Status Update – 4.19.14

Unexpectedly these last few weeks have been a little fast paced. I recently started a new contract role with NetHope, a nonprofit focused on increasing connectivity in the developing world and helping NGOs use technology smarter. At the same time a few volunteer projects came online. Juggling a few balls these days but I’m enjoying being fully active again. Hoping to share a longer post in the future about these changes.

Until then, below is a status update about what I’m currently working on.

###

I'm...

Reading:

The Happiness Project

Things Fall Apart

Watching:

RuPaul’s Drag Race 

One Piece

Naruto Shippuden
Blue Exorcist

Learning:
Core components of InDesign at the School of Visual Concepts
How to wake-up again with an analog alarm clock
Personal fitness tips
Adobe Illustrator

Dreaming about:
Working remotely in Barcelona
Visiting New York’s Highline Park
Exploring San Francisco’s Fillmore District
Taking a vacation where I can see the stars

Attending:
Easter Festivities with family and friends
5th Annual Institute for Democratic Future Trivia Night
Frozen viewing party
A weekend cruise to Vancouver, Canada

Working on:
My fiancé visa (yes, it’s still going on almost a year later… very long process)
Annual report content for the Delridge Neighborhood Association
Programing for the Greater Seattle Business Association’s (GSBA) Young Professionals with Pride (YPP) event 
LinkedIn updates for SVP Fast Pitch
Increasing my upper body strength
Proactively reengaging with my network
Getting back into a personal blogging rhythm
A longer blog post…

[Photo Courtesy of nomadic_lass]

New Thread for the Web

Happy to announce joshuaholland.co is now live! As explained in “Adding Another Thread to the Web,” the site will serve as a central hub for me on the web and is an updated version of a childhood dream.

It’s not perfect but after hacking it together from scratch I've learned a website shares a lot of similarities to crafting a blog post. There is no perfect. At some point you have to let it go and make improvements along the way by creating additional content through other posts or in this instance, website updates.

Big thanks to the School of Visual Concepts for a crash course in HTML and CSS and Rich Kim for hosting the site. Take a look around and let me know what you think! 

[Photo courtesy of Flickr user jamesrbowe]

Status Update - 3.24.13

Last week flew by thanks to a mix of time spent helping Citizen University with digital media support, attempting to build a "perfect" city on Sim City, and working on Jumpstart. I always fail at staying idle for extended periods of time. My gears are turning again. Short post this week about what I’m up to. Completed...

Social media support for Citizen University
HTML and CSS Level 2 class at SVC
My first independent new business pitch Started...
Creating to-do lists with Evernote focused on big tasks for the day
Using Foursquare to search for new experiences in the real world
Managing my calendar with Sunrise
Storing documents in the cloud using Dropbox
Exploring the world of digital payment with LevelUp and Square Wallet
Attempting to build the “perfect” city on Sim City
Learning more about content strategy
Discovering recipes via Pinterest
Reengaging with Google+

[Photo courtesy of Flickr user Schnitzel]

Adding Another Thread to the Web

Call it silly but I'm a believer in fulfilling childhood dreams. Unjaded by constraints of the real world, they often offer up a true look at the person we're meant to be and contain a grand narrative which helps inform the person we become as adults. Looking back at my own dreams, a few main themes emerge including technology, communications, storytelling, and helping others. This post explores my love for the web.

My fascination with the internet started in the 90s when my mom got our first computer. The amount of information available and ability to connect with others to exchange ideas resonated with me instantly. Shortly after discovering the web I began collecting Dragon Ball Z (DBZ) photos from sites and dreamed of creating a website to share my collection with friends and fellow DBZ enthusiasts around the world.

Like many things of the 90s, my full-time devotion to DBZ fizzled out in the 00s. After I entered Orting High School, my passions changed. I became interested in new activities like track, cross country, driving fast cars (see part 2 about my Maxima), and choir. Don't get me wrong, I'm still a HUGE DBZ fan; I could talk to you for days about the deep history and mythology of the series but given the year, I decided to reconfigure my dream to fit contemporary interests.

Thinking about my dream of creating a website through the lens of 2013, I decided it would be good to focus on my love for social media, networking, and photography. The site will serve as a central hub for me on the web and be an additional platform to share my thoughts about digital life and the vast world of communication. To accomplish this goal, I enrolled at the School of Visual Concepts (SVC) where I learned about copy writing in 2012. What drew me back to the school was its commitment to practical education and gritty real world vibe which made it feel accessible.

Despite not having touched HTML since I was an 8th grader at Sagahlie Middle School – formally Sagahlie Jr. High School, the language felt oddly familiar and was easy to pick up. After a month of developing the site, I'm excited to hit publish later this week! I'm also looking forward to continuing to learn more about HTML and other coding languages.

I never imagined myself wanting to learn more about computer languages but I'm slowly finding I actually enjoy the challenge of connecting the various pieces of code and appreciate the way it connects people with information. It's not the path I'd envisioned taking but like most things in life, it's sometimes better to take the long way around and enjoy the sights.



[Photo courtesy of Flickr user johnkay ]