This book, A Humument, is my new obsession.
Tom Phillips took the book A Human Document (1892) and drew over it, creating a new story line. Creating something completely new. I. Love it. It's beautiful.
Friday, March 26, 2010
My New Obsession
This book, A Humument, is my new obsession.
Tom Phillips took the book A Human Document (1892) and drew over it, creating a new story line. Creating something completely new. I. Love it. It's beautiful.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Monday, March 22, 2010
My Capstone Paper
So, my teacher says:
This should be the most polished piece of writing in your undergraduate career.
And I say:
I never revise anything I write for any class. Ever. So, even if I just go back and re-read it before I turn it in, I can assure you that it will be the most polished piece of writing in my undergraduate career.
I'm so lazy.
This should be the most polished piece of writing in your undergraduate career.
And I say:
I never revise anything I write for any class. Ever. So, even if I just go back and re-read it before I turn it in, I can assure you that it will be the most polished piece of writing in my undergraduate career.
I'm so lazy.
Friday, March 19, 2010
The phenomenon of adolescence
Young Adult novels get me.
Not get me as in, they grab me emotionally (although, they do that quite well), but they get me. We connect, me and the novels.
High school. High school was a living hell I am only willing to live once. Remembering it feels like reading a young adult novel. It was not my life. It belonged to someone else someone might someday write a novel about. And I read these YA novels and pieces of it are from me. They say the meaning of a text is only created once a reader brings meaning into it. I never want to be a young adult novel again, but I have an important role: bringing meaning to all of these over dramatic teenagers that seem to get me, scribbled onto blank pages. They get who I was, and the pieces that are still somewhere in my fingertips.
An excerpt from Paper Towns by John Green:
"Maybe it's more like you said before, all of us being cracked open. Like, each of us starts out as a watertight vessel. And these things happen -- these people leave us, or don't love us, or don't get us, or we don't get them, and we lose and fail and hurt one another. And the vessel starts to crack open in places. And I mean, yeah, once the vessel cracks open, the end becomes inevitable. Once it starts to rain inside the Osprey, it will never be remodeled. But there is all this time in between when the cracks start to open up and when we finally fall apart. And it's only in that time that we can see one another, because we see out of ourselves through our cracks and into others through theirs. When did we see each other face-to-face? Not until you saw into my cracks and I saw into yours. Before that, we were just looking at ideas of each other, like looking at your window shade but never seeing inside. But once the vessel cracks, the light can get in. The light can get out."
Reading is important.
I am important.
"...Imagining being someone else, or the world being something else, is the only way in." - John Green
Not get me as in, they grab me emotionally (although, they do that quite well), but they get me. We connect, me and the novels.
High school. High school was a living hell I am only willing to live once. Remembering it feels like reading a young adult novel. It was not my life. It belonged to someone else someone might someday write a novel about. And I read these YA novels and pieces of it are from me. They say the meaning of a text is only created once a reader brings meaning into it. I never want to be a young adult novel again, but I have an important role: bringing meaning to all of these over dramatic teenagers that seem to get me, scribbled onto blank pages. They get who I was, and the pieces that are still somewhere in my fingertips.
An excerpt from Paper Towns by John Green:
"Maybe it's more like you said before, all of us being cracked open. Like, each of us starts out as a watertight vessel. And these things happen -- these people leave us, or don't love us, or don't get us, or we don't get them, and we lose and fail and hurt one another. And the vessel starts to crack open in places. And I mean, yeah, once the vessel cracks open, the end becomes inevitable. Once it starts to rain inside the Osprey, it will never be remodeled. But there is all this time in between when the cracks start to open up and when we finally fall apart. And it's only in that time that we can see one another, because we see out of ourselves through our cracks and into others through theirs. When did we see each other face-to-face? Not until you saw into my cracks and I saw into yours. Before that, we were just looking at ideas of each other, like looking at your window shade but never seeing inside. But once the vessel cracks, the light can get in. The light can get out."
Reading is important.
I am important.
