Bios

As promised, here are the bios for the other two Ninjas. Serious bios are currently up at www.digitalninjasmedia.com, full bio pages will include these bios as well as other fun facts, but its not up yet. Because this is taking a while.

"Jim Gade holds an Associates of Science degree in Graphic Design, as well as a Bachelors Degree in Science for Multimedia from Westwood College. A Harlem Graduate, he also hints vaguely about his time at Wizard College, but only during re-runs of "Mork & Mindy". Currently, he serves as Video Services Manager for the Rockford Ice Hogs, has earned top-honors in art competitions, has work on public display, and has had photographic works published. When not working, Jim enjoys asking strangers for candy and painting impressionistic interpretations of what he calls 'giraffes snuggling'. You'll have to take his word on that because, to most outside observers, it just looks like six crazed ferrets fighting over what might conceivably be a banjo."

"Dave Block is a graduate of Guilford High School, and Owner-Extraordinaire of independent film production company, 'Block Films'. His acting career began in 1987 when he was cast in 'Peter Pan' at Rock Valley College's Starlight Theater, and he continued to be cast in numerous other roles until he took some time off to get a real job. After a string of management positions, he returned to writing music, and movies, and is currently working on a book. He has also written, starred in, and directed the 'Insurance King' commercials, where he played the ever-so-popular "Insurance Geek" (fighting crime and high insurance rates!) and an entire stand-up routine on being the middle child, "Middle Child Syndrome". It is an epidemic that he feels more people need to acquaint themselves with - preferably by buying tickets to his show. His 3rd Feature film, "The Adventures Of Wyatt Trash: The Devil's Spittoon" is currently in the works. And if you call him David, you will be challenged to a marathon Connnect-Four session, or be faced with listening to a saxophone solo of Billy Joel's, "It's Still Rock And Roll To Me". So we really don't recommend that you do that."

More Fun Business Stuff

Work on the Digital Ninjas Media website is coming along. We have no graphics and no photos yet, but its up. Part of it anyway. I'm still working on it. Yeah, its not great, yet.

Once we get pictures and graphics, it will hopefully look great.

Last night, I designed our business cards, and I'm pretty happy with them, I must say. We're getting quotes on getting them printed and should have cards by the middle to end of next week.

Now.... since I never finished the bios... Here's mine:
Wanda K. Alberts is a graduate of Winnebago High School, and a certified paralegal. She has come from, "Thank you! Drive through!" to be a force for social change via her not-for-profit and community outreach project, 'Tailored To Hire'. She has been known to slip into Japanese or Spanish in casual conversation, and cannot make Rice Krispie Treats without coming away with battle scars. She is experienced with Web Design, Marketing, Business Management, and more software packages than a Nerf display. She currently divides her time between work and plotting to take over one of the lesser moons of Jupiter and... oh, we've said too much.

Stay tuned for bios of Jim Gade and Dave Block!

We Have A Logo!

We are pleased to announce the logo for Digital Ninjas Media!

Get to know Digital Ninjas Media! Today: Heath

Heath D. Alberts is a graduate of Boylan High School, and a college dropout. He has been employed in a vast number of interesting positions, including Unix Mainframe SysOp, web site designer, Corporate Operations Manager, and cartoon character. He is the author of a novel, has experienced house flipping, and has been known to shoot bottle rockets out of his teeth. He is experienced with HTML, too many software packages and OS's to name, Marketing, a Wand Of Fire with a 2xD12 damage roll, and Business Management. And now he's taken on the mantle of, 'Guy who makes sure that your advertising dollar is so well spent that you just might plotz.'

Heath fun fact #127:
Did you know that Heath once held a Realtor's license?
After saving box tops for nearly 3 years, he realized that prize was not a valid license, so he attended classes in Rockford and finally achieved his goal.

Heath Fun Fact #3
Heath is a certified NRA Sharpshooter. 'nuff said.

