Melted Crayons: Project 365 Edition

Kawledge and Knowledge

2011-08-27T08:58:00.001-05:00

(I count this as a post for yesterday because it was finished but I forgot to click publish...fail)

So internet as been a little sketchy and getting on and posting has not been the easiest so I'm sorry for my fail of the last couple of days.

8/26/2011
Picture 6:

FAIL. I don't have a picture for today! :(
Today was orientation stuff which I mostly didn't have to go to, but then they had a giant freshman dance outside at the end of the day. Which was fun ;)

8/25/2011
Picture 5:
MOVE IN AND ORIENTATION = cray cray chaoticness - except not as bad as I expected.
And I was already moved in - extra win.
Day consists of: Free stuff and lots of people. Convocation (PARK/MUDD PIRATES REPRESENT)

Everyone in their ResCollege T-shirts, finally sitting down after cheering like crazy for our respective ResColleges!

8/24/2011
Picture 4:

At City Museum, being completely terrified, but also having SO MUCH FUN. Do you see how high up we are? Do you? DO you see what we are climbing though?

As well as having a ridiculously crazy time at City Museum we also did another service project which was fun.

8/23/2011
Picture 3:

The whole picture thing kind of FAILed today. We did a lot of interesting things but I just never got out my camera or phone, which was stupid, because today was pretty eventful.
I can however, give you a blurry representation of how we all felt after the day's work.


Everyone, meet Declan. Also meet blurry bus pictures.

Some of the days activities: community service talks/discussions, scraping/cleaning/painting the longest outdoor wall you have ever seen, eat at a random Thai restaurant, a big international grocery store, and hanging out in a cool park playing Egyptian ratscrew, and a poverty simulation

8/22/2011
Picture 2:

We had some incredible speakers today and learned all about what goes on outside the WashU bubble. It was intense and amazing, I couldn't even begin to fully describe.

Looking on at a memorial for one of the many kids who has died as either a direct or indirect result of the poverty/ drugs/violence/neglect in certain areas

Hands prints of his classmates

Bo-bo-BODACIOUS!

2011-08-21T22:48:00.001-05:00

8/21/2011
Picture 2:
I guess I will be writing a little about each photo for now as well, like a mini diary about my days. I'm writing from my phone now however because I'm not sure how the internet works so this should be interesting...

Anyway. Today LTS (leadership through service) started and apparently the theme this year is Kool Aid so there are different color groups all named after Kool Aid flavors. Me, being blue am on the "bodacious blueberry" team. Wh00t! We have a count off where at the end, being as loud as possible we shout (getting progressively louder) "Bo-Bo-BODACIOUS!!!" It's a little competition between the groups to see who can be most obnoxious :P

So today we just did intro stuff and each group went to a different restaurant for dinner. Our group went to "Blueberry Hill" which rocked because it coordinated with our color and no other group had that! The food twas yummy too.

Outside of the restaurant

And we're off!

2011-08-20T22:34:00.002-05:00

8/20/2011
Picture 1:
Ok, well I'm breaking the rules, it's going to be 3 pictures. But that's because they aren't super interesting and rather stereotypical. But that was kind of the point.

See? I told you. The classic - look! My car is really full of all my crap! shot.


However I felt I needed at least 2 pictures to kind of portray this idea. Although no picture I took from any angle seemed to exactly capture it :/

Then I was playing with my doggies for one last time (ahhh I miss them!!) and got this surprisingly good shot of Lily. Usually Pringles is the photogenic one. Awwww isn't she adorable?

I'm going to miss you sooooo much Samantha! Don't leave meee

Did you know stressed backwards spells desserts?

2011-08-19T22:39:00.002-05:00

Well it certainly is a terrible oxymoron of sorts. I'm sure the person who made this happen is silently laughing at the rest of the world's pain as they realize dessert and stress have no similar associations and all the stressed out people in the world actually want is dessert. Chocolate. Rich, dark, fudgey, delicious, chocolate. AND THEY CAN'T HAVE IT BECAUSE THEY HAVE TOO MUCH DAMN STUFF TO DO. Ok, maybe that's just me.
Maybe the realization of this was meant to calm the normal human being. To give them something light in a dark and stressed out world. Then again, I'm not a normal human being.

If you can't tell I'm a bit stressed out. That's what being an incoming college freshman does to you. Especially when you is me. And you are driving down to your college with literally EVERYTHING. TOMORROW. Big things down to little hair clips and pencils and paperclips and all of that crap. You also have a skating test tomorrow morning. You hate testing. It scares the bajeebers out of you. This past week you have been running around like a monkey with a screwdriver freaking out and hitting everything in your way. You've probably scared a lot of young children. You've lost so much of your mind that half the time you don't even know who you are, or who you're freaking out at now. Oops.

Anyway, I'm not going to go much further, this has already become a bit of a diary entry and I don't want to scare away the crowd of no one actually reading this. But I just thought I'd let you into a bit of the mindset of a girl, 18, leaving for college the very next day. Combined with lots of other fun stressful things happening in her life that very same week and even day. Introduce you to what is to hopefully become a slightly kept up photo blog. Oh isn't life just joyous?

My oh my, the (invisible) blogs from this quarter... (fav blog post)

2010-05-25T23:19:00.000-05:00

So the year is wrapping up and that thought goes through me head: blogs.

As we started junior theme I was told that we should be doing a blog about junior theme now, and somehow that translated to the fact that we didn't need to do as many blogs, even though I knew I was wrong. As the month of April continued on I was the most busy I'd been in a long time. Junior theme, plus busy in other classes, plus lots and lots of skating going on. After forgetting one week, the pattern went on. It saddens me because I really liked blogging, and I wish I had been a better student and remembered, however I was not, and I am very sorry for that.

So I guess my favorite blog is my most recent. Yes it is really the only real blog I have, but I still like it a lot. When I started writing it I didn't realize the depth I would go and as I was writing and researching it was fun for me to do that research and learn and connect it to ideas we have talked about throughout the year.

Blogging this year has been a fun new experience. I've never kept a constant blog before and it really taught me consistancy and focus, or at least how much is needed. I felt myself listening to the news more, and critically thinking about the world around me, even as my consistancy in blogging went downhill. I'm really glad we did blogging this year, because even though I myself wasn't completely able to keep up, I know many people were and I still learned from it and had a lot of fun.

PHEW. I think that was longest "favorite blog post" ever.