"...Imagining being someone else, or the world being something else, is the only way in." - John Green
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Would you like your mind blown?
Dear Everyone,
How awesome do you think I am? What's that? Pretty awesome? Thanks.
I won't deny my awesomeness. I mean, I can't. There's physical evidence:
Well, let me send you into an epistemological crisis.
Cardiac arrest.
Legendary coma.
BLAMO
Okay. hahah. NOt this. BUT. Let's pause for a moment in our busy lives and realize how AMAZINGLY HILARIOUS this really is. Let's consider the comic GENIUS of whoever put that f there. hahahahahahahahah.
I want to print this out and hang it on my wall.
FRAMED.
Okay okay.
Back to reality. (although...the question of "how much fart have you created?" IS reality, I understand that....)
The real heart attack I'm going to give you:
Hahah. Okay. It's not this either. But I just can't resist bathroom graffiti. SO FUNNY.
Okay. Brass tacks. Reality. Train tracks.
A few years ago, I decided to become a teacher. An English teacher to be specific. I went into classrooms with sweaty palms and knobby knees to watch teachers stand up in front of 9th graders to talk about Romeo and Juliet. I then applied for student teaching, a long laborious task, so that one day I would be the one standing in front of the class, explaining to students that cats are poetry too.
I'm not making sense.
Anyway, there's student teaching and then there's an internship.
Student teaching: you're in another teacher's classroom, helping her teacher her kids. It's only for a semester and you have a lot of support.
Internship: You get thrown into your own classroom. You decide how to arrange the desks, what novels to teach, whether or not you'll put down your grandmother's Spanish rug and how much of John Lennon's A Spaniard in the Works you want your students to read.
I applied for student teaching. Not an internship.
Then lo and behold, an angel from heaven (much like the angel who wrote make farts, not war) I was offered a placing to be an intern.
BLAMO
I got it!
I'm going to be an intern!
I'm going to have my own classroom!
I'm going to hang up my Kermit the frog poster!
And most likely I'm going to bring in my puppets...
There's no way around this.
So, how blown is your mind? How deep is your coma? How big of a crisis have I driven you into? I'm going to be a teacher. Teaching a full year. In my own classroom. With my own students. Writing on my own whiteboard. Making my own lesson plans....
My mind is still taking its time to wrap. Or warp. I can't tell. But something is happening.
So, you can think I'm more awesome now.
Love,
Natalie
How awesome do you think I am? What's that? Pretty awesome? Thanks.
I won't deny my awesomeness. I mean, I can't. There's physical evidence:
Well, let me send you into an epistemological crisis.
Cardiac arrest.
Legendary coma.
BLAMO
Okay. hahah. NOt this. BUT. Let's pause for a moment in our busy lives and realize how AMAZINGLY HILARIOUS this really is. Let's consider the comic GENIUS of whoever put that f there. hahahahahahahahah.
I want to print this out and hang it on my wall.
FRAMED.
Okay okay.
Back to reality. (although...the question of "how much fart have you created?" IS reality, I understand that....)
The real heart attack I'm going to give you:
Hahah. Okay. It's not this either. But I just can't resist bathroom graffiti. SO FUNNY.
Okay. Brass tacks. Reality. Train tracks.
A few years ago, I decided to become a teacher. An English teacher to be specific. I went into classrooms with sweaty palms and knobby knees to watch teachers stand up in front of 9th graders to talk about Romeo and Juliet. I then applied for student teaching, a long laborious task, so that one day I would be the one standing in front of the class, explaining to students that cats are poetry too.
I'm not making sense.
Anyway, there's student teaching and then there's an internship.
Student teaching: you're in another teacher's classroom, helping her teacher her kids. It's only for a semester and you have a lot of support.
Internship: You get thrown into your own classroom. You decide how to arrange the desks, what novels to teach, whether or not you'll put down your grandmother's Spanish rug and how much of John Lennon's A Spaniard in the Works you want your students to read.
I applied for student teaching. Not an internship.
