My Life In Essays

Reasons why you (yes, you!) should watch Arrested Development if you haven't already

Wed, 22 May 2013 23:46:17 -0400

A list in no particular order for my friends who haven’t watched it yet.

Season four is coming out on Sunday. I see a lot of fandoms complain about hiatuses, well, after a seven year hiatus, AD is back with the promise of a movie. You can’t get much better than that. Plus, the show’s being posted all at once meaning that there’s no wait to devour the season or make GIFs.
There are a zillion people you already know from other stuff on there. I’m not kidding. The show’s main cast includes Michael Cera and Will Arnett, and guest stars include Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Liza Minelli, Henry Winkler, and Mae Whitman. And yes, you have seen Mae Whitman somewhere, because she’s everywhere, and her occasional inability to be noticed is parodied with her character ~~egg~~ ~~plant~~ ~~yam~~ ann~~abell.~~ And all of these characters have a distinct place in the plot that makes sense with everything else, with one episode parodying the out of place guest star.
It is crazy well written. I can’t even begin to tell you how much time I’ve put into watching and rewatching all three seasons of Arrested Development. And why not? Arrested Development not only stands up to rewatching, but rewards it. The series is so dense in jokes and the continuity is so strong that no matter how many times you watch the show, there will always be new things to pick up on. While it does rely on topical matter, such as George Sr.’s acts of “light treason” building houses in Iraq, the show is able to use its own characters and plot to derive the majority of the jokes, making it still relevant. Speaking of jokes…
The running gags. These always pop up where you least expect them, keeping the humor fresh despite allusions to previous episodes. This makes me wonder where the show’s writers learned all of their ~~illusions~~ tricks. PS they also make for fun in-fandom references. Wink wink.
You can finally find out where that “I don’t know what I was expecting” GIF comes from. Yes, that’s from AD. Let’s not pretend, you were wondering where that came from. No, I won’t have to tell you what its context is, that’s for you to find out by watching.
The Bluths.The family themselves have engrossing personalities that it’s hard to choose a favorite, although Lucille doesn’t care much for Gob. They’re such a trainwreck it’s enjoyable to watch. Plus, whether you’re in the mood for a two hour angry nap or expecting something to go completely wrong, the characters’ variety all means that you could make a GIF about what you’re feeling.
Maeby. Remember how in my last point I said it was hard to choose a favorite? It’s hard, but it’s not impossible. Maeby, a fifteen year old who manages to bluff her way into a job as a studio executive, manage to be rebellious enough to win the audience over, but clueless enough to make her believable. She also has some of the best interactions with other characters because she serves as a foil to pretty much everyone. Plus it’s a refreshing change of pace to see a teenage girl who’s one of the more sane ones in her family.
Franklin Delano Bluth. In a way, Franklin, Gob’s puppet, is the show’s humor in a nutshell. A seemingly one off joke who appears unexpectedly throughout the series, Franklin has the sort of quirkiness that give AD its voice. Franklin serves at times as a representation of how insensitive Gob is. Plus half of the stuff he says is so shocking it has to be funny.
It’s a piece of television history. If you watch AD for no other reason, watch it because it has a lot of significance. Arrested Development was one of the first shows to come from the mockumentary genre, helping pave the way for other shows. It also set up the 2000s trend of smart sitcoms with a cult fanbase, high critical praise, and low ratings. Plus, the netflix revival makes it one of the first shows released on the site, and the first show to go from a network to online. So that’s something to consider.

Things I Learned from Starkid: Female Representation in Starkid

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 18:32:19 -0400

Things I Learned from Starkid: Female Representation in Starkid:

I’m reblogging this because it says a lot of the things that I wanted to say and makes some really great points.

thingsilearnedfromstarkid:

To begin talking about this issue, let me set a scene for you. Let’s say you’ve been petrified and are lying in the Hospital Wing, but as is mentioned later in the storyline, you can see and hear what’s going on. Your boyfriend comes in and gets a musical number while you just lie there. When…

Photo

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 22:03:43 -0500

fragilemask: krankenhaus: Oh my God, this is heaven-sent. It...

Sat, 15 Dec 2012 20:52:17 -0500

fragilemask:

krankenhaus:

Oh my God, this is heaven-sent.