Disappearing Diversity (LOST)

2010-05-24T18:43:00.000-05:00

As we have been talking about in class throughout the year, heightening with Mr Bolos's "TV Tokenism", there is a prominent issue of race in television. We talked about the TV show LOST and how it started out with this huge diversity of characters, a very powerful and good part of the show, but as it came to the end all the ethnic characters had been killed off and all the white people were left.

In my ventures to watch the anticipated LOST series finale, there was a little "pre-show" lets call it. The "pre-show" had the two writers and some of the actors/actresses talking and reflecting upon their experiences. A huge part of this pre-show was to explain how diverse and amazing the cast was, how they had been flown in from so many places and represented so many people. The writers however failed to mention the fact that they killed off all these characters. Obviously the fact that they started out so "diverse" made them think that they had done their job and could now kill them all off so they can play with their more "relatable" characters, as Mr Bolos talked about with the "key audience".

The even more interesting part to me was hearing the actors and actresses real accents. For example, Naveen Andrews played Sayid, a former Iraqi torturer. In the TV show Sayid is given an Iraqi accent, yet in real life he has a very strong British accent. This completely shocked me. Here I was on the show, taking him by appearance and believing this accent, yet the "diversity" is all just created by the false accent. As I researched Naveen Andrews I found out another interesting fact: he is actually of Indian decent, not Iraqi. Again, here I was believing the false Iraqi background and accent and they actually took a British man of Indian decent.
Also, Jin, played by Daniel Dae Kim, is an American born actor who actually had to learn Korean, and fake his Korean-American accent. And his Korean is apparently so bad that he is laughed at by native Koreans (although this is a "fact" from my father, so it's not completely trustworthy).

As I researched these actors I realized a very interesting thing. Even if a show looks diverse, it's not necessarily what it seems. Yes, American shows are going to have American actors, but it can be quite deceiving when actually watching a show. You don't realize that the, say, Chinese people on your American TV show are just barely fumbling over their new basic Chinese skills, or that the Italian on your show is faking an Italian accent and is actually from Canada.

And the writing begins...

2010-04-26T21:01:00.000-05:00

So we started writing. Eek.
I initially was having a lot of trouble just getting started because I couldn't figure out a thesis. Mostly I couldn't figure out what to do about the "sex education" part of my paper. I encountered so many different opinions that I couldn't quite find substantial evidence for one side. I'm still kinda working on that...

Now as our body paragraphs, or newly termed "paragraph blocs", are starting I'm starting with the media portion of my essay and will later rearrange. However, I'm having difficulty deciding what my different paragraphs in my "bloc" are going to be about. I was originally going to separate the media into, obviously, different types of influencing media like TV or movies or music, etc. Yet I was starting to feel a trend in how they each effected the teenagers and figured maybe I could organize my paragraphs that way. But as I started to focus on it that way, the lines between the ideas were very blurred and I realized I think I still need more sources. Yay more researching!
Which creates a question of mine:
How many sources should we have in each paragraph? And can those sources be repeated within the paragraph blocs?

So that's my issue of the moment, and I hope I can start to figure it out tonight as I rewrite a bit.

JT: Interview yay!

2010-04-19T21:12:00.000-05:00

So in my last blog post I was thinking about emailing Nicole Lynn Lewis, and since then I have emailed her, she has emailed me back, I have emailed her, and she has emailed me back! Yay!
She seems incredibly nice and willingly to talk to me so I'm very excited. I have another possible interview-y person but now that I have her I don't really need to worry about it! (Unless this is a total fail, hope not!)

Now what I need to do is think of some questions to ask her. Since she was a teen mother herself I'll probably asked some questions about that, but I don't want to get too personal. I'll probably ask her general my own why question to see if she has any of her own opinions. Or I could get specific and ask what she thinks about certain sex-ed programs, or TV shows. So I'm trying to brainstorm quick enough so I can be ready for her next email! She emails back fast! Wow!

She did write a book but I don't think I'll read it or completely ask about it because I haven't read it (awkward if she asks if I have...eek) just because he situation was unfortunately more complex. But we'll see what happens!

Oh Junior Theme....

2010-04-17T22:50:00.000-05:00

(Topic: Teen Pregnancy)
So I thought it was about time I posted a blog about the JT. Unfortunately you all missed my many confusions and changes about what I was going to research but that's ok, and it's my fault for not posting. Oops.
Right now I'm trying to figure out how to write an introduction. I have a pretty good start on some research, although I'd like a lot more. But I have time for that...I think? There is a lot of articles out there about abstinence programs and it's own history but I need more than just that. I have gathered a lot of information of types of sex education, some about media influences, and ideas about parenting and peer pressure. I've also been looking into religion it's not as convincing in my opinion.

For the media section I really want to watch something like "16 & Pregnant" or "Teen Mom". There are so many shows out there about pregnant teenagers. There is also "The Secret Life of the American Teenager". But since I don't watch any of these shows regularly I wouldn't know where to start so I'm holding off on that for right now. There is also the movie "Juno" and the lifetime movie "Pregnancy Pact" which I wanted to use for peer pressure as well.

Also. For a potential interview I found a woman named Nicole Lynn Lewis in my CQ Researcher Article. She is a former teen mother and advocates for the cause. She also wrote a memoir about her struggles. A book called Glori. I feel she would be great because of her personal background and willingness to talk about the topic. However, she lives in Maryland.

3rd Quarter Blog!

2010-03-24T20:45:00.000-05:00

My favorite blog post this quarter was probably "All Around Knowledge". I like that I took what we talked about in class and continued the discussion on my own blog. As I continued the discussion in this blog, I brought up the fact that just because the world may be filled with problems does not mean we necessarily need a "problem-solving-brain". In my mind problems have two different approaches and in order to find the best solution we need both approaches. The logical, and the creative. Starting our Junior Theme now in class I came upon a book in the library that talked about how the right brain (the more creative brain) is starting to take more dominane than the left brain has in the past. I immediately thought of this discussion and my blog post about how creative brains are very much needed in the world. It seems counter-intuitive with such a technology based upcoming world, but if you think about it technology really is creativity. And thats where the two collide and create the best possible solution. (As I explained briefly in my blog post)

Privacy vs. Security

2010-03-18T22:00:00.000-05:00

We all heard about the possibility of having a "full-body scan"at airports but we never thought the day would come. Or maybe did think it would. But either way, the day HAS come. And it has reached O'Hare airport.

