Cost of being homeless

If there is one thing I have learned over the past month, it's that being homeless is a lot more expensive than I thought.

Well, at least being a hybrid homeless person is.

I moved to DC about 3 months ago. I had a great apartment and work situation. But my apartment sublease was only 2 months long. I figured at that point, I would either be hired full time by the agency I work with or I would be heading home to Utah to find something else. Instead, I was offered an extension to keep working month to month until they had more of a long-term solution for me. I didn't quite expect it to turn into what it has become now.

I didn't want to sign any sort of apartment lease until I knew at least my not-too-distant future.

And ever since, I've kinda been homeless. There have been a number of people kind enough to take me in and give me shelter. I've already jumped to almost half a dozen couches, all the while living out of my few suitcases. Currently, I am staying with family of friends outside the district with 3 small children. I've become a live-in babysitter. Didn't see that one coming.

It wouldn't be too bad, except I don't have a car either. Which has made things a bit more tricky. I have to carefully plan out where I'll be and how I will be able to get 'home'.

Being homeless has been quite the adventure. I have definitely had my fair share of never-before experiences and run ins. But what I didn't plan for was the same thing I mentioned earlier—the cost.

Imagine having to pay for public transport everywhere and eating out for every meal. It starts to add up quickly. I have already gained a new appreciation for grocery shopping. Luckily I have an employer that pays me hourly, so I haven't gone hungry or anything. Not yet at least. The only benefit to this situation is not having to pay rent on an apartment. 

And if that's not enough, throw in the added pressure of being a young, single and LDS. That means dating. Which in turn means paying for two instead of just one. It can be hard enough with a home and car, but try taking both away. Call me old fashion, but it never gets less awkward to ask a girl out and then ask if she wouldn't mind picking you up too.

I am learning to enjoy the situation. It's definitely once in a lifetime—in the sense that as soon as I have a family/wife, not having a guaranteed roof over our heads won't fly.

Maybe the opportunity cost will be worth it in the end. Until then, call ahead if you want to come visit, because I could be in any number of locations.

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Investigative Citizen Journalism

If you know me at all, you know I’m a die-hard Utah Jazz fan. I feel personally invested in their success. When they lose, it physically hurts sometimes. Deep down.

So when I thought someone tried to pull a fast one on other Jazz fans like myself, I put a stop to it.

Here’s what happened.

Gordon Hayward became a fan favorite at the end of the season last year. After being the 9^th overall pick by the Jazz last year, he started slowly and struggled to find success. But now he is viewed as one of the building blocks for the future of the franchise.

He is fairly active on Twitter, and I have been following him since the day he became a Jazzman. I knew the things he would usually talk about and the way he would typically say them.

Well, one day, I caught wind of a Gordon Hayward profile on Facebook. Not a fan page like most athletes have, but one that anyone could actually request to be friends with. This was the first red flag. For a professional athlete to only have that many friends was strange. And for those of you who don’t already know, Facebook puts a stop to people who reach a certain limit of friends.

But it was worse than just having a profile. He was actually responding to almost every wall post and comment on his page. That’s when it started to get really out of ordinary. No way he would have time to respond back to everyone. I talked with other people about it, but most of them seemed to believe it was real.

To me it seemed obvious it was a fake. All of the pictures were taken from a Google image search. He would post the weirdest things. Stuff that not even a dumb NBA player would write about the NBA commissioner, let alone a class act in Gordon Hayward. And he would never even mention his girlfriend, which he never stops talking about on Twitter. Plus there were no real pictures of the two together. He pretty much just seemed like a different person.

Well, Gordon fever seemed to be taking off in the Salt Lake area. Every day it seemed like more and more of the people I knew were becoming friend too. So even if it was real, the exclusivity and cool factor of being friends with an NBA player was gone.

So I decided to do some investigating/experimenting. I wrote on his wall that the account was fake. And very soon after that the comment was deleted, I was defriended, and he had blocked my account from viewing his.