It took me like 50 years to understand what this is about

But now I get it and it’s awesome

But the thing is, said is not something that should be avoided at all costs. The main advantage of “said” is that it is unobtrusive, so if you have a lot of “dialogue”, said doesn’t take away from that. However, if you’re describing a character’s tone, then avoid “Said [adverb]”.

charlielikesdragons: starting a petition for the next starkid show to have a female lead

Mon, 12 Nov 2012 16:15:40 -0500

charlielikesdragons:

starting a petition for the next starkid show to have a female lead

ibetmittromney: I bet Mitt Romney has a tag for his queue that’s a pun on the word queue. They...

Sat, 15 Sep 2012 14:02:21 -0400

ibetmittromney:

I bet Mitt Romney has a tag for his queue that’s a pun on the word queue.

They used mine!

Context is Key

Wed, 29 Aug 2012 19:34:48 -0400

Okay, the title relates to both the quote surrounding an infamous scene in Looking for Alaska and the author’s statement about this.

And why yes, that’s TWO John Green posts in one month.

(under the cut because spoilers,(debate over) sex, and swearing)

However, this post is about his novel, Looking for Alaska, and some of the um- how do I put this?- criticism towards his novel. The reason? because I, as a member of the target audience, need to state that the “massively unerotic blowjob” as John Green put it, did not, in any way impact my attitude toward sex, and that banning books is a shitty (1) thing to do.

John Green recently shared an article about the book today on his facebook page. Let’s start with what I feel needs to be stated about the article first and foremost. It is not a good article from an objective, journalistic standpoint. And that’s not because I disagree with what it’s saying, although I do, because it’s very clearly biased. Let’s look at the way information is used, shall we? You would think, that because the article is about looking for Alaska, they would explain either the plot of the book or the context surrounding the scene in question. Nope! The only idea of what actually transpires the reader gets from the article is this quote. ”It was very graphic. I won’t be able to look at a Colgate toothpaste dispenser in the same way again.” However, that’s not the only fact the article is lacking. John’s quote about not letting his son is used out of context, and only paragraphs later is it mentioned that Henry is two years old. This might be reading into things too much, but I felt that fact was included out of a sense of obligation than anything. There are no stances from other authors, for instance, on the requirement of literary merit for a book not to be considered pornographic, something that might suit this debate. Most importantly, the article sidetracked from the actual story to talk about how “pornographic” LfA is. There really shouldn’t have been an article at all, because the story is just: book is shelved incorrectly, woman finds book on wrong shelf, woman is offended, book is moved. If anything, the series of events should have been featured in an introduction of an article about the debate on what is appropriate in books for teen readers, but it’s not even close to that, and it makes me lose faith in published media when drivel like this is accepted.

Obviously, I believe that LfA isn’t porn. In fact, if you read the dictionary on my computer’s definition of pornography, you wouldn’t either.

printed or visual material containing the explicit description or display of sexual organs or activity, intended to stimulate erotic rather than aesthetic or emotional feelings.

The scene in question, in which one character decides to perform oral sex on her boyfriend, doesn’t even really fit this description. It’s not erotic, it’s just awkward. That’s the point. The scene was designed to convey the message that sexual activity isn’t fun when you’re not engaging in it for the right reasons. That’s a much needed message in a time where a lot of media seems to be saying “sex is sex and it’s SUPER FUN!”(2). More importantly, it’s the only sex scene in the book.

That’s because sexual activity isn’t the main issue the novel deals with. It’s about a young woman whose choices, to a large degree, lead to her death, and how the characters close to her learn to adjust afterwards. That’s the main reason why most people who have read the novel wouldn’t recommend it to a child. it requires a degree of emotional maturity that children often lack. Pretty much everything “Bad” in the novel looks that way when taken with context, and the main problem with handing younger readers Alaska is that they might not understand that context.

