"911 what is your emergency?" Two days in a row.

Story #1
12/24/2008

My family and I were driving to a friend's house to celebrate Christmas Eve with them. We were driving behind a pick-up truck. All of the sudden I see this sedan driving next to us go off the road. As the driver of the sedan tried to get back onto the rode, he lost control of his car and ran into the truck. The truck then bounced and it became immediately clear that the driver of the truck had lost consciousness because the truck drove itself across onto on-coming traffic and only came to a stop when it drove into the ditch on the other side of the highway.

We pulled over, and tried to see if the truck driver was still moving. For the first time in my life, I had to call 911. The conversation went something like this....

APD: 911 what is the location of your emergency?
ME: (panickingly) I just witnessed a car accident!!! I'm on 620 and Great Oaks!!
APD: Oh, that's not in our department. Hold on. Let me transfer you to the right one.
ME: (WHAT?) Ummm...well, ok, please hurry!!!!! The driver of the pick-up is not moving!!
APD: Is anybody hurt?
ME: One of the drivers is not moving!!!!
APD: Ok, hang on.
ME: (hang on? really? she could be bleeding to death right now!!!!)
APD: Ok, we're sending an ambulance over right now.
ME: (wait, what do I do?) OK!?

The driver of the pick-up eventually woke up in shock and was hurt pretty badly but fine enough to call her husband. The ambulance came and took her away and I had to write a witness statement.


Story #2
12/25/2008

My sister was dog sitting for a friend and she felt sorry that the dog would have to sleep alone on Christmas. So I accompanied her to a little sleepover at the friend's house. As we were getting ready to settle down and watch a movie, my sister decided that it would be a good idea to turn on the security system. Well, the motion detector sensed me when I moved and the alarm went off. At first, we thought someone was trying to break into the house but quickly entered the code and the alarm was deactivated. About 20 minutes later, we saw some car lights shining into the house. We were a little nervous but the lights went away after a few minutes so we decided it was just a car making a U-turn. 5 minutes later...

SIS: Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! There's people out there!!!! I see shadows!!!!
ME: (as the dog started barking and running towards the door) What?
SIS: (as flashlights shined into the house) They have flashlights!!!!!
ME: Oh my gosh!!!!!! I see people!!!!
SIS: QUICK! Run into the bathroom!!!
ME: What?
SIS: (goes into the kitchen and grabs a big knife) Go into the bathroom and call 911!
ME: Ok, ok, I'm calling them.

APD: 911 what is your emergency?
ME: We see people outside! My sister and I are house-sitting and we see people with flashlights!
APD: What is your address?
ME: Crap, I don't know! I just know it's on Walhill Cove near Anderson High School.
APD: Who is the owner of the house?
ME: John Smith! Oh my gosh! They're ringing the doorbell now!
APD: Is it on 1234 Walhill Cove?
ME: Ah maybe!!
APD: Oh, ok. They're just police officers ma'am.
ME: What??
APD: Apparently, the alarm went off at your house, so these officers were checking on you.
ME: Oh, I'm sorry. We just really freaked out.

And yes, every person we've told this story to have said, "Wait, that was the first thing I thought of. Police officers checking on you guys!" Fine, think what you want but at the moment it was scary!

In Preparation For My Portfolio Review.

So, you may be wondering, what the crap is she doing blogging if she has a portfolio review coming up?

For those of you who may not know what that is, it is where all the faculty members of the Graphic Design Department look at everything you've done so far and give you critiques...as in tear everything apart and tell you that you have a lot to improve on.

This lovely event that we designers lose about 150 hours of sleep a week for about a month before the event, happens to be taking place on the first reading day. And if you go to BYU, where they only give you 2 reading days (which one of them happens to be on a SATURDAY), you end up with NO reading days.

But that's ok.

What is not ok is people not knowing what we do or who we are. And what I mean by that is that we are GRAPHIC DESIGNERS. We DESIGN.

We are not:
graphicS designers
graphicS design ARTISTS
graphic ARTISTS

When potential clients call me one of the above or anything that is not GRAPHIC DESIGNER, I lose interest in them and when asked if I am interested in working for them, I kindly decline the offer.

So, if you're planning on hiring a GRAPHIC DESIGNER, be aware not to call them the wrong thing, because most likely, I'm not the only one who will kindly decline your offer.