Operation: This Will Most Likely End Badly

Well, this is it kids; I’ve started a new quest. I’m going to learn to play the guitar! Kind of. Sort of. I really just want to be able to switch chords quicker and finger-pick. I know about six chords already but I fail at changing quickly and smoothly. And finger-picking? Yeah right; I fail at that completely. My older brother tried to teach me once, but he couldn’t pass on his genius to me. Give me a French horn and I’ll be all over it, so it’s too bad guitar is being so poopy!

All I really want to be able to do is make up my own stuff! I really enjoy composing music for piano and would find it super cool if I could do the same thing on my guitar, like my brother. Also, I have a really cool book of classic rock songs for guitar, voice, and piano, and I want to get started on it. I’ve been stuck on the “Your Song” page, trying really hard to learn this gem of Elton’s. Gah! It’s proving to be a challenge. However, I get to use my capo! Ah yeah. Even though it’s a piece of crap capo. Ah well!

I’ll keep this page updated on my progress, though that will probably be slow going. Poop.

The epic quest for employment has begun. I applied to Costco and may be working for a catering company that caters for the shows at my local amphitheater. That would be really cool! I’ve heard some super cool stories about the stuff that goes on there. I may even get the chance to actually drive artists around! Wouldn’t that be epic?! The answer is, of course, yes. Fingers crossed for that one!

I’m applying to Costco because there is one in Bozeman that I could very well transfer to when school starts again in the Fall. That’s nice insurance to have as a college student, being that the market is already crowded with people looking for work. I suppose we’ll have to see!

My older sister left last week on what I like to call a “learning cruise”; she’s in the Caribbean right now on a smallish cruise ship with Semester at Sea, which is this really cool program that allows you to earn college credit – or just learn in general – while you travel around really cool places and do crazy cool stuff. She gets to scuba dive in Belize and explore South American countries such as Peru, Costa Rica, and the like. I for one am super jealous, as is my brother and his girlfriend. Speaking of my brother’s girlfriend – Ariel – we might be doing something similar this time next year! The next Enrichment Cruise will be traveling to Europe, and we might be going! This trip will be 26 days long and will take us to: London, England; Oslo, Norway; Copenhagen, Denmark; Stockholm, Sweden; Helsinki, Finland; Gdansk, Poland; Kiel Canal Transit, Germany; Hamburg, Germany; Amsterdam, Netherlands. What an awesome list of places to go! It would literally be the trip of a lifetime, and we would be getting college credit along the way. Crazy cool, right? I really hope that it works out and we can both make it! If you’re at all interested in this kind of stuff, they have other super awesome trips planned for other places and longer trips that you can check out. Look them up at semesteratsea.org. It will be well worth your time!

Until next time, stay classy!

xoxo

CDO

    Hello and welcome to Camp OCD. Check-in begins at precisely 4:00 and will be open for three minute installments every three minutes. Expect to use proper grammar and English. Only guests who can handle rooming with two other people will be admitted. Warning: there will be twelve steps to the check-in table. All guests are recommended to come prepared with a step plan, and all rooms are numbered via the Dewey Decimal system according to last name. Thank you and good luck.
    Seriously, I wish this existed.
    I don't know what it is but my OCD has been acting up a lot lately, especially at school. I think it's mostly due to the heightened state of stress. Whatever it is, it's getting really frustrating and harder to deal with. Most of it is internal stuff that other people can't see unless they pay really close attention but a couple things are becoming more noticeable. Take my eating habits for instance: I eat all my food in bites or slurps grouped into twos, and I always have to lick the other side of the cup after I drink. My friends are starting to notice and I can tell it weirds them out a bit. I mean, it's not what you expect from anyone. I also have a thing with noises that I make in the back of my throat and they've been getting louder lately, and I definitely think that other people can hear them. It's frustrating. BLAH. And I have more. lots more. Let's just not go into them right now.
    Anyway, let me know if you have any sort of ticks that you'd like to hide. I know I'd like to hide a couple. Or a few. Or all of them.
xoxo

Malwart

                I am currently nomming on Yan-Yan and generic brand Ritz crackers. College has taught me many things.

                I realize that I haven’t blogged in a really long time, and that could be troublesome if people actually followed my blog. Shout-out to my only followers – Aunt Molly and Meg (my older sister). You guys are awesome! I am so lame.

                If you were brought here by my vlog account on YouTube, great! That’s awesome! Thanks for watching and reading; it makes me happy inside. Like small forest creatures are skittering around in my tummy. Yeah.

