Reading the Rundown for the Sloan Photos

Posted on October 12, 2017 by brent

Good evening, my friends. I hope everyone has had a great day so far. Thanks for returning to Don’t Blink. Here we go with the Thursday Rundown…

Birthday Cookie – How do you ship a cookie from one side of the country to the other and still have it taste like it just came out of the oven? Put it in a miniature pizza box of course! My mom sent me one of her homemade chocolate chip cookies this past week to mark my birthday. Sidney and I devoured it, well, I mostly devoured it, and I couldn’t have been more impressed with its quality. It tasted just like home. Thanks mom!

Thank you to my mom for sending me a delicious birthday cookie.

Brent “Trump” Reser – Out of all the birthday messages I received on Facebook (and I replied to each one), the most creative one came from Rob Wyeth, our director of creative services at Coastal. If you remember Rob from previous blog posts, he is the man behind our Festivus t-shirt exchange and our office birthday cards. Anyway, he celebrated my day of birth by “Trumping” me. I don’t really know if it is a good look for me or not. DISCLAIMER: Someone putting my face on a politician does not necessarily mean I support or endorse that person.

Rob Wyeth put this graphic together.

Deal Alert – I have written before about how good Walmart’s Great Value brand is, especially its ice cream. Heck, it beat out Ben & Jerry’s in a taste test I conducted. So when ice cream that good is on sale for a low price, I have to let my readers know about it. At our local Walmart Market this past Sunday, a tub ran just $1.84. This includes all flavors. A pint of Ben & Jerry’s runs close to $6 at some places. I had never seen the price of ice cream of this quality and quantity ever dip so low. Take advantage of it, you won’t regret it (unless you are trying to lose weight).

All those cartons of ice cream for just $1.84!!

Austin – Because I wrote an entire blog post on Jeopardy champion Austin Rogers, I feel obligated to follow up with an update on my Thursday Rundown (I will do this every Thursday until he is dethroned). The past two nights have been runaways for the champ as he continues to use the Daily Doubles to pull away. Last evening a woman from Surf Side, S.C., was a contestant and it would have been a storybook tale if she defeated Austin. Obviously, it didn’t happen. I am still punching the pillows and gritting my teeth as he sweeps categories and aces Final Jeopardy. At least I learned a cool fact last night…Austin buys all of his suits and ties at thrift shops…much respect to him!

Sloan at 30 Weeks – Sloan is well over 200 days old now! She reaches for everything and she feels that a box of baby wipes is more fun to play with than any of her toys. Her newest trick is clapping her hands. She loves to show off by doing it, bringing a big smile to her mommy and daddy. She keeps getting sweeter and prettier by the day.

Our baby girl is now 30 weeks old. Here is the latest collage with photos from this past week.

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Please remember the victims and families impacted by awful events such as the shooting, the hurricanes, and the fires. We all need to realize our own good fortune. Have a nice weekend. Don’t Blink.

Graphic Influences and Precious Text Messages

Posted on July 16, 2015 by brent

I like Thursdays more than half of the other days of the week and a reason for that is because of the Thursday Rundown. Here we go with this week’s five random topics…

Magazine Feature – Our latest alumni magazine here at Coastal Carolina University was recently sent out to the masses. I am tasked with contributing a piece of some sort to the twice-a-year publication. This time around I had the opportunity to do a short story on the opening of our beautiful new baseball stadium. I wrote the copy and conducted the interviews while our amazing graphics team came up with the sweet layout.

This is the portion that I got to contribute to Coastal Magazine.

Fat Brent – Speaking of our graphics team, the head man of that group, Rob Wyeth, created this flattering image of me. Rob usually responds to most of my blog posts with a witty sentence or two but this time around he replied with a graphic. Of course this came about because of my post I wrote earlier this week regarding my Cookie Dough Café concept. If I did in fact open such a place I would indeed probably look like this. But then since I would be so rich I would get liposuction.

That cookie dough will catch up to you after a while.

Price of Parking – I explained last week that Sidney, her dad, and myself would be making the night trip to and from Charleston to pick up her car. Left at the airport for two weeks because we had to drive it there to catch a flight, the charges piled up just a little bit. Just another byproduct of Delta’s incompetence.

The cost to keep Sidney’s vehicle parked at the Charleston Airport. Thanks Delta!

Precious Texting – Sidney has an adorable six-year-old niece who I already pretty much consider my niece as well. Yesterday I was surprised when I received a text message from her! Using an old phone of her parents, she got my phone number and made my afternoon. We had a very meaningful conversation as we went back and forth a few times. You can never send too many emoticon hearts.

Russell and I had quite the conversation.

Wedding Update – Today at our second marriage meeting we expressed the date we want for our wedding and submitted it for approval by the priest! Also related to our wedding, I am amazed at the amount of planning that Sidney and her mom have already devoted to the big day. Although we won’t say our vows for another 11 months, important things still need to be done this early in the game. Shout out to my fiancé for picking out her dress this week!