The scanner has caused some controversy between people as all new additions usually do. These scanners are designed to find hard to detect explosives but producing an x-ray of the entire body of someone within seconds. The picture that comes from it is almost like a naked picture and a passenger, quoted in an AOL article, says "I feel violated knowing they can see under my clothes, I'm a very modest person". There is an option to be patted down by a TSA agent, but most people would rather be scanned then touched and felt over by some officer. A CNN article gives a counter argument for the privacy saying that, "This system uses a pair of security officers. The one working the machine never sees the image, which appears on a computer screen behind closed doors elsewhere; and the remotely located officer who sees the image never sees the passenger". Yet this article still address the issue of privacy. The idea that the technology can really do more than they say it can, and more.

As I finished reading the second article I came across a comment that is something I always think about when relating to security, "It's stupid to spend money so terrorists can change plans". When we bring more security to airports then terrorists will either just work to find new ways around the system, or just find other places to attack and more creative, confusing ways at that. As we get smarter, they do too. Its a confusing concept, and very scary.

What do you think about the scanners? Do you feel violated? Is the security worth it?

Can there be TOO many advertisements?

2010-03-17T15:07:00.000-05:00

In class we have been talking about advertisements and how they affect our world and our choices. The country Russia came up in the conversation of almost no advertisements. Both my teacher and another student commented on how different and weird it felt to not have any advertisements. Daniel Boostin commented on how being back in the United States was a relief. He explained, "the flourishing of advertising then is a clue to the increasing opportunities for choice" compared to no opportunities for choice.

Yet, when I thought of a world filled with advertisements (well even more than the present) I not only cringed, I began to be skeptical. What if everything everywhere was advertised? Would their even be a need for advertisements?Advertisements in my head make certain products stand out, or at least make them known to you. But with too many my brain would be too bombarded with too many products and in my present mind, I'd feel they'd just all cancel each other out. How could I make my choices if every single choice was screaming in my face? As I think of the world to come I try to imagine what will become of all the advertisements and what new (and potentially scary) ways advertisers approach us next. What do you think?

Modern Marriage

2010-03-14T18:43:00.001-05:00

This weekend I saw the school's play "Thoroughly Modern Millie", twice. Millie has come to New York, ready for a new "modern" life. After learning about the 20's in class, it was interesting to see the play and recognize things. The younger girls in the play all wear flapper-type dresses and go out to party at speak-easies. Millie also has this "plan" in mind. What she swears is the "modern way". She plans to marry her boss, so to marry rich, claiming love comes later. She claims a "modern girl takes charge of her life". In the end she is persuaded by love, but she spoke so strongly of the plan, even referring back to "Vogue" where she read about it.

I found it interesting once again how view points and life changed so rapidly around the 20s for women. The 1920s was a decade starting to be run by business and then Millie refers to marriage as a "business arrangement". So as the nation changed, viewpoints changed. This made me think of how women see marriage today. I found myself debating against myself. I'd like to think that people are more romantic and marry for love but then I thought about "gold diggers" and "cougars" and those sorts.

How do you see marriage today? What you'd like it to be, or what it is in reality? How has it changed?

Who needs drugs when we have video games?

2010-03-09T23:19:00.000-06:00

So, cracked.com. I could do a blogpost all about that site, it's great, read it. But, I'm just going to talk about an article I found on it, or rather, my sister found and showed me. It's scary and whether it is completely true or not, it all makes sense. Anywho:

Poll: How many of you have played video games before?
How many of you are addicted to at least one?
Ok, so maybe this isn't the best time to be asking this question to my fellow 4 level high school students, but you get the point. I'm sure you know someone who is/was obsessed with some type of game.
This article is entitled 5 Creepy Ways Video Games Are Trying to Get You Addicted, and reading these ways I just cringe inside, because they are so true. I could go on about all the ways but I would never do them justice. I would just read the article if I were you, you will get amusement (and fear) out of it.

What I'm really getting at is how scary this is. I have found myself addicted to certain games, repetitive and boring, yet still pulled into them, and I know plenty of people who have addictions. The way these games are crafted to keep you coming back for more, to keep you going, that there are scientists just for this job. The science of gaming addiction. I'm not kidding. It's ridiculous. Games no longer care if someone buys their game and never plays it. It now feeds into the internet, and real money. There are games that require real money to be sent in to do certain tasks, receive a certain "golden key" that will open a "special door". These types of ploys are everywhere, and people soak them right up.

Yet getting at my title, video games are just as dangerous as drugs. It's true. The article links to another article about a couple starving their own child, and there have been more deaths associated with video games as well. People coop themselves up in rooms all alone, addicted to their fictional friends, or their online friends. And they think they're fine. People need real connections to the world, and without these they can find themselves cut off, depressed, only feeling better when back int heir games. Thus, the viscous cycle continues.

You there! Go make a living!

2010-03-01T23:01:00.000-06:00

Today Mr. O'Connor talked about what it means to "make a living", a very common phrase used around our society. It is usually meant to describe what someone's does when they get a job and start making money. The focus here on money. Then Mr. O'Connor asked what was our definition of "making a living".

Interested in what the images on the interwebs would portray, I typed in "make a living" into Google images. Most images did not have much to do with what I was talking about, but what I found with the few that did was the common theme of money. It makes sense, even to me, to think about "making a living" as "getting money", but when I grow up and "make a living" I'd really stick a different definition to that. And most likely not even use that phrase. The idea that I am just "making" this life sounds like I am taking a recipe out of a generic cookbook.

1. Go to school

2. Get a degree

3. Get a job

4. Make money

5. Start a family

6. Make more money

7. Retire

I am all for the idea of life being a "construction", but I feel like the construction is very individualized. My "making a living" would include getting a degree, finding a good job, but the manner at which it is done seems different than this robotic idea. If I take a year to relax, to do something that interests me; or if I am interested in something with little job opportunities and am just happy the way I am, so be it; or if I go out of order of this original "recipe", that's that. And I believe that's how many people I know think. What do we strive for? Well happiness of course! But the pressure is on from society for us to just go and"make a living!" It can't be that hard, right? But with the pre-determined connotations it brings it makes our mindset stuck on that one item, money. If we don't have money, we are not successful people.

Which I do not find true at all.

All Around Knowledge

2010-03-01T22:40:00.000-06:00

In class today we talked about giving money to the Arts and how we feel about that in an economically depressed nation, as ours is right now. For me, I would support that. I feel that having knowledge and exposure to the Arts actually supplements one's knowledge and can only help that person. Without the exposure of Arts we'd probably be a less developed world.

