Just do it

Taking pictures is so fun! Seriously, nothing is better than going out and trying to get the right photograph. Well, I guess the only thing better is going out trying to get a great picture with the one you love, who is also trying to get the right picture.

Me and my girlfriend have been going on these "photography dates," where we go around towns, farms, and nature preserves taking pictures. It has given us something very constructive and fulfilling to do while on a date.

We both took intro to digital photography classes last semester, and these dates have kind of been the results. We gone around Davis, Sacramento, old town Franklin, Lake Berryessa, the Sacramento Delta, San Francisco, Santa Cruz, and Monterrey so far in our trips.

It really makes a huge difference to have someone with you working through the same challenges that come with photography, like getting out and taking pictures. Having someone with you makes you get out and just do it.

Check out my Flickr here- http://www.flickr.com/photos/cecilio_padilla/

Hannah taking pictures at the Sacramento River

This is it...

So I passed. It doesn't seem real yet, but passing all my classes this semester without failing any means that I am going to UC Davis for sure. No rescinding. No more bitching and moaning about wasting my time at a community college (even though I didn't). No more waiting around. This time it is finally happening.

A
A
B
B
C

That final 'C' was in the class I was most worried about. Logic and Critical Thinking. Kind of ironic, since if I thought logically, I could have seen that I never got lower than a 'C' in any of the tests (although I never got higher than one either). Which would mean that there was pretty much no way I was going to get lower than at least a 'C' in that class. But for the past few days (as I was waiting for those final grades to come out) I had been agonizing over my fate in that class.

Looking back on this semester, I still have those same woes that I usually have at the end of the term. The "oh, I know I could have done better" thoughts and feelings, because I know I could have if I had just tried a little harder in each of those classes I got less than an 'A'. But such is life. We can't dwell on things a little as that. The bigger picture is that I passed. I passed. I passed. I can't repeat that to myself enough. I passed...

I am totally elated by passing for the simple fact that back in high school, I was accepted and ready to go to UC Santa Cruz. Only, fate didn't have it that way. I failed my Intro to Analysis class (pre-calculus) and Santa Cruz rescinded my acceptance. I didn't really feel like fighting it, because in the back of my mind I guess I really kind of wanted to go to Sacramento City College. But throughout the rest of my mind, thoughts about "oh, what a fucking failure" were the most prevalent, seeping into the fabric of my being and defining my personality for the first few semesters I was at City College.

That feeling of failure lingered for quite awhile in my semesters at City, but slowly, it was chipped away by the experience that I think will come to define me for the rest of my life: The Express.

Never before has an experience like I had there been so rewarding, so reinvigorating, and yet so frustrating. I can still remember my first day three years ago like if it were only this past week, or even just a few hours ago. Walking around with Hannah, killing time before the Express started, sitting around, seeing all of these unfamiliar faces, some of them kind of weird. I never thought I'd look back at this time nostalgically, but it has become that far disconnected (if that's the right word). From our dealings with Brown Issues, to me becoming Editor in Chief, to more dealings with Brown Issues, to the anti-abortion protesters, to me becoming Editor in Chief of the online class, and all the other stuff both Express and non-Express related, I feel like I've been through way more than someone working at a community college publication should have been through. But, don't get me wrong, I am so glad I went through it. Call it a trial by fire or whatever, but thanks to all of those experiences, for better or worse, I learned immensely from them.

Anyway, through all of that, how can I say that my time at City College was a waste of time? I can't even believe I thought that when I first started there. This place was anything but a waste of time. Yes, I've changed my major plenty of times; from journalism to film, to theatre arts, back to journalism, then to political science. But thanks to the IGETC, I still finished in only three years, what I would think is the average time for people to get their general ed's out of the way here even if they do call these "2-year schools". This place was the farthest from a waste of time that you could get.

