What House are You in?

Posted that on Tumblr then realized the grammar fail. I apologize:

In What House are You?

(Phew, all better now)

So, when people ask me what house I’m in, my answer is, “Griffinclaw”—because I haven’t been sorted on Pottermore and other house quizzes are often inconclusive, and because I’m REALLY indecisive. I mean, I’m a bit of an intellectual elitist, but I’m quite loyal, and at least as brave as Neville. So, when people ask me my house, I say, “Griffinclaw,” and that’s generally accepted (at least begrudgingly). But it occurred to me today: what if my house was, “Slythindor”? That just wouldn’t be acceptable, right? …I’m pretty sure the Ministry of Magic would obliviate my memory and send me to Pigfarts.

Economizing your Matchbook

On Thursday I decorated a mason jar to serve as a candle holder. I really like it and I'd really like to use it, but we're not supposed to light candles in the dorms, and I don't have a lighter.

Now, my birthday was a few weeks ago, so while my parents were visiting we got a cake and covered it with candles and had a little party in my dorm. Since we've got a ton of candles at home, my mom left the birthday candles and the book of matches in my possession, on the off chance I might need either while at college.

Perfect, right? I was just jones-ing for some candle-light, and now I've got matches, so I'm all set, yeah?

Not so much.

In the past week for my expository writing class, I read The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells. Personally, I find the Time Traveller in this story to be an idiot, for many reasons, but specifically for his usage of matches. Upon realizing that they amuse the cute futuristic species and scare the frightful futuristic species, he burns through them faster than a spark on a line of gunpowder. He has no thought for whether he may or may not need them, and wastes them all. When he happens to stumble upon another matchbook, he proceeds to accidentally burn down a forest with them.

Thus I'm perplexed--I mean, I can't just go lighting matches 'cause a little candlelight is pretty. What if I need them for some abstract use somewhere in the future? I've only got eighteen matches. I've got to economize my matchbook.

College Photography and Politics

I realize I've neglected this blog since I've started college, but now I've got something to write about.

This is a post about the failure of first impressions, cool stuff, and politics.

My first year photography seminar had me reading from a book called Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell, about the importance of a physical first impression: the snap judgement you make about a person when you lay eyes on them for the first time. The book offered the example of not believing that a hefty athlete was actually a hardcore intellectual. However, this psychologist named Samuel Gosling did a study concerning personality traits, and compared what people said about themselves with what their friends said, and what complete strangers who got to look at their dorm rooms for fifteen minutes said. His results showed that glimpsing a dorm room was the most informative. You can know a person for a really long time and know them really well, but if you see where they live, without them in it, you can make more accurate conclusions about their personality.

Similarly, another example to support an honest snap judgement made without witnessing the actual person in question focused on screened auditions for orchestras. Before a curtain was placed between those judging the auditions and the musicians trying out, very few women were in professional orchestras (we're talking late 20th century here). Once the visual presence of the musician was removed, and all the panel could observe was the music being played, those listening could isolate the one thing that mattered about the audition: the music. Instead of seeing a dented instrument, a cheap model, a nervous shuffle to the stand, an odd embouchure, they'd hear how well the piece was played and judge solely on the sound. Such a change in the audition process introduced many more women into professional orchestras, because conductors and the like assumed that women could not possibly play better than men. They were proved wrong.

(All of that is my little summary of the reading I was assigned from Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell: I encourage you to read it.)

Now, Gladwell came up with some fascinating stuff, but how does that tie into politics, you ask? Immediately after reading and writing a brief reflection on it, I went on Facebook to see that the page, "Miss Representation" (for the documentary on women's social presentation: check it out) had posted an article from the Washington Post on the attack of Michele Bachmann's manicure. I won't start on that issue per se, but rather tell you the thought that stemmed from it:

It occurred to me that with women working their way into politics and up to the white house--or one party or another trying to play a uniqueness card that could counter Barrack Obama's--we fall back on stereotype to judge them. We don't worry about Obama having a midlife crisis amid the debt crisis and running off with some vivacious young blonde, but our society is legitimately concerned that a female president might have a mood swing and destroy a relationship with another country, or ruin the state of the union by entering menopause early from the accelerated aging that comes with being president.

If I were Michele Bachmann I'd say, "I know that in this job I'll chip more than just a nail or two, so I want to make sure I've got enough nail to chip." (Though as a girl I'm not a fan of her nails. Just sayin'.)

However, I'm digressing a little bit. Even with the snap judgements made about having a Y or second X chromosome, it occurred to me to have a blind debate. Let the candidates sit in their pajamas or a suit, hair gelled back or bed-headed, and talk through just a microphone, sitting in a booth backstage, so no one can be distracted by their snaggletooth or eye bags or manicure while they're discussing something as important as the future of our country.

