IRA

(sorry for the length everyone)

Is anyone else fed up with all the talk about people who are part of the IRA (Inter Residence Association) getting bed waivers, or whatever they are called. These people signed up to do this because they wanted to be involved on campus, do something with their time, and potentially make a  difference (hopefully for the better of ALL students) on campus. Now they want to put more money towards themselves.

I recently got an email highlighting all of their fine accomplishments this year so far. I was far from impressed. They seem to be doing what they signed up for, and once in awhile getting credit for some ideas. Wow, shocking that people who signed up to do what they are doing, are actually doing it.

Now they think that they are doing some hugely amazing thing and deserve to take money meant to be used on campus for all students and put it towards themselves.

I for one, do not like it at all. I think it is incredibly selfish and rude of them to think that the thing they signed up to do gives them these rights. 

Quoting from the email I received,  "IRA works every single day to make sure that the residents are being heard and to ensure a higher quality of life." If they are so hard at work making sure to listen to the residents on campus, why are they so blatantly ignoring what people are saying? I must say, I am starting to wonder whose quality of life they are so worried about. They say they are concerned with "being the prominent student voice on campus", yet it doesn't seem to be all students voices on campus. Just a few chosen students making sure only their voices are heard. 

"The idea behind this proposal is a step towards raising the awareness of the work that we do every single day on your behalf." Apparently with us not giving them a huge standing ovation for following through on something they thought they wanted to do they decided to make sure they got the recognition they "deserve".

Now, maybe I am unaware of things, but to me saying, "We need your support if we are going to continue to strive towards our vision. Without it, we will be severely stunted in our effort to better the organization hence bettering the quality of life within the residence halls." Makes it seem like they think they can't continue with something they chose to do without this bed waiver.

Quickly some numbers:

The maximum room rate for a traditional double (what the waiver is for): $5,742.

What they receive now for compensation: $475 in catscratch a semester.

Student fee for those on campus: $15

Students on campus: over 5000

Budget of: +$150,000

*these numbers are all taken from the email sent out.

With the budget so big I guess they think we won't notice the money being used on them.

Thanks to you IRA Executive Board!

Meet the lucky ones. again.

First off, a very original post title isn't it?

So, after watching/reading/doing Meet the Lucky Ones, I was struck by one thing. Why does Alan wear a heart sticker into the tanning booth? Does he think it will add to his "appeal", or does he think it will make him unique? I must say a dead beat dad trying to pick up woman, yep Alan is one unique guy. Not a single other one like him out there. Oh, wait. Yes there is.

This time, I followed one character (Alice) all the way through the five episodes. Than I followed Alan through the five episodes. Than Yesper. And on and on. I think you can figure it out from there.

Not much else new that I could find.

understanding

I know, I know. Way late for this. But, I was once taught that nothing and no one is ever late until the destination is reached, so...

I feel that the drawing under the entry Understanding in Ben Peek's twenty-six lies/one truth is all about the need for understanding in life to be able to survive life. For instance, Ben Peeks need to understand that Geraldine Lee is forever gone from him and his life. I think this drawing also addresses a need to understand the basic knowledge of life and death.

we meet again... lucky ones

We're the lucky ones... Lucky to be alliiiivvveeee... 

Ok, so that has been in my brain continuously for the past few days...

So I already made a post about the lucky ones, but as our professor made us watch it again, I guess I'll do another one. But, that also means that it can be half free choice! So watch out.

I wish I could just watch the parts of the series that revolve around Jesper, Estelle, and Alan. But wait! I can... Sweet.

There's the beauty of the whole thing. You can decided what you want to watch, and when. So when you watch it in a different order you can get a whole different feeling. What I found was that when you watch it in order, or out of order, or in backwards order, it doesn't, obviously, change what happens during the series, but it can change what you perceive as being more or most important. Generally, if you watch the same person first every time, than that person's issues may seem more important.

The majority of the Star Wars desert scenes were filmed in Tunisia, where they still offer Star Wars Tours. (That's the "whatever you want to post about" part...)

The same holds true for the person you typically watch last. The ones in the middle don't seem to stand out as much.

But this is all very boring...

So I will end this post soon. "Be all you can be, keep hope alive."