However, if a reader is able to understand the novel and connect with it, it makes no sense to stop them from reading it. Even though it’s not a book I would recommend to young children, I’d definitely recommend it to older readers, just because it’s a powerful, thought-provoking novel. Personally, reading LfA was a really emotionally draining experience that was thoroughly worth it. I ended up looking like a nutjob, crying in the Las Vegas airport. Part of it was just the novel, but it was mostly because the novel connected to my life. My school had undergone a tragedy really recently, and Alaska brought up a lot of memories. However, once I was done crying about it, the novel was really cathartic, in a way. It helped me move on from what happened and accept the world around me. In my opinion, denying another reader an experience like that is just wrong.

There’s a reason why I mentioned banning books in the introduction. Apparently, people don’t want teenagers reading it. Which makes sense, as mentioned above, but is also really stupid. I’ve read books that were much more sexually explicit (still not porn) in my English classes without a parent complaint. That’s because, like Looking for Alaska, there is something about the novels that, our teachers believe, are really important. Not only did I enjoy reading these novels, but they really did do what our teachers intended.

Kind of related, according to the ALA website, the three most common reasons why books are banned are because they are sexually explicit, contain offensive language, and are “unsuited to age group”- whatever that means. Alaska fits all three of those.

So, while Alaska isn’t a book for younger readers, it is worth reading. There is no magic age for when kids will appreciate a novel. That’s up to parents, and also, though it is not really acknowledged, the kids themselves. And no, because some people don’t understand this, one parent cannot keep other people’s kids from reading a book, just their own.

So yes, I, too, stand by that massively unerotic blowjob.

(1) I try to keep this blog semi professional, but banning books is a really shitty practice. There really is no other way to put it. You need the swear.

(2) Not that I’m judging anyone for having sex or their reasons for doing so, but it doesn’t hurt to encourage responsibility in these matters.

A crash-course style open letter to John Green

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 19:00:00 -0400

Dear John Green,

Apparently, it is your birthday today. I’m not a hundred percent sure that this is true as I just saw it on my tumblr dash. Let me check Wikipedia. Okay. It is.

The thing is, before I discovered Nerdfightaria through my friend Marygrace, I probably wouldn’t have done that. So many of your videos (and Hank’s, but it’s not his birthday today so…) reminded me that I should appreciate the knowledge that’s available with a five second google search, and that learning about things is cool. Those aren’t things that I hear every day, so to see a community that loves learning and knowledge is super awesome.

Through these videos, I discovered your books. The first one I read was The Fault in our Stars. I’d have to say TFioS is my favorite not just because it introduced me to all of the other novels you wrote, but for the first time, I felt enthusiastic about my hometown. If you’re one of the approximately four residents of Indianapolis who are not Colts fans, like me, there’s not much going on in Indianapolis to be proud of, to be quite honest. However, there was something really exciting about reading a New York Times bestselling novel and saying “I live there!”.* I read my way through all of your other books, and there was something about all of them that reminded me just how much a good book meant.

I’m really glad I joined the nerdfighter community, too. It’s impressive that a group of smart, funny people has sprung up around a series of youtube videos. Since you and Hank created those youtube videos, I have to give credit where credit is due. However, all of Nerdfighteria’s accomplishments are its own, so I’ll just end this paragraph here.

Anyway, Happy Birthday, John. And as surprisingly few people here say, Don’t forget to be awesome.

Best wishes,

Aria.

*By the way, yes, I was the fan at LeakyCon who mentioned that I live about ten minutes away from most of the locations in that book. Except Amsterdam. I do not live ten minutes away from Amsterdam.

motherfickle answered your question: An elaborate coverage of everything that has happened at Leaky...

Sat, 11 Aug 2012 02:38:57 -0400

motherfickle answered your question: An elaborate coverage of everything that has happened at Leaky (So far)

You met Hank Green? Lucky!

Yeah. It really was lucky. I thought I would have to draw for a signing at least…

An elaborate coverage of everything that has happened at Leaky (So far)

Fri, 10 Aug 2012 17:59:02 -0400

Um spoilers for JMOMS? That’s about it. Under the cut because I know a lot of my followers don’t care.

10:00: Mugglecast- This was pretty much what you’d expect. It had the basic format of a mugglecast episode. There was some discussion over how The Casual Vacancy relates to fandom and they answered audience questions. I went up to the mic and didn’t get chosen. Expect that to be a common theme.

11:00: Joe Moses One Man Showses- Hoo boy.

