A living, breathing… July 12, 2007

Can you think of all the things you’ve ever been wrong about?

Like thinking that ‘tinkle’ was the real word for pee when you were a kid.

Like believing that an undergraduate degree is the end of the line when really it’s an extension of high school and a bridge to grad school.

Like assuming that granola bars are actually healthy for you. What the hell is sodium hexametaphosphate? And why does my Quaker bar have ‘chocolate liquor’ instead of actual chocolate? Start the alcoholics young I guess.

 Well, these ‘wrong’ perceptions, there are a million people out there who will tell you they build character. And on a day like today, who am I to argue with them?

Anyways, do you know how many people actually have blogs focused on sociology and their experience of living in a sociologically focused world? It doesn’t matter. But I read some today and I guess I’ll be able to write about that kind of stuff again when school starts up. If anyone’s prof (like mine) is using “Sociological Theory in the Contemporary Era” for a class, it’s almost half price on amazon.ca.

 I came across the term Astrosociology for the first time today. Good old wiki breaks it down for us as “the study of astrosocial phenomena, the social and cultural patterns related to outer space” so I guess it’s like identifying sociologically notable interactions within NASA and the way space travel impacts the social landscape. Maybe? I could only find one website on it but, heck, if you’re an astrosociologist I would love to hear from you. Until now, I still thought the space landing was faked but I might be wrong about that.

Final Fantasy X is on hold, Maester Seymour killed me good and there’s been no time. Facebook once again occupies my attention span and is a pretty good substitute for a real social life while I’m stuck in this office. Even my Gumby and Pokey figures look bored.

 (Hells yes, I actually own these and they’re on top of my desk right now)

Meth rabbits hopped up on sausages May 23, 2007

Alright so I have the job of being an office troll this summer down in the depths of the university where I don’t see the sunlight for days. This is why I have been so obviously silent on the blogfront. The simple root of the problem is that I work isolated in a little office with no coworkers and rarely any neighbours. The most excitement down here is when the door to the dean’s office opens and loud men in business suits walk out talking boisterously on their cell phones. The only human contact I have on a daily basis is with the woman who serves my coffee in the morning and the soci secretary who is here for half days. If I’m lucky, in the afternoon the girl whose office is next to me comes in and slams her door a couple of times, talks on her cell phone, and leaves in an hour. She has never said a word to me but I’m lonely enough to strike up a conversation about the weather (the weather, which constantly fascinates me as a topic for small talk because it’s always available but constantly annoying). By the end of the day, I feel as though I have lost the ability to communicate or even act in a social way, bleck, so how could I inflict that on blog readers? Well, I will anyway.

I’ve set the computer radio station to CBC Radio 3 and refuse to take more paid time to search for a station that is completely hip hop free – I swear that is the only problem with Canadian independent music, thank you Rascalz. And go figure, when I finally break down and get a membership so I can make my own playlist full of the Weakerthans and Malajube, they only play songs that would make anyone’s left eye twitch.

 A huge part of my job is to find information. Basically, I’m like a highly modified search engine that comes with bonus printing, stapling, and label making skills. I’ve been gleaning UK and Swedish websites for all information about their disability policies but I’ve noticed that when you’re surfing the internet with an academic purpose, even the most mundane things will obliterate your concentration. In my free time, I’ve gotten to the point where I can limit myself to watching a few elite youtube videos and skim over all the prolefeed. But here at work, well I’ll watch anything. I watched a video that was a guy standing with a black background doing sign language that explained an employment policy. No sound, just sign language, obviously good for someone who can understand it but I think I was just having a google burnout moment. If I had coworkers, my job would make me feel like someone inJPOD.

Anyways, I was thinking that I’m pretty good at what I do and with all the content on the internet, there must be people who get paid real money to do what I’m doing… You know, it’s probably the main job of librarians now that everything has become digitized, what do you think?

What else? I don’t want to digress into my weekly tai chi lessons at the community centre that are open to anyone and, aside from my boyfriend, most of the class is compiled of retirement aged individuals in blindingly white, new workout runners. Why you even need shoes when you’re going that slow is a question I ponder all class, it helps to clear my mind and make room for westernized zen. It’s quite enjoyable.

