Oh, hey. I’m back!

I totally skipped out on my journey though Scotland/Ireland and my return home. Whoops. I took notes, so I’ll write up something soon. In the mean time, I have pictures up on my flickr gallery.

 

Professional Writing

(This was written for an English class assignment. I got to choose what to write about, which you’ll quickly discover on your own what it is)

I recently made my final, permanent decision to become an English Major. It didn’t come easy, but I made it. At the end of last semester I decided I couldn’t pull of a foreign language because I dropped French 101. As such, I moved back to the idea of Photography, or even Painting, for a degree but by the end of the summer I realized I loved writing and only wanted to be a writer.

I could have gotten a Photography degree, but I’d never use it. And even though I’m at the point where all I want is a degree, (just started my sixth year of college) I’ve been fighting to get a grade for the most basic photography course for years now. I’m sick of it. Photography is fun, but not when it becomes work.

It’s my own fault, I won’t put anything on my professors. If I really wanted to be a photographer, I’d have taken care of everything long before it became a problem. I also became driven to prove to a mentor that I was, in fact, a capable photographer. I don’t need a degree to do that, though. I already know I am, but his words stung at the time and I felt the need to show off a piece of paper rather than quality product.

I did an awful job with learning French last semester and got scared off, thinking I couldn’t hack it. It was a panic move. This semester I’m taking Spanish 101 and should be a cake walk. I haven’t taken a Spanish class in seven years, but I did take three years of it in High School. It’s been too long to jump into a more advanced course, I definitely need the refresher.

The toughest part was telling my mother that I’d finally made up my mind. She wasn’t too happy. She’s of the opinion I’d be better off with a Photography degree, but that’s exactly why I don’t want one. I went with everyone else’s suggestion to be a photo major. I get a lot of compliments and my family really liked the idea. I even got my DSLR camera from my hobbyist uncle. It was pressure that kept me from stopping when I hit my first wall. I kept trying and now it’s like my hands are so raw, I can’t climb anymore. I feel bad a lot of people were excited and expectant of me to be a professional photographer, but it just wasn’t working.

My life has been so confusing, I’m glad I’m still walking. I’ve been so lost and confused for so long. There’s so much I want to do, but I haven’t had a grip on what I’m doing and what I need to get done in so long I’ve let go. There’s been so much chaos it’s really hard for me to sit down and concentrate.

In the end I’ll be freelancing anyway. Or maybe I’ll even be a teacher, if I’m lucky. Both concentrations have the same occupational options afterwards, but only one feels right. I’m comfortable with my decision and looking forward to what comes next.

 

They will never take… OUR FREEDOM!

Huzzah!!! Huzzah!!! Huzzah!!!

What was I saying? Oh, right. Scotland!! I’ll be living there for the next three weeks, just outside of Glasgow. I’ll have internet access, but not constantly. I’ll be certain to update my flickr gallery as often as I can, most likely with poor quality images unless/until I get the time to edit them properly.

I might write up a fancy travel journal to put online later, so everyone can know what I was up to.

Until next time, I’ll see you… on the flip side.

 

Microsoft and the military have something in common…

Because it’s practically a hobby of mine to talk about anything to do with homosexuality, there’s news out and about that Xbox Live banned a woman for describing herself as a lesbian in her gamer profile.

In the ToS, they require people not to mention their sexual orientation.  That means you cannot let it leak if you’re straight, gay, bi, lesbian, or anything.

While I find it noble of them to point out they require no one to even say they’re straight, as a society we generally assume someone is straight unless said otherwise.  I can also find no fault in wanting to avoid gay-bashing, because it shouldn’t be a shock if you tell people you’re different they’ll react poorly.  However, I find it obnoxious they’d actually ban someone over it – especially after being harassed.  To make matters worse, from what I can tell anyway, they never banned the folks who were attacking this poor woman.

The good news, again from what I can tell, is that people are working to change the Terms of Service or at least work on fixing some issues with it.

I never actually owned an Xbox and I played Live once at a friends house.  So, like most stuff I report, this never effected me.   But I probably would have lost faith in M$ (as if I had any to begin with) and gotten angry if they weren’t even taking notice to this issue.

There are greater problems in this world, but it’s good to see people working to solve them where they can.

 

Dance, Spider-Man! Dance!

Is this breaking news? This hasn’t even hit my geek blogs, and I read 20+ of them.

Spider-man is hitting Broadway!

I find it hilarious, and/or bizarre, that Bono is doing the music/lyrics.

I’m worried it’ll suck, but I might also get sucked into the craze (is there one?) and show up on opening night.

 

iTunes University – You just got another reason to cut class

Where have I been?  There’s a spiffy new feature on iTunes that allows students to download class lectures and videos.  The amazingly original and well thought name of iTunes University explains everything on its own, really.

I found out about this awesome new feature thanks to the article “‘iTunes university’ better than the real thing.”  In it, we learn people are doing studies on how podcastable lectures impact the classroom experience.  Despite overall abysmal results, it appears students who listen to the lecture outside of class do better than those who don’t.  Even in the small scale study there’s a sign this new tool has a positive impact on students.

It’s beautiful, really.  When I sat in the auditorium with 50 other people, it was real easy to fall asleep and just not care what the professor was talking about.  Even if I kept awake, no one could exactly ask questions – we were too large of a class and there was too much information to cover.  Now there’s a way to learn more, or at least get more chances to listen to whatever the hell that guy was blabbing about.  I appreciated professors that put their notes online to read after class, having the ability to listen to the lecture even a second time would have been great.