Joe introduced himself and told a joke about his middle name
The Doctor at Blockbuster sketch with Devin, Nick Strauss, and Brant Cox
A sketch where Walker was an actor and Joe Moses was his standin and the directors (Devin and Brian) liked the way Moses was saying the line better than Joe.
Joe Moses supposes, where Joe answered questions from the audience and Nick moderated. Every time Nick rang a bell, Joe had to change his answer.
Wrong Direction- A sketch about the boy band parody wrong direction, and it featured the Warblers and Tessa Netting.
Tessa and Curt sang a parody of “I Wanna Be” about wanting to be in StarKid
Potion Master’s corner with Brant Cox, Joe Walker, and Curt Mega.

1:00: Potter Puppet Pals/Mark Oshiro signing, where I’m pretty sure I weirded out Neil Cicierega because I couldn’t find what I wanted him to sign and I let two people go ahead of me so I wouldn’t hold up the line but then I just gave up and had him sign my program

1:55-ish: Went into the vendor room while looking for Living the Lovegood way and ran into Hank Green and asked him to sign my program.

2:00: Living the Lovegood way- I don’t know what I expected, but this wasn’t it. That’s okay though, because it was a great program. Evanna Lynch, Devin Lytle, and Andrew Slack (Founder of the HPA) discussed how to involve Luna’s influence in your life- not being negative, being okay with being weird. They took audience questions and (recurring theme) my question didn’t get chosen. That’s okay, because right behind me in line was Tessa Netting. I got a hug. I also ran into Marygrace afterwards.

This really fries my waffles

Fri, 03 Aug 2012 19:25:04 -0400

Okay. I just have to ~~refudiate~~ refute some things I’ve seen on Facebook that prove that nobody, like, does, any like, f***ing research(1) regarding the Chick-Fil-A controversy.

First, let’s explain what’s going on. Chick-Fil-A founder and president S. Truett Cathy has come under fire for donating over five million dollars over the past decade to Anti-LGBT organizations (2). Answering as “guilty as charged” to operating under “the Biblical definition of the family unit” (3)

So, let’s clear a few things up here just from those two sentences alone.

This is more than just “Some conservative making anti-gay statements”
He has confirmed his discriminatory practices
There is money involved.

I cannot stress that last point. Money from Cathy’s non for profit organization, WinShape, was donating money to these organizations (4). This money had to come from somewhere, which is why there is a boycott going on.

Some people who still support Chick-Fil-A claim that they support the organization on the grounds of “supporting free speech” and waive of protesters with “the first amendment”. I’ve seen it all over Facebook. Let’s first start with the incorrect use of the first amendment. The purpose behind it was to prevent government censorship of citizens, allowing them to criticize the government. I’m not going to cite this because this is basic American civics. So, let’s look at what’s going on here.

Things that are involved in the first amendment

Government
Censorship
The rights of citizens in relation to the government

Things that are not in the first amendment

Fast food restaurants
Boycotts
The response of citizens in relation to discriminatory actions.

Are we clear on that? If not, let’s put it another way. The first amendment gives you the right to say what you want and defends you from government censorship. It does not defend you from someone else using their first amendment right to criticize how you’re using your first amendment right and criticize your actions (5). It also says nothing about where people should and shouldn’t spend their money.

Nobody involved in the boycott is trying to censor Cathy. He can say what he wants and most of the people involved in the movement won’t try to stop him. They’re obviously not forcing people to avoid chick-fil-a, as they still have supporters. They’re just not going to his restaurant, which they are well within their right to do.

Because believe it or not, the LGBT+ community and its allies have the first amendment right, too.

For those of you non-StarKid followers, that’s a reference to a Darren Criss quote.
(Source)
If you don’t know what that phrase means get out from under your rock and go see the world. Also thank you for making my blog the main website for your rock. also (Statement source)
This was mentioned in previous sources. I’m too lazy to find a new one.
Unless they’re lying. However, since all of the information against Chick-Fil-A is verifiable, I’m not going to go into that.

IT SHOULD BE FEWER PEOPLE Grammar freak rage

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:59:44 -0400

IT SHOULD BE FEWER PEOPLE

*Grammar freak rage*

Trying out a narrative essay. Fun stuff!

