Senior Projects

Monday: Allergy sick didn’t do anything. My aunt got a Solar eclipse goggle from her community college, so I didn’t go blind when watching solar eclipse.

Wednesday: Nina was sick and Chris had to take care of her. So I did nothing either.

Tue, Thur, Fri: I started the Coursera programming course.

I finished Coursera finance weeks ago but didn’t cancel the subscription on time so it charges me another 79 dollars. I thought it cancel automatically when I’m done with the course. And Coursera didn’t send me any notification email for the subscription fee renew. I have to say Coursera knows how to make money based on people’s “I thought..” mentality.

On Thursday afternoon, I followed a different litigation attorney to court where he held a trial with a witness. The case is about a couple who leased a car and took out a loan from Alltru Credit Union to pay for it. The couple got a divorce and could no longer pay the money back, so they stopped making payments and kept the car. Now, Alltru is suing the individuals for the rest of the money on the loan. The Account Resolution manager at Alltru was on the witness stand during the trial where she was questioned about case. The trial went much longer than anticipated because the defendant’s attorney objected to just about everything he could. When it was his turn to cross-examine he wasn’t able to make any arguments against the evidence. The trial settled and they will meet again in 30 days to further discuss anything necessary for Hon. Nicolette Klap to make a judgement.

Here are the rest of the pictures since the last post was getting crowded!

This was one of the best events of my life and I had so much fun! The guests were also able to bid on the actual clothing items during a live auction as well as other experiences like a lake vacation, private jet ride, and a meal cooked by private chefs. From the donations $40,000 was made (one woman gave $10,000). From the auction around $30,000 was made, and from tickets, which cost $250 a piece, but I got to go for free since I am an employee and worked the event, was around $80,000.

Even though I did a lot of stuff Friday, I will quickly try to explain it, since there was a lot of special stuff going on Saturday. I am making an effort to keep my posts between 250-500 words, but if you would like to read the extended version (Ella’s Version, get it like Taylor’s Version?) feel free to check out my Substack under Ella Alt, username @jollyranger867 where I will be posting those shortly.

Friday 4/12:

We had our family’s history exploration day, so I worked that. I just helped wherever needed like setting up, storytelling, working a booth, or hanging out at the time traveling station, the theme was transportation so there were lots of trains, plans, & automobiles, etc. Then from 2:00 to 5:00 I worked the desks as a greeter; this was a little unexpected because originally I was supposed to leave at 2:00, but I didn’t mind! Julie also talked to me about being able to possibly lead my own storytime event, so that is cool!

Saturday 4/13:

Oh my goodness, I just got back home from Threads, and it was AMAZING!!! Everyone’s outfits were awesome, and it was so much fun. I worked the North Check In Desk with Lydia P., Mary (Suzi’s daughter), and Katie. This was fun because I got to greet people and see everyone’s outfits, while doing this I also met Travis Cummings, who is one of the lead anchors on KSDK Channel 5 News and also recently had a small part in a movie! Then I got to watch the fashion show and just hung out pointing people to rooms where we had other events for the night. It was really cool, I got to say hi to two of the designers and models after. I also met Chelsey Hanes, the MC (not main character *eye roll emoji*), she does a special program on FOX 2 News about STL stuff, and she complimented my outfit. I also met the ex-wife of a famous Cardinals player, Jim Eddmonds, her name is Meghan O’Toole King, she sells real estate, but also has appeared in reality TV shows. I also got to talk with Jason from the Historical Society, who was volunteering, and his wife Tomakio, I believe. Lastly, Jody, the president of the museum was wearing a fabulous sparkly black suit, we passed by each other at one point and he told me, “We compliment each other so well!” in reference to my jumpsuit. I ended the night with a cherry coke nightcap and chicken tenders with ranch from Wally’s.

Pictures:

*Look 3, designed by Mikkel Burnside, a senior fashion student at Lindenwood. Encouraged by his mother and love for making wrestling costumes, he began fashion design. He drew inspiration from a Drag Queen Costume worn by Candy Principle, a St. Louis based Drag Queen, ca. 1995.