Then lo and behold, an angel from heaven (much like the angel who wrote make farts, not war) I was offered a placing to be an intern.
BLAMO
I got it!
I'm going to be an intern!
I'm going to have my own classroom!
I'm going to hang up my Kermit the frog poster!
And most likely I'm going to bring in my puppets...
There's no way around this.
So, how blown is your mind? How deep is your coma? How big of a crisis have I driven you into? I'm going to be a teacher. Teaching a full year. In my own classroom. With my own students. Writing on my own whiteboard. Making my own lesson plans....
My mind is still taking its time to wrap. Or warp. I can't tell. But something is happening.
So, you can think I'm more awesome now.
Love,
Natalie
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Sleep. Pinball. Papers.
I'm so tired.
But I sit at work, writing a paper on why pinball is better than video games.
Yeah, I took that picture.
Nascar Pinball. Nothin' better.
My thoughts are dribbling out like a stroke.
But I sit at work, writing a paper on why pinball is better than video games.
Yeah, I took that picture.
Nascar Pinball. Nothin' better.
My thoughts are dribbling out like a stroke.
Monday, March 8, 2010
blaughs.
Remember how postsecret is fun to read but gets really obnoxious really fast? And people are always talking about how their depression and parents and how they're gay and the divorce is making it worse and they almost swallowed a whole bottle of pills on their wedding night because they had an affair at the reception?
Well there's a new postsecret that's not about secrets and it's not about affairs and diet pills and naked men.
So it's not a postsecret at all.
It's:
Hopefullymormon.blogspot.com
Co-created by one of my good friends Annie, so you know it's adorable because she's adorable and her BABY is adorable!
So. It's just where people submit why the Mormon faith has given them hope. I like that idea. It's meant to be uplifting, and it is. I like happy things about Mormonism on the internet. Because it makes me happy.
Well there's a new postsecret that's not about secrets and it's not about affairs and diet pills and naked men.
So it's not a postsecret at all.
It's:
Hopefullymormon.blogspot.com
Co-created by one of my good friends Annie, so you know it's adorable because she's adorable and her BABY is adorable!
So. It's just where people submit why the Mormon faith has given them hope. I like that idea. It's meant to be uplifting, and it is. I like happy things about Mormonism on the internet. Because it makes me happy.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Doin it 2010 style
When I write 2010 on the top of my paper...I feel like it's the future. Any second I'm going to turn around and see robots dispensing sandwiches. I guess that already happens.
We were looking at visual texts in my class. How it's the future. Jonathan Safran Foer and all that. Then he showed us this novel from 200 years ago. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentlemen. It was what we're calling the future right now. Visual text. Jonathan Safran Foer's great great great grandfather. Pages like this...
reflect Foer...
And I started thinking....Holy crap. The future started 200 years ago. 200 years ago was the future. So what are we? We don't even exist to them. We don't even exist. Alas poor Yorick!
Okay. That was extreme. We exist, obviously. And we rule, obviously. Ask the dues in cut off bald eagle tees if we rule; they know the truth.
Anyway. Did I have a point? I guess if I had a point it's that we are the super future. The future already happened and now we are the virtual-digital-battle-to-the-death-robo-scifi future everyone's been wondering about for so long. The future already happened. The book was written.
It's also interesting that Tristram Shandy has an "Alas poor Yorick!" page...followed by darkness, the vast unknown; and Oskar Schell in Foer's novel plays Yorick in his school play...
Got it. New thesis. Jonathan Safran Foer is a time traveler. Much more feasible. That means the future is still fictional (as Damien Fin would say).
This was a time waster.
But my lips were on fire.
We were looking at visual texts in my class. How it's the future. Jonathan Safran Foer and all that. Then he showed us this novel from 200 years ago. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentlemen. It was what we're calling the future right now. Visual text. Jonathan Safran Foer's great great great grandfather. Pages like this...
reflect Foer...
And I started thinking....Holy crap. The future started 200 years ago. 200 years ago was the future. So what are we? We don't even exist to them. We don't even exist. Alas poor Yorick!