Fri, 22 Jun 2012 16:02:46 -0400

When I was in middle school, I figured out that in between the time when the bus dropped me off in the morning and the time school actually began, I could go to the school library and check out a book. This daily ritual is how I discovered my love of Cliched YA novels. I’d read until the already barely distinguishable plots blended togehter into a sludgy mix of irredeemable mean girls, teen starlets, and bad best friends. I wasn’t looking to be amazed, if I was, wouldn’t be looking toward the wish fulfillment of middle aged women who seemed to hate both high school and their adult lives. It was just fun. As I made abundantly clear by reading in class, I enjoyed these innaccurate portrayals of high school far more than my real middle school classes. A world where an honest to God hopeless high school girl comes into her own and gets a boyfriend as a result* was better than my still-awkward middle school existence where I thought the boy who mocked me had a crush on me.

In a way, though, those novels were right. It’s bizzare. Once I left middle school, that library never really left, although in order to make it to the high school library, I had to go to the second floor, which I had no time for. I did end up growing as a person during high school. I became aware that the snide remarks I thought were funny in middle school were actually unbelievably rude, and while I never did ditch the narcissistic, overcompetitive, condescending group of GT kids I was forced by my schedule to spend time with, I did find friends who were actually loyal and respectful. None of this, however, came with someone to run off into the sunset with, but I realized that most of my crushes were on the idea of having a crush, anyway. There weren’t teen celebrities or trips to India or whatever MacGuffin you could think of involved in this realization. Just time. Maturity doesn’t happen in an instant, but it still happens.

PS if you want to pay for me to go to India or you can arrange for me to meet the celebrity of my choice, I’ll gladly accept.

*Why there always had to be a romantic interest, I’ll never know. Seriously, boyfriends don’t improve storytelling

I'm just going to leave this poem I wrote right here.

Fri, 22 Jun 2012 11:39:19 -0400

The visions of romance were over

Once I reached that uncomfortable phase

Known to most as “growing up”

Which, I realize now,

Is just the moment

Where the cones kick in

And you see

The world in color

Instead of black and white

It’s hard to believe in the triumph of good

When images of corruption and oppression

Are shown nightly at 6:00 and 11:00

And it’s hard to believe in true love

When there are horror stories

About just how sour and harmful relationships can get

The world has color now

But everything seems to be the same

Gloomy morose shade,

The shade when the rain has violently covered the sun

But one has to wonder

Since the grey-blue will never fade

If it really is

The better choice, as some claim

To go back

To black and white.

Late night musings on why movie musicals aren't a thing

Mon, 04 Jun 2012 14:06:00 -0400

This is from my new pop culture/media blog.

mediateen:

So, I was looking through Netflix looking for something to watch and review for everyone, and I naturally went to the “musical” section. It’s kind of a good starting point for me because

I know more than the average person about musicals

It is a storytelling medium I love

I have a general idea of how the Broadway community works overall and how any given musical would tie into Broadway history

Five seconds in I realized that over half of the titles were in black and white, as if to shamelessly say that they were made before technicolor became a thing. I found it so bizarre that this medium that had once dominated the screen was something almost rarely seen anymore on our cinema screens.

I have a few theories as to why this is a trend in recent media. First, we have to eliminate the assumption that people assume that musicals are for kids. While most musicals are directed towards kids, there are others that are very clearly geared towards adults, like The Book of Mormon. People mostly have accepted that musicals can be just as much for adults as kids, so why still the box office hesitancy?

I think it has to do with audience. The stereotypical demographics of a broadway musical are rich white people, and that’s not too far from the truth. While I was too lazy to get my readers around the paywall at Time.com, an excerpt from an article they did that fascinated me when they printed it shows that a night at the theatre can add up. That’s not to say that you have to have seen a musical to know about it, because I have fallen in love with musicals I’ve never seen, but it makes people hesitant to see a show less inclined to do so. Then it raises the point that it doesn’t need to have mass appeal to make millions a week, just have a really devoted fanbase.

