the Daily Universe

This headline made today's paper:

Fry Sauce: A Tradition of Utah Cuisine

This might beat the story about whether students prefer bagels or Jamba Juice.

I thought I wouldn't like this.

You've probably seen this game--Guitar Hero. I played it yesterday, and I was pretty sure I'd hate it. The jist is that it's just like DDR, except that instead of doing things with your feet, you "play" them on this guitar thing. You don't look all that cool when you're playing it, unless you're totally rocking out. But it was really fun.

The cool thing is that you play real songs... good ones, too. Mostly classic rock. Like, I walked in and Mike was playing "Carry On My Wayward Son," by Kansas. It was really cool. I mean, you can play Freebird. Freebird.

I think it was a good match for me, too. I play the guitar. And hand-eye coordination is kind of my thing. But if you get the chance to play it, give it a crack. Even if the other guy playing it looks dorky.

And now, an art project.

I used some Christmas money to upgrade my screenprinting equipment, to make t-shirts. To be clear, the Cecil shirts are printed by a company in Pleasant Grove; this is stuff to make shirts myself, which turns out to be a huge kick.

Here's the maiden voyage. I made these for my family, as well as my uncle's family, who I lived with this summer:

The setup was a lot of work. It turns out that photo emulsion is a pretty involved process, but it does allow you to get a lot of detail. Before I was cutting out stencils with an xacto knife, so this was a huge step up. Once it was set up, though, it was really easy to run off a million prints. The only inhibitor at that point is cost. What I think I'll do in the future is let people know when I'm running shirts, and anybody that wants to get in on it can just bring a shirt and chip in on ink. I was so stoked at how fast they went when everything was set up.

The other fun part was that to cure the ink, it has to get up to 300 degrees. I solved this problem by personally baking each one of these shirts, in my mom's oven, at 300 degrees.

These pictures don't do them justice, either. They turned out really nice.

Out with the old.

The clock rolled over to midnight a few minutes ago, and a new year began. It's not going to make a lot of things different--mostly I'm going to be writing the wrong year on things for a while. The change is enough, though, to mark a time to reflect.

I'm the kind of guy that is never satisfied to be living in the present, and instead dedicates all his attention to where he'd like to be in the future. And yet, when I find that I've moved into the future I've been blessed way beyond what I'd hoped for before, and I realize how low I'd been aiming before. I've been so blessed. And a year ago, I'd have never thought things would be going so well for me now.

I'm grateful for a lot of people and what I've learned from them. It's tradition to list those people, and I know that I always read those lists carefully to see if I've made someone's awesome-people list. I'm pretty sure I'd leave someone off, though, so rest assured that if you're reading this blog then you'd have been included, and if you feel that you deserve a special dispensation above other less-important people, then pretend that I've also noted that here.

I'm not the kind of guy that says this kind of thing well, or often enough, but thanks. Thanks for being who you are and doing what you do for me.

Chocolate Tasting, Day 3

The results are in! Let's take a look.

It was a tough fight, right to the end. The lame chocolates, including the one that tasted like peas, were out, and it was down to the all-stars. The kings. The Contenders.

Kudos to the Belgians, who placed second for the second year in a row. A solid country, I must say--maybe not #1 material, but they're hanging in there. Same with Spain--#4 two years in a row now--and hey, look at Papua New Guinea, the Cinderella team! Hitting the top three!

1. Perugina, Italy (??%)
2. Guylian, Belgium (60%)
3. Daskalides, Papua New Guinea (72%)
4. Valor, Spain (70%)

But most of all... congratulations to Italy, this year's Greatest Nation in the World!

You should probably read this right now.

http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,650219029,00.html

Maybe it wasn't so bad.

Since returning from my mission, I've looked back at my teenage years as a reasonably undesirable time--a time of social awkwardness and rampant emotions and intolerable high school. I don't think I'm necessarily wrong for thinking that, but I'm starting to put it into perspective.

I was at my Grandma's this evening with a great deal of extended family, and headlining among the hubbub were three of my cousins, all sixteen years old. I noticed them especially because they were having a blast. I was having a good time--everybody was having a good time--but they were having a really good time. And it made me revisit, nostagically, my teenage years. And I figured out what the difference is.

When I was a teenager, I had all the same awkwardness and insecurities as I do now, but they didn't matter and I knew it.

Girls were a point of concern, but I also was aware (at least subconsciously) that I was in a social training ground, and that I likely wasn't going to pick out my future wife at the time. School was a concern, but I'd learned through experience that good grades were easy to get if you played the game, and I knew well that my high school GPA would soon become moot. Finances were a concern, but not really--I only really worked during the summers, and I didn't have any real expenses outside of going to the movies and buying Christmas presents once a year.

These things have all come to a head now, though, and that's what makes now different from my care-free teenage years. It's time to play ball: I'm looking for a girl to marry, graduating college, and looking to nail down a good job that will start me on a pleasantly prosperous career. And it's all really, really hard.

I never thought I'd look back fondly on being a teenager. But maybe it wasn't as awful as I thought.

Chocolate Tasting, Day 2

A dramatic day.

1. Perugina, Italy (??%)
2. Daskalides, Papua New Guinea (72%)
3. Guylian, Belgium (60%)
4. Valor, Spain (70%)
5. Hershey's Extra Dark, U.S. (60%)
6. Ghiradelli, U.S. (72%)
   

But what does it all mean? Who will be the Greatest Nation in the World?

Perugina made a big push today--rising from #6 yesterday (and barely qualifying for this round) to holding a significant lead in first place. It looks unbeatable from here. The bad news is that the Americans pulled in dead last, and won't qualify for the finals. We decided to advance four chocolates to the finals because the gap between 3 and 4 was pretty small. So really, only the Americans got cut.

Tune in tomorrow to discover the identity of the Greatest Nation in the World.

Chocolate Tasting, Day 1

Every year, my family has a chocolate tasting. We get lots of different dark chocolates, from all different countries, and determine a winner through a thoroughly scientific process. The purpose is twofold: (1) To eat a lot of chocolate, and (2) to determine the Greatest Nation in the World. Last year's winner? Russia.

We've taken to doing it in several rounds, with several chocolates eliminated each time. This year, like last year, will be three rounds. We started with twelve different chocolates, and today was Day One. Six advanced to tomorrow's round. Three will then advance to the Finals on Christmas Day.

We (each of the five members of my family) rank the chocolates with an ordinal system, based on our own individual criteria. Here's how they fared. Format is Brand Name, Country of Origin (Percent of Cocoa Solids):

1. Valor, Spain (70%)
2. Daskalides, Papua New Guinea (72%)
3. Hershey's Extra Dark, U.S. (60%)
4. Guylian, Belgium (60%)
5. Ghiradelli, U.S. (72%)
6. Perugina, Italy (??%)
7. Hershey's Cacao Reserve, U.S. (65%)
8. Villars, Switzerland (72%)
9. Korkunov, Russia (72%) - Last year's winner
10. Droste, Holland (75%)
11. Scharffen Berger, U.S. (60%)
12. Lindt, Switzerland (70%)

Allow me to point out the highlights: The U.S. still has two in the running. I think we've still got a shot at being the Greatest Nation in the World. Also, look what happened to the Russians. They've sure gone downhill in just one year.

Tune in tomorrow for further results.