I think that learning about using creative energy and actually utilizing that creative energy is healthy for our bodies. As science has showed (also reference to what Ruchi said today), the right brain contributes more creative thoughts, while the left brain is a logical thinker. To only be using one side of your brain doesn't sound like a very good idea does it? I agree with the fact that murals and music can help boost someone's feelings but I really think that without learning to use the creative part of our brains we would not understand much of the logic we understand today. Solving problems is not always logical. Sometimes we need to come at them in a different, more creative way. Cutting out that creative side would slow down progress, even scientific "logic-based" progress enormously.

....Netbooks?

2010-02-26T15:22:00.002-06:00

So I was going to blog about how these small cute Netbooks take up all our class time starting up, but it took so long to start up that I now have to shut it down and have no time. Shame.

The Olympics: More Danger!

2010-02-20T11:46:00.000-06:00

Watching the Olympics my heart goes out to my own sport, synchronized skating, one that has not been admitted to the Olympics. Yet. But I am not here to advocate for the sport, even though I would very much like it to become part of the Olympics. I'm here to talk about what people look for in the Olympics. And that, is danger.

Sure, there are sports that are not very dangerous, but they have been around in the Olympics for much longer periods of time. But if you look back in time, more recently in that, you think about what excites people about the Olympics. Yes, team USA winning gold is most definitely exciting, but what else do you remember? Injuries and death. And when we watch, what do we talk about? That's right, who fell and hurt themselves, or maybe just who had a really epic fall. You may disagree with me, even I know that we watch the Olympics for other reasons as well, but we all know deep down that this is correct. On the women's downhill skiing slope, it was so icy that many women fell, very intense falls. The next day at school, that was ALL people were talking about. Before the Olympics even started, a luge athlete died. I hadn't even processed the Olympics were starting until I heard about the guy dying while practicing on the Olympics course.

So why did I introduce my own sport? Synchronized skating is being debated this summer on whether or not it will become part of the Olympics. As I looked online for opinions of this, the first article I clicked on showed me exactly what I have been arguing above. The author first talks about the history of synchronized skating, and how it is much different than people would expect, and much more difficult, but then the article turns to a personal experience. The experiences turn to injury, a calf being sliced open, fingers almost sliced off, and all these girls hopping right back into their program to finished what they started. People cringe as they hear this type of experience, the exact type of cringe you want when you watch the Olympics. As the author goes on to describe more experiences, all they talk about is the dangers and high speeds the skaters go at. And then concludes that it should become an Olympic sport on that knowledge alone.

In my mind I'd want to be advocating for Synchro in the Olympics because of the difficulty of it and the strength of the athletes, but instead I'm forced to use the apparently stronger argument of the high speeds teams go at, the high likely hood of crashes during intersections, the many slashes a blade has done to human flesh, and the dangerous lifts that higher teams do.

Discrimination Commercial

2010-02-09T22:13:00.000-06:00

I just finished watching LOST, and as a little experiment I decided to count how many African American people showed up in the commercials. In class we talked about commercials a little while back, how they've changed, and how they are constructed to get people to want the product. Our big discussion on kids and toys.

As I watched I counted 40 commercials, give or take a few. The amount of people in the commercials? Way too many to count. The percent of the people who appeared African American? Very little. There were maybe 22 appearances, 10 of which were part of another show being advertised and the others were put in places normally associated with the lower class. There were gangsters, a barber shop owner, and a factory worker. I've always been aware of an unbalance but watching more intently I really realized the impact it has. People design commercials to relate to the average person, so they can reach and convince the most people possible. Watching the smiling, thoughtful, decidedly average people with their "white" skin color I realized that even watching TV African American people are discriminated against and given bad symbols for who they are supposed to be. Under that notion, should we ban commercials? Of course that can't happen, but it makes me wonder why people don't see the problem in this type of discrimination.

Legos! And Growing Up

2010-01-24T20:20:00.000-06:00

As I finished my homework tonight (yay!) I thought I should entertain myself with something fun. What did my brain go to? Why, Legos of course! Well, maybe not of course, but seeing as my family knows and loves me all too well for my dorkiness I had received some Legos for Channukah. And not just any Legos, oh no, Spongbob Legos--complete with the Krusty Krab and all. *feels lame*

As I sat in our living room reading the instructions and carefully placing each piece where it belonged I thought of the list we put together in class about imagination driven games versus toy driven games. When I was younger I had a mix of both. Certain friends sparked the creative side of me, fairytales, animals, house, etc, while other friends brought out my MyLittlePony sets. As I thought back I remembered all the fun I had as a kid with my imaginary games, dressing up, running around, being a kid, the freedom it created. Then I brought myself back to reality. I'm a teenager. We don't "do", "imaginary". If we ever have time what are we playing? Wii, Xbox, iPod music dance party, assorted acceptable board games maybe, etc. A lot of these ideas come from our generation growing up with new technology as well. When have you gone up to a friend of yours and said, "Hey, let's play fairies!" That's right, never. Maybe once. Maybe you have friends like that, I'm not judging (Spongebob Lego girl here), but the majority?

I know the class discussion was about "childhood" but it still brought me to the aspect of "playtime" or as the term grows up,"hanging out time" or "friend time" and how we distribute our time and energy to bond with our friends.
What do you do with your friends? How do you think new technology has interfered with the bonds of friends?

Viscious Verizon

2010-01-10T19:08:00.002-06:00

Do you remember the old Verizon commercials? "Can you hear me now?" Does it ring a bell now? Do you remember old AT&T commercials? With the iPhone indistry taking over Veirzon is fighting back. And it's fighting back hard, yet very cleverly.

Recently on TV there has been a very visual war between Verizon and AT&T. Verizon showed AT&T as having a very uncovered map of coverage, only to be sued by AT&T because of misrepresenting their "3G coverage". So Verizon just stuck the words "3G coverage" on the map, and continued on. AT&T created their own map, and using the actor Luke Wilson, threw postcards over visually almost all of the nation showing their "coverage", being sneaky of course. But then Verizon came out with something I find very clever, "There's a map for that". Using Apple's words of "There's an app for that", they created a commerical to HURT the iPhone, with the same ring to the phrase meant to HELP the iPhone.

I do personally have an iPhone, but I have nothing against Verizon, being a customer there myself before switching to AT&T to be with the rest of my family. Watching Verizon's commercials I have to give them credit. But I also have to cringe at the immense hate flowing through them. It's a lot of effort put into a commercial, and it reminds me of the Geico commercials. They are genius. Simple, but fun. But yet, it makes me sad, does anyone know anyone you actually has Geico? I hope so.

There's a map for that! --> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZPjJI0K7Bk

I just looked back at the two logos and realized something: how different they are. AT&T has a sphere, rounded shapes and text, and blue and white logo. While Verizon has a check mark, straight lined shapes and text, and a red and black logo. Strickingly different. What do you make of that?