As for the racism stuff? Totally valid. Look at all of the musicals that have been popular throughout the past few years, the best musical winners, starting from 2001, their protagonists are

White

White

White*

Puppet (usually played by a white guy)

White

White

White

Latino

White

An interracial couple

White

I’m not saying that these musicals don’t have POCs as characters, I’m just saying that most broadway musicals tell stories about white people, and while it’s a problem in all media, it’s especially strong in broadway musicals. Again, remember the whole point about how because of ticket prices, broadway only has to appeal to a wealthy minority of people? Well, most wealthy people are disproportionately white. In order for something to cinematically translate, it has to at least pretend to communicate to audiences that aren’t white. Non-latino white people make up 63% of the US population. The other 37 percent have money, too.

Side note: stop saying that glee is a musical. It is a TV show. It has musical tendencies, a cast that has been involved in musicals, but it is not a musical. And stop saying it’s diverse. The screetime will show you it is not.

Also I will not be taking comments on this side note because my love/hate relationship with Glee is something for another day.

*Hairspray does get a lot of credit for some things for which very few things get credit: for example, the acceptance of Tracy’s weight or the fact that it passes the Bedchel test, it loses major points for fitting the plot of “white person helps black person with [insert problem here]”.

An Open Letter to Team StarKid

Thu, 10 May 2012 21:41:00 -0400

Dear Team StarKid,

You need to plan your events better, because they always seem to fall really close to when I have my history AP tests. Granted, I got a 4 on US History last year even though Starship premiered on YouTube that weekend, but still, not cool. It’s almost sounding like a “the dog ate my homework” thing. “Oh I didn’t do as well as I would have on my AP European History exam because I was too excited about Apocalyptour.” I mean, I’m good when it comes to AP Tests. You’re my kryptonite, my one weakness I can’t avoid. I know I’m not the only one. It’s no secret that most of your fans are nerdy (read: they may be frumpy but they’re super smart) high schoolers. They have finals, AP tests, and IB exams too. So maybe you could possibly take that into account the next time you plan on traipising around the country?

If you don’t I’ll still love you anyway.

Yrs,

Aria.

The comments here are blagh

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:08:19 -0400

The comments here are blagh:

As someone who’s going to college in less than a year and a half, this is one of my major concerns. I have no idea if there’s still going to be a recession when I get out of college, so society is increasing the pressure not to get a useless major so you’re not “wasting” your education. The thing is, all of my interests, with the exception of psychology, are all “useless majors” which means that society will judge me unless I get a major I hate, in which case I will still be judged.

pandorasmittens:

“Why don’t you get a job?” News Flash: Many students DID in fact have jobs while in college. Full time jobs. Sometimes second jobs. Those jobs only paid for expenses and books, NOT the cost of attending college. I worked 40 hours or more each week during the school year (nearly 80 during the summer), was involved on campus, volunteered, and managed to pull a 4.0 and highest honors. And I’m not alone by any means. If you think that’s “lazy” or “entitled” it’s time to burn your rose-colored nostalgia goggles.

“Why do you think you’re too good for McDonalds or minimum wage?” Finally, this is a generation that was told countless times by our parents, teachers, family members, politicians, bank landers, mentors, and adult family friends that we WERE “too good for McDonalds”. In fact, that’s why we were told college was a required passage in life as opposed to one of many paths. College was, as our adults so wonderfully put it, a counter to the “Do you want to flip burgers your entire life!?” accusation lobbied every time we made a mistake or produced a less than ideal grade.

We were told that student loan debt was “good debt”; it showed an investment into our futures, an investment that would most surely pay off, because it’s not as if our wise, money smart elders would ever elect people into power that, over decades, would empower business owners to eliminate both blue and white collar jobs at the expense of profits, bonuses, and shareholders, AMIRITE?

We were not the people who drove the cost of higher education absurdly high. We were not the ones who slapped a “Bachelors Degree required/ Masters preferred” sticker on every mundane office job, and still refused to pay a decent living wage. We were not the ones that decided that unlike other forms of “good debt”, student loans were unforgivable in a federal court. Apparently, the Amurrican Dream and the failure of such only applies to the individuals that want land and cars and other tangible commodities, as opposed to the imparting of knowledge and self-worth by an educational system that is increasingly resembling a commodity itself.

