Blogger TAG!

The lovely Ryan Adair from the blog, This Must Be the Place, tagged me in a blogger share activity, and it was perfect timing because my creative juices seem to be all back-logged and junk. I am grateful to her, not only because she reads my blog and likes it, but for tagging me in this fun writing exercise/share-a-thon. Hopefully, I don't overshare. Sorry people who know me IRL!

So, here's the deal: I have to tell  you, the internets 11 facts about me that you may not know, then answer 11 questions asked by my tagger, Ryan, and then tag some other bloggers I like and ask them to share 11 unknowns, and then answer my 11 questions. Whew!  Did everyone get that? Good.
Here we go:

11 Unknown/Little-known Facts About Me

1) When I was 12, I was diagnosed with Scoliosis and had to wear a back brace for 2 years. A couple of months before my 15th birthday I underwent spinal surgery to correct the severe curve in my spine. I spent a week in the hospital and spent six weeks at home recovering before I was able to go back to school part-time.

2) I'm slightly dyslexic with numbers. 

3) When I was 3, I got my head stuck in between the stair banister railings. My dad had to saw one of the railings off to get me out.

4) My favorite Disney characters are Chip and Dale.

5) I drink a ridiculous amount of water every day. If I don't have a bottle of water with me at all times, I start to feel anxious and cranky.

6) I still sleep with a menagerie of plushies and stuffed-animals on my side of the bed. Boyfriend has accepted this about me and thinks it's endearing loves me anyway.

7) As a kid I made up my own rules to the game Risk using my toys, figurines, and action figures. It was an epic bloodbath. My official rules are written down probably still inside our old-ass edition of Risk at my mom's house. While I love playing Risk as an adult, I still maintain that my rules make a better game.

8) When I was between the ages of 2 and 6, I had an imaginary friend named "Gubby" who "lived next to the Dairy Queen" (his only discerning feature.) When I was 7, I had an imaginary talking dog named "Barnaby."

9) My hair refuses to hold curl. I got a perm in middle school  and it fell out 3 weeks later. The salon re-did the perm and it fell out again in 3 weeks. My hair had a frizzy look to it for a while. (A nerdy awkward girl with a bad perm, a back brace, and braces. I was way popular in middle school.)

10) My prized childhood posession was my dollhouse. It was my Christmas present from Santa when I was about 7 years old. Even now, as an adult, I still occasionally fantasize about playing with my dollhouse.

11) I hate jelly beans. Hate. I refuse to eat them.

My 11 Questions From Ryan

1. What has been your biggest struggle in life? 
My biggest and longest struggle has definitely been dealing with chronic anxiety and depression. The earliest memory I have of feeling depressed was when I was 3. It's something I've had my entire life as I know it, but I wasn't diagnosed until I was almost an adult. I am getting better, but every day is a fight to stay "better."

2. How do you see your future self? (Do you have kids? A career you enjoy? In rehab?)
My career dream for my future self is to be able to make my living by writing and acting with lots of video games in between, and no crappy 9-5 job getting in the way. Boyfriend and I will get married when we feel like it and have a kid when we're ready. We'll have at least one dog and a nice cozy house with a yard. Maybe we can even have a pet piggie and a pet skunk too.

3. Who are you closer to, your mother or father? Why?
This one is tough. As a kid, I was a lot closer to my dad than my mom until they divorced and my dad left the country for a couple of years for work. During my Scoliosis treatment, my mom and I became closer since we spent so much time together (she was the one taking me to the doctor and taking care of me after surgery.) Now, it's hard to say who I'm closer to. I think it depends on what's going on in my life at the time.

4. If you had 24 hours to live, and you weren't wasting your time by freaking out about dying-- what would you do and WHO would you spend your time with, and you have to spend it someone other than your significant other!
I would want to spend as much of the day as possible with my family just sitting around and talking. I would also want to write each of my loved ones a letter for them to read after I'm gone telling them my favorite memory of them.