RUSH!

2010-01-10T17:58:00.000-06:00

Many people go to colleges hoping and dreaming to become part of a soroity or a fraternity. They are thought of as the epitome of college party life. The "in crowd", the only way to make friends. My sister has recently transfered colleges and has decided to try out this whole idea of soroities. I never thought of her as a soroity girl, but then I realized that colleges have tried to change this now.

There are 12 sororities at her school and everyone of them claims there is a "sorority for everyone". That each sorority has a different type of girl, creating a nice clique and friendship circle. There are even just charity sororities. Well this is all well and good I really wonder if that's true. My sister is undergoing her week of rush right now, where she goes to all these parties, meets people, and tries to showcase herself as someone the soroity would want. After each day of partying each girl is either invited back to a soroity or not. As I hear, apparently the first invite back should be between 6-8 sororities. I don't know too much about the process but to me, there must be many, many girls there. All trying to be there best. Be fun, inviting people. And in ONE day the girls already in the soroity can go back (after the party) and decide which girls they will invite back? It's like RUSH! show me who you are in....*uhh I have 2 minutes with this girl* 2 minutes of awkward talking! Go! The girls have one night to show if they have a personality fit for the soroity. One night. Unless they get invited back that is. Too me, that's too soon.

I haven't asked my sister much about what's going on, but my mom explained to me that she was told "not to talk to the press". The press? I didn't realize this was such a pressing issue for the press. But even then, the bigger question here is why? For secret reasons that is. This whole process is suppsed to be very secretive and mysterious. Which brings the soroities back to looking like cliquey groups of friends who dont talk to anyone else but the people in their soroity. Now I know this isn't true but this whole idea still interests me. It almost makes me want to rush a soroity just to see what craziness goes on! Or if there even IS craziness.

What do you know about sororities/fraternities? Sibling part of one, want to be part of one (and why)?

The Big Hungry Bear

2010-01-07T22:09:00.000-06:00

When thinking about secret messages in children's books I automatically went to one of my favorite books that I can remember, The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and The Big Hungry Bear. It's a simple picture book. No more than big pages and big text with not many words but it says a lot.

The idea of the book is *spoiler alert!* that a little mouse finds a strawberry only to be told by the narrator of a Big Hungry Bear who wants the strawberry and that there is nothing the mouse can do to hide the strawberry or disguise it. The book has the narrator constantly telling the mouse that his plans to hide the strawberry from the Big Hungry Bear will never work and the only solution is to share the strawberry with the narrator. We never actually see this so-called "bear" in the book so we don't even know if it really exists.

After re-reading this short picture book I realized that there could be many hidden messages. Each character (or fruit) can represent many things. There is the narrator who scares the mouse and eventually gets the strawberry, there is the idea of what the strawberry could represent, and there is the Big Hungry Bear who we dont even know if it exists or not. Sadly, my first instinct when reading this again for secret messages was the government. There is the citizen mouse with his new money he has earned, being told by the government that he needs to share it (give taxes) or he will be hunted down. Now, I'm probably reading too much into it, but you never know.

The book was most likely intended to teach children about the quailities of sharing but there is also a protectiveness. You need to protect what's yours. Or it might be taken away.

What do you think these characters (plus fruit) could represent? There are so many options and ideas that could be read into.

Enough is Enough. Leave Tiger Woods Alone.

2009-12-06T21:22:00.000-06:00

For the past week all I hear on the radio is Tiger Woods. OhEmGee guess what happened to Tiger Woods????
I. Don't. Care. The amount it's been on the news, on the radio, you'd think a disaster has hit the world. Ok, maybe I'm exagerating but it's almost as bad as the Jon & Kate Plus 8 scandal. And that was bad. They even talked about making a movie out of it. But that's besides the point.
So he got in this accident. Maybe he cheated on his wife. (I haven't really been following). So I know cheating on someone is bad, but people do it. He's a great golfer, he gets paid a butt-laod to golf, and he made a stupid mistake. One that's done many many times a year. This nation's obsession over it is just killing me. Do we really care that known golfer Tiger Woods potentially cheated on his wife? Does the publicity really help him out? Can't we just leave his life alone? For that matter can't we just leave all celebrity's lives alone?
In this time all he needs is to be alone, and figure this out on his own with his wife. If he cheated, shame on him. But I don't think the world needs to know. Needs to discuss it like it was their brother's doing. We don't know Tiger Woods's personally. So we shouldn't be discussing his personal matters.

I know we'll never stop being obsessed over celebrity's lives. I mean come on, it's great junk reading material for anyone. But it just disgusts me how certain matters get so much publicity. I just wish we wouldn't care. Wouldn't want to care. It's just unfair. It's like he'll never get a second chance, it's all people will ever care about. Oh Tiger Woods? Yah, he cheated on his wife. He's a bad guy.

Farmville Beats All. Facebook Rules All.

2009-12-06T20:37:00.000-06:00

Browsing AOL as usual, I had a topic in mind already to write about, but when I saw this article, titled on AOL as "69 million play 'Annoying Game'" I just had to write about it.

As I found out reading the article, 'Farmville' is this 'annoying' game. Now, I don't play Farmville, and I never intend to so I don't know too much about it but I do know that it's addicting. You have to keep watering and harvesting your crops or they die. Gasp? I also found out that this huge surprising number of 69 million players, beats Twitter's number of users. Really?

But another part of the article caught my eye as well. Facebook is taking over the world. Hence the picture. Don't worry world! I'll save you! Anyway, apparently the number of users of Facebook is more than the number of people in the United States. It also has more than the/the same (depending on your source) number of people on Wikepeida, Ebay, and Yahoo. That really shocked me. It really showed me, once again, how much the internet has changed our lives.

Facebook is my life. And it's horrible. If I need to contact someone I might text them, but I might not have their phone number or think they'll get to facebook quicker (and I'm usually right) so I inbox them or write on their wall. I rarely get birthday invitations in the mail anymore. No, I have friends. I just don't get paper invites anymore. I get events, groups, or inbox invitations. I miss paper invites, they're much prettier, but I'll admit it. The inbox and event invites are easier because people can discuss what's going on and ask questions, and everyone can see if they have the same question as well, get it answered, etc.

This worldwide spread of Facebook is daunting. I'm shocked, but I get it, the website's useful, it really is. The Farmville spread however is just too much. There could be users that aren't active in the game or the website, but that still leaves a lot of people. Do you play Farmville? Are you surprised by the numbers? What do you think of the spread of these websites and games?