And now, as we struggle against defaulting on our loans, we are chastized for not seeking the jobs that we were told were “below us”-which is not only a classist sentiment, but an ignorant one. I have sought those jobs, and I am constantly rejected for being “overqualified”, as few employers (and rightly so) want to spend the time and money training an employee that they feel will jump ship at the next available opportunity, leaving holes in schedules and drops in productivity.

Once again, the self-righteous stand back to mock the ones they feel are less than themselves; only this time the “less thans” are their children, nieces, nephews, etc. Fuck you. I may have made a poor choice or two, but I do not hold all the blame. If you can get bailed out for your McMansions and stocks, you can at least understand the plight of students you helped drive into this mess.

velocipedestrienne: velocipedestrienne: It’s time! Thanks to...

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 13:46:35 -0400

velocipedestrienne:

velocipedestrienne:

It’s time! Thanks to all of you lovely people, I’ve hit 500 followers and, as previously mentioned, it’s time for a giveaway! 500 may not be a lot for some people, but I’m beyond thrilled and I think you deserve something for being so wonderful :)

Included:

Burst Into Spring Ring - non tarnish bronze wire with interwoven beads in your size

Eggs in a Nestlace - non tarnish bronze wire on 18” silver chain

LOVE Ring - non tarnish silver wire in your size

40% Off Code for any item in my Etsy store

Rules:

Must be following velocipedestrienne at the time of the drawing

Must reblog this post in full - likes don’t count!

One entry per person

US/Canada only

Giveaway ends at midnight on this coming Saturday, April 21st. I will select the winner at random and notify him or her on Sunday the 22nd.

TODAY IS THE LAST DAY TO ENTER MY GIVEAWAY!! Tell all your friends!

Why Twilight is better than The Hunger Games

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 16:06:26 -0400

Once I found out that the dystopian young adult novel series The Hunger Games was being compared to Stephenie Meyer’s The Twilight Saga, I was beyond offended. How could they compare such a great work of genius to a piece of garbage that does not deserve to be called literature? So, on April 1st, I am going to sit down and explain to you why exactly Meyer’s novels are superior to the toilet paper that is The Hunger Games.

Katniss is not a well written protagonist. She’s stubborn, impulsive, and violent. Everyone knows that the only acceptable flaws for a female protagonist to have is clumsiness, and even then, it must be treated as if it’s cute. They must also be feminine and well read. Katniss hunts in the woods illegally and is never seen reading classic literature. How are we supposed to know that she knows how to use her brains to get men? We don’t, because Katniss is an idiot with no actual skills.

Also, the movie made Katniss even worse. Jennifer Lawrence is a horrible actress, and her skill does not come close to matching that of Kristen Stewart. Stewart’s bland facial expressions required the script to tell me what was going on. Lawrence’s portrayal of every emotion of Katniss’ left me super confused. Since when are protagonists supposed to have thoughts?

The love triangle in The Hunger Games also leaves much to be desired. Neither Gale nor Peeta is a good match for Katniss. Gale tells Katniss too many things. She spent the entirety ofMockingjay knowing what District 13 wanted her to do. Gale didn’t do nearly as good of a job as he should have of hiding information from her. Peeta, meanwhile, has his own flaws. He spends most of his life watching Katniss from a distance. How are we supposed to believe his crush when he doesn’t even watch her sleep? I mean, we’re supposed to interpret a loaf of burnt bread as “romantic” and “generous”? MAYBE if it was a cake that was in decent shape, but burnt bread is not a decent gift. Edward is a better boyfriend than both of them because not only does he not respect Bella’s wishes. He also hovers over her for her own safety. Collins does not acknowledge that women are simply incapable of making their own decisions. This is why we have so many problems in society. Not only are there now more female protagonists in the media, but they also perpetuate the stereotype that women don’t need a man to protect them. How untrue!

The love triangle isn’t even the focus of the series. It’s behind some political bullcrap about government. Does it look like I care? I don’t care what my government does or how it treats me. I just want to watch the drama unfold. And isn’t that what The Hunger Games is really about? How awesome it is to watch conflict between people and not do anything else?

Musical Misconceptions 1:

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 00:03:00 -0400

littlemissmars:

Songwriting is easy—just write what you feel and let it come to you.

