Sam Purtill

Brokeback Dumb and Dumber

2006-05-12T13:19:00.000-07:00

Hahaha Tom Cruise...

2006-05-11T22:59:00.000-07:00

Wow Tom, you dance just like me

Life

2006-01-31T08:54:00.000-08:00

I just finished my first semester of Junior year. School is just rolling right along, and I've come to learn a few things so far this year. The only thing that matters right now are my grades and test scores. Partying doesn't. A million friends doesn't. A job doesn't. A car doesn't. The only thing that I need to think about right now is getting into a good college.

Almost everyone I know is overlooking this. My friends are getting B averages and being lazy. A 3.0 isn't going to get anyone into a good college anymore, everyone knows that. Colleges are accepting kids with 3.7+'s. With the influx of Asians in America, who, by the way, are killing us academically, getting into college isn't as easy as it used to be. Some quick admission numbers (provided by collegeboard.com).

Percentage of freshman admitted into
California Polytechnic State University: San Luis Obispo: 45%
Harvard: 9%
MIT: 16%
New York University: 37%
Pepperdine: 27%
Princeton: 13%
Stanford: 12%
UC Davis: 55%
UC San Diego: 42%

But these percentages aren't made up of a bunch of 3.0 students that applied. These percentages are made up of the smart kids that applied. Out of, say, 30,000 applicants at Harvard, only 2,700 were accepted (not the real numbers, but you understand). And I don't know too many 3.0 students that are going to be applying to Harvard.

I screwed myself Freshman year by getting a 3.2 GPA. It makes my overall GPA look like crap, with something like 3.4. My last three semesters, I've gotten a 3.7 average (one B and the rest A's each semester), and this semester I'm going to get a 4.0. I'm just hoping that colleges won't look at my overall GPA and throw my application out because of it.

Well, getting into college isn't as easy as it used to be. But here's to good luck at the admissions office. This is going to be tough...

37signals

2006-01-26T08:13:00.000-08:00

Over the past month or so, I've been lucky enough to stumble upon a few new products: Backpack, Basecamp and Ta-da.

The makers of these three products is 37signals, a small, privately owned company based out of Chicago. Their products are incredibly simple and all use AJAX, so your page will never have to refresh when you save your work.

Backpack is a self organization tool. I have used it to organize everything from my web projects to my homework at school. They also have a very useful calendar, and it can be loaded into Mozilla Calendar and iCal once you add a new event.

Basecamp is a collaboration tool, and is a huge help for teams that are working in different areas. I am currently using it on a project that I am doing for a client on the east coast. His production company is based in San Diego, and he has people in the south that represent him. Basecamp gets everyone on the same page, and is oh so easy.

Ta-da is a very simple application. You make lists of what you need to get done and check them off once you finish them. Again, everything is done in AJAX, so it makes adding items to your list and editing them smooth.

All of 37signals products can be used for free, as long as you wish. Try them out, you won't regret it. And if you ever upgrade to a paid plan, you can use my code - BPXFSL9

Buy Apple stock

2005-10-12T14:06:00.000-07:00

If I have one thing to say to everyone it is go buy Apple right now. It's being offered at $49 right now, and they just came out with the new iPod video and iMac G5... Symbol AAPL. I've given advice to people about Macromedia, Apple and Google. No one listened to me. Listen to me now.

School

2005-09-21T09:20:00.000-07:00

School has been just rollin. I'm building three new websites right now, TFH UCD, TFH Worship and Encounter 2006.

Alpine's unlimited pass!

2005-09-03T02:03:00.000-07:00

Check it out, Alpine Meadows has the 05/06 season passes on sale right now. If you're 13-18, an unlimited pass is only $199... Check it out

Summer 2005

2005-08-31T13:47:00.000-07:00

Ok so this is going to be a recap of my summer vacation for two thousand five.

I started out the summer working everyday for about two weeks straight at The Father's House. I had a deadline on the new 1221 website and I wasn't going to miss it. I launched the site in June, and to date we've had over 80,000 hits.