Quidditch

This weekend when I went home my family and I had plans together. We were going to go watch the quidditch match. It was the second annual intercollegiate quidditch tournament. About fourteen colleges had teams that were playing. The teams came from Canada,  Louisiana, Boston, Washington (the state), and many other places. They all had their own unique outfits, and of course they all had brightly colored capes. At the tournament there were people dressed up as Hagrid, a hippogryph, and dementors.

  

There were owls and alpacas to visit with, food from local restaurants to buy, and of course quidditch to watch. The tournament went from ten in the morning until six that evening.

Muggle quidditch, a full contact sport, requires that more than one girl be playing on the field at all times. The players have brooms (Harry Potter brooms), and all wear safety goggles. There were different colored headbands, so that the different players could be identified. Yellow headbands denoted the seekers, green headbands showed who the keepers were, and everyone else had either white or black to separate the two teams.

  

My personal favorite part was the snitch. Track stars dressed in all yellow running around trying to avoid getting caught. The snitch would tease and taunt the seekers only to run away quickly. The snitch could often be seen jumping over people playing the game, sliding under benches, stealing the seekers capes, and hiding in the crowds. A few times a snitch would be more creative, one climbed on top of a bus, another rode a bicycle across the field, and once the snitch was put into a cardboard box and re-released onto the playing field.

The half time show was made up of singers, dancers, jugglers and potions. People walked around on stilts, juggled with flames or knives, or they rode around on a unicycle.

I must admit, I feared boredom when I went. Than while I was there I laughed, I shouted and I even took part in a wave. I am going to go next year also.

I have met the lucky ones.

I have met the lucky ones... and gotten to know them quite well. I have to say, that while I felt like a tool spending so much time going through every part of all five episodes, I did really enjoy the series.

I think my favorite characters would have to be Yes-per and Great Grammy Estelle. Jesper, as it were, was a very strange guy, but I thought he was pretty funny, and I felt like I could relate to him. Although he was very weird, he was still pretty down to earth. Estelle was just awesome. She may or may not have been completely off her rocker, but she was pretty cool either way. 

I'll admit that there were numerous times throughout my exploration of this story that I didn't want to go through all of the episodes and all of the characters, but something usually happened or I noticed something else that made me want to check out the rest of it. And check it out, I did. All of it... But in the end I was glad that I watched it all, because it is a really good story, and I think it was very well put-together.   

I think that, honestly, this has been my favorite piece we have covered, on a computer screen, thus far. It is right up there with twenty-six lies/one truth. I don't know which of the most recent two pieces of literature we have been studying I like more, but I enjoyed them both, differently. 

A good, concise way to describe Meet the Lucky Ones, is to say that it is worth the time it takes to watch it all.

Personal diary entry- Whoa...

When I was given the assignment to read all of the personal diary entries, in order, in twenty-six lies/one truth I was expecting some sort of grand revelation to fall upon me like a warm blanket on a winter night. Or something like that. But, alas, nothing of the sort took place.

Did anybody else think something like that was gonna happen?

Instead, the entries just made me feel a whole lot of different emotions that didn't seem to be tied to anything in particular. My mind was confused, and my heart was confused. I was confused. I still am confused actually... 

I feel as though reading all of the personal diary entries raised more new questions than it answered. 

On the positive side though, something is to be said for writing that can make me feel so strongly, whether it be sad, confused, or otherwise. And beyond that, something is to be said for writing that could put our entire lit. class into silence like it did today. I think that is the first time that room has been silent (with us in it) since the time in which no one wanted to record the voice-overs for their digital stories. 

I also found it ironic that our assignment was to read those, and to try to reach an understanding about "Understanding." And I didn't reach a definitive understanding of any of them. Just a little more insight.

I wish I didn't have two midterms tomorrow. 

skydiving

I wish I could say it was me who went, but it wasn't. Last weekend, the 11th, my friend went skydiving. The whole group of us from high school tried to get out there for it, I ended up not seeing anyone new there but that is another story. We got there in time to see her in a wonderful outfit. Amazing right? We were told that it would take twenty minutes for the plane to get high enough for her to jump. So we all got to watch a group of jumpers (skydivers) before she went. 

It was an amazing fall day, and watching the skydivers made me wish I had the money for it. I would probably chicken out though, not as brave as that I don't think.

My favorite part was as she landed her legs weren't high enough and she tumbled, along with the guy she was attached to.

All in all, a great way to spend part of a fall day.

Ben Peek A-M

So, I feel like we were all told to do this a long time ago, but here goes.