Okay. That was extreme. We exist, obviously. And we rule, obviously. Ask the dues in cut off bald eagle tees if we rule; they know the truth.
Anyway. Did I have a point? I guess if I had a point it's that we are the super future. The future already happened and now we are the virtual-digital-battle-to-the-death-robo-scifi future everyone's been wondering about for so long. The future already happened. The book was written.
It's also interesting that Tristram Shandy has an "Alas poor Yorick!" page...followed by darkness, the vast unknown; and Oskar Schell in Foer's novel plays Yorick in his school play...
Got it. New thesis. Jonathan Safran Foer is a time traveler. Much more feasible. That means the future is still fictional (as Damien Fin would say).
This was a time waster.
But my lips were on fire.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Camping?
Oh, hello internet.
What are you doing here? Distracting me from studying for the midterm I have to take tomorrow which I have studied this much for?:
I'm going to Moab, camping with my nature photography class on Thursday.
This will be my first time camping since I was 11. Let me tell you about that camping experience. What I can remember of it anyway:
It was a mother/daughter camping trip. We went somewhere camp-like and set up tents. I remember there were some men there and I thought, Um...are you a mother or a daughter? The thing I remember most though is the night time:
I slept in a tent with my mom and my sister. It was probably a 2 man tent, and although we were young, we stuffed the tent to capacity. I couldn't sleep of course. Every sound was a monster and every gust of wind was a tornado. There were bears waiting to eat me and killers slicing holes in our tent, but only I saw it happen. I finally fell asleep (in a sweat), and although no one believes me, in the middle of the night I felt little paws push against my side of the tent. They pushed me onto Emily, squishing her, and thoroughly freaking me out. "Mom, a raccoon pushed me over last night," earned only a laugh and a "Want some breakfast?" I think someone was then stung by a bee in their eye...and I thought breakfast was gross.
My other camping experiences consist of girls camp . Real camping? I think not. We were in cabins: (This section includes actual pictures from my actual girls camp experiences...enjoy)
and although there were no showers, there was this giant basin with faucets that only spewed freezing cold water where Rachel and I would wash our faces (while screaming) and hair (well, not Rachel. She wasn't into hygiene really). We had toilets that were 30 miles deep; you would sit there, wait a few seconds, and then hear the stream hit. Oh, the luxuries...The luxuries of jean vests and "chow wows", what we called the nights we ate so much snack food we went into comas...(see below)
We did have misquotes, ticks and spiders though, so that was real camping. I would bring a bottle of OFF bug spray and spray it on my mattress, body, luggage, clothes, journal...basically anything I brought with me. We went on 2 mile hikes, which would always inevitably end up being 9 mile hikes because we would get so lost. What do you expect? It's girls camp. I remember being a leader of a hike once...who let that happen? (Who let this happen?)
Those girls were crying and it was near dark when I got them back to camp. I think one girl had 12 ticks in her hair that night (she was gross though).
In conclusion, I have no idea what Moab has in store for me or what I have in store for the people in my class who will have to endure my never ending question: "Where do I go to the bathroom?"
In other news....
This little lady has returned home today from her 1.5 year mission in California!
How did that happen so fast? She's coming home to a whole new way of life. Kelly doesn't freak out when I try to hold his hand anymore? In fact, he willingly holds mine!? She'll freak out. Culture shock.
I'll let you know how it goes...
What are you doing here? Distracting me from studying for the midterm I have to take tomorrow which I have studied this much for?:
I'm going to Moab, camping with my nature photography class on Thursday.
