So today’s the day that I’m considered by western civilization to be an adult. It could be the same in eastern civilizations but I don’t know about that so I just won’t make a comment on it. From the time my eyes opened at 8:30 to now, I’ve been constantly bombarded with phone calls and texts congratulating me and wishing me the best which I wholeheartedly appreciate. However, there’s one line that came up in each message too many times for me to not address it. “How do you feel?” To which I replied everytime, “The same way I felt yesterday.” It began to puzzle me. Am I supposed to go through some sort of mystical transformation which completely changes my entire outlook of my life? Maybe it won’t happen until the time today is synchronized EXACTLY to the moment I exited my mom’s womb and took my first breath. I could just be reading too much into a commonly asked question, or I’m gonna be in for the craziest ride of my life later tonight.(Since i was born at nighttime.) Oh boy, now for the rest I’m gonna be in anticipation. This metamorphosis better live up to the hype I made for it literally seconds ago.
Monthly Archives: November 2012
Life of a Commuter
All i can think about right now is how hectic and stressfeul yesterday was for me. As a commuter, traveling for about 3 hours total each day is pretty exhausting task. However when weather conditions start to interrupt things are just totally out of control. Due to the “storm” warning yesterday my main attempt was to get home quickly and safely as i can. Rushing out of school i quickly tried to speed walk to the R train on broadway while experiencing what felt like hypothermia on my feet since like the idiot that i was (or atleast thats what Phil who was walking with me made me feel like…thanks Phil), i decided to wear moccasins to school and bring no gloves or a scarf or hat. Finally after the longest walk and drenched shoes..pretty much drenched everything,,,and mascara running down my face since of course yesterday i wasnt wearing water proof i finally made it to the station. Anxiously bouncing in place waiting for the train, and maybe to produce more body heat the R train finally strolled in.
As the doors opened i stood there with my mouth dropped after seeing how tightly the people were packed in there already. Instantly reminded me of chinese rice in a carton. Tightly packed stuck to each other. I was also pretty hungry at the time. The jerks before me managed to push and shove their way through and then there was me to tried the same and charged but bounced right out, Doors closed and train left. Glaring at the clock i panicked even more when i realized that only had 15 min until the 6:16 LIRR train left. Once again eagerly waiting for the R which took its SWEET time to finally get there i hopped on then got off at herald sq trying to get my feet which i practically lost feeling in to sprint that highly crowded block against the winding and snow flakes in my eye only to watch the 6:16 train pass right before my eyes leaving me there. And so i stood there right by the gate prepared and confident for the 6:35 to come and me being one of the first ones to enter…which i successfully was. Sitting there on the seat in relief the announcement was made “Due to weather conditions all LIRR lines are suspended” The rage that i felt inside of me after hearing that is indescribable in any language. After a detour to queens me and my friend who i thankfully met up with took, we ended up catching the 8;30 train (the first line to run after the suspension) and got to our home station. Of course my car was buried in snow and the only option was to brush it off with my bare naked hands, so i did. i FINALLY made it home and took the hottest shower of my life until my purple hands and feet and frozen body was fully thawed. What a great day
Sympathy for David Reimer…
I’ve studied the Reimer case before in my high school psychology class and i’m super excited to dive into it again. After reading some of As Nature Made Him: The Boy who was Raised a Girl, I’ve realized that it has an uncanny resemblance to the structure of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. John Colapinto takes the same route as Rebecca Skloot did. In his preface, he clarifies that the work is a true non-fiction account. He also recalls his story of how he was able to contact David Reimer and the lengths he went through to convince Reimer to expose his true identity and the identity of his family to the world. He also includes details of how great of challenge it is for Reimer to recall events from his stage as Brenda Reimer, similar to the situation with Skloot and the character Deborah Lacks and the rest of her zany family.
Getting into the story, Colapinto provides a back story to the Reimer case and structures his book like Skloot had. He shows the relationship between the parents Ron and Janet (similarly to Henrietta and David), the event that changed everything, the botched circumcision (similarly to the taking of cancer cells), and the involvement of Dr. Money (similarly to Dr. Gey). When I read the involvement of John Hopkins Hospital in the Reimer case, I wasn’t shocked. But, I can tell you I will never, ever go to that hospital if my life depended on it.
I’m super excited to hear David’s part of the famed case. In psychology, you never really get a chance to hear the patients perspective in the case because you’re dealing with scientist and a majority of the patients are always anonymous. Even though I greatly enjoyed the Henrietta Lacks, I think I’ll enjoy this one more because I have a greater interest in it.
SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!
I found the BBC Documentary on David Reimer’s case on Youtube so check it out so you can put a face and voice to the name if my featured picture doesn’t do it for you 🙂
Yes
Lukasz you stole my idea. Music from the 90’s was the best! I can’t believe how dumb music is getting. I mean I appreciate almost all types of music but I’ve been missing the old school jams. I thought this video shows how R&B has evolved so much, and how it’s become so bad now.
