Once again, I'm moving my Saturday "new experience" post to Wednesday because I'm too busy to do two posts a week. Wait, did you read wrong? Isn't that supposed to say "too lazy?" Oh... no... it says too busy... because I DO THINGS WITH MY LIFE NOW.
Anyway. Last week I had a bunch of new experiences, and in the middle of one of them, I began thinking about summer. Some of you probably know that I'm slightly obsessed with the different seasons. During this school year, I wrote a short poetry collection entitled "Three Seasons in the Woods," where I researched and wrote poetry about the changes a stretch of woods on my campus underwent during autumn, winter, and spring. You'll notice that summer is missing from that list. That's partly because I wrote the poetry during the school year, not the summer. But it's also because for a long time, I have had a disconnect with summer.
I was born in the summer. When I was little, summer was my favorite season. Not hard to imagine why- you get out of school, it's warm, you can do whatever you want, etc. As I grew up, however, summer and I grew apart. The winter was quiet and cold, like me. Spring whispered with hope, and fall made the world look like a work of art. But summer had nothing for me. It was hot and overly bright, shining with the beautiful intensity that felt like it had disappeared from my mind. I wrote in one of my journals, "I hate that feeling like summer is a dazzling tiger storm and I'm just rotting, sweating, melting into its linoleum kitchen floor."
Summer was dark, for me. It was the shadows under your eyes when you've stayed up late. It was the grey of interiors when you're inside and the world is outside. It was the aching loneliness of summer midnights after days of doing nothing. Summer was the hole in the year, where I crawled into every bad thing I could dream up, whereas school was when I really lived.
This summer was different. I made a lot of changes in my life. So this summer has been filled with new experiences. And during them, I tried to do what I do every season: listen and look and try to figure things out. I tried to discover the secret of summer. Not the high school summers that lived in the broken glass and shadows in my mind, but the summer that pulsed and shone all around me. I wanted to know what summer symbolizes to me, what it is when you strip away the things that aren't quite summer, what the essence of summer is.
I read a Tumblr post about summer that I really liked, by Tumblr user trembling-star. It reads:
"There are two types of summer; white and dark.
White summers are those full of lawn and linen, the sea and soft sunshine,
cherries and children’s smiles, in which you feel disconnected and light,
almost floating, dreamy and distant in a haze of white dandelion fluff. You don’t ever want to land.
Dark summers are honeyed and sulky, full of
pomegranates, thunderstorms, magnolias and un-kept promises. Cinematic and
shadowy, you exist in a trance of melancholy, and feel passionately,
though feign detachment. Pandora opens the box, and lightening [sic] fills the sky."
As I experienced new things this summer, I would try to categorize them as one of those two. But repeatedly I would realize that they didn't really fit into either category. There was shining summer, and desperate summer, and ocean summer, and green summer. And before I knew it I was making lists of summers in my head that I could not keep track of. Finally I came to my conclusion: the essence of summer is infinite.
Summer is every experience you have that makes you remember that you are alive, really alive, with a constantly moving heart and lightning-fast nerves and an imagination that stretches until it hits the barriers of nothing and everything. Summer is the street musician that tells you to drum your own song while the wind rushes past. Summer is the bookstore you go into that seems to open new rooms crammed with books every time you turn a corner. Summer is a teashop that serves you crepes by the window where the morning light is coming in. Summer is briny ocean waves rushing at you like mountains only to recede into foam before the saltwater can hit your eye, and summer is the ocean water that comes at you and knocks you over and fills your clothes with sand. Summer is crowds and music and fried food on the boardwalk. Summer is when you can't see the sea anymore because the night has made it the same color as the sky. Summer is the long streets of the city illuminated by shifting sunlight under green leaves and brick row houses. Summer is a perfect meal shared with friends and laughter in a tiny restaurant you might never see again but you can see every passerby rushing past the window. Summer is going out into your backyard to lie in the green grass that you forget was so soft because you hadn't lain in it for so long, and watching sparrows make their way in and out of the tiny forest. Summer is the silhouette of the New York City skyline in the far distance when you hear a song that makes a long-ago memory flash vividly into your mind. Summer is dancing barefoot and breathlessly in a park in a tiny Massachusetts town while the band plays the score to a musical you've never seen. Summer is swimming in a secluded lake. Summer is the marble halls of museums that stream the sun in through skylights. Summer is dreams that turn into poems the next day.
Summer is life. It feels grating and emptying when you feel dead inside. But when you feel alive, it is awakening. It's the complement of winter, where you dream. Summer is the dream awake.
(I don't expect you to read that giant paragraph by the way. Don't force yourself on my behalf.)
If you have any pure summer experiences to share, please do so in the comments! If you super-hate summer because of the heat and humidity, just think of it as a metaphor instead.
Anyway... my new experiences this week were going to Montclair for a day with my best friend and going to Ocean City with two of my online writing friends. They were both great and very summery.
Thanks for reading,
Ariel
Wednesday, July 29, 2015
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
Which Type of Pizza Are You?
Hey! So you may have noticed (if you keep up loyally with the blog) that I skipped my Saturday post. Well, I'm making up for it today!
What was my new experience, you ask? Something supremely amazing. I went on a... this was so good, you need to be prepared. I went on a PIZZA TOUR. A pizza tour of New York! I went with my best friend Rachel (of a-lot-of-other-blog-posts fame), my friend Julia from Ch1Con, and Camryn, who I know from Twitter. We got to eat at three amazing pizzerias and learn SO MUCH about the history and science of pizza. Super, super awesome and interesting. Scott's Pizza Tours- I totally recommend it.
After that we went to see the Hunger Games exhibition- less cool, because no pizza, but still pretty fun. And then we all went home. It was glorious and a great day.
Anyway, so my post about this is going to be fun, I hope: I'm doing a personality quiz so you can find out what type of pizza you are. We tasted three types of pizza on our tour: Neapolitan, New York style, and Sicilian. There are many other types of pizza in the world but I'm focusing on those three because I don't know many others outside of Chicago deep-dish, and that's not actually pizza as we all know.