In the end, yeah, I am still a bit bummed that I missed out on a lot of those experiences that my fellow DHS alumni were able to be a part of that so define college life. But, I can still make up for it a UCD. Two years doesn't seem like a lot of time. But if I learned anything from City College, it's that you've got to make the most of the time you're given; whether it's because you're dangerously balancing work and school (and family, and other obligations), or because you've only got so much financial aid (or any money for that matter) to take classes, or because you just want to get the most out of your education. It's time to make up for lost time...

Me, kind of being a dork at the Express

Losing sleep

Holy crap, I can't believe it, but the semester's already coming to an end. Today was my last day of regular instruction in any of my classes, and next week is finals. I need to get at least a 2.8 in my transferable classes in order to stay accepted at UC Davis. I don't think I'm doing too poorly in any of my classes so that I might fail like I did second semester of senior year, the thing that made me go to Sac City in the first place. So, in my crazed quest to not repeat the past, I've been finishing my homework all up. Of course, it would have been a good idea to stay on track and turn in everything earlier, but I guess that's not how I roll. I just have to make things interesting in the end...

I'm really trying to stay on top of my game. I still procrastinate way more than I should, but I'm starting to get that sense of urgency that I can't waste any more time. I will have to make up for the time that I didn't spend at UCD. Two years seems really short, but that's all I have. I've been going over financial stuff, and quite frankly I don't really have any time to waste, because it would be a huge financial burden on my family and myself if I can't finish on time. I spent an extra year at SCC, so hopefully that kind of makes up for some of the stuff I might need to finish, but I can't go blindly into things anymore. I have to stay in touch with my counselors, I have to keep track of all deadlines, I have to be on top of my game. This doesn't seem like it will be an easy feat...

Also, today was my last day of being Editor in Chief of SacCityExpress.com, the school newspaper's website. I must say, it was a lot more fun than being editor of the newspaper. I think online journalism fits me so much more than the usual print journalism. It's just something about being constantly on the clock, not just trying to meet the usual press time deadline. This class really restored my love of journalism, mainly because it introduced me to a whole bunch of new ways to tell a story. Writing is still the absolute most basic skill in how we can tell a story (and the thing that everyone should learn first) but at the dawn of the digital age, there are so many more ways now to tell a story. Indeed, this class has really drawn me away from my roots as a writer, but it has also made me combine my love of videography with journalism. I'm curious to see where journalism goes from here, but I think I'll be at the forefront of wherever it goes...

Past, present, and future

So, I was rejected from UC Berkeley. Not much of a surprise, but it was still a little depressing to log into the admission site and see that message...

So, that makes me 2 for 4, a .500 batting average. I've already decided where I'm going, however. GO AGGIES!!!

I'm going to write a little more on this later, but it feels right, going to UCD I mean. It feels like I was meant to go there eventually.

Also, on Monday, I made it through my last production day at the Express. I must say, I'm probably going to miss it a lot. 5 out of my 6 semesters were spent in that trailer. I calculated it out a little while ago, and I found that I have spent around a total of a month's worth of hours in that place, and that's the low estimate.

I'm not saying I wasted my time there or anything. I'm just saying damn, how time flies...

Batting average

So far, I've gotten into Sac State and UC Davis, and have been rejected by only UC Santa Barbara. That's 2/3, or .667 batting average. Pretty freaking good if you ask me, although if I compare it to how it was when I applied to college in high school, I only got into 2 out of the 6, which comes out to a .333 average. I guess I'm just psyched about it finally being baseball season again, I'm not exactly sure.

I'm still waiting on Berkeley, which is supposed to send out decisions on Friday, but I'm not really worried to really anxious at this point. I'm in at UCD, which for some reason, was the only one I truly really cared about. Something tells me that even if I got in at Berkeley, I would still choose Davis over it. How bizarre...

Listen to the music

A 70s Ventura Barney Kessel copy, an imitation of a Gibson guitar of the same name.


It took my uncle a whole year to finish it, but it's finally done.