Heath Fun Fact #87
Even though he is afraid of heights, Heath once strapped a lazy-eyed Dutchman to his back and fell out of a plane.

Official Announcement

Heath and I, along with two friends, Dave Block and Jim Gade, would like to formally announce the formation of Digital Ninjas Media, Inc.

Below is Heath's "announcement"

It is now a matter of public record. We will be supplying the area with turn-key media production: Television commercials, radio spots, web page design, media space design, viral marketing strategy, and anything else we feel that we can assist our potential clients with.

Dave Block is the founder of Block Films, an independent filmmaker with several comedy gems under his belt in the Wyatt Trash series. Dave has done not only movie production, editing, and sound, but has also spent a good deal of his life as an actor.

Jim Gade is an old friend whom I look forward to re-connecting with more in the near-term. If any of you have ever been to a Rockford Ice Hogs game, you've seen Jim's work (we'll have a whole working archive of all of our works once the page for the company begins to form up and go live). He handles all of the media production for them - digital and otherwise - and is some kind of alien/wizard hybrid when it comes to digital graphic design.

If a Song Could Be President

"John Prine would run the FBI" - Over The Rhine

A few weeks ago, my boss was announced as the new Chairman of the Winnebago County Republican Central Committee.

You may, or may not, remember that in 2009 he briefly ran for State Representative of the 68th District. (I wrote his webpage and was working on the campaign). He ran due to the announcement that Dave Winters would not be running for the position again. When Winters changed his mind and announced his candidacy for reelection, my boss decided that, since he fully supported Winters, he would not run against him and dropped out. It was understandable, but disappointing for me as this was a wonderful opportunity and experience.

Two weeks ago, the Event Coordinator for the WCRCC announced she had found a new position. As this is an extremely part-time position (roughly 3 to 4 hours a week), when the announcement was made in our office, I semi-jokingly said I'd do it.

Friday, for the third time that week, my boss said that if I was interested he could change the hours that someone needed to be in the office (once a week for a few hours) so that I wouldn't lose much time at work, and could easily make up the hours.

After discussing with Husband, I will be submitting my Letter of Interest tomorrow and finalizing details to confirm this will, in fact, work with my schedule.

Worse than a 10-year-old with a fair prize...

My ghost shrimp died yesterday. First one, then the other. I think they got a little too warm, but I'm not really sure.

Our power went out a little after 6:00 Tuesday evening. Just after my migraine hit. By 9:00 I had spent a large amount of time trying to sleep through the neighbor girl play catch in our yard just below my bedroom window (because her big, fenced-in backyard wasn't good enough for her) and had finally asked Heath if there was anything he could do about whatever was beeping in the house every minute or so.

I decided that, since the air wasn't on, and the upper level was getting a bit warm, I should move the fish, snail and shrimp(s) to the lower level. So I piled them all into the 1 gallon bowl I use when cleaning the tank and brought them downstairs where it was cooler. Of course, just over an hour later, the power came back on.

I left them in the bowl overnight, thinking I'd get them settled back in the tank Wednesday evening. I was completely out of it (see "migraine" above), but I do know that they were swimming around happily in the bowl before I left for work in the morning. However, I returned home to 1 less shrimp than when I left (the dead one having been given a "flush funeral" by Husband...thank you!). The other appeared happy and healthy, but less than an hour later, she too was gone.

So this weekend, I plan on setting up the corner tank so that I can take another try at raising baby ghost shrimp, and then begin the hunt for a store that is not out of stock. Hopefully, I'll find one with eggs. We'll see how that goes.

I'm bad at this

2+ months. So much for my plans to keep up-to-date.

A quick fill in... I now have two ghost shrimp, since Lou has passed. Both females, and both had eggs when I got them. I tried to raise the babies, and even found a couple of the super tiny, see-through guys a few days after the hatching, but they didn't survive the week.