Seems strange for a real person to be worried about something like that. I mean, if someone called me out for not being the real me, I’d just comment and ask what they were talking about. The guilty are always more nervous.

That’s when I knew. So I updated my status to let everyone else know. And even then, a lot of people still believed him. At least, they didn’t really have any other reason not to believe him.

So I decided to go right to the source. Luckily, on Twitter, celebrities have a little blue check next to their name to prove they are a verified account. I figured it was a long shot, but told him what was up. Here’s what happened:

And the rest is history. Mystery solved.

So I guess I can always try a career in detective work if nothing else works out.

Don’t worry Gordo. I got your back.

Go Jazz.

 

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What's in a name

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I’m not the first. With a name like Scott Stevens, I can’t expect it to be very unique. I love my name, but Scott, and Stevens are both very common names. Put them together and it doesn’t get much better.

But that’s not the worst part.

I always liked having a famous athlete share my name growing up, even if it was a hockey player. That just meant I could never Google my own name like most people and see what came up. But that was a minor sacrifice. I could live with that.

But it gets worse.

Most people can’t say they are the only ones in the world with their full name. A few more in their own country, and again in their own state. But what about their own family? You’d think everyone should at least be unique among family members. Not including deceased members, and making an exception for George Foreman’s children.

That’s what most people don’t know about me.

I’m not even the first Scott in my own family.

I have a hand-me-down name from my older brother.

I’m sure if my mom ever reads this, she’ll have some sort of explanation. But there may always be some scar tissue.

My older brother is named Nathan Scott Stevens. My parents wanted both of those names for their boy. But when they ended up having another boy just three years later, they decided they could actually use Scott as a first name.

It’s been recycled.

It never dawned on me growing up. It wasn’t until I was older that I started to realize how cheated I had been. You might ask, so why not go by your middle name? Well, that’s a tough decision for a child to make on his own. Self-imposed name changes never seem to go over too well. It’s like trying to give yourself a nickname.

When you share the same name as your older brother, I guess you learn to be more creative in other areas to try and stand out.

Despite obvious copyright infringement, I still like my name. Plus I am the only one in the family named after a relative other than our father—Lloyd comes from my grandpa. So that will just have to make up for the rest.

 

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Salesman

I met this girl yesterday and she asked what I do. When I told her advertising, she immediately asked me to try and sell her on something.

I then proceeded to slap her in the face.

I’m not a salesman.

And advertising should be more than just a sales pitch.

I got one of my first jobs because they told me I’d be working with advertising. But all it turned out to be was making cold sales calls. I quit after two weeks. Ironically, I got into advertising because I hated ads. It sometimes makes no sense. But I plan to make a difference.

Advertising doesn’t have to be the annoying 30 seconds you fast-forward on DVR to get back to the good stuff. Why not make advertisements the good stuff in the first place? Then, people will want to interact with your brand rather than fast-forwarding through it.

She apologized when I explained all of this.

Of course, I didn’t actually slap that girl in the face. It was a metaphor for me slapping her in the face metaphorically.

 

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The social media party and brand booty calls

It’s a party for all of your friends. Even for some people who aren’t your friends, but still claim to be. They come from all different stages of your life; they each have different backgrounds and personalities. Some of them aren’t even real people, they only pretend to be.

This is the Social Media party, and everyone’s invited. (Except Google+, they still have VIP passes. And they met their quota for the moment. But stay tuned for more invites shortly.)

Just like any real party, you have all different types of guests. There are the ones that show up awkwardly early to the party, and every party for that matter. But they don’t bring a whole lot to the party—neither friends nor personality. But there aren’t enough other people there yet to ignore them. So you stand there, uncomfortably shifting from eye contact down to the drink in your hand and back, occasionally nodding your head in acknowledgement while throwing in a courtesy laugh to make them believe you are actually listening.

There are also the people talk way too much. They may occasionally ask your opinion, but ultimately do so just to spin the conversation back to themselves. It’s overwhelming. And because of it, rather than actually listening to them, you are looking for any sign of taking a breath between sentences so you can excuse yourself and move to another side of the room.