 I’ve been house sitting for the last three weeks. Getting up in the morning and coming home after work only to tend to the bowel movements of a senior citizen dog who seriously, honestly weezes. He also only eats his kibble if it has milk on it, like a bowl of cereal.

I can do a simplified version of this… very simplified:

Fricken busy March 11, 2007

Arrgh! I hate it, I think of all these awesome blog topics and then I have no time to write because I have to do other homework. Though I’m getting excited about my reality TV paper and our group project, the subject just fascinates me but I guess you’ll hafta wait till the presentation to see why.

Oh well. Alright, so I really enjoyed the last class, even though the thought of subjecting a my music to the vulnerability of judgment from an audience freaked the crap out of me. From Paul’s warning e-mail it sounded like people were going to be allowed to really rip the music apart, or maybe I just contrived that in my little emo brain, but in reality it was quite civil. And many of the students really do listen to music that is ‘art’. Even if I didn’t like a certain song (i.e. country jams), after the person explained why they liked it I could still see that there was a genuine-ness and inner truth to many of the songs.
For the record, I was going to play “Jackie, Dressed in Cobras” by the New Pornographers because I’ve been playing their CD Twin Cinema for weeks in my car… Um, they’re happy…so that’s a step for me. But I also like them because they sound like Boney M meets the 2000s. And if that’s not good enough for you, their song “Use It” is The Hour’s theme song.

In other news, I too am starting to match faces in the class with the blogs that I read. However, I’m finding it quite difficult to bridge the gap between blogality and reality and actually talk to these people face to face. I mean, what do you really say? Therefore, I propose that for our last class we should all get nametags that we write our blog names on and then we can mix and mingle and know who we’ve been talking to all semester. Now, I know this sounds dorky (heeey, we could bring food too, nothing goes better with mingling than snacks!) but think of all the background knowledge and interaction you have with these people that you may never have spoken to in ‘real’ life. I mean, I have friends whom I talk to on a daily basis and I read their blogs; when I see them we can usually pick up a conversation right where the blog left off. One friend posted about being ill all weekend so when I saw her in the office on monday I didn’t waste time asking, ‘how was your weekend?’, instead I was able to go straight to, “Are you feeling better?” I think this added background knowledge that we are all putting into cyberspace about ourselves is an advantage in the realm of communication. It’s something pretty new and unique and I think people could use it to connect with each other.

Yup, that’s my rambling. Stay tuned….
YES, I have realized that people read shorter blog posts. So am I done posting? HECK NO. But I’ll just post the next topic in a short, concise and appealing post after this. heh, I’m so sneaky…

Live Blogging – Survivor February 15, 2007

Well, I stole this idea from someone who live blogged “Lost” last week. I thought it’s probably pretty fun and it’ll help me get another entry on here before the reading week craziness (you know I actually HAFTA read this year since I have so much work for my classes) starts.
However, my reception is starting to go…how bad is that, not only do I have four channels, when it’s windy I hardly get all four.

Alright, so you guys may know that this time they’ve split everyone into 2 tribes: one has everything to make it a vacation (shelter, food, comfortable furniture, etc) and the other has a knife and … I dunno a bucket. So one tribe is happy and one is miserable.

Eww the happy tribe is full of gross and annoying people, I think, someone just farted.

But the island is full of fruit, what are the guys with the knife complaining about? My mom just came in and interrupted me (yes I live at home and it’s great).

Rocky is really funny, he’s got that Boston type accent. I wonder if people like that are the equivalent of urban hicks. Oh, I shouldn’t label, that’s what the people who did the screening want me to do.

A guy just slashed his hand.. and then my reception went. Oh he’s the same guy who has the eye infection, man, he needs to go home. I wonder what kind of waiver these people need to sign before going on this show, how hurt can you really get before the TV crew has to interfere? Ah, I can’t believe this guy has gotten this hurt and he’s on the tribe that has everything provided.