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Last weekend was extremely relaxing and I hope to do it again this weekend. I wish the same for all of you. Be safe and enjoy the British Open. Don’t Blink.

Festivus 2014

Posted on December 19, 2014 by brent

Inside our University Communication office we have a very special group. If you are drawn to interesting/nerdy/humorous dudes, you would love our graphic design department. They produce outstanding work while letting their bizarre personalities shine through. The reputation they hold around campus is one of craziness and creativity. I get to eat lunch with them every day.

Our graphics department holds a not-so-typical Christmas party each year. The story is long but to sum it all up, the graphics guys created their own holiday gathering because their twisted sense of humor and tendency to draw a little too much attention to themselves at other parties demanded they hold their own. Every year now, the graphics department hosts Festivus.

This was the brilliant graphic for Festivus.

Inspired by Seinfeld, Festivus is a parody of Christmas. Our graphics folks use the term to create a party that is laid back, fun, and original. The past few years a different type of main event or exchange has highlighted the gathering. For Festivus 2014, the party centered on a bad t-shirt exchange. Attendees had to either create or purchase a bad t-shirt and sacrifice it up to the exchange. With the shirts concealed in gift bags, wrapping paper, and campus envelopes, numbers were drawn to determine the picking order. From there, one-by-one, participants went up and grabbed a t-shirt from the Coastal Ale House table. Drawing roars of laughter as each person opened up a package to reveal a hilarious shirt, he/she then had to put it on and wear it for the rest of the night!

Festivus attendees getting ready for the next person to pick his/her shirt.

By no means is Festivus exclusive to just the CCU graphic design artists. They make sure to invite anyone else who wants to forget about their reservations for a night and “nerd out like a designer.” I definitely had the evening circled on my calendar! Below is the shirt I designed for Festivus. I countered the good-natured ribbing I receive from the graphics department head honcho, Rob Wyeth, with a playful shot at his profession (he is pictured on the back). Although he told me that this means war, and even though the shirt is the exact opposite of what I truly think, everyone in attendance got a great laugh out of it.

This is my shirt that I designed for Festivus.

Jady, one of our other graphic designers, ended up with the shirt I created.

Below is the shirt that I received in the exchange. Created by Ron Walker, one of the designers in the graphics department, you can put the following equation together: Walter White + Donkey + Text = Bad Ass to the Core.

This is the shirt I proudly wore for the whole night.

This is the t-shirt that Ron Walker received. Designed by our graphics intern, Daniel “Scoops” Mableton, he created a Mr. Rogers shirt with the phrase “It’s All Good in the Hood.” Look closely and you will see some “enhancements” to the face of Mr. Rogers.

This is Ron Walker sporting his Mr. Rogers shirt.

Sidney attended the party with me and got to experience the weirdness of Festivus. She had the privilege of drawing a souvenir t-shirt from a roadside attraction called South of the Border. Regarded as the biggest tourist trap destination in the state of South Carolina, the attraction’s t-shirts are just as tacky as South of the Border itself.

Sidney wearing her super tacky tourist shirt.

I want to include Director of Creative Services Rob Wyeth himself, the biggest jokester in the department and the biggest promoter of Festivus. He picked an ice cream shirt.

Rob wearing his shirt.

Finally, our Sustainability Coordinator Jennifer Sellers ended up with this t-shirt that showed it was perfectly okay to simply take a sharpie marker and go to town.

Jennifer received a homemade shirt.

I think we had 18 shirts in the exchange. The reason why I am not showing more of them is because, well….some were a little inappropriate. But let me tell you what, last night was a ton of fun. Even with the weirdos in the graphics department (partly kidding of course) it was a nice evening of conversation, laughter, and holiday cheer. What a unique event I had the privilege of attending! Don’t Blink.

Eating at a Southern BBQ Buffet

Posted on October 10, 2014 by brent

All week I had looked forward to today. In celebration of the October birthdays in our office, we had decided to go eat at a very local restaurant. Much to my excitement, this certain restaurant was an all-you-can-eat BBQ/country cooking buffet. Needless to say, you can’t get much more southern than that.

We all piled into a few vehicles and drove deep into the heart of Conway, South Carolina, until we came to a modest joint called Radd Dew’s Bar-B-Que Pit. With a big pig out in the restaurant’s lawn, I knew this place was going to be an adventure.

Welcome to Radd Dew’s Bar-B-Que Pit!

We walked in and It was honestly a blast from the past. The place looked like a diner from the 1960’s or 1970’s. The tables, chairs, floor tiling, buffet setup, and the memorabilia resting on shelves made it feel like a complete time warp. We went up in line to pay first. For under $10 you got access to all the delicious southern food you wanted plus a drink. Since it was a lunch for the October birthdays, my wonderful boss paid for me.