The quiz will basically be questions with A, B, or C. Write down all the letters you pick and then at the end, tally them up and see which one got the most, and you'll see which pizza you are!
1. What's your idea of a relaxing Sunday?
A. Chill on the couch in your pajamas and watch reruns of your favorite TV show.
B. Go on a spa day and visit an art gallery.
C. Practice your guitar-playing skills while hanging out with your friends in a park.
2. If you entered the Hunger Games, what would be your tactic to survive?
A. Hide out in trees and use your knowledge of nature to your advantage.
B. Make alliances and then betray your allies when you kill them.
C. Run from the cornucopia first thing and fashion your own weapons and survival tools.
3. Which Harry Potter character are you most like?
A. Hermione Granger- you're smart enough to adapt in a new world
B. Minerva McGonagall- you're old fashioned but when people get to know you, they like you
C. Luna Lovegood- you're weird but that's what makes you great
4. Of these options, what are you most likely to order at Panera Bread?
A. Creamy Tomato soup with a baguette
B. A healthy Tomato Mozzarella Flatbread
C. A Lentil-Quinoa Broth Bowl
5. Pick one of the following as your new Twitter user name or Tumblr URL. (Or MySpace name or whatever you do, I don't know). (Also imagine they're not all as terrible as I made them haha)
A. Friendly_and_Fun
B. Classychic
C. The-Weird-One
6. If you had to own a cute store in a small town, which would you prefer to own?
A. A good bakery
B. A homemade teashop
C. A tattoo parlor
7. What Taylor Swift song would you pick to listen to right now?
A. "Shake It Off"
B. "Love Story"
C. "Blank Space"
8. Pick a common scented candle scent.
A. Apple Cinnamon
B. Fresh Linen
C. Coconut Lime
9. Which of the following animals would be your Patronus?
A. Friendly dog
B. Aloof cat
C. Cute hedgehog
10. What toppings do you usually get on your pizza?
A. Pepperoni if you're not kosher/vegetarian, olives if you are
B. Nothing, except maybe a sprinkling of garlic and oregano
C. Something weird like pineapple
11. Which of these sounds like a Halloween costume you might wear?
A. A superhero from the Avengers
B. A traditional witch
C. Peeves the Poltergeist
12. Who was your favorite Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, besides Lupin, the obvious fave?
A. Mad-Eye Moody (well, "Moody")- you like how to-the-point he was
B. Quirrell- he stuck to the curriculum
C. Gilderoy Lockhart- he was different
13. Which of the following musicals do you think would be fun to see live? (Note that I do not know a lot about musicals, so do not come after me, musical theater fandom).
A. The Sound of Music
B. Chicago
C. The Phantom of the Opera (is that a musical even? I told you I know nothing)
14. You just won a vacation! You can pick one of the following destinations. Which one?
A. A week at Disney World in Florida
B. A tour of southern Italy
C. A hiking trip in the fields of Ireland and Scotland
15. Which of these classic books do you like best?
A. To Kill a Mockingbird- it's easy to read and it's an American classic
B. Pride and Prejudice- so classy but it's funny at the same time
C. Lord of the Flies- you love how edgy it is
16. Which of the following is your favorite social network?
A. Facebook- everyone goes on it and it's easy to keep up with your circle of friends!
B. Twitter- you love the simplicity of 140-character tweets!
C. Tumblr- there's just so much weird stuff!
17. Pick a TV show to binge-watch.
A. How I Met Your Mother (easy-to-watch comedy show)
B. Downton Abbey (historical drama)
C. Orange is the New Black (comedy-drama about a women's prison)
18. What's your favorite of the five senses?
A. Sight
B. Taste
C. Smell
19. Which of these artists do you like best?
A. Norman Rockwell
B. Claude Monet
C. Leonardo da Vinci
20. Why do you like pizza?
A. It's the ultimate comfort food.
B. It's the ultimate food, period. Perfect ingredients coming together in the best way.
C. To be honest I'm just a fan of carbs and fat.
OK, time to tally up your score!
Mostly As: New York style pizza
You're a classic, but you're also easy to love. You're not too set in your ways but you do like doing things that feel familiar. You're pretty easy-going and like comfort.
Mostly Bs: Neapolitan pizza
You are very traditional. You value simplicity, as long as that simplicity translates to quality and good experiences. You like the finer things in life.
Mostly Cs: Sicilian pizza
You're a bit of a rebel, but not just weird for the sake of being weird. You like to put a twist on something that's already good. You're different from others in many ways, but where it counts, you have a lot of similarities with other good people.
Well, I'm super tired, so I don't know if that made any sense. I'm not saying that's the sort of pizza you should eat, but in my eyes I guess it would match your personality. Anyway. Pizza's great, is the point I'm trying to make.
Thanks for reading! See you Saturday,
Ariel
What was my new experience, you ask? Something supremely amazing. I went on a... this was so good, you need to be prepared. I went on a PIZZA TOUR. A pizza tour of New York! I went with my best friend Rachel (of a-lot-of-other-blog-posts fame), my friend Julia from Ch1Con, and Camryn, who I know from Twitter. We got to eat at three amazing pizzerias and learn SO MUCH about the history and science of pizza. Super, super awesome and interesting. Scott's Pizza Tours- I totally recommend it.
After that we went to see the Hunger Games exhibition- less cool, because no pizza, but still pretty fun. And then we all went home. It was glorious and a great day.
Anyway, so my post about this is going to be fun, I hope: I'm doing a personality quiz so you can find out what type of pizza you are. We tasted three types of pizza on our tour: Neapolitan, New York style, and Sicilian. There are many other types of pizza in the world but I'm focusing on those three because I don't know many others outside of Chicago deep-dish, and that's not actually pizza as we all know.
