Halloween

Last Halloween, I didn't want to celebrate the festivities. Partly because of the depression that I was going though, the other part is because I just didn't want to.

This year, I would really like to take part in Halloween, however, I dont have any plans. :-(

I'm sad.

Oh well, if worse comes to worse- I will put on my prettiest dress and drink all by myself.

Salve Regina

I LOVE THIS VIDEO!

Since I have been accused of only paying attention to things that make me unhappy (you know who you are!) Here is something that makes me happy:

Beauty and the Beast

I'm listening to Belle from Beauty and the Beast (over Youtube.com) and I could help thinking about Gaston, the hunk who wanted to marry Belle and his plans to marry Belle. Belle is the main character of the story and the most beautiful woman in the village, however, she's rather odd because she likes to read a lot, that and she's the inventor's daughter. Gaston only wanted to marry Belle because she was the most beautiful female in town, thus making her the "best" and since he deserved the "best"- he desired her. Gaston and Belle had nothing in common, Belle also wanted nothing to do with him. Gaston, however, proceeded to ruin Belle's, the Beast's and other's lives for his quest of marrying a beautiful woman he hardly knew.



 When I was younger, the story line was too complex for me to understand it's underlying tones. All I saw was a girl who had man falling over her because she was the most beautiful despite the fact that she was the odd one. (yeah, even at a young age I had issues with the way I look)

Now that I am older, I see the story as glorifying gender and sex roles for those who are young. I'm beginning to realize why I am so cynical at the concept of love, for the simple fact that it gets thrown around a lot- in movies, television, books, school, jobs, etc.

The way I see it, if I'm going to fall in love- even if it's just once or a billion times- why I can't I do it carefully and with consideration. I don't want to fall in love with a fool because he perceives to have the qualities that I think I am looking for. I want to fall in love because this person definitely has the qualities that I am looking for and even if we don't get married, I want to know that in that moment of time my heart and mind worked in conjunction of each other. I have a habit of giving love to everyone, even those who don't deserve it and I just want, for once, to have someone take that love and hold it dear to them. To feel the same way I do, I don't want to fall in love quickly and surely.... I want it to take time and to be mutual.

Back then, Beauty and the Beast was written when looks was more important than the self- marriage was going to be loveless because people didn't last that long and cared more about their gender duty than their feelings or emotions. If Gaston, Belle, and the Beast where characters put into a story today- and not just based on some folk tale- it would have to deal with angst but one thing that would not be left out is that instant attraction at first glance. The first glance that is mentioned in Twighlight, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, etc where the main characters just know in an instance that the person that they are looking at is going to be a great love in their lives.

This instant attraction is what make people in present time so ready to throw the word love around. They equate that feeling of attraction with "love at first glance" without realizing that everything takes work, relationship and time. I don't get how I'm so skewed with my view on love when most people are so willing to fall in and out of love so quickly and to rush into marriage after less than a year of dating. Age has nothing to do with it, people stay serious monogamers at all ages- it takes the smart and educated people (ie, romantics who realize that love takes work to thrive, not just the cohesiveness that most people believe in) to stay together to make love and (maybe) a marriage work.

A lesson that I take away from Beauty and the Beast is that love is gradual and happens when you know the heart of a person first before weighting the physical attraction. This means that a person can love another, even if they are beautiful and the other is ugly or if the other is ugly and they are beautiful or any variation. As long as they know that this person is someone that they have allowed into their hearts, who has allowed them into theirs and know that this is the person that they want to share love and a life with.

(Although I am a cynical, I do see myself as a romantic)



I've done a lot of stupid things in my life without carefully thinking about it. I could be described as being a person without planning, why can't I be cautious in this one aspect of my life. An important aspect that counts and will count. I fall with my heart first and with my brain last, I just want to know what I am getting myself into.
grr....

Media's Effect On Girls: Body Image And Gender Identity | MediaWise.org

Media's Effect On Girls: Body Image And Gender Identity | MediaWise.org

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(I came across this article and decided to share it!)

A couple things

Things that have been bothering me lately, eff you if you think this is complaining- it's my blog, Nachoes!!:

Halloween is coming up!!!! (Should I get a costume?!)

Is it wrong that I would head-butt a child, over the age of 5, if she or he bit me?

I....need....to....clean....my.....
ROOM!

My homework is going to take over my life, oh well atleast I'll be stressed over things that I love!

How does one stop being a jealous person? Cuz I am and I hate it. :-(

and last but not least:

I need to start liking cooking (or else I'm going to starve)!!

__________________________________________________________________________________


Rant: I have nothing against lesbian relationships, I am a gay ally and friend or whatever means "i support gay/lesbian/etc marriages, relationships, and such as." The only thing that I have a problem with is how television shows are more comfortable with showing lesbian relations and when they do, its either a sweeps draw in or a sexual device. Like tv needs women to be more sexual.

