Stress

American school systems suck. All they do is instill the fear of failure and competition in our young blossoming minds. I believe that school systems should be more like a building process. Sure the competition helps you get through life but what about all the "losers" What do they do for the rest of their lives? They more than likely give up which could possibly be the reason why 60% of America is obese. On college campuses so many kids stress out about the stupidest smallest things that could result in them making bad decisions of not wanting to go on living their lives. I myself am a vicim of stress partly because im am scared that i wont receive a job when i get into the "real world." Well, in the back of my mind i know stressing is pointless but its second nature to do it. If im not doing something i start spiraling down on something that doesn't deserve that much attention. Stress is unhealthy. So many college students have committed suicide due to it, some have developed premature illness like strokes or heart attacks in their 20's, and some of the minor cases may include irritation or common illness. School should be a place where yes it should be challenging but more like a job. College just proves that you can do the ultimate "bitch" work and graduate with a diploma saying you made it through. Its kinda like an initiation into the real world. Sure, school teaches you things about what you want to do for the rest of your life but many people have proved that you can find a job that no where meets the requirements of your degree and still earning a great deal of money WITHOUT the need for college education. School isn't for everyone, neither are "white collar" jobs. Our economy now pays some "blue collar" jobs triple what "white collar" jobs are offering. Hearing that statistic makes me want to just drop out of school and become a welder of fine metals. Then you could possibly go further and say yes welders and brick layers have to go to school to get their "licences"I guess you just have to go to school and there is no avoiding it. School needs to be a stress free environment but since i know that will never happen i must learn to deal with my stress and transform it to something good....right

The Importance of Travel

Everyone should travel at least 10 times in their lives. If you dont get out there you wont know what our world is about. You can travel all over texas and still discover five or so different environments and cultures. When i was young my parents took my sister and i RV-ing ALL THE TIME. Yeah it might sound fun now but back then it was dumb and embarrassing. Kids would ask me in middle school "where are you going for spring break" and i would answer under my breath "grand canyon...again" they would just stare at me like i was some dumb mouse trying to get out of a bucket. Personally, i think that they looked at me that way out of jealousy but i didn't see it that way back then. Now, i love my parents for hauling my sister and I all over the U.S. on those super long RV rides and all the sketchy RV parks we had to stay at. i really think travelling as a family has kept our love-bond very strong and it has given us knowledge of where we live. Out of all the places i have visited my favorite places would have be Las Vegas and Montana. When i think of RV-ing these two place stick out like a sore thumb in my mind. Las Vegas was amazing because as a small kid coming into sin city it is definitely an eye opener from the small boring town i come from. As for Montana, it was a rich taste of the true forrest and wilderness that every human reverts back to. No sky rises, only log cabins, and tons of wildlife. The air in Montana is so clean that i swear someone could add years to their lives just by simply breathing. On these trips i have learned many things about the native americans of New Mexico area,the old west like Tombstone AZ, and learn to get along with my baby sister on 10 hours road trips. If i had a billion gazillion dollars i would buy everyone on the plant a trip out of their state of providence just to go out and appreciate what else is in this world.

Social what?

I believe that facebook is going to be a terribly somewhat good thing for the world. Facebook is an extremely powerful tool that helps kids and adults of all ages to connect with other friends. It also promotes something called "stalking." When you accept that you want to go ahead and get a facebook you are agreeing to be stalked by at least one person. I partly believe that people get a facebook is to put themselves out there for people to look at them. Girls and guys alike post photos of themselves that have been photoshoped to the point that could make Amy Winehouse look like Natalie Portman. According to the Los Angeles Times, "These women are more likely to base their self-worth on appearance and use social networking to compete for attention." I'm not going to lie its a great feeling when you know people are looking at your profile admiring you in your "purest" form.
What annoys me are kids underage posting photos of themselves clearly drinking or smoking when they are underage. They don’t understand that companies have just as much access to you profile, when your trying to get a job, as a 15 year old girl with a crush. I respect those who just get a facebook to JUST reconnect. I think that facebook is going to make creepers out of all of but also help us to meet new people and make new friendships. If I had money I would put it in Facebook stock.
When the day comes when Facebook crashes all together, it will be very interesting to see how the world was only a few years ago. Quiet. Phone bills will rise in order to fill that void of not having someone looking at you 24/7 or being able to show your bestie that lives in Alaska a sweet ice fishing video from you tube. Until that day comes I will continue to creep on my friends and make sure my sister isn’t talking to some douche that needs a talking to….<joke….but seriously…

PERSPECTIVES

     In the book Isaac's Storm, the author Erik Larsen does a fantastic job of describing the hurricane that hit Galveston TX by covering every angle of the history. He uses multiple stories and statistics to give his work credible and factual information. In my architecture classes we are to taught to view an environment from every angle and design for what ever that environment needs. Ways I find different "perspectives" in architecture are things as simple as a small sketch on a bar napkin or a snap shot from your camera phone. If I decide to have a more detailed overview of the senario the use of software on a computer to generate 3-D images of the "situation" is a solution.
     There are really two different aspects when you start a project, very similar to the factual and narrative aspects of Isaac's Storm's set-up. There is a artistic and technical side to the perspectives of a project. Some architects discover a artistic style that transforms more into a technical as their studies increase. For example, If you were told to design a small foot bridge over a moat in a densely public area one might sit on a nearby bench and watercolor what he sees in front of him. As he does this he either goes ahead and paints in a "prototype" bridge that would accent the scene that is occurring in front of him. The more techy people stray away from engaging in the actual environment and run there precise preliminaries off quick snap shots off their phone. There is really no better way to go about this. The architects that take the artsy path may have more time on their hands so that they CAN go sit in a park an enjoy it first hand verse you are working in a competitive firm that demands multiple projects in a certain time period may not have that glorious time to appreciate the environment.
   The narrative parts of Isaac's Storm can also represent the verbal presentation that we had to endure to get our designs out to the boss or professors. We have to tell a story about our design to woo the buyer into investing in this project. Most investors aren't looking for the statistics or the factual info, they want to know how people will react to the "sculpture", are they going to want to use it? Are they going to spend their days playing on it with their kids? They want emotion as well as some facts here and there. This book is a great reference to how the process of an architect must endure when building for the environment.