You see, a friend of mine gave me this guitar for my 20th birthday. It was in absolutely putrid shape at that point. She kept it in her garage for a good part of the year, without a case. Before that, her dad (the original owner) kept it in storage for a good long while as well, out of the case. I'm not exactly sure why they were so hell-bent on destroying this guitar, but they pretty much succeeded.

When I first got this guitar, it had the wrong kind of strings on it (someone somehow stretched piano wire on it), the electronics were all shot (the pick-ups were pretty much fried), the jack somehow found it's way loose and was rattling around inside, and the neck was pretty much unplayable.

Well, somehow, my uncle go it back to at least playable shape. He replaced the pick-ups with some Epiphone ones that work and have a great warmth to them, he rewired everything so that it actually plays, he fixed the bend in the neck, and overall just cleaned the poor soul up. It is now it pretty respectable condition, although there is still a lot of work I would like done on it.

I'm considering taking it to a real luthier, but for now, as long as it plays, I guess I can deal with it.

Maybe I'll get my first gig sometime soon. Who knows?

Picnic Day, 2010

I'm on the fence about drinking. I guess I'm just not a fan of it.

You see, a few days ago now was the annual Davis tradition of Picnic Day. For years, the only thing I really knew of it was the cute little parade that marches through downtown. As a kid, this was the most bitchin' thing about Davis, because when the floats would trot on by, we would spray the ones we liked with silly string. As we got older, some of my friends would spray the floats with water guns. Eventually they outlawed silly string, not because of the people in the floats complaining, but because planners found that cleaning up the string was way too much of a hassle...

Anyway, once we got even older, we realized that the real reason so many people converged on Davis that day was because of all the crazy parties that would go on at the frat houses and bars. As a teenager, this was a mild curiosity, looking on at possible analogs of myself as the flopped along from bar to bar, hitting on any piece of ass they saw along the way. In my mind I was thinking, will I really be that way when I am of that age?

Well, I guess not, and thankfully so. I can count the number of alcoholic drinks I've had on one hand, and quite frankly I don't really plan on making that number grow exponentially, even though I turned 21 this past January.

To be even more frank, the novelty of even watching people drink and flop around wears thin after 3 years of college. As me and my girlfriend were riding our bikes to the parade at around 10 in the morning of this past Picnic Day, we must have passed by at least 3 houses where people were already playing beer pong. Is the only this day exists is for people to have an excuse to drink? Maybe it's because I haven't really let loose in my life, some friends of mine would probably say, but I don't really feel the need to let loose in that way. I want to be in control of my actions. I am afraid of what I would do if I were drunk.

I don't know if I will come off as an asshole or something, but one other thing about the drinking part of Picnic Day that annoys the hell out of me is how it brings all of these totally douche-bag-ish people to Davis who I know, I know! don't even go to UCD. There was this group of absolutely sketch-ass mother fuckers who set up camp in the middle of Central Park as me and my girlfriend were leaving downtown. Maybe they were just having a good time, but from what I heard from the cops later on was that quite a few groups, probably them included, go kind of rowdy and tazers were deployed on some people. While as an advocate for civil rights and everything, sometimes some people have it coming.

What this rant is really trying to get at is that even though I such easy access to alcohol, that even though quite a few of my friends are total drunkards and would totally love it if I "loosened up" and knocked back a few, I don't feel the need to at all. It's weird, really. Something inside of me is saying that "what would be the harm?" While the other, much bigger side of me, is saying "don't betray your beliefs." I'm not talking about religious beliefs, I'm just talking about the belief I have that I don't need alcohol to be a "cool" person.

I am so glad that me and my girlfriend still had fun at Picnic Day without drinking, or even getting near a single drop of alcohol. Granted, the drunks walking around that day were worth a chuckle or two. But I just hope that at least some of them can see that life doesn't have to be enjoyed in a haze where you don't really remember what you did last night.

I am no crazy religious conservative asking for temperance, I'm just a person who doesn't feel the need to drink alcohol.













This picture pretty much sums of Picnic Day; drunkards everywhere...