What is Wattis?

Tomorrow begins graduate orientation, and I will hopefully get a better understand of what I have gotten myself into. When I arrived on campus last week, I noticed a big orange logo with scripty white letters: Wattis. I second guessed myself for a moment, thinking I was in the wrong place, but in fact, Wattis refers to the "CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts," which is the school's gallery of international contemporary art.

So, orientation will be going on tomorrow and wednesday, and after that we have a three-day-long digital story-telling workshop (thurs, fri, sat), followed by a screening and welcome party Saturday night.

I looked into the organization that hosts these story-telling workshops, and most of the videos I watched were interesting and poignant tales about their lives (watch some for yourself). So, it sounds like we are going to have to put together a similar presentation in a short period of time that will then be shown to the group. No pressure, right? ...I can just hear the instructions now, "Okay, you have the next three days to produce something that will dazzle us...Go." I sure hope there are other incoming mfa students that are as clueless as I am.

In other news, I have a bone to pick with AT&T...I mean Cingular....I mean at&t. Whatever it is they're calling themselves these days, they're coverage is atrocious. Years ago, my family had Verizon, and I don't remember reception ever being an issue. With our current plan, however, I have had problems in a bunch of places. But I have to say, being in San Francisco, I have experienced the most problems of all. I could stay in the same spot and my signal strength will vary dramatically from moment to moment. It's very frustrating, so I'm going to try polling the people I meet to see if there's a provider that has better coverage for this area. So, for now the best way to get in touch with me is by email: paulina.cioce@yahoo.com