5. Is there anyone you want to make amends with and haven't
When I was in middle school, there was a girl who didn't really fit in (even less so than me) but she was super sweet to me. We were friends for a while but something happened to me. I gave in to my insecurities and peer pressure, and I turned into a huge asshole and started ignoring her and not sticking up for her when the other kids picked on her. I never picked on her directly, but I let her take the heat so that I wouldn't have to. She eventually ran away from home. I don't know what ever happened to her, and I still feel awful about it to this day.  Sometimes it even keeps me up at night. I'm sorry M.  Wherever you are, I hope you are well. There is no excuse for how I treated you, you did not deserve that.

6. What is your favorite dessert?
I love brownie sundaes.

7. What is your favorite ethnic cuisine? (Mine is Thai!)
I do like Thai food, but I am almost always in the mood for Italian.

8. What is the moment you are MOST proud of in your life?
I'm proud of myself for being able to get past my insecurities and anxieties and move 1800 miles away from home even though it hasn't been the easiest road I've chosen to take. I am proud of myself for having the chutzpah and the drive to actually do it.

9. What is your greatest contribution to friendships/relationships?
I have a ridiculous sense of humor and no matter what is going on, I feel a compulsion to make someone smile or laugh. I want to bring joy and comfort to the people in my life.

10. Do you avoid controversy or stand up and call it out?
It depends on the situation and the controversy. If it's just politics or an argument I know that no one will win (like a FB or forum debate online,) I will stay out of it. I have better things to spend my energy on.  But, if I see a true injustice or major bullshit going on, I will step up and do something to try to fix it.

11. What are you looking forward to the most in the next year?

Hopefully moving to California, expanding my acting/writing career, and getting a doggie.

Well, there you go.  Are you sick of hearing about me yet? I'm tagging these bloggers whom I enjoy reading:

Stephanie @ The Anecdote of My Life
The Management @ The Prince and the Prozac

Tristachio @ Tristachio: Just a Family of Nuts

Kathy @ That's What She Said

Rachel @ I Thought You Were Shorter

Lincoln @ Lincoln Blogs Stuff

TAG!

My 11 questions to you:

1) What was your most prized possession as a child?

2) What's the scariest thing that's ever happened to you?

3) Not counting a significant other, who is your favorite person to spend time with?

4) Did you have any imaginary friends as a kid?

5) If you could be any fictional character (from books, movies, TV, games, comics, etc.) who would you choose to be? Why?

6) What was your favorite game as a child? What is your favorite game as an adult?

7) What is your nastiest habit?

8) What is the most reckless thing you have ever done?

9) Do you have a nickname? What is it? Have you ever had an embarrassing nickname?

10) If you had to be stuck in a video game universe which one would you choose? Why?

11) If you could write your past self a note to tell yourself one thing, what would you say?

Happy blogging! I look forward to getting to know you all better.

Blogger 411: A Little Bit About Me

Tonight I will upload another PAX East video, (my favorite one) an interview with Susan Arendt of The Escapist. Until then, enjoy some random facts about me!



1. How long have you been blogging? And what got you started on blogging? Has your blog changed?

I've always been a journal-keeper, even before I could even write really well. My first journal/diary was one of those old diaries for little girls with the gold lock on it. It was salmon/pink and had a picture of a kitty on a window sill on the cover. I always lost the keys to that damn thing. Most of my entries consisted of single sentences scrawled illegibly diagonally across the pages. They usually said things like, "Andrew is my frend i lik him," and "i want a doggy samday," etc.

I first started blogging in college on my MySpace page. Mostly it was just a journal I kept that a few of my friends read and laughed at when I didn't have it set to private.  Mostly it was just a way to organize my thoughts and get them out. I started blogging here on Blogger in 2009 under Keep the Starving Out of Starving Artist and later under Gurl on Girl-Gaming.