Here is a look inside of Radd Dew’s.

Our table was already reserved for us so we hit the buffet right away. Taking a Styrofoam plate, I looked up and down the roughly 20 items in front of me. I then got in line and loaded my plate with BBQ pulled pork, fried chicken, chicken bog, green beans, macaroni and cheese, and a dish called Brunswick Stew. I went to our table and dug in. The BBQ pork and the chicken bog were both really good. The macaroni and cheese was so-so, my girlfriend and mom both make it much better. The green beans were green beans. The Brunswick Stew wasn’t bad. But what really made my taste buds delight was the fried chicken. It was the absolute best piece of chicken I had enjoyed since moving to South Carolina. You could literally taste the grease and the butter.

My first plate is on the left and my second plate is on the right.

I was guilty of going up for a second plate. Although the buffet also contained cat fish, pork chops, French fries, rice, potato salad, and other things I couldn’t come close to identifying, I stuck primarily to my favorite items from the first trip. In addition to my second helpings of fried chicken, chicken bog, and pulled pork, I also got a biscuit. My co-workers told me it was straight lard…I enjoyed it.

The start of the buffet line.

Throughout the meal, people from my office kept asking me what I thought of the different items. They enjoyed watching me dig into the southern fare. They laughed at me pretty hard because of my former misguided western belief that “BBQ” was throwing hamburgers and hot dogs on a grill. It was a fun meal and even though I didn’t want to do it to myself, I was stuffed when it was time to go.

The three birthday boys next to a pink pig. Our student graphic worker in the middle is Daniel “Scoops” Mableton and our Director of Creative Services, Rob Wyeth, is on the right.

But while the food was good, it was the experience itself that made the trip to Radd Dew’s Bar-B-Que Pit so enjoyable. Eating off Styrofoam plates, using plastic utensils, observing the locals, admiring the quirky decorations, indulging in a dining concept that I had never enjoyed before, and having a good time with my co-workers made the lunch hour a lot of fun. I felt like a real South Carolinian today and I wouldn’t shy away from taking any of my western friends to Radd Dew’s for some soul food and culture. Don’t Blink.

A Birthday Tradition at Work

Posted on October 8, 2014 by brent

The Office of University Communication at Coastal Carolina University is a great place to work. One of the many reasons why I enjoy it so much is because of our fun traditions. We hold premiere parties for new shows/videos we release, we go out to lunch each month to celebrate birthdays, and quite often people bring in yummy breakfast items on Fridays. However, there is one tradition that I like the best of all.

Whenever someone in our office has a birthday, our graphics department takes it upon themselves to create a card for that person. I am not talking about a basic piece of paper folded together with some text on it. Rather, I am talking about an elaborate, creative, funny masterpiece.

This was the card made for our Media Coordinator, Mona. As you can tell, it is a play on her name.

Rob, Regis, J.D., and Ron go out of their way to make cards that look awesome and that will make you laugh out loud. Their creations always speak to the birthday celebrant’s personality. If you are lucky enough to work in University Communication, on your birthday you will receive the best card of your life.

This was the card that our Vice President of University Communication (my boss) received. It is a Twitter timeline with tweets from people in the office. There are two other parts to this card with more tweet birthday wishes.

Once printed out, the card is secretly shuffled through our various offices in a red proofing folder for everyone to sign. When everyone has signed it and the time is right, the whole communication team will go to the birthday boy’s/girl’s desk and present the card. The crowd will huddle around the person’s desk and stare. The VIP of the day will then inspect the card, usually busting out in laughter.

Some of my bosses and co-workers waiting for me to open my card.

Today my 28th birthday was made even brighter when I was presented with my card from the “Social Misfits” (aka the graphics department…their words not mine). With the whole office watching my every move it took me two lines of the card before I hollered out in hysteria. Rob and his team came up with a parody of Darius Rucker’s “Homegrown Honey” that was all about me. Piggybacking off of my brief cameo in Rucker’s music video, the card was very timely and appropriate. Please take a minute to read the front.

Here is the front of my card. So funny and creative.

I then opened the card and filling up the whole left fold was a jar of “Homegrown” honey with my face plastered on it. To the right was space where my co-workers and bosses had signed. Even though I knew a card of some sort would be coming my way, I was so ecstatic and honored with what they had come up with.

The inside of my card.

Things like this make Coastal Carolina University such a great place to work at. The effort, creativity, and time that goes into something like this makes you feel special. I will keep this card for as long as it doesn’t get destroyed in a fire. Thank you so much to the graphics team for such a neat gift. Don’t Blink.

Don't Blink

By Brent Reser

Tag Archives: Rob Wyeth

Reading the Rundown for the Sloan Photos

Graphic Influences and Precious Text Messages

Festivus 2014

Eating at a Southern BBQ Buffet

A Birthday Tradition at Work