creative twist on children's imaginations

What an AWESOME idea... click here!!

"Jung's new series of photos, "Wonderland" (2004), presents costumed adolescents posing in sets based as closely as possible on children's drawings. He collaborates with many people to bring to life the boundless imagination in the drawings. For four months, Jung oversaw art classes in four kindergartens in Seoul and collected 1,200 drawings by children between the ages of five and seven. After pouring through them, he carefully selected 17 drawings and interpreted their meanings. Then he recruited 60 high school students by passing out handbills at their schools in which he invited them to act out the scenarios in the children's drawings. In order to recreate faithfully drawing details such as dresses with uneven sleeves or buttons of different sizes, he convinced five fashion designers to custom make the clothing for the photo shoot. He also made props unlike any scale found in reality but similar to those in the drawings." (http://photokaboom.photogrowth.com/2008/02/yeondoo_jung_wonderland.html)

World Mapper

really awesome map site shows you, visually, the numbers of nearly everything you can gather statistics on...

http://www.worldmapper.org/atozindex.html

to each his own

"This gets me thinking. I am just the sum of the experiences that have fashioned my personality into the type of person who has to make a big deal about being sustainable. A stockbroker is just the sum of the experiences that fashion his or her personality into the type of person who digs playing the market. There's no better or worse. No Impact just becomes the practice that works for me. Playing the market is the practice that works for someone else.

If I can maintain that attitude, if I can understand the human motivations and values that underpin everyone's actions, even if I don't necessarily agree with them, I have a chance of meeting people on common ground and talking to them, not as a person who is morally superior, but as a friend. And people listen more openly to their friends.

... I want to attract people and change their minds, I need to understand them and their foibles and appreciate them for the fact that they may be able to offer some great pointers on lipstick and sunglasses. Think what the people of the world would look like if they all dressed like environmentalists. Would that even be a world worth saving?"

from: http://noimpactman.typepad.com/blog/2008/05/sustainable-liv.html

and i'm still hungry

cold wheat beers
frozen custard and chilled java
extrememochafrenchvanillapumpkin cappuccino
banana nut muffins
gummy worms
cheddar pretzels
fresh bread and olive oil
shrimp fra diavolo
turkey provolone avocado sandwich
medium rare-ly perfected sirloin
melt in your mouth cheese burger
bacon cheddar fries
pasta and homemade gravy

(the most irresistible
delectable
delicious
overwhelmingly-beyond-satisfying
part?
you.)

...directionless part two...

"The American Dream is for immigrants. The rest of us are better acquainted with entitlement or boredom than we are with our own survival mechanisms. And when confronted with a fight-or-flight scenario, the latter usually takes precedence. Escape is our action of choice: escape through pharmaceuticals, escape through technology, and plain old running away in search of something else, anything else...

I continually revisit the words of some sociologist who I read in college. I think that is was Weber or Durkheim...He believed that the modern mind is determined to expand its repertoire or experiences, and is bent on avoiding any specialization that threatens to interrupt the search for alternatives and novelty. Many people would call that approach to life a crisis, immaturity, or being out of touch with reality. It could also be called the New American Dream. [Screw] the simple pursuit of financial stability. Here's to finding fulfillment in novelty, excitement, adventure, and autonomy."

-Do Travel Writers Go To Hell?, Thomas B Kohnstamm

directionless postcollegiate life

"...With such a character-defining foothold in the career world, I no longer have to make excuses for the life I lead. No longer do I have to explain my directionless postcollegiate life to incredulous eyes and repetitive questions, like: "What are you doing next year?" "Don't you want to do something with your life?" and my favorite, "When are you going to get a real job?" I am no longer just Thomas, the supposed slacker, backpacker bum, or permanent student. I am Thomas, the employee of ________, ________, ________ & _________ LLP, and I am going places.

I make more money than I reasonably should, putting papers into chronological order (chroning, in office-speak). My skill set also includes entering numbers into Excel spreadsheets and working the copier and fax machine. Between those projects, I search for old high school friends' names on Google; play online Jeopardy against my office trivia nemesis, Jerry; and generally while away the hours of my life...

Yes, I know, I really have it pretty good. There are people starving in Africa. And there are plenty of people here in New York who would love the chance to be in a cubicle all day and not have to operate deep-fat fryers, drive garbage trucks... or whatever it is they do. The problem is that I am an ungrateful by-product of a prosperous society -- the offal of opportunity. I am just another liberal arts graduate who bought the idea that life and career would be a fulfilling intellectual journey. Unfortunately, I am performing a glorified version of punching the time clock, and the financial rewards don't come anywhere near filling the emotional void of such diminished expectations."

-Do Travel Writers Go to Hell?, Thomas B Kohnstamm

a Canadian in Japan...

...messes with a Japanese man...