This week was my last week; I was there for three weeks. I enjoyed it a lot, and I learned more than I thought. As a member of this country club since 1999, I was not born yet, but it was cool to see everything that happens as a worker at this club. It was funny because head director Joe Schwent had been working there for nineteen years, and I am now eighteen, so he watched me grow up. That was cool, and I was fortunate to grow up there and belong there. So what I did this last week was Tuesday through Friday. Well, on Tuesday morning, I got to the golf shop. It was bright and sunny that morning, so a decent number of members were heading out onto the golf course to play. Still, as I said in my last post, we do Wednesday memos every week, so I went out with Jessica Fox and Joe Schwent onto hole number 9 on Lewis and Clark to shoot a video. I learned a lot about how to shoot a professional video and get the right angles, along with Joe teaching me how to fix ball divots, essentially removing a piece of turf from the ground with the head of the golf club when hitting a golf ball. Anyway, I learned about that. Then we had lunch, and that afternoon was just the usual paperwork: unloading shipments and assisting members. As usual, it was a slow day.

Then, I am trying to remember if it rained on Wednesday, but a lot got done around the golf shop. Golf Pro-Brooks actually shipped some clubs that were going to Arizona for a member through a shipping company called Chopsticks, which is a company that explicitly ships golf clubs. Then we packed some orders and went to lunch. Then, in the afternoon, I vacuumed with the best vacuum I have ever used in my entire life. Like guys, I was so amazed by this vacuum. It sucked everything right up, and it’s cordless, which is a game changer. So yeah, I learned how to do invoices for golf clubs and unpacked shipments of orders to sell in the golf shop of a brand called Peter Millar, which is a best-selling golf attire. Then, on Thursday, it was a fun day because when Curt, head pro, was gone, we didn’t get as much done, but of course, we still got a lot done. In the morning, I ran some remembers on golf carts over to the hitting range back and forth and cleaned the shop. Let’s say it was a fun day. Then Friday was my last day today, so everyone was working. It was the busiest day because it was Friday’s fun day, and many members and their guests wanted to play golf, including my father.

Anyways, in the morning, I helped answer the phone, assisted members with things, and helped with paperwork and shipping boxes, same as usual, but it was a fun day. I also just remembered that on Wednesday, Brooks, Ryan, and Jim ran a 9-hole ladies’ putting clinic, and I also helped, which was pretty cool. Anyway, I learned a lot these last three weeks:

• How to do practical work like invoices.
• What goes on behind merchandising?
• What makes a good merchandiser?

It was proven because Head Pro-Curt won an award for its merchandiser of the year, which was pretty cool. I also had a lot of fun. Some phrases that were used that were so funny to me is the golf pros would say “Me not Know,” “A whole lot of Boo hooin,” and Lots of singing Christmas songs by Curt. He loves Christmas, guys like way too much. There were lots of jokes, and we had the best dress contest each day. I judged each day; let’s say Paul won twice. I had an excellent experience at the CCSA! 

My employers gave me today off since they had family business to attend to. The break was well needed though since I had back to back meetings yesterday… That’s about it for this week.

Here is what I did at the museum on Thursday, since there is a lot I will make a separate post of what I did Friday and Saturday for the gala.

Thursday 4/11:

