CHARACTER: Dr. Polo

We're doing a video project in school, and we had to use an organization-chart to develop our main character...

CHARATER: Dr. Polo

AGE: middle of successful career as psychologist

MAIN TRAIT: eager, NERD

HUMANIZING TRAIT: Naive, passionate

PROFESSION: psychologist

ADDRESS: messy middle-class home (papers strewn about EVERYWHERE), has an old '62 convertible beatle

VALUES: work, bettering mankind

FOIL: his colleague/supervisor

OBSESSION: bettering the world (picks up litter, donates to charities, gives bums money)

GOAL: to perfect his brainwashing technique to make criminals good

IDOL: Albert Einstein

EPITAPH: "for the greater good" changes to "Preserving mankind"

INTERNAL CONFLICTS: wants to leave an achievement behind to be remembered by; is afraid of fading into the history books, but is shy & hasn't managed it yet

INTERPERSONAL CONFLICTS: is jealous of his fellow proffessor, who has the fame and fortune he desires, but Dr. Polo is shy and lets the outgoing man walk all over him

SOCIETAL & ENVIRONMENTAL CONFLICTS: lets his colleague take advantage of him, doesn't actually like him, but doesn't want to say anything because he's insecure of himself

BEST THING THAT COULD HAPPEN (but is actually bad): perfects his method and becomes famous (but brings about a dystopia)

WORST THING THAT COULD HAPPEN (but is actually good): destroys his work (and saves the world!)

WHY IS HE LIKEABLE: has a strong moral code he adheres to, he's a bumbling, naive, clueless genius and he saves the world :)

Blade Runner Review

For Humanities, Kay had us watch a movie about a utopian society and focus on the question:
What went wrong with this idea of perfection?

In the movie Blade Runner, which is set in 2019, Earth is in the grips of a nuclear winter. The premise is that man figured how to create androids that looked exactly like people and were as intelligent as people, but stronger. They also had a limited lifespan of four years. Replicants were used as slaves, especially on colony worlds.
What went wrong is that the robots- replicants, as they're called- went rouge and killed lots of people, proving that artificial intelligence can be more than just a little scary. A nuance of the movie that I noticed is that they had an experimental replicant who was created with a flase set of memories of life- a childhood and whatnot. She was human- the only thing setting her apart from other women being her inevitable short lifespan.

Interesting. According to the movie, what makes us 'human' is what we experience, how he are brought up.

world hunger: a problem.

PERSPECTIVE WRITING:

IF I WERE SUFFERING FROM STARVATION...

I wake up.
Wait- lemme rephrase that:

The sun rose.
I had been laying awake for a while, belly burning as I feigned sleep, knowing breakfast wouldn't come for a while.
Come ever.

'Cuz we have a problem, here in Haiti. In the world.
They call it...
"World Hunger."
Oh, sure- there's always someone in the world who's hungry, always someone who could do with a little less, but over the past year, it seems to have escalated. People are dying- my people are dying. With scarcity, prices rise, and now we are starving, cut off from the outside world by a paranoid government and cut off from food by a lack in our pocketbooks.

So we assess our options:
Sit idle and watch our lives decay, wither, die.

Or

Attempt to overthrow our useless government, try and get the one thing everyone in this world shares a need of- food.

In the meantime...
We cinch our belts a notch tighter
Ignore the churn in our gut
And pray for release from this living hell.

The Life and Times of a Hunter/Gatherer...

...I have the biggest urge to be really sarcastic and make cave-paintings to express this assignment (a journal entry of a day in the life of a hunter/gatherer...), for I've never like these fake-journal things... but ANYWAY...

~Day 12 of the Seventh Moon Cycle~

The great move has started. As the prey move and flee the cold, so do we of the Tribe.

We pack up our few worldly posessions and follow in their tracks along ancient paths.
So is the order of things, so has it always been, so it shall always be.

On a more personal note, the shaman has finally accepted me as a pupil. My parents are quite proud of me- as their only child, and eldest daughter, there was not much hope in me amounting to anything of great worth... Although I have finally proved them wrong.
As the new apprentice, many things were taught to me today as we trekked along, such as which herb does what, and where to find them... I hope I can remember them all! the shaman is not one to be dealing with the rambling mind of a young girl. I can only hope that I don't dissapoint too badly...

you won't break me, you won't take me...

"You won't break me

You won't make me

You won't take me

Under blood red skies

You won't break me

You won't take me

Ill fight you under blood red skies..."

Judas Priest, album Ram it Down, song Blood Red Skies

LOL slooooooow-moooo soooolooooo...

*ahem* ENNYWAIZ...

I bought (well, Daddy bought for me :) ) an awesome magazine aaaaall about the late Randy Rhodes (RIP Randy :( ). I thought my idol and fav player was Yngwie Malmsteen, but... Rhandy is just... wow. Not faster, but... better. *shrugs* So I have this awesome issue of Guitar Legends. And it's great. It makes me happy. It's got tabs and interviews, so I know more about him and I can be all inspired...