During that time my dad was getting a dock at Lake Berryessa for our boat. We finally got a dock and we started going on the boat a lot. The lake is one of the funnest things ever. Laying out on the boat, listening to music, and enjoying getting away from the world is relaxing. I went wakeboarding, slalom skiing and tubing a lot.

Usually every summer we go on one big vacation, and halfway through my summer we still hadn't decided where to go. We were thinking a beach house in Hawaii, Mexico or San Diego, but no plans were happening.

In July I went to Seattle and Canada with James and his parents. I didn't know at the time when I made my plans, but I could've gone to Tahoe with Trav and hung out with his family and the Roberts for the 4th of July. But I ended up liking Canada and Seattle. Even though James and I got really bored sometimes, we had fun. After I came home, we celebrated fourth of July by having a barbecue and sitting on my dad's Vine Street project and watched the fireworks.

After that I worked for my dad, hung out with Josiah and talked to him a few times, kicked it with friends. I still worked a lot. I ended up redesigning The Father's House entire website, which gets anywhere from 100-300,000 hits a month. I deleted myspace because I was wasting my time on it. I got an iPod and filled it up with 2700 songs from my library. I went out on the boat a lot still.

It was in late July that my parents finally decided where we were going to go on vacation. We had rented a small beach house on mission beach about three years ago, and we decided to rent in the same area again this time. Uncle Jim and his family were going to come too, and I couldn't wait. After looking at a lot of houses, my mom got a house. She also got hotel reservations in San Diego and Hollywood, so when we left Mission Beach we could go shopping in SD and to Universal Studios in Hollywood.

August came rolling in, and school was only three and a half weeks away. 1221 was hyping up Launch Camp a lot, and everyone was really excited to go. We left for camp on a Sunday and rode up on big buses. Camp was so much fun, it's hard to describe it. I got rocked at two of the late services, and I got the gift of speaking in tongues. I had an awesome cabin and counselor (Casey), and I loved every day of it. We would wake up at around 7, take showers and get ready, go eat breakfast and then come back for devotions. Then we went to the morning session, got rocked there, and left for free time. After that we'd go to lunch and then have a long stretch of free time. During free time, I met all the people at The Father's House that I didn't know, hung out with my friends, and usually went swimming or go kart racing. Then we had dinner and following that was the night service. The night services were the best, worship was all dialed and pro rock, and the messages were awesome. I took notes for the first time in like four years, and I was actually understanding what they were saying. After that there was usually an altar car, and I'd go and (sometimes cry) for about an hour. My life was completely changed. Ok, so after the night services we'd go and eat some food at the snack shack and hang out with friends until the Late Show. Late show starts at around 11 and ends around 12 or so. The Late Show was fun this year, and Nick finally went up and broke it down on the dance floor.

So I got back from camp on Friday afternoon around 2. I came home and we had a new computer that was incredibly fast. My mom asked us if we were ready to go to San Diego, and so I left my bags in the Sequoia and took off for San Diego. We drove behind Jim and Jen, and stayed the night in a hotel right before the grapevine. On Saturday we went all the way to our house on Mission Beach. When we got there, our houses got switched to a much bigger house on the beach (long story). It was awesome, we had five or so bedrooms, and the house was beautiful. My favourite part of it was on the third story. You could walk out on the deck and sit on this couch and look at the ocean. It was just peaceful.

San Diego was too much fun. The first few days, we just relaxed. I would go boogie board and body surf for hours, and then come up onto the beach and tan for hours. We went shopping a ton at [my new favourite mall] Fashion Valley. It was like heaven, they had all my stores: A&F, Banana Republic, Armani Exchange, Pac Sun, and American Eagle. At night, I'd watch Laguna Beach, hang out with my family, and play PartyPoker. We'd walk outside onto the beach and watch the sun set over the ocean, it was beautiful. Aunt Jen took tons of pictures and she's going to give me the CD of them, so I'll put some pictures up when I get it.

