02.28.08
What Does Your Screen Name Say About You?
I just started work on a new show produced by a different production company from the last show I was on. As a result, I’m interacting with a whole new group of people. A new staff list is being generated and I’m being asked for my contact information quite frequently. I’m scared one of these times someone’s going to ask for my instant messenger screen name. We use IM within our department quite a bit, but if anyone outside my department asks for my screen name, I’ll probably turn several shades of red.
I’m not ashamed of my screenname, it just isn’t very, well, professional. Its only previous use has been personal conversations with my friends and family. I think I made it up in 10th grade. To give you a clue, part of it comes from my favorite Disney princess. Nothing to make you seem younger in the workplace like a fairy tale monkier.
I began brainstorming a list of possible new screennames, but haven’t been able to settle on one yet. I came up with one I liked, but it included a French city and I want one that’s easy to spell, so when I verbally tell people they don’t have to ask how to spell it multiple times. Then I had trouble walking the fine line between “mature” and “bland”. I want one that says something about my personality, but not one that’s too silly or seemingly immature. I came up with some based on some of my favorite films, but “HighSociety” might give co-workers the wrong impression about my humility, “ItHappenedOneNight” sounds a little sketchy if you don’t know it’s 1934’s Best Picture. I thought “HisGirlFriday” would be cute and snappy, but it was already taken.
As I struggled to come up with a viable choice, I realized just how many things should be considered when coming up with a screenname, or an email address for that matter, especially when it’s going to be used in the workplace. At first it seems silly to read so much into something as simple as a screenname, but when I realized that several people in the production company will get a copy of the staff list with my screen name before they ever meet me, it became much more important to give the right first impression and make sure what my screenname says about me is truly how I want to present myself in the workplace.
02.26.08
A Perspective On Best Picture
After being let down at the ”No Country For Old Men” win at the Academy Awards ceremony last night, I felt compelled to revisit the list of Best Picture winners, and more interestingly, Best Picture nominees. I’m finding that often, the jewels are to be found in the nominees, not necessarily the winners.
For example, take 1940. “Rebecca”, Hitchcock’s first American picture takes the cake. Now, I love Hitchcock. I love Daphne Du Maurier whose novel the film is based on. “Rebecca” is a good film. It’s well-made, well-acted, and tells an interesting story. However, “Rebecca” never ranks in the top five Hitchcock movies, so I’m a little puzzled on how it beat films like “The Grapes of Wrath”, “The Letter”, and “The Philadelphia Story”.
Then there’s 1941. “How Green Was My Valley” took home the top prize. I have never seen this film, but my dad speaks highly of it, and he has good taste in movies, so I’m sure it’s a fine film. Also nominated that year? “The Maltese Falcon” and a little movie called “Citizen Kane”.
Or there’s another problem. Too many amazing movies were made in one year. Enter 1939. While “Gone With the Wind” – my favorite movie of all time – was deserving in it’s Best Picture win, the remaining nominees are some of the best movies ever – “Dark Victory”, “Goodbye Mr. Chips”, “Love Affair”, “Mr. Smith Goes To Washington”, “Ninotchka”, “Stagecoach”, “Of Mice And Men”, “The Wizard Of Oz”, and “Wuthering Heights”. (They used to nominate a lot more films for Best Picture.) There may have been one winner, but there were no losers in 1939.
Other notable losers from miscellaneous years: “It’s A Wonderful Life”, “Sunset Boulevard”, and ”To Kill A Mockingbird”.
Let “Citizen Kane” be our lesson – at one time, it couldn’t beat out a handful of other movies, but now it beats out every other movie ever made.
02.09.08
Couples crossing over
I only have internet connection for a brief amount of time, but I wanted to post something I heard on NPR the morning after Super Tuesday. A reporter was recapping her conversations with voters from the primaries the night before, and she noticed that for the majority of couples with whom she spoke, the trend was that the husband voted for Clinton and the wife voted for Obama. I found that very interesting, and actually a colleague of mine said he and his wife were the exact same way. Obviously this is only one reporter out of hundreds who noticed this trend, but I wonder why the men were the ones willing to accept the idea of a female president. Is it that the women could not, or simply that Obama’s stance on certain issues is more appealing? Maybe there’s no conclusion or theory to be drawn from this, but I thought I would throw it out there.
02.05.08
Super Tuesday
Just a friendly reminder that today is voting day for all those living in “Super Tuesday” states.
I’m attempting to stay away from the insta-pundits on the cable news networks today. No doubt they’ll try to make a dramatic mess out of everything while “projecting” the winner before any other network.
There are still many hours to go until polls close. Until then, I’ll be biting my fingernails…
