You See The Hat?

I had to edit some video a few weeks ago and put it together for class, so in between my classes, I decided to stay on campus and go to the computer lab to work on it. A friend of mine came with me, and we went into a lab in the ATEC (Arts & Technology) building.

Now let me just preface this with the fact that my program (EMAC-Emerging Media and Communications) is part of the overarching ATEC umbrella, but there is a clear divide between what the two programs do, one being more creative/artistic (ATEC), and the other being more media/communications/theory based (EMAC). That being said, we still have to share the same building and resources, but you can usually tell who’s in which program. Ok, now back to the story:

The computer lab is a combined Mac and PC lab, having a row of each type with the backs of the computers facing each other. This is important so you can get a clear visual of what happened next.

There were 3 guys already in there on the PC side. A chubby white dude, a skinny white dude, and an Asian dude. My friend and I sat on the Mac side directly across from them (me across from the Asian, and my friend across from the skinny white dude).

When we walked past, it was clear they were working on video game designing (meaning they were in the ATEC program). But whatevs. My friend and I logged on trying to get started on our video editing.

Now, when I’m in a computer lab, I try to keep my voice down if I have to talk to someone because I don’t want to disturb other people. I mean, I realize it’s not a library, but still I want to be respectful. Well, apparently these 3 guys did not care about things like that and continued talking very loudly, and I’ll be honest… I was a bit annoyed.

Their conversation revolved around a certain video game, and the Asian one started describing the plot of this one game that the other two had not played. The Asian hesitated saying, “Well I’m not sure if I should tell you what happens though because I don’t want to ruin it for you.” The other two replied, “Oh it’s no big deal, just tell us.”

To which I said, because I was feeling snarky because I was annoyed with their loud chatter, “UMM NO! You can’t say it! I don’t want you to spoil it for me!!!”

All three of them reacted like this:

Since they were so taken aback by my snarky comment, I quickly added, “I’m just kidding. I have no idea what you’re talking about, so you can keep talking. Just ignore me.”

The Asian one was very clearly annoyed with me

and says, “Well if we’re on the subject then let me just say, that Bruce Willis is actually dead the whole time in Sixth Sense.”

Which totally reminded me of a Divine Comedy skit, so I say a variation of a line from it, “WHAT? Next you’re going to tell me the boat sinks at the end of Titanic!”

Reaction of Asian dude who is still annoyed with me:

However, the skinny dude’s reaction:

And I’m pretty sure the chubby white dude wasn’t really paying attention cause he was like this the whole time:

So, obviously, skinny white dude found me quite amusing and decided that he wanted to be my friend, because after the Asian dude finish telling him the plot of the video game, he leans over and reaches in between the computers to shake my hand and introduce himself and the other two. Because the other two are no longer important to what happens next, they don’t get names, but we’ll call the skinny white dude… Tom (that is obviously not his real name).

Well Tom says that he wants to show me this really funny video and I should come around to look at it. Since my video clips were still downloading to the computer, I decided to humor him and got up to see this video. He proceeds to show me and the other two an Xrtranormal video titled, “So You Want To Be In the Video Game Industry?” Now even despite me telling Tom I did not in fact want to be in the video game industry, he thought it would still be funny for me to watch anyway.

The video is almost 8 freakin’ minutes long. Granted there were some amusing parts that I feigned a guffaw at, but I was standing there watching this video for what seemed like forever. I decided I was no longer interested, and I wasn’t alone because the other two stopped watching, so a minute before the end I said, “That’s pretty funny” and walked back over to my computer.

Then Tom decided he wanted to know what I was doing. So he asked, “Mattie, what are you working on?”

“I’m working on a video.”

“Can I see it?”

“Uhhh well I don’t have anything yet, my video clips are still downloading.”

“Are they video game clips?”

“No, they aren’t.” (By this time, he has gotten up and walked over to my computer and is standing behind me staring at it.)

“Oh, is this for a class?”

“Yes.”

“Is it a film class?”

I turn to my friend for confirmation because while the class does require filming, it’s not explicitly a film class, “Ummm it’s kind of like a film class, but that’s not what it is entirely.”

“What class is it?”

“It’s Emerging Media Studio.”

“Oh. Wait, what program are you in?”

“I’m in the EMAC program.”

His reaction:

“Ohhh.”

My reaction:

Then there was a moment when we were both like this:

And he immediately went back to his computer and didn’t say anything to me for like 10 minutes.

He did talk to me after that, but the tone had clearly changed. He definitely wasn’t excited to talk to me anymore like he had before he found out I was in the EMAC program. And I disappointed him again when he called me over to his computer to take a gander at the video game loading screen he had been working on for weeks and he asked if I knew anything about web design (Nope.) and then again when he asked if I played video games and if so what (umm Rockband. Does that count? [To him and the Asian, who also looked disappointed, no]).

I didn’t know if he wanted some suggestions on this screen he’d been working on or not, but I decided if he had made me walk over there, I was going to tell him anyway. So I told him it needed some food wrappers (it was a screen shot of a war room, so it was full of guns, amo, maps etc.) to which he actually said the Asian dude had suggested that too, so I felt a little validated in my mentioning it, even though the Asian was still looking at me like this: 

Tom was still cordial after that, telling me it was very nice to meet me and he’d see me around later when he got up to leave the computer lab. But, not going to lie… I felt a little bad that I had disappointed this video game nerd so much by saying I was in EMAC and not into video games.

Oh well… at least I gave him the chance to talk to a girl. Who knows when that’ll happen again.