Three month's ago, I wrote a blog post...

Hello dear people of Earth. No, I have not vanished from the face of the planet, however apparent this blog may make that reality seem. Three month's ago, on January 1, 2016, I wrote a blog post about my favorite music of the year 2015. That post was immediately followed by a bizarre chain of events that I could not have predicted if I tried.

First, I went back to school. Last year I graduated from university and received my BA degree in digital media communications. Unsure what to do after college, I decided to go back to my junior college to take two additional courses. See, I was one class away from an associates degree, and I thought I might as well complete that degree while I had the chance. I also just wanted to take a photojournalism class for fun.

So here we are, a college graduate back in college, and on top of that, I have been taking a lot of pictures. A lot. From festivals and parades to sporting events and street photography, my days are filled with taking pictures.

And yet, I am at a point where I have nearly no money and my future career is a haze of grey fog and  uncertainty. Yet I continue to progress along this path because it makes me happy now. Perhaps one day I will wake up and think, "if only I had gotten a job, worked a normal career and made lots of money, I would be in a better situation now".

Maybe that is true. But the reason that I am writing this post is because I feel like that is a flawed outlook on life. If all we do is prepare for a future that may or may not ever happen, at the expense of out current happiness, what is the point?

See, I think life is about learning and growing and, yes, being happy. If you are not happy, change something until you are. That does not mean quitting your job and leaving everything up to chance, however slowly changing things in your life that make you unhappy and adding things that make you happy is vastly important. Sure, you might be sacrificing some future savings or you might be giving up a stable job, but is your personal happiness and well being worth it? For me, the answer is absolutely not.

So I don't have a traditional job. I work when I can and use whatever money I do have to support myself and no, I will likely not have a lush and comfortable retirement. In fact, I don't even know if I will be able to support myself next month. But I am happier now that I have been my entire time at university.

Just something to think about.

Until next time,
-David.

The Shade (New Metric Song)

More or less, I have just one week left until my BA is finally a thing. Granted, there is a lot of work that I need to do before then, however, as one of the staples of this blog is music, I wanted to take a moment to mention the new single from Metric, called "The Shade."

This new song from one of my favorite bands has been on repeat for about 3 days now, and I literally can't get enough of it. If this song is representative of what their new EP or album will sound like, well let me just say that we are in for a treat.

I Missed January + Radio Show?

So, yah.... January came and went, and I completely forgot to do anything with the blog! To be fair, I was busy moving houses and working, and I honestly just sort of forgot.

In other news, however, it looks like I will have a radio show for the Spring 2015 university semester! That's right, I jot a "job" at KSSU, the college radio station for my university. When the details are finalized (in the next week, hopefully,) I will post all the details here, as well as Twitter. As of now, it will be a 1 hour show every week, and will be streamed online through a service called TuneIn, for which there is a website and an app. (Links to come)

Needless to say, I am excited to get started, and because the station is free form, there is no required playlist that I need to follow. Instead I simply keep track of the songs that I play and can pretty much play whatever I want, as long as I don't violate any FCC regulations for broadcast radio.

Because of this format, I plan of playing songs from a variety of genres and styles, however if you read this blog, you may find that the majority of music that I listen to falls roughly into the Alt/Indi category - fear not, however, as I will do my best to represent as many varying genres as I can.

As I said, I will post an official "Radio Show Announcement" when the time comes, to let you know of all the details and where/when you can tune in to the show. Until then, thanks for reading, and I will talk to you soon.

- David

I'm a strange one...

I often find myself reading some of the most bizarre things, and not for any reason, per say. I was not assigned these readings bey a teacher or professor, nor am I required to read things for work. No, I genuinely enjoy reading some of the most "boring" things on Wikepedia. For instance, I just finished reading the - in my opinion quite interesting - entry on the International Civil Aviation Organization's airport and aircraft identification and naming conventions.

I genuinely find these types of things interesting! Am I weird? Perhaps. But I think we all have interests that are a bit off the beaten path, existing on the fringes of what might be considered "normal" or "mainstream" and I think that that is wonderful. Let me know what you think.

Thanks for reading,

- Dave

Explanations and Excuses

Sitting in Starbucks, I realize that I am far, far behind on this blog. Why? I have no idea. Nor would I attempt to utilize half baked excuses that do little to right the wrong that is me not posting content to this blog. O.K, perhaps not quite so dramatic, however I do feel a sudden desire to post something here and to explain myself and my long absence.

As for the absence, I have begun the fall semester here at school, and, although exciting to think I will be graduating soon, the coursework and number of classes that I have to take in order to graduate when I want to is steadily growing. As such, things like this blog and my YouTube channel have, sadly, taken a back seat. Today, however, I am filled with optimism as I recently got A's on a paper and 2 exams, and realized that perhaps the semester is not all that bad, and I may, just may, have the time required to devote more of myself to endeavors such as the Daily Digit.

In addition, I have, for a long time now, wanted to share my love of all things media with the world through my YouTube channel, however because so mush of what I am interested in is intellectual property of people who are not me, the things that I am able to post on my channel are quite limited in that department. Because of that, I have decided to make this blog all about media, such as film, TV shows, music and the like, and my channel will be dedicated to design, software and educational things (like video tutorials,) as well as, of course, occasional random vlogs and videos.