For example, Heroes and their lesbian kiss, am I supposed to be more impressed because the other girl is less conventional looking than most girls her age on tv? Grr......

http://www.hulu.com/watch/101544/heroes-claires-kiss-extended-version#s-p1-st-i1

Oooh Oooh!

I took a quiz on the Oprah Show website, it said that I am an artist (ie free spirit/thinker/etc)!
Duh!
I already knew that Oprah, that's what makes it so hard for me to figure out what career path I want to take after graduation....

then again, I never really knew what I wanted to do and I don't think I would want to settle on something easy! Seriously, I have never known what I wanted to do when I grew up- my career path changed with every move I made in life. (Although a part of me still wants to help women deliver babies or work in adoption field)

All I know is that I would rather make a difference, than make a buck!

Although I don't want to be poor, tried that once: it didn't work!


-------

Reference to NieNie Blog:

I heard about "NieNie" on the Oprah website, she is a mom and a blogger who survived a terrible plane crash that left her (and her husband) with burns that covers most of her body (her husband, however, did not have as many burns). NieNie did not let that stop her from being a mother to her four children, blogging, and living a remarkable life. Her blog still shows how upbeat she is about life and being alive!


 Just a small reminder that sometimes, somewhere a person can show you how to march on- even in the worst of times. She is truly a brave spirit.


 (Although a little bit too conservative for my taste but hey, I don't judge!)

The one thing:

Before college, I used to write these short stories about things that upset me and uplifted me throughout my days.

I never told anyone about them and I don't have any of them left, seeing how my room was entirely cleaned out when I left home for college. (....and my mom wonders why I don't feel like her house is my home)

I miss writing but I never have the motivation or time to do anything like it. School sucks a lot of that want and motivation out of me, the constant barrage of papers does get tiring.

I think, I'm going to do that more, instead of just writing blogs.

Where to start?

After college

Is it wrong that my plans for after I graduate from college, have nothing to do with what I want to do? Instead they deal with what I want to learn and the adventures I want to have. I have no plans for a career after college, as I should. I don't have the desire to be set upon the world, only to find a job that may or may not be my definition of what a good life should be.

Instead

I dream of learning how to paint

and to write that one good story

of traveling around the world

I dream of volunteering my time, unpaid

of meeting different people with different ideas, hopes and dreams and allow that to shape who I want to become

of finally learning how to cook and clean, for myself and not to up my prospects of marriage

.... and to allow all these hopes and goals to finally lead me to how I want to spend the rest of my life- especially how I am going to bring home the bacon!

Pictures lingering on my Desktop, no stealing!:

This was taken at the infamous watergate, I just adored this fountain (below):

View outside an A.C. hotel room (below):

The tiger (or lion) compound (below):

Entrance[?] to the zoo (below):

Botanical Gardens water fountain (below):

You can't tell but the friend I went to visit is hiding (below):

Shoes made from items found in nature (below):

These are my favorite pictures, I just love the colors in the pond-fountain thing. I would love to go there again(below and above):

Again, watergate (below):

These are pictures I found on my desktop, I adore them and wanted to share with the world what I saw. These pictures were mostly taken in Washington D.C at either the botanical gardens or at the Smithsonian zoo and as there are no beaches in D.C.,the beach picture was done in Atlantic City.

Oh and if you can't tell, I just L.O.V.E. water fixtures.

Blog Edit

There used to be a blog here, then I decided it was private. You can't read it. If you already did, good for you.

a roommate

Instead of the boring writings about how life has disservice me in some way, I'm going to talk about a girl. Not just any girl but a former roommate of mine.

During the first semester of my sophomore year, I had this roommate I'm going to call Kay, Kay was a bitch. Although she didn't seem like it at first, she actually appeared to be pretty cool- being a waitress at a tavern I wanted to visit.

I messaged her first on facebook during the summer between freshman and sophomore year, she only had kind and intelligent words to say. Her pictures were modelrific which were the first inkling that something was rotten in the state of Denmark- she was too pretty to be nice or smart, at least that's Shar believed.

In Kay's defense, she was driven career and academic wise- Kay wanted to be an officer in the Navy after graduation. Unfortunately, Kay seemed to be raised in a household that allowed her to be shallow and just plain nagging, probably because she was so beautiful. Or maybe she was just born that way, self-centered and mean.

At first, Kay seemed nice. She tried to include us- Shar, the other roommate and I into her daily activities and offered stories about herself. Her boyfriend was also very sweet, he lived above us which was why she chose our apartment to live in. His visits were short but memorable; he was too good to be in a relationship with her. Barely saw him because she went up there to drink with him and his buddies, and no I wasn't invited to partake in said activities Oh well, I found my alcohol else where.

Then came the issue with the thermostat. Our first inkling that the current arrangement was not going to work. Almost every other day, Kay was enraged with the temperature of our small 600 square foot apartment. Sometimes it would be cold then turn freezing. Other times, it would be hotter than Hades. When we had the privilege of living in the room next to her, one of us only changed the temperature on the thermostat once- Shar turned it down because it was too hot to be alive in that apartment. Honestly, the air was awfully sticky that day.