My blogging in college was very superficial, mostly just me bitching about life and stuff. Now I write to attempt to entertain and inform and uplift. I still do it for me, but I try to produce content that I think other people will enjoy as well.

2. Did you go to college? If so where, and what did you study?

I studied Theatre Arts at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley. I graduated with my B.A. in 2006

3. Where have you traveled?
I've been very fortunate to travel. I've met people here in NYC who have never even set foot outside of the five boroughs, yet alone travelled to other countries. Those people make me sad. As a kid I loved to fly. As an adult, I really dislike flying, but my affinity for new places and experiences outweighs my anxiety of the act of travel. I've been to Mexico, Canada, England, France, and 26 of the 50 U.S States.

4. If you won the lottery, what would be the first thing you would buy?

Probably a nice bottle of champagne to celebrate.

5. What are your 3 biggest pet peeves?

Rudeness, injustice, poor spelling/grammar

6. What is your favorite movie?

There are so many movies that I love that it's hard to choose only one, but if I had to choose, I would say The Princess Bride.

Source

7. What is your drink of choice; wine, beer, or liquor. Or Water, Soda, Tea?
I prefer a good wheat beer, or water/coffee/tea.

8. What is something you enjoy doing when you have me time?
Sleeping, reading, playing video games, writing fiction

9. If you could have a $10,000 shopping spree to one store, which store would it be?
The World of Disney (not entirely practical, but I love Disney!)

10. Share with us an embarrassing moment of your past? Or present.
I have lots of embarrassing stories, but my favorite one deserves an entire blog post, because it's that epic.

11. What day would you love to relive again?

Any day at Disney World

12. If your life was turned into a movie... what actor would play you?
Either Ellen Page or Emma Stone

Source



People.com



13. What are the jobs you had in high school/college/the early years?

I worked at a golf club, Dairy Queen, and Pizza Hut during high school and College

Sexy DQ uniform

14. Show us a picture from high school/college.

Every high school senior picture ever.

15. If you could travel anywhere in the world, all expenses paid, where would you go?
I would love to visit New Zealand or Australia

16. Show us the most current picture of you, or your family, or anything of meaning to you.



Me & my siblings (littlest sis not pictured)

 17. Where do you see your life 5 years from now?
I hope Boyfriend and I will be living in California and making our livings in the film/TV industry.

Adventures in Job Applications (A Cover Letter) ~UPDATED~

UPDATE: 3/26/12-I did actually send this cover letter in an e-mail to Vox Media in February, but never heard from them.  I figured it was safe to post this on my blog now seeing as how it's almost April, and the odds of them giving me any response are slim.

I just submitted my cover letter to Vox Media. They sent out an online recruitment call a couple of weeks ago for their new gaming site. After days of pondering and researching and trying to find the right words, this is the cover letter I came up with and sent them:

Dear Creators-of-Awesome at Vox,

I hope I am not too late to express my interest in applying for an available position with your company. As I’m certain you already gleamed from the subject line of my e-mail, I am a passionate artistic blogger and an obsessive gamer. I’m a well-rounded nerd, and eager to increase my knowledge and experience in the growing gaming industry. I would love to do all of that with the creative minds at Vox.

Instead of badgering you with inflated tales of what a stellar specimen of a human being I am, I will let my blog speak for itself, so you may draw from it what you will.

I would be grateful if you will take a moment of your time to view evidence of my potential as a desirable addition to your company by way of my blog, Gurl on Girl-Gaming. Please find the requested links to my work below:

Nerdlesque

Uncharted 3 Review

NYCC Day 3

I sincerely look forward to your reply.

Respectfully,

Jessica "GurlNxtDoor" Ayers

Hopefully this will make an impression at Vox, enough to make them want to interview me and then I'll make them love me-wow them with my awesomeness and they'll say, "How did we get through life without this girl working in our company?!"  Hired!

That's how it'll all go down.

Until then, I'll just keep blogging.