The quiz will basically be questions with A, B, or C. Write down all the letters you pick and then at the end, tally them up and see which one got the most, and you'll see which pizza you are!
1. What's your idea of a relaxing Sunday?
A. Chill on the couch in your pajamas and watch reruns of your favorite TV show.
B. Go on a spa day and visit an art gallery.
C. Practice your guitar-playing skills while hanging out with your friends in a park.
2. If you entered the Hunger Games, what would be your tactic to survive?
A. Hide out in trees and use your knowledge of nature to your advantage.
B. Make alliances and then betray your allies when you kill them.
C. Run from the cornucopia first thing and fashion your own weapons and survival tools.
3. Which Harry Potter character are you most like?
A. Hermione Granger- you're smart enough to adapt in a new world
B. Minerva McGonagall- you're old fashioned but when people get to know you, they like you
C. Luna Lovegood- you're weird but that's what makes you great
4. Of these options, what are you most likely to order at Panera Bread?
A. Creamy Tomato soup with a baguette
B. A healthy Tomato Mozzarella Flatbread
C. A Lentil-Quinoa Broth Bowl
5. Pick one of the following as your new Twitter user name or Tumblr URL. (Or MySpace name or whatever you do, I don't know). (Also imagine they're not all as terrible as I made them haha)
A. Friendly_and_Fun
B. Classychic
C. The-Weird-One
6. If you had to own a cute store in a small town, which would you prefer to own?
A. A good bakery
B. A homemade teashop
C. A tattoo parlor
7. What Taylor Swift song would you pick to listen to right now?
A. "Shake It Off"
B. "Love Story"
C. "Blank Space"
8. Pick a common scented candle scent.
A. Apple Cinnamon
B. Fresh Linen
C. Coconut Lime
9. Which of the following animals would be your Patronus?
A. Friendly dog
B. Aloof cat
C. Cute hedgehog
10. What toppings do you usually get on your pizza?
A. Pepperoni if you're not kosher/vegetarian, olives if you are
B. Nothing, except maybe a sprinkling of garlic and oregano
C. Something weird like pineapple
11. Which of these sounds like a Halloween costume you might wear?
A. A superhero from the Avengers
B. A traditional witch
C. Peeves the Poltergeist
12. Who was your favorite Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, besides Lupin, the obvious fave?
A. Mad-Eye Moody (well, "Moody")- you like how to-the-point he was
B. Quirrell- he stuck to the curriculum
C. Gilderoy Lockhart- he was different
13. Which of the following musicals do you think would be fun to see live? (Note that I do not know a lot about musicals, so do not come after me, musical theater fandom).
A. The Sound of Music
B. Chicago
C. The Phantom of the Opera (is that a musical even? I told you I know nothing)
14. You just won a vacation! You can pick one of the following destinations. Which one?
A. A week at Disney World in Florida
B. A tour of southern Italy
C. A hiking trip in the fields of Ireland and Scotland
15. Which of these classic books do you like best?
A. To Kill a Mockingbird- it's easy to read and it's an American classic
B. Pride and Prejudice- so classy but it's funny at the same time
C. Lord of the Flies- you love how edgy it is
16. Which of the following is your favorite social network?
A. Facebook- everyone goes on it and it's easy to keep up with your circle of friends!
B. Twitter- you love the simplicity of 140-character tweets!
C. Tumblr- there's just so much weird stuff!
17. Pick a TV show to binge-watch.
A. How I Met Your Mother (easy-to-watch comedy show)
B. Downton Abbey (historical drama)
C. Orange is the New Black (comedy-drama about a women's prison)
18. What's your favorite of the five senses?
A. Sight
B. Taste
C. Smell
19. Which of these artists do you like best?
A. Norman Rockwell
B. Claude Monet
C. Leonardo da Vinci
20. Why do you like pizza?
A. It's the ultimate comfort food.
B. It's the ultimate food, period. Perfect ingredients coming together in the best way.
C. To be honest I'm just a fan of carbs and fat.
OK, time to tally up your score!
Mostly As: New York style pizza
You're a classic, but you're also easy to love. You're not too set in your ways but you do like doing things that feel familiar. You're pretty easy-going and like comfort.
Mostly Bs: Neapolitan pizza
You are very traditional. You value simplicity, as long as that simplicity translates to quality and good experiences. You like the finer things in life.
Mostly Cs: Sicilian pizza
You're a bit of a rebel, but not just weird for the sake of being weird. You like to put a twist on something that's already good. You're different from others in many ways, but where it counts, you have a lot of similarities with other good people.
Well, I'm super tired, so I don't know if that made any sense. I'm not saying that's the sort of pizza you should eat, but in my eyes I guess it would match your personality. Anyway. Pizza's great, is the point I'm trying to make.
Thanks for reading! See you Saturday,
Ariel
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
The Ultimate List of Ways to Waste Time on the Internet
I've decided to write a blog post on something I'm a real expert on: procrastination. Specifically, procrastination on the Internet. Now, I know that there are obvious ways to waste time on the Internet: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Reddit, and Buzzfeed, to name a few. But what about when those websites have run out for the day or you're just kinda not feeling them? Fear not! I have spent the last... however many years honing the art of Internet procrastination, and I have found many, many, many places to waste hours of time on the Internet. So I've decided to organize a few of them here for your time-wasting needs. If I think of more later, I might come back and add them.
So... what is it you want in a procrastination website?
I want to watch some lighthearted funny videos!
Do you like nitpicking over grammar? Here's a YouTube series that finds Internet comments with bad grammar and reads them dramatically. It's called Your Grammar Sucks.
Do you like complaining about annoying things? Here's a YouTube playlist from the amazing Superwoman about annoying people and annoying things in life.
Do you wonder about the people who drive the Google Street View Car? Here's a funny video about those imaginary guys, and then the sequel.
Do you like 6-second videos by an adorable and hilarious young man? Here's the wonderful Thomas Sanders' Vine page!