I am working to reinstate the anonymous work blog, and that will hopefully be up and running soon. I just can't make some of these stories up!

Other than that, I am trying to maintain a drama-free life. I think I would be able to achieve this goal, if it weren't for the overwhelming drama others seem to bring to the table. And now, somehow, I find myself being the bad guy, which is more than confusing to me. I'm 34. I do not need to be put in a position where my friend(s) are mad at me and I don't know why. To quote my sister-in-law "Sometimes when people are in the wrong and they know it, they act very childish." I hope it passes, but if not, I'll live.

I'm trying to market and grow both the Tailored To Hire and Virtual Assistant businesses, which seems to have taken over my weekend, and will probably continue to do so. I will continue to post when I manage to drag my lazy self to the site, so until next time... Have a wonderful, yet drama-free, week!

Dance, Burger Boy!

I've been working on developing Job Skills Preparation classes in partnering with RootsUp. So far, I have each of the classes' main topic, a summary of what each class will teach, and a variety of information thrown unorganizationally (is that a word) into an MSWord document.

Also, it has changed from being "classes" to being a seminar. It's a learning process, I suppose there will be more changes as it forms.

In December, I finally broke down and purchased a used Blackberry Curve. I love it. I'm a technological nerd. I love being able to say I learned to type at the age of 10 on a commodore 64 (with 128 mode). And I drool over the next newest gadget (Blackberry Playbook, anyone?)

I also decided to purchase friends for my fish, Ryuk. I have a snail. This is the second snail, actually. The first one was our friend. Husband liked snail, Ryuk liked snail, I liked snail and I believe Cheyenne liked snail. She was a good snail. Then she spent a day not moving and it wasn't long before we determined she was dying. It took a whole week (apparently they die as slow as they move), it was sad. So we bought a new one, and while I was there I decided to buy a ghost shrimp. It looked evil at first, but now he's just cool. He's see-through, and it's really gross to watch him eat, since you can see the food in his body. They have names, now, too. I had one name picked out, but I didn't know which one to apply the name to, and I didn't want to name one without the other, so I held onto it. Until two weekends ago. Knitter-in-law was visiting and when I told her the name issue, she said that I should name the Ghost Shrimp "Lou". Hence, I have a Ghost Shrimp named Lou. The snail is now named Menchi. Menchi was a dog from an anime series. In the show, a poor girl finds the dog and takes it home with the intention of eating it. However, on the way, she stumbles upon food. She takes the dog home and decides to keep it as her Emergency Food Supply. She names it Menchi.

Along the lines of filling in holes, an old high school friend is back in the picture. Her daughter contacted me via facebook one night and the rest is history. However, she has decided to make the change from one version of shortening her name to another version. Boy is that hard to get used to. So far, I'm not doing so good with that...

I finally got my hands on a garden gnome, and I'm currently waiting for Husband to use the bathroom... I decided I could get away with the lame gnome-on-the-toilet prank this time since he doesn't even know we have one. I did take a picture of him with a razor taped to his hands that will become the background on his laptop tomorrow morning before I leave for work.

I think that catches us up for now. Now, if I can just keep up with it!

I'm back

Yes. I am back. With a goal of posting at least once a month, a plan to redesign the page, and no reason as to why.

Coming soon:

Tailored To Hire Partnering With RootsUp.

Old friend / New Name.

Why my Ghost Shrimp is named Lou.

and more!

So don't miss out on this exciting(?) reinstatement!

Yay me!

Cheyenne says Hi.

I finally get settled in with my notes and laptop; ready to type away and the cat takes over.  Settled half on my keyboard and half on my arms, this will be quite a challenge. But I have procrastinated long enough, so here it is:

January 20th
Wednesday
I stopped at the local store this morning to pick up soft lotion kleenexes thanks to my lovely cold and noticed that the lane which is usually open is now closed.  In fact, they are all closed.  My only option is the self checkout lane, which I avoid like the plague.  Jobs are hard enough to come by these days, why not find other ways to get rid of low paying jobs and help others join the unemployed crowd.