                If you want to follow a slightly more exciting – and definitely more updated – blog of mine, go check out my Tumblr! I’m toasterness, man. Go find me. Please?

                You know what’s really fun to do? Midnight trips to Walmart.

                I first found out about these exciting adventures when I went to go see a showing of Juno at the theater nearby. There also happened to be a Walmart next to it. So, one thing led to another, and we ended up spending over four hours in Walmart and didn’t buy a thing. Wonderful! Although, I don’t recommend riding around the bikes; they don’t take lightly to that.

                Once in college, Walmart became one of the only places where I could buy food and not spend my entire month’s budget. The food was nasty but cheap, so it went in my belly when the dining hall food wouldn’t do it for me. Which was a lot. Blegh. Anyway, we would take the bus to Walmart at night and spend a couple hours dinking around, though we usually came out with a bit o’ booty. Actually, sometimes we actually bought Pirate’s Booty, that nummy popcorn stuff. I once scored a Darth Vader can of Pringles. So worth it. It’s a good thing Montana doesn’t have a sales tax, or a lot more of my money would have been spent. I tended to arrive at Walmart hungry, and you should never be in grocery store hungry. Bad juju.

                Once, we bought two whole pounds of bacon. Obviously, we ate all of it. With a side of Sunny D. Breakfast of champions.

                My personal favorite way of getting to Wally World was to take the “Drunk Bus”. Now, this is not a bus that we rode when we were drunk. Oh no. This is the bus that we ride while other people are drunk. It’s really the funniest thing ever; wasted people screaming the lyrics to “Wagon Wheel” at the top of their lungs, women dressed in skimpy outfits despite the below zero winter temperatures, and the general awesomeness of watching plastered individuals swinging from the roof rails. Oh Bozeman, how I love you. We would get on the bus right about the time that everyone was switching bars – around 10:30 pm to 11:00 pm – and we would get back on the bus right as people were starting to go home for the night – around 2:00 in the morning. It was always worth it, and we always seemed to make friends. Once, we met a bunch of people from England, Brazil, and Peru. It was awesome! And let me tell you; those Streamline buses can fit a lot of people. Oh yes.

                Alright, that’s it for this post. Check out my vlogs on YouTube! I’m echoiconicify and I try to make a few videos a week. Thanks for reading and have a glorious rest of the week.

xoxo

Nerdgasm

    So. The Transit of Venus, huh? Yeah. That was epic.
    Did you get to see it?? Ohmygosh. I about cried. This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience! This won't happen for another 105 years! No one alive today will be alive then!! I've been bugging out all day and have had NASA's live feed from Hawai'i up on my laptop basically for the whole day. I am so happy I got to see it! I even took some photos of it, though not many turned out quite well. Here's the best one I got:

 
   If you look at the upper right portion of the Sun, you'll see a little black speck. That's Venus!! This isn't a very great photo, so I used MS Paint to zoom-in and take a closer - albeit, slightly more pixelized - look at the transit:

    This view offers a much better glimpse of Venus (it's that little freckle!). So cool! I know the photos aren't great but I was just glad I was able to capture it so other people could see it. It's been cloudy here for a while and where my friends live, so hopefully they like the photos!
    How I took them: I used my dad's Nikon D5000 with its super zoom lens for the original photo, along with a welder's mask for a filter. I wish I could have had access to a telescope but you make do with what you have, right? I like it, so yay.
    I was so excited about today's event that I even wrote a song. It's about space, and science fiction, and space, and how much I love space because space is awesome. Yes. Here are the lyrics. I may post a recording of it on my YouTube channel if you'd like to see that. Enjoy!

"Space: the Final Frontier

Too bad I’m stuck right here

Maybe someday I’ll be on the surface Mars

Or maybe Voyager I or II will reach a distant star

Till then we’ll boldly go where no man has gone before

And we’ll just keep on learning more and more and more

But if you’re bored, now don’t you mope

Just go out and grab a big old telescope

Mr. Kepler, teach me your ways

I want to understand those gamma rays

Let’s make a giant leap for mankind

And go out and see some planets align

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away

A man forgot his towel and he was swept away

Oh, the wonders that he did behold

Nebulas, pulsars, and black holes, they never get old

Though it’s true that Andromeda is speeding towards us on a collision course

I’m still glad we’ve got gravity and all its powerful Force

Everyday space is expanding and ignoring our silly clocks

And yet, somewhere out there is a madman with a box

Mr. Sagan, help me understand

I need to know how to make a spaceship land

Let’s make a giant leap for mankind

And go out and see what we can find

Sitting down here I feel so small

And now I know I’m not much at all

Except, of course, star dust, and the ashes of this place

Did I yet mention that I love space?"