I want to make fun of Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey!
Weirdly specific, but I got you covered!
Do you want to see videos of people reading them? Here's Alex Reads Twilight (he has some other stuff in that playlist too), and Cara Reads Fifty Shades of Grey.
Do you want an exaggerated fanfiction-esque story of the Cullens' family life? Here's the hilarious series, Growing Up Cullen.
Do you want to read a blog with MS Paint comics about the Twilight books? Here's the series Blogging Twilight.
I want to analyze my own writing and my own personality!
Do you like character questionnaires? Here's F*ck Yeah Character Development's questionnaire tag, and NaNoWriMo's Official Character Questionnaire.
Do you just want some fun quizzes? Here are two Mary Sue litmus tests for your characters, and here are (almost) infinite Buzzfeed quizzes for yourself. (Or your characters, if you really want to know which SNL funny lady would be their BFF).
Do you want questionnaires to answer yourself? Here's a Tumblr full of personal questions.
Do you want to make a word cloud? Go to Wordle!
I want to see analysis and funny posts about Harry Potter!
Oh, did you come to the right place.
Do you like long analytical essays? Here is MuggleNet's essay section, The Quibbler. You've got podcasts, essays, editorials, blogs, forums, contests, whatever you want, all analyzing Harry Potter.
Do you like cute funny comics about Harry Potter? Definitely check out this fantastic Tumblr artist's work. I am not going to spell out their user name because it is really long.
Do you like rereading the books and seeing the stuff you missed? So does Tumblr user lotstradamus! Check out her Harry Potter reread posts! (They're in order from recent to most recent, so click back to get to the first one).
Do you like pointlessly funny Harry Potter jokes? Check out MuggleNet's fun lists page!
Do you love good Harry Potter fan art? My favorite fan artist, Burdge, has a DeviantArt page full of Harry Potter fan art. She also has a Tumblr (burdge.tumblr.com) but it's more difficult to find her HP art there. (Also, if you like other fandoms, like Percy Jackson, she has awesome art for those too).
Do you like imagining diverse characters and controversial backstories at Hogwarts? Check out hiddenhogwarts, a Tumblr for diverse HP headcanons, and lavenderpatil, a blog of general interesting HP headcanons.
I want to read cute comic strips!
Are you a new adult who likes relatable posts? Check out Sarah C. Andersen's relatable comic strips.
Do you love Disney Princesses? Read the adorable and funny Pocket Princesses series!
Are you a writer with serious procrastination issues? Check out the artist/writer Inkygirl, and specifically her fantastic comic Will Write for Chocolate.
I want to immerse myself in a long and beautiful story!
(Warning: some of these are unfinished).
Do you like sci-fi/fantasy stories and beautiful art? Check out the multimedia webcomic Ava's Demon.
Do you like dry humor and parallel universes? Check out the funny webcomic BlankIt.
Do you like Harry Potter fanfiction about the Marauders? Check out the insanely long (like, 200,000+ words long) Shoebox Project, a story that I started reading a while ago but never finished. I've heard it's AMAZING though.
Do you like mesmerizingly charming worldbuilding and beautiful characters? Look at Kimberly Karalius' Figment page. She has several short stories and novellas up there and they are SO GOOD. Seriously... it's like The Night Circus and Pushing Daisies had some beautiful children.
I want to torture myself with pictures of food!
Do you like listicles and links to recipes? Explore Buzzfeed Food for a while.
Do you like a variety of good recipes, many of which are healthy? Check out the excellent Tumblr blog Foodffs.
Do you like this very blog? May I remind you that I wrote two excellent blog posts about food? SHAMELESS SELF PROMOTION!
Do you just want straight-up food porn? Well, I guess /r/FoodPorn is the place for you!
I want to virtually travel the world!
Do you wish you could teleport to any random place in the world? That's exactly what MapCrunch can do! Well, it'll take you there on Google Street View.
Do you want to make a fun game out of that last link? GeoGuessr drops you in a random location and challenges you to figure out where you are. The website has a variety of games based on this theme that you can play.
Do you want to check out beautiful photos of the Earth? /r/EarthPorn is a subreddit devoted to professional photos of stunning landscapes. The entire "SFW Porn Network" on Reddit, which has nothing to do with actual pornography, has variations on this theme: winter porn, mushroom porn, design porn, etc. You can check it out by clicking the links on the right side of the EarthPorn page.
I want to play fun flash games!
Do you want to turn yourself into a mermaid! You can right here! This version also allows you to make mermen.
Do you want to learn some geography? Here's a game to learn the placement of the 50 states of America, or learn the geography and capitals of continents around the world here.
I want to read long lists of funny stuff!
Do you like nitpicking people's punctuation errors? Here's a blog making fun of signs with unnecessary quotation marks.
Do you always think the villains in movies could have done a lot better? The Evil Overlord List agrees with you. (The link worked for me this time, so I hope it works for all of you).
Do you think no one has any wonder and curiosity anymore in this world of Photoshop? Cracked.com is here to prove you wrong with their series of "I Can't Believe It's Not Photoshopped" articles! Here's a link to the first one, but the end of each article should link to the next in the series.
Do you love funny Tumblr screenshots and you don't want to actually get a Tumblr to see the funny posts? Luckily for you, Imgur user Wadjet (now ActualRaccoonBuckyBarnes) has compiled 120 galleries of funny Tumblr screenshots. Imgur users peggysue and puggless had the same ideas. So, basically, enough Tumblr posts to last to the apocalypse. A lot of them reference fandoms you may not have heard of, but most are funny to just about anyone.
Do you hate when people post obviously fake stories? Then check out /r/ThatHappened, the home of completely 100% true stories of the time someone on Facebook totally made out with Emma Watson and then told off that person in Starbucks and was applauded.
I want to shut my brain off and waste time on mindless websites!