Anyone who says that songwriting is writing your emotions is either a liar or Taylor Swift. I like to think that there are two components in writing music: the music itself and the emotion that it conveys. I don’t like to think of lyrics as a writing component but rather a subject that falls under emotion, since not all music has lyrics but all music has sounds and can convey the almost same things lyrics do.

What a lot of people fail to realize regarding the musical component, is that music is a science. While for some people it’s easy to catch on to without much study, you need a lot of developed, innate senses and instincts to understand how to organize sound. Songwriting is not just a right-brained creative task, but a left-brained puzzle. Not everything works in music, and if it does work, that does not necessarily mean that it’s good. It probably means your idea is a basic pattern or mediocre chord progression that came to you because you figured out the simple rules of the foundation of music.

But from that springs creativity. It’s understanding what’s common and what’s basic that gets you to create something new and exciting. That’s why people like music with 7 chords and accidentals: they aren’t supposed to be chords. They are mistakes that ended up sounding beautiful somehow.

However, this comes from discovery. Not necessarily “playing what you feel.” While creating music through your emotional episodes may produce a great piece of music eventually, you have to discover through a slightly painful, tedious experience with a lot patience what that sounds like.

Besides the musical component, there is the lyrical one. This is mostly where people think this misconception will carry them to success.

Writing lyrics is not about people hearing your lyrics and understanding you.

It’s about you understanding people, hearing their words, and turning them into lyrics.

Music is useless without relatability. It’s the power that takes you from just appreciating a piece of music to falling in love with it. It has to have something that strikes a chord in people and makes them think. And since human beings are innately selfish, one of the sure fire ways to get people to think are to get them thinking about themselves.

The infamous Taylor Swift is a great example for how relatability successes and fails. For groups of people like me, who don’t admire her as a musician, it has a lot to do with her biggest flaw but in a way, her greatest attribute: how personal she makes her music. I have never been a girl crying whilst playing my guitar on a Tuesday night in the rain because my boyfriend left me for a cheerleader and called my best redheaded friend Abigail who lost her virginity freshman year to comfort me. The amount of specificity Taylor Swift writes her songs turns some people off because she pointedly describes how terribly mediocre her teenage experience was. Because I don’t care for her experience her music doesn’t speak to me. It doesn’t make me care for her and it doesn’t make me feel anything. (Also musically, she’s just a mess, but we’re talking solely about the lyrical component and so that’s not a really big deal at the moment.)

I don’t want to relate to her music. But her target audience does and that’s why she’s become so popular. Millions of teenage girls across the globe listen to her for the same reason I listen to Mumford and Sons to convince myself that I’m a deep, introspective, philosophical blue-grass British hipster. Swift convinces them that their typical experiences were heartbreaking and important to their growth and will make them independent, empowered young women (although, let’s face it, life isn’t that hard when you’re a blonde, skinny, pretty teenage girl with enough boyfriends to write albums about until you’re 22.) They like the fact that they can hear the names “Drew” and “Abigail” or say “she” and “he” and try to replace them with people in their personal lives. In “Fifteen”, she writes the entire song in second person to throw that personal feeling onto the listener: this is happening to you, I know what it feels like. It also helps that she’s not the most sophisticated writer either. The lack of complexity and the same phrases she uses repeatedly are what a 14 to 17 year old girl would write.

But another key in writing good music, that Taylor lacks at times, is universality. Her popularity and recognition and reputation is what earns her awards, not necessarily her talent or writing ability. While you certainly cannot satisfy everyone, you can attempt to be appealing to more than a restricted age and gender demographic.

All in all, writing what you feel is a bad idea. Well, it’s not as much of a bad idea as it is one, minuscule step. Try writing what you feel and then see what comes. It’s going to be a jumbled mix of sounds and words and just…noises that you are going to love but no one else cares for. It’s taking that and finding a way to tweak it and really make it want you want to portray, what other people are going to like hearing, and something unique.

Emotions are messy and broken and indescribable and difficult and it’s not a musician’s task to copy them exactly as they are. It’s a musician’s task to find what messy and broken and indescribable and difficult sounds like. And then make it just a little more beautiful.

Again, not mine (obviously), but enjoy!