This will be my first time camping since I was 11. Let me tell you about that camping experience. What I can remember of it anyway:
It was a mother/daughter camping trip. We went somewhere camp-like and set up tents. I remember there were some men there and I thought, Um...are you a mother or a daughter? The thing I remember most though is the night time:
I slept in a tent with my mom and my sister. It was probably a 2 man tent, and although we were young, we stuffed the tent to capacity. I couldn't sleep of course. Every sound was a monster and every gust of wind was a tornado. There were bears waiting to eat me and killers slicing holes in our tent, but only I saw it happen. I finally fell asleep (in a sweat), and although no one believes me, in the middle of the night I felt little paws push against my side of the tent. They pushed me onto Emily, squishing her, and thoroughly freaking me out. "Mom, a raccoon pushed me over last night," earned only a laugh and a "Want some breakfast?" I think someone was then stung by a bee in their eye...and I thought breakfast was gross.
My other camping experiences consist of girls camp . Real camping? I think not. We were in cabins: (This section includes actual pictures from my actual girls camp experiences...enjoy)
and although there were no showers, there was this giant basin with faucets that only spewed freezing cold water where Rachel and I would wash our faces (while screaming) and hair (well, not Rachel. She wasn't into hygiene really). We had toilets that were 30 miles deep; you would sit there, wait a few seconds, and then hear the stream hit. Oh, the luxuries...The luxuries of jean vests and "chow wows", what we called the nights we ate so much snack food we went into comas...(see below)
We did have misquotes, ticks and spiders though, so that was real camping. I would bring a bottle of OFF bug spray and spray it on my mattress, body, luggage, clothes, journal...basically anything I brought with me. We went on 2 mile hikes, which would always inevitably end up being 9 mile hikes because we would get so lost. What do you expect? It's girls camp. I remember being a leader of a hike once...who let that happen? (Who let this happen?)
Those girls were crying and it was near dark when I got them back to camp. I think one girl had 12 ticks in her hair that night (she was gross though).
In conclusion, I have no idea what Moab has in store for me or what I have in store for the people in my class who will have to endure my never ending question: "Where do I go to the bathroom?"
In other news....
This little lady has returned home today from her 1.5 year mission in California!
How did that happen so fast? She's coming home to a whole new way of life. Kelly doesn't freak out when I try to hold his hand anymore? In fact, he willingly holds mine!? She'll freak out. Culture shock.I'll let you know how it goes...
Monday, March 1, 2010
Kaitlin has an Asian beef blog.
Kaitlin's new blog inspired me to write on my blog. I never write on this. What's to say? Hmm....
I'm a skiing pro.
I'm eating runts.
I can't stop singing Hercules songs.
Yesterday, Kaitlin and I drove out to Utah Lake to take pictures. Try out all my new photography skillz I'm learnin' in school.
We saw the line where the water turned to ice and threw rocks at it.
We also saw beer cans and some grumpy hillbilly trying to catch fish. He was playing some America-Rulez rock song and drove off, tires spinning angrily, when we started climbing on the rocks. I guess we ruined his buzz.
If you ignored the nasty fuzzy stuff growing on the rocks, and the creepy floaties that looked like someone's puke, the lake was really beautiful.
And on the way home, we drove along a road with horses and cows. I couldn't resist jumping out of my car to feed the horses. They came over to me and ate from my hand. They are so powerful, but I just ran my hand down their noses and they loved me. I fell in love with them.
I'm pretty sure they fell in love with me too.
I'm a skiing pro.
I'm eating runts.
I can't stop singing Hercules songs.
Yesterday, Kaitlin and I drove out to Utah Lake to take pictures. Try out all my new photography skillz I'm learnin' in school.
We saw the line where the water turned to ice and threw rocks at it.
We also saw beer cans and some grumpy hillbilly trying to catch fish. He was playing some America-Rulez rock song and drove off, tires spinning angrily, when we started climbing on the rocks. I guess we ruined his buzz.
If you ignored the nasty fuzzy stuff growing on the rocks, and the creepy floaties that looked like someone's puke, the lake was really beautiful.
And on the way home, we drove along a road with horses and cows. I couldn't resist jumping out of my car to feed the horses. They came over to me and ate from my hand. They are so powerful, but I just ran my hand down their noses and they loved me. I fell in love with them.
I'm pretty sure they fell in love with me too.
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