There are the ones that show up once the party is already full-steam. They can’t be there on time, because that would be so faux pas. But rather than helping to make the party into a success, they piggy back on the conversations of others, often trying to steal the spotlight. And then head for the exit at the first sign of the party slowing down.

There are the complete randoms that no one seems to know. Everyone simply assumes that person must have been invited by someone else. Also known as “randos.”

Similar to the randos are the hoverers. You may know them or you may not. They don’t fully join the conversation, but they hover just behind everyone in the circle, laughing on cue with the rest of you. Never leading or contributing, but they are always there. And it makes you uncomfortable.

Every once in a while you may experience the ‘elderly’ at your party. Elder in the literal sense of being older than you. Not the cool kind of the older, though. The bad kind. This might be a parent dropping by unannounced, or something similar to that time you saw your 3^rd grade teacher outside of class at the grocery store. It just didn’t feel right.

Then there are always the ones who stay way longer than welcomed. They can’t seem to let it die and continually beat it like a dead horse. That’s animal cruelty people, c’mon.

Of course, if the party is good enough, then brands will start to show up. This can be a good or a bad thing. Some get it, but most don’t. It depends on the party and it depends on the people attending. For example, when the Redbull girls show up to an outdoor event/concert/dance party, they are usually well received. It fits the context. But I don’t care to hear what a pet food might do for me while at that party. More often than not, it seems that brands show up to a party because one was happening. Nothing more. I may even be a pet lover, but that doesn’t make it okay. Certain brands are getting it right. They might even be the ones throwing the party in the first place.

As an advertiser, and a party-goer, I’m okay with brands joining the party. But I don’t want the ones who have nothing else going on this weekend, so they find the first party they see. Don’t call me at 11 PM on Friday and expect anything. I’m not your brand booty call. If you want to see success with social media, it takes careful planning ahead of time. It requires strategy and a game plan. I’ve often felt that the success of my weekend can be directly related to the amount of preparation during the week.

There is no real way of knowing where the next big party is going to happen. But I am at this party because my friends are there. So if you’re a brand, listen to what’s going on around you before you start talking and throwing your own parties.

 

Did I miss any party personalities? Let me know if you think of any others.

 

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Copy-righter

Most in advertising probably sees this title and thinks, "Amusing. But overplayed."

Most in other professions probably assume this has legal ramifications. Think C with a circle around it.

Most of my friends outside of work/school probably think that it's actually what I do.

Most other people have no idea what just happened.

Which is why I try to avoid the full title of 'copywriter' in most conversations. I tell people I'm a writer. That's what I do. And that's really all they need to know in most cases. I obviously do the whole writing thing specifically in advertising, but details tend to confuse people for some reason.

The only reason I bring this up is because I've finally experienced a slight shift in my goals as a writer. For the longest time, I always tried to steer clear of being a 'writer.' I enjoyed writing and always had a fun time expressing myself through the written word. But I always thought of writers as people that tried to separate themselves from society and considered their intellect to be far superior to the vast majority of the human race. (maybe a slight exaggeration). And I am not like that. I like to come up with and write things that apply to as many people as possible and help bring them together. I consider myself to be more of an ideator (an idea guy) than an actual writer anyway.

Writers seem to always be in the quest for their next screenplay or complex novel idea. Even in advertising, it seems like a lot of copywriters dabble with this kind of writing. I think it would be fun if I had all kinds of money, but for some reason, the huge appeal was never there. Until recently.

I finally had the desire to write my own book someday. I have one idea already, but I'm keeping it under wraps. But I'm accepting others if anyone has any. I don't know why the sudden change. It may be because I've been reading a lot more since I've been out of school. This is probably a good of time as any for a shameless plug for my mom's book. If you haven't heard of ParentFix before, check it out. It will change your view on life through parenting.

Well, I guess I've got a new item for the bucket list. After all, I am a writer.

And I may need a copyright for this one.

 

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