So we left Mission Beach on Saturday and went to the nicest hotel ever in San Diego. We drive up to the entrance, hop out, give the valet guy our keys and walk inside. They parked our car and brought our bags up and stuff. I felt weird, because in the past my parents have always been jewish with their money. We decided to go swimming, so we go out to the pool on the fourth floor and it is like heaven. There's this square pool, a gigantic area with these nice seats and stuff, a bar, and waiters that would come up to you and get you drinks. The pool place overlooked a lot of San Diego, and you could even see the Padres baseball field. The people at the pool were all rich people, there were no kids. There was this one lady wearing a Louis Vutton bikini, and all these other hot girls walking around with crazy stuff like Gucci on. Lets just say it was a ton of fun.

We hung out with Uncle Chris and his family for most of the day. At around 5, we met up with the Kirkseys. We hung out with them for the whole night. We went to this super famouse hotel, I forgot it's name, but there were five weddings going on at different places in the hotel. It was really cool. This one couple was getting married on the beach as the sun was setting. That was hot. So after the hotel, we went onto the docks and looked at the famouse boats for a while. Then we all got hungry and went to dinner. The place we went was unforgettable, it was really loud and there was a ton of drunk people. The food was really good though. We had fun.

So we left San Diego on (I think) Sunday and went to Hollywood. We were staying at the Hilton that's right next to Universal Studios. We got there and unpacked. We went to Universal Square or whatever it's called and shopped for a few hours. We also saw Red Eye which was awesome. On Monday we went to Universal and did everything there was to do at the park, got tired and came back to the hotel. We were all burnt out and decided that we were going to leave on Tuesday. On Tuesday morning we packed up and went to the Walk of Fame. I took my picture in front of a bunch of stars, all the actours that I liked I found. We left for home on Tuesday afternoon. We got home around 7, and I chilled. On Wednesday, I hung out with people, for it was the LAST DAY OF SUMMER. Thursday came, and summer was over. School has begun, and it looks like I am going to be busy for the next nine months again.

It's going to be a fun year this year.

-

Sam

(Originally posted on MySpace blog)

School

2005-08-31T13:41:00.000-07:00

School has started. It was the first time that I ever wished that it coulds be longer (summer vacation). I wrote a gigantic blog on myspace that I'll copy into here about my whole summer. Summer was fun and God is good.

San Diego!

2005-08-16T16:32:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've written, I went to camp and now I'm in San Diego. I'm on the home stretch of summer vacation and I'm livin it up haha. San Diego is awesome, we're right next to the beach and boardwalk. Anyways, it's going good.

Frequency Worship Conference launched

2005-08-04T23:44:00.000-07:00

Check it out... www.frequencyconference.com...

Kanye

2005-08-03T22:52:00.000-07:00

"Now I could let these dream killers kill my self-esteem
Or use my arrogance as the steam to power my dreams
I use it as my gas, so they say that I'm gassed
But without it I'd be last, so I ought to laugh"

-"Last Call" from The College Dropout by Kanye West

Frequency Worship Conference website

2005-08-03T22:24:00.000-07:00

Launches tomorrow. Been working on this for about two weeks now. It's pretty cool. After this I'm going to do TFH Worship, SoWA v2, TIGHT Kidz Church and Encounter Youth Conference 2006. Wow. I have a lot of work to look forward to! http://frequencyconference.com coming tomorrow...

Shopping spree today...

2005-08-01T16:38:00.000-07:00

Yeah so today I went to Arden Fair and bought soo much clothes. It felt good. Spending money every once and a while is just the most awesome feeling ya know? Haha

Work.

2005-07-29T15:49:00.000-07:00

Busy, busy, busy. Workin on a new site right now for a conference coming in October, I'll be sure to give the URL once it's released.

Eminem Show review

2005-07-26T20:28:00.000-07:00

I came across this when I was looking for how many records he's sold...

"... When added to the equation that he has a great ear for melodic hooks, and the production quality of his work is never found wanton, this reviewer would assert that it is damn near impossible to come to any other conclusion but this: Eminem is one of the most important artists of our time."

This is coming from a guy who hates him...