I realize this is unrealistic and a really strange approach, and there's most likely a better way to do this, but my point is: what would elections be like if we didn't see our presidential candidates initially? If we heard their positions before we saw them? Let's focus on the competence of our president before his or her closet.



wheeeee citation (because I didn't read the entire book before writing this post, and if you actually want to read the part i'm talking about, you'd want to know page numbers): 
Malcolm Gladwell, “Listening with Your Eyes,” Blink, (New York: Back Bay Books, 2007) pp. 245-254

Etsy Opening: Get Ready. Get Pumped. Get Taped.

I have now opened my shop on Etsy, Adherently Awesome. Here you can purchase the wallets or other duct tape creations I've made, order a custom wallet, or suggest custom duct tape pieces. If you have any questions, you can contact me at AdherentlyAwesome@gmail.com.
Please enjoy the tape!

Also, if you like my poor cartooning, check out the "Too Literal" page for more puns :)

My Love/Hate Relationship with Hyperbole

So. I hate hyperbole. Sure, it's beautiful and adeptly describes situations that are comedic, poetic, or frustratic (Yeah, I made up a word for the sake of parallel structure, so sue me. -- please don't). But-- it's terribly inaccurate and tears apart the severity of situations, turning life into an over-dramatized performance. "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players" (huzzah for Shakespeare). 

I do love hyperbole. Nothing makes me happier than throwing out the most absurd analogy to depict a preposterous position, a tangle of diction to distill discomfort and disconcertion (More word-crafting. Deal with it). I'll tell you with the utmost certainty that the contact juggling I witnessed today was the coolest thing I've ever seen. I mean-- it was freaking awesome. (But was it really the coolest thing I've ever seen? Well, I've never seen a guy literally lit on fire (before today), but I doubt it really was the coolest thing I've ever seen).

But still, hyperbole kills the very impact of words. Because we use such extreme terms to describe mundane--or at least much less intense--events/situations, we force our language and diction to shape more emphatic ways to express ideas that are slightly more awesome/depressing/scary/strange than the ones for which we already used hyperbole (Or we re-use hyperbolic statements and equate situations with unequal quantities of severity). By using extra-emphatic diction to describe less-emphatic scenarios, we degrade the very meanings and connotations of the words we use.

The Degree of Scandal.

It occurred to me that in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, there is the concept that "everyone belongs to everyone," which is just a euphematic way of describing socially encouraged sexual promiscuity. (I don't judge.) However, the promiscuity is limited in the society Huxley created by male-female couplings. Women are expected to have fleeting relationships with as many men as they wish, and men with many women (though not at the same time). There is no discussion of promiscuity outside the bounds of male-female relationships.

Granted, Brave New World was written in the early '30s, so the idea of promiscuity in general was probably less scandalous than the idea of homosexuality or any non-M/F-sexuality (However, I cannot be sure, I'm not from the '30s). That though, the different degrees of scandalousness, is absolutely fascinating. The idea that one idea is taboo, but another is double taboo. Like, for example, swear words that have different levels of gasps attached to them if used in front of parents, or certain audiences. A child says shit-(aki mushrooms) and parents' eyes get wide and they direct the youth toward the preferable "shoot,"-- but a child drops an F bomb and parental units tweak as if miniature grenades just burned the soles of their shoes, and proceed to take away privileges as if they were candy. Why is there that distinction?

It makes sense though, due to the cliche which discusses the many shades of gray in life. It's the difference between belching and mooning someone at a black tie event. Society is just wonky.

Belated disclaimer: I have not read Brave New World in a year, as it was summer reading for AP English, so my recollections are probably hazy.

A Word I Realized I Didn't Know, Starting with the Letter "A"

I've spent a lot more time on YouTube in the recent months, and thus have heard a lot more talking than usual (I've been plowing through vlog videos, not music videos, ergo the extensive words flowing toward my ears). In doing so, I've come to realize there was one particular word that I had seen a lot but never known really what it meant or how to use it. The word, you ask? "Albeit." Now, if you've read the word, you have probably read it to yourself with the proper pronunciation. However, whenever I read "albeit" to myself, it would be spoken in my head as if it were, "ALL-BAIT."

So yeah, I've always pronounced albeit as "all-bate" (my fail-phoenetic spelling isn't critical). Therefore, when I heard one vlogger say something sounding like, "All bee it," on more than one occasion, used similarly to what I read as, "ALL BAYT" (yeah there's gonna be a different phoenetic spelling every time I say it), I thought, "HM, that's probably the same word... WOW CATIE, you're foolish."

So I did what any child of the interwebulous generation would do, and Dictionary.com-ed it, realizing that I already had a general sense of the definition of "albeit" and thus I shall be able to read it and understand it as it is being used.

However, I also realized that, when reading it, even from now on, I will probably still read it pronouncing it in my head as, "Awl-Baet."