The Night League Phenomenon

2009-12-02T22:30:00.000-06:00

I've never been good at basketball and the whole "Night League" thing never crossed my mind but today I found myself pulled to a game after being recruited randomly by some senior girls I know from cross country. I heard of it being intense but I really had no idea.

When I get there I find teams in the same color shirts, or even made shirts, war paint, sweatbands, all out. Our team had a color but we werne't intense or matching about it. Since we don't play basketball our goal was to just have fun, score a least one point, you know just have the experience. Yet, the team we were playing against was the exact oppostite. They had gotten a pizza place to sponsor them and had gotten sponsor shirts with their name and the pizza place's name on it. Really? You have a sponsor for Night League? I commend the commitment but it brings me back to a reacurring theme in my blog about competition.

To go as far as getting a restaurant to sponsor your school intermural basketball tournament I think is a little insane. Maybe I'm just new to this. What I wonder is where do you cut the line for this? Night League is the talk in school for as long as it runs but how compeitive can we be? What's your view on Night League and the competition drive it brings to the school?

Internet Rights

2009-11-24T21:35:00.000-06:00

So I'm sitting in front of the Fox news right now after watching "So You Think You Can Dance" and the first story they mentioned had to do with Michelle Obama. It wasn't quite about her but about a Google Image of her. And the idea mentioned in the was free speech. Which of course, brought me to blog about it, seeing as we have paid so much attention to that right in class right now.

The story was about a disturbing image someone had posted on the internet, which had made it's way to google images as the number 1 photo. The picture is a really horrible and racist photo that has super-imposed a monkey and Michelle Obama's face. The issue of free speech came up with what people are allowed to post on the internet. One woman said that anyone should be allowed to post wahtever they want but if the person it is about does not like it they should be able to do something about this. Many people argued that this is infact Google's fault for letting this image be posted. But how can google monitor all of this?

With such a horrific picture free speech is once again brought up into our country, with a new media and all. It goes to show that even as times change, the rights we have will still come into play.
What do you think about the photo? Should it be allowed to stay there because of the public's right to free speech or should google or someone else have taken it down because it is so offensive? How can issues like this go about being solved?

A New Graduation Requirement?

2009-11-23T22:56:00.000-06:00

Any graduation is always a scary, exciting, fun time. It means you get to move on, start a new section of your life, meet new people, etc. Everyone wants to graduate. There are always those few who don't and those few who unfortunately can't, but I've never in my life heard someone not being allowed to graduate because of their weight.

At Lincoln University in Oxford, Pa 25 students will not be able to graduate because as freshman they had BMIs over 30. I found this article explaining what Lincoln University has done. If you are obese as a freshman (i.e. had a BMI of over 30) and do not lose some weight you will not be able to graduate. As first glance, of course I was shocked. How could someone clearly discriminate against certain people? I then noticed that the students also had the choice to take a course if they didn't want to/couldn't lose the weight. This made a bit more sense. At least it isn't "lose weight or else". Still in shock I read on to find that the author of this article commended the idea. He thought it was harsh but great, saying "Congratulations on taking an unpopular but principled stance that reflects a commitment to the well-being of your students".

Now as I thought back over the article I became mildly conflicted. On one hand this is horrible discrimination and can really cause great depression and sadness in someone. Not being able to graduate is bad enough and now it's because of something that is probably very hard for the person to control? Not to mention pressure like this can cause eating disorders. Yet, on the other hand I get that the school wants their kids to be healthy. Graduation is a huge day so it can really get someone moving to help make themselves healthier. I just wish there was some other way they could do it without seeming so discriminant and without putting so much unneeded pressure on students who are already under so much pressure.

Memory Confusion

2009-11-16T23:08:00.000-06:00

On wednesdays I've been going to a group after school that is working on re doing "Snowball", this camp-like program revolving around health, etc. Last wednesday we had a hypnotist come to our group sort of as a fun thing and to teach us some valuble lessons.

One thing she taught us was EFT. EFT stands for "Emotional Freedom Technique". This is a type of therapy hypnosis where you have a huge problem in your life and you can calm yourself down about it, allowing your emotions to center around other things, not just that (hence the freedom part). She went through the process with us and I was following until she came to one point. The purpose of this one point was to "search" for a memory. Here she had us roll our eyes around and up and down, left and right. Her reasoning was that somewhere in your brain you have a memory that you need to bring up (and looking around you are "looking" for this memory )in order to complete the technique.

As she was talking about this I automatically referred back to the many conversations we've had in class about "memory is a construction". We talked over and over again about how you don't just have a file with your memory on it. You re-create it everytime you think it. So I sat there conflicted. Here I was supposedly "looking" for my memory, just "pulling it out of my brain" yet I re-create it everytime? This women (I sadly can not remember her name) was hypnotist of the year. She has used this technique for very serious problems and swears by it. Seeing all the progress she'd made I believe her. But I still wonder about the idea of memory.

Memory in the eyes of the hypnotist is treated as something to look back on. To help you forget, help you problem solve. By here in school we thought of it as a contruction. Are these two ideas completely different Is it possible it can be both??

Resident Priviledges or Plain Laziness?

2009-11-07T16:50:00.000-06:00

I was watching the news a couple days ago, something I very rarely do and you could tell it was a slow news day - stories about random new police dogs and video games. But there was one story that interested me.

Apparently seats in Millenium Park are very valuable. Seats there are first come first serve and Chicago residents have been complaining that the good seats are going before they can get to them. They want priviledges because they are residents. At first I agreed. Yah, they live there why not? Until I heard their reasoning. In an article of the Sun-Times I found later on the same issue, a Chicagoan says "You have people from the suburbs who get there earlier and glom onto all the seats. ... They’re putting their blankets across rows and rows of chairs". In the news all these Chicagoans were saying how it's not fair that people from the Suburbs come up ridiculously early and take all the good seats. Ok. Come ON. If these people are driving an hour to Chicago to get their early and get good seats why can't someone who lives inside the city get their early enough to get their good seats? I understand their concern when they say that this is where their tax money is going and it's "not fair" but if people an hour away can get their so early why can't they?

The trial on this issue ended with my viewpoint winning because of Chicago's idea to treat all tourists as if they were Chicagoans but their were still some strong viewpoints on the other side. What do you think about this? Should the priviledge be their because they are paying the taxes or is it a free-for-all for whoever gets there first? Both points I think are very strong but in my opinion I just think the residents are thinking lazily (if that's possible). I'm all for their point on their tax paying but when it comes to getting there early I think they can do that. It's not that hard.