I dunno. It's cool to get to see a little piece of your heroe's life and be all, "...Wow. I can do this, I can make it, too." Sure, I gotta work at it, but everyone has their dreams. I want to write music, I want to have people go, "Oh, yeah, I have that album by her! She's awesome!" Or at least "She's good."

One of the worst things someone ever did to me was laugh at me when I said I wanted to be a musician- a rock star, I always say, to give people the 'short answer.' (It's hard to explain what I trully strive for, and it takes too long)

I looked her in the eye and told her that she has no right to squash my dreams, that they're mine and mine alone, and she can't change that. Don't let anyone take your dreams, 'cuz when you think about it, they're all you've got. They're all you'll ever have. You can be stripped of your posessions, they can think you're a fool, you can maybe never manage to fulfill them, but as long as you hold on, they can never break your soul, 'cuz you'll have hope.

So while some people dream of going to heaven, I dream of making music, sweet, sweet music, that is all my own.

"They say that no one is irreplaceable. That's bullsh-t. Randy Rhodes is irriplaceable."-Tommy Aldridge

FINAL SHOWDOOOOOWN...

Kay Framed
The Elusive Vanishing Point
Behind Bars
Blossom Tree
Broccoli Tree




These are my top 5... :)

PICTURES O.o

These are just some of the pics I've taken over the course of our photography project (all of my good ones are at home... D:). The only ones I really like are the Broccoli Tree, My Bookcase, and Elizabeth.

The Broccoli Tree
My Bookcase
Emo
Emo #2
Elizabeth

good vs bad... the secret of photography

GOOD VERSUS EVIL...We find it in Star Wars, in The Lord of the Rings, in Inkheart, in fary tales, in myths and legends. In most of these great stories, the line between the two is thick and black, as if drawn by a Sharpie.
Unfortunately, this line isn't quite so defined in photography. What makes a photo good? This whole post is an attempt to try and compare two photos that I've taken (a few minutes ago, actually!) and see what makes a bad photo, or a good one.
Before I begin, let me make it very clear that I am by no means a professional photographer, nor have I had any training! Be easy on me!

GOOD:

It's got an interesting perspective, it's subject is interesting. It's lightsource isn't overbearing. One doesn't look at this image and think it's terrible. In short, this is a pretty decent photo.

BAD:

THIS SHOT IS TERRIBLE!!!

The subject it's supposed to represent (a broccoli bit) isn't in focus, yet my legs in the background are. Because you can't even see what the "main part" of the image is, the entire purpose is killed, leaving this as wasted memory card space.

all these subliminal messages being crammed into my head without even knowing it...

{[BY THE WAY... I actually do like Mulan... I am just dissecting it cruelly and callously to prove my point.]}

We watched bits and pieces of Mulan today in class today, to try and analyze how media affects the way we see the world (media, by the way, is a way of communicating to a wide audience. Think magazine ads, billboards, pictures, movies, books, poetry... the possibilities are endless!). Before I begin, let us stop and think about what Mulan is: a Disney film- created in America. A form of media.
Throughout the movie, different aspects of- not the Chinese culture, per say, but what Disney WANTS us to think of the Chinese culture- are portrayed, such as honor, masculine dominance, the beautiful and obedient child-bearing (movie says "bear sons," actually) slaves the men want their women to be, their strict obedience to superiors, their fear of invasion. We unknowingly take this little slice of "China" and believe it to be true. For every bit of China put into it, there is something else left out- footbinding, for instance. It was a sign of highest wealth to deform your daughter's feet to be "small and dainty like the lotus blossom" so that she was unable to walk, to work. Disney never mentions any of that, and I was very unpleasantly surprised to learn the more gruesome details of the culture in later years, when I had watched Mulan as a young, impressionable child.
Yet we never wonder why things are called "the Disney version." Did you know that the evil queen in Snow White sent out a huntsman to cut out Snow White's heart? Feeling pity for the child, he instead returned with the heart of a boar (which the Queen ate, thinking it belonged to Snow White). As a reader of Grimm's Complete Fairy Tales, I find little inconsistencies throughout the little girl's world of princesses and fables. Heh- media fooled them with edited tales of princesses, added color, and sound, thus fooling all but those who tackle the daunting, thick volume of the true ones on later years.

Have I convinced you of the power of media? Take a look at an average diamond commercial- boy likes hot chick, boy buys hot chick shiny rock, hot chick tackles boy and smothers with kisses.
Subliminal message: if I buy her these diamond-things, I get sex.
Even the whole diamond industry is manipulated- a company called Zales fooled people into making these things of higher value than they otherwise would be (diamonds are very common stones, dear). And, after all, Diamonds_Are_a_Girl's_Best_Friend, no? Music is media, too.

Wow.
All these subliminal messages being crammed into my head without even knowing it...

confusion is synonimous to growing up

So...

If breaking the rules and throwing a fit over your punishment is considered childish...
Is maturity realizing you deserve your punishment and feeling guilty for breaking the rules in the first place?

Does this mean I'm finally growing up?

Are these just growing pains?

And (if they are)...

when
will
they
stop?