As we move forward into the fall, I hope to become active once again both on this blog and my YouTube channel. Anything you would like to see either here or there is greatly welcomed as a suggestion, and I would love to hear your thoughts on what I should post here and make videos about over on YouTube.

Thank you all for sticking with me, and I hope to make the long wait for my return will worth the wait. Thanks, and I will talk to you soon.

- David

Music & Emotion

There is a moment while you are listening to a song that you can understand exactly what the singer / songwriter was feeling when they wrote it. All that emotion and energy and feeling is almost palpable. Which asks the question, do songs need to be positive? I think not, but I also wonder what the effects of negative songs might have on society.

Let me explain. A song that I recently heard for the first time is one of these such songs. Negative, depressing and all too catchy. When I first heard the song, the context of what the song meant and the overall feel of the video was different, and I was left thinking, “wow, that is a catchy song, let me look it up,” which I promptly did.

Yes, the song is catchy, but after watching the video, and the remix video, I was left feeling sad and depressed, a strange feeling after listening to the song which, musically, is rather upbeat (especially the remix.)

So what, I asked myself, keeps me clicking replay. Admittedly, the video is well made, and the song is catchy, but why would I want to repeatedly listen to a song about drinking away the pain of a breakup? I honestly don’t know. You might say that it is because the song is so catchy. True in part, but there are plenty of catchy songs in existence with much more positive lyrics, and any number of these is available for me to listen to. So I ask again, why?

I think, for me, it has to do with emotion. When an artist writes songs like these, they do so because they feel something. That emotion and feeling translates itself to the music, which becomes relatable to a listener because of shared experience, or simply because of the human ability to empathize with the artist.

I think that, while negative and depressing songs like this can make a listener feel down, they are important because they allow artists to express their emotions and feelings freely and without inhibition. Do I feel depressed after listening to this song? Yes. But, I also feel a connection to the song and artist on a more human level, and that, I think, is one of the great powers of music in our society. We are able to connect with artists and each other through music.

So, stay high on music my friends, and break the habits that lead to the emotions that end up as songs like this. Without further ado, here is the music video for Habits by Tove Lo as well as the remix video, entitled Stay High.

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Let me know what you think, as well as your thoughts on music and society.

Thanks for reading, and I will talk to you on Monday.
- Digit

I almost forgot this one!

I really just blanked on one important fact relating to this blog. It is, in fact, Monday, a day on which I am to post to the daily digit! At least, it is according to my own rules. At any rate, I guess I am still stuck in the weekend, as I completely forgot! But not all is lost, as I remembered in time, as as such, here we are!

Today, I want to talk about something that has been on my mind for a few days. That is, the school season. For some reason, I am oddly excited for the fall semester to start at my university, and I think that the reason for that is three fold. First, and perhaps most importantly, the classes that I am taking, while potentially difficult, are all in all, quite fun classes. Or at least, they should be, given I have a decent professor who actually tries! But that is only one reason. There are a few more as to why I am so excited.

Another reason for my seemingly baseless excitement for the return to school is the fact that I only have one year left. What! You might ask! Yes, only one year or two more semesters and I am done with by Bachelors degrees. Insert excitement here! I am stoked to be finally finishing up with a degree that has been five years in the making. Yes, I beat around the bush at community college, taking random classes at first to test the waters and see what I enjoyed doing. But still, I am ready to be out of school, at least for a while. I may go back in the future and get a masters, but well see.

And finally, the last reason that I am excited to return to the classroom is the fact that I will get to be back on a college campus. I am not sure about you all, but for me, a college campus is a magical place of learning and knowledge, and the peace and quite one can find on campus can be one of the most relaxing and tranquil experiences ever! Yes, I know I am a little odd!

At any rate, I am excited to pick up the books, pack the bags, and hunker down for the last two semesters of college. I wont be sad to leave, but I am not all that sad to stay, either.

Thanks for reading, and I will talk to you tomorrow.

Some Pictures about a Campus

Today, I had some time to walk around my local university and take some photos. I picked a few that I thought turned out rather well, and decided to share them with you. These are not edited at all, just straight from the camera, so I realize they could be better, but anyways, enjoy!

An emergency call station at dusk.

A Tree

A Rusty Railing by a dumpster.

A Flower on a bush.

Art Dept. Staircase.

Art Dept. Lockers.

I hope you have enjoyed these photos, and I will talk to you tomorrow! Thanks for reading,

- Digit

lol

This will be a short blog post, as I am tired and slightly loopy. At any rate, I must post, so here goes. Today I was re introduced to a game called League of Legends. You have probably heard of this game, in some form or another, and I have had experience in the past, but have not played for several months.

Fear not, however, because I am now back in the thick of things, as it were. I am working at a tech/computer summer camp, and a group of staff and campers all got together and we played some LOL! It was a great deal of fun, and I realized how important people are while gaming, even when you might not think that.

So get out there gamers, and everyone for that matter, and keep building those human bridges.

Like I said, a super short post, but I hope you enjoyed reading it, and I will talk to you tomorrow.