My first work I did was work as greeter at the Key Bistro from 11:00 to 2:00. A big perk are Char, Anthony, Pierre, and Dan who are all very nice to talk to. Today, Pierre was walking up to Dan, and Dan was like, “Oh, what’s up, man?” And Pierre goes, “Not much, baby girl.” Oh my word, too funny. I would also like to say my outfit was slaying Thursday, unfortunately it almost tried to slay me! I say slay me because I was actually wearing a jacket made out of butchering knives, so every time I turned I was almost stabbed. Just kidding. OK, here is the OOTD (Outfit of the Day, in case you don’t know the lingo). I wore these wide legged pleated, high waisted, trousers my mom thrifted for 50 cents. They are so comfortable. Then I wear my mom’s old black tank top with lace trim around the sleeves and neckline. Then as a layer over top, I used my mom’s vintage white, silk button up as a layering piece. Originally, I was gonna button it up, but I liked it better open. The top also has these flowers and leaves pattern on it. It’s not embroidered onto the shirt, the best way I can describe is like they’re almost burnt into it, if that makes sense? Now here’s where I almost got slayed! I was wearing these vintage, black, platform, lace-up combat boots that were my mom’s in the ’90s. And my mom was like, “oh, make sure to maybe take a second pair of shoes with you if they get uncomfortable.” And I was all like, “Say less, boo thang! They’re already in my bag!” (I didn’t actually say the, “say less, boo thang!” part.) And my mom was like, “oh, those aren’t the pair where the heel is coming off, are they?” And I was like, “Nope, LOL!” They were really comfortable, so I figure I wouldn’t swap them out, until later that night, if at all. Then I went to Kat’s office to grab my bag before heading up to the Key Bistro, and BAM!!! The right boots heel came off, so I clomp out of the office and I am taking them off. Then I go to take off the left one, and its heel, also came off! I was like, “SHEEESHHH!!!! It’s a good thing this little goblin brought her converse!” and then I swapped out the boots for the tennis shoes. RIP those boots, I hope I can maybe repair them, somehow. Then I shadowed Dan, who I had not met before at the South (front desk). Dan was very cool. He is retired, but used to write the breaking news reports for KMOV Channel 4. Then he began volunteering at the museum and after a year, he decided to work a few times a week for pay. From 3:00 to 4:00 I stayed with Aslyn at the front desk, where I learned that Aslyn happens to be the one person in the whole museum (so far, maybe there are others) that likes the corn ice cream.Then from 4:00 to 5:00 MJ said I could work the grand hall desk by myself and gave me a radio (walkie talkie) to use if I needed it! An author gave a talk about it and signed books, and there were also a group of Lindenwood University students who came to the first part of happy hour in the lobby to share their projects on the different countries represented at the worlds fair. This is something that is really cool about the History Museum is that they partner with all of the local city colleges to do stuff like this. 

These last days I began looking into the world of databases. Although they seem straight forward and simple like they are a bunch of tables, they are a lot more complex than they seem. First I began looking into database providers like amazon (AWS) and other non local databases. For my project they told me to use a local database(meaning it is stored on this computer). The database in question was postgreSQL which is a provider for these types of db’s. I looked into it and the more I looked the more confusing it got. Thankfully the people here hopped on some calls with me and helped me on the right path. I learned that SQL is the language, basically, that runs the database and it’s better to have a ui like pgAdmin which helps keep track of your database. This Friday I have spent most the day downloading and setting up this software to help my creation of my db and will hopefully finish it on monday.

These first three days I worked further on my project and added input text boxes opposed to just using the computers gps to calculate it. That took some time because I had to have a deeper understanding of the code in order to be able to change the main function of my javascript code. This lead me to a big in my code which I thought was a problem which turned out to be nothing. In order to send a Json object (data if you will), from my webpage to my server it has to be in the right format. Initially I thought that this format was in issue with formatting from the webpage to the flask server. This I later figured out was my own fault because the measurements on the webpage was only expecting two digit numbers. If there are any more digits than en the code wouldn’t work. So for my testing I always put more than three digits. I found this out later after trying a million things.

This week was a little slower than the first two. There was less for me to do, and the things that I did didn’t take me a long enough time to keep me occupied. I got a small research project about the laws that link an employer to their employees and more specifically, how using a work email for personal reasons can lead to other documentation or contracting issues in the future. I sat in on a couple meetings and phone calls about the purchase of a large property and learned of all the pieces of a large transaction like that, especially of a personal property. 

I haven’t been given any more organizational work and I’m very glad for that. In my free time I’ve been productive, but I hope next week is busier.