Do you like fun websites with one or two functions? Buzzfeed has a fantastic list of 35 websites like WeaveSilk and Cat Bounce to play around with.
Do you want to come down from an anxiety attack? My anxiety post (shameless self promotion part two) has a lot of good links for calming websites.
Do you have a short attention span and need small bursts of little fun things? Shameless self promotion part three: I have made three blog posts on this theme before. One. Two. Three.
I want to scroll through some hilarious 140-character jokes on Twitter!
Do you like bad writing ideas? Check out The Worst Muse.
Are you sick of dystopian YA's repetitive tropes? Check out DystopianYA.
Do you know that one guy that thinks he's the next Hemingway, but is not? Check out GuyinYourMFA.
Do you want to make fun of EVERYTHING in ALL THE BOOKS? There's a million Twitter accounts for cliche characters. Start off with Brooding YA Hero, Manic Pixie Dream Girl, Dystopian Dictator, and Typical YA Heroine. There'll be links to others on all those pages. (And I'm sure someone out there has a masterpost with all the links? But I am too lazy to find one).
Do you just want... the weirdest thing? Then definitely check out BirdsRightsActivist.
OK, wow... That took a LONG time to put together. Longer than I thought. But it was worth it if I make someone else procrastinate! As Ron Swanson once said, "I'd work all night if it meant nothing got done." And you can thank my procrastination by re-watching Parks and Rec for me having that quote at the tip of my tongue.
If you have any suggestions to add to this list, feel free to comment!
Thanks for reading, and I'll see you Saturday,
Ariel
So... what is it you want in a procrastination website?
I want to watch some lighthearted funny videos!
Do you like nitpicking over grammar? Here's a YouTube series that finds Internet comments with bad grammar and reads them dramatically. It's called Your Grammar Sucks.
Do you like complaining about annoying things? Here's a YouTube playlist from the amazing Superwoman about annoying people and annoying things in life.
Do you wonder about the people who drive the Google Street View Car? Here's a funny video about those imaginary guys, and then the sequel.
Do you like 6-second videos by an adorable and hilarious young man? Here's the wonderful Thomas Sanders' Vine page!
I want to make fun of Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey!
Weirdly specific, but I got you covered!
Do you want to see videos of people reading them? Here's Alex Reads Twilight (he has some other stuff in that playlist too), and Cara Reads Fifty Shades of Grey.
Do you want an exaggerated fanfiction-esque story of the Cullens' family life? Here's the hilarious series, Growing Up Cullen.
Do you want to read a blog with MS Paint comics about the Twilight books? Here's the series Blogging Twilight.
I want to analyze my own writing and my own personality!
Do you like character questionnaires? Here's F*ck Yeah Character Development's questionnaire tag, and NaNoWriMo's Official Character Questionnaire.
Do you just want some fun quizzes? Here are two Mary Sue litmus tests for your characters, and here are (almost) infinite Buzzfeed quizzes for yourself. (Or your characters, if you really want to know which SNL funny lady would be their BFF).
Do you want questionnaires to answer yourself? Here's a Tumblr full of personal questions.
Do you want to make a word cloud? Go to Wordle!
I want to see analysis and funny posts about Harry Potter!
Oh, did you come to the right place.
Do you like long analytical essays? Here is MuggleNet's essay section, The Quibbler. You've got podcasts, essays, editorials, blogs, forums, contests, whatever you want, all analyzing Harry Potter.
Do you like cute funny comics about Harry Potter? Definitely check out this fantastic Tumblr artist's work. I am not going to spell out their user name because it is really long.
Do you like rereading the books and seeing the stuff you missed? So does Tumblr user lotstradamus! Check out her Harry Potter reread posts! (They're in order from recent to most recent, so click back to get to the first one).
Do you like pointlessly funny Harry Potter jokes? Check out MuggleNet's fun lists page!
Do you love good Harry Potter fan art? My favorite fan artist, Burdge, has a DeviantArt page full of Harry Potter fan art. She also has a Tumblr (burdge.tumblr.com) but it's more difficult to find her HP art there. (Also, if you like other fandoms, like Percy Jackson, she has awesome art for those too).
Do you like imagining diverse characters and controversial backstories at Hogwarts? Check out hiddenhogwarts, a Tumblr for diverse HP headcanons, and lavenderpatil, a blog of general interesting HP headcanons.
I want to read cute comic strips!
Are you a new adult who likes relatable posts? Check out Sarah C. Andersen's relatable comic strips.
Do you love Disney Princesses? Read the adorable and funny Pocket Princesses series!
Are you a writer with serious procrastination issues? Check out the artist/writer Inkygirl, and specifically her fantastic comic Will Write for Chocolate.
I want to immerse myself in a long and beautiful story!
(Warning: some of these are unfinished).
Do you like sci-fi/fantasy stories and beautiful art? Check out the multimedia webcomic Ava's Demon.
Do you like dry humor and parallel universes? Check out the funny webcomic BlankIt.
Do you like Harry Potter fanfiction about the Marauders? Check out the insanely long (like, 200,000+ words long) Shoebox Project, a story that I started reading a while ago but never finished. I've heard it's AMAZING though.
Do you like mesmerizingly charming worldbuilding and beautiful characters? Look at Kimberly Karalius' Figment page. She has several short stories and novellas up there and they are SO GOOD. Seriously... it's like The Night Circus and Pushing Daisies had some beautiful children.
I want to torture myself with pictures of food!
Do you like listicles and links to recipes? Explore Buzzfeed Food for a while.
Do you like a variety of good recipes, many of which are healthy? Check out the excellent Tumblr blog Foodffs.
Do you like this very blog? May I remind you that I wrote two excellent blog posts about food? SHAMELESS SELF PROMOTION!
Do you just want straight-up food porn? Well, I guess /r/FoodPorn is the place for you!
I want to virtually travel the world!
Do you wish you could teleport to any random place in the world? That's exactly what MapCrunch can do! Well, it'll take you there on Google Street View.