Ahh, my dad came in and interrupted me, ok so living at home has it’s… yeah whatever. So now they’re trying to start a fire with glasses, come on, if that worked people would be combusting on sunny days while walking down the street.

Excellent, that guy went looking everywhere and then the woman just found a batch of pineapples! Awesome, who knew they grew together like that.

Wow what’s with all these products in the commercials coming with free movie coupons? Heh, did they figure out no one can afford to see movies anymore?

lol, yes of course they want to win for revenge. Duh. Argh, I dislike Sylvia just as must as the rest of them, how do they put up with her?

I enjoy Jeff’s cowboy hat, he has the best job in the world. The immunity idol looks so freaky this time.What’s with all the puzzles in these games? phphfft, brains, who needs em? Hah, I knew it, the underdogs are going to win… (Wait, why is one of the guys wearing a toque on a tropical island?) OH MAN! Moto, the guys what have been pampered won. GEEZ. Sylvia is going home…. goin home… yup, they picked Earl to go to exile island, Sylvia is gone.

Wow.. my hair can look like Chantel Kraviatzuk’s if I get that shampoo..

Look at this guy, throwing his knife at a “highly poisonous sea snake” … can they REALLY put people in this much danger without getting sued?

“If you have laundry just bring it to us” Really?! Sylvia just said this to one of the guys, way to enact gender roles. Jeez, I was wrong about the voting, they’re getting rid of Erika instead of Sylvia now because Erkia got all nervous and yelled a lot during the challenge. Dude, I learned that stress increases people’s neurotransmitters that make them fall in love and feel lovey feelings for others, I think this tribe is experiencing that. The people who want to vote off Sylvia are like “We were fine before she came, we went through stuff she didn’t go through, we’re tight, yo”

Tribal Counsel:
I wonder if Jeff has a background in counseling. Youman kicks ass, he’s basically the yoda of the island. Immunity idols are for wussies. … Does Sylvia have eyebrows? … Wow this voing process takes so long. Hmm they’re divided, I think it’ll be Sylvia still, she so crazy. She wants to lead. I love how Jeff has to tally the votes after like two have been read. OH MY GOSH, it was Erika, she totally didn’t need that, dude, like that was all Rocky’s fault, how could that happen? Stupid Sylvia, she’s the weakest link and I bet that’s why they kept her. Dude that tribe is screwed.

Whew, that’s the end of it, thank goodness, I felt like my brain was melting. But I like Survivor: it was one of the original Reality TV shows, therefore to me it sort of is the apitamy of the Reality TV genre, which I love/hate and might want to do my grad thesis on. But by the time I get to grad school maybe no one will be interested in it anymore. Also, Survivor’s pretty simple, it’s longstanding, and there are still people who watch it religiously so I can banter with them about it.
YESS! Deal or No Deal – Go Howie Go!!!!!!!

Bloggity, Blog, Blog January 26, 2007

Things that rock my world:
- hookahs with orange juice in the base instead of water and orange shisha (not for marijuana, just so you know)
- Apple’s mighty mouse. I mean, come on, just because it always thinks you are right clicking does not mean that the scroll ball and squishy side buttoms are not awesome. Anyways, it beats the finger pad thing that is on my laptop. (not for marijuana, just so you know)