My favorite entry for twenty six lies/one truth  would be Kinship. In this entry he talks about his family on Christmas and how his mom is an outsider. He realizes his mom, sister and him are all outsiders because his father died. He understands how unfair his extended family is to his mom, so he stops seeing them. I thought this entry should good insight into his family.

I'm a new man.

This post is pretty closely related to my last one about my brother's wedding, but I neglected to mention a couple things...

You all probably know me exclusively as the kid with the tangled brown hair and dark, heavy beard... Because I've looked pretty much that way since I got to school. But I am no longer that person I once was. I didn't want to look scruffy on my brother's big day, especially if I was to be standing up in a tuxedo in front of everyone, so got my hair cut... pretty damn short... and shaved off my whole beard.

I tried to ease people into the new me before the weekend, by shaving some of my beard, leaving a goatee. I had that in class one day... But it didn't quite do the job. I've already had one of my friends almost walk straight past me, even though I was waving at her! Finally she stopped when I said, "Hey... You don't recognize me anymore." She responded by saying, "Wow! You look different without the beard!"

So... This is basically just a public service announcement reminding you that the Doug you knew has changed, so don't FREAK OUT. 

P.S. MY HEAD IS SO FREAKIN COLD EVERY TIME I GO OUTSIDE NOW! So the beard will return.

Weddings. Gotta love 'em.

So far in my life I've been to only three weddings that I know of. Two of these weddings have been since I started college... so just in the past few months. This weekend was a wedding weekend, so it is fresh in my mind.

This weekend will go down in my memory as one of my favorite weekends of my life. Something about weddings is just so happy and uplifting.

This past Saturday my eldest brother got married, and I (along with my two other brothers) were ushers. So I got to wear a tux. Pretty sweet. 

The whole ceremony went off without a hitch... well, other than the fact that they got "hitched"... but thats neither here nor there... Seriously though, the minister was great, the music was fantastic (my brother and his new wife walked out to a trumpet player and 2 strings playing All You Need Is Love), and the readings were wonderful, despite the fact that the bride's brother had a sinus infection and could barely speak when he first got to the chapel. But really, they ended up being perfect.

And then there was the reception... I can pretty much sum up the reception with a couple fun facts... After last call my brother ran distraction so one of the groomsmen could lean over the bar and start filling glasses out of the tap... and it was the general consensus throughout the reception was that it was the first time anyone had ever been to a wedding and been given free jello shots made by the bride's brother. Good stuff...

In all seriousness though, it really was an absolutely wonderful day. I can't believe I have a sister-in-law now... I'm really proud of my brother and happy for them both. I know I sound kinda "girly" or whatever... but I love weddings. Saturday was the most fun I think I've ever had. 

m4apes

musicians for apes... They have a pretty good cause.

Today, they performed in Brennan's. I probably would not have been there if it weren't extra credit for anthropology, but when i got there it was pretty empty and I felt bad. The guy who founded the company is against chimpanzees and pretty much animals in general being used in the entertainment business, promising no harm on the set but then later on they are hurt and tested on. He and his partner play guitar and they played some songs for us, some were pretty creepy but there was an awesome one I liked. It was acoustic guitars but they were plugged into amps. There is one song where he drums on the guitar and the other guy was just plucking the same string.. i don't know how they did it but it sounded like they were in a jungle. It was perfect, sounded like a chimpanzees natural habitat. they were good at playing the music but I think they could improve their lyrics before they actually promote more. this was their first time coming to a university, a student here had contacted them to come. he is working on the site and I think everyone else should check it out! 

I felt bad because they had a donation jar and nobody really put money in! Not that I'm one to donate to charity a lot but this actually seemed interesting. He mentioned one poor chimp that he used to visit in a sanctuary in Africa, they would pump aspartame into his cheeks for testing. Thats the stuff they use in diet soda! Supposedly they do a lot of worse things to the chimps they use for the circus and other entertainment. Next think i have a soda I know I'm going to have chimpanzees on my mind and I am going to feel REALLY bad. I hope more people get into causes like these, I thought this show was going to be a waste of my time but it really wasn't bad at all. They were thankful for the small crowd that actually did come out, imagine if more other  people actually cared too.

A-M... C!

I didn't have a favorite entry from sections A-M (this is partially because I'm not actually enjoying this book. does everyone else actually like it? i kind of just feel like it has no point, I'm just reading a bunch of words. When we discussed it in class about all the entries that connected, I saw some connections that i hadn't realized when I read it. I hope that there are more and that he actually goes somewhere with his entries because i'm really not enjoying it as it is...) 