Do you want to make a fun game out of that last link? GeoGuessr drops you in a random location and challenges you to figure out where you are. The website has a variety of games based on this theme that you can play.
Do you want to check out beautiful photos of the Earth? /r/EarthPorn is a subreddit devoted to professional photos of stunning landscapes. The entire "SFW Porn Network" on Reddit, which has nothing to do with actual pornography, has variations on this theme: winter porn, mushroom porn, design porn, etc. You can check it out by clicking the links on the right side of the EarthPorn page.
I want to play fun flash games!
Do you want to turn yourself into a mermaid! You can right here! This version also allows you to make mermen.
Do you want to learn some geography? Here's a game to learn the placement of the 50 states of America, or learn the geography and capitals of continents around the world here.
I want to read long lists of funny stuff!
Do you like nitpicking people's punctuation errors? Here's a blog making fun of signs with unnecessary quotation marks.
Do you always think the villains in movies could have done a lot better? The Evil Overlord List agrees with you. (The link worked for me this time, so I hope it works for all of you).
Do you think no one has any wonder and curiosity anymore in this world of Photoshop? Cracked.com is here to prove you wrong with their series of "I Can't Believe It's Not Photoshopped" articles! Here's a link to the first one, but the end of each article should link to the next in the series.
Do you love funny Tumblr screenshots and you don't want to actually get a Tumblr to see the funny posts? Luckily for you, Imgur user Wadjet (now ActualRaccoonBuckyBarnes) has compiled 120 galleries of funny Tumblr screenshots. Imgur users peggysue and puggless had the same ideas. So, basically, enough Tumblr posts to last to the apocalypse. A lot of them reference fandoms you may not have heard of, but most are funny to just about anyone.
Do you hate when people post obviously fake stories? Then check out /r/ThatHappened, the home of completely 100% true stories of the time someone on Facebook totally made out with Emma Watson and then told off that person in Starbucks and was applauded.
I want to shut my brain off and waste time on mindless websites!
Do you like fun websites with one or two functions? Buzzfeed has a fantastic list of 35 websites like WeaveSilk and Cat Bounce to play around with.
Do you want to come down from an anxiety attack? My anxiety post (shameless self promotion part two) has a lot of good links for calming websites.
Do you have a short attention span and need small bursts of little fun things? Shameless self promotion part three: I have made three blog posts on this theme before. One. Two. Three.
I want to scroll through some hilarious 140-character jokes on Twitter!
Do you like bad writing ideas? Check out The Worst Muse.
Are you sick of dystopian YA's repetitive tropes? Check out DystopianYA.
Do you know that one guy that thinks he's the next Hemingway, but is not? Check out GuyinYourMFA.
Do you want to make fun of EVERYTHING in ALL THE BOOKS? There's a million Twitter accounts for cliche characters. Start off with Brooding YA Hero, Manic Pixie Dream Girl, Dystopian Dictator, and Typical YA Heroine. There'll be links to others on all those pages. (And I'm sure someone out there has a masterpost with all the links? But I am too lazy to find one).
Do you just want... the weirdest thing? Then definitely check out BirdsRightsActivist.
OK, wow... That took a LONG time to put together. Longer than I thought. But it was worth it if I make someone else procrastinate! As Ron Swanson once said, "I'd work all night if it meant nothing got done." And you can thank my procrastination by re-watching Parks and Rec for me having that quote at the tip of my tongue.
If you have any suggestions to add to this list, feel free to comment!
Thanks for reading, and I'll see you Saturday,
Ariel
Saturday, July 11, 2015
Weekend in Massachusetts!
For the first time in a while, I have a new experience long enough to take up the length of a blog post! The last time that happened was probably February, haha.
Usually I write a blog post based on the experience, but not a direct journal-entry type post, but I can't think of anything good, so I'm just going to sum up my experience this weekend. If you get bored with details, then you can skip this post. :) Or just read the bold stuff for what actually happened.
Earlier this week, my family decided to take a weekend vacation, since my sister is currently touring the US with her camp and we want to do something fun too. And take a break from life and stuff. (For example, I skipped the last THREE Camp NaNo days. Hopefully the prolonged vacation from writing will help jump-start my creativity tomorrow.)
When I was fifteen, I was a total Henry David Thoreau fangirl, and I sort of dragged my family to Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts. They ended up really liking the place and we went there again last summer. So we decided that Walden would be a fun place to go for our weekend vacation. We also decided to check out some historic sites in the area, which I'll get into later.
So Thursday morning, after I got out of work, we got in the car and drove the four hours up to Massachusetts. Our first stop was Minute Man Historic National Park, where many of the important sites of the Revolutionary War are preserved. We arrived around 5 pm, so a lot of the cool stuff was closed, but it was still pretty interesting. I've forgotten most of my APUSH knowledge, so I looked stuff up on Wikipedia and read all the signs to refresh my memory. We went to the Paul Revere capture site, hiked a little on a trail that we thought led to a historic tavern but it did not, and then we found our way to Lexington, where the first battle of the Revolution took place. Lexington is such a pretty little town and so before making our way to the battlefield, we had dinner at a nice restaurant. Then we walked down the street to the Battle Green. The place is a grassy field now, and some kids were playing Frisbee there. A stone plaque commemorated the words said by Captain Parker at the Battle of Lexington: "Stand your ground. Do not fire unless they fire first, but if they want a war, let it begin here." It was pretty exciting, and surreal, to stand on the same ground where the American Revolution started, imagining the early morning skirmish and the shot heard 'round the world. And now it's a field in the middle of a small historic town.
After the battle green, we headed to an open-air concert of wind instruments that was taking place in a park a little way down the street. We hung out there a while and heard their lovely music. It was really peaceful. When they finally finished up, we headed to the hotel.