    If you still have time, go look at it! Or check out NASA's feed at http://venustransit.nasa.gov/transitofvenus/. It's totally worth it! That being said, Google "nebula" and begin to feel small. Have a nice day!

xoxo

The Avengers

    I just got back from seeing The Avengers for the first time and HOLY POOP; that was an awesome movie!! I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing, start to end, including the extra bits after the credits (both of them!). I'm officially adding this to the list of films I think everyone should see.
    The best part of this film for me was the fact that I never really got bored. During a lot of movies, there are breaks that cause me to lose focus, or get bored. In The Avengers, I found that I was engaged throughout the whole film. As this rarely happens with me, I was very pleased. I expected a lot from it, and it delivered. Also, The Avengers captured a balance between action, comedy, romance (?), and sadness that not all movies now-a-days get to. There was a proper amount of hilarity that didn't get annoying, and the action was believable in a way that didn't make me feel like I was watching a cartoon (which really wouldn't have bothered me too much, since the movie is about comic book heroes).
    Everyone should go watch this movie! Or, if you're okay with waiting, rent it or buy it. I for one am definitely going to buy it when it comes out on DVD. I'll add it to my collection! I do love me some super hero!
    That being said, Captain America is still my favorite.
    At the moment, I am enjoying a delicious oatmeal raisin walnut Clif Bar (I missed dinner to see the movie. Dedication!). I'm enjoying for a couple of reasons: one, it's ridiculously tasty, and two, it's milk and wheat free. Yay! Something that won't cause my sinuses to explode, something that can't be said for the mass quantities of butter that the concessions guy put on my popcorn at the theatre. But we all know it was totally worth it.
    If you've been following my vlog, you'll have noticed that I post there more than I do here. Sorry, sorry, it's just a bit easier to say what you want to talk about rather than type it all out. However, typing lets me think before I scribe, and this lets my thoughts stay relatively organized. By all means, watch both though! I don't always say the same stuff in both. In fact, I seldom do. However, this written blog will be far fuller of attempted wittiness and quips, if you're inclined to enjoy that sort of stuff more than me making funny faces and laughing at myself. Whatever you prefer.
    This will be a short post today, since it's late-ish and I've been ill. Go and see The Avengers! And eat a lot of movie theatre popcorn!
    Stay classy.
xoxo

Fire

    Here's a question for you; what is the color of fire?
    Now, don't answer "orange" on me, that won't do! Fire isn't orange, or blue, or whatever. Fire is light, and heat, and black body radiation. Fire is that tingly sensation you get when you see the person you like, or the feeling in your face when you're embarrassed.
    The answer is that fire has no color.
    Science geeks and technical people, bare with me; I realize it appears to have a color. Yes, I've taken chem before and I get that whole subject, and no, I don't care. I'm just writing about the general feeling of fire and how it works with people. Because fire can burn in all colors, depending on what elements are burning, so fire is all colors, creating light. And fire is also not a color in that it touches you like no other color can. Can blue drown you? Can yellow electrocute you? Can green cause you to grow? Nope. But fire can burn you, warm you, calm you, light your way. It is so much more than a color or a chemical reaction.
    All that philosophical jabber set aside, let's talk about why people like fire, pyro-to-pyro. For me, it's the way the embers look when the fire has died down, all smoldery and hot, and how a single flame reacts to wind, growing and building till it's devoured everything in its path. The power of fire fascinates me. S'mores are also delicious.
    Mmmmm.
    Perhaps humans like fire so much because we're built to; when man first discovered how to create and control fire, it was life-changing. Fire gave man the ability to become the powerful force that it is today. Without fire, where would we stand? Well, for starters, we'd all probably be dead, or just frozen. It may be this instinctual feeling towards fire of simultaneous fear and admiration that creates such a strong bond between people and fire.
    Or, it could be that some people just like to watch the world burn.
    Weeeeeee!!
    So, why all the sappy fire stuff, you may ask. To be honest, I don't really know. I think it's because I'm out of school and have no outlet for all of my fancy writing (not that this was fancy). I just have to let it all out! GAH!
    Really though, it's mostly because I went camping this weekend up near Leavenworth. We built a fire every night and every morning, using it to keep us warm and cook. It was a lot of fun, like always. I'd forgotten how much I loved campfires. My sweatshirt still smells like campfire smoke and I keep catching myself sniffing at the collar. I can't wait till later this summer when it's warm enough to go camping every weekend without getting slight frostbite.
    While I was in Leavenworth, I got to try some new chocolate. It's from Seattle Chocolates and is freaking delicious. It's the Pike Place Espresso Dark Chocolate Truffle Bar. Oh. My. Gosh. This chocolate not only uses my lifeblood as its truffle center but is all natural and made in Seattle. That's 45 minutes from my house! Every true chocolate lover needs to try this chocolate at least once. Seattle Chocolates has a bunch of different kinds of bars, all of them wonderful. I found mine at QFC but I bet you can find it all around the PNW. Glorious, local chocolate, where have you been all my life?
     If you come up with some great reasons why you like fire, send 'em my way! Or, if you find a chocolate that you simply cannot live without, please tell me about it!
    Stay classy.
xoxo