But I did have a favorite section, like a good number of others i picked C.

I mean, if i'm reading a book of some guys opinions... and random facts about things i don't care about, I want it to at least be humorous... Cunt.... maybe as a female i wasn't supposed to enjoy this section as much as i did. Well, he did defend women saying that if he was a woman he wouldn't appreciate people saying a cunt is the "most disgusting word." But I think he just has a male state of mind.  Us females found it amusing. It was weird at first, 10 entries on the same topic when all the other sections were floating around on random topics.  It was pretty ridiculous, but I guess the funniest entries were the creative writing and the elementary school  classes. When I think of "the c word" I think of "crap". Isn't that what it was when we were kids? Now they just have cunt, a womans private parts? When we were kids I remember "dickhead" was a pretty bad insult you used when you were mad at someone. Guys didn't find that too offensive... so the fact that "cunt is the most dirty word" doesn't actually offend women...  well, most of us. i don't know, these are just all the things I thought about as Ben went on and on about  cunts.

You guys heard of Charlie?

He is a British baby who likes to bite.  His brother thinks it really hurts. I mean, this kid has over 55,000,000 views of the clip of him that his mom posted on youtube. I didn't hear about him until last night, when the rest of my suite was gathered together watching it, instead of watching the last debate. I probably should have watched one of those debates since I have to vote this year and all, but distractions like that  left  me with not watching them. When I heard laughter I went out to the common room to see what was going on, and this is what i found: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBlgSz8sSM

Apparently I missed out the past year since their mother posted the video, because the rest of the world has seen it. I even called up  my sister to tell her to watch it, but she told me she saw it months ago and has her boyfriend (he is british too) say "charlie bit my finger and it really hurt" in his accent sometimes just for amusement. I don't think it would be amusing to see anyone but that little kid say it about his brother, but whatever. It just about does it for me when there is silence at the end and Charlie looks sad but then bursts out laughing. I don't know if you guys have seen it, but you should. Just don't shut me down and say you also saw it years ago. I have replayed it too many times today since I got back to my room and decided to study for my midterm tomorrow. If any one else is taking that geography midterm, i promise this is more enjoyable than those boring readings she said we should reread. 

Postsecret

I know, I know. No more "In the life of..." blog posts. No one wants them. Blah blah blah.

Suck it up or close out the window. Doesn't matter to me.

So tonight I went to the Postsecret event in the Ira Allen Chapel. It was started by Frank Warren. Postsecret, for those few unaware, is a community art project where people send their secrets on postcards to a man. He puts them up online, and travels the country talking about secrets. There are also books that are sold full of secrets. 

Not to sound completely disgusting and almost cliché-ish, I found the event to be surprisingly unifying. Having someone go up and share their secret at the end was amazing, emotional, personal, and almost terrifying (even with me just sitting in the audience). It was impossible to know what secrets would be revealed, what secret might connect with my own personal secret. I have to give props to anyone brave enough to share their secrets with everyone there.

Everything talked about tonight was something that I am sure touched at least one person in the audience.

In the end, it ended up being one of the best five dollars I have ever spent.

13 chapters/one sitting

Last night I decided to have a seat and start reading our assigned homework in twenty-six lies/one truth. I had planned on starting it, maybe reading the first half of the assignment, and then finishing it up the next morning (which, by the way, is this morning that I am currently living in) but, after I started I didn't really want to put it down. I took one break from reading the first half of this book and that was to get food because the dining hall was set to close soon. In short, I really enjoyed the first half of twenty-six lies/one truth. Ben Peek really gets to the cynical, realist core of things in a way that I respect, because he isn't, as many "cynics" are, overly pessimistic. There is a subtle, yet salient, difference between being a pessimist and a cynic. Fortunately, you can easily be a realist and cynic, and apparently a funny bastard in the process, and that is what Peek has done in this book.

To give you a little insight into how much I enjoyed reading these first 13 chapters I'll tell you about how I read them. I sat at my desk, in my dull wooden and metal chair, with my book on my desk before me, and my computer behind that. Eventually, I let my computer go into sleep mode because I had been ignoring it in favor of the book. I sat in my not particularly comfortable chair for about an hour without really moving at all and just ripped through pages and chapters. Many times I read a whole page, or a little entry, over and over a few times because I thought it was funny or provocative and I wanted to remember how he phrased his thought. At some point a couple chapters in, I grabbed the highlighter out of my marking implement and other such thing cup  on my desk and began making different types of markings around different pieces that either confused me, made me laugh, or that I just thought were very well-made points. 