Read whole article

Sunburn

2005-07-25T17:18:00.000-07:00

I just got back from a super long day at the lake. Jumped off some cliffs and stuff. There's this song that I just got that's pretty sweet...

[Jermaine Dupri]
In the Ferrari or Jaguar, switchin four lanes
With the top down screamin out
Money ain't a thang

[Jay-Z]
Bubble hard in the double R flashin the rings
With the window cracked, holler back
Money ain't a thang
...
[Jay-Z]
Jigga's style is love, X and O
Save all your accolades, just the dough
My game is wide, all lames aside
Tryin to stay alive, hundred thou' for the bracelet
Foolish, ain't I? The chain'll strain ya eye
Twin platinum gun son, aim for the sky
Ice on my bullet, you die soon as I pull it
Willies wanna rub shoulders, your money's too young
See me when it gets older, ya bank account grow up
Mine's is one-zero-zero-zero-zero-oh-doub'
---- near out the rear trunk when I roll up
Multi til I close up, it's all basic
I been spending hundreds since they had small faces
Rob your stash house, doubled out down in Vegas
...
Ya'll ---- ain't for real til y'all ship a mil'
And ya hit a R&B chick and she fit the bill
Said she loved my necklace, started relaxin
Now that's what I call a chain reaction
Went from wholesome to Jigga, you owed some
Baby, I don't play all my jewelry is light grey
Platinum, spend your whole life in the day

Lake Time AGAIN!

2005-07-24T22:11:00.000-07:00

I went out again today and did some tubin with Nate and my lil bro. It was straight up G UNIT. Oh yeah get that new energy drink CRUNK!!! It's soooo awesome!

Here's a picture of Steele Park. Haha I found it on Google Images, the best place on earth to find images.

Lake Time!!!

2005-07-23T22:50:00.000-07:00

So today I went to the lake. It was tons of fun. I'm going tomorrow and Monday, so I'm going to be sleeping all day on Tuesday I think... Yay!!! Oh yeah when I was at the lake my mom did the most punk thing ever, she deleted like 30% of my iTunes library, of all the music that she didn't like. P U N K!!!

So here is our boat just because I thought I'd show you... Ours is in a dock and this is just some pictures of the same kinda boat we have.

My iPod is so sick

2005-07-23T13:44:00.000-07:00

You can put album covers on the songs its sweet... So I've downloaded like 80 album covers and put it into my iTunes...

TFHWeb.com finished

2005-07-22T17:56:00.000-07:00

TFHWeb.com is finished! Check out the directions page, pretty dope. I'm still working on the top banner...

Got my iPod

2005-07-22T17:51:00.000-07:00

It came today, a day and a half after I ordered it... It's now loading all my songs from my iTunes. This will takes about 5 hours...

I'm officially a Flash geek!!!

2005-07-21T23:50:00.000-07:00

I looked on the posts and found that I had answered the last five questions. The only person that I'd ever seen do that before is kglad, and he's a Flash god. Well hopefully that says something... Haha jk jk...

TFH Redesign almost complete...

2005-07-21T22:08:00.000-07:00

I didn't think it would go this fast, but I did almost all of it today. Still have to work out some of the small stuff, but overall the site is looking fresh.

New team member

2005-07-20T21:38:00.000-07:00

Thanks for signin up James. You're the man.

My new iPod

2005-07-20T18:50:00.000-07:00

Check it out, so today I woke up and decided I wanted an iPod color 20 gig. Went online, got some accessories and I ended up with this ^

Some new stuff for TFHWeb

2005-07-20T17:34:00.000-07:00

Today I added a new image, which I thought was really cool, and added some more stuff on the flash header.

We're working on the color scheme right now to revamp TFHWeb.com. I'm tired of the blue and yellow, it hurts my eyes. Here's a sample of what it might look like - sdpurtill.com/tfh/revamped/

I'm here.

2005-07-20T17:25:00.000-07:00

Hi. This is my first post... I'm doing this because I need a place to write down everything about the studio. Enjoy!

-Sam