I’m actually surprised this hasn’t come out sooner.  Or maybe I shouldn’t, we are at the front of technology after all.  Podcasting became popular just a few short years ago.  Anyway, creating podcasts of lectures and learning material is brilliant.  It’s free and should be easy for everyone to obtain (unless a professor wants to be an ass and control who actually gets to listen).

There is a concern, however, that should it become mainstream more students will skip class.  It should be noted I never wanted to skip a class that took attendance every day or gave suprise quizes, but I did want to skip anonymous classes that lectured right out of the required text.  This tool really benefits those types of classes I most want to avoid going to, but it gives me an alternative to showing up in person every other day at 7am.  That doesn’t mean it won’t benefit the smaller, more intimate courses but the big idea is to get students to attend classes.  Who knows, maybe professors will take this as a great opportunity to reach students who don’t attend every class.

As someone who’s contemplated the idea of a future in education, the idea of reaching more and more students is fantastic.  Of course, I can understand the desire to bring more students into the classroom – to make sure they understand what is being taught.  I do, however, feel that the desire to reach the most students outways making them attend a class they can take at home or on the bus or at work or anywhere.

There have always been classroom technology, in fact my mother teaches other teachers how to mak use of it all, but it hasn’t gotten an incredible amount of attention.  At least not to the student level.  With Apple as the host, this iTunes University idea might actually pay off and reach a lot more students.  Isn’t learning great!

 

Emotional Frustration

Way back when I was still diagnosed with depression and took medication, I was told that I should take those emotions and make art. At the time, I was astonished someone (who was not depressed, nor artistic) thought they knew how to “fix” me. I didn’t mean it in the literal sense, but I was put off they had their 0.02 on what was wrong with me and how to handle it.

I spent two years doing almost nothing. I should have been kicked out of college at least three times for failing to attend courses. I slept all the time and played video games when I wasn’t mooching off of friends at their homes. I was lucky, people took care of me. But that lack of motivation is still tough to handle. I’m attending classes and getting grades, so I’m happy but painfully aware that I can go back to the way I was all too easily.

Needless to say, I wasn’t interested in leaving my bed let alone making art. However, today a light bulb hit me upside the head. I figured out how to use the pent up emotion welled inside of me.

Write.

No shit, you’re probably saying. Hell, I do it (write) all the time; in my private journal, notes, even concepts for plots. I still have all these emotions in my head, though, so it’s not incredibly fulfilling. Instead, I realized how I could let lose my feelings and thoughts. Once again: writing, but productively. I’m actually going to be working on a spin off from the piece I posted earlier.

It seems pretty obvious in hindsight, but it wasn’t something easily realized.

And it’s not easy to explain, either. Sorry.

 

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The End of Human Civilization

(Disclaimer: This is just an exercise taken from my World History class today.  You, personally, might object to this situation if it were real but for the sake of this exercise assume there was some kind of convincing reason to get you to go along with it.)

Here’s the situation.
Tomorrow, some sort of spacial anomaly is going to crash into the Earth’s atmosphere and wipe out Human Civilization, quite literally it will be as if humans never existed.  Luckily, there is a bunker that will be able to shield you and ten other people.  You may take relatives, friends, or loved ones along with you but you may not bring strangers like Les Stroud, he won’t believe/trust you.  If you cannot provide enough people, random strangers from your town will be taken along as well.

You have been assigned the task of making the list and obtaining 10 items to bring with you. Due to the design of the bunker, you’ll only be able to bring 10 items with you, no matter the size. So a screwdriver is equal to a car, a toolbox is one item and the tools inside are separate.  Don’t argue with the logic, it’s just how the bunker was designed.  Keep in mind, you have until tomorrow so most likely if something doesn’t exist yet or is something you are unable to obtain in time can come with you.

What is taken care of for you? You’ll have the bunker after the “disaster” as a form of shelter and enough food to last a month. The bunker is located nearby your home and can withstand a time effecting apocalypse and is near invulnerable. Also, the clothing on you normally wear won’t count against you but anything more will.

There will not be domesticated animals, electricity, roads, or anything “man-made” when you leave the bunker door.

So, what will you take and why?

 

Did Two Towers Come Before Fellowship… or… Arg! Stupid Sobs!

I’m not sure who it is that I need to talk to, but there needs to be a standard when a novel becomes a series to make it clear which order the book goes.  As in… “Book 1 in the <insert series name here> series!”

I went to the bookstore to pick up Black Magic Woman by Justin Gustainis, unfortunately they were lacking all formats.  Not to leave empty handed, I wondered aimlessly until I found Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews.  I’m not even sure what made me pick it up (the same thing happened with Cry Wolf and Stray) but I took a look at it and it’s sequal Magic Burns.  Unfortunately, without possibly ruining plot I couldn’t tell which one actually came first.  I was able to decide Magic Bites came first due to the list of Ilona Andrews books inside, but I wasn’t 100%.  I come home and fell into Ilona’s website coincidentally and see “Now Available” followed by “Magic Bites.”  Below that post, an article on Magic Burns.  I panic, thinking I picked the wrong book up (I’ve done it before) before noticing “book 1″ and “book 2″ prefacing the story descriptions.

I’m not trying to give the impression I often suffer panic attacks, but the short-lived experience pointed something out to me.  Not enough book series display the sequence of where the book takes place in the series.  Amazon is great for this because in most of their title captions, it lists the series name and what book number it is.  It’s quite an issue in person to not know which book takes place when.  Sleuthing is required to actually figure it out, whereas it wouldn’t be an issue to proudly display the proper reading order.

It’s a stupid and fussy complaint that I’m sure not many people have issues with but it’s my stupid and fussy complaint, dammit.