January 21st
Thursday
Sometimes during lunch I like to go relax on one of the two couches in our building.  I have a favorite, due to the fact that the room is usually hovering around 80 or so (I so love warmth) The office right next to the room this particular couch is in is used by the Baptist Association and today he was searching the web listening to several politicians and the Baptist view of them. Interesting.

January 22nd
Friday
We have renters in our building at work.  One of these is a process server and another is another attorney.  The secretary for the attorney and the process server apparently used to date way back in the day.  She’s married now and happy.  Today, I saw them kiss. Sort of.  It was a friendly sort of thing but definitely shocking to someone who didn’t know and wasn’t expecting that sort of thing.

January 23rd
Saturday
Heath used my label-maker.  It made me giddy with organizational joy.

January 24th
Sunday
I went to pick up some clothes that was donated to <a href=”http:\\tailoredtohire.com”>Tailored To Hire</a> and as I was returning home some handicap driver pulled out in front of me.  Then almost ran into a parked car.

January 25th
Monday
I have been trying to train Ryuk (my fish) to eat out of my hand. I stick of piece of his “treats” on my finger and dangle it in the water.  Today, he took it from me!

January 26th
Tuesday
Today I got to see a lady just barely make it outside of a public building before throwing up. All over the sidewalk.

January 27th
Wednesday
For Christmas I got the attorney’s in my office something they were passionate about.  They each got a picture of something that they hollered and yelled about all year long.  In one case, it was a picture of someone who had no business in our building parked in our parking lot.  Today, the attorney finally had enough and went outside to tell her she couldn’t park there anymore. Just as the bus pulled up dropping off her child.

January 28th
Thursday
My cat threw up everywhere today.  By the time I got home, my husband had it all cleaned up, but there were paper towels warning of wet spots scattered throughout the house. Yuck.

January 29th
Friday
I really don’t have much for today other than watching people try to be lazy and cut across the work parking lot only to realize they can’t get through because of the snow and they have to turn around. Exciting, I know.

January 30th
Saturday
My Knitter-in-law’s birthday celebration.  We went to a yummy restaurant where I ate food I had never eaten before. We hung out and had a good time. Keen.

January 31st – February 5th
I appear to be missing my notes from January 31st through February 5th and since I am writing this on March 9th there is no way I am going to remember this.  To be posted later????

February 6th
Saturday
My day was spent with my new laptop! It’s pink and shiny and perfect!

February 7th
Sunday
Today was spent with my laptop still. Setting it up and fun stuff. My husband is keen.

February 8th
Monday
We have very fat squirrels at work. But they’re cute, especially when they drink out of puddles.

February 9th
Tuesday
Our neighbor (from down the street) snow-blowed our driveway today. Thanks, Tyler! Our snow-blower has gone to … wherever snow-blowers go to when they are no more.

February 10th
Wednesday
Our receptionist had to shovel today.  She hurts herself walking from one room to another, she doesn’t go a week without dropping and/or spilling a can of soda, she is over 50 and has very bad knees, but she was asked to shovel.

February 11th
Thursday
I received a call today from our of counsel attorney’s husband.  I told him she was not there and his response was:

“Oh. Well I’ll tell you what I needed, I was just wondering what size mitten I should get.”

I told him I was sorry, but I really didn’t know.  And that was our conversation.

February 12th
Friday
My brother-in-law and his wife came up and we watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics.  It was fun and horrible all at the same time.

February 13th
Saturday
We played Wii Bowling with my brother-in-law and his wife. Finally, something I can beat them at.

February 14th
Sunday
Today I watched more Olympic fun.

February 15th
Monday
Food Pantry!  Tonight I worked on cleaning off shelves in a storage closet and hid from some people.  It was nice.

And I will leave you with that. Still almost a month behind, but better than it was!