If you decided that you didn't want to read this book, I recommend that you reconsider. It was worth the short amount of time that you have to dedicate to reading it.

Woke this morning and it seemed to me
That every night turns out to be
A little bit more like Bukowski
And yeah, I know he's a pretty good read
But God, who'd want to be
God, who'd want to be such an asshole?
-Isaac Brock, Modest Mouse

Inanimate Alice

I didn't really have a favorite episode of Inanimate Alice, however I will go with episode 3, Russia. I mean, the first one was short (yay) and sweet and i kind of wanted to see where it was headed in the next episode, but when i watched the second episode and saw that it wasn't really a continuation i was turned off. I kind of hated Alice here, she called for help and then hung up and decided to solve her problem by making it worse? She knew she shouldn't have gone outside in the storm, and she also knew that it was already late and her parents would be home soon, so clearly she should have stayed in the house. Russia was my favorite because it was more kept me wondering what would happen. I wasn't understanding why Alice had to hide or why her parents had to get away so this was the one episode that i wanted to keep watching. That one scene also sort of reminded me of Anne Frank, the way Alice just had to sit in the closet and listen to the voices. and they were after her parents, and when they tried to escape they got stopped at a checkpoint before they could leave, that reminded me of the sound of music where the von trapps tried to escape in the car in the middle of the night but would have to get past them to get out the country. The fourth episode was decent I guess, I mean, I was happy Alice was finally normal, but it sucked that once she finally got some friends she gave into peer pressure. Poor girl. i don't think i care to watch the next episodes. im thankful that i chose not to play the games in them, too.

Inanimate Alice...

Maybe it was because I watched it all in a row, or maybe it was the knowledge that I "had" to watch it. By the time I got to the fourth chapter, I was bored. I didn't want to watch anymore. I enjoyed the first three, they were "cute", I almost shudder to use that word, but, it fits.

The fourth one was far too long, too convoluted and boring. I found myself wishing for a fast forward button. Hoping I would be out of my misery soon.

Forcing myself to watch this video only made the watching of it worse, as I felt there was no escaping it with no end in sight. I wish the author had had the foresight to realize making it a little shorter would only have improved the story line.

On the other side. I enjoyed the way the story was done. I liked all the effects it had, I enjoyed the playing around with the text, and the optional side games contained within the stories. I also enjoyed all the pictures employed within the stories, as I felt they made it more interesting. Having to interact at times so that the story could continue was a clever way to ensure the viewer stayed attentive to the story.

Overall, I feel that if they were not viewed all at once in a row, it would be a pleasant experience to watch Inanimate Alice.

Inanimate Alice. Eh.

Let me start off this post by saying that I did not enjoy any of the episodes of Inanimate Alice very much at all. Generally, I found them mind-numbingly hollow and boring. There are, of course, a few exceptions to any generality, and I'll admit that at a few points throughout the total four episodes I was intrigued, piqued you may say, and a couple parts made me laugh, but all in all, I would consider it a less than enjoyable way to spend my time.

If I were to pick an episode to call my favorite, I would have to pick the "Italy" episode. This is, of course, while overlooking the fact that I wanted to reach through my computer screen and tell Alice that she is a bumbling moron for going out in a damn blizzard, on the side of a mountain, in the dark. I would call it my favorite because it was somewhat short, it managed to not drive me crazy with references to a character that the main character invented herself and then developed an infatuation for, and it didn't go into completely random, off topic, distracting digressions, as much as some of the other episodes did.

Did anyone else think similarly about these pieces of entertainment? Sometimes I can't tell if I'm just being overly-critical because I'm cranky or if I have a legitimate gripe. I don't think I'm cranky...

Cheese

I just got back from getting a quick meal at the dining hall. Yet again I have noticed a serious lack of the utmost importance in our campus dining halls. Cheese. Real cheese.

Some poor misguided souls are under the very mistaken impression they are consuming cheese when they ask for "American Cheese". I am here to tell you that is WRONG. American cheese is basically a square cut from any form of plastic used in our day to day lives. Know that saran wrap you insist on using? Mix it with a little yellow or white rubber. Tada. American cheese.

