Digital Duds

Dating is Dead

Recently an article in the Daily Campus, written by Nikki Cloer discussed the movement of the current dating culture into cyber space. The article titled, “Dating is Dead,” pleaded that people stop relying on text messaging and facebooking to contact people and actually pick up the phone.

I totally agree.

I personally have had similar experiences to the author where someone you didn’t realize you knew, or better yet you didn’t realize knew you, messages or friend requests you on facebook. It’s just creepy.

Honestly, us girls really don’t ask for much. Introduce yourself and show us that you want to get to know us. Any guy who asks a girl out without even knowing her name by, facebook message is obviously in it for the wrong reasons. Don’t be a “virtual Romeo.”

Dating is not the only place that people have become obsessed with communicating digitally. Everywhere you go people seem to have a cell phone glued to their ear. People create their own community…their speed dial list. Forget casual conversation amongst the people around you, or even moments of mental peace. We have to communicate with people in one form or another all the time.

Think about college students. We are either in class (often texting), out of class on the phone, hanging out with our friends, or talking to them online. Whatever happened to being alone in your own thought?

I think that the digital age as Nikki said has contributed to the ‘death of dating,’ but something else is lost when you don’t talk to people face to face. You can’t sense expression, personality, or emotion (as much as the emoticon tries). People need to not only call people versus text messaging, but get off the phone, look around you, be a part of the community you live in rather than only those you “accept friend request” to.

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confessions of a compulsive shopper

What do you hear?

I have always seen life through a lens. Always framing landscapes into mental compositions. There is something about capturing a moment forever behind the lens of a camera that I think is magical. When I look at a picture I see a story that comes from the way the eye travels across a picture, from what you see and what you don’t see. I have posted some of my photography here, and want to know what it is that you hear when you see it.

Argument Paper

Claim: Stop thinking about work in such a negative way.
• Reason: Our dislike of work is an arbitrary learned behavior
o Evidence: paraphrase: we are brainwashed by the media to dislike work (Finding Flow, 50).
Reason: We are surrounded by media that suggests that work is a negative thing that we shoud not like
o Evidence: http://www.disgruntledworkforce.com/blog/


• Reason: We actually like work because it gives us a sense of purpose
o Evidence: Use The Function and Meaning of Work and the Job book.


Claim: Our negative view of work begins with our first jobs as teens in the minimum wage workforce.
• Reason: We begin taking jobs for the sole purpose of making money even though it does nothing to better ourselves, or our careers.
o Evidence: I would reference personal experience as well as the experiences of high school friends.
• Reason: Having a job makes us feel as though we are doing something positive even if we dislike the work itself.
o Evidence: “Work is a strange experience: it provides some of the most intense and satisfying moments, it gives a sense of pride and identity, yet it is something most of us are glad to avoid”(Finding Flow, 49).
• Reason: Having a more positive relationship between the adult workforce and teen workforce would benefit both parties.
o Evidence: Working at Cupcake Royale gave me a meaningful mentoring experience from an adult in my desired profession versus my friend who worked at starbucks.
o Evidence: Youth have unrealistic high goals for their jobs because of the lack of meaningful job opportunities and adult mentors (Finding Flow, 53)

Claim: Given the option to have enough money to never work again most people would continue to work.
• Reason: People like the feeling that someone is relying on them
o Evidence: My grandparents, my grandfather is lively and productive and still holds a job. My grandmother retired years ago and with the loss of her job lost her sense of motivation.
• Reason: Without work people feel lost.
o Evidence: Talk about dad retiring
o Evidence: Use American Sociological Review stats



Ultimately I want this paper to prove that we whine too much. Work is a part of life and whether we want to admit it or not we love it, and we would feel lost without it.

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Deal With it

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Please Don't Wake me From This Dream

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Housing

Weird Sensations

In an incredibly long apartment search with my best friend, we came across old, new, clean, dirty, revolting and far overdone places. While ultimately we found the perfect match, there is one I will never forget.

I know that being a girl on a budget means keeping a very open mind, which is why I said nothing when we walked the four or five block distance away from campus. I said nothing when we stopped in front of a dirty looking building and an unkempt yard. I said nothing when a lizard scurried up the wall. I said nothing when we called the landlord and he had forgotten who we were and that we had an appointment to view the place.

We walked in to the narrow entry, and up the uneven stairs with mismatched carpet, and into the unlocked door on the second floor. We looked through the bedrooms. I ignored to broken door handles and rusty windowpanes. I looked past the mismatched cabinets and odd floor plan, stained carpet, and inconsistent cabinets in the kitchen. The one thing I couldn’t ignore was the feeling I got when I walked into the bathroom. The hairs on the back of my neck raised and my shoulders tensed. There was nothing there that I could see that was out of the ordinary; it was simply a feeling I got.

We then walked to the next floor it was a loft with no distinction between kitchen living room, or bedroom. There was no closet, but rather open shelves no more than three inches deep that lined the walls. It made no sense. While the landlord was talking to my friend in the unit below, I told my other friend that was with me that we had to get out of this place. We walked back down to talk to the landlord who proceeded to tell us that the building was an antique from the early 1900’s. I tried not to let anyone see my quick short breathing or nervousness, and told the man that we would stay in touch without asking for details.