The next morning, we went down to Walden Pond only to find out that the water was contaminated and no one could swim there. (Also that morning I had Nutella French toast for breakfast. Just to let you know.) So we decided to find somewhere else to swim. We went to Lexington's Old Reservoir, which was nice and small with a lot of shady spots to sit and there were only a handful of little kids and their moms there, so it wasn't super crowded. We read on the sand, then swam around in the water, then hung out on the sand some more and ate lunch. And! I found three snail shells in the water. It was really nice.
We went back to the hotel to shower and change, then we headed out to dinner in Lexington at a fancy restaurant. IT WAS SO GOOD. OK, here's all the food I ate. First, really good bread with herb butter. Then, green beans tempura with sriracha-honey-lime dipping sauce. Then, crusty toasted bread with hummus and marinated olives and artichokes and cooked sun-dried tomatoes that tasted like fire and the sun and summer and wonderfulness. Then, amazing mac and cheese with creamy delicious sauce and garlic breadcrumbs on top. It was really really really good.
After that meal, we took a walk in Lexington as the sun set. It's a beautiful town full of old buildings and stuff. We got ice cream- I got blueberry ice cream with mini M&Ms, as if I hadn't had enough good food already. We finished up our walk and then back to the hotel.
The next day (today), we had breakfast at a nice cafe and then drove down to Amherst, a gorgeous rural town. And guess who lived there? Emily Dickinson! We went to the Emily Dickinson Museum, based in her old house where she was born and where she died and wrote most of her poems. It was a pretty slow day so my mom and I were the only ones on our tour. (My dad sat it out). It was suuuuuch a fascinating tour. We saw all of Emily Dickinson's house and learned about her whole life and her family and her inspiration for her poems and all the cool stuff she did, plus historical context, plus learned about the work they do at the museum. We also saw her brother's house, the Evergreens, which was right next door, and was much better preserved in its historic glory (except that it's falling apart. But falling apart in its original furniture and stuff). So so so cool!
After the Emily Dickinson tour, we went to the Eric Carle museum of picture books. It was a pretty small museum and mostly little kids were there, but it was super fun anyway. I love picture books because I run a craft for little kids at the library and I have to pick out stories to read for each craft, and after five years of picking picture books, I have kind of a taste for them. :) The museum had a craft going on that day, in their art studio: a make-your-own truck or car thing. It was just a small cardboard box with a place for wheels, and then you decorate the rest. There were amazing decoration supplies there. I wish our library had stuff like that. I got really into it and made a Poets Mobile with a face and ribbons and a canoe on the top (my mom made the canoe). We then toured the museum, which had a very small gallery of Carle's work and some other great picture book artists. It was pretty interesting. Then we had to leave because they were closing early for a wedding. Imagine getting married in the picture book museum!
Then we got dinner at a small-town diner (I got veggie nachos) and drove home. And now I'm here! It was a super great weekend and I had a lot of new experiences: Seeing important sites from the American Revolution, swimming in an old reservoir, going to Lexington and Amherst, seeing Emily Dickinson's house (!!!), and seeing the picture book museum. Yay!
So, hope you enjoyed that post. Thanks for reading, and see you on Wednesday,
Ariel
Usually I write a blog post based on the experience, but not a direct journal-entry type post, but I can't think of anything good, so I'm just going to sum up my experience this weekend. If you get bored with details, then you can skip this post. :) Or just read the bold stuff for what actually happened.
Earlier this week, my family decided to take a weekend vacation, since my sister is currently touring the US with her camp and we want to do something fun too. And take a break from life and stuff. (For example, I skipped the last THREE Camp NaNo days. Hopefully the prolonged vacation from writing will help jump-start my creativity tomorrow.)
When I was fifteen, I was a total Henry David Thoreau fangirl, and I sort of dragged my family to Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts. They ended up really liking the place and we went there again last summer. So we decided that Walden would be a fun place to go for our weekend vacation. We also decided to check out some historic sites in the area, which I'll get into later.
So Thursday morning, after I got out of work, we got in the car and drove the four hours up to Massachusetts. Our first stop was Minute Man Historic National Park, where many of the important sites of the Revolutionary War are preserved. We arrived around 5 pm, so a lot of the cool stuff was closed, but it was still pretty interesting. I've forgotten most of my APUSH knowledge, so I looked stuff up on Wikipedia and read all the signs to refresh my memory. We went to the Paul Revere capture site, hiked a little on a trail that we thought led to a historic tavern but it did not, and then we found our way to Lexington, where the first battle of the Revolution took place. Lexington is such a pretty little town and so before making our way to the battlefield, we had dinner at a nice restaurant. Then we walked down the street to the Battle Green. The place is a grassy field now, and some kids were playing Frisbee there. A stone plaque commemorated the words said by Captain Parker at the Battle of Lexington: "Stand your ground. Do not fire unless they fire first, but if they want a war, let it begin here." It was pretty exciting, and surreal, to stand on the same ground where the American Revolution started, imagining the early morning skirmish and the shot heard 'round the world. And now it's a field in the middle of a small historic town.
After the battle green, we headed to an open-air concert of wind instruments that was taking place in a park a little way down the street. We hung out there a while and heard their lovely music. It was really peaceful. When they finally finished up, we headed to the hotel.
The next morning, we went down to Walden Pond only to find out that the water was contaminated and no one could swim there. (Also that morning I had Nutella French toast for breakfast. Just to let you know.) So we decided to find somewhere else to swim. We went to Lexington's Old Reservoir, which was nice and small with a lot of shady spots to sit and there were only a handful of little kids and their moms there, so it wasn't super crowded. We read on the sand, then swam around in the water, then hung out on the sand some more and ate lunch. And! I found three snail shells in the water. It was really nice.
We went back to the hotel to shower and change, then we headed out to dinner in Lexington at a fancy restaurant. IT WAS SO GOOD. OK, here's all the food I ate. First, really good bread with herb butter. Then, green beans tempura with sriracha-honey-lime dipping sauce. Then, crusty toasted bread with hummus and marinated olives and artichokes and cooked sun-dried tomatoes that tasted like fire and the sun and summer and wonderfulness. Then, amazing mac and cheese with creamy delicious sauce and garlic breadcrumbs on top. It was really really really good.