New Definition of "Kids Movie"?

2009-11-04T22:29:00.001-06:00

Semi-recently I went to go see the movie "Where the Wild Things Are". The book seemed to attract more boys than girls so I had never actually read it as a young kid, but what drew me in was the artistic feel and intensity the trailers showed. It looked "cool".

Coming into the movie I had no idea what to expect. Yes, there was the feel that it would be intense in some aspects, but it came from a kids book, it shouldn't be anything TOO dramatic, right? Boy was I wrong. *spoilers within* The movie opens up to a sweet image of the little boy Max, building an igloo, only to end abruptly with yelling and the destroying of his sister's room when she abandons him for her friends, after they jump on his igloo. The audience quickly gets a feel for Max's imagination, but also for his anger and sadness he feels. Once Max is with the monsters we expect all good things would happen. Even they turn on him. I found myself cringing though deeply engaged the whole time. The movie had such strong elements of sadness and even scary scenes! Once the movie ended you could feel the emotion of everyone in the audience. It was just silence. We were all trying to digest it.

Even with the sad, scary, intense moments I fell in love with the movie. I could connect to the emotions, the movie was so strong and powerful. But then I float back to my original thoughts. Kid's movie? It was a kids book but with such intense scenes I couldn't even imagine a young child watching this.

With that I decided to check the trusty internet to see what people were saying. Surprised, I found articles contrasting my beliefs and saying that kids love it! And I even found one saying the movie is good for kids. This article addresses the question, "But what if that intensity, that asymmetry, is exactly why kids should see Wild Things?" It then goes on to explain that kids face all these hardships in life and are never prepared. The movie helps show them what they are up against in the world. In another article a man brought his 5 year old to the movie who sat there the whole time deeply interested and loved it. Then in a third I found addressed my concern when the actor who played Max said that kids said, "I don't want to listen to this" and that they "covered their ears or their eyes".

As I thought about it I started to agree with the first article. That maybe it's a good thing for kids to be introduced to an intense movie at a young age without the aspect of swear words, sexual content, or gruesome violence. But at the same time my heart gave out to any small child who saw the movie and was frightened by the monsters and by Max's lashes out at his mother. If you've seen the movie what do you think about it? Kid friendly or artsy teenager friendly?

Save Animals to Save Fat People?

2009-10-12T20:19:00.001-05:00

While thinking about what to write for my blog my sister mentioned a new PETA billboard that was causing controversy. As we talked about it I immediately had reactions so I decided to write about it.

The billboard declares "Save the whales. Lose the blubber. Go vegetarian" Then pictured is the back of a fat woman in a bikini. I was blown away right as I saw this. How on earth could a company be able to post something that degrades bigger women so much? My sister argues that bigger women are degraded all the time in magazines, TV, movie, you name it, and that really this was no different. Yet, in my opinion I see it much differently. These women might not be represented and smaller bodies are always portrayed as "better" but to announce them as whales, publicly, for the world to see, I think is completely outrageous. Feministing.com wrote an article about this as well, including a quote that left me heartbroken:
"I was planning on taking [my family] to the beach to enjoy the beautiful day when I saw a billboard that made me want to cry...We all sat there and stared at it for a minute and everyone in the car was silent. No one wanted to mention my weight. I laughed it off as usual, but it really had made me so embarrassed, so self-conscious and so ashamed of my weight that I dropped off my family at the oceanfront and left to go home, making the excuse that I wasn't feeling well"

This woman was so distraught by the poster that she couldn't even spend a lovely day with her family at the beach, where the billboard's setting is.

I understand that PETA wants to save animals and that maybe as a whole America could lose some weight but to use someone's weight against them to try and force them into being a vegetarian isn't worth it and could produce the opposite effect. If I saw PETA degrading my body type like that I'd most likely try to lose weight another way just so I can prove to them that I don't need their "program". (PETA offers a starter kit program for vegetarians and says "studies show that vegetarians, on average, are about 10 to 20 pounds lighter than meat-eaters")

Crayons of the World

2009-10-07T21:00:00.001-05:00

In class we were asked to write what we thought race was, what our definition of it was. It turned out to be harder than we all thought. The initial reaction in my head was skin color. Yet, I didn't write that down. It felt, well, racist. When asked how many people write down skin color maybe 3 people raised their hands, I not being one. I wondered how many other people had done what I had. Here we were in class, saying things like "nationality" and "background" were race.

Now every time I visit my own blog I see that picture of all those crayons and in class, reading Fredrick Douglass and talking about race, that picture isn't just crayons anymore, it's a representative of the people in the world, of race. Now I'm not comparing race to a happy coloring book filled world of crayons because race is not a happy issue like that. But as I look at the picture more and more I see new things. One particular part of it that's interesting is the color white. It stands out. There's no doubt about it. In the original picture (re-inserted at the bottom of the blog post) there is one white crayon in about the middle of the picture that clearly stands out. Yes, white traditionally stands out as a color but that made me think more and more about superiority. All the other colors are "darker" than this white and kind of blend together if you squint your eyes. Is this how we used to think, how some people still DO think? All those people, over there, if you ignore humanity, squint your eyes a bit, they blur out, like they don't even matter anymore. All that matters is that the white people, they still stand out of a crowd.

So maybe I'm over analyzing a picture of crayons but all I know is that it sparked something in me about race. About color of skin. No one wants to admit it, but that's what race is all about. If you squint your eyes all you see is color, the person themselves don't matter anymore. It's this that shaped the history of slavery. Not seeing the African Americans as people, only as "blacks".

All the colors of crayons versus "flesh" colors. What do YOU see?

Bagel Snob

2009-09-28T14:13:00.001-05:00

So I live in the NorthShore. As part of the "NorthShore stereotype" I would be materialistic, a brat, have a huge house, have a giant overflowing closet of designer labels, and just downright be a rich snob.
I like to pride myself on not being these things. I might have many nice things but I do care about others in the world and I wish there would be more equality. I take so many things for granted and I like to think I could do better with less, and then came bagels.

Here at our school there are "bagel fridays" where an advisee brings bagels for the rest of the advisory. Having a Panera and an Einsteins near us the bagels are almost always from one of the two. Now, yesterday I had a skating practice. Being early in the morning each girl takes turns bringing breakfast. Today someone brought bagels. Yay! A very exciting treat indeed. When the bagels were taken out I realized I didn't recognize the brand. They weren't Panera, nor were they Einsteins, they were a grocery store brand. Then I saw the cream cheese, using the plastic knife to scoop some out I noticed how hard it was. This was so fancy whipped cream cheese like I'm used too, it was normal cream cheese, one I haven't seen in forever.