Whats real?

In the article Glamour, That Certain Something, written by Robin Givhan, he talks about how people veiw hollywood actors and our perception of who they truely are. He goes on to descibe what glamour is and why we are so entertained by this imaculate fantisy life. Givhan speaks to an audience that has similar thoughts. He includes himself in this category of people that loom and drool over these "cool" or "glamourous" gods.
Givhan describes how we, as in the general public, judge these celebrities surface values and not who they truely are. We are given the impression that these people take everything with a grain of salt and flow through life with ease while in reality they are working just aas hard to mae a living as the general public are. Givhan states that glamour isn't charisma. I strongly agree with this especially if it pretains to the Hollywood world. Sure in the movies we may think we know their true heart warming selves when really they are cold hearted old grumps. I am willing to bet money that Dumbldore of that beloved series Harry Potter is just a scrooge in real life. Givhan's article tells us its hard to tell.
He goes on to mention famous political leaders and how they are classified which to disagree with him they to could be putting on a show much similar to a movie of the hollywood actors. So, even the political leaders are hard to put in a category of charisma or glam.
Being famous is a whole different world. Once you accept it you have to choose are you going to be the srcooge with a glamourous facade or are you going to be truely beautiful inside in out. I don't care what anyone says these ladies are beautiful are inside and out (Scarlett Johannson, Natalie Portman, Reese Witherspoon).
Robin Givhan's article speaks truth about a world we know very little about. A part of me is glad i dont know the truths about most actors or celebrites because if I did I would find myself disliking anything they are tied to or represent.

Freaking Dinosaurs!!!

While reading in my Read, Reason, and Write book, written by Dorothy U. Seyler, for my english class, I came upon a section of the book that talked about claims and grounds on those claims. I thought to myself, "Oh no, another boring story on politics or global warming. The title of this particular article is called The Varieties of Tyrannosaurs by Mark A. Norell and Xu Xing. After reading this title I cried a little inside out of happiness and delight. When growing up I always watched dinosaur movies like Jurassic Park (classic) or Godzilla. In the way back of my mind I was a tad concerned on how this boring english text book could possibly tie in dinosaurs with claim and grounds.
The T-rex was the chosen reptile that the authors decided to base their meat of the article on. They based their research off the CLAIM that the Tyrannosaurs were a "gregarious" or these huge animals could reach sprint like speeds. First off, the authors of course have to be the debby downers and prove them wrong by involving physics. I bet if six tons of dinosaur was running after  your butt you would think he was speedy.  I personally believe myself that a fully grown T-rex can get up to speeds of about 35 miles an hour if he was really hungry.
Another claim about the Tyrannosaurs is that they were considered "scavengers" because of their short front limbs. They may have really short arms but i think they compensate for its huge mouth. In the new King Kong movie, directed by Peter Jackson, there is a scene where the mighty ape is attacked by what seems like four ravenous T-Rexs. Kong manages to keep them at bay while still having Noami Watts in his clutches perfectly unharmed. First off, monkeys dont get that big and second, i bet if that fight happened again ONE T-Rex could destroy that primate.
Even though T-Rexs may be considered "slow" scientifically. I think no one can even know the truth unless they are witnessing these reptiles first hand.

Finding Your Special Place

       In the New York Times article, "Words of War" Dr. Azar Nafisi uses books as her weapon against violence. Nafisi was a professor teaching at the University of Tehran during the Iraq-Iran war. She seems so real when explaining her experiences during bomb explosions and gunfire going off like a chaotic choir with no instructor. Inside herself, Nafisi feels as scared as everyone one else but knows deep down that she has an instrument that can put the light back in her students eyes. Hope was her main objection, taking bits and pieces of history and taping them together like a science fair project to give a correlation of their own situation."Memoirs from concentration camps and the gulag attest to this: 'Even more than bread we now need poetry, in a time when it seems it is not needed at all.'" During her time as a professor when bomb sirens and warnings would go off during school children would come to her classroom concerned about a certain story's ending. I feel that this was a very dramatic point of where children would ignore danger for the taste of something new. I'm pretty sure these kids weren't given many opportunities to explore literature before the arrival of Dr. Nafisi. Now that what i just said seemed bad but during that time period assuming that the government wasn't focused on education.
       Opening a book creates escape for Nafisi and her students. I believe this could be true. There are so many books out there that have such rich meanings that can take you to a better place like the beautiful plantations of the south in Gone With the Wind...(before the Civil War of course). When I try to find escape I do not run to the nearest book. I draw. I sketch. I distract my mind away from whats going on around me. Much like a book would do. Listening to a certain genere of music while sketching or drawing can put a certain twist in your work. Similar to how a plant reacts to negative energy. If positive energy, like a book, is given to read to a large amount of people who are in a rough place good things with flourish. So this article about this university in Tehran gives perfect examples to the uses of literature being used as a tool to mend the broken.

kmd