IT'S ALIVE. Also, new vlog!

    Well, goodness; it has been a long time since I've posted anything. AHHH. The trouble with blogs is, you have to remember to post stuff. I suck and remembering things. I should write myself a note ...
    In other news, I'm home from school now, back in the good ol' state of Washington! And it's Sunny, with a capitol S (I have the sunburn to prove it). I know, I know; everybody thought that the sun didn't exists in Washington. Well, I'm here to tell you that it does, as much as you or I or Squatchy does (He's just a little shy is all).
    This post promises to be short, since it's Sunny and such. I don't really want to waste it while it's here! What I wanted to do was let everyone know that I am still alive! Yay! And that I'm starting a vlog on Youtube (GASP!). Hurrah! That should be fun, I suppose, if you like watching that kind of stuff. Which you should, because you're reading this. At least, I hope somebody is reading this. Hello??
    SO! Go to Youtube and check out echoiconicify, my channel, and like/subscribe to your heart's content! It's sure to be a riotous time!
    Also, go outside; it's beautiful.
Stay classy!
xoxo

Movies That Make Me Happy

                My family and I love watching movies together. It’s definitely one of our favorite things to do together besides camping, hiking, or otherwise anything fun outside. My dad sometimes even goes out and randomly buys a film just so we can check it out. We don’t go out to the theaters much but we have a fairly large TV at home and a killer sound-system from the 70’s that makes it all pretty awesome. Sometimes, we pop a little corn and make a delicious treat out of chocolate chips and cashews! It really is a blast.

                Well, recently, I got my dad the movie Cowboys and Aliens as a gift. We decided to watch it last night since it was a Friday and early enough so as to not disrupt our natural sleep pattern (yes that is a real reason my family uses to keep ourselves from not staying up too late). And boy, did we enjoy it! At least, I totally did. You really can’t go wrong with Harrison Ford, especially when he’s tag-teaming with Daniel Craig! I pretty much had an action-hero-overload-of-pure-awesome. Sure, some of it was fairly predictable and even a little cheesy but I thought, as a whole, the movie worked; the story was fun, the characters were believable (except Olivia Wilde’s Southern accent; ugh!), the graphics were amazing, and the music was fabulous! It was great! I even think my dad – a big movie critic – liked it, which is saying something of today’s movies.

                As movies go, I enjoy most kinds except horror; I still get nightmares, and that’s just not cool. Rom Coms are usually predictable but mostly enjoyable, if not a bit silly, and I will frequently go for a classic comedy from the 70’s – 90’s. I tend to not like many comedies made now-a-days because they just aren’t written with the same ingenious humor like they used to be; it’s all inappropriate jokes and repeated clichés. The kind of comedy I like is classy slapstick, punchy one-liners, and witty banter. Sometimes I find a comedy of today that makes me belly laugh but mostly I just quietly giggle to myself. As for action and adventure, I’m pretty much up for anything that has massive explosions, robots, hot men, spaceships, sci-fi elements, and epic graphics and fight scenes, or any combination of said things, as long as the film has a semi-decent plotline. I enjoyed The Expendables but it was definitely targeted at those who don’t really care about plot and just want explosions. This being said, I still loved seeing all of my most memorable action heroes all in one place.

                Now, I have some friends here at college who have not seen some of the movies that I say are some of the best ever made, and a couple of them are film majors. Imagine this; a film student who hasn’t seen the original Star Wars or any of the Lord of the Rings movies, films that are cinematically genius and pioneering in their field. So, taking this is to account, I decided to compile a list of the films I personally think everyone should watch before they die. Keep in mind that I myself haven’t seen every film ever made, and some would say that my list is incomplete, but I’m just basing the whole thing off of the films that I have seen. If you have more movies you think should be on it or you think that I should take some off, go make your own list.