As I sat there eating my bagel, not really enjoying it's white-bread texture and dense cream cheese I thought to myself, "Wow, I'm a bagel snob" The realization was strange. I don't care what food I eat, as long as I have it right? Apparently not. I mean, the bagel was still good, it just wasn't great. I looked down ashamed. Here I was priding myself in not being the stereotyoe of "NorthShore" and I can't accept a bagel that isn't "Designer". It might just be a bagel but to me it meant a lot. I wondered then what defines a "snob". I certainly don't want to see myself as one. There are very many definitions of poor and rich in all cultures and countries and me and my bagel certainly wasn't too big of a deal but it made me change. It made me see once again how much I take for granted and how much it should mean to me. From now on I'll think more about my life and not worry so much if it's not what I'm used to seeing everyday.

Sliding Doors or Revolving Doors?

2009-09-27T15:30:00.003-05:00

September 22 our AiS class talked about these poems labeled as "sliding doors". I found them both to be extrememly interesting; one to talk about a tiny choice about taking a newspaper effecting the whole world, and one commenting on all these time ghosts living ahead of you.

As I think about all the random or maybe not so random choices I've made in my life I can't help but wonder how my life would have changed. The second poem about the ghost ahead of the writer stricks me as interesting and I wonder something. He wrote that "there is no catching him,/no way to slow him down/and put us back into sync". When I first read the poem it made a lot of sense and these kinds of things really interest me. Yet when he wrote that I actually dissagreed. He is implying that the ghosts ahead of him will never make choices he otherwise wouldn't have. Maybe this ghost ahead of him would have chosen to go back for another book when the author in real time did not, putting them in sync.

Once I thought of this I wondered if maybe there is more than one choice that will still give you the same outcome. Everyone of us has made a lot of choices in our lives but are there some choices that don't change our lives? Maybe there are even some big choices that may change some things but later in our lives we would have still done something.
Out of all the choices I've made, which have made significant differences in my life? Which have changed others and are the bigger choices necessarily the most influential?

Grades Turned Ugly

2009-09-13T18:24:00.000-05:00

So even though I just posted about grades, school, and competition I just stumbled upon an article that stunned me.

I sometimes like to browse around aol.com and find random interesting things going on but when I found this article I was shocked. After reading Molly's blog about a teacher asking kids to give her money for extra credit and then thinking about competition in my own school I've come to realize how serious grades really are. This article explains how a 14 yr old boy gave his teacher a death threat over raising his grade to an A++.

The annoying part of the article was that was the only information it gave. I wanted to know why. Why did this kid feel the need to raise his grades with such violent efforts? I wonder if the parents were strict, if the kid was hard on himself, or maybe if he had some mental issues. All this would have changed the story completely. Reading how a 14 yr old made death threats automatically makes me think he is some psycho jerk. But learning that his parents pressured him, or he has mental issues I would have more sympathy towards the kid and the life he is living.

Did the writer simply leave the story short to make it more shocking or was that all that was known? How competitive are schools these days? Death threats, bribery, grade crazy students, the news is everywhere, what can we do about it?

The Competitive Edge

2009-09-12T22:01:00.001-05:00

A couple of days ago in class we were talking about Obama's speech on health care and at one point he explained, "My guiding principle is, and always has been, that consumers do better when there is choice and competition". In my head I substituted "consumers" for "students". I started to think about the competition at New Trier and how that affects our lives.

Going through New Trier competition has always been huge. The thing is New Trier likes to claim they "don't care". Teachers all focus on how grades "don't matter, only learning does". And this all may be true, but do students really listen? Of course not. The obvious wondering question here would be, why? Why don't students listen to this? Yet, being a student myself I know how others feel. It's not the fact that Oh well my teachers say all they care about is learning so if I do bad on a test it's ok! It's more the pressure of the common dialogue heard at NT.
Student #1: "Oh my gawd, that test was SO hard. I did SO bad. What did you get?"
Student #2: "Ugg, it's bad, a 78%"
Student #1: "Oh well I got a 93% but I swear we never learned that one question!"

Now that student #2 has heard that "doing bad" for student #1 is an A- he/she is now thinking to himself/herself that they are doing horribly and they have to do much better, even if it was just one test. This affects everyone. I won't lie, I feel pressured by my peers to do well. Teachers constantly tell you not to share your grades, but no one listens, they either want to brag about how good theur score was or surprisingly how bad it was.

There is also the college factor. ACT and SAT scores, where people are applying or have gotten in to college, and their extracurriculars flying though the hallways like it's everyone's business. And people purposfully make it that wat. Once it's out there, the competition is at a high.

In my opinion I feel that New Trier just needs to accept the fact that they are a competitive built school. Some teachers don't allow kids to see what grade they got on a paper, many don't give out progress reports, and some jsut plain ignore grades all together, driving some kids bazookas. I feel if New Trier just ignored the "grades don't matter" policy it would actually stress kids out less. In my experience not knowing what grade I got on something because a teacher wouldn't tell me has actually stressed me out much more, not less. Kids should get a choice on whether they want to know their grades or not at any point in time.

Your thoughts?

A Secret Box

2009-08-30T21:38:00.001-05:00

I've always been one of those people who isn't very open but lately I've been thinking about secrets.

People all over the world look for places to post their own secrets anonymously: websites, magazines, newspapers, etc. What I wondered is why they do this? If they really didn’t want to share their secret why post it somewhere the whole world can access it? I mean I guess in this way the people they are close to can’t tell who it is and coming from my own prospective this is better but then I think back.
Whenever I share a secret to someone close by to me it always makes me feel happier. Letting something out to another means a lot to people and to my own self and in the end it was the right thing to do.

If someone keeps something from another this usually causes issues later when the secret is later discovered. What is usually said then? “If you had told me earlier it would have been OK”. So why don’t people take this advice? I would like to know what the world would be without secrets. What if everyone knew everything? Would that be too much or would the world function better? Secrets cause anxiety and stress but would no secrets be too revealing? When does the line between knowing “too little” and knowing “too much” cross in the perfect balance? What don’t we know about our president, our teachers, our parents? How would our lives change if we did know these things? Secrets are really quite powerful. I know I’m a hypocrite in my own belief of sharing but I still wonder.

My First Post! Hurrah!

2009-08-28T14:59:00.000-05:00

So this is my first post. This is me, typing, in a box.