Besides that incident, the only person to touch the thermostat was Kay. I believe she was able to fool herself because she happened to only be in the apartment at times when she was getting ready for something, either going to work or to visit the boyfriend. She hated when anybody touched that thermostat, she even left passive aggressive notes demanding that we left it alone.

The three of us would converse when she was gone: Kay was the only one who touched it. Why didn't she notice that?

Oh well, she seemed to be the only one who cared.

At the end of the semester she moved out, not because of the temperature but the fact that she hated Shar and Shar hated her. There was supposed to be a fight between them, Kay even waited but it never happen.

Shar and I knew one of Kay's new roommates, the sweet girl was a friend of a friend. Too nice of a girl to have to deal with Kay and her paranoia surrounding thermostats and apartment temperature. Sadly for sweet girl, Kay had carried her thermostat issues along with her and always wondered who touched the little device. Carrying on with her new roommates the same way she had carried on with us, except they got to see her more. Kay broke up with her nice boyfriend, so she wasn't drinking with them anymore.

The sweet girl said she was quite bothered by Kay and her thermostat antics, she even had dreams where she would beat Kay down. I guess her new roommates never understood her either.

.

no FYL, mine is doing just fine

Picture of his windmill, here: http://blog.ecuamedios.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/eolico_malawi.jpg

I enjoy reading about peoples' misery on the FML website. I know that's a mean statement but I take solace in the fact that I am not alone on my bad days. It is easier to laugh at someone's misfortune if we do not know them, especially if that person's misfortune is not that big a deal. People like to think their lives suck without realizing how great they have it, I should know this- I worked at a country club this summer. We all, however, like to complain about the little things without realizing that we are very lucky. We have a roof over our heads and most of us have full access to electricity, food, water and clothing that we are more than happy to waste, because we have a lot of it.

What am I writing about is William Kamkwamba, his story brought (happy) tears to my eyes. William is from Malawi, Africa, at age 14 he wanted to go to school but his parents could not afford the $80 a year tuition. This is because Malawi was suffering a devastating drought and William's parents where farmers. William Kamkwamba was not deterred, however, he attended school for as long as he could until administrative authorities kicked him out. After that he decided to educate himself and everyday studied at the small library in his village. There, he found a book that would change his life: a 5th grade textbook.

A chapter in the textbook spoke about windmills and its advantages to use for electricity purposes. He saw windmills as a way to provide his village with electricity and pump water. Instead of just wishing, he made things happen. So he studied an old drawing of a windmill and worked on how he could build one of his own. He drew a plan of his own and set out to build a windmill with tools that he could produce from his environment, such as a bicycle wheel. His result was a homemade windmill, that soon garnered attention from a teacher's organization.

William was invited to a technology convention about windmills and what they could bring to his village. Now he has three windmills at his home and another in a nearby village. His story is remarkable: http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/a_malawian_miracle/

sAtUrDaY nIgHt

Its 1020 pm on a Saturday night and I am at home doing my homework.

[There are a billion things wrong with that statement]

1. I'm at home on a Saturday night.
2. I am doing my homework
3. I have no where to go after my homework is finished.

:-(


Isn't that an awful realization?

If you're wondering why I don't call my friends, I did- I called four of them, oddly enough none of them picked up to phone. They don't know each other, so each one of them has to do something separately exciting today.
This sucks because this means that, again, my friends have other things to do tonight (work, curfew, boyfriend, friends, drinking, etc) I would really like to go dancing tonight.

:-(

As I have risen from freshman to why-am-I-still-here I have realized that the parties and invites for outings have ceased. Some of it is due to friends moving, working and others is due to the fact that I don't drink as hard/often as I used to. Friends who drink prefer not to hang out with those who don't, for various reasons. Either because they don't believe that I will have a good time with drunk people when I am sober (which is a lie). Or that the concept of someone who doesn't drink is odd.

Not spending my weekday/weekend drinking is a good thing in my life. I'm not vomiting my nights away and making a complete ass of myself on weeknights while having my friends tell me about what I've done the next morning. What I can't- and don't like to handle- is the fact that people treat me like a leper because I don't drink. It very much sucks.

My roommates act like a couple, they treat me as some person they just live with: not a friend that they have known for half a decade. Friends my age have already graduated and are starting to figure out what they want to do with their lives while working full-time. Other friends live with their parents and have to deal with the whole "they live under their roofs, they do as they say" stuff.

I'm not complaining, I'm just extremely lonely.

I would meet new people, but the only people around me are younger and they annoy the hell out of me. Other people my age, who don't drink, are too busy with grown up jobs and lives to make new friends. In order for me to make new friends, I would have to have time to sacrifice to coordinate schedules and normally, they don't match.

It's all very confusing, but everything is the same. On a Saturday night, I have no where to go and no one to talk to.

Maybe I should take up reading.

I'm not complaining, I'm venting and worried.

Funny Breast Cancer PSA