Real cheese consists of many options. My personal favorite being cheddar cheese. (As long as it is not just plain wimpy cheddar.) I like Cabot extra sharp, hunter seriously sharp, and new york extra sharp. Cabot makes some really good cheese. I also enjoy muenster cheese, swiss cheese, provolone cheese and a wide variety of others.

If you want a list of cheese go here. Sadly, they too are misguided and included American cheese on the list. (Apparently American cheese meets the legal definition of cheese. Aren't we lucky?)

I feel bad for the youth of America who have been raised with this notion of American cheese being a real cheese.

As a side note. Check out Kate Fiano. Actually this is probably a better one to check out. She just released her first CD. Really good. The CD is only ten dollars, if any was wondering.

final story

So here is my final digital story. I hate it because all weekend I would play it back and listen to how awkward my voice sounds. I tried to speak quietly and in one tone... it was horrible, I feel really bad for everyone who decided to go through that in class. Every time my roommate was out at events with her mom, I would tell myself I was going to re-record it in the room. But I didn't. I guess I have no choice now, I can't keep telling myself I'll re-record it later... I'm giving in and just posting what i have because class is soon.

So here it is.

Jewelry Making!

I just woke up from my second nap today. I'm really tired because last night, around 11 pm, all my suitemates got back from spending the weekend out with their parents or at home. I live in the Jewelry making program in living and learning, however we haven't really made much jewelry so far. in fact, i hadn't made any because i didn't bring up my beads. But last night, all six of us from my suite really bonded in our common room for the first time over jewelry, which is kind of what we were supposed to be doing all along.  Then one of the girls took out her Shrinky Dinks kit, have any of you heard of it? I hadn't, but apparently it is supposed to be a staple of childhood arts and crafts. You draw on this sheet of plasticy-paper that they give you in the kit, and then bake it, and then it curls up so you think that you suck at life and messed up a project meant for 8 year olds, but then it settles back the other way and it is fully done shrinking. We had a lot of fun with that... too much, we were making those until about 3 am. Then we basically made them into charms for simple cord necklaces or bracelets or earrings. One girl attempted to bend it into a ring, that took courage because it is pretty hard, and to be a failure at shrinky dinks is pretty embarassing. I pretty much stuck to necklaces. I made a few pretty cool ones last night that I was excited to wear today, but when i woke up it was already 8:45  (I pressed snooze around 10 times more than usual...) and I had to jet over to my 9 am class, so its not as if i had much time to accessorize.  Whats cool about it is, people don't know it was shrinky dinks, and they look at it and think about all the intricate detailing and colors on such a small thing, they don't know that when we drew on to it, it was 5 times bigger haha. Overall it was a great way to spend a  Sunday night (more fun than writing an English paper...) with friends. I just wish we had started earlier, because we were having way too much fun to quit even as we saw the hours pass and knew we would have to wake up soon. 

Maybe a little early

This year for some reason I am really excited for Christmas. Not the actual Christmas day. The whole season in general. I have, I must admit, already hung up some christmas ornaments, and started listening to Christmas music. I have also, with a friend, made paper snowflakes, decorated ornaments, and made plans for even more Christmas decorations. The really weird part, is that I used to never be that excited about Christmas. I would look forward to school break, and the Christmas eve service at my church. Yet never the whole Christmas day with gifts and everything. This year is very different. I wish Halloween were over, so that I would be able to find more Christmas items in stores. I bought a CD with Christmas music yesterday. I will probably buy more online. I even am really excited about making Christmas cookies. I will probably do that in another few weeks. (Anyone who knows me knows how huge that is, I cannot cook, bake or do anything productive in a kitchen. It almost always burns, doesn't cook, or doesn't set. My mom is the only one typically who will try my stuff. I can make a good cake from a box but that is it.)

Hopefully the time till Christmas goes quickly, yet not to quickly. I plan on enjoying it every chance I get.

Loved

I've come to the conclusion that I'm not loved by my family. 