There, now that I have gotten those two tidbits of mindlessness out of the way, I will proceed with trying to make a post. Just wanted an easy way for people to know this one for sure is not going to be marked Soci 3390. However, rest assured, it was going to be. I was going to write a kickass post after I read a reading for the week because, frankly, I think I am just wasting time if I do not know anything and expect people to reply to my junk for marks (or to feed my ego). So I read Ch 6 The Web (dun dun dunn) since Paul said the text chapters were of highest priority. Now, here is where we cut the textbook some slack, please consider:
- it is a sociology textbook. Soc texts have a long history of suckiness and constant outdated-ness
- it is trying to be simple, this is why I need a whole bullet paragraph to tell me what “external links” are
- sure it is the fourth edition, but that usually means updating a few pictures and changing the page numbers so the company gets money from all the kids that cannot use the Used ones. Therefore, yes, it is expected the text would explain how graphics really suck on a 56K modem but even my hippie parents have high speed now
- the authors are wimps, and they have to be to please everyone. I am glad Paul is going to teach a class on porn because the book reeeally backed out of that subject
- it is trying to be Canadian, whatever that may be
Alright, so you get it hey? My main beef is that in order to look at how the internet is a component of mass communication and how it affects us, I do not need to know the innerworkings of the gear itself (such as what bandwidth or a fibre optic cable are). So, with hope and an itchy brain, I will move on to the other readings, it is such a very good thing that they have been provided. **Please note though, this is not a knock to the choice of textbook because, having experienced many worse soci texts than this, I bet there really is not much else out there. So cudos to Paul for giving us alternatives too.
Yes, even though that is my opinion, you can classify it as sucking up and give me a wedgie after class.
Well … You know what I am going to do, I am going to post this and then write a better entry. Until then, here is my story about this video. I was online last night doing my WebCT assignment for a class where we all have to reply to a question on the discussion board, much like blogging but with less options. So this week we are talking about drug companies and how they make so much money. We have over 60 people in the class and many of them had posted already so I could not think of anything new to say and was on youtube looking for vids of drug commercials and found this. In my lack of sleep state, I almost posted it but considering it is a fairly serious class it would not have been in good taste. Rather I can inflict it on all of you:

Muh hah hah hah, happy friday everyone.

Quick Thoughts… January 13, 2007

… Do you think that the popularity of self-produced wide-rearching media (ie. Youtube vids, podcasts, blogs, independent film sometimes, etc) has increased because the public just does not believe the “experts” anymore? Perhaps cultural knowledge, individual know-how, and even generational myths will be renewed as valid ways of knowing. Afterall, as the text says (are we supposed to cite it if we mention it?), the news is more often going the route of infotainment these days. In fact, when CBC asked people to call in and tell what they heard too much or too little about in the media during 2006, much of the ranting was about too much focus on the stars, particularly TomKat – ugh.
As for the experts today, the USA has now declared that Al Quaida is rebuilding in Pakistan and that they are still the largest threat to “American interest” (CBC news, 9:00am). Note that no one said they were the largest threat to world peace, but rather solely to what American’s wish to do. Now, I’m pretty bad with my knowledge of history or economics, but does anyone know if there would ever be a reason that the US would feel inclined to control Pakistan? I mean, Iraq has/had oil so…

The other thought of the day: “Ahh!”. I could spend hours blogging and still not be able to read and write and comment as much as I want to. Everyone’s blogs are so fascinating!

Here goes… January 10, 2007

Blogging hey? I had a blog once but I started it as a cathartic teenagers and as I grew up, I didn’t want people to read my backposts about ‘hotties’ and embarassing moments. Also, the same thing that Professor Lawton was talking about happened, the most interesting people just stopped posting. Actually, there was a pretty scary rumor that someone who had deleted his/her blog account decided life was not worth it anymore (if you know what I mean) so avoiding that topic became pretty depressing and difficult – for a teenager at least. However, on the bright side, I’m sure grown-up’s blogs are much less dramatic. I wonder if we’ll talk about the trend of teens spending hours upon hours surfing the net and instant messaging. Particularly, I’ve noticed that if the 13-17 year olds want to coordinate a social gathering, they’ll IM each other and only use the phone if that doesn’t work. I think if I were to do that, I wouldn’t catch all my friends online at the same time or else someone would get the time or place wrong, etc. But these teens are probably experts at the whole thing by now.

Hey look at that, I went to google an image for “addiction” as in “internet addiction” and it brought me to a Greys Anatomy Addiction website link but that was out of commission so I actually ended up at the wordpress tag listing for Greys Anatomy. I’m sure some people in the class will be able to find conversations of interest there.

So just incase you missed anything while the professor was going over the WordPress features, I thought it was kind of neat that I was able to find WordPress tutorials on Youtube. Here’s one:

Please note: On a Mac, many of the tools look different so I still have not found the spellchecker yet.