...a small voice appeared beside me.
"Excuse me, " it said. "May I practise my English with you?"
..."I like very much the Macaroni Westerns. Do you like?" And then, in a sudden shift: "Tell me, when writing a letter, do you use P-S or B-S as the end? I understand that one is considered slang and the other is a way of -- "
"It's P-S. " [I answered]
"B-S, " he asked.
"P-S. P as in pneumonia and s as in psychotic."
-Hitching Rides with Buddha, Will Ferguson

hahahahaha

how to guess?

Is it just me, or would it actually be less work just to LEARN the information on which you are being tested than to memorize these crazy rules for guessing? Probably just me, especially if you are good with the logic behind all of these and its makes sense quickly to you, so that you can memorize it easily...

still crazy...
http://drzeuss.blogspot.com/2008/05/how-to-guess-on-standardized-tests.html

which rung are you on?

When are you getting promoted? When are you getting married? When are you going to have babies?

When are people going to realize you can make your own path in life and you don't have to follow theirs? When are people going to realize there are more important and interesting things to talk about?

""What are you doing after graduation?"

"I'm so sick of that question." John said. "No one really cares what I'm doing after graduation. It's conversational masturbation. We spent the first two years asking each other what our major was and the last two years asking what we're doing after graduation. Why don't we ever talk about what we're really interested in?" Everyone sat in silence for a moment."

Ah-un

"You approach Shinto shrines...and the entrances are usually guarded by a pair of stone lion-dogs...komu-inu, "Korean dogs"...One lion-dog has a mouth that is always open, the other has a mouth that is always closed. The open mouthed lion-dog is named Ah, the other is named Un, or more properly, nn. "Ah" is the first sound you make when you are born, "nn" the last sound you make when you die. "Ah" is the breath inhaled that begins life, "nn" the exhale of release, the breath that allows life to escape. Between the two lies all of existence, a universe that turns on a single breath. Ah is also the first symbol in the Japanese alphabet, n the last. And so, between these two lion-dogs, you also have the A and the Z, the Alpha and Omega. In the original Sanskrit, ah-un means, "the end and the beginning of the universe; infinity unleashed."

In Japan, people who are in perfect tune with each other, such as a pianist and a violinist playing in duet, are called ah/un-no-kokyu. Kokyu means "breathing," and the phrase suggests perfect, exquisite harmony: ah/un-no-kokyu, two or more breathing as one. If self-actualization is the ideal to which the Western world aspires, then common breath is the ideal to which Japan-and indeed, much of Asia-aspires. The word harmony in Japanese has the same cachet that the word freedom has in the West...

On a less esoteric level, ah-un also refers to old married couples (or even old friends) who have been together for so long that they no longer have to finish their sentences. One begins with "Ah..." and the other agrees with "Nn..." (which is the Japanese equivalent of "uh-huh") and the entire meaning is understood."

-Hitching Rides with Buddha, Will Ferguson

call us crazy idealists but...

what? education's purpose is to LEARN? really?

so glad

"said i many times, love is illusion,
a feeling result of confusion
with knowing smile and blase sigh,
a cynical so and so, am i

i feel so sure, so positive,
so utterly unchangeably certain
though i never was aware of loving you
'til i suddenly realized there was love in you and oh...

chorus:
in this world of ordinary people...
extraordinary people,
i'm glad there is you

in this world of overrated pleasures
and underrated treasures,
i'm glad there is you.

i live to love,
i love to live with you beside me
this role, so new
i'll muddle through with you
if you'll guide me through.

in this world where many, many play at love
and hardly any stay in love,
i'm glad there is you

more than ever, i'm glad there is you

said i many times, love is illusion..."

check them out

super awesome sites to bookmark!

http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/?

http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

part two

my last post found me taking stock of my possession in order to move my life...
potentially just as important, if not more, as what i am moving is why

i've been pared down to:
a bathroom box
a kitchen box
an office box
a shoes box
vacuum packed clothing
cameras
books
and a computer
but i am not a list of possessions
the load lightened
organized and allowing for
the most important thing
freedom...
reconstruction
re-creation
change
opportunity
experience
education
in three months, just me and the open road
heading 2000 miles in a southwesterly direction
my sun rising in the west

(and as i type this...shuffling onto my itunes...a Railroad Earth show from Albuquerque)

memories

when asked if i think about the man i loved for a whole fifth of my life,
i can honestly answer that days sometimes go by without a thought.
when asked if i think about the man who raised me for the first fifth of my life,
i can honestly answer, again, that days pass, and when a thought appears, there is no accompanying emotion.
am i without a heart?
i like to think i'm simply more without strings
there are some, keeping me grounded to this moment, perhaps
but when each day allows for re-creation of this person i call myself
i need not be defined by the people, places, and things i've moved on from
on this the eve of a very big move
i'm mired in memories
deciding which to take
which to leave behind
which to donate
and which to discard
its a tiresome process, that demands nostalgia, measurement of pricelessness, and selectivity of necessity.
in the end, like my friend said, 'its just stuff.'
i still possess only two items from my childhood,
and will keep only one.
each year of your life becomes a smaller percentage of your life as time passes
and you own proportionally less from each era.
so many things being gifts, representing hard earned money of loved ones...i'm left with much to store.
and with them, i'm storing away that person who owned all those things
and realizing how much it feels like i could not even call that person me
the things changed, the things lost, the things forgotten...
and so this passage spoke to me:

"...how a file opens the door to a vast sunken labyrinth of the forgotten past, but how, too, the very act of opening the door itself changes the buried artifacts, like an archaeologist letting in fresh air to a sealed Egyptian tomb.
For these are not simply past experiences rediscovered in their original state. Even without the fresh light...our memories decay or sharpen, mellow or sour, with the passage of time and the change of circumstances...But with the fresh light the memory changes irrevocably. A door opens, but another closes. There is no way back now to your own earlier memory of that person, that event. It is like a revelation made, years later, to a loved one. Or like a bad divorce, where today's bitterness transforms all the shared past, completely, miserably, seemingly forever. Except that this bitter memory, too, will fade and change with the further passage of time.
So what we have is nothing less than an infinity of memories of any moment, event, or person: memories that change slowly always, with every passing second, but now and then dramatically, after some jolt or revelation. Like one of those digital photographs whose every color, tint, or detail can be changed on a computer screen, except that here we're not in control and can't revert at will to an earlier image. They say "The past is a foreign country," but actually the past is another universe.
-The File, Timothy Garton Ash

A Nation at Risk

the history and prediction of falling short

tangibility

twinkling pixels
electronic mail
plane ticket bills
text message trail
entire intangibility
i need...
that warmth from your hands
that dictates my hips

that magnetic force
that calls out my lips

that shape of your body
thats made so mine fits

that look in your eyes
that video doesn't catch

that way that you hold me
that no one could match

that awareness of your breathing
that lulls me to dreams

that tiny little sigh
thats more than it seems

that tiny little kiss
and the love that is meant

that spot on your neck
that defines your scent

that nook between your body and bed
that delineates my sleep

that place in your arms
that decides my smile
some tangibility would really be nice
for awhile

give it a shot

whether the cause be peace, the environment, educational reform, or supporting the losing candidate because you agree with his stance, you'll get more fulfillment out of being true to what you believe than being in the winner's circle.

giving up because you'll never see the fruits of your labor is rather selfish and more so, besides the point. if you really care about the cause, seeing your own actions make an impact should not really be a motivator.

if nothing else, you challenged, tried, cared, fought, and therefore, mattered.

more holidays

incredible timing for how i've been feeling...

"So when I see one of these cycles begin, I try to intercept, intercede. Isolate the catalyst and counteract it. Not feeling creative? Sit and write--even if it's about not feeling creative. (What do you think I'm doing now?) No results? Find something you know will provide them and do it, however small, inefficient or temporary. [Like my friend said last night...make my list out of SMALL things I can get done instead of BIG things that seem insurmountable]. Head it off now to save the time and struggle. But remember the metatheme. Don't be too hard on yourself. It's ok if one of them gets away from you every once in a while. There's no shame in taking a little break and feeling human--it's always better than bottling it up. But more often then not, step back and regain control. Do not let one emotion feed off another or let small bums throw you wildly off track. For you will find Aurelius' "fluent stillness" to be a goal well worth striving for."

motivational

This guys words really get inside me...

to quote the parts I like...
"The more I read the more I become convinced that life's only meaning from that which ascribe to it. That purpose exists only when your project and live it daily....
...Although I might not have reached true actualization, I am well on my way to warming up. Everyday I get up and I scratch a little at the walls that society sets up to prevent you from getting there. That my purpose is to be involved in the creation and furtherance of public discourse, so each book I read and word I write is the functioning of my soul. Happiness comes from action, and that action must be excellent...
...When we fail to tell people this, they lose life in the forest for all the trees--clutching with the vastness of it all, when what they need is tiny enough to hold. Some of us know this and are happy--and productive. Others know this and refuse to admit it, drowning the simplicity with alcohol or drugs....
...Excellence here becomes excellence there, and combined they equal the ultimate excellence: happiness. It seems to be logical, if happiness is that which we all aspire too, it must be the most excellent--and only through excellent action are we excellent....
...Read and read often. Act in moderation. Resist the pleasures and pains that distract you. Wake each morning prepared for exertion. Do not sleep or leave the gym until you have. Drench the ground in your sweat, fill the pages with words. The Resistance will dog you the entire way, pay it no attention. When you diverge from the path, look inwards and correct--dedicate a second to chastisement and move on. But most importantly, realize that not knowing your purpose is no excuse for stasis. Even if the destination has yet to reveal itself, you still must be ready for the call. Prepare, be active, and be open. Only then will you find happiness and contentment. I have had only a small taste, but I at least know it's worth every bit of effort."