                Here it goes, not in any particular order:

-          The original Star Wars trilogy

-          The Lord of the Rings trilogy

-          The original Indiana Jones trilogy

-          Donny Darko

-          Blazing Saddles

-          Waterworld

-          Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome

-          The Postman

-          Monty Python and the Holy Grail

-          The original Planet of the Apes

-          The Charleston Hesston Planet of the Apes (“Get your hands off me, you damn dirty ape!”)

-          2001: A Space Odyssey

-          Disney’s The Jungle Book

-          Robin Hood (live action)

-          Robin Hood: Men in Tights

-          The Princess Bride

-          The King’s Speech

-          Pride and Prejudice

Well, that’s all I have now for that list. I enjoy a ton of movies but these are definitely my top films of all time. I hope you’ve seen most, if not all, of them! If not, GO DO IT NOW. They are all wonderful in their own aspects, and they all have flaws too. But they are films that I will be watching till I’m old and decrepit, sitting in my nursing home drinking prune juice (yuck!). Also, if you haven’t been keeping up on your classic Disney animated feature films, you should get on that, because they are ALL awesome.

Tell me your favorite movie! Maybe I haven’t seen it yet! And I’d sure love any recommendations if you think I’d like it. Thanks!

Stay classy.

xoxo

Why Our Music Industry Isn't What It Used To Be

                Okay, first off, let me get something straight; I am not dissing on any specific genre, or artist. I am simply picking songs that are examples of what I’m talking about. If I pick a song or artist that you really love, and you are somehow offended by what I say, please don’t get angry; I mean no harm! Well, not really.

                Who am I kidding? Say what you want, I don’t care.

                Now, I can’t be the only person who has noticed a serious lack of writing skills in the music industry lately. I mean, some artists are just getting lazy! Come on Beiber; you can do better than, “Baby, baby, baby, ooooh.” You’ve got it in you, I know you do! And ‘T-swift’? I admire you for your skills as a performer and the fact that you write your own songs and design your tours and such, but you need to seriously start changing up the topics of your songs! The world can only take so many songs about break-ups and ‘true love’. For real. Country music is full of that stuff anyway. And Patriotism.

                AMERICA!

                I can’t help but notice that songs ‘back in the day’ were written at a much higher standard than they are now. I’m sure there were some silly songs then too but the mass majority was pretty stellar. Take for example one of my favorite songs, The Sound Of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel:

”Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence

"Fools", said I, "You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you"
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed
In the wells of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said, "The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls"
And whispered in the sounds of silence”

                SO GOOD!!! The lyrics are so poetic, and they speak of public issues with such grace. They don't express their main point directly or outright but you definitely get what they are trying to say. Plus, the tune of it is absolutely to die for. My personal favorite line is “The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls”. Possible tattoo idea? I think yes!

                Anyway, if you look at these lyrics and compare them to a popular song of today’s lyrics, you’ll notice a sad decline in not only poeticism but a true deeper meaning. Gone are the days when artists wrote songs about injustices and true feelings. Today is the era of selfishness and over-done clichés! Hurrah!

                Let’s look at the facts; the top five songs of 2011 as picked by Billboard’s Critics are as follows:

5) Motivation by Kelly Rowland featuring Lil Wayne

4) N***as In Paris by Kanye West and Jay-Z

3) Till The World Ends by Britney Spears

2) Someone Like You by Adele

1) Super Bass by Nicki Minaj

                Holy crap. Nicki Minaj got best song of 2011??? I can think of hundreds of songs more deserving of that title! Yes, the song is catchy in that its beats make you want to dance, but the lyrics are just silly! And Kanye West’s and Jay-Z’s song? I think the title explains it all. To me, the only song on that list that truly deserves to be there, both musically and lyrically, is Adele’s Someone Like You; that is a truly beautiful song that speaks to the way lyrics used to be written. The list itself is 20 songs long, and I suggest you go check it out for yourself. Just Google ‘top songs of 2011’ and pick the link to Billboard’s website.

                I feel as though song-writers need to step up their games a bit and start producing works of art like they used to. Bring back the words of Fleetwood Mac, The Who, Led Zeplin, and good ol’ Simon and Garfunkel! Musical poetry, that’s what they produced, and that’s what we need to bring back into today’s music. So I challenge all of today’s artists to write a song – just one, really – that showcases your lyrical skills. Go for it! You’d be surprised as to what you can come up with.

Stay classy!

xoxo