My friend's family couldn't come see her, so they sent her a new ipod. One of the cool new nanos, in ORANGE. They finally made a new color nano, as opposed to just using a different shade of the colors they always used. I called up my mom and told her, hinting that I wouldn't mind being sent a gift. She said that she just got me a new ipod this summer, but she didn't get it for me, I got it free with my laptop. Plus the new ipod touch is so much cooler than the old one, it has built in speaker just like the phone. But whatever, I don't need a new ipod so its not a big deal. My family didn't think it was worth it to drive 7 hours up here, pay for gas, a hotel, etc just to see me for a day it would have been practically a thousand dollars. I agree, it just sucked being alone while EVERYONE else I know has family coming up. My mom told me that she was sending me a package too I would just have to wait for it to come. I reallyyyy wanted to know what it was, I knew it wouldn't be an ipod or something like that, but i figured it would be something nice. So then I called up my sister to see if she could give me a hint. I thought, it better not just be my winter coat that I was asking her to mail up to me, but she said it wasn't. Yessss. A few minutes later, i got it out of her. The gift my mom is mailing up to me is one of those halloween bags of candy, you know the assortment of different mini chocolate bars that you buy to give to trick or treaters. What a rip off. I could buy one of those in the marche downstairs. Ugh. Thanks mom, I love you too.

(Rereading this post, I realize I kind of sound like a brat. I'm not, its just the idea of the thing. She told me she was sending me a package when I told her my friend got an ipod. So now i'm getting a chocolate bar?! really??)

It's Not Illegal!

So tonight my roommate and half my suitemates disappeared .. bored to death, we went through the many DVDs one of my suitemates brought. Being a new freshman unsure of what to bring to college, i filled up my mom's car in august with clothing (I didn't bring a winter coat though.. just sweatshirts and I will be freezing in the coming weeks if mother dearest doesn't send me the rest of my wardrobe soon... it was hard to bring 3 closets and 2 dressers worth of clothes I had at home and have it fit into a tiny wardrobe in a dorm- i had to narrow it down some how!) instead of bringing my own movies. When I saw all the movies everyone else had i was happy, but I missed my own collection. I also wanted a a way to copy a few of these DVDs they had, but of course there are copy protection laws against it so when you insert the DVD it will only be able to play it. Searching online brought me to this legal program just for macs that you can download, and then copy the DVDs to your computer. I think the idea of the program was that you would copy the DVDs you bought to protect them in case they get old and scratched up. This way, you already bought the DVD and you own it, you can do what you want with it. Of course I downloaded this program and copied 4 movies tonight. 

I mean there's no way for the people in charge to find out that my suitemate paid to own the DVDs and not me, right? You know, if anything i made a copy of the DVD for my friend because she doesn't have a computer.  Then I burned it onto a cd for her and then deleted the file right away. yep.

My final version...

Unfortunately I had some issues with this project. It is not what I originally wanted or started with. I changed the pictures in it many times. As a result the pictures do not match up that well. Sorry. If I ever do this again, I will definitely do it all in one sitting, much easier to manipulate that way. Enjoy

BTW this video is supposed to be all about me and my twin. Who is far far away right now. (Well only like 2-2 1/2 hours away.)

I think it's finally finished.

So there's my video... I hope you enjoy it. I'd write a better caption but that would just be taking away from what I could otherwise put in a five page paper that I now have to write...

not quite finished...

I've been plagued with technical difficulties throughout this project... and it has nearly driven me insane. So if you don't like what you've seen so far, frankly I don't care. Feel free to comment, but feel encouraged not to. PEACE!

My Digital Story

So heres my digital story so far... I tried to make it about my favorite places to go as a kid growing up in New York. Some of these places are gone now, some just aren't the same anymore, and some I still enjoy, however it's just not the same being in Vermont. I kind of gave up on playing around with the music clips so there are only two, but I think I found a cool part for them to change. I need to work on my script for what to say over the music clips so the music clips might be changing too.

Manners

Personally I like to use Skype as a way to stay in contact with my friends and family. Recently while talking with someone (who shall remain undisclosed) I decided I wanted a late night snack and started munching from my bag of pretzels. Now, as I am sure people know, Skype involves webcams so you can video chat with someone. I went to answer a question asked of me, and showed my entire mouthful of food, right in front of the video cam. I received a little lecture, which adds up to:

1. Chew your food with your mouth shut.

2. Put your hand in front of your mouth if you must talk while eating.

3. Swallow fully before talking, or initiating conversation.

4. Do not ever intentionally show your food to someone else.

Now, as I am sure some people are aware. If your nose is really stuffed up, from allergies or a cold, it makes it harder to chew with your mouth fully shut. My problem comes when I need to breathe as well as eat. She was not very understanding. I finally had to give up my pretzel munching until after the chat.

(For the record, normally I have really good manners)