After that meal, we took a walk in Lexington as the sun set. It's a beautiful town full of old buildings and stuff. We got ice cream- I got blueberry ice cream with mini M&Ms, as if I hadn't had enough good food already. We finished up our walk and then back to the hotel.
The next day (today), we had breakfast at a nice cafe and then drove down to Amherst, a gorgeous rural town. And guess who lived there? Emily Dickinson! We went to the Emily Dickinson Museum, based in her old house where she was born and where she died and wrote most of her poems. It was a pretty slow day so my mom and I were the only ones on our tour. (My dad sat it out). It was suuuuuch a fascinating tour. We saw all of Emily Dickinson's house and learned about her whole life and her family and her inspiration for her poems and all the cool stuff she did, plus historical context, plus learned about the work they do at the museum. We also saw her brother's house, the Evergreens, which was right next door, and was much better preserved in its historic glory (except that it's falling apart. But falling apart in its original furniture and stuff). So so so cool!
After the Emily Dickinson tour, we went to the Eric Carle museum of picture books. It was a pretty small museum and mostly little kids were there, but it was super fun anyway. I love picture books because I run a craft for little kids at the library and I have to pick out stories to read for each craft, and after five years of picking picture books, I have kind of a taste for them. :) The museum had a craft going on that day, in their art studio: a make-your-own truck or car thing. It was just a small cardboard box with a place for wheels, and then you decorate the rest. There were amazing decoration supplies there. I wish our library had stuff like that. I got really into it and made a Poets Mobile with a face and ribbons and a canoe on the top (my mom made the canoe). We then toured the museum, which had a very small gallery of Carle's work and some other great picture book artists. It was pretty interesting. Then we had to leave because they were closing early for a wedding. Imagine getting married in the picture book museum!
Then we got dinner at a small-town diner (I got veggie nachos) and drove home. And now I'm here! It was a super great weekend and I had a lot of new experiences: Seeing important sites from the American Revolution, swimming in an old reservoir, going to Lexington and Amherst, seeing Emily Dickinson's house (!!!), and seeing the picture book museum. Yay!
So, hope you enjoyed that post. Thanks for reading, and see you on Wednesday,
Ariel
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
Summer: A Little Scrapbook in Art
It's that time again: I ran out of blog post ideas so I'm going to take a bunch of other people's art and show it to you. If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out my other two posts on this theme. This time, the theme is the whole season of summer. Poems, photos, short stories, visual art, songs, etc, all about summer. Here we go:
(Vincent van Gogh)
There came a wind like a bugle (by Emily Dickinson)
There came a Wind like a Bugle-
It quivered through the Grass,
And a Green Chill upon the Heat
So ominous did pass
We barred the Windows and the Doors
As from an Emerald Ghost-
The Doom's electric Moccasin
That very instant passed-
On a strange Mob of panting Trees,
And Fences fled away,
And Rivers where the Houses ran
Those looked that lived- that Day-
The Bell within the steeple wild
The flying tidings told-
How much can come
And much can go,
And yet abide the World!
Where one finishes, the other begins.
On top, a band of blue; underneath,
a band of green and gold, green and deep rose.
John stands at the horizon: he wants
both at once, he wants
everything at once.
The extremes are easy. Only
the middle is a puzzle. Midsummer-
everything is possible.
Meaning: never again will life end.
How can I leave my husband
standing in the garden
dreaming this sort of thing, holding
his rake, triumphantly
preparing to announce this discovery
as the fire of the summer sun
truly does stall
being entirely contained by
the burning maples
at the garden's border.
(Vincent van Gogh)There came a wind like a bugle (by Emily Dickinson)
There came a Wind like a Bugle-
It quivered through the Grass,
And a Green Chill upon the Heat
So ominous did pass
We barred the Windows and the Doors
As from an Emerald Ghost-
The Doom's electric Moccasin
That very instant passed-
On a strange Mob of panting Trees,
And Fences fled away,
And Rivers where the Houses ran
Those looked that lived- that Day-
The Bell within the steeple wild
The flying tidings told-
How much can come
And much can go,
And yet abide the World!
("Summer Begs" by Sarah Jaffe)
Verdant May (by me!)
In my mouth, the taste of mango
I had for breakfast.
White blossoms of spring
strewn on the margins of the parking lot.
Waft of honeysuckle on the air.
The rain,
liquid sky of grey clouds,
streams around me,
curtain into forgotten dreams.
I enter it,
waking haze.
Green wilderness
creeping at the edges of our
constructions.
Worlds upon worlds
in the woods-
coming alive like a tiger's breath
to the noon of summer.
I crack open an edamame pod
and examine its sticky skins.
Life opens petals infinitely,
releasing the wild scents
out with the May rain.
(Amanda Clark)
("Swimming" by Florence and the Machine)
Heaven and Earth (by Louise Gluck)
On top, a band of blue; underneath,
a band of green and gold, green and deep rose.
John stands at the horizon: he wants
both at once, he wants
everything at once.
The extremes are easy. Only
the middle is a puzzle. Midsummer-
everything is possible.
Meaning: never again will life end.
How can I leave my husband
standing in the garden
dreaming this sort of thing, holding
his rake, triumphantly
preparing to announce this discovery
as the fire of the summer sun
truly does stall
being entirely contained by
the burning maples
at the garden's border.
("Put Your Records On" by Corrine Bailey Rae)
(designed by the Boue sisters)
("St. Clarity" by the Paper Kites)
A whole season is pretty difficult to encapsulate in one blog post with a handful of works of art, but these are good ones, I think. If you have any of your own favorite summer artworks, feel free to share in the comments!
Thanks for reading,
Ariel
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