Veal
Thank you Kim for bringing up the treatment of animals because it gave me an idea of what to write about for my blog post!
EVERYONE READ THIS: http://eloquentanimals.wordpress.com/farm-factories/
Over the weekend I was reading Chapter 7 for philosophy and it brought up how cows intended for veal were treated. It said they were placed in such confined areas that they can’t lay down, can barely move their head, and stand in their own filth. They’re also malnourished in order to keep their meat so tender. They also can’t produce any sort of cud to chew on due to the fact that they don’t feed these cows hardly any roughage. The list goes on with the countless cruelties they must endeavor on a daily basis until the day they are taken to be slaughtered.
(look at their poor little faces!)
This is just not okay! Ever since I looked up that dairy cow cruelty video that Phillip had talked about in class I have been more and more sickened by what happens to the animals that we rely on as food sources. Did you know that there were no laws regulating the treatment of dairy animals? What is that?! ALL animals deserve good treatment, and above all, the ones that provide us with nutrition. What I think is overall so terrible about all of this is the fact that so much of the pain and suffering that these animals go through isn’t necessary.
I’m no vegetarian and I hope I don’t sound heartless in saying this, but when animals are killed swiftly without being dragged out or tortured, after a lifetime of wandering pastures and what not I believe that to be ok. It’s the circle of life and it’s just how the world works. They deserve to lead a decent existence though before they are slaughtered. Let them be animals, living things.
It’s so horrible how selfish we are! When dealing with living things, there needs to be a serious crack down on the treatment of these beings. The greed of the people that just want to make as much money as possible without caring how they go about doing that need a serious reality check.
I miss music from the 90s. Jason started playing throwbacks before FRO the other day and it reminded me of all the great music from when I was a kid. I don’t know if it was necessarily because the music was great or just because I associate the music with times where everything was easy but to this day music from the 90s is my favorite. Bands like Counting Crows, 3 Doors Down, Oasis and Matchbox Twenty on top of all the countless one hit wonders such as Closing Time by Semisonic and Save Tonight by Eagle Eye Cherry just have the kind of sound that never fails to make me feel nostalgic.
Im actually very surprised no ones written about music in these blogs yet. Maybe its because we all had to do the top 10 list for FRO but today it clicked with me that this was such an obvious choice. Music is something universal, not necessarily the type of music, but the power it has to link up with certain events. I think people tend to associate events or time periods with songs. For example all the bands I listed above remind of when I was younger and life was so easy. It was just me, my friends, and the park. And of course my 90s music.
Is Social Media good or bad?
Something that I was just sort of thinking about recently was the presence of social media in today’s world. I was just thinking about all the people posting things about the election and voicing their opinions. Yeah I was kinda annoyed about the numerous things posted throughout the campaigns and election day, but I figured I guess its good that everyone can just put whatever they think and believe no matter how simple or complicated (unless in twitter’s 140 character limit) on a public forum. But it also made me think, it may be not as great as it seems considering everything else I’ve seen from Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Its become something that has completely taken away our privacy, nowadays we can figure almost everything about a person from just “creeping” on their Facebook profile or following them on twitter. I’m starting to think that this is actually backfiring and becoming more of a bad thing than a good thing.
First of all, we’re losing our “right to privacy” the more we post on these media sites. Companies are now making advertisements directly to us, they know everything about our lives. Both Facebook and Twitter give all of our information to companies that want to target certain people. Doesn’t that make you feel a little uneasy? Plus, when going for job interviews, that company can just search you up and make a decision based on your profiles. We have completely exposed our private lives to the public! We can no longer claim privacy because of the internet, if not used responsibly. I was just thinking about this the last couple days and thought it’d be some nice food for thought and to just give some advice about being careful what you say/post cause you never know what the future may bring. Especially in technology and on the internet, or Worldwide Web.
Cruetly Free Cosmetics.
Animal cruetly is something I am strongly against. The commercials with the dogs and cats that have been abused are incredibly hard to watch and I just change the channel when that song comes on and tries to ruin my commercial watching experience. I don’t understand how people could be so mean to an innocent animal. All they want is for someone to love them. How can someone willing be cruel to a face as cute as a puppy or kitten?
I try to always buy my cosmetics with the cruelty free stamp of approval. My favorite brands to buy are Tarte and Buxom cosmetics. These brands are proud to be cruetly free. They always add to the packaging that their products are cruelty free. I like having the feeling that I was a bunny’s honey and bought cruelty free products. Bunnies are usually the animal of choice when they test if a product is safe or not. Check for the bunny on the box to see if the product is cruelty free.