Upon leaving the building I quizzed my girls on what they thought about the place. They just said “well its old.” “Really?!” I replied. I was shocked that they didn’t feel anything. I was overcome with the nervous feeling that I was being watched or followed. Where do these feelings come from? Why was I the only one who felt them? I realize that I was the only one who went into the bathroom, but why would walking into a bathroom cause a person to feel this way? To feel as though I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I wonder has anyone else had such an experience? Where do you think it comes from? Why do you think that some people feel it and others don’t?

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Why I Stopped Drinking Coke...

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Cry it Out

Home is Where Your House is

Moving is somewhat of a curse word in some homes. In mine it’s a way of life. My parents grew up moving, their parents grew up moving, and I was raised the same way. To never feel connected to places, but rather to people.
Texas, California, Singapore, Australia, Boston, Washington, the story of my life. There are people all over the world who have moved far more than I have. I know, some of them are my best friends. It seems that something dies inside when you have to leave people that many times; when you are forced to become a part of a community where no one knows who you are. I've seen it happen, from distance, of course. I have told friends many times that life is all about perspective. Do you see an opportunity or a horrible situation? I saw an opportunity.

My life has been one of fresh starts, world travel, and the constant promise of uncertainty. Knowing that I would live in one place for four years initially made me feel trapped. In my community high school students tended to have a lot of connections based on the fact that they lived there their entire lives. I, on the other hand, didn’t know anyone; I knew I would never have a history in a community. My pre-school teacher would never become my employer; my teachers would never have known…anyone in my family. I had two options: one, give up; two, learn to self-advocate at the age of 14. I became immersed in the community, making connections whenever possible. I volunteered my baby-sitting services to the moms of the other boys on my little brother’s baseball team. I donated cakes to local auctions. I volunteered for anything that caught my interest. It didn’t take long at all before I no longer had to seek opportunities. Soon I was being requested to volunteer at functions to raise money for a local restaurant that caters to the homeless community; I was invited to attend a mission trip to Tijuana; I was asked to be the photo editor of the yearbook by a teacher who is notorious for not even knowing her students names.
I realized then that simply living in one place doesn’t really entitle a person to anything, and neither does knowing a lot of people. Only after earning respect does one gain success.

I have a clear bias that moving is a way of life that forces a person to be a self-advocate. It forces families to stick together, in the periods of time when you are all each other have. As well as causing you to realize that the connections you make with others are really all that you leave behind.

What I wonder is what it is like to live in one place your whole life? Does it create a feeling of freedom in knowing what to expect from your life? Or might a person feel trapped by the expectations of the community that raised them?

Does Practicality Trump Fantasy?

I was never the kind of girl to pick favorites. I loved all colors, flavors of ice cream, music, cars, flowers. I never knew what college I wanted to go to, I never got that feeling that I was where is was meant to be. There is one absolute in my life that has never waivered. I am absolutely obsessed with cooking.

To me sitting down to a good book, is flipping through my favorite recipes in a cookbook. I far prefer cooking a meal for my best friends than being cooked for. When I see a dining room table I plan menus for it. When I taste something cooked by someone else I imagine all that went into it. I think about it constantly getting excited over even the sound that a carrot makes when it snaps.

Which is why I am at SMU getting my business degree.

So why am I not at cordon bleu donning a chefs coat and perfecting my julienne? My original idea was to do exactly that. To make sure that I was absolutely positive I sought out an internship at a local cupcake bakery. After my first week the night bakers quit, and the head baker was left to not only bake everything, but also manage the shop during the day. When I came into work the next day I saw the dark bags under her eyes, and the list she left me of what to do that day. At the age of fifteen with no experience she left me to run the bakery for the day by myself. It was then that I fell in love with the idea of having my own place and completely rejected the thought of ever cooking in someone else’s kitchen.


I continued to work in bakeries throughout high school always taking notes of what I wanted for my own shop. While I sit in economics class, and calculus doodling pictures of cakes in my notebooks, I often wonder if I am in the right place. I wonder if I am setting myself up for a life in the corporate world and ignoring my dreams altogether in the name of practicality.


I know that in reality you can’t start a business out of thin air, and that having a back-up plan is highly important in the restaurant industry where 90% fail in the first year. But how much can a person focus on practicality without losing sight of their dreams?

I pose this question to the dreamers out there who opted for practicality. Am I doing the right thing? Should I return to economics tomorrow with the insurance that my degree will pay off? Or should I take a risk and go for it?

First Day of Class

Upon hearing about this blog project I had my reservations. After reading the two articles assigned during class I am interested to reap the benefits. I like to read classmates writing and have them read mine, as it is so easy to get stuck in a boring style of wirting. I think that blogging will help me keep ideas fresh.
When Mrs. Channel told us that we would be reading the blog about an American soldier that died I immeadiately froze. My big brother will be deployed within the next year. I don't really know what will be worse, the anticipation of him going, or knowing that he is there and in constant danger. Hearing about a fallen soldier is the last thing I want to read about. I have always been stubborn on this subject realising that I need to expose myslef to this information just lie anyone else. After the first couple paragraphs I found myself smiling as I was reading a testament to life and communication. The blog helped Andrew to feel that he was heard and not simply forgotten. The blog helped me remember that dying for something you beleive in is one of the most noble things a person can do. While the blog in no way changed my fear for my brother, it made me feel at the very least happy to be living this day.
The article about the proffessor at Sydney University that used blogging made me recall essays that I had written in the past. Often the sign of a good english student is not one who can express their ideas well, but rather one who can present the teachers ideas in the way that they prefer. I am excited for this class as I feel that this is precisely not the case, and this excercise is meant to deter the regurgitation of the teachers ideas.